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International justice and the reform of global governance: a reconsideration of Michael Walzer's international political theory

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 July 2009

PETER SUTCH
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Abstract

Walzer has recently updated his just war theory to take account of terrorism, humanitarian military intervention and new interpretations of the doctrine of self-defence, pre-emptive and preventative warfare The ethical considerations that underwrite Walzer's most recent work invite us beyond the routine citation of his work to a proper consideration of the moral parameters of international politics. Beyond Just and Unjust Wars Walzer has a wealth of insight into the key questions of international theory. His work on toleration, the nature of universality or on the role of social criticism has always been the basis of his insight in to the hard questions of international ethics. Despite being heavily criticised for being communitarian or conservative (both charges that need serious re-evaluation) Walzer's ideas offer a real alternative to the dominant neo-Kantian cosmopolitan tradition and a workable ethical framework for thinking about the challenges of contemporary international politics and international law. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the final essay of Arguing About War. The essay, entitled ‘Governing the Globe’ offers a radical vision of a reformed international society inspired by the principles that underpin Walzer's development of his just war theory and it is vital that we take notice.

Type
Research Article
Information
Review of International Studies , Volume 35 , Issue 3 , July 2009 , pp. 513 - 530
Copyright
Copyright © British International Studies Association 2009

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References

1 M. Walzer, Arguing About War (Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 2004).

2 M. Walzer, Just and Unjust Wars: A Moral Argument with Historical Illustrations (Basic Books, 2006). See also M. Walzer ‘Regime Change and Just War’, Dissent Magazine (Summer 2006) at http://www.dissentmagazine.org/article/?article=663 (accessed on 14 April 2008).

3 M. Walzer, Arguing About War, pp171–91. Also ‘International Society: What is the best we can do?’ Paper number 8 http://www.sss.ias.edu/publications/papers/papereight.pdf, June 2000, p5. (accessed on 14 April 2008). This article (an earlier draft) was also published in the Journal of the European Ethics Network, Ethical Perspectives, December 1999. All references will be to the version published in Arguing About War.

4 M. Walzer, ‘Response’ in Miller and Walzer (eds), Pluralism Justice and Equality (Oxford, 1995),p. 293.

5 M. Walzer, Just and Unjust Wars: A moral Argument with Historical Illustrations (New York: Basic Books, 1977), Part Two.

6 Walzer, Arguing About War, p. 179.

7 Orend, Walzer on war and Justice, p. 176.

8 Walzer, Arguing About War, p. 186.

9 Ibid., p. 188.

10 Walzer, Just and Unjust Wars, p. 54.

11 See particularly G. Doppelt, ‘Walzer's Theory of Morality in International Relations’, Philosophy and Public Affairs, 8:1 (1978), C. Beitz, ‘Bounded Morality: Justice and the State in World Politics’, International Organization, 33:3 (Summer 1979), pp. 405–24 and D. Luban, ‘Just War and Human Rights’, Philosophy and Public Affairs, 9:2 (Winter 1980), pp. 161–81.

12 See M. Walzer, ‘The Moral Standing of States: A Response to Four Critics’ and articles by C. Beitz, D. Luban and G. Doppelt in Philosophy and Public Affairs, vols 8 and 9 (1980).

13 M. Walzer, ‘Philosophy and Democracy’, Political Theory, 9 (1981), pp. 379–99.

14 M. Walzer, ‘Liberalism and the Art of Separation’, Political Theory, 12 (1984), pp. 315–30.

15 M. Walzer, ‘The Communitarian Critique of Liberalism’, Political Theory, 18 (1990), pp. 6–23.

16 M. Walzer, ‘Nation and Universe’, in G. Petersen (ed.), TheTanner Lectures on Human Values XI, 1989 (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1990), p. 509.

17 M. Walzer, Thick and Thin: Moral Arguments at Home and Abroad (University of Notre Dame Press, 1994).

18 E. Adler, Communitarian International Relations: the Epistemic Foundations of International Relations (London: Routledge, 2005), pp. 14–5.

19 For Walzer's principal defence of non-intervention see M. Walzer, Just and Unjust Wars. For a representative sample of criticisms of this stance, see articles by C. Beitz, D. Liban and G. Poppelt in Philosophy and Public Affairs, vols 8 and 9, 1980.

20 The important thing to note here is that Walzer reaches this position by starting at the opposite end of the theoretical continuum and still regards the position occupied by the cosmopolitans to be very dangerous.

21 M. Walzer, Thick and Thin: Moral Arguments at Home and Abroad (University of Notre Dame Press, 1994). M. Walzer, The Company of Critics: Social Criticism and Social Commitment in the Twentieth Century (Peter Halibran, 1989).

