Abstract
In the early 1960s the notion of « military condition » appeared, first designating, for the members of the defense sector, the rights and duties of those exercising military activity. Since then, there has been abundant literature and many debates on its content, frontiers or distinctive characteristics. Beyond the identity dimension it has acquired, the military condition can be seen as a category of public action. The uses made of it depend on the relations among military people, civil servants and representatives of political power. Their development sheds light on the logics of the definition of defense policies and management of the French army personnel from the end of the Algerian war to the reforms of professionalization of the 1990s.