ABSTRACT
Military service readiness of reservists is twofold: on the one hand, it is based on patriotism and unit cohesion but, on the other hand, there are practical barriers – economic concerns and lack of family support. In this chapter, we follow the multiple contracts approach in micro-, mezzo- and macro-level to understand and explain the reserve-based military system and its challenges following the example of Estonia. We use the reserve service related data collected in 2019 within the qualitative study among employers, who play a significant part in the negotiation process. We will look at the circumstances and situations how negotiations and multiple contracts influence the motivation of employers and employees towards contributing to the state defense. We argue that higher level contracts affect forming agreements on lower levels and the nature of agreements is dependent on human agency. In addition, we propose that the type (individual, collective and proxy) and scale of agency needed to reach agreements between different parties is also affected by the higher level contracts, but agency on lower levels could in turn shape contracts on higher levels. Our analysis shows that the model proposed by us has proven to be a useful analytical tool for analyzing relations between reservists, employers and the military and it can be used to analyze reserve service in other countries as well.
