Justice, international

Author(s):  
Brian Barry ◽  
Matt Matravers

Although it has been denied (by, for example, F.A. Hayek 1976) that the concept of distributive justice has application within states, it is not controversial that there can be unjust laws and unjust behaviour by individuals and organizations. It has, however, been argued that it makes no sense to speak of justice and injustice beyond the boundaries of states, either because the lack of an international sovereign entails that the conditions for justice do not exist, or because the state constitutes the maximal moral community. Both arguments are flawed. Without them, we are naturally led to ask what are the implications of the widely-held idea of fundamental human equality, the belief that in some sense human beings are of equal value. This cannot be coherently deployed in a way that restricts its application to within-state relations. In either a utilitarian or Kantian form it generates extensive international obligations. An objection that is often made to this conclusion is that the obligations derived are so stringent that compliance cannot reasonably be asked under current political conditions. But this shows (if true) that current political conditions are incompatible with international justice.

Author(s):  
Mathias Risse

This book explores the question of what it is for a distribution to be just globally and proposes a new systematic theory of global justice that it calls pluralist internationalism. Up to now, philosophers have tended to respond to the problem of global justice in one of two ways: that principles of justice either apply only within states or else apply to all human beings. The book defends a view “between” these competing claims, one that improves on both, and introduces a pluralist approach to what it terms the grounds of justice—which offers a comprehensive view of obligations of distributive justice. It also considers two problems that globalization has raised for political philosophy: the problem of justifying the state to outsiders and the problem of justifying the global order to all.


2017 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-66 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura Valentini

Principles of distributive justice bind macro-level institutional agents, like the state. But what does justice require in non-ideal circumstances, where institutional agents are unjust or do not exist in the first place? Many answer by invoking Rawls's natural duty ‘to further just arrangements not yet established’, treating it as a ‘normative bridge’ between institutional demands of distributive justice and individual responsibilities in non-ideal circumstances. I argue that this response strategy is unsuccessful. I show that the more unjust the status quo is due to non-compliance, the less demanding the natural duty of justice becomes. I conclude that, in non-ideal circumstances, the bulk of the normative work is done by another natural duty: that of beneficence. This conclusion has significant implications for how we conceptualize our political responsibilities in non-ideal circumstances, and cautions us against the tendency – common in contemporary political theory – to answer all high-stakes normative questions under the rubric of justice.


2005 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 153-174 ◽  
Author(s):  
William Moul

Abstract. The usual quantitative study of inter-state war and peace tallies observations on hundreds, sometimes thousands, of dyads or pairs of states. These observations miss elementary features of inter-state relations that should be examined when testing Realist explanations of war and peace. The way in which three prominent studies (Bremer, 1992; Bueno de Mesquita, 1981; 1985) chose to count the Seven Weeks War dramatically reveals the theoretical difficulties when tallying dyads. Re-analyses of these studies demonstrate the sensitivity of the results to particulars of 1866 Germany and, more importantly, illustrate the merits of analyzing the dispute rather than the state dyad or the state-dyad year.Résumé. L'étude quantitative des périodes de guerre et de paix entre États comptabilise des observations relatives à des centaines, parfois des milliers de dyades ou paires d'États. Ces observations ne prennent pas en compte certaines caractéristiques élémentaires des relations entre États qui devraient pourtant être examinées lorsque l'on teste les théories réalistes expliquant guerre et paix. La manière dont trois études reconnues (Bremer, 1992; Bueno de Mesquita, 1981; 1985) ont choisi de comptabiliser la guerre des Sept Semaines révèle de manière éclatante les difficultés théoriques dans la comptabilisation des dyades d'états. De nouvelles analyses de ces études ont démontré la sensibilité des résultats aux caractéristiques de l'Allemagne de 1866, mais soulignent surtout les mérites de l'analyse des disputes par rapport à l'analyse des dyades d'États ou des dyades d'États annuelles.


