This study asks how acute external threats affect public attitudes toward military service under authoritarian rule, using original survey data collected in Iran before and after the April 13, 2024 missile exchange with Israel. The article compares responses across the two periods to examine whether a geopolitical shock increases support for coercive mobilization and for expanding military roles across gender boundaries. The author frames the contribution as evidence about how external threats may legitimize coercion and reconfigure gendered citizenship in contexts of regime distrust.
Original survey data from Iran, matching techniques comparing pre/post responses, changes in support for conscription and women’s military service
Data and methods
The study leverages original survey data from Iran fielded before and after the April 13, 2024 missile exchange with Israel. The author uses matching techniques to compare individuals surveyed in the two periods, aiming to approximate comparable groups across the pre- and post-attack samples. The abstract identifies the timing of the fieldwork and the primary analytic approach (matching) but does not report additional sampling or weighting details in the abstract.
Main findings
According to the abstract, individuals surveyed after the attack were significantly more likely to support mandatory male conscription and to support women’s military service. The abstract emphasizes that these increases occurred despite conscription being widely unpopular in peacetime and despite existing gender hierarchies in Iran.
- Support for mandatory male conscription rose after the missile exchange.
- Support for women’s military service also increased after the event.
The author situates these results as evidence that external threats can legitimize coercion even in contexts of regime distrust and can shift gender boundaries around military participation. The abstract frames this as a contribution to research on public perceptions of war, coercion, and militarization, while preserving the study’s qualifying language about context and mechanisms.
