Faruk Rahmanovic - Walzer Analytic Book Report

7/29/2019 Faruk Rahmanovic - Walzer Analytic Book Report

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Faruk Rahmanovic Military Ethics Analytic Report

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In his 1977 book,Just and Unjust Wars, Michael Walzer seeks to lay down the guiding

principles of differentiation between just and unjust warsboth in their initiation and

prosecution. To this end, he introduces the legalist paradigmthe conventions of law and order

as the primary principle, though he readily admits that a revisionist approach will also be

necessary in order to account for our moral judgments about the justice and injustice of wars. In

the preface, Walzer acknowledges the moral basis of our judgments, but dismisses the approach

of first defining morality, citing the difficulty (in not impossibility) in providing a satisfactory

theoretical moral account.1

Instead, he opts for the legalist examination of the rules of war,

coupled with historical examples, to bring out the readers innate sense of morality. Walzer then

weaves his way throughJus ad Bellum andJus in Bello, relying on a number of historical

examples to both tease out the finer points of the moral and legal issues, as well as provide a

reified basis for his acceptance and rejection of particular arguments.

Walzers work, though valuable and comprehensive in its analysis, is intended as a

general overview of the subject, rather than a military manual, or even an in-depth scholarly

argument. It comes on the heels of Americas involvement in Vietnam, Korea, and the general

tensions of the Cold War. As such, it seems designed to offer an analysis by which such

involvement in international affairs may be considered and, to a certain extent, justified. This is

not to say that his outlook on the American military involvement is uncritical; rather, it balances

the legal, moral, and at times utilitarian positions, and produces an assessment that incorporates

the reality of war with its theoretical components.

In his presentation, Walzer builds up the methodology of Just War, tracing modern

elements them back to their relevant sources and supplementing them with superb examples

1Walzer, Michael.Just and Unjust Wars. Basic Books: New york, 1977. Preface. Pg. xxi.


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from military histories ranging from Ancient Athens to the American Police Action in Korea.

His crucial points tend to revolve around extraordinary exceptionsor attempts to classify

particular situations as suchmost commonly through the use of WWII examples. In the

background of this analysis lie several assumptions. First, there exists a moral law, whose

application is incumbent on all peoples and states (though Walzer never defines what the

authority and particulars of such a law may be). Second, the state, insofar as it is a state, is an

expression of its populations political affiliation, which is itself an inalienable right. Third is that

a state has inalienable rightsnamely sovereignty, autonomy, and the right to exist. Just War

theory is thus built up starting from general rules and prohibitions (stemming from state and

citizen inalienable rights), and these basic rules are reaffirmed by the use of military examples

that either support or violate such precepts. Next, the general rules are challenged through

extraordinary circumstances of theoretical and military examples, such that the general rule

seems rather untenable and must be ignored in such situations. Here, Walzer introduces opposing

positions, commonly given in the form of political or military disagreement about the use of such

measures in the particular military example. He then considers both the moral and utilitarian

outcomes of each approach, and arrives at a conclusion he believes satisfactory to his legalist

paradigm approach.

However, in several cases, Walzers desire to balance morality against legalism, leads

him to pursue rather odd lines of argument, and to conclude with language both confusing and

paradoxicalwhich is tortured into the legalist paradigm. The failings of Walzers work may

come, in part, from the generalized nature of the work, and the lack of defined moral basis on

which he relies. Another contributing factor may be his failure to define the underlying

assumptions with which he approaches the work (viz. the authority for the rights of states).


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Consequently, his position suffers from several problems, which are compounded throughout his

analysis. His use of morality without definition, uncritical reliance on modern notions of

statehood (viz. a right to exist), willingness to abrogate rights of states and peoples, and the

notion that the object of war is the death and destruction of the enemy, all work to make his

approach via legalist paradigm problematic (if not untenable) from the legalist, moral, and

utilitarian perspectives. No matter the cause, the final analysis Walzer offers is one that cannot

help but turn against itself, as the paradox of necessity and prohibition collide. While Walzers

work does give the reader some food for thought on the issues of just war, it fails to provide an

internally coherent account of such justice.

The following critique will focus on three points of Walzers work, which may be critical

to the success of the project as a whole. These three are, by no means, the only three problematic

issues inJust and Unjust Wars. However, they do present the most salient points.

