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A Defense of Pacifism1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2020

Tom Regan
Tom Regan*
Affiliation:
North Carolina State University
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Extract

The title of this paper is misleading. I do not intend to defend pacifism against those who would contend that it is false. In point of fact, I agree that pacifism is false, and profoundly so, if any moral belief is. Yet pacifism’s critics sometimes believe it is false for inadequate reasons, and it is important to make the inadequacy of these reasons apparent whenever possible. Otherwise pacifism’s apologists are apt to suppose that they have overcome their critic’s strongest objections, when, in fact, in exposing the inadequacy of the grounds of certain objections, they have succeeded only in meeting the weaker ones. What I intend to defend, then, is not the truth of pacifism, but the very different claim that pacifism is not necessarily false. This objection to pacifism, which, if sound, would silence the debate over its possible merits, and which, therefore, if sound, would be a strong objection indeed, is set forth by Jan Narveson in his paper on pacifism. I hope to show that this objection is unfounded, and I shall, accordingly, direct my argument principally against Narveson’s. And yet it is with a certain degree of reluctance that I do so, since Narveson, himself, suggests that “most people” whose opinion he has solicited would agree with me that pacifism, although false, is not necessarily so. One runs a risk, in such a situation, of pouring old wine into new bottles.

Type
Research Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Philosophy , Volume 2 , Issue 1 , September 1972 , pp. 73 - 86
Copyright
Copyright © The Authors 1972

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Footnotes

1

A somewhat shorter version of this paper was presented at the sixty-third annual meeting of the Southern Society for Philosophy and Psychology, held on April 8-10, 1971, at the University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia. I want to acknowledge the helpful criticisms of an earlier draft by my colleagues, Paul A. Bredenberg and A. Donald VanDeVeer.

References

2 Jan, Narveson,. “Pacifism: A Philosophical Analysis,” Ethics, Vol. 75 (1965), pp. 259-271Google Scholar. Reprinted in War and Morality, edited by Richard A. Wasserstrom, Wadsworth Publishing Company, Inc.: Belmont, California, 1970, pp. 63-77. Page References are to the Wasserstrom edition.

3 Jan, Narveson,. “Is Pacifism Consistent?,” Ethics. Vol. 78 (1968), p. 148Google Scholar.

4 Whitman, M. J. “Is Pacifism Self-Contradictory?,” Ethics. Vol. 76 (1966), pp. 307-08CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

5 Miller, Ronald B. “Violence, Force and Coercion,” in Violence, “Award Winning Essays in the Council for Philosophical Studies Competition.” Edited by Jerome A. Shaffer, David McKay Company, Inc.: New York, 1971, pp. 11-44, especially pp. 41-44. Miller attempts to show that Narveson’s objections against pacifism can be raised against “any moral principle that asserts that an action is wrong,” (p. 143). According to Miller, since it is true, not only in the case of pacifism, as Narveson argues, but in any case in which an act is declared wrong, that “it is always logically possible that in order to prevent any given wrongful act we may have to do that act itself” (p. 44), it follows that Narveson’s line of argument, when generalized, shows not that pacifism alone is self-contradictory, but that “any moral principle that asserts that an action is wrong is self-contradictory.” And this. Miller concludes, is “patently absurb.” (Ibid).

Miller’s argument will not stand careful examination. Narveson’s argument does not lead to the conclusion that “any moral principle that asserts that an action is wrong is self-contradictory.” When Miller’s interpretation of Narveson’s argument is applied to principles of prima facie duty, for example, these principles do not emerge as self-contradictory, despite the fact that it is “logically possible that in order to prevent any given (prima facie) wrongful act we may have to do that act itself.” Our prima facie duty not to lie, for example, may always be overridden, but the assertion expressing this duty is not self-contradictory simply because it is conceivable that in order to prevent future lies, we may have to tell one now. Miller, therefore, is rash to suppose that Narveson’s argument has the consequences he attributes to it.

