Weeks 7 & 8

Wasserstrom, “On the Morality of War”

Two purposes:

• Explain and undermine “international realism”
• Outline the dilemmas of killing in times of war
  (ethical dilemmas for the just war doctrine)

Recap

Non-violence:

• As a personal ethic
• As a political doctrine

• As an absolute principle
• As a qualified principle
  

1. What arguments are found in Western intellectual history to support an ethics of pacifism and non-violence?
2. Under what conditions is it justifiable to attack or kill another person?
3. Is war justifiable? Based on what conditions?

Three most important positions on the ethics of war:

1. Pacifism & nonviolence
2. The just war doctrine
3. International realism

Just war doctrine: constraints & major controversies

jus ad bellum
jus in bello

jus ad bellum

1. Just cause
   Military aggression & self-defence?
   Pre-emptive war?
   “Humanitarian military intervention”?
2. Legitimate authority
3. Right intention
4. Likelihood of success
5. Proportionality
6. Last resort

jus in bello

1. Proportionality
2. Non-combatant immunity:

Absolute immunity? The doctrine of double effect? Walzer’s doctrine of double effect?

Pacifism & non-violence

Universal human rights

Just war doctrine

Wasserstrom’s challenge to “international realism”

International realism –
Essence of the position:

• Morality is inapplicable to the assessment of war
• Discussion of peace and justice in debates about war is naive, irresponsible or totally absurd
• “In matters of war, morality has no place”
• “The war in Vietnam may be stupid, unwise, or against the interests of the United States... It is neither immoral nor unjust—not because it is moral, or just—because these descriptions are in this context either naive or meaningless or inapplicable”

International realism and the “ancient ethic”

• Athenian Generals argued in the Melian Dialogue:
• “The strong do what they can, and the weak suffer what they must”
  
• von Clausewitz said that
• “War is the continuation of politics by other means”
  
• Thrasymachus argued that:
• “Justice is the advantage of the stronger”
  
• Hans Morganthau said that:
• “The state has no right to let its moral disapprobation… get in the way of successful political action, itself inspired by the principle of national survival”

Main variants:

• Descriptive realism
• Analytic realism
• Prescriptive realism

Descriptive international realism asserts:

• Matters of war are uniformly decided on grounds of national interest or expediency rather than by appeals to what is moral
• Allowing morality to enter the war debate is a category mistake
• To talk in moral terms is naive
  
• Athenian Generals:
  “The strong do what they can, and the weak suffer what they must”
  
• von Clausewitz:
  “War is the continuation of politics by other means”
  
• William Tecumseh Sherman said:
  “War is hell”

• These are a factual claims
• Decided by looking at the empirical facts
  

Answering descriptive international realism

• We frequently do see examples of nations placing morality over national interests
• National interests are always coupled with national values and ideals
  
• Harry Truman & Dean Acheson:
  
• Truman after dropping atomic bombs (August 6 &9 ’45):
  
• “Having found the bomb we have to use it. We have used it against those who have attacked us without warning at Pearl Harbour, against those who have starved and beaten our prisoners of war, against those who have abandoned all pretence of obeying international laws of warfare. We have used it in order to shorten the agony of war, in order to save the lives of thousands and thousands of young Americans”
  
• Acheson during Cuban Missile Crisis (October ‘62):
  
• “Judgment centred on appraisal of dangers and risks, weighing of the need for decisive and effective action against considerations of prudence; the need to do enough, against the consequences of doing too little. Moral talk did not bear upon the problem.”
  
• Are matters of war (always?) decided via national interest and expediency, rather than by appealing to moral considerations?
• Disregarding and suppressing moral considerations?

Analytic international realism asserts:

• Morality is meaningless in times of war
• War is an exceptional realm where “anything goes”
• War is a unique because everything is permissible
• To talk in moral terms is absurd
  
• Two underlying propositions:
• Universal proposition that all morality is meaningless
• Scepticism about the absence of international law

Answering analytic international realism:

• All morality is meaningless...
• All of us appear to understand “moral language”
• Moral considerations are intelligible
  
• Scepticism about international law...
• The law isn’t the complete moral story
  
• Our moral language offers more than concepts of condemnation and punishment

Wasserstrom’s diagnosis:

• —War presents a “most troublesome moral dilemma”
• Accusation that one’s country is involved in an unjust war is personally very threatening
• Penalties for opposition and resistance

