Justice and Morality (Ethics and Global Politics)

Justice and Morality Human Suffering, Natural Law and International Politics

Amanda Russell Beattie

Justice and Morality

Ethics and Global Politics Series Editors: Tom Lansford and Patrick Hayden Since the end of the Cold War, explorations of ethical considerations within global politics and on the development of foreign policy have assumed a growing importance in the fields of politics and international studies. New theories, policies, institutions, and actors are called for to address difficult normative questions arising from the conduct of international affairs in a rapidly changing world. This series provides an exciting new forum for creative research that engages both the theory and practice of contemporary world politics, in light of the challenges and dilemmas of the evolving international order. Also in the series Targeting Terrorists A License to Kill? Avery Plaw ISBN 978 0 7546 4526 9 Bloody Nations Moral Dilemmas for Nations, States and International Relations Cherry Bradshaw ISBN 978 0 7546 7120 6 Ethics in an Era of Globalization Edited by M.S. Ronald Commers, Wim Vandekerckhove and An Verlinden ISBN 978 0 7546 7195 4 From Terrorism to Politics Annisseh van Engeland and Rachael M. Rudolph ISBN 978 0 7546 4990 8 Emerging Conflicts of Principle International Relations and the Clash between Cosmopolitanism and Republicanism Thomas Kane ISBN 978 0 7546 4837 6

Justice and Morality Human Suffering, Natural Law and International Politics

Amanda Russell Beattie Aston University, UK

© Amanda Russell Beattie 2010 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior permission of the publisher. Amanda Russell Beattie has asserted her right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work. Published by Ashgate Publishing Limited Ashgate Publishing Company Wey Court East Suite 420 Union Road 101 Cherry Street Farnham Burlington Surrey, GU9 7PT VT 05401-4405 England USA www.ashgate.com British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Beattie, Amanda Russell. Justice and morality : human suffering, natural law and international politics. -- (Ethics and global politics) 1. Natural law. 2. Natural law--History. 3. International relations--Moral and ethical aspects. 4. Human rights. I. Title II. Series 327.1'01-dc22 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Beattie, Amanda Russell. Justice and morality : human suffering, natural law and international politics / by Amanda Russell Beattie. p. cm. -- (Ethics and global politics) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-7546-7522-8 (hbk) -- ISBN 978-1-4094-0230-5 (ebk) 1. International relations--Moral and ethical aspects. 2. Natural law. I. Title. JZ1306.B43 2010 172'.4--dc22 ISBN 9780754675228 (hbk) ISBN 9781409402305 (ebk.II)

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Contents Introduction Realizing the Human Experience: Vulnerability and Human Suffering   1

International Relations and Modern Institutional Design: Locating the Isolated Individual   Introduction   Enlightenment Political Philosophy   International Political Thought   Modern International Political Theory   Conclusion  

2

The Morality of Natural Law and International Relations: Establishing a Tradition of Influence   Introduction   A Natural Law History   Thick and Thin Morality   Thick and Thin Morality: The (Limited) Value of the New Natural Lawyers  

1 19 19 23 32 40 49 51 51 52 61 74

3

Thomas Aquinas and the Morality of Natural Law   Introduction   On the Individual   On Natural Law   The Salamanca Theologians  

85 85 86 92 101

4

A Relational Account of ‘the Political’ Agency, Community and Loving Reasonableness   Introduction   Natural Law Agency   Relational Politics: Friendship, Love and Charity   A Natural Law Community  

111 111 113 120 127

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vi

5

The Morality of Natural Law and International Politics: Unbounded Moral Communities and Collective Moral Agency  Introduction   ‘The International’   A Casuistry of Well-being   Establishing ‘the Personal’  

137 137 139 149 162

Epilogue  

179

Bibliography  

183

Index  

201

For their love and support, this book is dedicated to my parents.

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Introduction

Realizing the Human Experience: Vulnerability and Human Suffering Human relationships have long been the focus of scholarly attention. Whether it is an examination of the non-instrumental relationships which sustain the quotidian existence of individuals throughout the world, or the more central relationships of power, legitimacy and authority which feature in the development of governmental structures, relationships at a very basic level shape the human experience. Throughout history different aspects of relationships have played a key role in developing an account of this experience which is, throughout this work, referred to as ‘the political.’ ‘The political’ refers to the sight where the actions and interactions of politics unfold. Ancient and pre-modern political thought displays a balanced appraisal of both the instrumental and non-instrumental relationships within this sphere. In fact, to distinguish between these different types of relations was, for philosophers like Aristotle, Augustine and Aquinas, an unnecessary scholarly endeavor. The modern turn in political and moral philosophy, as this work will document, reflects a changing series of assumptions which outline the demarcation of public and private realms of action which distinguish between personal and public relationships. Modern political thinkers, represented in the ideas of the social contract tradition, reflect an attempt at institutional design which locates a pre-eminent role for instrumental relationships. Such a focus provides a means of limiting the negative consequences of communal living,   This is a point that is well noted by Preston King and Graham M. Smith, Friendship in Politics, Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy, 10 no. 2 (June 2007),125–145 and Introduction, Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy, 10 no. 2 (June 2007), 117–123. They articulate how the idea of a ‘private life’ is at odds with ancient understandings of the political community which supported the development of individuals as moral beings. The notion of a public and private divide, they go on to show, is very much a modern phenomenon. The diminishing influence of the Aristotelian notion of civic friendship in the formal discourses of politics reflects this modernist turn.   This idea is well documented in the writings of feminist scholars. They note, and challenge, the distinction of public and private lives and the ensuing idea that a public sphere is dominated by a male persona while a feminine experience is left to exist within the private sphere. This idea is documented through an analysis of ‘care ethics’ in Chapter 4.   From a historical perspective this tradition is reflected in the works of Thomas Hobbes, John Locke and Jean Jacques Rousseau. The influence that this tradition has had on IR and international politics will be revealed, in Chapter 1, through an examination of



Justice and Morality

otherwise known as being human in common; however, this focus has revealed alternative consequences which are likewise equally problematic. In the absence of non-instrumental relationships within a formal account of ‘the political’ an understanding of the ideas, values and goals which support and sustain the unique personalities of individuals, within the community, is otherwise absent. This work acknowledges, in the opening chapters, the dominance of instrumental relationships within the broad field of international relations; however, it seeks to engage with this phenomenon and proposes an account of being political which situates the knowledge associated with non-instrumental relationships as equal and valuable components within an account of being human, in common, which emphasizes the relationality of politics. A relational ontology which structures an account of ‘the political’ is at odds with formal accounts of international politics. International relations has long since abandoned the idea of relationality, focusing instead on the instrumental roles of power and authority in order to engage with its pre-eminent concern: anarchy. Consequently, as Hollis and Smith point out, most works within IR can be situated within a fourfold schema which, while loosely conceptualized, identifies either an individual or holistic assumption in order to explain or understand international politics. Explanatory approaches, they argue, reflect a philosophical interpretation of the scientific method. On the other hand, scholars who seek to understand international politics work from within the discipline itself eschewing the idea of impartiality and unbiased interpretations of unfolding events. An examination of the historical development of IR reveals that throughout its relatively short history these different methodologies have exerted a considerable degree of influence. The early years of IR demonstrate a desire to understand the events of international politics as scholars sought to blend the disciplines of history, philosophy and law in order to engage with the events of diplomacy. This approach was called into question after the Second World War which ushered in the behavioralist revolution. the development of ius gentium in the modern age and the idea of a domestic analogy in contemporary international politics.   Throughout this work international relations (IR) will reflect the formal academic discipline of international relations whereas international relations (ir) will reflect the discourses which examine the practices therein. Likewise, the events under examination within IR will be referred to as international politics.   Martin Hollis and Steve Smith, Explaining and Understanding International Relations (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990).   This is well documented within introductory texts to IR. See for example Chris Brown, Understanding International Relations (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005); Robert H. Jackson, Introduction to International Relations: Theories and Approaches (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003); and finally, Michael Nicholson, International Relations: A Concise Introduction (Palgrave Macmillan, 2002). A good investigation of how all of these fields can come together is evident in the edited text by Herbert Butterfield and Martin Wight, Diplomatic Investigations: Essays in the Theory of International Politics (Boston: Harvard University Press, 1968).

Introduction



This methodology espoused the rigor of impartiality and objectivity in order to determine how states, the primary actor of international politics, could maintain their survival and security within the climate of the Cold War. Broadly speaking this, in turn, engendered a series of scholarly ideas which coalesce, in the United States, with the academic discipline of political science and espoused a framework of impartial and unbiased instrumental relationships. Events in the United Kingdom unfurled in a somewhat different manner. They reveal a sympathetic interpretation of more ‘understanding’ approaches to international politics. A description of this idea begins with the works of ‘English School’ scholars. Such a descriptive account prefaces an examination of contemporary normative works in order to situate a relational account of ‘being political.’ The English School is represented through the works of Hedley Bull, Herbert Butterfield and Martin Wight. All of these authors were interested in the relationship that ethics could play within international politics and examined the practices of conflict and diplomacy in order grapple with the tense relationship of morality and international politics. Their examinations provided a critical response to the philosophical structuring of politics within a scientific methodology. Yet their ideas share some similarities with their North American counterparts. Their works are structured by an examination of instrumental relationships which highlight the potential of international law and world order to establish a series of rules which, in the absence of a foundational account of morality, could guide state behavior and mitigate anarchy. Martin Wight is keen to establish means of classifying international political theories. He questions the idea of international theory and instead identifies three thematic interpretations of international politics; Machiavellian, Kantian and Groatian. On the other hand, Hedley Bull investigates the possibility of a ‘classical account’ of international politics while engaging with the discourses of world order and inter alia anarchy. Herbert Butterfield is slightly  An excellent description of this unfolding of events alongside a heartfelt criticism is offered by Thomas Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1970).  This point is well documented by Adam Watson who provides an excellent overview of the idea of an English school approach. See, The British Committee for the Theory for International Politics, Leeds University, http://www.leeds.ac.uk/polis/englishschool/ watson98.doc (accessed September 27, 2005).  See for example Martin Wight, International Theory: The Three Traditions, Gabriele Wight and Brian Porter (eds), with an introductory essay by Hedley Bull (London: Leicester University Press for the Royal Institute of International Affairs, 1991); Why is there no International Theory? International Relations, 1 no. 2 (1960), 1–35; and An anatomy of international thought, Review of International Studies, 13 no. 3 (1987), 221–227. For Hedley Bull see, The Anarchical Society: A Study of Order in World Politics (New York: Columbia University Press, 1977); International theory: the case for a classical approach, World Politics, 18 no. 3 (1966), 361–377; and finally, Order vs. Justice in International Society, paper delivered to the Annual Conference of the P.S.A., Birmingham, UK, March 1971.



Justice and Morality

distinguished from this generalization owing to his interest in the relationship of Christianity and history, the philosophy of history and international relations.10 As a whole the importance of these authors is twofold. They challenge a natural law approach, an approach which is advocated throughout this work. Consequently, a brief exposition of English School ideas is helpful in order to engage with traditional critiques of IR and natural law morality and the wider influence that it exerts on normative interpretations of international politics. Likewise, it is instructive to look at the contemporary influence of the English School and its bearing on wider normative interpretations of international politics. The English School agenda stagnated during the Cold War years. It was reignited as a research agenda in the early 1990s by Barry Buzan and Richard Little with the publication of The English School: an underexploited resource in IR. This article argued that an English School approach could stem the tide of liberal and realist interpretations of international politics articulating the idea of an international system of civilized states.11 As Tim Dunne points out in his examination of this political tradition, the English School can be understood as representing a consensus within international politics which recognizes the centrality of states and articulating at the same time a series of rules, norms and institutions which are viewed as legitimate by all.12 This thought echoes the idea of Hedley Bull who claims that international conflict, when systematically analyzed, can be controlled through properly understood rules and regulations articulated through the discourses of international law.13 The English School remains a contested and troubled theoretical framework for some scholars of IR. Ian Hall has questioned the value of this framework which, he claims, marginalizes the important distinctions in and amongst its seeming members.14 Alternatively, Nicholas Rengger highlights the point first made in the 1970s by 10  See, for example, Herbert Butterfield’s chief work, The Whig Interpretation of History (New York & London: Norton, 1965); or, his contributions to Butterfield and Wight (1968). The legacy of Butterfield within IR is well documented by Ian Hall, History, Christianity and diplomacy: Sir Herbert Butterfield and international relations, Review of International Studies, 28 no. 4 (2002), 719–736. 11  Barry Buzan, The English School: An underexploited resource in IR, Review of International Studies, 27 (2001), 471–488. 12 Tim Dunne, Sociological investigations: Instrumental, legitimist and coercive interpretations of international society, Millennium: Journal of International Studies, 30 no. 1 (2001), 67–91; and, Inventing International Society: A History of the English School (London: Macmillan, 1998). 13  Hedley Bull, Natural law and international relations, British Journal of International Studies, 15 no. 2 (1979), 171–181. 14 Ian Hall, Still the English patient? Closures and inventions in the English school, International Affairs, 77 no. 4 (2002) 931–942. This work elicited a dynamic response from Barry Buzan and Richard Little, The ‘English patient’ strikes back: A response to Hall’s misdiagnosis, International Affairs, 77 no. 4 (2002), 943–946. They claim that Hall misunderstands the idea of the English school and ‘misrepresents the idea of an international system in world history.’

Introduction



E.B.F. Midgley.15 English School advocates, they both claim, cannot provide a solid foundation upon which the legitimacy of their claims rest.16 The emergence of this particular framework, regardless of its internal quarrels, reflects a wider series of changes within the discipline. It established the necessary space in which a normative focus on international politics concerned primarily with moral and ethical interpretations and responses to international politics could emerge. Scholars such as Chris Brown,17 Molly Cochran,18 Mervyn Frost19 and Janna Thompson20 all provide works which fall broadly into the category of normative international politics. They each confront the idea of morality and ethics within IR and provide, in their own way, an account of moral institutional design. Normative works within IR can be located within the junction of moral philosophy, political theory and international politics. Like most scholarly works within this field these studies engage with the assumed centrality of the state, yet question this particular state of affairs and ponder the historical idea of the polis and the possibility of a cosmos. There is within this work a nod towards the possibility of ethical communities within international politics and an associated discourse which transcends, and permeates, the seemingly static boundaries of a state-based system. As Toni Erskine has pointed out, this normative development ought to be understood as the natural outgrowth of domestic political theory into the theater of international politics.21 She goes on to argue, in opposition to Bull, that this development provides an otherwise absent historical background to the emerging discipline of international political thought.22 Collectively these works engage with the schema established by Hollis and Smith. Normative international political 15  E.B.F. Midgley, Natural law and the ‘Anglo-Saxons’: Some reflections in response to Hedley Bull, British Journal of International Studies 5 no. 3 (1979), 260–272. 16 Nicholas Rengger, International Relations, Political Theory and the Problem of Order: Beyond International Relations Theory? (London: Routledge, 2000). 17 Chris Brown, International Relations Theory: New Normative Approaches (London: Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1992); Sovereignty, Rights and Justice: International Political Theory Today (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2002). 18  Molly Cochran, Normative Theory in International Relations: A Pragmatic Approach (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999). 19  Mervyn Frost, Ethics in International Relations: A Constitutive Theory (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996). 20  Janna Thompson, Justice and World Order: A Philosophical Enquiry (London: Routledge, 2002). 21 Toni Erskine, Embedded Cosmopolitanism: Duties to Strangers and Enemies in a World of ‘Dislocated Communities’ (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009). 22 The idea of an disciplinary interest in international political thought is evidenced by the emergence of following texts: Chris Brown, Terry Nardin and Nicholas Rengger, International Relations in Political Thought: Texts from the Ancient Greeks to the First World War (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002); David Boucher, Political Theories of International Relations: From Thucydides to the Present (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998). This idea is likewise supported through the development of new



Justice and Morality

thought responds to the ethical dilemmas which emerge within an instrumental political framework guided by power, authority and insecurity. Chris Brown’s seminal work International Relations Theory: New Normative Approaches offers a schematic ordering system of this burgeoning field of normative international politics.23 He articulates the possibility of cosmopolitan and communitarian frameworks and contrasts these approaches with one another. Communitarian political thought, broadly speaking, locates a central role for the community. It is within this communal space that individuals are constituted and the values and ideals which they articulate first take shape. The idea of a communitarian political thought is articulated in the works of authors such as Mervyn Frost, Alastair MacIntyre and Michael Walzer. Mervyn Frost adopts a neoHegelian framework in order to establish a link between embedded norms within the community and a conception of the individual. Individuals, communities and states, he argues, play a mutually constitutive role which shapes and reshape their very being.24 While Frost looks to embedded norms in order to stem the tensions associated with the international ideal of political sovereignty alongside the norms of non-intervention and human rights, Alastair MacIntyre focuses instead on the role of traditions in our understanding of what it is to be human. Traditions emerge from shared understandings within the community which gives rise to the values and ideals towards which individuals all strive. They provide a necessary background knowledge which gives meaning to the rules and institutions guiding our daily lives.25 Finally, Michael Walzer, like Frost, engages with the norm of international sovereignty in order to determine when, and how, individuals facing grave danger can be protected. He situates his account of political obligation and responsibility within the community. It is within the community that individuals are provided with meaning in their lives. Consequently, when faced with a ‘supreme emergency’ they can act collectively in order to ensure their own protection.26 On the other hand, cosmopolitan assumptions originate within the individual who is a source of value. Broadly speaking, cosmopolitan thinking highlights a universal conception of right and good. It engages with the fragility of the human condition and espouses a commitment to a global community comprised of individual, moral, beings. To be a cosmopolitan, according to Martha Nussbaum, is to display a primary allegiance to a community of global citizens.27 Likewise, Toni journals which overtly engage in the ideas of political theory, international politics and the history of political thought. 23  Brown, 1992. 24  Frost, 1996; and, A turn not taken: Ethics in IR at the millennium, Review of International Studies, 24 no. 5 (1998), 119–132. 25 Alastair MacIntyre, After Virtue: A Study in Moral Theory (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1981). 26  Michael Walzer, Just and Unjust Wars: A Moral Argument With Historical Illustrations, 3rd edn (New York: Basic Books, 1977). 27  Martha Nussbaum, Patriotism and Cosmopolitanism, The Boston Review (1994), 1–8.

Introduction



Erskine identifies the idea of ethical cosmopolitanism which notes that ‘everyone, regardless of where he or she stands in relation to political borders, community boundaries, and even enemy lines, is equally an object of moral consideration.’28 This is in keeping with Patrick Hayden’s identification of three cosmopolitan ‘moments.’ In his work Cosmopolitan Global Politics he notes the centrality of the individual, conceptualized as an equal being, a universal account of morality and a universal interest in the well-being and development of individuals as members of a global community.29 Patrick Hayden goes on to distinguish between what he identifies as moral and legal interpretations of cosmopolitanism. The former focus on the moral equality of all individuals qua individuals whereas the latter is keen to promote a global political order premised on a universal understanding of legal rights and duties.30 Much like Hayden, Jeremy Waldron distinguishes two types of cosmopolitan thinking. Cosmopolitanism, he argues, can be located in the discourse of political philosophy as well as the philosophy of law. A cosmopolitanism that is rooted in political philosophy espouses a utopian ideal and draws on the notion of the polis in order to construct a global moral state. This idea corresponds roughly to the legal cosmopolitanism identified by Hayden and challenges the state-centric idea of international politics. On the other hand, the cosmopolitanism he attributes to the philosophy of law draws on the assumptions of Immanuel Kant. According to Waldron, Kant’s use of the phrase, ‘cosmopolitan law’ reflects the contemporary ideas of ‘international law.’ Kant, he argues, employed this idea chiefly to investigate the intersection of law, justice and right within a particular ambit of human life. As he concludes, for Immanuel Kant the idea of a perpetual peace and a cosmopolitan right was not cosmopolitanism per se, rather, it was a thesis embedded within the idea itself.31 This cosmopolitan distinction is evident in the normative discourses of IR. Within this ethical subset one can further distinguish two differing frameworks. Liberal interpretations, which draw on the original ideas of John Rawls’s A Theory of Justice,32 employ the rhetoric of rights in order to establish the well-being of 28  Erskine, 2009, 1. 29  Patrick Hayden, Cosmopolitan Global Politics (England: Ashgate Publishing Limited, 2005). 30  The focus of this critique of cosmopolitan assumptions focuses on the moral and ethical uses of the idea. This is not to discount the works of such scholars as David Held and Daniele Archibuggi who use cosmopolitan ideas in order to engage with the discourse of world order. See, for instance, David Held, Cosmopolitan Democracy: An Agenda for a New World Order (Cambridge: Polity, 1995); or, Daniele Archibuggi, The Global Commonwealth of Citizens: Toward Cosmopolitan Democracy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008). 31  Jeremy Waldron, What is cosmopolitan? Journal of Political Philosophy, 8 no. 2 (2000), 227–243. He articulates these ideas in order to clarify his original arguments which are evident in Minority cultures and the cosmopolitan alternative, University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform, 25 (1991), 751–793. 32  John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Cambridge: Belknap Press, 1971).



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the individual. These ideas are best displayed in the works of Charles Beitz33 and Thomas Pogge34 who, as students of Rawls, sought to extend justice as fairness beyond the political state. They offer an international ethic which responds to the plight of suffering others throughout the world. Charles Beitz, like the communitarian scholars already highlighted, engages with the idea of international sovereignty alongside the possibility of universal human rights. His investigation of economic institutions, situated within the state, provides a means of developing an account of international distributive justice which benefits individuals, who are conceptualized as members of a global community. This approach has wielded a formidable influence within the wider discourses of ethical international politics.35 An understanding of Beitz’s work prefaces an understanding of the ongoing debates of justice and morality in the wider discourses of IR. The relationship of justice and economics is likewise visible in the works of Thomas Pogge. He argues that global economic inequality prohibits a realistic engagement with the vulnerabilities of being human. He proposes, in the same vein as Beitz, the idea of distributive justice focusing on the redistribution of global natural resources which thereby challenges the centrality of state borders within the international system.36 33  His original work is Charles Beitz, Political Theory and International Relations (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1979). His cosmopolitanism is further developed in later publications such as International liberalism and distributive justice: A Survey of recent literature, World Politics, 51 no. 2 (January 1999), 269–296; and, Social and liberal cosmopolitanism, International Affairs, 75 no. 3 (1999), 515–529. 34 See, for example, Thomas Pogge, Real world justice, The Journal of Ethics, 9 (2005), 29–53; Severe poverty as a violation of negative duties, Ethics & International Affairs, 19 no. 1 (2005), 55–83; World Poverty and Human Rights: Cosmopolitan Responsibilities and Reforms (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2002); A Global Resource Dividend, in Ethics of Consumption: The Good Life, Justice, and Global Stewardship, David A. Crocker & Toby Linden, eds (New York: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 1988), 501–536. 35  See Nicholas Rengger, “Reading Charles Beitz: Twenty-five years of political theory and international relations, The Review of International Studies, 31 no. 2 (2005), 361– 369; Chris Brown, The house that Chuck built: Twenty-five years of reading Charles Beitz, The Review of International Studies, 31 no. 2 (2005), 371–379; David Miller, Defending political autonomy: A discussion of Charles Beitz, The Review of International Studies, 31 no. 2 (2005), 381–388; Simon Caney, Global interdependence and distributive justice, The Review of International Studies, 31 no. 2 (2005), 389–399; Catherine Lu, Cosmopolitan liberalism and the faces of injustice in international relations, The Review of International Studies, 31 no. 2 (2005), 401–408; and finally, Charles R. Beitz, Reflections, The Review of International Studies, 31 no. 2 (2005), 361–423. 36 Currently a second generation of scholars, who have, in the past, engaged with cosmopolitan ideals, are now turning to an alternative work of John Rawls, The Law of Peoples (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989). This facilitates an account of a cosmopolitan citizen embedded within a community of friendship. See, for example, Erskine, 2009; as well as Catherine Lu, Political friendship among peoples, Journal of International Political Theory, 5 no. 1 (2009), 41–58 and P.E. Digeser, Public reason and

Introduction



One can also distinguish a Kantian cosmopolitanism which, like liberal versions, notes the vulnerability and frailty of the human condition. This interpretation highlights the autonomy of the individual within the community and is well documented in the works of Onora O’Neill.37 Her cosmopolitanism draws on what she identifies as a Kantian Ethic which is derived from, but ultimately distinct from, the original works of Kant.38 She employs this theoretical framework because, she claims, it takes seriously the empirical claims of a Rawlsian influence in moral philosophy but views the centrality of the state, its border, and the bounded nature of justice discourses with a degree of skepticism. Furthermore, this particular framework sustains an account of human moral agency which draws on the ideas of Kantian reason, freedom, action and individual judgment. Such an approach, she claims, can facilitate the shifting role of the state and the cosmopolitan ideal of universal morality. These ideas are presented in their most refined state in her latest work, Towards Justice and Virtue, where O’Neill seeks to provide an account of justice premised on practical reason in order to accommodate both universal and particular assumptions of human good.39 Cosmopolitan discourses, regardless of their origin, represent the chief response to the problems of human suffering and inequality within the theater of international politics. Underlying their structural differences cosmopolitanism is united in its recognition of the frailty of the human condition and the vulnerabilities which this brings about. A cursory glance at international politics by cosmopolitan scholars reflects the inequalities associated with the structures of global governance. They reveal a deep seated malaise as individuals lucky enough to live in a developed and stable state thrive to the detriment of other individuals in less developed and less well-endowed states. For cosmopolitan scholars, suffering exists within the structures and practices of international politics. These structures are man made international friendship, Journal of International Political Theory, 5 no. 1 (2009), 22–40. This idea is challenged by Simon Keller, who claims that the link between individuals and their friendships when applied to inter-state relations is dubious and ontologically challenging; see Against friendship between countries, Journal of International Political Theory, 5 no. 1 (2009), 59–74. 37 See, for example, Onora O’Neill, Bounded and cosmopolitan justice, Review of International Studies, 26 (2000), 45–60; Faces of Hunger: An Essay on Poverty, Justice and Development (London: Allen & Unwin, 1986). 38 There are, she claims, three different ways of labeling the works of Kant and their various interpretations. The first, Kant’s ethics, reflects the original works he produced. A second category, ‘Kant’s ethics,’ is the first round of interpretations of his ideas which, she notes, is distinctly negative in its tone. A third and final category, ‘Kantian Ethics,’ reflects a discourse derived from the ideas of Kant, but is distinct from his original interpretations. This work is largely positive and has been used within IR to develop a discourse of international cosmopolitan ethics. See Onora O’Neill, Kantian Ethics, in A Companion to Ethics, Peter Singer, ed. (Oxford: Blackwell Publishers Ltd, 1991), 175–185. 39 Onora O’Neill, Towards Justice and Virtue: A Constructive Account of Practical Reasoning (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996).

10

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and are, logically, capable of being changed. Potentially, they could be restructured in order to better acknowledge the frailty of the human condition and address the needs of individuals. The possibility of change is central to the human experience. It represents, in the wider discourses of the history of political thought, the emergence of the modern notion of human progress. It combines the cognitive abilities of individuals, who are understood as political agents, to structure the social world. Cosmopolitans engage with the notion of progress. In so doing they highlight a series of assumptions about the human being. The idea that individuals possess the wherewithal to affect structural change, and effectively deal with the contingent factors of being human, is a decidedly modern phenomenon. It assumes a degree of control in the natural world, which in reality individuals struggle to realize. As Cynthia Helpern notes, modern conceptions of the individual assume that human knowledge and ingenuity can responsibly address and react to the problems which emerge when individuals live together.40 This idea is likewise documented by Niamh Middleton. She notes how the philosophy of the social sciences, loosely based on a scientific methodology, facilitated an understanding of individuals as autonomous and knowledgeable beings.41 Knowledge, it is revealed, empowered individuals who sought to limit the contingent frailty of being human in common. It facilitated political agency directed at improving the human experience. This historical turn had serious implications for moral institutional design. It was assumed that in order to focus on the potential for human progress, an impartial and sterile institutional design was necessary. Consequently, human progress came to be associated with the public realm of ‘the political.’ This move further entrenched the centrality of instrumental relationships to the detriment of non-instrumental relationships. This, in turn, marginalized the social assumptions associated with ‘being political.’ Consequently, contemporary interpretations of moral cosmopolitanism begin with a series of assumptions which sustain an impartial and autonomous moral agent. This individual exists unaware of the wider social assumptions which support his or her moral development. This isolated state challenges effective agency and denies a realistic understanding of human vulnerability. The individual fails to engage with the idea that suffering might just reflect either one of two uncontrollable variables, being social or moral luck. Discussions relating to moral luck become relevant when sought-after ends are not achieved. As Bernard Williams points out, deliberative agents may act in a morally appropriate manner yet sought after ends may remain elusive.42 At this 40 Cynthia Helpern, Suffering, Politics and Power: A Genealogy in Modern Political Theory (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2002). 41  Niamh Middleton, Aquinas, the Enlightenment and Darwin, New Blackfriars, 86 no. 1004 (July 2005), 437–449. This point is likewise noted in Hyn Yol Jung, Enlightenment and the question of the Other: A postmodern audition, Human Studies, 25 no. 3 (September 2002), 297–306. 42  B.A.O. Williams and T. Nagel, Moral luck, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Volumes, 50 (1976), 11135 & 137–151.

Introduction

11

point one must then look beyond the controllable, to the contingent, and ponder the consequences of one’s actions. Are remorse and regret suitable reactions to negative consequences, or should individuals continue on, aware that, regardless of the outcome, their reasonable deliberations were best suited to the sought after, yet elusive ends? As Williams points out, regret and remorse remain unpalatable in a modern context. He highlights the central assumptions of John Rawls to make his point clear. His account of deliberative rationality does not allow for the possibility of blame, and the practical methodology he articulates is a sound one. Morality and luck, within this liberal framework, can not coexist simultaneously in the lives of individual political agents. This framework highlights the lack of control which individuals have over the natural world and challenges the modern ideals of institutional design. Likewise a Kantian perspective is hard-pressed to accept a role for moral luck in the daily lives of individuals. This idea is expressed by Thomas Nagel, in response to Bernard Williams, when he highlights that virtue, according to Kant, is equally available to all individuals. He acknowledges that it may be more difficult for one individual over another to achieve a virtuous state, but his exposition of the autonomous will leading to an understanding of the moral law provides an account of the free individual who exists outside contingent life factors.43 One can draw parallels between this idea and the early writings of Martha Nussbaum who contrasts the tragic and vulnerable experiences of Hector, in the battle of Troy, with the experiences of Agamemnon who must sacrifice his daughter, Iphigenia, in order to appease the gods and set sail for Troy.44 While Hector is aware of the moral tragedy he is experiencing and mourns graciously, and incorporates the experience into his moral trajectory, Agamemnon remains aloof and unaffected. This state of being is unsatisfactory and as the Chorus reveal, his unwillingness to bend to the hands of fate requires punishment. The Fragility of Goodness45 articulates an ancient moral framework revealing an account of human life that is vulnerable and balances on the precipice of tragedy. For Nussbaum, moral experiences are set within the community which advances a notion of moral goodness. This stands in stark contrast to the Kantian experience whereby right is an independent standard discoverable through human reason, and is not focused on the community. The autonomy of right facilitates the removal of moral luck from the contemporary moral experience in a way that Aristotelian readings of the moral life and its contingencies could not. Her Aristotelian examination of luck and tragedy hints at the ensuing account of being political which facilitates the contingent and unpredictable human experiences which challenge the ideal of progress. Moral luck is but one aspect of the human experience that allows for the expression of human vulnerability. Another aspect which demonstrates an 43  Williams and Nagel, 1976. 44  Martha Craven Nussbaum, The Fragility of Goodness: Luck and Ethics in Greek Tragedy and Philosophy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001). 45  Nussbaum, 2001.