22 M. Walzer, On Toleration (Yale University Press, 1997), p. 87.

23 B. Orend, Walzer on War and Justice (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2000), pp. 178–9.

24 Walzer, Arguing About War, p. 186.

25 I. Kant, Perpetual Peace and other essays in Politics, History and Morals, translated by T. Humphrey (Indianapolis: Hacket, 1983).

26 See, for example, Pogge's vertical dispersment of sovereignty in ‘Cosmopolitanism and Sovereignty’, Ethics, 103 (October 1992), pp. 48–75.

27 See my discussion of the cosmopolitanism of Beitz and Pogge in P. Sutch, Ethics, Justice and International Relations: Constructing an International Community (London, New York: Routledge, 2001), ch.2.

28 Walzer, Arguing About War, p. 184.

29 Walzer, Thick and Thin, p. 10.

30 Walzer, ‘Nation and Universe’, p. 515.

31 Walzer, ‘The Politics of Difference: Statehood and Toleration in a Multicultural World’ Ratio Juris, 10:2 (1997), p. 168. First published in R. McKim and J. McMahan (eds), The Morality of Nationalism (Oxford University Press, 1997).

32 Walzer, On Toleration, pp. 19–20.

33 Walzer, ‘Nation and Universe’, p. 527.

34 Walzer, Thick and Thin, p. 17.

35 Ibid.

36 Walzer, ‘The Moral Standing of States: A Response to Four Critics’, in Philosophy and Public Affairs, 9:18 (1980), p. 222.

37 Walzer, Thick and Thin, pp. 18–19.

38 M. Walzer, ‘Response to Veit Bader’, Political Theory, 23:2 (1995), p. 249. Here Walzer is responding to Bader's demand for large scale economic redistribution and open borders.

39 Walzer, ‘The Politics of Difference’, p. 168.

40 Walzer, On Toleration, p. 21.

41 Walzer, Arguing About War, pp. 184–5

42 See, for example, Kymlica and Opalski (eds), Can Liberal Pluralism be Exported? Western Political Theory and Ethnic relations in Eastern Europe (Oxford University Press, 2001), ch.1.

43 See Walzer, Just and Unjust Wars, especially chapters 3 and 4.

44 Walzer, Thick and Thin, p. 6.

45 The phrase is David Reidy's see D. Reidy, ‘Political Authority and Human Rights’ in R. Martin and D. Reidy (eds), Rawls's Law of Peoples: A Realistic Utopia? (Blackwell, 2006), ch. 10. I would particularly like to thank a reader for Review of International Studies for generous and critical comments that led to me presenting the argument this way.

46 Walzer, The Company of Critics, p. 229.

47 Walzer, Thick and Thin, p. 101.

48 Walzer, On Toleration, pp. 24–30.

49 Walzer, ‘The Politics of Difference’, p. 175.

50 Walzer, ‘Nation-States and Immigrant Societies’ in Kymlica and Opalski (eds), Can Liberal Pluralism be Exported, pp. 150–3.

51 Walzer, ‘The Politics of Difference’, p. 175.

52 Walzer, Arguing About War, p. 182.

53 Ibid., p. 179.

54 Walzer, ‘The Politics of Difference’, p. 175.

55 Ibid., p. 176.

56 Walzer, Arguing About War, p. 186.

57 Walzer, Arguing About War p. 187–8.

58 Ibid., p. 186.

59 Walzer, ‘Nation and Universe’, p. 523.

60 See the work of social constructivists such as M. Finnemore and K. Sikkink, ‘International Norm Dynamics and Political Change’, International Organization, 52 (1998), pp. 887–917, J. Brunee and S. Toope, ‘International Law and Constructivism: Towards and Interactional Theory of Law’, Columbia Journal of Transnational Law, 39:19 (2000), or F. Kratochwil, Rules, Norms and Decisions: On the Conditions of Practical and Legal Reasoning in International Relations and Domestic Affairs (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989).

61 See liberal institutional theory such as A. Slaughter, ‘A Liberal Theory of International Law’ Proceedings of the American Society of International Law', 94 (2000), or R. Keohane, Power and Governance in a Partially Globalized World (London, New York: Routledge 2002), and the second wave of legal process theory led by H. Koh, ‘Why do Nations Obey’, Yale Law Journal, (1996),p. 2599.

62 The place of norms that are part of legal discourse but not formally law is found in much legal theory and in a range of traditions and it is here that Walzer has much to offer. See, for example, C.Chinkin, 'The challenge of soft law:Development and change in International Law, International and Comparative Law Quarterly, 38:4 (1989), pp. 850–66 or K. Abbot and D. Snidal, ‘Hard and Soft Law in International Governance’, International Organization, 54 (2000) pp. 421–56.

63 F. Teson, A Philosophy of International Law (Westview Press, 1998), A. Buchanan, Justice, Legitimacy and Self-Determination: Moral Foundations of International Law (Oxford University Press, 2004).