The relief is immediate; the moral heat is off

--> War is unique because everything is permissible??
--> War is unique because killing and violence are permissible in contexts and conditions they otherwise would not be

Prescriptive international realism asserts:

• Matters pertaining to war should always be decided on grounds of national interest or expediency rather than any discussion of what is moral
• In the context of war, talking in moral terms is irresponsible and wrong
  
• Thrasymachus argued that:
• “Justice is the advantage of the stronger”
  
• Hans Morganthau said:
• “The state has no right to let its moral disapprobation… get in the way of successful political action, itself inspired by the principle of national survival”
  
• Truman in August ’45:
• “Having found the bomb we have to use it. We have used it against those who have attacked us without warning at Pearl Harbour, against those who have starved and beaten our prisoners of war, against those who have abandoned all pretence of obeying international laws of warfare.”
  
• “We have used it in order to shorten the agony of war, in order to save the lives of thousands and thousands of young Americans”

Two main arguments:

1. Moralizing is always a source of increasing conflict
   National interests always should outweigh other moral considerations
2. Only for those involved in political leadership, national interests always should outweigh other considerations

Human rights: foundations and criticisms

The human rights concept:

• All human beings, regardless of who we are, and where we were born, are owed a minimum standard of treatment à
• Some basic human needs and interests are so important they should be respected at all times, for every person, no matter what it will cost à
• When human rights come into conflict with the social good, rights trump overall good

Different species:

• Legal rights
• Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms (“The Charter”)
• Criminal Code of Canada (“CCC”)
  
• Moral rights
• “Values that respect the dignity and worth of each person”
• “Rights” of self-determination
• It’s wrong to deceive your friend on purpose
  
• Universal human rights
• Rights located in the U.N.’s Universal Declaration of 1948
• Rights that against genocide, slavery, torture and so on
  
• Virtually the same spirit:
• Certain needs and interests are so crucial they should be respected all the time, for every human being, no matter what it will cost
  
• When human rights come into conflict with the social good, rights trump overall good

Three components:

• A right held by individuals
• A right held universally
• A right held equally

The human rights-based political ideal:

• The only thing capable of dislodging our universal duty to protect human rights is when those in question have already forfeited their rights by performing their own prior acts of human rights violation
• Violations of human rights are justified only in situations where they are intended to protect other human rights

The human rights revolution:

Growing & globalizing

• U.N. Declaration of HR (1948)
• U.N. Genocide Convention (1948)
• U.N. Human Rights Council (1946)
  
• The Council of Europe “Statute #1” (1949)
• Regional treaties (OAS Charter)
• National Charters of Rights
  
• U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights (1993)
• The International Criminal Court (1998)

Deepening

• Basic human rights
• Civil & Political Rights
• Social Rights
• Minority & Group Rights
• Environmental Rights

Orend’s foundations:

1. Religion as justification
2. Legal positivism
3. Moral convention
4. Prudence
5. Rawls’s argument
6. Human dignity
7. Consequentialism
8. Inference
9. Vital needs

“Human rights inflation”:

• Basic rights vs. equality rights
• John Rawls talks of “human rights proper”:
• The right to life, the right to liberty, the right to property, and the right to formal equality
• Natural context: international society
  
• Modern society has cultivated an open concept:
• A human rights violation is any situation where your equality or status before the law is being neglected
• People seek redress at their “human rights office”
• Natural context: a functioning democracy

• Minimum moral standards below which we should not fall
  vs.
• Ultimate moral ideals toward which we should strive

Foundations

• Start with “elements of a good justification”:
• What standards of justification are we working with?
• To show adequate grounds for people to believe in the truth of a proposition and guide their conduct by it
  
• Every justification should rest on some set of premises and principles using a valid chain of reasoning
  
• Preferably, via set of “mutually supporting” claims
  
• Is moral/political debate different from justification and science and logic?
• Science and logic:
• 1+1 = 2
• When heated to 100%, pure H20 turns into vapour (?!)
  