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individual’s potential for tragedy, and therefore suffering, lies in their social nature. The idea that individuals are naturally social beings is a contested one; however, as this work unfolds the social ontology of being human will emerge and with it another related assumption: individuals require both instrumental and non-instrumental relationships in order to develop as moral beings. This work highlights the centrality of non-instrumental relationships as vehicles of social learning within ‘the political’ which engage with both the public and private aspects of the human experience in an equal manner. It describes how familial relationships educate children on social expectations and behavior within the community. Likewise, they establish the reciprocal expectations of care and love which help to foster a greater sense of solidarity, friendship and, perchance, charity within the community. These values and ideals, this work argues, preface an alternative structure and role for both the individual and the community which is both ethical and moral and relevant to normative IR discourses. This institutional design does not preface the non-instrumental relationships over their instrumental counterparts, it simply reiterates their importance. However, in so doing it reveals the vulnerability which modern and contemporary institutional designs seek to limit. With care, love and friendship also comes the possibility of hurt, mistrust and fear which can arise in egotistical situations of desire. Such are the contingent factors which human beings can not control and when left unaddressed can lead to the wider consequences of suffering. The various cosmopolitan institutional designs reveal a proclivity to deny the very aspects which unite individuals as beings in common. The denial of noninstrumental relations, and therefore uncontrollable contingencies, within this realm does not afford a realistic means of engaging with what it is to be a human being. When Nussbaum and, inter alia, Williams speak of moral luck they are asking their readers to grasp the sensitivity of living together aware that there are situations in which individuals exercise limited control on their outcomes. When these outcomes are negative, this is referred to in many political discourses as a tragic state. It is the reality of this experience which is recreated throughout this work through the deployment and defense of a natural law account of politics. This account offers a critical interpretation of international politics which allows for a reengagement with non-instrumental relationships. Non-instrumental relationships, it will be argued, reveal a particular type of knowledge which stands in stark contrast to the impartial cosmopolitan individual. It acknowledges that individuals, while founded on a social and moral ontology, are in effect unique beings. It is this individuality which must be addressed within the community if our shared vulnerabilities are to be acknowledged. Until this acknowledgment permeates the wider structures of international politics, and the vulnerability of the human experiences is engaged with, the tragic nature of international politics will remain and the discourse of moral international politics will have, at best, a limited influence on the ability to accommodate the vulnerability of the human condition. Individuals, regardless of their location, are vulnerable and frail beings. This vulnerability marks the primary means whereby individuals can relate to each other

Introduction

13

as beings in common. Our shared vulnerability stems from our need to engage with each other and reflects our inherent social nature. It demonstrates the shared need we all have to live within a community of individuals. These communities reflect both the instrumental and non-instrumental relationships which provide the reciprocal support that individuals require to develop and care for others in turn. A failure to identify and engage with this natural sociability limits the possibility for human moral development which, in turn, limits the possibility of a realistic conception of ‘the political.’ While cosmopolitan scholars articulate an understanding of human vulnerability, their supporting assumptions fail to offer a means of realistically grappling with the challenge of vulnerability itself. It is the absent social assumptions of being human which facilitate the personal knowledge of individuals, in their daily lives and experiences, which incorporates the vulnerability of the human experience within ‘the political.’ This work reflects an alternative means of understanding what it is to be a human being as a social and moral individual. It situates itself within the historical and contemporary conceptions of natural law morality in order to move beyond the structural assumptions of the cosmopolitan discourse which, it argues, is unable to seriously address the contingent and particular variables of being human within a moral community. Suffering is both a natural and political experience. Its consequences are expressed in the daily experiences of being human. As William E. Connolly points out, suffering is an ongoing activity. Particular individuals ‘bear, endure, undergo, or submit’ to experiences which limit their ability to develop in a morally acceptable fashion. To suffer is to experience the opposite of joy, comfort, mastery and wholeness.46 As a political phenomenon, suffering can be located as the opposite corollary to agency. It is the inability to act and express hurt and pain. It is, as David B. Morris writes a silent process. In order to understand this process one must experience it. It is incommunicable.47 The relationship of agency and suffering is likewise commented on by Cynthia Helpern who notes the manner in which both come together. ‘Politics sits squarely in the middle of that void between active and passive, patient and agent, sufferer and deliverer,’ she writes.48 One can extend this idea further, situating ideas about suffering not only within ‘the political,’ but also within a moral framework. This is a valuable step beyond political notions of suffering because it facilitates the idea that suffering is part of the human experience. Consequently, any attempt to 46  William E. Connolly, Suffering, justice and the politics of becoming, Culture, Medicine and Psychiatry, 20 no. 3 (September 1996), 251–252. This idea is likewise articulated in Suffering, justice and the politics of becoming, in Rethinking Ethics and World Politics, David Campbell & Michael J. Shapiro, eds (Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press, 1999), 125–153 (Chapter 5). 47  David B. Morris, About suffering: Voice, genre, and moral community, in Social Suffering, Arthur Kleinman, Veena Das and Margaret Lock, eds (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997), 27. 48  Helpern, 2002, 10.

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engage with this phenomenon of human suffering requires a holistic understanding of what it is to be a moral human being which draws on both instrumental and noninstrumental relationships. Non-instrumental relations provide agents with the particular knowledge necessary to engage with specific instances of suffering while aware of the idiosyncracies that distinguish individuals within the community. The structure of ‘the political’ which emerges from a fusion of instrumental and noninstrumental relationships reveals how responses to suffering can be both individual and particular provided the response is couched within a wider moral framework. This twofold approach to understanding and engaging with human suffering is facilitated by a natural law framework. A natural law approach facilitates such an understanding of human suffering. It articulates the absolute ends of goodness and the particular ends of human development which provide the sensitivity to address the vulnerabilities of the human experience through a particular understanding of love and charity. This approach highlights the most basic aspect of a shared account of humanity: our common frailty. It also highlights the relational nature of the being human. A natural law morality consequently accepts the structural focus of cosmopolitan accounts, but argues that the impartialist assumptions of their origins fail to address the totality of the human experience and by extension, human frailty as well. Before moving on to engage more fully with the idea of natural law morality one further interpretation of cosmopolitanism must be examined. Second generation cosmopolitan scholars have sought to address the challenges of impartialism and universalism which accompany both the liberal and Kantian interpretations. The ideas of Catherine Lu and Toni Erskine reveal a cosmopolitan framework which embeds the individual within a particular conception of the community. This facilitates a reworking of cosmopolitanism while simultaneously challenging the dichotomy established by Brown. Catherine Lu attempts to ‘salvage’ the idea of an ethical cosmopolitanism by highlighting different images of humanity. She challenges the utopian critique through an exegesis of human vulnerability and the proclivity individuals, as agents, have to do morally evil deeds; however, she does not express vulnerability and frailty in isolation. She is also aware of the peculiarities which define each individual. Cosmopolitanism, she claims, need not be a homogeneous ethic. This particularity avoids the challenges of imperialism which underscores its universality. She concludes that cosmopolitanism can be ‘non-idealist, non-alienating and non-coercive.’49 These ideas are similarly taken up by Toni Erskine who seeks to articulate the idea of embedded cosmopolitanism which not only addresses the shortcomings of previous cosmopolitan thinkers, but invites otherwise excluded scholars, namely communitarian ethicists, into the debates in order to enrich the role of the ethical community alongside the individual. Their works provide many parallels with the soon to be elaborated natural law approach; however, while one can find evidence of an improved 49 Catherine Lu, The one and many faces of cosmopolitanism, Journal of Political Philosophy, 8 no. 2 (December 2002), 244–267.

Introduction

15

interpretation of cosmopolitanism, they fail to discuss the relationality of human experience which, it is argued, is required in order to address the vulnerabilities of being human in common. Embedded Cosmopolitanism: Duties to Strangers and Enemies in a World of ‘Dislocated Communities’ represents a detailed and thought out response to many of the challenges faced by cosmopolitan scholars. It also engages with the manner in which IR proposes to study the idea of normative international relations.50 Erskine’s ideas draw on the works of many scholars, in particular Michael Walzer, Onora O’Neill and a group of feminist scholars which she labels ‘different voice feminists,’ in order to argue that when individuals are conceptualized within particular relationships the idea of geographic communities is dissolved thus opening up the possibility of a porous international ethic. Relations, for Erskine, sustain human autonomy and self-sufficiency all the while providing an account of the ‘dislocated community.’ Individuals can choose which relationships will define who they are and what allegiances and affiliations will be close to their heart while other will remain further afield. This idea of community highlights the centrality of shared membership, but remains an informal conceptualization. The various communities which individuals are part of can overlap, increase or decrease depending on the nature of the individual. Moreover, they are, for Erskine, the primary means of addressing both the impartiality and universality critiques of previous cosmopolitan accounts. A cursory glance at this idea seems to improve on previous interpretations; however, at the same time, alternative challenges must be addressed. The theme of vulnerability, key to many of her predecessors’ and contemporaries’ works, is all but absent from her theoretical framework. Like Beitz and Pogge, she draws on the asocial individual attributed to the ideas of John Rawls. Owing to this influence there remains an overt acceptance of the pre-social self. Moreover, she brackets human agency from the moral experience. How an individual can embed themselves absent a strong idea of agency remains problematic. Another inconsistency is the manner in which norms and instrumental relationships are used to make the case for an embedded community and a responsibility to strangers, even during times of war. Instead of pointing to the underlying vulnerability of being human, Erskine highlights the legal discourse of the Geneva Conventions to add credibility to her claims of partial cosmopolitan ethic. While her notion of community begs for an examination of non-instrumental relationships she remains focused on the instrumental relations of formal IR discourses as represented in the international laws of war. Consequently one wonders whether or not Erskine is able to bridge the gap established by Brown so long ago. What emerges from Erskine’s reworking of the cosmopolitan ethic is in fact a desire to recapture the relationship of the individual and the community which typifies pre-modern moral thought. This relationship would provide the elusively sought after unity which Erskine seeks to establish though her engagement with the works of communitarian and feminist thinkers. 50  Erskine, 2009.

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A natural law framework sustains the elusively sought after unity of ‘embedded cosmopolitanism.’ Advocating the morality of natural law may seem an unexpected ethical traditional to invoke within international politics. Indeed, it is understood by some to be a less than palatable turn. Yet it is to the natural law tradition that this work turns in light of the previously articulated idea of human suffering. It notes the vulnerabilities associated with both moral luck and an inherently social nature and claims that only a framework that articulates a holistic account of being political will successfully begin to address the phenomenon of human suffering. As individuals, we are all linked by our common frailty and the possibility of death. Indeed, death is the ultimate expression of moral failure in the presence of human suffering. A natural law framework addresses this most basic of human phenomenon which incorporates the realities of the human experience. It advocates the integration of human non-instrumental relationships alongside the formal structures of governance in order to provide knowledge of what it is to be a particular person within a larger moral framework. Consequently it improves the impartiality of the cosmopolitan discourses by articulating the idea of persons in relations. It openly addresses the relationship of morality and ethics within international politics and engages with the idea of tragedy in IR more broadly. It provides a response through the articulation of an account of moral agency which locates the potential for positive action within each and every individual conceptualized as members of particular and distant communities. It assumes outright the social and moral nature of individuals and espouses a symbiotic relationship between individuals which reflects a particular ordering of the moral community. The community, on this account, is the end of personal non-instrumental relationships structured within an account of moral governance engendering institutional patterns which sustain individual identity within the community. It identifies who will care and support us and who we support in turn. A natural law framework also provides a critical standard from which to evaluate current political structures and determine if they are meeting the primary needs they were originally created to meet. As this work will reveal, the ends of human happiness, or integral human fulfillment, coupled with the particular knowledge gained through non-instrumental relationships of love provide a means of evaluating the patterns which emerge from formal political structures. It develops a casuistry of well-being drawing on a rearticulation of the ends of universal human rights while simultaneously challenging their current liberal interpretation. The value of a premodern natural law framework lies in the challenge it mounts against the impartiality of modern liberal political thought and the contemporary political subject therein. Likewise, it is skeptical of the ideal of human progress and its centrality in the task of institutional design. Instead, it focuses on the idea of human engagement. This final focus on human engagements, and relational being, distinguishes this natural law account from its cosmopolitan cousins. The pre-social origins which Erskine identifies, and are visible in the works of other scholars, do not necessitate

Introduction

17

an associated account of agency at the outset.51 Owing to the relationality of human beings and the epistemic relationships of thought and knowledge, a natural law interpretation offers an account of agency and individuals as moral agents alongside and within an unfolding natural law interpretation of being political. It is the possibility of agency which allows for a critique of current institutions, as well as the possibility of future change. It is the possibility of change which drives this work. It seeks not to engage in the debates of suffering per se, but rather, having identified the problem of human suffering and locating its place within the formal structures of international politics through an exegesis of cosmopolitan discourses, it seeks instead to propose an account of international politics which engages with the possibility of moral institutional design in light of man’s inherent vulnerabilities which emerge when individuals are simultaneously conceptualized as social, moral and necessarily political beings. Chapter 1 moves quickly beyond the cosmopolitan works identified in this Introduction and locates alternative accounts of tragedy in international relations. It does this through an examination of political philosophy and international political thought, documenting the loss of non-instrumental knowledge within domestic institutional design and the discourse of international law. It offers a historical account of political and moral philosophy beginning with the Enlightenment. It then highlights the challenges posed for more modern interpretations of international politics and the changing relationship of ethics and morality within the discipline itself. This is achieved through a formal investigation of the contemporary idea of tragedy in international relations and draws on a wide range of authors who exist within the peripheries of the realist discourse in IR. Chapter 2 proposes the idea of a natural law framework. As was documented in this Introduction, the natural law framework is decidedly pre-modern and focuses on the relationality and vulnerability of the human experience. Yet Chapter 2 is concerned with addressing the criticisms of natural law within the formal discipline of IR. It offers a historical overview of the tradition before demonstrating its presence, albeit a hidden one, within contemporary debates of IR through the distinction of thick and thin ideas of natural morality. Chapter 2 establishes the presence of natural law in international politics and goes on to show how an assimilation of thick and thin accounts is possible owing to the work of the New Natural Lawyers. It challenges their interpretation, but offers at the same time a defense of the theological criticisms highlighted by English School scholars, in particular Hedley Bull. It draws on the Papal Encyclicals and the philosophical ideas of Weber in order to demonstrate that faith reflects ideas and that ideas are central to the human experience. Moreover, it demonstrates how this notion of 51  While Erskine brackets the idea of agency within her work, she does not discount the need to account for the idea of individual and collective moral agency. See Toni Erskine, Can Institutions Have Responsibilities? Collective Moral Agency and International Relations (Houndsville: Palgrave MacMillan, 2003). She articulates an all-encompassing definition of agency and examines the role of institutions and states in light of this idea.

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faithful politics can inform contemporary international politics when one seeks to offer a realistic appraisal of the human condition. Chapter 3 builds the necessary framework needed to adopt an account of politics in which instrumental and non-instrumental relationships feature as equal and prominent sources for institutional patterns. It draws on the ideas of Thomas Aquinas in order to articulate an account of the natural law individual and locates these ideas in his original ideas of natural law. It develops the interweaving of thick and thin natural morality in order to demonstrate that within his works Aquinas provides a vision of the community that supports agency and challenges the centrality of the state in international politics. It articulates an account of being human premised on the potential of human development in order to espouse an account of political obligation and responsibility derived from the idea of love. Chapter 4 draws out the nuances of the natural law account of love. It uses this idea to offer an account of the natural law agent alongside the community espousing the ideals of civic friendship when it is coupled with the natural dominion of the Salamanca Theologians. It concludes with an examination of Aquinas’s understanding of charity in order to show how this particular virtue can contribute to an understanding of an unbounded account of international politics. This facilitates the development of fluid and dynamic institutional patterns which accommodate the idea of individuals conceptualized as agents of justice. It highlights the possibility of commutative interpretations of justice, as opposed to distributive accounts located in cosmopolitan discourses, and shows how this idea complements the relationality of being. It situates this work alongside pre-existing feminist debates about care and shows how the natural equality of being which features within the morality of natural law can offer insight into the possibility of relational politics. This work draws to a close by demonstrating how, in the end, the morality of natural law can affect the structures, practices, and traditional ideas of international politics. It begins with a description of ‘the international’ in order to demonstrate the possibility of an open-ended account of international politics. This facilitates a non-territorial account of the political community. This is followed by an acute critique of human rights and provides, instead, a natural law response. This facilitates the development of a casuistry of well-being which demonstrates the feasibility of collective moral agency. Chapter 5 concludes through an articulate of ‘the personal’—an informed account of international politics which engages, one final time, with the vulnerability of being human, in common. It notes that individuals are fallible, but reiterates that when situated within the proper moral structures there is a possibility to do goodness, but that individuals can at times err, and in such instances the possibility of human suffering is greater.

Chapter 1

International Relations and Modern Institutional Design: Locating the Isolated Individual Introduction A contested notion, the idea of modernity invokes a wide variety of interpretations. Nicholas Onuf notes that modernity represents the unfolding of a story of how we, as individuals, have chosen to structure our political communities. The ‘we’ to which he refers must be a Western understanding of the political community and originates primarily in the works of Rene Descartes. For Onuf, Descartes’ works are of chief importance if one is to understand the traditional assumptions of modernity. His works influenced not only politics and philosophy, but dramatically changed the role of morality and religion within the state. In a similar vein, Stephen Toulmin, highlights the varied interpretations which surround the notion of modernity. Toulmin offers an alternative insight to that of Onuf and focuses his energies on the received view of modernity. He challenges this particular account, noting that modernity does not represent one moment of time but instead ought to be understood as a development which took place over a few hundred years and brought with it wide-sweeping social change. Modernity, he argues, represents a response to the malaise which resulted chiefly from the social turmoil and domestic conflict in Britain and Europe. While he is skeptical of the ‘modernity’ label, his work indentifies some overarching themes that are important for this work; in particular, a call for universal order in order to sustain stable political relations. He does however identify some overarching themes with which this work is interested; in particular, a call for universal order in order to sustain stable political relations. He further argues that such themes can be found in the social contract tradition of political philosophy which outlines a particular version of legitimate political authority and an account of responsible citizenship as well. Modernity not only brought with it an emerging discourse on authority and citizenship, it also instigated a series of discussions on the following themes: the role of morality in politics as well as religion, and the many ways the political  Nicholas Greenwood Onuf, The Republican Legacy in International Thought (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998).  Stephen Toulmin, Cosmopolis: The Hidden Agenda of Modernity (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1990).

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community ought to be structured. What emerges as one further investigates the various accounts of modernity is the desire for a general methodology which favors rational knowledge over reasonableness. Likewise, a clear demarcation between the public and the private emerges The individual, as a political agent, came to be associated chiefly with public engagements of a rational sort. These assumptions subtly informed the nature and function of morality in the community. Public morality was focused on notions of right and wrong and took on the language of jurisprudence. Reasonable moral discourse was accessible to the individual through a process of inner reflection and was limited to the private areas of daily life. It did not feature in public social institutions. This inward moral turn is discussed in some detail by Richard Rorty. His work, Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature, focuses on the moral philosophy of the Enlightenment paying particular attention to the works of Immanuel Kant. He notes how Kant processes the ideas of Descartes in such a way as to turn the desire to know and understand morality into a personal endeavor. This is contrasted with pre-modern and ancient accounts of political society which located the task of knowing and understanding morality as a central task for the community, itself the product of human relationships. Consequently the discourses of civic friendship and solidarity evident in pre-modern and ancient accounts of political philosophy disappear into the political landscape. These evolving ideas of the individual and his or her interactions within the community bear significant contemporary import. They sustain the philosophical foundation of contemporary cosmopolitan ethics, which it is argued contribute, in no small part, to the isolation and self-interested nature of the contemporary political individual. Albeit it a contested notion, the themes associated with modernity have had a dramatic influence on ‘the political.’ Natural law scholars such as E.B.F.  Richard Rorty, Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1980).  These themes will be further explored in Chapter 2 when thick and thin accounts of natural law morality are offered to the reader. This exploration reveals how, in contrast to modern social contract accounts of justice and morality, historical authors such as Aristotle and Aquinas offer a vision of the political community focused on human relationships and reveal the primacy of friendship, solidarity and charity in the development of political communities.  This work focuses primarily on the political interpretations of modernity and not those which choose to highlight the economic changes. Yet it does not deny that they exist. Rather, it recognizes the intrinsic link between the differing accounts as detailed in the works of the authors mentioned below. For example, Hardt and Negri articulate an interpretation of modernity which focuses on the powers of a temporal existence in order to challenge the capitalist structures of the state. The contemporary state, they argue, represents the ends of capitalism and demonstrates how the centralization of power in the hands of the prince sustains the economic incentives for warfare. See for example, Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri, Empire (Harvard: Harvard University Press, 2001). Likewise, C.B. Macpherson notes the detrimental effects of twinning capitalism and the modern state. He associates these relationships with possessive individuals motivated to act for their own

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Midgley and Jacques Maritain highlight how the modern turn in political philosophy marginalized the ontology of being that was characteristic of pre-modern philosophical works. Whereas previously the individual was conceptualized as a graceful being sustained by the assumptions of natural dominion and political agency this is no longer the case. The changing ontology of being led to a vision of the domestic community which, as Maritain argues, denied individual autonomy and freedom, thus precluding any vestige of one’s telos. In the same vein, Midgley demonstrates how this non-ontological turn fails to account for any overarching universal account of morality. An investigation into the development of ius gentium throughout history demonstrates a focus on ‘its content’ and not ‘its source,’ thereby denying the possibility of scholars and practitioners to realistically account for a universal moral community and more generally a legitimate global political order. With this in mind, the second section of this chapter investigates the development of an international discourse of jurisprudence paying particular attention to the idea of ius gentium. This, it is hoped, demonstrates the influence of modernity’s assumptions of morality and its extension into the wider sphere of international politics and law. A.P. d’Entreves further investigates the relationship of law and morality in light of modernity. He argues morality was transformed and came to represent right and wrong and, like the arguments of Maritain, lacked a teleological component. What was natural, he argues, was to be controlled, and if found uncontrollable, it was situated outside the accepted boundaries of politics. The removal of ‘the natural,’ he argues, facilitated a subjective account of the world and the individual’s place within it.10 These ideas are similarly articulated by John MacMurray, a theologian, self-interested needs which stem from the dominance of scarcity and abundance discourses in political economy. See for example, C.B. Macpherson, The Political Theory of Possessive Individualism: Hobbes to Locke (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1964). Also, C.B. Macpherson, Democratic Theory: Essays in Retrieval (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1974). While Macpherson articulates a renewed sense of democracy in order to overcome this problem, Hardt and Negri emphasize the transcendental abilities of individuals as political agents and mount a challenge to the assumptions of modernity.   E.B.F. Midgley, The Natural Law Tradition and the Theory of International Relations (London: Elek, 1975).   Jacques Maritain, Philosophy and the unity of the sciences, Address by Jacques Maritain at the 27th annual meeting of the American Catholic Philosophical Association, University of Notre Dame, April 7, 1953. Transcribed from a written manuscript (Jacques Maritain Center, University of Notre Dame), http://www.2nd/edu/Departments/Maritain/ jm209.htm; and, The Range of Reason (New York: Scribner, 1952).   Jacques Maritain, True Humanism, translated by Lionel Landry (London: Sheed & Ward, 1946).   For a more detailed account of this claim, see his exchange with Hedley Bull in the British Journal of Politics detailed in Chapter 2. 10  A.P. d’Entreves, The case for natural law re-examined, Natural Law Forum, 5 (1956), 5–52; and, Natural Law: An Introduction to Legal Philosophy (London: Hutchinson

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albeit not of a natural law persuasion.11 He, like d’Entreves, locates what he calls a pragmatic morality arising in the works of many modern political philosophers and, in particular, Hobbes. His focus is on the place of the individual within the community and his writings document the demise of reasonableness, the rise of the technologically rational state and the individual therein. His writings describe what many scholars of international politics have sought to understand—the tragedy of the human condition. This chapter builds on this idea of tragedy which is itself related to the vulnerabilities of the human condition. It highlights, in the first section, how the modern social contract tradition reflects one response to this problem. Moving onto the international influence of these ideas, this chapter concludes with an examination of the works of the tragic realists, both historical and contemporary, and describes the tragic vision of international politics. What ought to emerge from this descriptive account is an awareness of the isolation and self-interested account of the individual and its associated account of ‘being political.’ As a whole, the assumptions which are represented in the various accounts of modernity provide a descriptive account of similarly constituted individuals living an isolated existence in the community. When this isolation is examined alongside the morality of right and wrong it further establishes the self-interested existence of the individual. It reveals the inevitability of the amoral community and precludes any desire on the part of the individual to take an active interest in the well-being and development of another. It is this depiction of the individual which, when placed alongside the accounts of human suffering offered in the Introduction, further challenges any account of institutional design seeking to achieve a measure of equality and justice in the theater of international politics. This chapter seeks to inform the reader as to how these assumptions came to dominate ‘the political’ and how this account has also informed international politics. This work acknowledges the problems associated with the term ‘modernity’ and modern political thought; however, it accepts certain central themes within the authors’ works investigated in this chapter. These themes provide a point of origin for the ensuing critique of the political and social structures which shape the contemporary human experience. What ought to become increasingly clear as the chapter concludes is that, in order to begin to understand the phenomenon of human suffering in a more appropriate manner, one needs to develop a relational account of being, something that is missing, yet hinted at in the discourses of second generation cosmopolitan scholars House, 1951). This is also documented by John F. Wippel, Metaphysical Themes in Thomas Aquinas: Studies in Philosophy and the History of Philosophy, Volume 10 (Washington DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 1984). 11  John MacMurray, The Form of the Personal, Vol. 1. The Self as Agent; being the Gifford lectures delivered in the University of Glasgow in 1953 (London: Faber and Faber Limited, 1953); as well as, John MacMurray, The Form of the Personal, Vol. 2. Persons in relation; being the Gifford Lectures delivered in the University of Glasgow in 1954 (London: Faber and Faber Limited, 1961).

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who articulate an embedded cosmopolitanism yet fail to provide a foundational account of their relational nature. Enlightenment Political Philosophy As the introduction to this chapter has shown, there are a variety of alternative interpretations of modernity or, sometimes, the Enlightenment. Indeed the very notion of ‘modern’ political philosophy is a decidedly Western idea limited to the political philosophies of Great Britain, continental Europe and some areas of the Americas. That being said, one can draw a few thematic similarities in and amongst all of these interpretations: a universal human nature, an emphasis on scientific, rational thought, and the desire for one overarching account of political order. In what follows, three authors are examined: Thomas Hobbes, John Locke and Jean Jacques Rousseau. These theorists have not been chosen at random. Their works reflect, in different ways, the ideas examined by scholars of modernity. Each in their own way reflects on a key problem of contemporary international relations—legitimate political authority. Theirs was a domestic interpretation of political order but their theories, it is argued, have influenced the central ideas of international politics. It is these origins which go some way to explain the current isolation of the individual as a political subject. An exegesis of their ideas begins to explain more fully the manner in which contemporary politics remains focused on the idea of stability as a political goal and the means used to achieve it. Thomas Hobbes The works of Thomas Hobbes represent a reaction to the violence of the English Civil Wars.12 He bore witness to the atrocities of this time period and sought to limit the possibility of political violence. He believed that the potential for violence rested on the subjective world views of men which, owing to a lack of complete knowledge about the natural world, were open to interpretation and, therefore, disagreement.13 Consequently, he articulated a negative view of human nature which influenced his understanding of religion and the need for political authority coalescing in the idea of the Leviathan as the ultimate form of political authority. If religion was the primary quarrel among men then it ought, Hobbes supposed, to be eliminated from the practice of politics. In order to achieve this end Hobbes began to redraw the lines of acceptable and unacceptable political discourse and in the process placed religion outside the realm of politics. Religious political discourse demonstrated how emotional and passionate responses to serious political problems challenged the stability of the political community. Instead, Hobbes framed the 12  A point well documented in Toulmin, 1990. 13 This point is highlighted in Richard Tuck, Introduction, in Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan, revised student edn, Richard Tuck, ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991).

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discourse of politics in the rational language of scientific discourse. He was fascinated with the absolute certainty of mathematics and believed that if such rigorous standards were applied to the rhetoric of politics a rational and sterile interpretation of political order could be established and in the process the instability of political conflict could be overcome.14 This was a marked change from the political philosophies which predated his work. Instead of focusing on a natural ontology which assumed the benevolent grace of God informing human nature, Hobbes looked to the natural world in order to understand the true nature of human beings. Hobbes begins his account of politics in the state of nature, which he describes as a state of war owing to the lack of legitimate political authority.15 In this arena the true nature of the individual is revealed. All individuals are equal beings but are driven by a natural desire for glory and thus must compete with one another for its attainment.16 This competition fuels an atmosphere of insecurity and mistrust as individuals are unable to discern a measure of natural cooperation amongst one another. This is complicated to a further degree owing to the fact that in a state of nature all individuals all are equally endowed with the necessary skills for survival. Consequently, a natural competition emerges whereby individuals vie with one another for an increasing amount of power.17 This notion of power is discussed in some detail in Hobbes’ work De Cive.18 Power is instrumental and can only be secured through the natural capacities of the individual in a competition to dominate another. Thus in a state of nature one acquires power, albeit for a short period of time, through the death of another. Power, so interpreted, is fungible. It can only be measured against something or someone and therefore lacks the transferability which ought to secure survival. Therefore while the accumulation of power ought to generate a degree of security, in fact it does not. It is in a constant state of flux. Consequently, individuals in a state of war tend towards political organization in the form of society, if only to guarantee their own survival. It is this account of power, and the origins of political conflict which, when coupled with his account of human nature, influence contemporary interpretations of international politics.19 14  For a more detailed account of this account, see Hobbes, 1991a, Chapter 5, Reason and Science. 15  Hobbes, 1991a. 16 See for example Gabriella Slomp, Thomas Hobbes and the Political Philosophy of Glory (Basingstoke: Macmillan Press, 2000). 17  This account of conflict reflects Hobbes’ previously described assumption of a subjective, and not objective, world view adopted by individuals. It should be noted that the idea of a subjective account of politics, which is criticized in this work, does not reflect traditional ideas of subjectivity, but rather is focused instead on the role of the individual as a political subject and not an objective agent. This point will be further explored in later chapters. 18 Thomas Hobbes, The Elements of Law, Natural & Political, Ferdinand Tonnies, ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991b). 19  The idea of a tragic human nature will be fully developed in the final section of this chapter.

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Hobbes proposes the creation of a Leviathan, one overarching powerful figure which governs civil society.20 The legitimacy of such an entity lies in the consent of the individuals to be governed and thereby accept its rulings. The establishment of the Leviathan represents the emergence of the individual from a state of nature and the establishment of political society. The Leviathan legislates and orders the political community, defining at the same time what it is to be a responsible political subject. The chief responsibility of the citizen is one of obedience to the Leviathan. It is a reciprocal account of obedience. The legitimate authority of the Leviathan relies on an accepted account of individual liberty which guards the autonomy and freedom of the individual. Yet his vision of the individual, like the Leviathan, is sterile, even mechanical. Individuals are likened to mechanical parts; the heart is a spring, the nerves are strings and the joints are wheels.21 Nowhere in this explanation is there room for objective interpretations. The agent, like ‘the political,’ is subjective and therefore prone to conflict. Thus for Hobbes, liberty both allows and curbs human action. He redefines what it was to be a human being, removing the teleological assumptions of his pre-modern ancestors. Likewise he redefines authority in the political community. The ends of agency are reflected in the development of the Leviathan in order to establish and promote stability. Personal sentiments, emotions and opinions are reassigned and exist only outside the realm of ‘the political.’ The institutional design of Hobbes prompts an account of agency which highlights the isolated state of the individual. Theirs is a focus which remains primarily on the self and not on others within the community. This isolation guided both Hobbes’ account of agency and politics as he sought to limit the consequences of a subjective world view. Hobbes’ Leviathan becomes the all-knowing and powerful political authority as evidenced in his account of revolution and his proposed civic religion.22 These sterile political ideas reflect the mechanical vision of man as political agent and remove the threat of instability and conflict by providing a rational world view which all individuals, as responsible and obedient citizens, accept. Coupled with his ideas of responsible citizenship, political authority and man’s inherently conflicted existence, Hobbes’ reinvented a role for morality as well. Morality came to represent, like many modern interpretations of politics, the idea of right and wrong. Individuals were deemed moral if they followed the laws of the land and were immoral if they broke such laws. So it was that that the language of jurisprudence came to be intimately tied to the language of secular morality and the teleology of 20 See for a greater exposition of this idea see Richard Tuck, The Rights of War and Peace: Political Thought and the International Order from Grotius to Kant (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999). 21  Hobbes, 1991a. 22 It should be recalled that Hobbes did not advocate revolution, instead arguing that a tyrannous Leviathan was better placed to govern political society then no laws. Likewise, his account of civil religion, as Richard Tuck points out, existed to solidify the rule of the Leviathan providing his citizens with the opportunity to further accept his own authority and world view for the community.

