Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Notes on contributors
- Foreword by Richard Dannatt
- Acknowledgements
- 1 Introduction
- PART I A framework for ethical decision making: state and civil society-based approaches
- PART II Responding justly to new threats
- PART III Fighting wars justly
- PART IV Securing peace justly
- 12 Justice after war and the international common good
- 13 Conditions for jus in pace in the face of the future
- 14 From just war to just peace
- PART V Concluding reflections
- Bibliography
- Index
14 - From just war to just peace
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 03 December 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Notes on contributors
- Foreword by Richard Dannatt
- Acknowledgements
- 1 Introduction
- PART I A framework for ethical decision making: state and civil society-based approaches
- PART II Responding justly to new threats
- PART III Fighting wars justly
- PART IV Securing peace justly
- 12 Justice after war and the international common good
- 13 Conditions for jus in pace in the face of the future
- 14 From just war to just peace
- PART V Concluding reflections
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
In one of its modes, just war theory would also abolish war by the (theoretically) simple method of calling unjust wars ‘crimes’ and just wars ‘police actions’. We have here a nice example of what the Chinese call ‘the rectification of names’, but it presupposes in practice a thoroughgoing transformation of international society.
In this essay, I argue that just such a thoroughgoing transformation in international society is taking place even though it does not amount to the establishment of a global state, which is what Walzer implied. Just war theory is difficult to apply in the context of those changes we lump together under the rubric of globalisation. A new ethical approach is needed, and one that is grounded in the notion that the rights of individuals supersede the rights of states and that, therefore, international law that applies to individuals overrides the laws of war. In other words, jus in pace cannot be suspended in wartime in favour of jus ad bellum or jus in bello.
There is still a role for legitimate military force, but the way it is used is more akin to domestic law enforcement than war fighting. I use the term ‘human security’ to refer to the defence of individuals as opposed to ‘state security’. Of course, some of the just war principles are relevant to law enforcement, as is much of the content of humanitarian law, but a change in the language is important.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Price of PeaceJust War in the Twenty-First Century, pp. 255 - 274Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2007
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