In response to this, Miller might say that what he means by “any moral principle” is “any absolute moral principle. . .” —i.e., “any principle declaring of an identifiable action that it is always, without exception wrong.” But this, even if it is what Miller means, exposes his argument to two further objections. For now Miller’s claim that the belief that all such principles are self-contradictory is “patently absurb” is gratuitous and question-begging. What we want to know is if there are such principles that are not self-contradictory, especially since, as Miller concedes, “it is always logically possible that in order to prevent a given wrongful act that we may have to do that act itself.” The question is, “In such a case, ought we to do the wrongful act?” And what we want is some well thought out answer to this question, not a begging leave of it. My argument in the sequel, I think, goes some way toward satisfying this demand.

However, even if it is “patently absurd” to believe that all principles that assert that a given action is wrong are self-contradictory. Miller fails to show that Narveson is guilty of this particular absurdity. At the very most Narveson’s analysis can be generalized to apply, not to all moral principles of the type in question, but to those only according to which (a) a given action. A, is declared to be absolutely wrong, and (b) actions of type A are thought to be wrong because of the consequences of performing them—namely, because they lead to greater evil, and, in particular, to greater A-ing, in the future, than would result from not A-ing. Now, it is consistent with the belief that not all absolute moral prohibitions are self-contradictory, that all absolute moral prohibitions satisfying conditions (a) and (b) are. Accordingly, even if we were to concede the former belief to Miller, nothing whatever would follow concerning the “absurdity” of the latter one. And since it is this latter belief which Narveson’s argument against pacifism, when generalized, can be argued to imply, conceding Miller the former belief could go no way toward exposing the “absurdity” of Narveson’s analysis.

6 Cf., e.g., Miller’s essay, as well as Robert Audi’s “On the Meaning and Justification of Violence,” also in Shaffer’s Violence, op. cit. One might choose, of course, to limit the usage of “pacifism” so that it applies only to those who oppose violence, but not to those who oppose both violence and force; or to those only who oppose a particular form of violence—namely, war; etc. Ordinary usage provides no sharp guidelines, but Narveson seems to me to have captured adequately one way in which the term ‘pacifism’ is ordinarily used.

7 Narveson (in Wasserstrom), op. cit., p. 69.

8 Whitman, op. cit., p. 307.

9 Ibid.

10 Narveson, Ethics, Vol. 78 (1968), p. 148.

11 Whitman, op. cit., p. 307.

12 Narveson, Ethics, Vol. 78 (1968), p. 149.

13 Ibid, (my italics).

14 Narveson, (in Wasserstrom), op. cit., p. 72.

15 This is somewhat misleading. The point is that a pacifist needn’t have grounds for his belief, in the sense that he must infer his opposition to the use of force from the presumed truth of some other proposition. It is open to him to claim to intuit its truth, rather than to infer it. In the jargon of moral theory, pacifism can be either “teleological” or “deontological.”

16 Narveson, (in Wasserstrom), op. cit., p. 73.

17 In this connection, see Arne Naess’ “A Systematization of Ghandian Ethics of Conflict Resolution,” in Conflict Resolution, Volume II, Number 2,1958, pp. 140-155.

18 Even this is to concede to Narveson more than his argument shows. The question he discusses is whether any person could ever be justified in using force. To argue that a person could be because it is conceivable that the use of force might reduce evil is surely inadequate. What is required in addition to this is an argument to show that people sometimes can know, as a matter of fact, that the use of force will reduce evil. Narveson does not even begin to argue for this position, and yet a pacifist could agree that, conceivably, the use of force could reduce evil, and yet deny that we can ever know, in advance, that it will. Such a pacifist could, it would seem, consistently maintain that no person ought ever to use force. A full scale inquiry into the credentials of pacifism would require a careful examination of this alternative.

19 Narveson, Ethics, Vol. 78 (1968), p. 148.