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being previously associated with human freedom, and autonomy was, like emotion, opinion and reason, situated outside the realm of ‘the political.’ The overarching goal of this account of institutional design, and all that it encompassed, was to focus on one primary goal—acceptance of and obedience to, the Leviathan. John Locke In much the same way as Thomas Hobbes, John Locke was concerned with the problem of legitimate political authority. He begins his investigations into the nature of politics by theorizing about the original state of nature.23 The state of nature is a state of perfect freedom whereby individuals use their capacity to reason in order to achieve their own happiness. The law of nature is the law of reason which teaches all individuals to respect the freedom and security of all individuals and thereby avoid doing harm to one another. Moreover, in this state each individual has a natural right of punishment.24 Consequently when they have been wronged they are naturally endowed with the capacity to seek justice. In this way Locke’s state of nature is quite different from that of Hobbes. A state of nature is not a natural state of war. Rather war exists in the absence of a common judge who is able, for the common good, to legislate the laws which maintain the original freedom of the individual found in a state of nature. Locke’s account of the individual, as an agent, demonstrates remarkable similarities to that of Hobbes. Through his own capacities an individual is able to acquire the means necessary for survival. The interesting development in the works of Locke, however, is the manner in which his theory of agency establishes the economic and political ties which shape the modern notion of society.25 In his account of human labor Locke proposes that individuals can acquire land, and the goods that it produces, by laboring upon it. It is an individual’s ability to labor which sustains his account of agency. This theory of labor coexists alongside the idea of a state of nature where land exists unspoiled awaiting the discovery, taming, and fruitful use by the individual seeking the necessary means of survival. Individuals who happen upon this land, and work it in a fruitful manner, have a natural right of ownership and can enjoy the ends of production. Ownership of the land and the goods that are produced are protected through civil society. Locke 23 This section will draw primarily on John Locke, Two Treaties of Government, Peter Laslett, ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988). 24  For an excellent overview of Locke’s account of natural punishment see Anthony F. Lang, Jr., Punishment, Justice and International Relations: Ethics and Order After the Cold War (Oxford: Routledge, 2008). 25 As Peter Laslett has argued, Locke’s greatest contribution to the history of political thought is the manner in which he blends both political and economic assumptions in his work. He argues that Locke’s theory of human labour as a mode of agency which also establishes civil society distinguishes his writings from others. See Peter Laslett, Introduction, in Two Treaties of Government, Peter Laslett, ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988).

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thus distinguishes himself from Hobbes by providing an economic incentive beyond mere survival for the establishment of civil society. Locke shares many of the same assumptions which focus the writings of Hobbes. His agent is conceptualized as a ‘doer’ and it is the characteristics of agency which go on to establish a vision of civil society.26 Likewise, the laws of civil society are functional. They are related to a version of morality that understands political responsibility as the adherence to the laws of society. This morality is not interested in the idea of moral development per se, but rather, on the achievement of stability. Yet the difference in Locke is the introduction of an economic theme which tempers agency and the need for political society. Locke discusses in some detail how the onset of a monetary policy and an economic system premised on monetary transactions (as opposed to a barter economy) provided individuals with the necessary means to acquire and store goods, thus leading to an abundance and surplus of goods. The function of society, beyond stability and survival, was to protect the ends of man’s labors. Civil society distinguishes itself from the state of nature owing to the presence of a ‘common judge.’ This political body provides both a legislative and judicial function. As a legislative organ, the judge seeks to recreate the atmosphere of perfect freedom found in a state of nature so that individuals are free to pursue their own happiness. This freedom, like the discourses found in Hobbes, reflects the idea of individual liberty. Civil society does not exist to sustain a social human nature, but, rather, to further the economic endeavors of the individual. Individuals in this environment labor in order to produce the goods, but in so doing create a degree of competition in and amongst one another. For Locke, like Hobbes, power is instrumental, yet fungible. It is measured in the economic output of goods relative to each other in the community. This focus on abundance not only generates inequalities within civil society, but it also leads to what C.B. Macpherson has labeled ‘the possessive individual.’27 For Locke, civil society protected the abundance of man’s labors. Yet, according to Macpherson, one begins to understand how Locke’s institutional design further entrenches the isolation evident in Hobbes’ writings. As individuals become increasingly self-sufficient and self-reliant there is less need to focus on the reciprocal relationships of care and well-being with others in the community. Consequently the necessity of civic friendship and the ideas of human solidarity and charity within ‘the political’ become obscure.28 The decreasing influence of such discourses paves the way for a 26  Macpherson, 1964. 27  Macpherson, 1964 and 1974. 28  See King and Smith, 2007. They demonstrate how such ideas were an everyday necessity for ancient Greek and pre-modern philosophers who lacked the modern conveniences which allow for self-sufficiency. Intimacy and personal relationships were, in these times, instrumental. This change is one associated with modernity’s focus on power, authority and the changing nature of the relationship of the individual and the community, a theme to be discussed in greater detail in Chapter 2.

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focus on instrumental relationships of power and authority within the community to the detriment of non-instrumental relationships. The diminishing influence of non-instrumental relationships further entrenches the isolation which is characteristic of the discourse of liberty, obedience and authority evident in the social contract tradition. Community does not have an instrumental role in the moral development of the agent. The instrumental role of morality evident in the works of Hobbes is further revealed in the writings of Locke. To be moral is not only to obey the laws, but also to survive, and survival is linked to the emerging economic discourses as they influence ‘the political.’ A Lockean society makes provisions for individual survival because money can be saved and goods purchased to sustain the isolated modern self. In fact, human interaction comes to be conceptualized in terms of the producer and the purchaser. Political society becomes, as John MacMurray has written, pragmatic.29 Its pragmatism is defined in its ability to channel human ingenuity into the various modes of production within the community and deny the possibility of creativity and human fellowship thereby achieving a degree of stasis and predictability in the mundane activities of human life. This enables the tragic element of human nature to be further removed from ‘the political’ thereby ensuring the desire for stability and longevity in the face of human frailty. Jean-Jacques Rousseau Following in the tradition established by Hobbes and Locke, Jean-Jacques Rousseau investigated the relationship of the individual and the government within political society. He begins his investigations in a state of nature and, similar to Locke, puts forward a positive interpretation of human nature.30 A state of nature is not a state of war, as articulated by Hobbes, but is rather a perfect state of freedom. Man is however asocial and this is at odds with Locke’s account of human nature. These two assumptions guide and shape Rousseau’s institutional design. Men emerge from a state of nature and create laws which will provide a measure of equality and in so doing create an atmosphere of perfect freedom. In order to ensure the legitimacy of such laws Rousseau offers the concept of the general will. It differs from the natural man who is concerned only with his own survival. The general will is able to determine the best course of action for society as a whole. It is the primary task of the general will to establish the necessary laws which will further develop the moral freedom and civic equality of each and every individual within the community. The general will legislates on behalf of individuals in order to establish a compact among men. This compact allows Rousseau to argue that his state is 29  MacMurray, 1953 and 1961. 30  Jean Jacques Rousseau, On the social contract or principles of political right, in Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought, Rousseau, The Social Contract and Other Later Political Writings, Victor Gourevitch, ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 39–152.

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not totalitarian, but in fact the ends of human deliberation and action. So, if properly structured, the general will sustains a contract leading to a peaceful society comprised of just individuals in relation to one another. In the absence of proper laws however, individuals are unable to act in a responsible and obedient manner and the passions and emotions evident in a state of nature surface. Laws, for Rousseau, are both positive and negative. When properly institutionalized they cater to the common good and the civic equality of citizens. Equally, when the original intent of laws is perverted they can fuel war and violent conflict. These ideas stand in stark contrast to the assumption of Locke and Hobbes. Rousseau’s account of the law would perfect, rather than control, the free individual.31 In fact, Rousseau’s writings are motivated by the mismanagement of civil society. He bore witness to the pervasive human suffering which surrounded him and which led him to argue that the role of laws were not the solution, but rather the problem, for individuals in society. In this way his institutional design is at odds with the social contract thinkers who come before him. Thomas Hobbes assumed that violent conflict arose from man’s natural equality. He limited the potential for conflict through the creations of the Leviathan in order to emerge from a natural state of war. His use of legislation was not to establish equality, but rather, temper its negative manifestations—the security dilemma. John Locke, on the other hand, sought the protection of property and human labor from the competitive, selfinterested motivations of men. Legislation for Locke, like Hobbes, provided a measure of security and self-preservation in light of the self-interested reasoning of individuals. For Rousseau however, the solution to these identified problems was not in the establishment of civil society, but rather it lay in an acute examination and critique of the form and function laws provided to and for society. In fact, Rousseau, unlike Hobbes and Locke, was not convinced of the need to leave a state of nature and establish civil society. Man, in the original state, was selfsufficient and it was this self-sufficiency that was lost upon its creation. Laws, according to Rousseau, ensured that individuals had access to the requirements of survival and sought to establish a degree of equality among men. Laws, according to Rousseau, structure the political community and outline the responsible use of power while paying due deference to the liberty and freedom of the individual. This concept of the law means that it ought to instruct leaders as to when the legitimate use of force can, or ought to be used in order to protect the common good. If laws provide this function then individuals will be able to work toward not only the civil freedom characteristic of the state of nature, but their moral freedom as well. It is the achievement of moral freedom that allows 31 In fact, his account of the social contract, the general will and the role of law are integral to each other’s survival. Law legislates for human freedom and individuals participate in the process, yet even if individuals choose not to be involved in the process they remain under the protection of the law. This point is well described by Ian HampsherMonk, A History of Modern Political Thought: Major Thinkers from Hobbes to Marx (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 1992).

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individuals to become full beings and come to know the true nature of justice as equal members of the community. Unfortunately, laws in civil society have become polluted and, as Rousseau sees fit to point out, do not guide the moral use of force. Rather, laws in civil society legitimize political authority. The legislative ability of the general will has thus digressed from its original intentions. Being no longer concerned with the just and moral development of the individual it instead has created longstanding institutions which legitimize the use of force on behalf of the body politic. It comes as no surprise then for Rousseau that civil society is rife with human suffering, conflict and war.32 Rousseau presents an interesting image of the individual as an agent. It is at the end of the day an individual which seeks a moral development outside the morality of right and wrong proposed by Hobbes and Locke. His language does not speak of the mechanical and rational discourse of jurisprudence evident in these other two authors and his use of the laws is not to control the subject, but rather to provide a required degree of freedom to achieve the subject’s moral development. In this way his agent reflects many of the assumptions of a pre-modern morality. He advocates dynamic political structures and echoes the teleological assumptions of classical political philosophy. What links the works of Rousseau to the social contract tradition, and the ideas of Hobbes and Locke, is revealed in the manner in which he conceptualizes the relationship between the general will and the compact of men. It takes the form of a contract. He articulates a relationship between the individual as a political subject and a legitimate political authority guiding the development of laws and institutions for the greater good of society. He, like the others, is concerned with political authority. It is, however, is a critique of that which came before him, and he seeks, unlike his predecessors, to challenge the amoral and asocial human nature which dominate the state of nature and the notions of order which stem from these assumptions. Unfortunately he is unable to challenge the wider assumptions of Enlightenment political philosophy. Conclusions The social contract tradition has been the subject of a wide range of critiques. Feminists such as Carol Pateman challenge the traditional depiction of the agent as a masculine figure and argue that this interpretation of politics limits feminine interpretations of the political.33 Similarly, Cynthia Helpern shows how theories 32  In fact, he goes so far to state that war and conflict is a result of the lasting and permanent features of laws and their institutions. War is not natural and thus would not exist in a state of nature. War is instead the product of human creation, of the inability of structures and institutions to change and adapt to the needs of the body politic. Static structures are at odds with natural progressions and thus engender conflict, human suffering and the negative orientation of human nature. See Jean Jacques Rousseau, The state of war, in Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought, Rousseau, The Social Contract and Other Later Political Writings, Victor Gourevitch, ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 162–176. 33 Carole Pateman, The Sexual Contract (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988).

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which begin in a state of nature fail to take into account a suitable ontology which provides for the moral and social nature of the individual.34 From an Aristotelian perspective, Alastair MacIntyre shows how the social contract tradition denies key ideas as they relate to the development of morality and the moral individual.35 The following critique of international politics remains informed by these pre-existing criticisms and offers an additional idea. As the strength of the domestic analogy within IR is revealed, the self-interest and isolated themes evident it the works of the social contract thinkers, Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau, are shown to have had a detrimental affect on the contemporary engagement of vulnerability and tragedy which has, in turn, challenged the ends of moral institutional design. As a whole, these different interpetations endorse what is referred to throughout this work as a subjective world view. This idea of subjectivity identifies the individual as a rights-bearing subject. Such an individual is an artificial creation which fails to accommodate a realistic account of being human. Specifically, it denies the teleological drive of human beings and the potential for moral development. Moreover, it fails to accommodate the need individuals have to live within a particular understanding of the community. A subjective account of ‘the political’ reflects the legalism of Enlightenment political philosophy and the legalist paradigm which influences international politics. This use of the term ‘subjective’ throughout this work is different to its traditional use in philosophical discourses. Throughout this work, a subjective world view refers to the isolated state of the individual, and challenges the ability of enabled institutions to respond to the plight of suffering others. The primary problem with a subjective politics is that it denies the necessary assumptions needed for individual moral development and moral institutional design which supports such ends. This is a problem associated with domestic and international politics.36 As the ensuing section demonstrates, negative assumptions of human nature and the desire for stability influenced modern visions of world order and statecraft. The ideas of human nature and political communities evident within the various Enlightenment political philosophers influenced the idea of political sovereignty and ius gentium. 34  Helpern, 2002. 35 Alistair MacIntyre, Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry, Encyclopaedia, Genealogy, and Tradition (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1990). 36  A subjective world view is referred to throughout this work. It deserves particular attention because this use of subjective is at odds with traditional philosophical interpretations. A subjective account of ‘the political’ reflects the status of individuals as political subjects and relates to the rights-bearing depiction of human beings which emerges out of the legalism of Enlightenment political philosophy and the legalist paradigm which influences international politics. The primary problem with a subjective politics is that it denies the necessary assumptions needed for individual moral development and moral institutional design which supports such ends. One can link this idea of subjectivity to the subjective idea of dominion documented in Chapter 4 of this work. They remain distinct, but related, ideas.

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International Political Thought The social contract tradition of political thought did not develop in isolation. The changing nature of the ontological, epistemological and metaphysical assumptions within political theory also had an impact in the sphere of the international realm. Today, scholars interested in the history of international political thought look to the works of international lawyers such as Grotius, Pufendorf and Vattel in order to determine the nature of international order.37 Their writings represent an Enlightenment view of the theater of international politics. In their own way these lawyers and jurists sought to achieve a measure of stability and peace in the international arena that mirrored the ideal of a rational scientific account of politics espoused in the works of Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau.38 Grotius, Pufendorf and Vattel are united in their endeavor to understand the nature of the law of nations and provide different accounts of its content and role in international politics. The distinction for these international jurists, as Martin Wight points out, as distinct from political theorists, is in their engagement with the problem of anarchy. Anarchy was deemed to be problematic in a domestic political setting, but, ultimately, a legitimate political authority could remedy the problem.39 Within the sphere of international politics, anarchy was an accepted state of affairs. In the absence of a legitimate political authority, the importance of a clear account of the law of nations, or ius gentium, became, for these authors, increasingly important. Hugo Grotius Hugo Grotius is heralded by many as the father of international law.40 His works have influenced the development of international politics and his assumptions have been adopted by contemporary scholars who articulate a‘Groatian tradition’ of international 37 One could also include the following authors in this section: Thomasius, Leibniz, Suarez and Wolff. Or, one could look to the political philosophies of Edmund Burke, the Abbé de St. Pierre and Immanuel Kant; however, these latter three suffice as they highlight a few key themes. The centrality of the state, the role of sovereignty and non-intervention in the affairs of states and the role of international law all demonstrate, on an international level, the same assumptions noted in the previous section. 38  Hidemi Suganami, Reflections on the domestic analogy: The case of Bull, Beitz and Linklater, Review of International Studies, 12 no. 2 (1986), 145–158. This article provides an interesting depiction of ‘the domestic analogy’ and backs up the point made by Toulmin. The discipline of international relations and the various ideas of international order are heavily influenced by domestic political thought and the role of legitimate political authority with reference to stable political orders. The international lawyers discussed here provide an example of how domestic law is reflected in the idea of the law of nations. 39  Wight, 1960. 40  This claim is a contested one. Tuck, 1999, argues this point. On the other hand, James Brown Scott’s work The Spanish Origins of International Law (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1934) argues that the title of founder of international law belongs to Francisco

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politics.41 Moreover, his work is increasingly incorporated into the ever growing field of international political thought.42 His value to international politics rests on his desire to provide a summary account of the law of nations, or ius gentium. This task, he claimed in 1625, had yet to be done in a adequate manner and was needed in light of the manner in which war was conducted. Its sheer brutality brought human frailty and vulnerability to the fore, and demonstrated how the laws of peace were unable to curb the violent capacities of men. A law of nations, supported by an understanding of the laws of nature and positive law, was the appropriate means of structuring the theater of war, thus ensuring that peace could be achieved in the future.43 Grotius assumes that individuals are social beings and, based on his interpretation of the laws of nature, they are also political agents. The laws of nature dictate that man should not steal and man ought to restore those goods which belong to another along with any gains they received whilst the goods were in their possession. Similarly, individuals are obligated to fulfill promises and punish those who transgress the laws of nature. These four laws of nature structure political society. Grotius also goes on to identify a positive law established through human intelligence and custom. Positive law reflects what is beneficial and harmful to individuals within the community.44 In order to establish what is, and what is not, beneficial Grotius assumes that the will of the individual is best placed to mediate any discrepancies between the two. This is a marked changed from pre-modern natural law accounts which sought a complimentary absolute and normative account of morality and ethics. Instead, Grotius claims that in order to assimilate the ends of positive and natural law one must ensure that the law reflects the best interest of the individual. Legitimate political order, according to Grotius, emerged through the union of natural law and positive law. Political obligation, he was quite clear, is the result of pacts or agreements among men. The pact which validates civil society reflects the union of two different ideals—utility and honesty.45 The laws of nature Vitoria. The works of Vitoria feature prominently in Chapter 3 of this work and provide a counterpoint to the classical account of international politics which follows in this chapter. 41 See for example Hersch Lauterpacht, The Grotian tradition in international law, International Law Being the Collected Papers of Hersch Lauterpact 2, E. Lauterpacht, ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1975), 307–360. Martin Wight, Four Seminal Thinkers: Machiavelli, Grotius, Kant, Mazzinin, Gabriele Wight and Brian Porter, eds (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005). Renee Jeffery, Hersch Lauterpacht, the Realist challenge and the ‘Grotian Tradition’ in twentieth century international relations, European Journal of International Relations, 12 no. 2 (2006), 223–250. 42  For a detailed account of this relationship, see Renee Jeffery, Hugo Grotius in International Thought (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006). 43 See for example Hugo Grotius, De Jure Belli ac Paci Libri Tres (Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1925). 44  Grotius, 1925. 45 Annabel Brett, Natural right and civil community: The civic philosophy of Hugo Grotius, The History Journal, 45 no. 1 (2002), 31–51.

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dictate man’s need for society. This is the intrinsic value of the community. It sustains an account of the good which reflects the will of the individual as he or she interprets the laws of nature. This union goes on to establish the bonds of civil society facilitating the harmonious coexistence of individuals. Yet there are times, as Grotius points out, when individuals can be released from this agreement to act in a manner which is at odds with the natural law. These exceptions accommodate man’s tendency toward conflict and are evident in both Grotious’s account of domestic and international law. Ultimately these exceptions demonstrate the absence of perfectionist assumptions in his understanding of natural law. Moreover it accommodates the role that the individual will play in discerning positive law. This tendency toward conflict marks a key thought in Grotius’s work—human vulnerability.46 Like many humanists, Grotius recognized the frailty of human life and the need for political structures to accommodate the possible negative consequences of man’s nature. This prompted Grotius’s development of a legal war discourse. In his critique of jus ad bellum he argues that both sides of a conflict can claim just intentions. This denies the possibility of accepting a long lasting peace as the defeated side will continue, in the name of justice, to sue for peace. He ascribes to both sides of the conflict, through the laws of war, belligerent rights. Consequently each state enjoys the right of killing, plunder and territorial acquisition as long as they abide by one convention—the formal declaration of war made by a sovereign authority.47 The underlying assumption of this account is that both parties to the war enjoy a degree of legitimacy and therefore the outcome of the conflict will be lasting. A legal war convention, he claims, provides a means of achieving a long lasting peace in a manner not possible in the just war tradition. What Grotius demonstrates is the need for law, both natural and positive, to sustain the structures of the community as well as among states. The Prologemena reveals that states, like individuals, are not invincible and will, at times, require help in the form of alliances and defense.48 For this reason, they consent to be bound by the ends of ius gentium. The various permissions which Grotius affords ius gentium and the actions which it fails to condone endorse the possibility of progress, which is a key feature of modern political thought. War, he claimed was an accepted fact of the human condition; to legislate against it, or even support the ends of pacifism, was an unrealistic fantasy. The flexibility of his account of ius gentium is, according to Steven Forde, the means through which war could be managed and allow for the possibility of a future peace.49 This was a drastic change. Grotius removed the perfectionist assumptions which marked his predecessors but which remained visible in the works of Scholastic scholars. He, like the social contract thinkers, provided a credible account of international political order 46  Annabel Brett, 2002. 47  Grotius, 1925. 48  Grotius, 1925. 49 Steven Forde, Hugo Grotius on ethics and war, The American Political Science Review, 92 no. 3 (1998), 639–648.

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which rested on the legal language of the law of nations. He provided the pretext for the domestic analogy in international politics whereby states, supported by the norm of sovereignty, were the primary actors in international politics. Pufendorf Similar to the works of Grotius, Pufendorf’s works examined the natural law tradition in order to frame an account of ‘the political.’ His most popular work, On the Duty of Man and Citizen According to Natural Law, reflects his attempt to unify the universal ideals of the law of nature with the empirical experiences of individuals within the state.50 As Boucher points out, Pufendorf sought to align the expectations of the newly emerging Westphalian order—political sovereignty— with current ideas of statehood and citizenship.51 His account of the natural law reflects an enlightened assumption of human will, freedom and self-determination. Consequently, his writings, like those of Grotius and Hobbes, are distinct from the alternative Scholastic natural law tradition. He seeks to reconcile the demands of justice and utility and understand the nature of international politics as they are, and not as they ought to be. Pufendorf adopts a positive human nature. In the third chapter of his work he notes the mutual obligations among men and claims a sentiment of love, peace and kindness.52 These ideas are at odds with Hobbes’ account of human nature, but reflect similar assumptions made by Grotius. Moreover, they have particular import on his ensuing account of the state of nature and the potential for the development of civil society. Pufendorf assumes that individuals are naturally social beings. Consequently they are driven by a natural desire to form a community. Such a community, whilst occasionally bearing the consequences of conflict, is for the most part peaceful. An assumption which, as he points out Chapter 8, leads to the development of a political society with rights and duties complementing and reflecting the rights and duties of the individual.53 There is, within this account of the community, an overarching theme of ‘do no harm’ in order to achieve security.54 This benevolence distinguishes Pufendorf’s institutional design from that of Grotius. Obligation, he argues, is natural and provides the means of establishing a common moral language. The idea of security runs through Pufendorf’s works. It provides the primary incentive for individuals to establish civil society and enjoy the positive benefits of freedom. This freedom is guaranteed through the development of perfect and 50 Samuel Pufendorf, On the Duty of Man and Citizen According to Natural Law, James Tully, ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). 51 David Boucher, Resurrecting Pufendorf and capturing the Westphalian moment, Review of International Studies, 27 no. 4 (2001), 557–577. 52  Pufendorf, 1991. 53  Pufendorf, 1991. 54  Pufendorf, 1991.

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imperfect duties which, as Pufendorf goes on to show, delineate the obligations individuals share in the wider realm of humanity. One begins to see in this work of Pufendorf a particular role for virtue that is absent in both Grotius and Hobbes. Beyond the accepted ‘do no harm’ discourse of the time, Pufendorf clearly demarcates a particular account of human moral agency which sets out the requirements of care vis-á-vis one another.55 Like the individual, the state is also a moral entity with moral obligations above those of the collective. As a moral entity the state has duties toward humanity. These moral obligations reflect the original desires of security and sociability evident in the laws of nature and are reflected in Pufendorf’s account of ‘reasons of state.’56 Pufendorf’s writings bring two important ideas to international politics and the history of international political thought. The thematic link of security is one that he shares with Hobbes. The manner in which it is linked with his account of state sovereignty and how it becomes intertwined with a particular notion of ‘reasons of state’ allows for an alternative interpretation of raison d’état associated with Machiavelli.57 It draws on the pre-existing Aristotelian, or republican, tradition of political thought, thus referring, at times, to the mediating role that individual will plays in the institutional design of the political community. Yet, as H. Drietzel has pointed out, Pufendorf’s account of the sovereign state ensured that the previously subscribed to perfectionist ends of natural law became increasingly obscure as did the teleological assumptions associated with humanist discourse.58 This was to accommodate Pufendorf’s desire to marry the discourses of history and philosophy in one account of politics as they were, and not as they ought to be. Moreover, as Kreiger has argued, this idea of state interest was a means through which Pufendorf could align the actions of the ruler within the state to accommodate a variety of empirical conditions in order to sustain the longevity of the state within a Westphalian world order.59 Pufendorf’s engagement with the works of both Hobbes and Grotius demonstrates the growing influence that the social contract thinkers had on the realm of international politics. He is understood to have taken the former’s ideas and examined them in light of the latter’s account of the laws of war and a natural 55  Boucher, 2001, 564. 56  Brett, 2002. The emergence of the idea of ‘reason of state’ represented a decline in the original humanist, and Aristotelian, influence of the international jurists at the time. As Brett has pointed out, this influence provided a means of understanding, in a more traditional civically minded orientation, authors traditionally associated with international political thought 57 Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince, and Other Political Writings (London: Orion Printing House, 1996). 58  H. Dreitzel, Reason of state and the crisis of political Aristotelianism: an essay on the development of seventeenth century political philosophy, History of European Ideas, 28, no. 3 (2002), 163–187. 59 Leonard Krieger, History and law in the seventeenth century: Pufendorf, Journal of the History of Ideas, 21 no. 2 (1960), 198–210.

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right of punishment. Pufendorf’s assumptions on punishment are influenced by Hobbes who claimed that the right of sanction must exist prior to any wrong committed. Pufendorf therefore disagreed with the Grotian claim that punishment is a natural right which exists within the laws of nature. Therefore, states, as moral and juridical entities, could not possibly have a natural right of punishment vis-ávis other states. The only recourse to war a state possessed was one of retribution. Pre-emptive wars in and amongst states was an impossibility owing to the natural obligations to humanity which predate the law of nations and the international community of states. This idea followed on from Pufendorf’s primary claim that a state of nature is not necessarily a state of war, but rather a community which suffers at times from self-interested aims and ends, but for much of the time exists in a state of peaceful coexistence. Pufendorf was able to argue these ideas because, as mentioned above, he, like Grotius, denied the perfectionist aims and ends of the preceding natural law tradition. His was a pragmatic account of justice and morality. Like Grotius, he claimed that human will mediated human desires and in so doing provided an account of human nature as it was, and not as it could be. The focus was wholly focused on utility, not virtue, and the dominant political discourse was described as a ‘worldly utilitarianism’ as ethics and duties were deemed to be solely private, transcendental affairs.60 The langue of morality and law came to represent two different realms of human interaction as law accommodated the potential for human and state failure. Moral development was situated outside the realm of political action. Like Grotius’ work, Pufendorf’s work provided an acceptable space within which conflict and war could exist, but did so in such a way that the possibility of transcending or engaging with man’s self-interested, or tragic, nature was cast side. Emmerich de Vattel Like Grotius and Pufendorf, Vattel is a scholar of natural law who pays particular attention to the law of nations. He is clear from the outset that he is interested in developing an account of ius gentium. His work is not, he argues, an original tract. Vattel sought to promote Wolff’s ideas in the wider scholarly community; however, Vattel’s reorganization of international law reflects, as Nick Onuf points out, a significant change from that of Wolff’s original ideas. Consequently, he argues that Vattel’s work marks the end of the republican tradition within the history of ideas.61 Instead, as Michael Byers demonstrates, Vattel’s writings blend the disciplinary assumptions of international relations and international law.62 While contemporary 60  Krieger, 1960. 61 Nicholas Greenwood Onuf, Civitas Maxima: Wolff, Vattel and the fate of Republicanism, The American Journal of International Law, 88 no. 2 (1994), 280–302. 62  Michael Byers, Introduction: Power, obligation, and customary international law, Duke Journal of Comparative & International Law, 11 no. 81 (2001), 81–88.

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international politics discourses do not feature his works as prominently as they once did, the threefold distinction of international law which Vattel presents to the reader in his chief work, The Law of Nations or the Principles of Natural Law, continues to provide the structural foundations of current international politics.63 His emphasis on the daily practices of international politics sustained his account of legitimate state action and provided a nuanced interpretation of an international political environment. Today, however, Vattel’s importance chiefly rests in the realm of the history of international law.64 The political thought of Vattel integrates two different political traditions. According to Fenwick, one can see evidence of both the social contract tradition as well as hints of Scholasticism within Vattel’s writings.65 Vattel assumes that individuals are naturally sociable beings. In this way he reflects both the ideas of Grotius and Pufendorf. At the same time however, he is clear that the political communities that individuals go on to establish are the product of a social compact. Yet both of these assumptions are guided by his understanding of the laws of nature. Like Grotius and Pufendorf, Vattel is clear that all individuals are driven by the desire for self-preservation. Like Pufendorf in particular, Vattel also articulates the obligation that all individuals have to help others—as much as is in their power—to develop and survive as political beings. These two assumptions go on to underpin both his account of the state, which, he claims, is a moral person and carries a degree of moral weight independent of the individuals who constitute the political community. This has an important significance when Vattel speaks of the sovereign state. Vattel, in the same manner of Pufendorf, takes the view that the state has a moral capacity as a single entity above and beyond the particular rights and duties of the individual and that this sovereignty is delegated to the sovereign leader who represents the interests of the state and its individuals. Consequently, one finds within Vattel’s writings a clear demarcation of order. The sovereign seeks to sustain the lives of its domestic population while simultaneously representing the collective in the wider international domain of politics. It is within this international realm that Vattel comes to focus on the discourse of ius gentium, or international law. As in his account of the state, he seeks to demonstrate how the benevolent notion of self-preservation governs the affairs of states and their conduct with one another. His account of the law of nations applies a deductive methodology in order to interweave the original laws of nature with the principles of statecraft that were acceptable during his lifetime. He goes on to describe a necessary, or natural, law of nations. This is an abstract category of law which is not to be associated with the facets of international statecraft. 63 Emmerich de Vattel, The Law of Nations or the Principles of Natural Law (1758). Available online at http://www.lonang.com/exlibris/vattel/. 64  Charles G. Fenwick, The authority of Vattel, The American Political Science Review, 7 no. 3 (1913), 395–410. Charles G. Fenwick, The authority of Vattel, The American Political Science Review, 8 no. 3 (1914), 375–392. 65  Fenwick, 1913.

