Interlinking the Domestic with the International: Carl Schmitt on Democracy and International Relations

2006 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 9-40 ◽  
Author(s):  
CHRISTOPH BURCHARD
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Weimar Republic ◽  
Just War ◽  
State System ◽  
Carl Schmitt ◽  
The Political ◽  
Just War Tradition

Carl Schmitt's Der Nomos der Erde allows us to rethink his interlinked proposals for the organization of the Weimar Republic, namely his theory of ‘democratic dictatorship’ and the ‘concept of the political’. Connecting the domestic homogeneity of an empowered people with the pluralism of the Westphalian state system, Schmitt seeks to humanize war; he objects to the renaissance of the ‘just war’ tradition, which is premised on a discriminating concept of war. Schmitt's objections are valid today, yet their Eurocentric foundations are also partially outdated. We are thus to argue with Schmitt against Schmitt to reflect on possibilities for the humanization of war.

scholarly journals Scarred souls, weary warriors, and military intervention: the emergence of the subject in the just war writings of Jean Bethke Elshtain

2012 ◽  
Vol 39 (4) ◽  
pp. 859-880 ◽  
Author(s):  
PETER LEE
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
Just War ◽  
Military Intervention ◽  
Military Force ◽  
The Past ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Just War Tradition ◽  
A Site

AbstractOver the past three decades Jean Bethke Elshtain has used her critique and application of just war as a means of engaging with multiple overlapping aspects of identity. Though Elshtain ostensibly writes about war and the justice, or lack of justice, therein, she also uses just war a site of analysis within which different strands of subjectivity are investigated and articulated as part of her broader political theory. This article explores the proposition that Elshtain's most important contribution to the just war tradition is not be found in her provision of codes or her analysis of ad bellum or in bello criteria, conformity to which adjudges war or military intervention to be just or otherwise. Rather, that she enriches just war debate because of the unique and sometimes provocative perspective she brings as political theorist and International Relations scholar who adopts, adapts, and deploys familiar but, for some, uncomfortable discursive artefacts from the history of the Christian West: suffused with her own Christian faith and theology. In so doing she continually reminds us that human lives, with all their attendant political, social, and religious complexities, should be the focus when military force is used, or even proposed, for political ends.

Conclusion

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew R. Hom ◽  
Cian O’Driscoll ◽  
Kurt Mills
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Just War ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Traditional Notion ◽  
Use Of Time ◽  
Moral Context ◽  
Just War Tradition ◽  
Temporal Dimensions ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Do So

Despite the numerous issues with victory identified in this book, a traditional notion of victory still holds sway today. Therefore, this conclusion extracts shared themes, emerging tensions, and further avenues of inquiry running through the book as a whole. To do so, it highlights the normative, political, and temporal dimensions of moral victory. Normative includes the importance of moral context for thinking about victory and efforts to reinterpret such thinking in more ethical terms. Political pertains to the relationship between dramatized notions of victory, (relaxed) limits on fighting, and an opposite interest in restraint. And temporal concerns whether victories actually mark clean and durable endings to war as well as the creative use of time to negotiate victory differently. These issues also connect the volume to International Relations and Security Studies literatures. We close by proposing how these reflections on victory might help reconstruct the just war tradition.

Review: Austin Harrington, German Cosmopolitan Thought and the Idea of the West: Voices from Weimar

2018 ◽  
Vol 35 (7-8) ◽  
pp. 319-324
Author(s):  
Thomas Kemple
Keyword(s):  
Martin Heidegger ◽  
Weimar Republic ◽  
Max Weber ◽  
Carl Schmitt ◽  
The Political ◽  
Georg Simmel ◽  
Critical Perspective ◽  
The West ◽  
Karl Jaspers

Austin Harrington’s monumental investigation into the ‘radical centrists’ of the Weimar Republic is discussed in terms of key themes such as universalism, cosmopolitanism, and the critique of Eurocentrism that still resonate with recent debates. Contrasting the voices of lesser known critical intellectuals from this period such as Karl Jaspers and Kark Mannheim with the political writings of Max Weber and Georg Simmel, as well as with the reactionary positions of Carl Schmitt and Martin Heidegger, Harrington’s book affords a useful critical perspective on ‘protesting the West’, yesterday and today.