1968 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
pp. 101-119
Author(s):  
Paul P. Bernard

That Austria's monolithic refusal to tolerate religious minorities within its borders in an age of increasingly general religious permissiveness would not for long outlive Empress Maria Theresa must have been apparent to all but the most obtuse contemporary observers. Throughout the period of his coregency (1765–1780), Joseph II had made it plain on more than one occasion that while, unlike Frederick the Great, he did not believe that all his subjects might attain their salvation in whatever way seemed best to them, he was, nevertheless, aware that many of them would persist in assuring their damnation in spite of the best efforts of Church and crown to save them. And he was unwilling to let the obduracy of a minority of his subjects cause the state to lose their wealth, their services, and their loyalty. Dominated by such radical ideas on the place of religious minorities in a state, Joseph, State Chancellor Prince Wenzel Kaunitz, and Franz Joseph Heinke, once Kaunitz's man but now independently charged with drawing up policy guidelines for a subsequent reorganization of Church-state relations, were as early as 1769 discussing not the advisability of tolerating non-Catholic religions but ways and means of implementing such toleration.


2018 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-49
Author(s):  
Paul Kucharski

My aim in this essay is to advance the state of scholarly discussion on the harms of genocide. The most obvious harms inflicted by every genocide are readily evident: the physical harm inflicted upon the victims of genocide and the moral harm that the perpetrators of genocide inflict upon themselves. Instead, I will focus on a kind of harm inflicted upon those who are neither victims nor perpetrators, on those who are outside observers, so to speak. My thesis will be that when a whole community or culture is eliminated, or even deeply wounded, the world loses an avenue for insight into the human condition. My argument is as follows. In order to understand human nature, and that which promotes its flourishing, we must certainly study individual human beings. But since human beings as rational and linguistic animals are in part constituted by the communities in which they live, the study of human nature should also involve the study of communities and cultures—both those that are well ordered and those that are not. No one community or culture has expressed all that can be said about the human way of existing and flourishing. And given that the unity and wholeness of human nature can only be glimpsed in a variety of communities and cultures, then part of the harm of genocide consists in the removal of a valuable avenue for human beings to better understand themselves.


2008 ◽  
Vol 24 (suppl 4) ◽  
pp. a569-s580 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sérgio Silveira Franco ◽  
Adelaide Cássia Nardocci ◽  
Wanda Maria Risso Günther

Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH) are widely distributed in the environment, and some are carcinogenic to human beings. The study of biomarkers has helped clarify the nature and magnitude of the human health risks posed by such substances. This article provides a review of the state-of-the-art on PAH biomarkers for human health risk assessment and also discusses their applicability within the context of environmental management in Brazil. The article discusses the methodologies for determination of some biomarkers such as 1-hydroxypyrene and PAH-DNA adducts. Cytogenetic markers, frequency of chromosomal aberrations, and micronucleus induction were considered for the evaluation of cancer risk. The current stage of studies on validation of such biomarkers was also approached.


1978 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 348-354 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wayne C. Thompson

In August 1914 Kurt Riezler accompanied Chancellor Theobald von Bethmann Hollweg to the Supreme Headquarters in Koblenz and Luxembourg. His duties were not clearly defined and included a variety of things: He worked on war aims, parliamentary speeches, revolutionary movements, and domestic political questions. He helped interpret the chancellor's policies to the press, establish guidelines for censorship, and write anonymous articles supporting Bethmann Hollweg's policies. He could be called Bethmann Hollweg's assistant for political warfare.Unlike most Germans Riezler sensed from the beginning that a German victory was not assured. On August 14, 1914, in his first diary entry after the outbreak of war, he noted that although “everybody was apparently happy to be able for once to dedicate himself unreservedly to a great cause, … no one doubts or appears to consider even for an instant what a gamble war is, especially this war.” Riezler also realized that the “ideas of 1914” would not retain their strength forever. “Just as the storm frightens the vermin out of the air—when it becomes quieter again, everything crawls out of its refuge—and emerges again in the state as well as in individual human beings.” This realization protected Riezler from the naive belief that Germany could bear a long war without an obvious effort to achieve a negotiated peace, without a new European order which at most allowed Germany indirect control, and without domestic political concessions to the German masses.


Societies ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 1 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rami Zeedan

This study applies the negative peace/positive peace approach to internal nation-state relations between the majority and ethnic minority. This approach focuses on the policies implemented by the state. In order to understand the social system from its formation, an important focus should be given to the period of establishment of a new state, whereas physical borders are defined along with the borders of society, which determines who is included in the new nation and who is excluded. The conclusions are based on the case of the Israeli Druze, an ethnic minority with whom the state of Israel and its Jewish majority have achieved positive peace. This study suggests that the positive peace with the Druze was achieved following their integration in the army—as a decision of the state of Israel—that lead to their integration in the Israeli society. Conversely to the Israeli Muslims, where a negative peace is maintained, following the early year’s state policy to exclude them.


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