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He assumes that, within this very necessary aspect of international law, states understand their duty of self-preservation. This necessary law reflects the social contract assumptions which underscore the original social desires of individuals. States, like individuals, according to Vattel, exist within a wider community. In much the same way as domestic law guides the interactions of individuals, it is therefore necessary to provide a sustained account of international law to guide the relations of states. Alongside Vattel’s description of necessary international law there is also an account of the voluntary law of nations. These laws reflect the relaxing of the laws of nature within the realm of international politics. States, guided by their own particular moral conscience, agree to a relaxation of the obligations of the laws of nature in order to provide more flexibility in the rights and duties that they have toward each other. Like individuals in a state of nature, states must act benevolently towards other states, but all the while be assured of their ongoing liberty and freedom. The question which remains unanswered in this flexible adaptation of the laws of nature is what political entity has the authority to outline such an account of institutional design. Whereas the necessary law of nations is premised on a natural account of the political community, Vattel does not provide an account of international political authority or community which sustains his understanding of voluntary international law. In this way Vattel clearly distinguishes himself from his predecessor Wolff. It is a point which is made quite clear by Onuf who, in his investigation of the republican tradition of political thought, demonstrates that within the works of Wolff one can see the assumptions of an international political community which seeks a universal peace, or universal order where states would coexist. Vattel, on the other hand, rejects this republican ideal of international order and instead focuses on the balance of power relations among states in order to accommodate the original deductive methodology underscoring his account of ius gentium.66 Vattel was quite remarkable in that, in his view, his third, and final, demarcation of the law of nations was to be found in treaties and customs. In this way Vattel was quite remarkable. Vattel drew on these sources to establish the legitimacy of both necessary and voluntary law. This brought an element of pragmatism to Vattel’s account of the law of nations and mediated the lack of legitimate political authority in the realm of international politics. The pre-existence of treaties leading to state alliances was an accepted reality of state survival for Vattel. The accompanying role they played, alongside the necessary and voluntary laws of nations, facilitated not only stability and security for the state, but the legitimacy of an international law of nations. Likewise, treaties and customs complemented the emphasis placed on the balance of power as a means of supporting his account of the international community. Treaties outlined acceptable and non-acceptable behavior on the part of states, and went some way to demarcating what was an acceptable relaxation of the laws of nature. Vattel’s understanding of the balance 66  Onuf, 1994.

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of power structured his understanding of voluntary and necessary law and outlined the way things ‘were’ and how they ‘ought’ to be. Within his works he held that, if states accepted the underlying assumptions of the law of nature within international politics, then he could provide an institutional design which outlined the manner in which international politics ought to unfold. His pragmatism provided the sought after flexibility that was originally outlined by Grotius and, in a similar fashion to Pufendorf, lent an air of humanity to the claims of ius gentium as it outlined the benevolent role that states could play, in times of peace. In the works of Vattel one begins to see what had begun in his predecessors: namely, a distinction between the rules of engagement and the ends of justice. In order to describe the reality of international politics, justice and morality were increasingly placed outside the rules of statecraft thereby accommodating the possibility of war. Pragmatic rules of engagement dominated the realm of international law outlining the acceptable modes of statecraft while justice remained a lofty ideal. This pragmatism, originally found in the assumptions of Grotius, brought with it an account of world order which became further entrenched in the ideas of Pufendorf and Vattel. Within the state a measure of justice was attainable while within the realm of international politics such ends were questionable. This was to reflect the same distinction of public and private politics which feature in the discourse of the social contract tradition. This distinction came with the idea of a balance of power amongst states, conceptualized as legally equal entities, which challenged the previously sought after world state that was seeking, above all, peace. At the same time a pragmatic vision of international politics ensued as international law was fascinated not with the ontological foundations associated with the Scholastic tradition, but instead on the content, that is the rules of the game. The elimination of the perfectionist ends of scholastic, and pre-modern, natural law was successfully achieved. The focus remained firmly focused on the instrumental relationships of power and authority in the construction of a viable world order and paved the way for the implementation of international politics loosely framed in the same structure as the social contract tradition of political thought. Modern International Political Theory The combined works of Grotius, Pufendorf and Vattel had a profound influence on the now developed discipline of international relations and the various discourses found within it. What emerges throughout these writings was a struggle to conceptualize a role for justice and morality within the realm of international politics. The formal rules of political engagement, referred to as statecraft, came to be represented in the discourses of international law. At the same time, the moral ideals which sought to engage with the vulnerabilities of the human condition danced around the peripheries of international law, but remained outside the central focus of international political agency. By removing the perfectionist

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aims and teleological orientation from the discourses of natural law these authors highlighted the importance of power and authority when an account of ‘the political’ was articulated. This historical exposition of ius gentium has demonstrated the preeminence of instrumental relations within international politics. The rules of the game, for scholars like Grotius, Pufendorf and Vattel, focused not on the relationships in and amongst individuals within states, but instead focused on the coexistence of states within the theater of international politics. Set within a distinctly Westphalian understanding of international politics, this was a field which highlighted the centrality of the state, placed an overwhelming degree of faith in the ideal of sovereignty, both legal and political, and was focused increasingly on achieving a balance of power in and amongst states.67 In the end, the vulnerability of the human condition was cast aside and the notion that individuals and communities alike could strive to achieve a more balanced and nuanced understanding of the role justice and morality could play in international politics was lost. The realist discourses of international politics is now described in what follows in order to highlight this particular understanding of morality, justice and international politics. This description of international politics is articulated in order to demonstrate the need for perfectionist assumptions of morality and justice in international politics. These ideas are central to the natural law tradition and are required if agents wish to challenge the current state of moral politics and the pragmatic political structures that sustain its practices. Realist discourses have accompanied the formal development of IR. They represent an account of ‘the political’ which focuses on the primacy of the state within international politics. It is focused on relationships of power in order to facilitate the self-interested survival of the state.68 This basic account of the realist tradition does not account for the wide variety of interpretations and scholars who 67 A series of treaties that brought about an end to the religious wars that had dominated Europe, the peace treaties of Westphalia placed domestic governance in the hands of the people. The treaties also advocated a universal doctrine of religious toleration. As a result, the state emerged as the supreme actor in international affairs and was defined by an account of international sovereignty coupled with domestic sovereignty. The treaties explicitly recognize the idea of territorial sovereignty and respect the independence and jural rights of the state; moreover, the treaties, decidedly legal in their approach, emphasize the importance of laws, customs and institutions as the primary vehicles deigned to establish international civility and, therefore, stability. So interpreted, the Westphalian peace treaties established a lack of natural authority within international affairs which highlighted the fact that no one body can subsume the interests of the state to an overarching governing principle. John M. Hobson, The State and International Relations (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), offers a good overview of these points. 68 A basic overview of a realist framework is offered in Jack Donnelly, Realism and International Relations (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000). In addition, see Jack Donnelly, Twentieth century realism, in Traditions of International Ethics, Terry Nardin and David Mapel, eds (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), 92 & 93;

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have been accorded a place within its developmental history. From an historical perspective, one can locate realist themes in the works of Thucydides, a Grecian general,69 Carl von Clausewitz,70 a strategic military and political writer, as well as Thomas Hobbes.71 Each author in their own way highlights the central assumptions of realism: namely, negative human nature, a desire for power and the desire for survival, and, finally, the inevitability of conflict. Indeed, if one focuses on the works of Hobbes, his ideas have influenced the idea of a domestic analogy. This idea is that international law can function in the same manner as domestic law, but in the realm of international relations.72 Likewise, the themes of punishment which are found within his work echo the ideas of Pufendorf and his critique of Grotius and the law of nations. Yet the works of these authors are not the sole representatives of the realist tradition of international politics. Upon closer examination, a body of scholars, traditionally referred to as ‘realist,’ continued to grapple with the themes outlined by Vattel and his predecessors. How ought one to understand the role that justice and morality play alongside the discourses and practice of high power politics is evident in the works of the following classical realist scholars. During the interwar years E.H. Carr penned his seminal work The Twenty Years Crisis 1919–1939: An Introduction to the Study of International Relations.73 Carr provides an account of ‘the political’ in which the activity of politics is understood simply as a quest for supremacy. With this in mind one must be constantly aware of the role of power and the motivations of self-interest which sustain the activity of statecraft. Carr was writing during the interwar years and had borne witness to the failure of the League of Nations and the fact that the Great War did not curb the possibility of future violent conflicts. His attack is directed toward the Utopian or Idealist thought which had sustained such lofty ideals in the realm of international diplomacy. He claims that any account of ‘the political’ could only endorse a relative and functional role for ethics and morality. Carr was aware of the moral nature of human beings, as well as their ultimate need for community. He claimed however that one can not discount the role that the ego plays within a decision-making paradigm. This lead him to conclude that within the realm of international politics international law may mediate the actions and interactions of states, but it provides simply a pragmatic function. Like those scholars in the history of international political thought, law could facilitate peace, providing it and Steven Forde, Classical realism, in Traditions of International Ethics, Terry Nardin and David Mapel, eds (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), 62–84. 69 Thucydides, The Peloponnesian Wars, translated by Benjamin Jowett, revised and abridged with an introduction by P.A. Brunt (New York: Washington Square Press, 1963). 70 Carl von Clausewitz, On War (Everyman’s Library, 1993). 71  Hobbes, 1991a & 1991b. 72  See the argument made by Suganami, 1986, 145–158. 73  E.H. Carr, The Twenty Years Crisis, 1919–1939: An Introduction to the Study of International Relations, 2nd edn (London: Palgrave 1946).

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was peace that states wanted. It could not prohibit violent conflict. Consequently, as Linklater points out, Carr was unable to provide means of escaping this tragic state of affairs.74 Reinhold Niebuhr was an American theologian who was writing at the same time as E.H. Carr. He sought in his work to align the assumptions of the protestant faith with the current practices of international statecraft and diplomacy.75 Like Carr, he was skeptical of the possibility of an international moral community and within his works one sees evidence of a tragic account of human nature. He frankly discloses the role that the ego plays within ‘the political’ yet he does not discount the moral potential of any single individual. Individuals, according to Niebuhr, are both moral and ethical beings who demonstrate feelings of sympathy and care towards other beings. There is, within his account of ‘the political,’ a benevolent attitude which is nurtured through man’s education. Man’s ability to learn and understand the ideals of justice sustains the natural social nature of the individual and the wider possibility of communion. Yet for Niebuhr it is impossible for individuals to overcome their natural egoism completely, and to assume the idea of a progressive moral community, be it at the state or international level, is misleading. It is impossible for the state, in Niebuhr’s opinion, to develop in the same manner that the individual can be educated in the ways of justice. The state is not a moral body, as articulated by the scholars of the previous era, and is therefore unable to develop a moral conscience capable of moral and ethical decisions. In light of this fact it is difficult for states to realistically comprehend their moral obligations to other beings and the benevolence evident within the individual is unable to be cultivated within and amongst states. In such an environment the original self-interested ego is left to flourish and the ethical and moral ideals represent, at best, a vague and inarticulate framework for agency. The only forces which can generate enough momentum to check this egoism are relationships of power and force. Laws, for Niebuhr, like Carr, play an important role in his accounting of ‘the political.’ This leads to the following conclusion for Niebuhr: conflict, he claims can have a moral purpose in the relationships of individuals, and within this particular grouping of individual relationships there is an important role for ethical and moral deliberative frameworks. Group relations, as represented by the state and its interactions, can only be guided by politics and the role that law plays in mediating conflict is of particular import owing to its ongoing and ever-present state within international politics. There exists, within Niebuhr’s account of international politics, a distinction of instrumental and non74  Andrew Linklater, The transformation of political community: E. H. Carr, critical theory and international relations, Review of International Studies, 23 (1997), 321–338. 75 Reinhold Niebuhr, Moral Man and Immoral Society: A Study in Ethics and Politics (Westminster: John Knox Press, 2001); Reinhold Niebuhr, Children of Light and the Children of Darkness (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall College Divinity, 1974); and, Reinhold Niebuhr, A protest against a dilemma’s two horns, World Politics, 2 no. 3 (1950), 338–344.

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instrumental relationships. In seeking to determine what, if any role, ethics and morality have to play within international politics Niebuhr ascribes a political and moral role to individuals, yet is unable to determine the particular role that morality plays in the wider theater of international politics. The role to which Niebuhr assigns to non-instrumental relationships of care and interest within the community is strikingly at odds with the predominant emphasis of instrumental relationships of power and authority within international politics. Yet the manner in which he describes the individual is one which hints at the possibility of moral and ethical improvement. He is able to conclude that man is both moral and social. He is unable, however, to provide an account of ‘the political’ which engages both morality and justice alongside international law. The works of Hans J. Morgenthau also reveal an account of ‘the political’ which incorporates man’s inherent morality and sociability, all the while questioning the idea of international morality amongst states. Two of his works in particular, Scientific Man Versus Power Politics and Politics Among Nations: The Struggle for Power and Peace, provide his interpretation of ‘the political’ and describe how he sought to envisage the relationship of law, morality and ethics within international politics.76 In the latter work Morgenthau articulates two alternative visions of international order. The first interpretation outlines the moral ideals which underlie modern statecraft. In this examination he clearly shows how states, in their quotidian affairs, demonstrate a degree of restraint and calculation when determining a particular course of action. As his description of the laws of war and practices therein demonstrate, it is now, unlike other times in history, imprudent of states to engage in the practice of assassinations and the mistreatment of prisoners of war and enemy non-combatants. There is, then, a lofty ambition of ethicality in the behavior of states, much like the ideals hinted at by Vattel in his description of the law of nations. There is however a problem with this account. Morgenthau, very much in the same vein as Niebuhr, points out that the state is no longer the moral entity of past eras. The movement toward a more democratic approach to diplomacy and statecraft has rendered impotent the idea of state obligation and duties. Whereas in the past states have been represented by a sovereign authority whose personal reputation rested on the actions of states, this is no longer the case. Pledges of allegiance by way of personal support no longer feature in the technical details of international diplomacy as individuals are replaced and transferred by technocrats within the state itself. Consequently the moral obligations and duties which accompanied the obligations of sovereigns have eroded. In their place has sprung up a formal 76  Hans J. Morgenthau, Politics Among Nations: The Struggle for Power and Peace (New York: Knopf, 1973). Hans J. Morgenthau, Scientific Man vs Power Politics (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1946). These ideas are also found in Hans J. Morgenthau, The twilight of international morality, Ethics, 58 no. 2 (1948), 79–99; and Hans J. Morgenthau, The mainsprings of American foreign policy: The national interest vs. moral abstractions, The American Political Science Review, 44 no. 4 (1950), 833–854.

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structure of law which is supported by an account of power relationships. This, it is hoped, can mediate the threat of conflict in and amongst states guided by their own national interest. International relations is, for Morgenthau, a continuous effort to maintain and increase state power and in the process reduce or check the power of other nations. The cultivation of power remains the primary national interest of states, and leaders who abdicate this responsibility are guilty of moral failure. Again like Niebuhr, Morgenthau distinguishes different accounts of morality and associates them with particular facets of human life. Instead of placing power and morality in opposition to one another he clearly articulates two different accounts of morality. The first notion reflects a morality derived from the realities of international politics. The second account of morality reflects the original assumptions of human nature that man is naturally social and desires to be moral. Morgenthau’s notion of moral politics is at odds with less nuanced realist accounts of politics. Instead, he reflects on the different relationships in which the desire for morality is apparent. Within international politics there is little space for a moral framework which emphasizes individual virtue and perfection. This framework exists within the personal relationships of individuals within the community. The particular moral framework which bears on international politics is derived from the morality of national interest which provides a taxonomy for leaders to do the best they can in relation to long-term survival. This taxonomy advocates the acquisition of power. As realism further developed the fraught and tense relationship of power, justice and morality was relegated outside the realm of international politics. The onset of the Cold War and the tensions that it brought focused the attention of scholars on the role of power, anarchy and survival. Increasingly the focused turn towards international law, the balance of power, and theories of hegemonic stability as realist discourses were further broken down into structural, neo-realist, offensive and defensive manifestations. Neorealist discourses were at the fore of this development. These discourses highlight a structural approach to understanding the source of conflict in international politics and places primary importance on the assumptions of power and self-interest. These ideas are best exemplified in the works of Kenneth Waltz, whose Man, the State and War articulates an account of ‘the political’ whereby international relations is composed of states, understood as ‘black boxes’ existing in a state of anarchy. In order to understand the constant threat of conflict one must look to the desire a state harbors for survival in the absence of political authority.77 These assumptions continue to bear political import as is evidenced by John Mearsheimer’s work The Tragedy of Great Power Politics where he offers an account of offensive realism drawing on the previously

77  Kenneth Waltz, Theory of International Politics (New York & London: McGrawHill, 1979). Kenneth Waltz, Man, the State and War: A Theoretical Analysis (New York & London: Columbia University Press, 1959). These are the two most widely cited texts in this discourse.

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outlined structural assumptions of Waltz.78 This account of offensive realism is accompanied by an alternative, defensive realist discourse as noted in such authors as Stephen Walt.79 As a whole, they demonstrate the foothold that strategic, and sterile, accounts of international politics have when seeking to explain the nature of international politics. In 1978 however, Charles Beitz sought to renew the discussions of power and morality in his work Political Theory and International Relations.80 Emphasizing the influence of Hobbes’s account of power and authority, he articulates a particular role for institutions in domestic states to develop a distributional account of political justice. Upholding the distinctions of domestic and private associated with international sovereignty, Beitz’s work highlights two important phenomena within the practice of international politics. In the first instance, he reiterates alternative traditions—beyond realist assumptions—incorporating institutions and liberal assumptions with which to understand international affairs. Second, he demonstrates, by way of analogy, the influence of the social contract tradition on structures guiding international politics and highlights the preeminent role of the state alongside international sovereignty and the norms of non-intervention and non-aggression. Although Beitz’s attempt to integrate morality and realpolitik is troubled, it is an interesting rejoinder to an account of international affairs which remains vibrant even with the eventual end of the Cold War. Moreover, Beitz’s return to the perennial problem of morality within international politics opened the door for many different forays into the normative discourses of world politics.81 One particular manifestation of the space created by normative political thought exists in the reinvigorated idea of ‘the tragic.’ This idea, best found in the works of Ned Lebow, highlights, like those classical realist scholars, the ongoing struggle that individuals face when they seek to tame their wild egoism in light of their natural sociability. In his restatement of the realist tradition of political thought Lebow has articulated a vision of international politics which draws heavily on classical sources in order to understand anew the assumptions of interests, ethics and some aspects of order.82 Lebow draws heavily on the ideas of Morgenthau and posits that the tragic aspect of man’s condition creates a site of social learning whereby man can begin to understand this particular state and work through it. He associates man’s inability to overcome the challenges of conflict with hubris, 78  John J. Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (New York: W.W. Norton, 2001). 79 Stephen Walt, The Origins of Alliances (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1987). 80  Beitz, 1979. 81  A point noted by Brown, 2005b. He singles out the following works and authors: Mervyn Frost, Andrew Linklater, Terry Nardin, Onora O’Neill, Thomas Pogge, Johns Rawls, Henry Shue and Michael Walzer. 82 Ned Lebow, The Tragic Vision of Politics: Ethics, Interests and Orders (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003). These ideas are also restated in Ned Lebow, Tragedy, politics and political science, International Relations, 19 no. 3 (2005), 329–336.

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self-interest and egoism which motivates agency. The tragedy of international politics, according to Lebow, is that the practices and discourses of international politics fail to take into account the very real limitations of individuals within the community. On the other hand, Chris Brown moves beyond the realist discourse in which Lebow engages and seeks to focus a normative lens upon the idea of tragedy.83 It is his belief that tragedy has ‘political purchase’ and when one delves into the discourse and practice of human rights, humanitarian intervention and international or global justice, one begins to understand the tension that global agents face when making difficult decisions. Unlike Lebow, who investigates Thucydides and Morgenthau in some detail, Brown turns to the ancient tragic plays in order to determine what the nature of the tragic is. In this way one begins to see some sympathies toward the idea of vulnerability displayed in the cosmopolitan discourse in the Introduction of this work. He seeks to demonstrate how difficult moral dilemmas are for agents of justice and how the difficulty of decision-making further complicates the ability of agents to act. In a way, he echoes the ideals of Morgenthau who draws on Abraham Lincoln’s appeal to ‘do the best you can.’84 What Brown highlights, however, is the fact that there remain questions to be posed and seriously answered in the realm of genuine global moral agency. Brown’s conclusions point toward the inclusion of a tragic discourse in the realm of international political thought and normative theory which ultimately would reveal the nuances of poverty, global inequality and the need for social justice in a way that would bring a greater degree of humanity to the discourses of international relations. This notion of tragedy recalls the original vulnerability which unites cosmopolitan scholars as they seek to develop their moral capacities while being aware of the frailty of the human condition. However, not all scholars are convinced of this tragic theme. As Nicholas Rengger has argued, one ought to challenge the idea of tragedy with an anti-Pelagian approach which understands human actions simply as they are—human actions. There is, on this interpretation, no nuance or hubris which would add depth or understanding to the human condition. While this approach does not deny the vulnerabilities associated with

83 Chris Brown, Tragedy, ‘tragic choices’ and contemporary international political theory, International Relations, 21 no. 1 (2007), 5–13. 84  This refers to Morgenthau’s use, during the Second World War, of a quotation from Abraham Lincoln when he (Morgenthau) discusses the idea that within a moral argument each side would argue their correct moral position. In the absence of an authoritative guiding figure, Lincoln urges man to do the best he can. This analogy is employed by Morgenthau in his discussion of international morality about when states and their leaders seek to act in a moral and upright fashion. This tension of morality and politics, which is here highlighted, is like the tension that agents face when facing serious moral dilemmas, and as outlined by Brown. And it is this tension that any realistic account of global moral agency, like that presented in Chapters 4 and 5, must address.

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human life it simply reasons through the quotidian while being aware of the possibility of morality therein.85 Peter Euben also engages with this notion of tragedy. As a classically trained scholar he demonstrates how the tragic plays, for the Greeks, were a means of education, much like individuals today participate in pop culture as a mode of development—moral or otherwise—which echoes Lebow’s idea of ‘social learning.’ The tragedies which Euben discusses depict many characters engaging in the paradoxes of every day life; for example, violence and ethics, old and young, politics and power, empire and democracy, mortality and divinity, leadership and citizenship, luck and glory, hope and fear, passion and sanity, men and women, rich and poor, the free and enslaved, sight, insight and foresight and madness and blindness. While some of these themes have no political import within international relations, some of them do. What the plays offer is a mode of casuistic training in situations which reveal the struggles individuals face when seeking to balance the demands of justice and self-interest within a moral account of ‘the political.’ This tragic theme, and its educational potential, hints at the possibility of a casuistic account of international politics. Peter Euben’s writings echo many of the themes found in the works of Martha Nussbaum that will be investigated in Chapter 2 of this work. It highlights the idea that individuals are reasonable, moral and open to the possibility of moral communities. Euben thus stands outside the realist tradition because of the particular relationship which he endorses between the individual and the community. It is, unlike the realist scholars discussed in this chapter, a site of moral education. Thus, if one engages with these outlined paradoxes what becomes clear is not only the plight of the individual, but also a reasonable response to their existence. The developing idea of tragedy in the field of international relations, according to Euben, lies in its ability to reread classical texts, as does Lebow, but with a sensitivity that cultivates reasonable policies which cater to the hinted at nuances of Brown. Euben lies outside the assumptions of realist politics, yet his work in this area draws on many of the same sources which support a cosmopolitan discourse in international politics. Yet within his writings one is able to see hints of the longforsaken teleological and perfectionist assumptions which sustain ancient and premodern natural law accounts. He challenges the ideas of the international political theorists discussed in the previous section and provides an alternative reading of the relationship of justice and morality which features in the works of these classical and contemporary tragic realists. His incorporation into this particular discourse reveals how the discourses of morality, ethics, law and politics all exist alongside one another, as well as the interdisciplinary nature of international relations itself. Moreover, it reveals a decidedly empty space whereby alternative interpretations of ‘the political’ can exist. While this particular chapter does not engage with the lost assumptions of modern natural law it does demonstrate the need to revitalize 85 Nicholas Rengger, Tragedy or scepticism? Defending the anti-Pelagian mind in world politics, International Relations, 19, no. 3 (2005), 321–328.

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the ties which bind these different academic discourses in order to realistically engage with the vulnerable and tragic elements of being human, in common. Conclusion This chapter has achieved two different aims. First, by way of an examination of the social contract tradition, it demonstrated how the moral assumptions needed to engage with vulnerability were lost. Second, it moved on from these assumptions to investigate their influence on the modern and contemporary accounts of international politics. It concluded by way of an account of how realist politics have accommodated the somewhat fraught relationship of power, morality and ethics evident within the dominant accounts of ‘the political’ in international politics. It distinguished between the instrumental and non-instrumental relationships which feature in the daily lives of individuals and the interactions of states. In so doing it generated the space to argue the following claim: alternative accounts of ‘the political’ which take into account the possibility of moral development, within the community, are possible and needed within the discourse of international relations. Yet, the dominant discourses of international politics, influenced as they are by a domestic analogy, are currently unable to do so. With this in mind, this work turns to the pre-modern tradition of natural law in order to establish an alternative response (to that of a tragic realist or a cosmopolitan scholar) to the realities of the human condition. With this in mind, Chapter 2 outlines the tradition of natural law, both as a historical tradition as well as a tradition of morality. It describes the various roles that a natural law discourse has played in historical and contemporary international politics before demonstrating the shortcomings of its current popular rebranding from the New Natural Lawyers.

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Chapter 2

The Morality of Natural Law and International Relations: Establishing a Tradition of Influence Introduction Natural law is a moral tradition. It articulates an account of morality that offers a series of ontological, epistemological and methodological assumptions that sustain an ethical framework for both the individual and the community, both of which are understood as agents. Above all else, natural law is concerned with the ability of the individual to achieve the ends of goodness. Consequently, the morality of natural law is distinctly teleological. Its ontology is marked by this teleology of being that describes the ends of human happiness which each and every individual, situated within the community, ought to be able to achieve. Human happiness represents the absolute ends of being human and is coupled by a normative framework—the product of human experience—which sustains just political structures. Natural law is thus identifiable not only by its absolute ends, but also by its articulation of a normative framework within which agents act and interact with one another coming to know the good and actively seek to participate in its benefits. The distinction of absolute ends and relative means is intrinsically important to this account of natural law. Natural law is chiefly associated with the works of Thomas Aquinas. It is he who assimilated the ideas of Aristotle within the Christian tradition. Within his works he provides an account of the laws of man, alongside eternal laws, in order to demonstrate how individuals are at once moral and social beings, and consequently political. Through a particular application of the doctrine of grace, Aquinas is able to argue that individuals are naturally predisposed not only to know the good, but to actively seek it out. This version of human morality is distinct from that of Augustine, a theologian who enjoys a prominent role in the discourses of international relations, in particular realist interpretations of   d’Entreves, 1951.   Yves R. Simon, The Tradition of Natural Law: A Philosopher’s Reflections, Vukan Kuic, ed., with an introduction by Russell Hittinger (New York: Fordham University Press, 1992).   Heinrich A. Rommen, The Natural Law: A Study in Legal and Social History and Philosophy (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, Inc., 1998).

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international politics. Whereas Aquinas demonstrated how individuals, by their very naturalness could never lose the original graceful divination, Augustine did not. Aquinas could therefore argue that human happiness was something which individuals could strive to achieve on earth; thus he was moving away from the twofold distinction of a City of Man and the City of God articulated by Augustine. This was possible because human happiness was part and parcel of the teleology of being. Thus while the ultimate ends of human happiness were a constantly developing endeavor, individuals could always improve their nature; however, while Aquinas, like Augustine, believed ultimate human happiness was relegated to the divine existence, Aquinas professes a positive human nature which in modern discourse could be referred to as human potential. The assumptions of Aquinas have influenced a wide variety of authors throughout history. In fact, natural law is both a historical tradition in and of itself, as well as a tradition of morality. This chapter investigates both the history of the idea of natural law as well as its modern interpretations in order to reveal two separate yet related ideas. Historically the ends of natural law morality have been used as a benchmark against which to critique customs and practices. This morality can play an intrinsic role in the idea of moral agency. With this in mind, the first section of this chapter offers an historical account of the development of natural law. The second section reveals a variety of ‘thick’ and ‘thin’ accounts of morality in order to demonstrate the contemporary applications of this idea. This dichotomy is set up with a view to articulating the following: both thin and thick notions of morality presuppose assumptions like those evident in the morality of natural law, yet they complement one another offering a balanced appraisal of the human condition. Ultimately, this work focuses on thick accounts in order to emphasize the relationality of being which will be developed in Chapter 3. This is intrinsically important to the ensuing institutional design articulated in Chapter 5. Finally, the chapter ends with an examination of the New Natural Lawyers in order to describe the (limited) value of their interpretation of natural law morality vis­-á-vis the practices of international politics in general. A Natural Law History Ancient Natural Law References to natural law run rampant throughout history. Scholars point to the works of Sophocles in order to establish the assumption of an overarching moral power guiding the lives of individuals within the community. In his work Antigone the central character of the same name references a higher moral order when she acts in a way which contravenes accepted political customs. Antigone desires to  Augustine of Hippo, On the City of God against the Pagans, Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought, R. W. Dyson, ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988).

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prepare her brother’s body for burial which had been forbidden by the King. This led to her now famous speech: That order did not come from God. Justice, That dwells with the gods below, knows no such law. I did not think your edicts strong enough To overrule the unwritten unalterable laws Of God and heaven, you only being a man. They are not of yesterday or today, but everlasting, Though where they came from, none of us can tell. Guilty of their transgression before God I cannot be, for any man on earth.

This idea of a higher moral order, as William Orton points out, provided the ancients with a means of understanding their role in the wider cosmos. Moreover, it provided a means of measuring the morality of social customs and individual agency. Antigone demonstrates two key aspects of moral agency: the ability to reason and then act, aware of a discord which exists in the accepted practices of the community and a higher notion of ‘the good.’ The ideas of this speech are likewise evident in the philosophical tracts of ancient philosophers as well. Aristotle’s works Ethics and Politics make repeated mention of the idea of ‘the good’ and the desire for individuals to achieve such an end. He provides the reader with the idea of the Eudaimon, the individual whose life is oriented around an understanding of this good in order to develop as a truly moral being. Aristotle articulates an account of the virtues, those worldly and bodily goods which individuals must strive to develop within their quotidian existence. The virtues provide a moral framework which helps the individual to develop as a moral being. What individuals must seek is a balance of aims and ends. Aristotle was aware that all individuals were unique beings. Consequently a plurality of paths could be pursued. Yet all individuals, according to his account, were social and moral and thus could, through the development of upright habits, contribute to the moral structures of the political community which informed a universal idea of morality. There is a decidedly outward orientation in the works of Aristotle. Knowledge of the good was ascertained within the cosmos which proffered a particular understanding of ‘the political.’ This account of morality accommodated his ideas of virtue and the mean, all of which were encompassed within his idea  Sophocles, Antigone, Mark Griffith, ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999).   William Orton, The sources of natural law, International Journal of Ethics, 36 no. 2 (January 1926), 147–161.  Aristotle, The Nicomachean Ethic, L.A.K. Thomson, trans. (London: Penguin Classics, 2004).  Aristotle, The Politics (London: Prentice Hall, 1981).

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of friendship. Aristotle proffers three levels of friendship, the highest level of which was individuals seeking, in common, the nature of ‘the good.’ This ideal of civic friendship is at odds with modern interpretations of political society. It demonstrates that the community is an agent who helps individuals to achieve a moral existence which reflects a balance of practical experience and understood moral laws. This account facilitated the placing of an equal emphasis on the role of practical as well as theoretical knowledge, thus shaping the deliberations and actions of the agent. This idea is well documented in his work Rhetoric. These ideas were carried forward in the works of Stoics. Collectively, the Stoics strove to achieve a balance between the rationality of the universe and the rationality of individual human nature evident in a life void of passion. They follow a single adage: live according to nature. One could achieve such an end by employing the natural skill of reason. The Stoics use of reason facilitated their association with the natural law tradition. The preeminent Stoic was Cicero whose works are informed by the ancient writings on justice, morality and the community. One can find evidence of Aristotle’s influence in many of Cicero’s works, in particular On Duties.10 Cicero held an Aristotelian idea of the cosmos and morality, and in his writings he urges his readers to seek a harmonious relationship between the two. His particular importance, in relation to this work, lies in his own comportment and the ideals which guided his own life. Cicero was an advocate engaged in politics, as well as a scholar. As Toulmin and Jonsen point out, he loathed personal glory. They highlight his disgust with ‘opportunism and unprincipled pragmatism.’11 He sought instead to focus on the ideals of civic achievement in light of the ideals of the Stoic motto which eluded the grasp of many.12 Cicero engages in a debate between virtue and utility in order to propose a reasonable balance between human expectations and reality. He examines human duties in the wider context of human relationships where he notes that duties, from time to time are called into conflict with one another. In so doing he subtly transformed the Stoic motto of right reason in the face of duty to include a knowledge of the particular thus ensuring that each individual is accorded his or her due. In so doing he blended an account of morality reaching back to Aristotle, a Roman interpretation of civic virtue and the method of casuistry.13 Cicero’s account of natural law marks the final account of this moral tradition which draws distinctively on the works of ancient political philosophers. The  Aristotle, Art of Rhetoric (London: Penguin Classics, 2005). This work demonstrates, among other things, the importance of a well-rounded epistemology alongside the moral agent, as featured in Ethics and Politics. 10 Cicero, On Duties, M.T. Griffin, trans. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). 11  A.R. Jonsen and S. Toulmin, The Abuse of Casuistry: A History of Moral Reasoning (Berkeley, California: University of California Press Ltd., 1988). 12  Jonsen and Toulmin, 1988. 13 Casuistry come to play an important role in the unfolding developments of natural law, and it is a theme which will be revisited in some detail in Chapter 3 where the specific ideas of Aquinas are examined.

