Military Metaphors: Inappropriate Lessons from the Language of Violence

Metaphors are abundant in the English language, and their use both enriches and adds depth of meaning to prose and poetry.  However, when practitioners in business, economics, healthcare, and other fields use military metaphors, they risk conveying lessons and inciting actions that may be confusing, harmful, and even illegal.  References to wars and their strategies, tactics, battles, and weapons raise images of violence which, while appropriate to wars and one’s enemies, are inappropriate outside of the military context.  This study explores the underlying philological, psychological, and philosophical principles on which metaphors are based and searches for alternatives to the language of violence.  The study finds a consensus in the literature regarding the value of metaphor in conveying messages while raising questions about the efficacy, the efficiency, and the morality of using military metaphors, the language of violence, to characterize non-military situations, including business, economics, healthcare, public policy, and education.  Metaphors range from the poetic to the mundane, but they have in common varying degrees of evocative power to move from abstract thought to concrete action.  We conclude that such power must be constrained so as to avoid confusion, misunderstanding, and actions that have the potential for damage to organizations and individuals.