The first problem in Walzers approach is the failure to define, or at least roughly

identify, the moral grounds upon which he bases his approach. While he rightly notes that such

an endeavor is difficult,2

he makes no move to so much as provide any guidelines to his use of

the term. By his pervasive use of moral language, Walzer seems to rely on the presence of some

sort of universally sharedif ineffablemoral ideal. However, such assumption leads to several

significant problems for the work.

1)

Clearly, Walzers moral ideals are not, in fact, universal. After all, the fact that a nation

has willingly undertaken the practice of atrocities Walzer holds up as the paradigm of

2Ibid.


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moral repugnancy, indicates that there are at least some groups of individuals whose

moral ideals seem a polar opposite of his own.

2) Some of Walzers examples note the practices considered moral in antiquity. However,these same moral practices are strongly rejected by the modern usage of the term. Since

he offers no grounds for his own interpretation and understanding of morality, instead

apparently relying on some form of modern moral consensus, Walzer falls right into

moral relativisma fact further supported by point 1, above.

3) While Walzer insists on human rights, and does so on moral grounds (while specificallyrejecting the utilitarian calculus for their basis), he seems willing to suspend and abrogate

those same rights in cases of supreme emergencies, brought on by the immeasurable

evil of ones adversary.3Here we find an inherent assumption in Walzers approach,

namely that certain systems (Nazism) are evil of themselves not as a result of

particular actions. He argues,

[S]hould I wager this determinate crime (the killing of innocent people) against that immeasurable evil

(Nazi triumph)? surely I must wager But I dare say that our history will be nullified and our futurecondemned unless I accept the burdens of criminality here and now.

4

Walzers failure to define a moral code leads him to further moral quandaries, this time to

those of an absolutist form: on what groundssans actioncan Nazism be considered evil, and

particularly immeasurably evil? Action must be excluded, because its introduction into the

equation forces the argument to collapse entirely. For, if Nazism is immeasurably evil by its

willingness to obliterate the line between legitimate and illegitimate targets, and as a result of

these (and other) attitudes is willing to deny human rights, then those who would oppose Nazism

can legitimately act against it only insofar as they continue to stand by that combatant/non-

3Ibid. Pp. 154,178, 196, 199-200, 215, 216-221, 325-27.

4Ibid. Pp. 259-60.


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combatant distinction and protect human rights. To do otherwisethat is, to engage in the same

form of human rights denialis to become such an immeasurably evil force oneself.

The apparent alternative to this conclusion, found in distinction by gradation of evil actions,

is a utilitarian one. However, utilitarianism specifically denies the existence of any rights, save

by the hedonistic calculus, by which the initial evil may be supporting by its actions against

the minorities, to which it denies human rights (viz. Jews and Gypsies of Europe). Therefore, if

the sacrifice of such minorities can bring greater happiness to the majority, then the utilitarian

position cannot help but support such an action.

4) Given the foregoing points, and the apparent willingness to view conflicts as a battle ofgood versus evil, Walzer must end up with a moral standard of revisionist, might

makes right paradoxical reading of history of political acts as defined by Kant and

Zizek. Though Walzer would be loath to admit it, the victor will, inherently, cast the war

in the terms of good and evil and thus justify the policies of the conflict by the notion of

supreme emergency, and thus as mandated by a morality left undefined.

Thus, Walzers exclusion of the definition of morality, along with the willingness to act by any

means necessary againstwhat is perceived asan immeasurably evil state, turns on itself, and

becomes paradoxical.

The second problem of Walzers approach, and one that is often at issue in the

background of numerous other problematic conclusions, is the assertion that a state has a right

to exist, and that such a right is greaterthan the sum total of its citizens right to politically

organize.5

This issue becomes apparent in Walzers notion that, even though the right of the

5Ibid. Pp. 114, 196, 216-21.


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Germans to politically organize was justly suspended by the Allies, the German States right to

exist could not be denied. That is to say, Germany must endure, and its existence cannot be

challengedeven when its political landscape may justly be abolished.6

The issue so problematic about this claim, is Walzers assertion that the state, which is a

human constructand an abstract one at thatshould have any rights above and beyond those

of its member citizens. The fact that the state was invented as a particular time prior to which it

did not exist as a fact or even a notionseems an arbitrary line on which to establish the justice,

legality, and morality of war. Further, given that such establishment is predicated on warfor

how else does one claim a land and its people from its former rulersand that the modern

borders, globally, are generally those imposed by the White-Western colonial tyranny, such

distinctions are arbitrarily tyrannical at best. After all, Kuwait (part of the Ottoman Empire until

it was annexed by the British, and of the Persian Safavid Empire until it was annexed by the

Ottomans) was invented by the British after WWI; Texas was made a part of the US by

annexation from Mexico in 1845; and a vast number of African and Middle Eastern nations and

their borders were drawn up with rulers and protractors on maps by the British, French, and other

European colonial powers early in the 20th

century.