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natural law scholar Thomas Aquinas sought to blend the assumptions of Aristotle with the Christian tradition.14 His threefold account of laws distinguishes his ideas from those of his predecessors and he goes on to develop a scholastic natural law tradition. This interpretation of natural law is at odds with that of the natural law scholars discussed in Chapter 1. In particular, the scholastic tradition assumes alternative roles for the individual will in light of its perfectionist assumptions and teleological ends. Moreover, it highlights the centrality of the individual set within the political community, which is itself a site of moral learning. This second assumption provides an alternative account of understanding human vulnerability and potential which contrasts the cosmopolitan and realist accounts of being human previously examined. Scholastic Natural Law Natural law, during the Middle Ages, distinguishes itself for a wide variety of reasons. What is most interesting—at least for the ends of this particular work—is the point made by Brian Tierney. His historical analysis of natural law morality throughout the Middle Ages reveals that this was the final moment in history when the individual and the community enjoyed a relationship of equality.15 An examination of their roles reveals a shared teleological orientation aimed at the moral development of the individual.16 Scholasticism and natural law build on the assumptions outlined by Thomas Aquinas. This Scholastic interpretation accepts the distinction of natural, civil and eternal laws and adopts the threefold ontological, epistemological and methodological assumptions he outlines. As Bernice Hamilton demonstrates in her examination of the Scholastic natural law tradition, those authors associated with this interpretation—Vitoria, Las Casas, Molina and De Soto—all work within this tripartite framework in order to provide an account of the universe premised on the hierarchy of eternal law over positive law.17 14  Knud Haakonssen, Natural Law and Moral Philosophy from Grotius to the Scottish Enlightenment (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996). He argues that most examinations of natural law morality understand all those accounts of natural law which predate Aquinas as leading up to his interpretation and those which follow are widely influenced by his assumptions. 15  Brian Tierney, The Idea of Natural Rights, Natural Law and Church Law, 1150– 1625 (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2001). 16 The emergence of a natural rights tradition, alongside that of the natural law, would begin to focus on the laws of the community vis-á-vis the rights of the individual and alter the conception of this particular relationship. In fact, these changes began to emerge along with modern interpretations of the natural law tradition. If one examines the distinction of objective and subjective dominion the subjective account accommodates the changing ontological, epistemological and methodological assumptions of natural law as well. 17  Bernice Hamilton, Political Thought in Sixteenth-Century Spain: A Study of the Political Ideas of Vitoria, De Soto, Suarez and Molina (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1963).

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Collectively these authors are referred to as the Salamanca School and their various writings set out what is now the Scholastic natural law tradition. As a whole these authors enjoyed a wide reputation during the Middle Ages. Their writings reflect an interest in a wide variety of topics ranging from theology to anthropology and metaphysics.18 Within their writings it is possible to discern an idea of equality that is rooted in the capacity and capabilities of individuals, as social and moral beings. Each author, as will be demonstrated in Chapter 3, shows in their own particular manner the capacity of individuals to live within a community and develop long-term institutional arrangements. These patterns establish the potential for civility and therefore an obligation of care towards other, less-endowed individuals, both domestically and in wider areas of the world. Obligation and responsibility are, for these theologians, premised on the idea first discussed by Aquinas: dominion. Dominion naturale, or natural dominion, is, as Roger Ruston points out, a feat of both nature and grace.19 As Aquinas first discussed, dominion could not be lost with the original sin as it was a product of nature, and therefore of man’s nature. It provided the necessary means for individuals to develop as moral beings. As Lewis Hanke points out, in his history of the Spanish Empire, the evidence of dominion, seen in the organization of political communities, made it possible for the Salamanca Theologians to challenge the Aristotelian idea of the natural slave.20 The Amerindians, because they possessed their own cultures, civic customs and political traditions, must be considered as moral beings in potential awaiting the requisite education which would lead to a modern civil society. For this reason, Jean Porter points out that the morality of natural law provides an account of individual moral agency as well as an account of moral political order.21 It is this potential for moral development which distinguishes a Scholastic interpretation of natural law. With regards to the cosmopolitan tradition examined in the Introduction, Scholastic natural law does not always assume a progressive moral framework. While it seeks a perfectionist end for both the individual and the community, it is wary of the very real possibility of moral failure. It thus shares some insights with an Aristotelian notion of vulnerability, which will be discussed in the following section. Moreover, it engages with the pessimistic concerns of contemporary tragic realists as outlined in Chapter 1. Scholastic natural lawyers 18 Anthony Pagden, Introduction, in Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought, Vitoria, Political Writings, Anthony Pagden and Jeremy Lawrence, eds (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), ix–xxxii. 19 Roger Ruston, Human Rights and the Image of God (London: SCM-Canterbury Press, 2004). 20 Lewis Hanke, All Mankind is One: A Study of the Disputation Between Bartoloméo de Las Casas and Juan Gines de Sepulveda in 1550 on the Intellectual and Religious Capacity of the American Indians (Illinois: Northern Illinois Press, 1974). 21  Jean Porter, A tradition of civility: the natural law as a tradition of moral inquiry, Scottish Journal of Theology, 56 no. 1 (2003), 27–48.

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did not, however, need to negotiate in and amongst different academic disciplines. They could accommodate both positive and negative facets of human nature. Theirs was not a world divided by rational, reasonable and scientific knowledge. Consequently they did not engage in the pragmatic moral discourses as evidenced in the works of the modern international lawyers of Chapter 1. As Chapter 3 will demonstrate in greater detail, the Scholastic interpretation of natural dominion provided an account of political relationships of obligation and care as instrumental relationships capable of addressing the fraught relationship of morality, ethics and power within ‘the political.’ Not all authors agree with this interpretation of Scholastic natural law. In fact, Midgely provides a scathing critique of the already changing ontological assumptions of the time.22 He argues that in the works of Suarez and Vattel the ideas of Aquinas have already changed in such a way as to devalue their interpretation of natural law. Suarez’s works lead into a discussion of international law and examine a state’s natural right to self-defense and to wage war. His words alter the original Thomist assumptions and instead articulate a doctrine of natural honesty.23 With this in mind he goes on to argue that obligation is not a function of practical reason, as Aquinas maintains. Instead Suarez argues that obligation is recourse to the ultimate will of God. Midgely likewise is critical of Vattel’s account of ius gentium. The problem with Vattel’s work, Midgley points out, is the relationship he goes on to develop between one’s natural obligations and the particular purpose of conscience in determining such obligations. The original Thomist assumptions demonstrate that all moral actions are guided by one’s conscience. The distinction drawn by Vattel with regards to perfect obligations, international obligations and imperfect external obligations calls the original relationship of the conscience and agency into question. Midgely is thus able to show how, by adopting the language of jurisprudence and focusing on the idea of international civil society, that Vattel dramatically alters the epistemology and methodology of the original Thomist position. These modifications to Aquinas’s original thoughts were not the only discursive changes occurring at this particular moment in time. The idea of dominion itself was subject to two different interpretations. Annabel S. Brett provides a well-rounded examination of the discourse of ius (right) and lex (law) during the Middle Ages and into the Enlightenment period. She goes on to identify an objective and subjective dominion in the discourses of rights and morality of this time.24 These changing assumptions signaled alternative ontological and metaphysical assumptions in the discourses of morality and justice. The schism that was occurring within the 22  Midgley, 1975. 23  While Suarez’s chief contribution to the Scholastic tradition rested in his works on metaphysics, Disputationes Metaphysicae (1597), his other work De Legibus (1612) provides an account of his assumptions on political theory and political philosophy. 24 Annabel Brett, Liberty, Right and Nature; Individual Rights in Later Scholastic Thought (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997).

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idea of dominion is itself a consequence of modernity’s changing ontological and epistemological assumptions. The subjective world view, evidenced in the works of the social contract thinkers, and in particular Hobbes, brought a focus on rights and liberty. These were accommodated by a subjective account of dominion. These changing relationships challenged the instrumental role that obligation and care could play within ‘the political.’ This modern unfolding of ‘the political’ represents one particular account of the history of political thought. As Onuf’s work has demonstrated, it was not the sole political discourse.25 His work highlights the republican tradition. Likewise the Scholastic tradition of natural law did not disappear as the subjective world view came to dominate the discourses of political thought. It simply existed outside the rational and stable political structures established with the onset of modern international political order. Scholastic assumptions remained dominant in the institution of the Papacy, providing the moral and political frameworks within which it could provide its interpretations of ‘the political.’ An examination of a wide variety of Papal encyclicals demonstrates the steadfastness of the Scholastic tradition outside the accepted accounts of (international) political thought and provide an account of ‘the political’ engaging with the original relationship which concerned natural law scholars: namely, power, justice and ethics in the daily affairs of individuals conceptualized as social and moral beings. Natural Law and the Christian Tradition The Papacy is a controversial institution within the world. It enjoys close relationships with some states while displaying tense diplomatic ties with many others. Despite its existence outside the formal structures of world order it provides a critical lens to examine a wide variety of issues and practices within politics, both domestically and internationally.26 In order to communicate its vision of politics the Papacy relies on its encyclicals. They promote the ideas of love, charity and forgiveness within its vision of institutional design. Each encyclical detailed below provides insight into many issues exhibited in political thought, both historical and modern.27 What is particular important is to notice the symbiotic role the 25  Onuf, 1998. For another alternative which describes the roman notion of liberty see the works of Quentin Skinner. Quentin Skinner, Liberty before Liberalism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997). 26  For a detailed account of the papal encyclicals and the role of justice and morality, see The Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 2004). 27  Written in 1891 Rerum Novarum (Encyclical of Pope Leo XIII on capital and labor) challenges the ideology of socialism and the idea of communal property rights. In a turn of phrase which echoes many of the ideas of John Locke the Papacy defends the inherent right to private poverty, endorsing along the way the structures of a liberal market economy.

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Church envisions for morality within the political community and the ability of the individual to act as an agent of justice. Written in 1885, Immortale Dei outlines a vision of institutional design that employs the assumptions of natural law morality.28 Immortale Dei demonstrates the critical function of natural law morality tackling head on many of the themes associated with modernity. The document identifies the modern ideal of human liberty and an associated equality of being premised on the naturalness of individuals as a race of human beings. It challenges the notion of authority which stems from these assumptions and indicates how they generate a permanent climate of political insecurity. The way the text challenges the modern distinction of public and private agency and calls on all individuals, as Christians and Catholics, to act as unified moral beings is central to the natural law tradition. It highlights the teleology of being chiefly associated with a pre-modern morality and the desire to achieve the ends of ‘the good.’ This encyclical argues that the church and the modern political state enjoy a relationship which is simultaneously absolute and relative. Each is organized to achieve its own particular end: the former, a stable political order, and the later, a moral order geared toward the moral development of the individual. The inherent conclusion being that both accounts of ‘the political’ must work together to provide a foundational account of moral good governance. In order to sustain such a claim, the document investigates the authority of political rule and the right of assassination on the part of citizens. Political authority, established through the laws of nature, is the product of reason and experience. It ought, therefore, to be accepted by citizens who are constituted by the self-same natural sociability. This shared ontology engenders a degree of stability which eludes the political structures which rest solely on the authority of positive law—a man made creation. This encyclical argues that it is practical reason and not positive law which will ultimately shape moral and ethical decision-making. Its discussion of political assassinations reveals that should individuals begin to question the role of the leader, and seek their replacement, any moral deliberation would reveal the immorality of such an act. Positive law, on the other hand, is challenged and stability is shown to be part and parcel of natural moral reasonableness. If the modern ideal of political stability is to be achieved, one can conclude, it must necessarily include the ends of both civil society and the assumptions of natural law morality. Like the ancient idea of natural law evidenced in Antigone’s challenge of societal justice, and the challenge the Stoic individual faced in achieving high standards of the ideal life in his quotidian events, and finally, the manner in which scholastic theologians employ the notion of equality to challenge the Arisotetlian category of natural slave, Leo XIII emphasizes human agency in order to combat injustice and immorality within the realm of ‘the political.’ What this encyclical reveals is a highly nuanced critique of the pragmatism which 28  Pope Leo XIII, On the Christian Constitution of States, Immortale Dei, Given at St Peter’s in Rome, the first day of November, 1885, the seventh year of Our Pontificate.

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can be located in the legal structuring of ‘the political.’ In order to challenge this idea, alternative encyclicals have argued the idea of obligation and responsibility couched in the language of love. One first finds evidence of the importance of love in the 1930 encyclical Casti Connubii.29 This document is aimed at the private relations of husband and wife and focuses on how their relationship ought to function; namely, on the ideal of loving reasonableness. Yet this is not the only encyclical which calls on the role of love with regards to institutional design. Redemptor Hominis was published in 1978 and provides a thoughtful analysis of the role that the Papacy can play in the twentieth century.30 It returns to the themes of love and reasonableness in order to demonstrate the increasing need for virtues and moral agents in light of the current international political climate. Pope John Paul II highlights the problems of the Cold War, the potential use of nuclear weapons, the ongoing arms race and the suffering generated therein. He calls for a united Church, and even a united humanity, which he premises on the idea of love. This love is experienced within the community and recalls the unity of both the individual and the community as moral beings. It draws on the Second Vatican Council, thus reaffirming the plurality of faiths within the world, and highlights the variety of means through which the ends of morality can be achieved. In so doing it reaffirms the plurality of community development couched within an overarching moral order. The interesting aspect of this document is the role which it assigns to the Catholic Church. As an institution it is charged with overseeing the well-being and moral development of individuals. Consequently, the institution of the Papacy reflects neither one defined idea of the political community, nor does it associate itself with one political ideology. Rather she is that which safeguards and watches ‘the transcendence of the human person.’31 In this way, the rhetoric of the papal institution is mindful of the critical function that the moral tradition of natural law can provide in times of social malaise, injustice and immorality. The document identifies a ‘disquieted anguish’ which challenges the existence of individuals, qua human beings, and highlights the increasing distance between individuals and the moral order—that is to say, natural law,—which ought to guide their lives. In a time of genuine moral progress individuals and communities remain focused on the task of subduing the earth in lieu of the requirements of justice and love which balance out the equations of society. In response to this problem, John Paul II replies with the principle of solidarity with which to unite the class, communities and the global population at large. This account of institutional design is, by its very nature, Catholic. It will bring to bear many challenges for the scholar of international relations. Its 29  Pope Pius XI, Casti Connubii, On Christian Marriage, given at Rome, in St Peter’s, this 31st day of December, of the year 1930 the ninth of Our Pontificate. 30  John Paul II, Redemptor hominis, Given at Rome, at St Peter’s, on the fourth of March, the First Sunday of Lent, in the year 1979, the first year of my Pontificate. 31  Pope Leo XIII, 1885.

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overt religiosity is mindful of the gracefulness of being which presupposes the natural law agent. Moreover, it is a decidedly Western interpretation of religion and philosophy. The universality of its assumptions will prove problematic for those individuals who exist within the peripheries of its absolute ends. Moreover, it challenges the assumptions of reason and rationality which contribute to the modern understanding of politics and the demarcations of public and private agency. All of these criticisms will be addressed in turn in the final section of this chapter. On the other hand, what ought to emerge from this description is yet another example of the possibility of critical engagement which the assumptions of natural law morality provide. By articulating an alternative understanding of the political community, and the moral potential of individuals, the Papal publications reveal one manner of understanding the relationship of morality and politics. It reinvigorates the social and teleological assumptions of being human and offers a holistic account of being political. Thick and Thin Morality The morality of natural law, as the previous section demonstrated, was dramatically altered as modern assumptions of the individual and the community transformed the relationship of power, morality and ethics within ‘the political.’ While it continued to exist formally and openly within religious institutions, natural law as a moral tradition did not exist formally within the discipline of international relations, nor did it feature in the various interpretations of international politics. Yet if one looks carefully it is possible to find evidence of the natural law tradition’s existence, albeit a tempestuous one, alongside some of the discourses and practices of politics. This section seeks to demonstrate a latent presence of natural morality. Moreover, it reveals the importance of including the natural law tradition among the key ethical frameworks which feature in international politics and international political thought. Moreover, it helps demonstrate the need to draw on the morality of natural law in order to develop alternative accounts of ‘the political’ which reflect the reality of the human condition. This understanding is necessary if agents seek to tackle head on the problems which arise because of man’s inherently conflicted, yet moral, nature. Four different authors are examined in the following section. Jacques Maritain and E.B.F. Midgely represent formal natural law scholars who seek to reinvigorate the assumptions of Thomas Aquinas and demonstrate their import within the wider field of international politics. While Maritain demonstrates the value of natural law morality vis-á-vis the emerging doctrine of universal human rights in the post Second World War environment, Midgely demonstrates how the principles of natural law morality provide a foundational account for a legitimate moral world order. Two alternative scholars, Martha Nussbaum and Alastair MacIntyre, are also examined. Their works stand in contrast to those of Maritain and Midgely as they adopt distinctly Aristotelian interpretations of morality. In a similar vein

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to Maritain, Martha Nussbaum engages with the notion of tragedy and luck in ethics and shows how a particular understanding of the human condition reveals a predisposition to moral agency and human rights which she refers to as ‘the capabilities approach.’ MacIntyre, like Nussbaum, looks to the Aristotelian notion of human virtue in order to develop a holistic account of morality within ‘the political’ which is at odds with modern liberal rights agenda. These two authors provide a contrast to the Scholastic tradition of natural law examined throughout this work; however, as a group these authors provide a sense of ‘natural’ morality. This title draws on the historical description of natural law morality described in the previous section. It employs the wider title of natural morality in order to encompass approaches which adopt both Aristotelian and Thomistic assumptions of natural law. These accounts are accorded the titles of thin (Aristotelian) and thick (Thomism) accounts of natural morality in order to establish some common themes in all four accounts while remaining aware of the key differences. This process acts as a vehicle for demonstrating the following claim: regardless of whether one adopts a thick or thin account of natural morality what emerges is an alternative conception of responsible and moral citizenship which emphasizes both instrumental and non-instrumental relationships. All four authors present a particular interpretation of ‘the political’ and in so doing demonstrate alternative modes of understanding the relationship of power, morality and ethics within politics premised on the natural skill of practical reason. Jacques Maritain Jacques Maritain is a natural law scholar of the Scholastic tradition. He draws on the assumptions of Thomas Aquinas in order to provide a neo-Thomistic account of morality and justice, and he applies it to many facets of the temporal order. According to Jacques Maritain, it is the ontological and epistemological assumptions of natural law morality which presuppose its naturalness. He writes: The genuine concept of Natural Law is the concept of a law which is natural not only insofar as it expresses the normality of functioning of human nature, but also insofar as it is naturally known, that is, known through inclination or through connaturality, not through conceptual reasoning.32

As moral beings, individuals are able to discern these laws regardless of their religious, cultural, or political development. Natural law provides a united account of human nature which emphasizes the benevolent capacities and capabilities of individuals, who are conceptualized as moral agents. For Maritain, the morality of natural law is simultaneously ideal and ontological.

32  Jacques Maritain, Natural Law: Reflections on Theory & Practice (South Bend, Indiana: St. Augustine’s Press, 2001), 20.

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It is something ideal because it is grounded on the human essence, on its unchangeable structure and the intelligible necessities it involves. On the other hand, natural law is something ontological because the human essence is an ontological reality which moreover does not exist separately, but in every human being, so that by the same token natural law dwells as an ideal order in the very being of every existing man.33

This shared human nature provides the foundation for his account of natural law. Maritain’s account of natural law reflects the original distinction of absolute ends, or ‘the good,’ alongside a normative order which highlights the values of any single political community.34 The goodness which he articulates is the ultimate unity with God, and his temporal order, or institutional design, functions to accommodate such ends. Maritain articulates, in The Humanism of the Incarnation, a vision of the political community which understands human beings as social and moral beings supported by the ideals of love and goodwill. These values support the development of the individual within the community.35 He provides a discourse of love, which is defined as the recognition of the potential to do good in another. When this goodness of the self is reflected in another, one is disposed to act in a charitable manner to endeavor to help not only the self, but others as well. Maritain’s account of charity incorporates the Aristotelian ideal of civic friendship in order to articulate the ends of love which, he claims, will unite individuals and restore the lost account of sociability associated with modernity’s institutional designs. The Humanism of the Incarnation is a decidedly Catholic, and religious, account of the community. Maritain is certain that only such a design will allow all individuals throughout the world to achieve their true end; however, he does not discount the possibility of individuals of different creeds working together in order to achieve a just political order, domestically or internationally.36 In Scholasticism and Politics, Maritain reveals how a pluralistic world order founded on civic friendship can sustain a loving and moral community.37 He also demonstrates how a common human nature reveals the possibility of a world community founded on the common laws of solidarity.38 This community is sustained by a universal 33  Maritain, 2001, 31. 34  Jacques Maritain, The Rights of Man and Natural Law (London: Geoffrey Bles, the Centenary Press, 1945). 35  Jacques Maritain, The Person and the Common Good (Indiana: University of Notre Dame Press, 1966). 36  Jacques Maritain, True Humanism, M.R. Adamson, trans. (London: Geoffrey Bles, The Centenary Press, 1938). 37  Jacques Maritain, Scholasticism and Politics, Mortimer J. Adler, trans. (London: Geoffrey Bles, The Centenary Press, 1940). 38  Jacques Maritain, The ends of Machiavellianism, The Review of Politics, 4 no. 1 (1942), 1–33.

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recognition of the need for a common good emanating from the ability to love, goodwill and the recognition of the inherent dignity of all mankind seeking to develop and survive throughout the world.39 It is an account of politics which features in the work he does with UNESCO and the development of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Chapter 5 examines some of the documents associated with the development of the universal human rights discourse. Those documents reveal the dominant role of practical reason which Maritain seeks to reestablish in the practices and discourses of politics while simultaneously articulating the social and moral nature of all individuals throughout the world.40 Man’s isolation, according to Maritain, stems from the anthropocentricism of modernity. The changing nature of ontology simultaneously empowered individuals as political agents, while at the same time creating structures which denied a particular place for sociability and reason. The laws which were put in place depicted a rational account of man and an account of political authority which stunted the moral potential of all individuals. These ideas are evident in Martian’s critique of modernity which, as was outlined in Chapter 1, reveals a nonontological account of being, a non-teleological account of moral development and a denial of the perfectionist aims of natural law morality. There was, as a consequence of these developments, a turn towards a secular and rational account of politics. The discourse of political sovereignty carried this account forward and had implications in the internal affairs of the state. Legal structures outlined the acceptable idea of citizenship, which Maritain locates in the works of Rousseau and Hobbes before him. Internally there was a turn away from a democratic politic as laws revealed the power of the sovereign authority above that of the people. It is an understanding of law which Maritain is quick to reveal is at odds with the morality of natural law.41 Likewise, the external vision of sovereignty also wreaked havoc on international politics. The status of states, as sovereign entities, placed them above any notion of an international community. Sovereignty, he argues, denies the possibility of an international political community founded on international law. Moreover, sovereignty reveals the fraught relationship of 39  Jacques Maritain, The achievement of co-operation among men of different creeds, The Journal of Religion, 21 no. 4 (1941), 364–372. 40  See for example, Jacques Maritain, Communication with regard to the Draft World Declaration on the Rights of Man, United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization, Paris, 18 June 1947 (The United Nations, 1947). Available at www.un.org; and, Introduction, in Human Rights, Comments and Interpretations: A Symposium edited by UNESCO with an introduction by Jacques Maritain, The United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization, ed. (London: Allan Wingate), 55–72; and finally, On the philosophy of human rights, in Human Rights, Comments and Interpretations: A Symposium edited by UNESCO with an introduction by Jacques Maritain, The United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization, ed. (London: Allan Wingate), 55–72. 41  Jacques Maritain, The concept of sovereignty, The American Political Science Review, 44 no. 2 (1950), 343–357.

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morality and politics. Politics, he contends, is revealed to be simply a performance and not an engagement. States, he claims, must be seen to be ‘doing something.’ Maritain links this idea with a Machiavellian account of politics in which states are guided by power and raison d’état and fail to work toward the moral ideal of the common good. A Machiavellian account of politics reveals, like the domestic laws of the state, the isolated existence of states and the inability to work cooperatively to create a moral politic. It highlights the central problem of ius gentium noted in Chapter 1; namely, the focus on instrumental relationships of power and authority and the absence of a social conscience.42 Maritain’s work challenges the dichotomy of moral realism and political realism which features in the works of many classical realists, in particular Morgenthau. Maritain’s inclusion of both instrumental and non-instrumental relationships which can transcend the boundaries of the political state reveals why a twofold moral distinction within international politics is unnecessary. Instead, he shows how a single account of international morality which encompasses the multifaceted nature of the human condition can generate the much needed sense of solidarity, international political community and an international political conscience absent in a Machiavellian account of politics. Maritain’s critique of Machiavelli’s influence in politics informs his own interpretation of politics. The primary task of politics is about creation. Politics is an activity associated with man’s temporal existence, and the state, as an entity, is not eternal. If agents seek longevity the state must exist within the realms of values and ideas, and so the primary activity of politics is, according to Maritain, the establishment and safeguarding of the common good. The common good reveals a community that is predisposed to moral development and safeguards the ideals of justice and civic friendship. It reveals a mode of reasonable agency that understands reasons of state that are in accord with the ends of justice. It reveals an account of ‘the political’ which unifies the ends of power and justice emphasizing the non-instrumental relationships that bind individuals together. This account of being political is open to the possibility of injustice and the destruction of the state because it offers ideals that challenge the modern desire for stability and predictability and reveals the vulnerability of the human condition that modern scholars seek to deny. Maritain does not discount the role that moral luck will play in light of just and unjust political actions, or whether or not states will survive throughout history. What is made clear in his work however is that a state which aligns its understanding of moral ends with its political ends is engaged in the true ends of politics; namely, the creation of a moral political space. Moreover, any agency which occurs within this space will, more often then not, reflect the ends of justice.43

42  Maritain, 2001. 43  Maritain, 1942.

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E.B.F Midgley E.B.F. Midgley, like Jacques Maritain, is a natural law scholar who adopts the assumptions of Thomas Aquinas. He articulates the ultimate end of happiness as one’s unification with God and provides a normative account of the political community. Like Maritian, Midgley is also concerned with the manner in which the assumptions of natural law have altered since their original articulation by Aquinas. He seeks in his chief work, The Natural Law Tradition and the Theory of International Relations, to present an all-encompassing description of natural law morality that demonstrates the changes and problems which the historical development of the tradition has endured.44 Moreover, he provides a scathing critique of modern international lawyers, and their account of natural law morality, while demonstrating how the underlying assumptions of the natural law tradition neatly coincide with the need for an account of a moral order in international politics. Midgley claims that the morality of natural law is well equipped to provide a normative international relations theory. In order to proceed with this task what is required is an understanding of the problems of contemporary natural law morality and its abuse within history and a resolution to such assumptions. Like Maritain, Midgley is wary of the political doctrine of sovereignty. It emerged during the Westphalian moment of history and provided an account of order that has delineated an internal and external account of the state as the primary actor in international politics. The legal and political ideal of sovereignty is, according to Midgley, one of the reasons why there has not been a suitable account of the philosophy of international society. The emergence of a Westphalian order brought with it particular assumptions. Consequently, the absolute ends of goodness emanating from a shared will, or common humanity, were denied. The various attempts at discerning the foundations of international law offered by scholars such as Grotius, Pufendorf and Vatell were, for Midgley, unable to establish a genuine notion of international society. Midgley is clear that his aim is not to return to the pre-modern accounts of politics. What he does claim however is that within the original assumptions of Aquinas one can find a faint account of the beginnings of an international moral community when one focuses on the social nature of man. Human beings, as social beings, require community and owing to their ability to reason and to recognize goodness in another they are predisposed to a loving nature. Midgley’s account of ordered love reflects many of the ideas put forward by Maritain and demonstrates how individuals can live together in a harmonious fashion. The expectation of loving another is accompanied by a specific edict which denies the possibility of hate and the possibility of agency which is motivated for such ends. There is a mutual expectation in loving another. It allows for man to overcome his insufficiencies and develop as a moral being. In order to know what is truly moral and act as an appropriate agent, man must exist within a political community. 44  Midgley, 1975.

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The political community, on this interpretation, is one which is premised on the interrelationships of individuals. It pays particular attention to the requirements of one individual qua individual. These relationships grow exponentially and lead to the formation of a wider sense of community which is sustained by the idea of the common good. For Midgley, there is no one account of the common good. Instead one can establish a hierarchy of goods which reflect the needs of the individual and it is in mediating these needs that a legitimate political authority emerges. This reveals the problem that Midgely has with contemporary ideas of order. They bound the moral needs of individuals within the territorial state and deny the wider international possibility of community. The idea of a common good can, according to Midgely, be applied to the realm of international politics providing it with an account of legitimate political authority. Such a body would coordinate in and amongst the various communities which constitute the global realm. He is clear that Aquinas never offered such an account, but he is certain that an understanding of the social and moral assumptions which support his notion of human nature reveal myriad social and political organizations at the global level which relate to the various conditions of men. The task of the international authority is then to mediate these organizations based on the insufficiencies of the particular communities to provide for their citizens.45 This account of political authority sustains an account of international relationships that transcend the state structure. It focuses on the absolute ideals of human moral development and is accessible to all individuals who accept their social and moral nature. Moreover, it openly accepts a plurality of normative political structures. In order to realize this world vision Midgley relies on the principle of subsidiarity. As a principle of global governance, subsidiarity engages with a myriad of global actors, states, institutions and a global government. It demands that capable agents engage with matters which relate directly to a particular skill set and thereby provide the best possible outcome for individuals throughout the world. It is a conception of devolved government which asks states, as legally equal entities, to work within, alongside and independent of global political structures in order to provide a common good which supports the development of moral beings. Global government, for Midgely, promotes and perfects humanity.46 This account of global governance set Midgley apart from a wide variety of international relations scholars of his time. He is deeply critical of E.H. Carr’s conclusions and the polarization of realism and idealism which emerge from his writings. Such accounts of international politics are, he claims, ‘unintellectual.’ Likewise, Midgley is highly critical of the ‘classical’ or ‘traditional’ accounts of international politics. He engages with the works of Martin Wight which he claims suffer from an ‘intellectual poverty,’ poverty he further identifies in Hedley Bull’s work The Anarchical Society.47 45  Midgely, 1975, 20. 46  Midgley, 1975, 352. 47  Bull, 1977.