• Arts, ethics and culture:
• All 20th century painting leads back to Picasso
• “It is wrong to lie under oath in court”
• “It is wrong to murder your friends and relatives”
• “We are all owed a minimum standard of treatment of vital human needs and interests”

Three basic strategies:

• Law of nature / human nature
• The social contract
• Positive laws and moral conventions

Striving for universality:

• The universal community of humankind
• Universal friendship
• Whittled down to a basic minimum
  
• Against international realism
• Against particularism & state-ism

Moral convention

• Shared beliefs in a living society
• Custom and regular ethical practice
• Orend’s problem: some cultures resist human rights
  
• Walzer’s answer: thick and thin morality

Human dignity

• “The inherent dignity of human beings”
• Failing to protect human rights violates human dignity
  
• Orend’s problem: “substantial vagueness”
• Is the value of human dignity self-evident?
• How can we improve this argument?

Consequentialism

• Our benchmark should always be: advancing human happiness, promoting well-being
• Human rights have an impressive record of promoting happiness and well-being, so we should always obey them
• Problem: if well-being is our benchmark, why shouldn’t we torture terrorists?
  “Consequentialist” human rights have shrunk completely from our original vision

Inference:

• Hart’s argument: every specific entitlement implies at least one general right
  (i.e., a general right to freedom)
• The general right to freedom is a prototype for universal human rights
  
• Problems:
• Seems to make human rights inferior to “lesser” rights
• Leads to a (single) right of liberty too narrow compared to what human rights advocates desire

Here’s the structure of Hart’s argument:

1. Everyone has a right to something
2. Some other things are necessary for enjoying the first thing as a right, whatever the first thing is
   
3. Therefore, everyone also has rights to the other things that are necessary for enjoying the first as a right

• Shue’s expansion:
  
• Basic rights include: i) security of the person, ii) basic subsistence and iii) fundamental liberties
• These ones are prior to all other rights
  
• One can’t have any entitlements without antecedent having basic rights satisfied

Three strategies:

1. Human nature
2. The social contract
3. Moral convention

Striving towards universality:

• Universal community of human beings
• Universal friendship
• Towards a basic minimum

• Minimum moral standards below which we should never fall
  vs.
• Ultimate moral ideals toward which all of us should strive

Three critiques:

1. The Marxist critique
2. The Feminist critique
3. The East Asian critique

The Marxist critique

• Human rights function only within a market society
• The central claim: Human rights are not universal, and have relevance only in a market society

Defects of market society

• Market society is composed of individual people
• We all have roughly the same basic needs in terms of survival, shelter, nutrition, development, self-respect
• But, people in a market society occupy vastly different roles:
  
• Some are owners, who maintain control of producing what is needed for survival and flourishing
• Others are workers who need their jobs to survive, and have very little bargaining power over those who employ them
  
• Owners become more free, always able to provide basic needs for themselves using the “surplus value” contributed by their workers
• Workers become alienated, unable to control their lives, subject to repression by owners
  Marx’s conclusion:

Human rights are part of the mythology of market society:

• They exist primarily to create an illusion of universal freedom and equality
• They steer peoples’ minds away from their own economic entrapment and exploitation
• They evolved in the context of market society, and their purpose has always been to create ideal conditions for the functioning of a free market
  
• But free markets typically benefit a small ruling elite by violently repressing a powerless ‘working class’
• By entrenching and enforcing human rights, we advance defective capitalism

The central claim: Human rights are not universal, and have relevance only in a market society

• Orend’s answer: in the modern world, human rights are nevertheless genuinely universal minimal standards of decent treatment

The feminist critique

The central claim: Human rights are actually derived from a “male ethic”

• Within the male ethic, we often presuppose: i) isolated and separate individuals, against ii) a natural background of social competition
• The male ethic is “artificial and assertive, calculating and competitive, disconnected and disadvantageous”
• Whereas other forms of ethical language involve concepts of community, care and nurturing
  
• By entrenching universal human rights, we inadvertently advance the facets of human nature that are calculating and competitive
  
• Orend’s answer:
• Women’s liberation has always involved the notion of rights

The “East Asian” challenge

The central claim: Human rights are rooted in Western European ideas about the nature of people and society

• Non-European societies (e.g., those in China, Malaysia, India, and throughout Africa) often do not share these ideas
• These typically attach high value to culture, heritage, public spirit, and the common good, compared with European societies
• Human rights inevitably erode core social values
  
• Human rights are not universal, and actually are unique European creations that could potentially cause great harm if enforced globally

15 minute essay on universal human rights

1. Choose one of justification for international human rights and one challenge
2. Decide where you stand. Do you believe the justification OR the challenge rests on a stronger rationale?
3. Clearly explain the reasoning behind your stance
4. 4. Give support for your position (facts and/or arguments)