As should be readily apparent, the existence of the modern state is historically based

precisely on the denial of the states right to exist. Modern Spain exists because it denied the

Moorish states right to exist; which existed because it denied the right ofthe disorganized-post-

Roman Spain to exist; which existed because Rome denied the right of local city-states to exist,

and so onad infinitum (or rather to the first inhabitants of any given region) . Clearly, the simple

6Ibid. Pg. 259


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acceptance of the modern state borders uncritically as the only ones with a right to exist, is

problematic to say the least.

Finally, it should be noted that the human analogue to the state right to exist namely the

right to lifeis a conditional right, based on the premise of lawful behavior. The absence of

lawful behavior in a human being may lead to the permanent revocation of that rightyet what

of states? As states are ultimately unaccountable to any external standarda standard which for

human beings is played precisely by the stateit would seem that no revocation of such right

seems possible under any circumstances. However, this leads us down a problematic path once

again. Lets say, hypothetically, that a situation came about whereby either state A or state B

could continue to exist, but not both. In what way could a state, then, be condemned to die? By

what measurements and methods ought it be condemnedand why should that state accept such

a condemnation? In such a case, how could the condemned state reactfor its unwillingness to

be destroyed is equivalent to insistence that another state be destroyedand thus both states are

in the exact same position; they are morally and legally unable to accept the condemnation, yet

neither are they morally and legally able to act against the condemnation. Ultimately, Walzers

position in untenable, as it makes gods of states, and thus elevates that which is naught more than

an abstract notion, beyond the human life and rights which first gave it birth.

The third and final problem is the outcome ofWalzers attempt to combine an unfounded

(or undefined) moral theory with the legalist paradigmoften torturing language to make the

former fit into the latter. In several instances throughout the book, Walzer is left to conclude that


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a moral solution to a problem is not, and cannot be, a solution supported by any instantiation of

the legalist paradigm, yet remains morally viable nonetheless.7

Besides undermining Walzers legalist approach, such conclusions fly in the face of war

theory and morality alike. To put in in general terms, Walzer holds that, in certain circumstances,

it is possible for both sides of a conflict to act in a just and justified manner i.e. morally and

legally. So the situation can be summed up: resistance is legitimate, and the punishment of

resistance is legitimate.8

What this claim indicates is that it may be morally and legally valid for

each side to act in a way that makes it an aggressora morally culpable actor against whom

retaliation is morally and legally valid. It is specifically this understanding that has been rejected

in war theory since the 16th century writings of Francisco de Vittoria, and is supported by

virtually every instantiation of moral theory, arguing that, in any given conflict, only one side

can be justified, while the other must be considered as the aggressor. It is not difficult to see that

the necessary conclusion of such a position entails that morality must be relative, and that war

can become a series of legitimate escalations, until the total destruction of one of the nations. We

are then left with the paradox of this position: it is legally and morally permissible and consistent

to act illegally and immorally, so long as we perceive the need to do so.

Ultimately, Walzer seeks to reaffirm international laws (Hague and Geneva

Conventions), yet goes further, and frequently stresses the point that special circumstances can,

and do, override such restraints by supreme emergency, which in turn generates something of a

moral justification. Paradoxically, such acts produce an outcome where both sides are justified in

their (re)actionsso that the traditional war and legalist theories are, in essence, circumvented

7Ibid. Pp. 108, 115, 154, 178, 196, 199-200, 215, 216-21, 288-90, 325-7.

8Ibid. Pg. 178


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from their distinction between the aggressor and the victim. Walzer concludes that, despite the

paradoxical nature of such notions, this is the only just way of warfare consideration, given their

exceptional circumstances. In doing so, Walzer does not simply bring out the problems of justice

in war, but offers a series of solutions. Yet the solutions proposed are worse than the problem

itself, in that Walzer constantly lays claim to some form of exception to the rules, leading to an

anything goes conclusion. Though considerable in its comprehensive layout and the attempt to

define the justice of war, Michael WalzersJust and Unjust Wars simply falls short of the mark

by moral and legal considerations.

Faruk Rahmanovic - Walzer Analytic Book Report

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