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Hedley Bull and E.B.F. Midgley engage with one another in the pages of the British Journal of Politics.48 Bull’s review of Midgley’s work is highly critical. He criticizes Midgley’s methodology and attacks the faithful assumptions associated with the natural law tradition. Bull is adamant that moral dilemmas in world politics can be resolved through the application of rational language or rules. In his opinion, moral dilemmas originate from a series of factual misunderstandings which, if ‘settled rationally,’ reveal a mutually beneficial course of action. In order to resolve moral dilemmas, Bull asks for a clarification of rules, primarily in legal terms. What is unclear, and this point is well articulated in Midgley’s reply to Bull, is the source of the legal rules and customs, and their relationship with one another. Bull fails to provide a rigorous response to this query. Not only is the reader left in a state of unresolved moral and legal tension, the original claim which Midgley made with regards to world order, and its lack of ontological foundations, remains in place if one follows the conclusions of a classical approach, or English School, to the logical ends espoused by Bull. Legal rules and logical rationality fail to endorse a foundational account of global governance and a moral international community. This debate remains to be concluded. As Nicholas Rengger has noted in his work on order, the now enlivened English School, which develops the works of Bull and Wight in further detail, has yet to provide a resounding response to the origins of the moral origins of rules, laws and international institutions.49 Obviously, for Midgely, the answer remains in an account of natural law which highlights the centrality of teleological and perfectionist assumptions in order to understand the potential for moral agents and communities, both domestically and internationally. Midgely’s views are similar to those of Maritain: only such a framework provides a solid account of the relationship of ethics and power which accommodates the potential for individuals and communities to strive toward an always developing moral account of institutional design. Maritain and Midgley’s works provide two alternative accounts of natural law that engage with the structures and practices of international politics. Underlying both of their accounts is an assumption of reasonableness on the part of individuals. They both argue that these reasonable beings require a community to survive. Consequently there emerges within their writings a distinctly relational theme which is reflected in their account of ‘the political.’ While Maritian’s account provides reflections of domestic political communities, Midgley’s provides an international focus that instead develops themes related to global governance. Yet, as Bull’s engagement with Midgely reveals, contemporary scholars will find it difficult to accept this framework in light of its theological origins. In order to mount a response to this problem this work now turns to the alternative ‘natural’ accounts of morality. The emphasis they place on reasonableness and the relationship they 48 A heated dialogue between these two authors can be found in Bull, 1979, and Midgley, 1979. 49  This question remains largely unresolved to date; a point which is noted in Rengger, 2000.

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envision for the individual and the community reflects those of ‘thick’ moral interpretations. These similarities facilitate the beginning of an argument which envisions a role for natural law morality within international politics. Martha Nussbaum Martha Nussbaum’s works are not considered to be part of the canonical natural law literature. Her reputation as a scholar of international relations stems primarily from her contributions to the cosmopolitan discourses of international politics and ethics. Yet her early work demonstrates a thorough knowledge of ancient philosophy, ethics and morality. A close examination of The Fragility of Goodness reveals a strikingly natural morality premised on the assumptions of Aristotle.50 The Fragility of Goodness examines the role that luck, or tuché, plays in the lives of ordinary individuals. Like natural law scholars, Nussbaum articulates a social and moral ontology for individuals. Moreover, she, like Aristotle, is unconvinced of man’s self-sufficiency and therefore looks to the role that emotions can play in improving the moral capacity of individuals. Along the way however, she seeks to determine how individuals, as moral beings, navigate the tragic choices that they potentially face due to the role that luck and change play in the quotidian affairs of human beings. One cannot discount the vulnerability associated with humanity. In this sense Nussbaum shares some assumptions with the tragic realists investigated in Chapter 1. She remains distinct from this framework, however, because she believes that individuals, if they engage with tragedy and display the proper emotional responses associated with loss and love alike, develop a truer sense of self. A focus on the Aristotelian idea of appearances, or phainomena, allows for an examination of individuals as they really are and challenges the Kantian idea of self-sufficiency associated with modern political and philosophical discourses. She reinvigorates the tradition of practical reasoning and demonstrates how human desires motivate human action. The diversity of human desires necessitates a discussion of plurality and diversity at a normative and structural level. It is significant to note however that desires are capable of being trained, or reigned in, and individuals can become habitual moral agents. Consequently, the vulnerable being is also a flexible being and, owing to their reasonable predisposition, can function within a casuistic methodology thereby engaging in truly human experiences. This idea of vulnerability and luck is situated within Aristotle’s account of the virtuous person, or Eudaimon. All individuals are subject to the forces of luck and exist in a state of potential tragedy all the while striving towards excellence. The tragic realists of Chapter 1 emphasize the ultimate dominance of power in the relationship of ethics and politics which focuses on the self-interested nature of the individual as a political agent. On the other hand, Nussbaum’s work demonstrates how the continuing entanglements of individuals and their relationships, despite 50  Nussbaum, 2001.

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the threat of luck, provides for moral development because even the individual whose attempted human experience is thwarted by luck demonstrates the potential for moral action. This idea echoes the idea put forth in Maritain’s critique of Machiavellianism. He is clear that the individual who provides an institutional design which mirrors the common good may face enemies and suffer at their hands. This threat, he is clear, is ever present, regardless of one’s institutional structures. Its actual occurrence is not the result of a lack of foresight, but rather, luck. Thus, the moral individual is better placed to weather the results of such an experience and provides an example upon which to build future moral communities.51 There exists a link, between a Thomistic morality and an Aristotelian morality, which demonstrates the way in which the perfectionist, or eudaimonistic, ends of human agency engage with the vulnerabilities of the human condition which is expressed in a desire for knowledge in order to overcome the insufficiencies of being human. This philosophical framework is further extended by Nussbaum as she begins to take note of the daily experiences of suffering individuals throughout the world. She articulates an alternative account of human rights which she calls ‘the capabilities approach.’ The capabilities approach is informed by one question: What is the individual able to do and to be? It assumes, as does the natural law, that all individuals are endowed with basic abilities, primarily to reason and act, and in using those abilities become agents engaged in the task of moral constitution.52 This developmental approach to human well-being presupposes access to the basic goods needed for survival, both physical and moral, and criticizes the inability of the dominant world powers to satisfy such needs on a global scale. Nussbaum proceeds to articulate a list of capabilities and goods which are required by all individuals in order to develop and thrive as moral beings; namely: life; bodily health; bodily integrity; sense, imagination and thought; emotions; practical reason; affiliation, respect for the self and other; other species, respecting other non-human sentient beings; play; and finally, control over one’s environment, both physically and materially.53 This list is not exhaustive, but rather reflects the independence of human desire and the plurality of needs which individuals identify within the Aristotelian tradition. One should understand this list very much in the casuistical tradition of moral reasoning which emerges from her work on vulnerabilities and human emotion. It reflects one particular normative institutional design motivated 51  Maritain, 1942. 52  Martha C. Nussbaum, Women and Human Development: The Capabilities Approach (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000). 53  This list is reproduced in many of her publications, in particular, Martha C. Nussbaum, Capabilities and social justice, The International Studies Review, 4 no. 2 (2002), 123–135. Martha C. Nussbaum, Women and equality: the capabilities approach, International Labour Review, 138 no. 3 (1999), 227–235. Martha C. Nussbaum, Capabilities and human rights, Fordham Law Review, 66 (1997–1998), 273–294. It should also be noted at this particular point that this list bears significant similarities to the idea of basic goods proposed by the New Natural Lawyers to be examined in the following section of this chapter.

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by the Aristotelian desire for sufficiency. Consequently, it endorses a flexible approach to human development which embraces human diversity within the community. This notion of human capabilities seeks to emphasize, above all else, individual choice. It articulates a moral minimum which states must provide for their citizens thereby fostering the required human capacities to choose in and amongst such goods. While Nussbaum draws on her Aristotelian heritage in order to describe the individual, she quickly distances herself from other authors associated with the capabilities tradition; namely Amartya Sen who abides by a Millean or Razian account of liberalism.54 She argues that this account of the capabilities functions when one adopts a Rawlsian methodology.55 Adopting this approach will allow individuals, as agents, to develop an overlapping consensus of goods and thereby foster the necessary reflective equilibrium needed to satisfy a particular account of ‘the good.’ The value of this interpretation rests on its decidedly political, as opposed to ontological, account of human nature.56 There are decisive drawbacks with this turn of events. On wonders how it is possible to maintain the tragic element of being human and the casuistry of natural morality within a Rawlsian framework of analysis. Likewise, one must begin to question where the emotional desires which characterize the virtuous individual feature in this institutional design. Bearing in mind the critique of modern and contemporary political discourses, the answer must be a resounding negative; however, the relationship of luck, human vulnerability and the potential to be moral beings which characterizes Nussbaum’s early work demonstrate a shared ancestry with the thick accounts of natural law morality as evidenced in the work of Maritain and Midgley. Alastair MacIntyre Alastair MacIntyre, like Maritain and Midgley, begins his work After Virtue with an acute critique of modern interpretations of morality.57 He asks the reader to imagine a devastating world catastrophe which renders scientific knowledge incomplete. This natural disaster challenges the community’s ability to pass on knowledge of the scientific world to future students. There are, he claims, identifiable gaps in the scientific literature which fail to give individuals the necessary context and background which would enable the rightful application of this knowledge to the natural world. This hypothetical case is analogously linked, for MacIntyre, to the current state of moral knowledge. The modern turn in philosophy, theology and political discourses destroyed the context within which 54 See for example, Amartya Sen, Development as Freedom (New York: Knopf, 1999). 55  See John Rawls, 1971. 56  Martha C. Nussbaum, Political animals: luck, love, and dignity, Metaphilosophy, 29 no. 4 (1998), 273–287. 57  MacIntyre, 1981.

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individuals, as actors, ought to understand morality. The task of recreating moral discourses in the face of modernity, what MacIntyre labels ‘The Project of the Enlightenment,’ proceeded to fracture the sense of the self and the community. The various attempts at institutional design, as evidenced in the social contract and emotivist thinkers, failed to provide the necessary historical and social knowledge necessary to contextualize the moral potential of individuals.58 Instead, individuals live as rational beings, balancing both a public and a private persona in order to accommodate the image of a rights-bearing subject. This critique of modernity prefaces MacIntyre’s attempt to reinvigorate the tradition of virtue ethics. Drawing on the assumptions of Aristotle, MacIntyre, by articulating anew the aims and ends of the Aristotelian Eudaimon, demonstrates to the reader the possibility of a hopeful morality.59 This idea of the moral being is, according to MacIntyre, a well-rounded and balanced individual who reasons in order to develop virtuousness. Unlike the modern subject, the Eudaimon highlights the pre-modern assumptions of teleology and therefore understands moral development as an ongoing process through which individuals come to understand the nature of ‘the good.’ Like the accounts of thick morality which feature in the opening sections of this chapter, this interpretation of thin morality also assumes the possibility of moral development and social learning. Unlike Maritain and Midgley this idea is not articulated in the assumptions of perfection and goodness espoused by Thomistic accounts of natural law. Instead, these desires for knowledge of the good and the self are located within an account of the dramatic narrative. This engagement with the arts links MacIntyre’s framework to the ideas of Nussbaum, yet he does not look to the tragic poems in order to engage with the idea of vulnerability. Instead, he proposes an account of living traditions which educate individuals on the social and historical roles that inform a particularly understanding of morality. Individuals are identified primarily through their speech acts, according to MacIntyre. This singles out individuals from other animals and informs their potential for agency. Yet the crisis of modern moral discourses does not allow for a significant context to be given to the actions of individuals. As fractured beings their actions exist solely in the present and are uninformed by past histories. This makes it difficult to understand the purpose of acting. Moreover, lacking the moral context of previous eras, contemporary action is unable to significantly engage in the development of future frameworks. It is not simply enough to be social beings. MacIntyre makes it clear that the only way to have any context to human agency is to embed the action within a narrative. It is these narratives that indicate the interests, the purpose and the ends of any human activity. MacIntyre further identifies two 58  For a descriptive account of the development of ethics and philosophy, see Alastair MacIntyre, A Short History of Ethics: A History of Moral Philosophy from the Homeric Age to the Twentieth Century (London: Routledge, 2002). 59  This is not the only moral framework which MacIntyre has investigated. For alternative interpretations, see MacIntyre, 1990.

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particular features of the human life which are important, and otherwise absent from modern accounts of self, namely, unpredictability and teleology. The central thesis of the human narrative becomes one in which the individual is a storyteller. The story being told is represented as a quest in which the agent faces obstacles and tasks which are not known in advance. These obstacles can be either pleasant or tragic and it is therefore necessary for individuals to have a moral context to their deliberation process. Likewise, the teleological quality of the quest/story provides an ongoing sense of discovery that is associated with pre-modern interpretations of morality. The ends of this journey are to achieve an understanding of truth, not only regarding the self, but also about the nature of ‘the good.’ The narrative framework, or the idea of the quest, is central to MacIntyre’s thesis and provides the possibility of individuals becoming moral beings. Narratives provide the unity of the human life which is otherwise absent in modern accounts of morality. It bridges the gap between the public and the private. It gives context to the legal rules and expected forms of behavior that exist, but are otherwise unexplained and which lack the necessary historical context to structure society. In other words, narratives educate individuals about their roles in society and how to perform them properly. The Aristotelian account of moral virtues is pivotal in MacIntyre’s work. Virtues reside within the individual and exist autonomously of human practice. They provide a series of reference points which define human relationships and inform the practices within the community. They highlight the shared purposes and standards that individuals engaged in a quest acknowledge as genuine. Virtues are central to the moral institutional design that individuals, who seek the ends of Eudaimonia, engage in. The virtues sustain practices, provide a means of attaining the internal goods of practices and support individuals as they engage in their stories. In the end, they highlight that the ‘good life’ for the moral individual is the ongoing experiences which contribute to an ever-growing understanding of what it is to be a moral person. There is a dynamic element to this account of moral agency that is at odds with the idea of actors in modern moral discourses. This is not a vehicle for stability and predictability, rather it faces head on the unpredictability associated with the human condition and in so doing provides individuals with the moral context within which to navigate through the tragic choices associated with being human. The necessary moral context emerges when individuals are embedded within communities. It is at this point that both the social and historical contexts of the self are intertwined and the idea of ‘becoming’ is cemented in the development of the individual. The coinciding of different facets of the self is mirrored in the role that the virtues play in the lives of the individual. MacIntyre is keen to point out that the virtues, when they are properly exercised, strengthen the traditions that inform the political community. The unified self that emerges from a dramatic narrative is open to the possibility of moral virtue. Virtues not only sustain the notion of ‘the good’ and ‘the self,’ they demonstrate how this knowledge is embodied in living traditions which embed individuals within the community and facilitate

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an understanding of a moral taxonomy which is needed to engage actively with future experiences. Like the individual described in the thick accounts of morality, MacIntyre’s individual is a moral being in potential. Situated in the proper social structures the individual is able to engage with other beings in potential and develop virtuously, provided the institutional design is appropriately modified. MacIntyre’s institutional design articulates the self-same themes of teleological ends, the potential for moral development premised on habitual actions and an awareness of moral failure couched within a wider understanding of the role of practical reason. Thick and Thin Morality: The (Limited) Value of the New Natural Lawyers Collectively, the works of Maritain, Midgley, Nussbaum and MacIntyre facilitate a general description of ‘natural morality.’ These accounts, as was highlighted in above sections, share some broad similarities which demonstrate that within the wider discourses of political philosophy one can discern the influence of natural law as a historical tradition. The distinction employed within this heading of natural morality identified two types of morality, thick and thin, which have been drawn from the works of H.L.A. Hart. His work The Concept of Law distinguishes thick and thin accounts of morality.60 Thick accounts of morality, on his interpretation, have both prescriptive and descriptive content. Generally, such an account is associated with the morality of natural law which not only provides an absolute end toward which all individuals strive, but also outlines an account of agency with which to achieve such an end. On the other hand, thin accounts of morality are simply descriptive. For Hart, the discourses of legal positivism are, for the most part, a general theory about the nature of law. Laws are descriptive and morally neutral. In other words, they focus on the ‘is’ as opposed to how things ‘ought’ to be. This schematic is employed throughout this chapter to distinguish theologically oriented accounts of morality with their ancient predecessors. It facilitates the beginnings of a natural law defense which begins with the identification of shared qualities and characteristics, and highlights the centrality of practical reason when seeking a balanced appraisal of the human condition. As the ensuing section will reveal, a sympathetic reading of Karl Weber couched in an understanding of the aims and ends of the Papal encyclicals written by Pope John Paul II reveals the need for a unified account of being human. This engagement reveals a moral framework within which thick and thin moral assumptions work collectively to engage with the vulnerabilities of being human in common. The viability of such a union is revealed through a close examination of the works of the New Natural Lawyers. 60  H.L.A. Hart, The Concept of Law (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994). This distinction is also discussed in his article Positivism and the separation of law and morals, Harvard Law Review, 71 no. 4 (1958), 593–629.

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Natural morality, at the most basic of levels, displays a teleological quality. All four authors specifically addressed under the heading Thick and Thin Morality share this idea. They articulate an understanding of the individual who is social and has the capacity to become moral when situated in the proper communal structures. This establishes the continuous and ongoing desire for individuals to achieve a degree of goodness. For Maritain and Midgley, this goodness is happiness, which is conceptualized as unification with God. Martha Nussbaum focuses on Aristotelian self-sufficiency, and MacIntyre, Aristotelian virtues. These ends, which are absolute in nature, are accompanied by a normative account of ‘the political.’ Midgley and Maritain focus on Aquinas’s account of the common good in order to grapple with the relationship of morality and power, and in a similar fashion MacIntyre chooses to focus on the role of traditions within the community. On the other hand, Nussbaum focuses on Aristotle’s account of appearances in order to structure the political. Where differences do emerge amongst these authors they are easily accommodated within a nature law framework because of the diversity and plurality of second order normative structures that the framework endorses. Underlying all of these accounts, finally, is a shared sense of human vulnerability. This vulnerability is demonstrated in the cosmopolitan discourses featured in the Introduction, as well as in the tragic realists highlighted in Chapter 1. If individuals are conceptualized within a framework of natural morality they become agents, and potentially moral agents, as well. The choice to develop as a moral agent is intrinsic in the teleological assumptions accompanying this account of morality. Yet this predisposition toward goodness remains unsupportable in contemporary institutional design. Consequently, individuals experience moral dilemmas or ‘hard choices,’ but they are unable to realistically engage with such scenarios. Positive outcomes are the product of luck, and negative consequences remain inexplicable and outside the formal structures of the community. For realists an explanation of these events rests chiefly on the conflict of egoism, and morality reveals a predisposition for failure. On the other hand, cosmopolitans see a potential for a moral resolution which relies on a shared sense of humanity. Natural lawyers respond to this vulnerability with an awareness of moral luck. As free and autonomous beings, agents must be aware of contingent circumstances beyond their control. Moral luck highlights the control an individual has over his or her reasonable deliberations which shape agency, as well as the inability of the individual to predict the potentially negative possibilities which arise from action. Yet there is an underlying hope that regardless of the tragic choices faced by individuals, the taxonomy provided by a natural morality will ensure that, failing the achievement of their absolute ends, agents will remain the teleological and morally developing individuals they are capable of becoming owing to the moral habits that structure their quotidian life. The combined works of these four authors demonstrate a symbiotic relationship of morality and power that draws on the assumptions of practical reason. Yet the discourses of natural morality, thick or thin, have but a weak resonance within the traditional discourses of international politics. One can only surmise that the

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final critique which Bull lodged in Midgley’s direction remains central to this problem. His summary judgment of Midgley’s work, and the natural law tradition of morality, highlights how epistemological and methodological assumptions which are premised on a theistic framework will be hard pressed to find acceptance in a globally diverse arena.61 Cosmopolitan responses to human suffering, as represented in the Introduction, reflect the necessary abridgment within politicoethical frameworks of morality and power in international politics. Their distinctly modern assumptions facilitate a tempered acceptance in the wider discourses of IR. In place of faithful adherence to a political framework, cosmopolitanism, embedded or otherwise, draws on the self-sufficient rationalism of Immanuel Kant and legitimizes the modern ideal of progress in lieu of tragic vulnerability. The shortcomings of this approach were well documented in the Introduction and Chapter 1 of this work; however, to discount the potential for a cosmopolitan response to human suffering requires an alternative framework from which to proceed. The viability of a natural law framework requires a response to the original criticisms made by Bull. An examination of natural law morality, in its pre-modern interpretation, reveals the social and moral ontology needed to account for the relational nature of political agents; however, invoking such a discourse brings Bull’s criticism to the fore. On what grounds could non-theistic agents, global or otherwise, begin to be convinced to adopt such a moral framework? From a theological perspective one answer has already been provided by Pope Paul IV. Dignitatis Humanae, published in 1965, articulates a ‘purely human’ position whereby experience and reason provide a sense of human dignity with which to discover truth. This search for truth, and truth once found, is reflected not only in the establishment of civil society, but also in the freedom to establish the requisite religious institutions therein.62 This echoes the plurality and freedom of the natural law morality. This plurality demands, however, an equal place for religious and non-religious views alike. Commenting further on the inherent dignity of man stemming from the authentic and purely human experience, Pope John Paul II goes on to demonstrate that religion and faith exist because of the relationship that they have with atheism, unbelief and a-religiousness. Both of these frameworks are central to the human experience.63 When Pope John Paul II speaks of the relationship of faith and its absence he is developing a strand of thinking that is also evident in the writings of Max Weber. Politics as a Vocation reveals a purposeful function for politics as a human activity.64 How that purpose is defined is a matter of faith. For Weber, faith is reflected in an idea which is actualized through agency and achieved through the 61  See Bull, 1979. 62  Pope Paul VI, Dignitatis Humanae, December 7, 1965. 63  John Paul II, 1979. 64  Max Weber, Politics as a vocation, From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology, H.H. Gerth and C. Wright Mills, trans., eds (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1946).

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process of being political. The ends of politics can be humanitarian, religious or even powerful. Likewise, the goals that are harbored by political agents can be national, social, ethical or global. For Weber, faith represents an idea. For the purposes of the arguments found within this work, this idea is structured within the perfectionist and teleological assumptions about natural law morality in order to articulate the shared idea of human fulfillment, or goodness. What Weber is quick to point out is that modern politics has placed its faith in a political discourse of rationality and power. Yet this sterile account of being human, much like the human experience articulated by John Paul, exists only in opposition to the reasonable and emotional discourses of morality. There is, within Weber’s account of politics, a relationship between two seemingly opposing sides. The articulated idea of vulnerability prefaces a response to the criticisms of Bull by drawing on the ends of well-being and development which emerge from a moral and reasonable ethical framework. It professes a faith in the moral development of individuals. This stands in stark contrast to the faith which Bull finds in the ‘rules of the game’ approach to world order. This approach to world order reflects a technical account of being human and fails to engage with more reasonable concepts of being human. It can not move beyond the articulated schema of Hollis and Smith and employ both an understanding and explanatory engagement with politics. It draws on the discourses of power highlighted in the description of Weber’s Politics. Left on its own it exemplifies the fractured existence of the self articulated by MacIntyre. It requires, and what Bull could not comprehend, is a complementary account of the reasonableness, or the deliberative aspects of being human, in common. It ought to be clear that, in much the same vein, a theological account of being human which fails to address the totality of being human would likewise be guilty of the same faults. The value of natural law is that it seeks to achieve this balance which is facilitated by the ability of individuals to reason supported by a moral taxonomy which combines both theoretical and practical knowledge. This is what Bull failed to comprehend in his scathing critique of Midgley’s work. A unified account of natural law morality which is achieved through a thoughtful blending of thick and thin assumptions represents one attempt to achieve a balanced understanding of natural law morality. This interpretation engages with the technical and reasonable assumptions of being human as it articulates a social anthropology. Yet it goes one step further. By placing Aristotle’s ethical framework alongside that of Aquinas, one balances the more secular interpretations of natural law with its theological cousins in an attempt to achieve a balance which will accommodate the challenges of Bull and the sought after ends articulated by John Paul II. One can find evidence of this type of synthesis in the works of the New Natural Lawyers. Unlike the authors in the previous section who were classified according to ‘thick’ and ‘thin’ accounts of natural morality, theses scholars all work explicitly within a natural law framework; however, they approach the task of institutional design from distinctive disciplines. John Finnis is a legal scholar who

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engages with the assumptions of Thomas Aquinas.65 Germain Grisez and Joseph Boyle, Jr, represent the discipline of theology while Robert P. George works within the field of law and international relations.66 Yet the combined scholarly writing of the New Natural Lawyers, demonstrates the viability of alternative interpretations of natural law working together in order to achieve a particular end; namely, the moral development of human beings within the community and the value of natural law morality in the discipline of international relations. Nuclear Deterrence, Morality and Realism was published in 1987 and demonstrates the critical function of natural law morality as its authors reflect upon the chief ethical issue during the Cold War: the morality of nuclear deterrence.67 Nuclear Deterrence, Morality and Realism engages with the moral dilemmas associated with City Swapping and Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) as the New Natural Lawyers assimilate their individual interpretations of natural law morality into a cohesive single interpretation. Such a process demonstrates how one can argue for a defence of natural law morality which engages with, but remains critical of, a thin moral ontology. For example, the discourse articulated by Finnis reflects the legal framework in which he engages and echoes many of the ideas found in the writings of Nussbaum. They both share an affinity for contemporary liberalism and at times there are hints of a negative liberty within their accounts of morality. Likewise, Grisez and Boyle’s interpretations share many of the assumptions of both Midgley and Maritain owing to the theological origins shared by Grisez, Boyle, Maritain and Midgely. Yet linking all of these authors together is the very real threat that nuclear deployment, for whatever reason, puts on the lives of individuals. It highlights the vulnerability of the human experience in light of newly emerging technologies and defends the inviolability of human 65 The works of John Finnis referred to in this work include, but are not limited to the following texts: Moral Absolutes: Tradition, Revision, and Truth (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 1991); Fundamentals of Ethics (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1983); Natural Law and Natural Rights (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1980). 66 The chief works of Germain Grisez include The Way of the Lord Jesus: Christian Moral Principles, Vol. 1 (Chicago,: Franciscan Herald Press, 1983); Germain Grisez and Russell Shaw, Fulfillment in Christ: A Summary of Christian Moral Principles (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 2001); Beyond the New Morality: The Responsibilities of Freedom, revised edn (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1980). The works of Joseph Boyle, Jr, are as follows: Natural law and the ethics of tradition, in Natural Law Theory: Contemporary Essays, Robert P. George, ed. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1992), 3– 30; Natural law and international ethics, in Traditions of International Ethics, Terry Nardin and David R. Mapel, eds (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), 112–128. The works of Robert P. George include, Natural law and international order, in International Society: Diverse Ethical Perspectives, David R. Mapel and Terry Nardin, eds (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, New Jersey, 1998), 54–69; Making Men Moral (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993). 67  John Finnis, Germain Grisez and Joseph Boyle, Jr., Nuclear Deterrence, Morality and Realism (Oxford: Clarendon Press, Ltd. 1987).

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lives and forcefully re-exerts the need for a critical account of morality pertinent to the practices of international politics. The account of natural law which emerges from Nuclear Deterrence, Morality and Realism can be identified by four primary tenets. 1. Individuals are the central focus of the theory as individual agents and members of a community. Each person is dignified and exhibits a human nature that is dominated by reason and not passion. This ability to reason aids in the self-constitution and the development of personal well-being of the individual. 2. It is based on the primary moral principle which states; In voluntarily acting for human goods and avoiding what is opposed to them, one ought to choose and otherwise will those and only those possibilities whose willing is compatible with integral human fulfillment. 3. Based on this primary moral norm, intermediate principles are derivable that guide the decision of the actor. First, one ought to conduct his or herself in the same manner in which she or he would prefer to be treated by his or her fellow individuals. Second, one should avoid acts premised on hostile feelings; and third, one should not do evil to promote good. 4. Certain features of the real world, namely responsibility, must be taken into account when investigating the decisions made by actors. Specifically, an investigation into the ends or means of a decision taken, as well as both its intended and non-intended side effects, must be examined in order to properly understand the morality of any particular action within a natural law framework.68

This interpretation highlights the centrality of the individual as a social and moral being and is guided by on absolute command: The good is to be done and pursued; the bad is to be avoided.69 If properly adhered to, this command will foster a lifestyle oriented around the ends integral to human fulfillment. This understanding of natural law is founded upon the assumption that the individual is a naturally moral agent and is inclined to develop an understanding of morality through their engagement in the natural world. It openly adopts the ontology of being which is evident in the historical progression of the tradition of natural law. Building on the idea of virtues established by Aristotle, and further transformed by Aquinas, the New Natural Lawyers propose that all individuals are constituted by the basic human goods. The goods are divided into four reflexive goods: self-integration, practical reasonableness, justice and friendship, and religion and holiness. They are accompanied by three non-reflexive goods, life, knowledge of truth and the appreciation of beauty and excellence, and finally,

68  Finnis et al., 1987, 139, 279, 283 and 285–287. 69  Grisez, 1983, 178.

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the activities of skilful work and play.70 These seven goods mirror the capabilities which are highlighted by Martha Nussbaum and share an underlying principle of development. When the basic human goods are allowed to develop, individuals are then capable of developing the capacity of moral agency. The idea of integral human fulfillment represents, for the New Natural Lawyers, a contemporary interpretation of the original Thomist idea of ‘the good.’ This moral principle and its derived account of human happiness assume, like preceding natural law interpretations, an ontology of being which presupposes human reason. Practical reason supports individual agency and facilitates the development of a viable moral taxonomy in order to achieve this goal. A normative political framework emerges in order to further develop and clarify the absolute rule of achieving goodness which revolves around the following moral principle: In voluntarily acting for human goods and avoiding what is opposed to them, one ought to choose and otherwise will those and only those possibilities whose willing is compatible with integral human fulfillment.71

Practical reason becomes increasingly important within this normative framework, as does the ability of the individual to chose properly in and amongst the various goods at their disposal. The New Natural Lawyers go on to propose the ‘requirements of practical reasonableness’ as a means of structuring the decisionmaking paradigm of the agent.72 The requirements of practical reason reflect an ethical framework which guides the agent in his or her daily tasks. The requirements demonstrate the possibility of moral deliberation on the part of agents. For this reason, the New Natural Lawyers are important. They highlight the pre-modern skills of casuistry. Yet, this ethical skill, while employed in their moral analysis of nuclear deterrence, does not feature prominently in the wider assumptions that structure their institutional design. Collectively their works fail to engage with the necessary moral and habitual development of agents which would challenge the structures of modern international politics and thereby renew the idea of conscientious practical deliberations. Individual conscience is a cornerstone of natural law morality. It provides the individual with the requisite freedom and autonomy to reason in an ethical and moral manner. The requirements of practical reasonableness ought to be flexible, yet they have been interpreted with the rigidity associated with the laws 70  Grisez, 1983, 124. 71  John Finnis et al., 1987. 72  The eight requirements as described by Grisez, 1983, 225–226, are: a coherent plan of life, detachment and commitment; no arbitrary preferences amongst values; no arbitrary preferences amongst persons; the (limited) relevance of consequences; efficiency, within reason; efficiency in pursuing the definite goals which we adopt for ourselves and in avoiding the definite harms which we choose to regard as unacceptable; respect for every basic value in every act; the requirements of the common good; following one’s conscience.