13. Normative International Relations Theory

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Toni Erskine
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
Moral Philosophy ◽  
Iraq War ◽  
Just War ◽  
Ethical Reasoning ◽  
International Relations Theory ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Ir Theory ◽  
Just War Tradition

This chapter deals with normative international relations theory, a field of study that relies on a variety of approaches and theories to explore moral expectations, decisions, and dilemmas in world politics. Normative IR theory has adopted — and adapted — conceptual categories such as communitarianism and cosmopolitanism from political theory. It also borrows from moral philosophy to designate different types of ethical reasoning, such as deontology and consequentialism. The chapter begins with an overview of the history, influences, and some of the categories that normative IR theory brings to the study of international relations. It then examines the ways in which normative IR theory engages with the hidden ethical assumptions of a range of IR approaches. It also considers the case of civilian deaths during the 2003 Iraq war in relation to the the just war tradition, and more specifically to the idea that soldiers have duties to exercise restraint in war.

Just War Theory in Times of Individual Rights

2018 ◽  
pp. 220-232
Author(s):  
Janina Dill
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
Just War ◽  
Just War Theory ◽  
First Century ◽  
The Political ◽  
Individual Rights ◽  
International Political Theory ◽  
Radical Revision

Just war theory (JWT) has undergone a radical revision over the last two decades. This chapter discusses the implications of this reformulation for the role of JWT in International Political Theory (IPT) and for JWT’s strategic usefulness. Revisionists’ consistent prioritization of individual rights means JWT now follows the strictures of justified violence according to contemporary IPT. At the same time, the collective nature of war makes it impossible for anyone but the omniscient attacker to properly protect individual rights and thus to directly implement revisionist prescriptions. I argue that revisionism is strategically relevant not in spite of, but because of this lack of practicability on the battlefield. It highlights the impossibility of waging war in accordance with widespread expectations of moral appropriateness, which largely follow the strictures of justified violence according to contemporary IPT. This is a crucial limitation to the political utility of force in twenty-first-century international relations.

Bridging the Political Gaps

2018 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 51-74
Author(s):  
Christian E. Roques
Keyword(s):  
Weimar Republic ◽  
Thomas Mann ◽  
Carl Schmitt ◽  
The Political ◽  
Paul Tillich ◽  
Karl Mannheim ◽  
The Republic ◽  
Political Spectrum

Political romanticism is one of the keys to accessing the intellectual debates of the Weimar Republic. This article tries to adopt a radically historicized approach centered on the concept of reception. Such an approach allows it to focus on the strategic nature of the different uses that were made of the romantic paradigm between 1918 and 1933. This article contends that one of the main features that romanticism offers in the German context is its interdiscursive quality that renders it able to transcend traditional political divisions like left /right and conservative/progressive. This idea is illustrated in this article with a series of examples covering the entire lifespan of the Republic and the entire political spectrum therein, which can be represented by such figures as Sigmund Rubinstein, Thomas Mann, Hans Freyer, Carl Schmitt, Karl Mannheim, Othmar Spann, Wilhelm von Schramm, and Paul Tillich.

God is Not Dead or Violent: The Catholic Church, Just War, and the “Resurgence” of Religion

2012 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 419-440 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lan T. Chu
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Vatican Ii ◽  
Just War ◽  
Just War Theory ◽  
The United States ◽  
International Relations Theory ◽  
The Political ◽  
Hard Power ◽  
Politics And Religion

AbstractWhile scholars have recognized a resurgence of religion, their focus mainly has been on religion's more violent aspects, overlooking its peaceful capacities and effects. This oversight is due in part to the lack of theoretical rigor when it comes to the study of politics and religion. Using the Catholic Church's opposition to the United States’ 2003 war in Iraq, this article highlights the political significance of religion's moral, symbolic voice, which is as important as the hard power that has traditionally dominated international relations. The post-Vatican II Catholic Church's modern articulation of human dignity and interpretation of just war theory challenges both scholars and policymakers to utilize the peaceful, diplomatic methods that international relations theory and practitioners have made available. Religion's role in politics, therefore, can be one that is supportive of modern political societies and it need not be violent.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document