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of contemporary society which outline acceptable modes of behavior. They fail to endorse the freedom and autonomy needed to attain integral human fulfillment. In other words, the requirements reflect a pragmatic morality which sustains a contractual state/individual relationship. A seemingly innovative theoretical argument was lost as these loosely based principles became increasingly focused on linear processes and ends. These principles, which resemble legal rules, have replaced the social learning processes of the individual and marginalize the traditional role of the community as a space for moral learning. An examination of the common good, articulated by the New Natural Lawyers, reveals further disparities with natural law assumptions which are further revealed in light of an examination of Grisez’s, Finnis’s and Boyle’s accounts of the political community. Moreover, such an examination begins to highlight the alternative ideas within the New Natural Lawyers themselves. While their account of natural law itself reflects a well-synthesized critique of nuclear deterrence, their understandings of the natural law community highlight the disciplinary distinctions which guide their work. For example, John Finnis’s account of the common good is one that respects the rights of individual persons within the community. Rights are the ‘implicit’ articulation of an individual’s well-being. Moreover, a rights discourse best describes the responsibility of governments to coordinate all individuals’ well-being in order to ensure equal access to the basic goods.73 This discourse outlines an account of legitimate political authority, establishes and creates laws and develops institutions which marginalize the chaos emerging out of myriad individual relationships which sustain the community. This is a technical account of government which emphasizes coordination at the expense of human experiences in order to limit the negative consequences of human interaction. In many ways John Finnis’s interpretation of the common good reflects the subjective assumptions of modern political societies. He outlines an account of being political which incorporates the ends of individual liberty and self-determination, and focuses on the equality achieved through the structures of distributive justice. In so doing he contributes to the problem of individual isolation and fails to account for the non-instrumental relationships which feature in historical accounts of natural law morality. His works misconstrue the nature of political obligations and the responsibilities which it engenders. Rights, similar to basic human goods, are distributed like property, and are apportioned on the assumption that equal access sustains equal developmental potential. This institutional design fails to account for local characteristics and personal requirements deferring instead to the technical organization of governance. Thus, at the end of the day, common good, instead of referring to the idea of being in common, delineates spheres of agency which reflect instrumental relationships of power and authority in the absence of a mutual and relational ontology.74 73  John Finnis, 1980, 214. 74  This is not an isolated phenomenon within ethics and international affairs. As Nicholas Rengger illustrates in his article, On the just war tradition in the twenty-first

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With this in mind, the value of Germain Grisez and Russell Shaw’s work on community becomes increasingly important. Like Finnis, these two authors describe a moral agent and in doing so draw on the idea of basic human goods. They also account for the notion of the common good reflecting human autonomy and freedom within the wider political structures of the community and share an overarching assumption of legitimate political authority. These two accounts of morality diverge because Grisez and Shaw focus on the relationality of being within the community. In Beyond the New Morality they show how community exists when one or more individuals develop a relationship.75 The foundation of any relationship is a shared commitment to a moral vision expressed through a mutual commitment of love. As the relationships become increasingly interconnected they reflect institutional patterns which, when entrenched, form communities. It is within these patterns that individuals engage in order to achieve a higher degree of fulfillment. These relationships challenge the rights discourse of which Finnis is so keen to incorporate into his account of natural law, but in so doing it reveals the possibility of moral agency which accepts, and welcomes, human vulnerabilities. Thus it paves the way for a holistic account of being human which is at odds with the rights-bearing individual. Germain Grisez and Russell Shaw’s work on the morality of natural law shares many of the assumptions of the ontological accounts of morality evidenced in the ideas of Martian and Midgley which were discussed in the previous sections. They openly discuss the ontology of being proposed by Aquinas and investigate a holistic account of the individual as a social and moral agent. Consequently, their account of ‘the political’ incorporates both instrumental and non-instrumental relationships associated with being human. They offer a viable account of a purely human political experience and offer up an agent predisposed to a moral and reasonable engagement with ‘the political.’ Individuals are guided by reason, but it is a reason which incorporates passionate and emotional responses and which motivates human agency. It is a vision of the agent which blends the idea of a personal politic and a public politic. The morality guiding agency thus exists within the community which reflects, and supports in turn, the non-instrumental century, International Affairs, 78 no. 2 (2002) 353–363, this same type of evolution is also evident in the transition from a tradition of just war to a contemporary theory of just war. This demonstrates a process whereby the idea of a just war tradition revolving around practice has become increasingly legal and relevant to the practice of war in the twenty-first century despite deep chasms in the arguments and assumptions of both the tradition and the modern conception of the liberal state. What is interesting to note is the movement from practical to theoretical argumentation as a tradition is molded so as to suit the needs and development of a contemporary society. In like manner, the natural law is abused when it is transformed from a practice-oriented tradition with an anthropological understanding of the individual and community into a process-oriented tradition seeking, above all else, rules and principles from which to derive moral and ethical action. 75  Grisez and Shaw, 1980.

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relationships of agents. Individuals, on this account of politics, can thus only be understood as persons in relations. There are considerable inconsistencies with the New Natural Lawyers interpretation of morality. Yet their assimilation of morality, broadly construed, demonstrates the critical function of the natural law tradition. Realism, Morality and Nuclear Deterrence demonstrated how a shared purpose within ‘the political,’ namely, the defense of human lives, can be interpreted in a Weberian understanding of faith even though it has roots in a theological tradition of political thought. Consequently, the New Natural Lawyers achieved two ends. Namely, they demonstrated the immorality of nuclear deterrence as a defense policy; and, they illustrated how thick and thin accounts of morality, be it natural, or natural law, can be synthesized in order to achieve mutually sought after ends. It describes a purposeful account of politics that engages with the institutional patterns of power, defense and security all the while adopting a less than traditional moral framework. Consequently, their works demonstrate the viability of a natural law discourse within the field of international politics, broadly construed. If however, the critical function of natural law morality is to remain pertinent to the evolving injustices in international politics it must bring to the table new and innovative ideas. The strength of natural law morality rests on its social and, therefore, relational assumptions. Collectively, the writings of the New Natural Lawyers fail to provide this relationality. Individually, however, Grisez is able to hint at the value of thick natural law and its use to develop a relational account of ‘the political.’ An examination of the morality of natural law, in a pre-modern context, demonstrates the value of non-instrumental relationships to any account of politics and paves the way for an alternative account of ‘the political.’ As the ensuing chapters will reveal, a focus on the non-instrumental relationships of agents reveals an account of governance which articulates a symbiotic relationship for individuals and governments alike. Consequently, Chapter 3 provides alternative means of understanding agency, international institutional design and the possibility of global justice that is trans-communal. In other words, a pre-modern interpretation of natural law provides an alternative account of ‘the political’ and challenges the dominance of sovereignty, order and anarchy in the realm of international politics.

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Chapter 3

Thomas Aquinas and the Morality of Natural Law Introduction A pre-modern interpretation of natural law morality stemming from the assumptions of Thomas Aquinas reveals a particular ontology of being. This ontology is naturally social and moral and reveals an account of the individual which is political. The individual develops relationships whose interactions and outcomes flavor the social setting, and within this setting there is a need to account for the values, aims and ends of all those involved. There is also an account of the community. This chapter seeks to demonstrate the social assumptions of Aquinas, which, it is claimed, are decidedly absent from modern interpretations of natural law. It outlines the original ontological, epistemological and methodological assumptions of Thomas Aquinas in order to move forward and offer a relational, unbounded and open-ended account of politics which highlights a complementary role for traditional relationships of power and authority alongside the non-instrumental relationships of care and love which feature prominently in the quotidian existence of all individuals who are conceptualized as natural law agents. The descriptive account of natural law morality draws on the original assumptions of Aquinas in order to facilitate an understanding of the individual and the community which is purposely symbiotic. Each entity, the individual and the community, seek in common to achieve the ends of goodness. Aquinas’s Summa Theologaiae provides the most comprehensive description of the individual, the community and the nature of natural law morality. This work is examined alongside other less prominent works of Aquinas in order to establish the necessary natural law framework needed to achieve the above outlined ends. An in-depth investigation into the works of Aquinas not only reveals his idea of morality, but also pays attention to his understanding of the individual as a moral and social being contributing to his notions of politics. This descriptive endeavor provides an interesting account of the individual as an agent of justice and provides an accompanying account of political and moral agency which features prominently in Chapter 4. These two particular facets of being political provide the necessary foundations from which to interpret anew the idea of ‘being political’ and begin to pave the way for an objective, as opposed to subjective, account of being. Instead of focusing on the individual as a right-bearing subject, the sum product of rights and laws within the community, this account of being political demonstrates how individuals, comprised of a conscience, and sustained

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by experience and reason, are able to act in a prudent manner that supports a casuistic methodological approach to agency. In order to demonstrate these claims, this chapter therefore proceeds in an orderly fashion. It first examines the ontology of being which presupposes, and at the same time supports, an account of natural law morality. The morality of natural law is described in full in the second section. The chapter concludes with an examination of the Scholastic development of Aquinas’s interpretation of natural law. It seeks to demonstrate the viability of an international account of obligation and care originating in the idea of dominion naturale (natural dominion). The assumptions which are examined are instrumental in this work’s account of being political and its understanding of international relations and are vital to the task of international moral institutional design and the description of a more personal and engaging account of international politics which follows in Chapters 4 and 5. On the Individual Aquinas’s ontological assumptions originate in the soul. It is the possession of a soul, fused with matter, which distinguishes human beings from other forms of sentient life. A.P. d’Entreves notes the importance of Aquinas’s ontological assumptions and writes that his interpretation of moral being remains central to the natural law tradition. The primacy of the soul is very much in evidence in Aquinas’s work Essence and Being which makes clear that individuals come into being when the soul, the ethereal component of living, joins with earthly matter. What Aquinas understood, and what has been marginalized within contemporary debates of ethics and international politics, is that one must look to the anthropological nature of man in order to understand the ontology of being human. This anthropology of being provides a unique account of human agency which highlights the moral potential of all individuals living as beings in common. It demonstrates that to be human is to act and one’s actions represent the individual’s participation in the natural law. Being, according to Aquinas, cannot be separated from morality. One exists in the natural world, yet displays a remarkable ignorance of its structures; however, his metaphysical assumptions, namely his interpretation of the intellect and will, provide individuals with the necessary experiences to engage and interact in the moral world. These experiences reveal a natural disposition, on the part of the individual, toward a moral existence. This is a relationship that is commented upon by Robert Pasnau. He demonstrates how Aquinas could not conceive of an amoral state of being. To be human was, essentially, to be moral. Aquinas demonstrates   A.P. d’Entreves, 1956, 34 & 35.   Thomas Aquinas, On Being and Essence, translated with an introduction and notes by Armand Mauer (Toronto, Canada: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1949).  Robert Pasnau, Thomas Aquinas on Human Nature: A Philosophical Study of the Summa Theologiae Ia 75–89 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002) 20.

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these assumptions when he describes man’s status in the natural world. He begins at the most basic level and identifies what makes men human; namely, the ability to act in the absence of outside stimuli. Such actions, he goes on to show, are responsible for the general understandings which individuals can acquire of the world around them. This anthropology is accompanied by a series of metaphysical assumptions which state that individuals, based on the first principles, are imbued at the outset with a basic understanding of good and evil which complements the sensory and cognitive capacities. With experience comes knowledge, and with knowledge comes understanding which culminates in the actualization of human potential. The soul, as Aquinas repeatedly states in all of his work, is the first element of life. The soul sustains the first principles of being. It is, as MacIntyre writes, the ultimate form of being. The soul sustains the human experience. It is part and parcel of one’s will and intellect, both practical and speculative, which goes on to sustain the actual existence of the individual. Aquinas understands being with reference to actualities, and the soul, as Pasnau highlights, represents one form of actuality. One’s actuality is achieved as one experiences the natural world and develops the first moral principles. The soul, when united with the intellect and will, sustains both the moral and social assumptions of being human which indicates the need all individuals have to live in a community and engage with other likeminded individuals. Such interactions sustain, and develop, the natural law idea of ‘the good.’ As individuals acquire this higher level of knowledge they further develop their actual existence. Consequently, individuals ought to be conceptualized as epistemonical entities in and of themselves. They are curious beings that demonstrate an eagerness to acquire knowledge. This eagerness is the product of the will and intellect of the individual which sustain the rational and reasonable assumptions of Aquinas’s interpretation of human nature. For Aquinas there exists a hierarchy of beings. God exists at the supreme end of this hierarchy where he governs over all that he has created. Living within this realm are the angels which, like individuals, are comprised of a soul, yet, unlike earthly beings, have an intimate knowledge of the eternal world. It is this knowledge which distinguishes angels from individuals. At the same time, the lower end of this hierarchy is constituted by animals and plants who are referred to by Aquinas as self-movers and non-movers. These beings are distinct from humans because they do not have the potential to deliberate in a moral fashion. Individuals are ‘rational self-movers’ who are capable of independent action. Desire prompting independent action originates in the will. The most basic idea of goodness and the precepts of natural law sustain a natural teleological drive on the part of the individual which prompts deliberations on the part of the intellect and supports

  MacIntyre, 1990, 153.   Thomas Aquinas, Disputed Question on the Soul’s Knowledge of Itself, Richard T. Lambert, trans. (Stillwater, Oklahoma: Translation Clearing House, 1987).   Pasnau, 2002.

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the possibility of agency. This willfulness is the ontological essence of Aquinas’s individual. It is natural and is equally present in all of nature’s creatures. The intellect is simultaneously theoretical and practical, and provides individuals with the knowledge of technical and practical skills. This distinction reflects the Aristotelian influence under which Aquinas was working, that is the idea that knowledge is theoretical (phronesis) and practical (nomoi). The theoretical intellect shares many affinities with the will and provides for one’s cognitive abilities. It is in this location that the individual reflects upon the desires of the will. The practical intellect, on the other hand, is that which motivates the individual to move, and to experience the world of which he or she is a part. It demonstrates the cognitive ability to reason. While the will is aware of the most basic of moral precepts it is within the intellect that individuals deliberate in and amongst a variety of options and it is that deliberation which goes on to prompt action. The will and the intellect demonstrate a relative relationship that complements each other. Working together they are able to further develop the special habit of synderesis, the virtuous moral existence, and the possibility of a moral framework within which deliberation and moral outcomes can be achieved. It is the will that orients the natural telos toward the last ends of the individual— namely ‘the good.’ As Aquinas explains in the Summa Contra Gentiles, the desire for the good is natural, and is located in all of nature’s creatures. This desire is intellectually driven and is rational. All individuals, within this tradition, have a particular end, and for Aquinas this end, or account of ‘the good,’ is happiness. Happiness is determined absolutely and relatively. In its absolute sense it refers to one’s union with God. Relative goodness refers to the particular relationships of individuals. It is something to be enjoyed by the individual who remains open to the possibility of engagement and being loved. The end is consequently interpreted as a goal toward which all individuals strive.10 The will has a basic understanding of goodness as happiness. This idea of happiness highlights the overarching perfectionist assumptions of Aquinas’s moral framework. The good reflects the teleology of being. It generally exists beyond the natural limitations of   Thomas Aquinas, Summa contra Gentiles, translated by the Fathers of the English Dominican Province (London: Buns Oates & Washbourne Ltd., Publishers to the Holy See, 1923–1929), 210.   Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Ia, q. 79, a. 8; and Ia, q. 79, a. 11.   Aquinas, 1923–1929. 10  Thomas Aquinas, Quaestiones Disputated De Veritate, Q. 21, a. 2 corpus as found in Truth, vol. 3, p. 10, a translation of the Deveritate by Robert W. Schmidt (Chicago: Henry Regnery, 1954) as quoted in Ronald Duska, Aquinas’ definition of the good: ethicaltheoretical notes on De Veritate, Q. 21, The Monist, 58 no. 1 (1974), 152; and Thomas Aquinas, Public disputations on Evil 6, text from Queastiones Disputatae de Malo (Opera Omnia, Leonine edn, vol. xxiii) in Thomas Aquinas, Selected Philosophical Writings, selected and translated with an Introduction and notes by Timothy McDermott (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993), 176.

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being human. It is superior and beyond the relationship of the will and intellect, and carves out a space for the graceful assumptions of natural dominion. The moral development of the individual presupposes an objective account of dominion. Aquinas articulates the idea of dominion naturale which highlights the autonomous reasoning capabilities of the individual. This concept highlights the innate potential all individuals have to become moral, providing they are able to engage in the natural world. Natural dominion highlights a natural equality enjoyed by all individuals owing to the ontological and metaphysical assumptions put forward by Aquinas. Dominion, as Roger Ruston points out, is a fist of nature. It is present when the soul and body are fused. It is further developed through reasonable deliberations and is perhaps best illustrated in the community-building endeavors of individuals.11 The centrality of dominion in the assumptions of Aquinas distinguishes his account of individuals, and his wider theology, from alternative theologians, in particular Augustine.12 Aquinas professes to his readers that individuals, after the occurrence of the original sin, did not lose their God given grace. As a product of their natural ontology it could not be removed. Consequently, there lies in Aquinas’s account of being human the possibility of a positive human experience, albeit it tempered by the equal possibility of immoral and erroneous human deliberations. The intellect and will reinforce the first principles of life. It is in this metaphysical space that the Thomistic idea of synderesis exists as well. Synderesis is a habit which informs a basic understanding of good and evil. As Aquinas writes, synderesis is not a power, ‘but a natural habit’ which incites the individual to good and to murmur at evil in order to judge what is experienced.13 Conceptually, synderesis is purposively vague. Its generality is not only its pre-eminent strength, but also its weakness. In other words, it provides the intellect with the vaguest concept of the morality of natural law inciting good and murmuring against evil. It is part and parcel of the first principles of life, and its inception and development recalls the original social and moral ontology of the individual. Synderesis maintains the primordial claim that action and reason, on the part of the agent, are in and of themselves moral. As John Haldane points out, the synderesis rule does not concern itself with explicit statements about right and wrong. Instead, it points to an axis, or poles, of good and evil along which opportunities for agency lie. One navigates these poles, and makes good judgments, with the help of one’s conscience.14 The individual conscience reflects the knowledge acquired through human experience interwoven with the first principles found within the speculative 11  Ruston, 2004. 12  Augustinian interpretations of human nature emphasize negative ends for man. See Augustine, 1988. 13  Aquinas, Ia, q. 72, a. 12. 14  John Haldane, Faithful Reason, Essays Catholic and Philosophical (London: Routledge, 2004), 117.

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intellect. The pre-modern idea of conscience is distinct from that of modern concepts. It is, as Aquinas states, ‘an act.’ Conscience, he writes, implies the application of knowledge to some act.15 To borrow from contemporary discourse, one’s conscience ought to be understood as a taxonomical structure, informed by both the first principles alongside previous human experience. If it is properly developed one’s conscience performs three key roles. First, it distinguishes between right and wrong; second, it collates the relevant experiences which go on to inform a vision of moral action; and finally, it is within one’s conscience that the relationship between right and wrong, moral and immoral, actions and their consequences emerge.16 It is impossible to legislate for the development of an individual conscience. Owing to the idea that it is an act, the focus must center on the relevant human experiences. Only such experiences will provide the necessary tool to develop the first principles and the underlying principles of synderesis. Practical reason is simply not enough. Aquinas maintains that all individuals are free to determine their proper course of action and follow the directives of the will. Yet this idea is not without its difficulties. The will is intimately tied to the ends of God which challenge the inherent freedom of any individual pursuing a course of action. As Wippel highlights, this is not entirely problematic. He is clear that God can function as both a principle and secondary causal agent and that the will of the individual can mediate in between these two roles. But what bears important scrutiny is that the will of God and the perfectionist ends of happiness are one and the same. Consequently if individuals will actions in line with the natural teleology of being they are acting as free and autonomous beings.17 Thus to understand God as having removed the freedom of the individual in acting towards the ultimate good is to misunderstand the ultimate good as conceived by Aquinas and the derived scholastic tradition. The absolute divine knowledge possessed by God does not remove the freedom and self-determination of the individual, but rather fosters the drive, latent within the will of the individual, to fulfill her telos, thereby fostering a healthy idea of human flourishing and well-being. Jacques Maritain provides further insight into Aquinas’s idea of freedom. He identifies two interpretations of freedom: the absence of constraint, and second, the absence of necessitation.18 Whereas the absence of necessitation is more closely aligned with the theoretical concept of man and occupies the thoughts of philosophers and theologians, the absence of constraint concerns itself with the actualization of the individual as an epistemonical agent. This second account has a direct bearing on the development of an individual conscience because it fosters the development of reasonable moral deliberations and hints at the possibility of a casuistic account of moral agency. Yet it is also to be noted that these two 15  16  17  18 

Aquinas, Ia, q. 79, a. 13. Grisez, 1983, 82. Wippel, 1984, 256. This distinction is noted by Maritain, 1940, 118.

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components, like much of Aquinas’s thought, can not be separated from each other. Working in communion with each other, they provides the means for the intellect to develop and the individual to acquire a knowledge of the world in which he or she is situated, and in so doing develop the habits and virtues of the prudent individual. Prudence grows in importance in light of the first principles of knowledge. Recalling the habitual nature of the first principles and the limitations of a rational soul, natural law morality is limited to the capacities and experiences of the agent. Aquinas was aware of this particular challenge and therefore the virtue of prudence reflects his engagement with this potential challenge. It facilitates the further development of the original idea of synderesis and the potential of humans to develop a conscience. Prudence reflects the relationship of the intellect and the will and its influence on the experiences of the individual in order to develop the latent synderesis principle. On this matter Aquinas writes the following: ‘prudence does not reside in the external senses whereby we know sensible objects, but in the interior sense, which is perfected by memory and experience so as to judge promptly of particular case.’19 This flexibility and adaptability reflects the unpredictable events of individuals as they engage in the natural world. Aquinas was aware of this unpredictability. He writes: It is because the infinite number of singulars cannot be comprehended by human reason, that ‘our counsels are uncertain.’ Nevertheless experience reduces the infinity of singulars to a certain finite number which occur as a general rule, and the knowledge of these suffices for human prudence.20

Prudence engages with the vulnerabilities of being human. It ensures that, in the presence of moral habits, individual engagements within the wider social setting are guided by second-order rules and procedures. Yet it accommodates the unpredictability of human affairs by drawing on the synderesis principles. Moreover, it also responds to those contemporary critics who envision, within a flexible and adaptable ethical framework, the possibility of insecurity fostered through egoism and self-interest. Synderesis and prudence reflect the practical reason of natural law morality. The idea of the prudent individual hints at a return to the idea of habitual moral action. A habit is to be trained in relation to one’s nature. Aquinas writes on habits, noting that a habit is a quality which pertains to action.21 In order for individuals to all develop moral habitual practices they must be situated in a political structure which accommodates instrumental and non-instrumental relationships. These relationships structure individual experience which then facilitates the ongoing development of synderesis. This is reflected in the agent’s ability to reason and act. 19  Aquinas, II–II, q. 47, a. 3. 20  Aquinas, II–II, q. 47, a. 3. 21  Aquinas, II–II, q. 49, a. 3.

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The idea of ethical habits is central to pre-modern accounts of morality and ethics. They have, since the modern turn in political thought, been denied a crucial role because of the emphasis placed on legal rules and expectations. Janet Coleman has reflected on the loss of habitual moral practices in contemporary moral discourses as she criticizes contemporary ideas of agency and ethics. Habitual practice requires practical reasonableness, and indicates the potential for autonomous moral agency.22 Indeed, habit formation plays a central role in the natural law tradition as it seeks to develop virtuous beings. The virtuous being is a prudent being, one who is able to reason, reflect and act in such a manner that envisions a long-term commitment to the ends of morality. The virtue of prudence reflects the inner workings of the synderesis principle, the development of one’s conscience and the ability to reason. It exists not in the external sense of the individual, but rather, as Aquinas points out, ‘in the interior sense’ and is perfected by memory and experience. It sustains the ability of the individual to act in a manner befitting his or her own moral ontology and when faced with new and challenging decisions, to seek counsel from other, more knowledgeable beings. Habitual moral actions are of central importance to the ensuing account of moral institutional design. As Chapter 4 reveals, moral habits are part and parcel of moral agency, especially one which relies on the methodology of casuistry. Likewise, moral habits, as is revealed in Chapter 5, demonstrate how one can begin to engage with moral assumption within an atmosphere characterized by anarchy. A discussion of the virtue of charity within a just war framework reveals the predisposition of virtuous soldiers to reason, in the absence of moral structures, in a manner which reflects the wider ends of morality. The backbone of such an account rests on the morality of natural law understood as both an absolute value and a normative framework within which individuals engage and act as moral and reasonable beings. On Natural Law The ontology of being supporting Aquinas’s account of the individual structures his account of natural law. This individual, as the previous section demonstrated, is moral, social and reasonable, and these assumptions stem from ethical ideas of Aristotle which Aquinas further develops.23 As Knud Haakonssen has pointed out, Aquinas is thought to be the foremost natural law scholar. Most natural law accounts which pre-date Aquinas’s work are thought to lie in wait for Aquinas to complete, whereas all works on natural law which occur after the publication 22  Janet Coleman, The history of political thought in a modern university: the first Henry Tudor Memorial Lecture, History of Political Thought, 21 no. 1 (Spring 2000), 152–172. 23 An examination of this relationship is offered by Joseph Owens, among others, in Aristotle and Aquinas, in The Cambridge Companion to Aquinas, Norman Kretzmann and Eleonore Stump, eds (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 38–59.

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of his Summa are thought to have been heavily influenced by his ideas.24 As the final section of this chapter goes on to highlight, the works of Aquinas established the Scholastic school of natural law which was preserved in the writings of the Salamanca Theologians. Their works sought, above all else, to capture the objective account of natural dominion as theories of natural rights rose to prominence in the development of political thought.25 It is question 94 of the Summa which directly speaks of natural law. Natural law, Aquinas writes, is both reasonable and habitual and relates to both the speculative and active components of being human. The universal precepts of natural law are located within the will and intellect, and experiences facilitate the development of moral habits. Aquinas outlines the idea of natural law as follows: Since, however, good has the nature of an end, and evil, the nature of a contrary, hence it is that all those things to which man has a natural inclination, are naturally apprehended by reason as being good, and consequently as objects of pursuit, and their contraries as evil, and objects of avoidance. Wherefore according to the order of natural inclinations, is the order of the precepts of the natural law. Because in man there is first of all an inclination to good in accordance with the nature which he has in common with all substances: inasmuch as every substance seeks the preservation of its own being, according to its nature: and by reason of this inclination, whatever is a means of preserving human life, and of warding off its obstacles, belongs to natural law.26

There is, in this definition of natural law, an emphasis on the choices of individuals and a heavy reliance on their reasonable abilities. It assumes, owing to its ontological assumptions, that individuals naturally desire the good. Moreover, owing to the accompanying notion of synderesis, it also assumes that individuals, at the most basic levels, are capable of discerning this good. Goodness, for Aquinas, is reflected in the ends of happiness. All individuals, owing to their ontological origins, seek this end. Happiness, on this interpretation, is not an emotional state. For Aquinas, happiness relates to the eventual union that individuals with have with God. Yet there is both an absolute and relative scope to his notion of happiness. While ultimate happiness is limited to one’s unification with God, one can also strive for happiness within the social and political world. In this sense, happiness is a relative concept and relates to the moral development of individuals within the wider community of human beings. Happiness is part and parcel of human agency which is reflected in the attainment of a virtuous state. Russell Pannier highlights this idea when he writes that happiness ought to be

24  Haakonssen, 1996. 25 An excellent documentation of objective and subjective dominion is offered by Brett, 1997. 26  Aquinas, Ia–IIae, q. 94, a.2.

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conceptualized as a mode of being, or an activity.27 Jean Porter carries this idea one step further and notes how happiness as a mode of being reflects the teleological orientation which distinguishes the natural law agent.28 This notion implies that it is only within an account of human engagement that individuals will be able to achieve a measure of happiness within the community. This account of natural law highlights the intricate relationship of the ontological assumptions sustaining the individual and the epistemological and methodological assumptions which ensure his or her ability to discern the true nature of morality. It articulates the most basic moral absolute—to do good and avoid evil—and is aware of the equal capacities all individuals have for understanding goodness. It reinvigorates the teleological ends of natural law which are absent in the modern natural law interpretations. In addition, its focus on the ability to achieve the ends of goodness reinvigorating the perfectionist ends which, as Chapter 2 argued, characterize thick accounts of natural law morality. This drive for perfection is itself an ontological desire which is rooted in the will and intellect, and facilitates the most basic understanding of the synderesis principle. This principle is itself fostered through the reasoning skills of the individual. Thus, when one speaks of the ontology of natural law morality one is invoking a series of assumptions which note the capacity individuals have to acquire knowledge of the natural and social world and develop it in such a manner that reflects their natural moral disposition. The cumulative effect of these assumptions is reflected in the idea of loving reasonableness. Love, in the natural law tradition, is not akin to the loving emotions of contemporary social discourse. For Aquinas, loving another was associated with reasonableness. If one could discern this similar capacity in another the relationship which ensued was a loving one. To love another was to provide the necessary means of generating human experiences in order to understand the idea of ‘the good.’ It recognizes the potential for goodness within another individual. Moreover, it provides a framework within which to structure the relationships of the community and is intimately tied up with two other ideas: namely, friendship and charity. When these ideas are properly interwoven they support the morality of natural law as they explain the motivations for moral agency in the first place. With this in mind Aquinas investigates the notion of loving reasonableness alongside friendship, justice and charity in order to further articulate the value of natural law morality. Beginning with a definition love, Aquinas writes the following: Love belongs to the appetitive power which is a passive faculty. Wherefore its object stands in relation to it as the cause of its movement or act. Therefore the 27  Russell Pannier, Aquinas on the ultimate end of human existence, Logos: A Journal of Catholic Philosophical Thought, 3 no. 4 (2000), 169–194. 28  Jean Porter, The Recovery of Virtue (Louisville, Kentucky: John Knox/Westminster Press, 1996).

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cause of love must needs be love’s object. Now the proper object of love is the good; because, as stated above (26,1.2) love implies a certain connaturalness or complacency of the lover for the thing beloved, and to everything, that this is a good, which is akin and proportionate to it. It follows, therefore, that good is the proper cause of love.29

Where does one locate this good? It is found in the core of what it is to be a human being. The potential to love, and be loved, rests on the particular moral ontology articulated by Aquinas. It reflects a shared desire to know the good and seek it out, not only for one’s self, but for the development of others within the community. It develops, as Chapter 4 will further reveal, with the acute recognition of the potential for moral reasonableness in another. It directs the individual to engage with others in a manner that facilitates goodness. It extends the vague precepts of synderesis and hints at the possibility of moral learning and habitual developments which recognize the natural moral equality of other individuals and their shared desire to achieve the ends of goodness. When the reasonableness of love is allowed to develop, it underscores the original social assumptions of Aquinas. It demonstrates the need that individuals have to live within a community and the possibility of generating a unified community reflected in the emergence of a wider moral fellowship. Aquinas notes that the primordial desire of all individuals is survival which, he claims, is best achieved through the creation of a community. He writes, on the matter, the following; First, because man is naturally a social being, and so in the state of innocence he would have led a social life. Now a social life cannot exist among a number of people unless under the presidency of one to look after the common good; for many, as such, seek many things, whereas one attends only to one.30

Consequently, individuals establish communities in order to engage more fully with the ends of natural law morality. These communities reflect the idea of loving reasonableness and are successfully achieved when one can establish a measure of human fellowship. This fellowship is reflected in a shared desire to work towards the ends of happiness which facilitates a deeper understanding of ‘the good’ itself. The form of fellowship, in the natural law tradition, is friendship. Similar to Aristotle, Aquinas begins his account of friendship by noting the self-same equality of being which marks all natural law agents. It is further developed when he recognizes the natural need all individuals have to exist within a community. With this in mind he writes the following:

29  Aquinas, II–II, q. 27, a. 1. 30  Aquinas, Ia–IIae, q. 96, a. 4.

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Loving relations and friendship are intimately tied to one another. One engages with another owing to the potential for reasonable interactions. These relationships further intensify and develop in a friendly manner when the shared desire for ‘the good’ is cemented. This idea of love and friendship can, at first glance, seem quite selfish. Individuals, it would seem, love in order to further their own commitment to happiness; however, such is not the always the case. Aquinas is quick to point out that all individuals are members of that same species of humanity and this relationship motivates each person to ‘wish good to him as to himself.’ Contemporary interpretations of Aquinas’s account of love have also reflected on this seemingly self-interested motivation to love. As Stephen Pope writes, the original teleological orientation to know the good is motivated out of selfinterest. These developing relationships, he concludes, demonstrate the sameness of self and foster a mutual respect for the objective equality typified in the scholastic tradition of natural law. He observes that this self-interest is tempered by the equality of being, which is the foundation of any account of friendship. ‘Friendship,’ he writes, ‘reflects the voluntary decision of a free agent to regard another free agent with affection and benevolence, a choice obviously possible only for beings possessing the capacity for a free will.’32 Yet Aquinas actually goes one step further than Aristotle in his account of friendship. The obligation of love, as described in the Scholastic tradition, calls on individuals to love, even when the one’s experiences would seemingly call for a cessation of the relationship. Sharon Sytsma investigates this call for charity in the works of Aquinas and concludes that in adopting the language of civic friendship he provides a mediated account of Aristotelian friendship. Unlike Aristotle, Aquinas called for the continuation of friendship in the face of evil.33 His inclusion of the Christian idea of charity, alongside friendship, could account for the presence of human relationships when they remained unreciprocated, and even hurtful, to one or both members of the relationship. Far from being a selfish endeavor, the obligations of love call on 31  Aquinas, IIa–IIae, 23.1. 32  Stephen J. Pope, Neither enemy nor friend: nature as creation in the theology of Saint Thomas Aquinas, Zygon, 32 no. 2 (June 1997), 225. 33  Sharon E. Sytsma, Agapic Friendship, Philosophy and Literature, 27 (2003), 428–435.

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agents to love in both positive and negative environments, thus challenging the idea that individuals are only motivated to act for selfish ends. The obligations of love are indicative of an overarching humanity, a self-same ontology of being which, when properly cultivated, is indicative of positive human fellowship. This idea of fellowship is in keeping with the objective account of dominion which features in the writings of Aquinas. It acknowledges the anthropological assumptions which sustain his understanding of the individual, as a social and moral agent, which facilitates the following argument: namely, individual relationships are a mutual experience. The absolute ends of natural law morality can only be achieved when individuals seek it out in common. Not only do individual engagements with others facilitate an understanding of morality, they also enhance the experience for all parties to the engagement. Aquinas is clear on this as he writes that what is good individually, is better in common.34 At the same time however, Aquinas is mindful of the original freedom and autonomy of all individuals, as was discussed in the previous section. Therefore he is mindful to facilitate the creation of diverse and political structures in order to ensure that individuals are capable, within the community, of achieving both the ends of the good in common as well as their own particular needs. There is, within this account of natural law, a desire for plural political structures and that desire is reflected in the second-order normative structures which shape the experiences of individuals in common. Aquinas’s account of natural law does not offer a modern methodology which clearly articulates the steps which need to be taken in order to develop the social and political structures of the community. Much like the synderesis principle, the structure of the community is open and guided by a common understanding of ‘the good.’ The second-order principles build on the underlying assumptions of reasonableness evident within the natural law agent, and focus on the precepts which are reflected in the idea of love. As Kossel writes, one does not find in this account of natural law rigid rules and a methodology akin to modern deductive processes.35 What the natural law offers is a clearly articulated end of goodness and a similarly open-ended guide to achieving that end. Consequently, any attempt to structure ‘the political’ lies chiefly in the reasonable actions of individuals, conceptualized as moral agents. An examination of Aquinas’s understanding of laws is particularly helpful. Laws, for Aquinas, are akin to reason and relate indirectly to moral precepts which are found in the ultimate ideal—to do good and avoid evil. In the Summa Theologica, Aquinas offers a threefold distinction of law—eternal, natural, and human. Laws, in general, he argues, are to command and forbid. Commanding, he further notes, is related to reason.36 Thus laws are 34  Thomas Aquinas, 1923–1929, 220. 35  Clifford G. Kossel, Natural law and human law (Ia–IIae, qq. 98–108), in The Ethics of Aquinas, Stephen J. Pope, ed. (Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 2002), 169–193. 36  Aquinas, Ia–IIae, q. 90, a. 1.

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joined to the human ability to reason and indicate one of many ways in which the political community can be structured. Positive law is revealed to the individual through their own shared experiences. Their development relies on the natural moral absolute to do good which, when combined with human experience, reveal a series of moral structures which highlight upright moral action. As Aquinas himself points out, ‘laws are nothing else than an ordinance of reason for the common good, made by him who has care of the community, and promulgated.’37 Laws complement the individual’s ability to reason. They provide a second-order normative structure which takes into account the expected actions of agents in particular situations, and those expected actions are based on the values and ideals of the community. They reflect the institutionalization of moral habits in wider social settings. This interpretation of law is decidedly open-ended and reflects the constantly changing and unpredictable situations which arise within a communal setting. As Paul E. Sigmund notes, Aquinas articulated this account of law well aware of the mutability of the human experience and he was able to do this owing to the teleological assumptions of being human which were couched in a wider framework of potential human perfection. Laws could, on this account, shape the actions of particular individuals who are working in common to achieve a particular goal.38 Underlying this interpretation of laws is the central assumption of reason which features in all assumptions of natural morality. It is reason which directs individuals toward this goal, prompts the recognition of a shared moral ontology and articulates, through human interaction, the need for political structures which reflect and perfect the natural equality of all individuals, conceptualized as moral beings in potential. Laws, on this account, facilitate just human relationships in the wider social setting. They draw on the example of personal, non-instrumental relationships which structure the first instances of moral learning in order to facilitate a moral community geared toward the ends of moral goodness. Laws, for Aquinas, reflect the social and relational nature of being human. He writes in the Summa the following: It is proper to justice, as compared with the other virtues, to direct man in his relations with others; because it denotes a kind of equality, as its very name implies on the other hand the other virtues perfect man in those matters only which befit him in relation to himself.39

Aquinas was clear that within the community many different forms of justice featured in the relationships of individuals. There was, in his institutional design, space for both the instrumental relationships associated with contemporary politics 37  Aquinas, II–II, q. 90, a. 4. 38  Paul E. Sigmund, Law and politics, in The Cambridge Companion to Aquinas, Norman Kretzmann and Eleonore Stump, eds (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), 222. 39  Aquinas, II–II, q. 57, a. 1.

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as well as the now marginalized non-instrumental relationships. When speaking of the formalized idea of politics, the coordination of the basic goods necessary for survival, Aquinas clearly references the idea of distributive justice. He describes the idea of epikeia, understood in contemporary terms as equity, and outlined a technical account of the structures of government. Epikeia exists in order to rectify injustices which arise when situations and laws find themselves to be at odds with one another. As Aquinas writes: Epikeia does not set aside that which is just in itself but that which is just as by law established. Nor is it opposed to severity, which follows the letter of the law when it ought to be followed.40

Epikeia ought to be understood as a means of achieving the original intentions of codified laws, which is a point well explained by Daniel Westberg.41 This is a task which falls to the legislative and judicial institutions in the community and is concerned with the fair distribution of goods. There are however other types of justice which Aquinas acknowledges. The idea of commutative justice which highlights equality, friendship and charity is also apparent in the works of Aquinas and it is these themes which were lost in the modern natural law interpretations. Commutative justice complements the original social assumptions of being human. It emphasizes the relationships in and amongst individuals, and not the distribution of resources which has come to be associated with accepted discourses on justice. Commutative justice, according to Aquinas, highlights ‘the mutual dealings between two persons.’42 It focuses on the non-instrumental relationships which structure the daily interactions of individuals. It is a reflection of one manner in which individual relationships can serve as an institutional pattern for the political community. Justice is a normative manifestation of the original teleological desires which emerge from the will and intellect and manifest themselves in the reasonable deliberations and actions of the individual. As Ralph McInerny points out, justice reflects the ‘business’ that all individuals, as members of a political community, have with one another.43 Justice, so understood, is a reflection of one’s telos, but also highlights the mutuality of being that all individuals, as moral beings in potential, share. Likewise, as DeCrane point outs, justice highlights the manner in which the needs of the collective can be addressed and reflected in the needs of the particular individual.44 40  Aquinas, Ia–IIae, q. 120, a. 1. 41  Daniel Westberg, The relation between positive and natural law in Aquinas, Journal of Law and Religion, 11 no. 1 (1994–1995), 19. 42  Aquinas, II–II, q. 61. 43 Ralph McInerny, Ethics, in The Cambridge Companion to Aquinas, Norman Kretzmann and Eleonore Stump, eds (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), 205. 44 Susanne DeCrane, Aquinas, Feminism, and the Common Good (Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 2004), 79.

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Commutative justice is inclusive and comprehensive and its scope is universal and focuses on family, friends and distant people. It is concerned, as Aquinas writes, ‘about the mutual dealings between two persons.’45 It assumes a natural equality amongst all parties to the relationship. This equality is founded on the assumption that as reasonable beings united in a desire to know ‘the good’ all individuals are similarly endowed with the capacities and capabilities to do so. Commutative accounts of justice complement the idea of the natural law agent because it is agency which sustains the original idea of equality. Beyond equality however, commutative justice endorses the discourse of friendship which also highlights the capacity for reasonableness. It describes a pattern of human relationships focused on the self-same ends and identifies the teleological account of being within the community. Consequently, it provides the incentive and structure for an account of the common good that coalesces around the ultimate end of human happiness. Moreover, it highlights the complementary role that instrumental and noninstrumental relationships play within the formation of ‘the political.’ This account of justice therefore does not discount the need for distributive and rectificatory accounts of justice within the community. Rather, it endorses a holistic account of being political which assimilates a true account of being human. A holistic, and human, account of being political recognizes a role for the relationships of power and authority which feature in any account of politics; however, it also recognizes that there are other, equally important, facets of the human condition which must also be acknowledged: namely, emotions, passions and the underlying assumption of the individual’s social and moral nature. This is in keeping with the objective natural dominion previously articulated and stands in stark contrast to the ideas of order and politics examined in Chapter 1. As was documented in Chapter 1, the internal and external accounts of order sought to achieve stability and, in order to achieve this end, focused on the instrumental relationships of power and authority, but failed to articulate a role for the human relationships which relate to reason, friendship and care. These were set outside the formal idea of politics. Renewed interest in a commutative interpretation of justice which accommodates and tempers this traditional account of politics provides a means of understanding the common good within the community. It provides the necessary space within the political for the true human experience which can accommodate the need for faith in ideas other than anarchy. The natural law response to this need for ideas rests in its idea of human moral development underscored by the idea of love. There are two ideas which emerge from this discussion. Aquinas’s ontological assumptions provide an alternative framework to situate an account of being political. He intertwines the social and moral nature of the individual and provides an account of being which can only be moral. The value of Aquinas’s account of natural law provides an alternative means of understanding the nature of the political community, its role in supporting the individual and, finally, the manner in 45  Aquinas, II–II, q. 61, a. 1.

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which agents interact within its confines. Aquinas’s assumptions are also dynamic and stand in stark contrast to the stable features of institutional design which emerge with Enlightenment political philosophy, both domestic and international. This open-endedness is only possible because of the underlying account of love which presupposes that agents take an active interest in the well-being of another. This dynamism and unbounded account of agency and the community is further developed by the followers of Aquinas, in particular, the Salamanca Theologians. Within their writings the idea of dominion is further clarified, and along the way a vision of international institutional design which incorporates moral responsibility and obligation emerges. The Salamanca Theologians The theologians at Salamanca carried on the Thomistic account of natural law. They are noted for writing on a wide variety of topics, yet it is their views on theology and moral philosophy that are by far the most widely read and cited works. As Brett points out, the Salamanca School refers, in general, to the entire period of sixteenth-century scholasticism, from Vitoria to Suarez.46 All of these scholars are generally held to sustain, and further develop, the ideas first articulated by Aquinas. They build on the relational ontology which presupposes the inherent morality of the individual. This is well noted by Roger Ruston who points out that all of the authors, in particular Vitoria and Las Casas, all engage with the idea of natural dominion.47 They understand individuals as self-directing, free, rational animals made in the image of God and who require the community in order to thrive and develop as nature intended. In this way, the Salamanca Theologians share one overarching goal that is noted by Anthony Pagden: ‘the creation of a moral ordo based on Aquinas’s singular merger of ancient philosophy and Christian theology, which would afford a greater understanding of man’s essential humanitas.’48 Not all contemporary scholars, however, profess the belief that all Salamanca Theologians articulated a faithful interpretation of Aquinas’s work. As was previously highlighted in Chapter 2, Midgely provides a scathing review of both Suarez and De Soto which demonstrates how the former’s idea of natural honesty and the latter’s idea of international civil society perverted the original ontology professed by Aquinas.49 Early Salamanca scholars, such as Vitoria and Las Casas, however, provide interpretations of Aquinas’s original notion of dominion which is at odds with modern and enlightened understanding of being human. For this reason their works feature in this chapter and not others. The Scholastic 46  Brett, 1997. 47  Ruston, 2004. 48 Anthony Pagden, The Fall of Natural Man: The American Indian and the Origins of Comparative Ethnology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982), 147. 49  Midgley, 1975.

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tradition of natural law focuses on the idea of objective dominion. Like Aquinas, these scholars articulate an objective ontology which highlights the centrality of human relationships within any account of being political. This objectivity is at odds with the subjective assumptions of Enlightenment political thought. As Brett highlights, the Salamanca Theologians articulate philosophy which blends Aristotle’s and Aquinas’s assumptions and stands in stark contrast to the ensuing Enlightenment authors who propose a theory of rights and a subjective world view as demonstrated, in particular, in the works of Hobbes.50 The Salamanca Theologians also demonstrate a continuing interest in Aquinas’s account of human equality. In the works of Vitoria and Las Casas equality originates in the moral and social potential of human beings. It is best displayed in the capacities and capabilities of agency which are coupled with a particular theory of knowledge. Individuals who demonstrate the ability to learn, and develop a moral taxonomy within their own daily lives and participate in the sustainable development of institutional structures are considered moral beings. As Jean Porter notes, this was not an account of equality established through top-down procedures of justice. The idea of equality emerges in the daily interactions of the lives of individuals which, when institutionalized, establishes a norm within the community itself that all individuals are equal beings.51 This interpretation of equality relies on the preceding account of objective dominion which supports and relies on, in turn, the relational and mutual human experiences which sustain the possibility of practical reason. It is practical reason which defines the manner in which both Vitoria and Las Casas go on to defend the plight of the American Indians at the same time as they are advancing a Thomistic interpretation of natural law. It was on Easter Sunday in 1511 in a sermon preached by Antionio de Montesino that the torturous treatment of the Indians came to light. Standing before his parish he posed the following questions to his community: With what justice do you hold these Indians in such cruel and horrible slavery? With what authority have you waged such detestable wars against these people who were living in their lands so mildly and peacefully, where you have consumed such huge numbers of them, what unheard-of death and destruction?52

Living in and amongst these individuals and bearing witness to the institutional practices in the colonies, Montevido called into question the system of Encomiendas which the Spanish Crown had developed. These colonial structures fostered wealth creation, and the American Indians were treated as slaves in order to achieve this end. The manner in which the Indians were treated denied their inherent humanity 50  Brett, 1997, I. 51  Jean Porter, 2003, 37. 52 Text recorded by Bartoloméo de Las Casas, Historia de Las Indias in Obras escogidas (OE), studio critico y educion por Juan Perez de Tedula Bueso (Madrid: Atlans, 1957–1958) 5 vols, vol. 2, col. 176 (translated by Roger Ruston). As quoted in Ruston, 2004.

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which was, for the Scholastics, inherently problematic. It was this situation that prompted Montesino to argued that the Indians, like all other beings, were ‘worthy of love.’53 This one sermon sparked a series of discussions which eventually lead to the creation of laws which sought, albeit unsuccessfully, to protect the well-being and development of the Indians. While these laws were never formally adhered to they led to a series of correspondences between Vitoria and other Jesuit scholars in the New World, who sought to determine how best to advance the cause of the Indians. It is an account that is likewise evidenced in the first-hand experiences documented by Las Casas who, unlike Vitoria, lived in the colonies and sought to defend the plight of the Indians vis-á-vis the Papacy and the Spanish Crown. The works of these two authors, and the wider tradition of scholasticism, provided the necessary political discourse to continue the discussion of civic friendship, albeit mediated by an account of Thomistic charity and equality and not based on the discourse of rights which emerged alongside ius gentium. Vitoria Vitoria first indicates his disgust of the system of Encomiendas in a letter written to Miguel de Arcos. It is a situation which he claims ‘freezes the blood in my veins.’ With this in mind he writes the following: In truth, if the Indians are not men but monkey, they are incapable of injury. But if they are men, and our neighbors, and as they claim vassals of the Emperor, I cannot see how to excuse these conquistadors of utter impiety and tyranny; nor can I see what great service they do to His Majesty by ruining his vassals.54

For Vitoria the means and ends employed by the Spanish monarchy and the Papacy were contradictory. One could not claim that the Indians were subjects while at the same time denying their very basic humanity. If they were subjects the Crown then they could not be treated as slaves. The type of treatment that they suffered would then contravene the obligations and responsibilities of well-being and development associated with legitimate governance. Consequently, Vitoria sought to identify in the Indians the possibility of practical reason in order to establish an ethical claim on their behalf. Once their humanity was established, a basic ethic of equality and justice could permeate the system of Encomiendas. Like Aquinas before him, Vitoria turned to the capacity for agency in order to determine both the reasonable and rational capabilities of the Indians. As G. Scott Davis points out in his work on Vitoria, intentionality, reason and action are all 53  Ruston, 2004. 54  Fransisco de Vitoria, Letter 1: Letter Miguel de Arcos, OP, Salamanca, 8 November [1534], Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought, Vitoria: Political Writings, Anthony Pagden and Jeremy Lawrence, eds (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 331.

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indicative of the ontology of being characteristic of natural law morality. Intention, he goes on to argue, makes an act personal and identifies the capacities of free will, autonomy and action.55 Within the work On the American Indians, Vitoria documents the daily customs and conventions of the Indians. There existed, within the Indian communities, evidence of institutional design, social conventions and knowledge acquisition all of which indicate a basic level of reasonableness. Vitoria writes the following: This is self-evident, because they have some order (ordo) in their affairs; they have properly organized cities, proper marriages, magistrates and overlords (domini), laws, industries, and commerce, all of which require the use of reason. They likewise have a form (species) of religion, and they correctly apprehend things which are evident to other men, which indicates the use of reason. Furthermore, God and nature never fail in things ‘necessary’ for the morality of the species, and the chief attribute of man is reason; but the potential (potentia) which is incapable of being realized is the act (actus) is in vain (frustra).56

It is these basic social patterns and arrangements which demonstrate the central relationship of a willing moral being sustained by an intellectual capacity to achieve particular sought after ends. While the institutional design of the Indians differed significantly from European civil society it sufficiently established the potential for long-term moral development. The particular cultural practices of the Indians, in particular, the rumor of cannibalism, had to be addressed in light of the moral potential of the American Indians. Ritual sacrifice and the eating of human flesh contradicted the absolute ends of natural law morality. These practices facilitated an argument by those opposed to the idea of Vitoria, in particular the Renaissance Humanists, that the Indians were the ideal example of an Aristotelian natural slave. Vitoria counters this claim. He draws on the natural law distinction of absolute ends and normative customs and demonstrates that with regard to the practice of cannibalism the role of the Spanish conquistadors was quite simple. On Dietary Laws outlines the power of princes over their own individuals and those who exist outside their control.57 He is clear that while a prince can coerce his own subjects to abandon practices which contravene the laws of nature, such is not the case outside his authority. Such a matter is primarily spiritual and therefore does not fall within the 55  G. Scott Davis, Conscience and conquest: Francisco de Vitoria on justice in the New World, Modern Theology, 13 no. 4 (October 1997), 479. 56  Fransisco de Vitoria, On the American Indians, Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought, Vitoria, Political Writings, Anthony Pagden and Jeremy Lawrence (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 250. 57  de Vitoria, On dietary laws, or self-restraint, Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought, Vitoria: Political Writings, Anthony Pagden and Jeremy Lawrence (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 205–230.

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civil power of a prince. However, as Pagden and Lawrence note, some practices within the community reflected a limited participation of individuals with the laws of nature and consequently the rights that such beings could be accorded existed in potential only.58 In essence, education could curb such practices while simultaneously bringing the natural rights of the Indians into practice. Vitoria is able to conclude that foreign powers do have obligations and responsibilities toward those who engage in such nefarious practices. Princes ought to educate those who contravene the natural law, and ought seek, where ever possible, the non-coerced establishment of morality and justice within the community. Vitoria’s work established that the European powers were obliged to provide responsible care for those who were less educated in the ends of moral goodness. His writings reveal a potential foundation for a universal account of responsibility. The obligations of civilized nations, writes Cardozza, was to punish those who transgressed the laws of nature.59 What Vitoria did was establish when it was, and was not, acceptable to engage in coercive measures to do so. The legitimacy of this account, Streski points out, rests on the original social and moral foundations of natural law morality.60 Vitoria’s work highlights a complementary role for love and education within an account of reasonable equality. If one could discern a potential for moral development within another who acted contrary to the ends of natural law morality then the structures of loving reasonableness outlined a means of engagement premised on the obligations of love. Consequently, Vitoria’s work provides an initial glimpse into the potential for a relational understanding of transnational and intercommunal communities of justice and thereby alludes to the possibility of an open-ended and unbounded account of politics. Las Casas As a Dominican monk Las Casas spent the majority of his time in the Spanish colonies educating the American Indians. He saw first hand the brutalities that these individuals endured and sought in a variety of fashions to curb the abuse. His is an interesting story because, upon arrival in the New World, Las Casas was an active agent of the Crown. Consequently he partook in the daily customs and conventions associated with the system of Encomiendas. He not only witnessed the brutality that the Indians suffered, but brokered it in turn. Very quickly however, Las Casas became disillusioned with the system and became an educator and a champion of the Indian potential for moral development. His unique position in the daily lives of the Indians provided observable evidence of both the social and moral ontology of their being. Unlike Vitoria, he looked to the customs and 58  Pagden and Lawrence, 1991, xxv–xxvi. 59  James Muldoon, Francisco De Vitoria and humanitarian intervention, Journal of Military Ethics, 5 no. 2 (2006), 136. 60 Ivan Streski, The religion in globalization, Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 72 no. 3 (September 2004), 639.

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practices of these peoples in order to make them more palatable to the European palate, blending, as de Courcelles points out, the philosophical and theological discourses of Salamanca with the actual practices of the Indians.61 On April 16, 1550, Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor declared a halt to the conquest of America. The publicity generated from a wide variety of correspondences between the New World and Old World had successfully demonstrated the squalor which the conquistadors, as agents of the Spanish Crown, had generated. Consequently, he sought to determine whether or not it was lawful for the Crown or the Papacy to wage war against the Indians and instruct them in the ways of the monarchy in order to develop their natural potential. Lewis Hanke’s work provides an insightful documentation of these debates. He describes the lead up to the debates between Las Casas and Sepulveda and demonstrates how Las Casas is able to argue in favor of the natural sociability and inherent moral potential of the Indians.62 His first hand observations provide the necessary documentation for his written arguments. The empirical validity of Las Casas’s arguments was extremely important. As Anthony Pagden demonstrates, Las Casas was fighting against a descriptive history of the lives of the Indians that had been written by Oviedo who had never set foot in the colonies and had not witnessed the potential for moral development and just social practices in and amongst the Indian communities.63 In order to overcome this challenge, Las Casas sought to blend his empirical observations with the works of noted scholars, in particular Aristotle and Aquinas, in order to dispel the common assumption of barbarity. 61  Dominique de Courcelles, Managing the world: the development of Jus Gentium by the theologians of Salamanca in the sixteenth century, Philosophy and Rhetoric, 38 no. 1 (2005), 1–15. 62  Hanke, 1974. The majority of the works of Las Casas come to us as a script he prepared for a debate against Sepulveda which was held in 1550 and was about the legality of the imperialism of the Americas by Spain at the behest of the Papacy. The debate that occurred between the noted Dominican theologian and heralded Aristotelian has been studied at great length. A short account of the origins of the debate is interesting and useful to international relations generally and will be given the briefest account here. On April 16, 1550, Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, declared a halt to the conquest of America until there was an answer to the question: Is it lawful for the King of Spain to wage war on the Indians, before preaching the faith to them, in order to subject them to his rule, so that afterward they may be more easily instructed in the faith? At its outset, this debate was premised on the Aristotelian theory of natural slavery, that there existed, in the world, a category of individual that lacks the necessary capacities to reason right and is therefore never able to attain a virtuous state of living, which is the goal of every individual living in the Greek city-states. The cessation of colonization, for whatever period of time, was an outright victory for Las Casas who had been campaigning for a halt for quite a long time. It set the stage for a debate between the two scholars about the nature of the capacities of the Indians. 63 Anthony Pagden, Ius et factum: text and experience in the writings of Bartoloméo de Las Casas, Representations, 33, Special Issue: The New World (Winter 1991), 147–162.

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Vitoria wrote that nature never fails to provide for its children. Building on these self-same ontological assumptions, Las Casas also articulates that nature always provides for its creations. It ensures their development in the natural and social world. He writes the following: For the good and all-powerful God, in his love for mankind, has created all things for man’s use and protects him whom he has endowed with so many qualities by a singular affection and care (as we have said), and guides his actions and enlightens each one’s mind and disposes him for virtue in accordance with the ability given to him. Hence it necessarily follows that a rational nature, receiving its power from the Creator alone, should include men who, as a rule, are endowed with the best gifts of their nature and are rarely slow witted or barbarous.64

Like Vitoria, Las Casas looked to the social conventions in order to gain a glimpse of the rational capacities of the Indians, and moved quickly to the actual capacities of individuals to offer empirical backing to the ideas already mooted by those before him. Las Casas was quick to highlight that the Indians existed as a fellowship of human beings. They cultivated friendly relations and, along the way, developed laws, religion and customs in order to administer their states during times of war and peace. As Anthony Pagden writes, it was important for Las Casas to establish this history in order to demonstrate to the European community the potential morality of the Indians.65 This potentiality provided the means, Las Casas argued, for the Indians to overcome the worshipping of idols and adopt the language and customs of a Christian state. From his vantage point he was able to observe and argue the following: they [the Indians] are of such gentleness and decency that they are, more than other nations of the entire world, supremely fitted and prepared to abandon the worship of idols and to accept, province by province and people by people, the world of God and the preaching of truth.66

It is this decency which allows Las Casas to further point out both the necessary cognitive and actual abilities that the Indians possess, thus fostering his arguments of objective equality. As a teacher in the colonies he successfully argued that a formal education in the liberal arts allowed the Indians to achieve remarkable literary ends. 64  Bartoloméo de Las Casas, In Defense of the Indians: The Defense of the Most Reverend Lord, Don Fray Bartoloméo de Las Casas, of the Order of Preachers, Late Bishop of Chiapa, Against the Persecutors and Slanderes of the Peoples of the New World Discovered Across the Seas, translated, edited and annotated by Stafford Poole, C.M. (Illinois: Northern Illinois Press, 1974), 35. 65  Pagden and Lawrence, 1991. 66  Las Casas, 1974, 28.

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Their reading and writing skills displayed a high level of sophistication; ones that, when compared to the works of native European scholars, were indistinguishable from them. Moreover, the Indians displayed an astute understanding of logic and grammar. These successful scholarly pursuits were mirrored when the Indians were exposed to musical knowledge and performance. Las Casas used his observations and offered them to his readers alongside the original moral ontology employed by Vitoria and developed by Aquinas before him. Las Casas concluded that the Indians were nothing less then ‘our brothers.’ Consequently, an obligation to engage with them as moral beings in potential existed. Furthermore, the responsibility to educate the Indians fell to the civilized European colonists. Las Casas’s most exceptional statement, in light of these conclusions, was that at some conceivable point in the future some Indians could surpass even their conquistador rulers and theological teachers and one day become members of the Christian order themselves. He concludes by stating that ‘we must consider it possible that some of them are predestined to become renowned and glorious in Christ’s kingdom.’67 On this evidence he was able to argue at Valladolid, like Vitoria, for an equality of being originating from within a moral social ontology and that, consequently, the Indians ought to be involved in reciprocal relationships of care and obligation participating as equal beings not only amongst themselves but also with their European rulers. With this in mind he goes on to conclude that ‘we have not choice but to conclude that the rules of such nations enjoy the use of reason and that their people and the inhabitants of their provinces do not lack peace and justice. Otherwise they could not be established or preserved as political entities for long.’68 Vitoria and Las Casas employ the tradition of natural law to challenge the accepted social customs and norms of their time. Justice and morality, interpreted in this light, are not bound by the modern political structures shaping political communities. Offering to the discourse of natural law the rhetoric of equality, stemming from the shared capacity to develop the virtues of justice and prudence, the Salamanca Theologians demonstrated that all individuals, united in the teleological quest for ‘the good,’ are aware of justice and the ethical treatment with which it is associated. Articulating an equality of being arising from the capacity to reason and the capability to act as free and autonomous agents, Las Casas and Vitoria extend the ends of dominion beyond domestic communities into the international realm. On this account, equality of being is yet to be associated with a universal account cognitive epistemology that is typical of Enlightenment accounts of human beings. In light of this fact, the Salamanca Theologians could endorse moral customs and practices seemingly at odds with the overarching morality of being within the natural law. By extending to the Indians a capacity to engage in fellowship with others they set out a discourse which broadened the scope of political responsibility. Their works opened the door for a debate 67 Las Casas, 1974, 39. 68  Las Casas, 1974, 42.

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regarding the bounds of political relationships that challenged a subjective account of dominion. While their works could not overcome the philosophy of the Enlightenment their works existed in the peripheries where the notion of a loving community and an order of charity would remain alive, albeit outside the boundaries of public politics.

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Chapter 4

A Relational Account of ‘the Political’ Agency, Community and Loving Reasonableness Introduction The ontological assumptions of Thomas Aquinas, and in particular his interpretation of natural law morality, reveal a social and moral being that is interested not only in his or her own well-being and development, but one that must also be interested in others as well. This led to the exposition of a relational ontology and what has been described as the mutuality of being in common. It describes how one can potentially offer an account of ‘being political’ that centers not on the relationships of authority and violence which dominate traditional accounts of politics and international relations, but rather, on the non-instrumental relationships of individuals throughout the world. In so doing it highlights the general notion of equality which sustains all individuals, and offers at the same time an account of political obligation and responsibility that is akin to the idea of care articulated by feminist scholars of international politics. Feminist scholars have long sought to criticize the amoral and rational discourse of international politics, which is a theme that has floated throughout this work. Individuals such as Grace Clement, Joan C. Tronto and Victoria Held have drawn on the original works of care Nel Noddings and Sarah Ruddick who demonstrate the ability of female agents to reason taking into account the ‘grey areas’ of political and moral deliberation. Female agents, they argue, are able to incorporate emotional responses to political and moral problems unlike   Grace Clement, Care, Autonomy, and Justice, Feminism and the Ethic of Care (Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1996).   Joan C. Tronto, Moral Boundaries: A Political Argument for an Ethic of Care (London: Routledge, 1993). Joan C. Tronto and Bernice Fisher, Toward a feminist theory of care, in Circles of Care: Work and Identity in Women’s Lives, Emily Abel and Margaret Nelson, eds (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1991), 40.   Virginia Held, The Ethics of Care (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006).  Nel Noddings, Caring, A Feminine Approach to Ethics & Moral Education (Berkley: University of California Press, 1984).  Sara Ruddick, Maternal Thinking: Towards a Politics of Peace (London: Women’s Press, 1990).

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their male counterparts. This ability to care, they further argue, replicates the maternal familial bonds that structure family life and are particularly important to the functioning of the local community. This vision stands in stark contrast to the depiction of high-power politics which was offered in Chapter 1. However, these maternal relationships play a critical role in demonstrating the problems with such depictions of politics, and current feminist discourses now seek to use the language of care in order to engage with the newly emerging discussions of international justice. The works of Fiona Robinson offer a key insight into the value of care in international relations. Her investigation of the history of international political theory, and in particular the practice of humanitarian intervention, challenges the traditional manner in which politics is conceived, much like the work of those feminist care scholars who come before her. Her examination of humanitarian intervention takes aim at the traditional military and state-lead endeavors of intervention, and calls into question the standard operating procedures employed. She queries the assumption that all cases of human suffering are similar and wonders at the absence of cultural sensitivities and the need for ‘case-specific’ knowledge in order to deliver the most appropriate care to individuals located in different, and generally remote, areas of the globe. Her work thus offers a critical phenomenological account of care ethics that endorses a relational ontology emphasizing the shared human proclivity to help those in need, all the while advocating diversity and dynamism in its approach. In and of itself this approach calls for practical reasonableness and agency that traditional interpretations of politics and its institutions fail to grasp. Like the reasonableness of natural law, and the idea of a relational ontology proposed in the previous chapter, the discourse of care ethics, its aims and ends, share many affinities. Yet care ethics has been unable to respond in an adequate way to the challenges its critics highlight, in particular the parochial problem of distance. How does one recreate the maternal bonds of care in a state-based system of anarchy? With this in mind, this chapter examines further the idea of natural law politics and demonstrates how the conception of love provides a vision of the natural law community which is at odds with contemporary liberal societies. Love, conceptualized as trans-communal and intranational, challenges the state-based political structure and endorses a commutative account of justice. It develops an account of natural law agency and argues that this account is in line with the natural law individual previously outlined. It then goes on to make a case for an underlying account of charity with which to understand the normative structures of ‘the political,’ before moving into a final discussion of the natural law community. When these different arguments are appraised holistically they respond to the parochial challenge of care ethics and allude to an alternative interpretation of ‘the personal’ within international politics.   Fiona Robinson, Globalising Care: Ethics, Feminist Theory, and International Relations (Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1999).

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In order to achieve this end this chapter unfolds in the following manner. The first section provides an account of natural law agency drawing on a wide range of scholarly works which articulate the idea of moral and political agency. The second section reveals how love and charity sustain a relational account of politics which is sympathetic to, but ultimately distinct from, feminist accounts of care. It highlights the centrality of equality and the emergence of commutative forms of justice in order to establish an initial foray into more mainstream discussions of international politics. It then concludes with an account of the political community. This account highlights the natural equality of all individuals which is premised on the social and moral ontology of being. This account prefaces the need for an unbounded and open-ended understanding of international politics in order to address the potential for trans-communal forms of collective agency, the subject of Chapter 5. Natural Law Agency Agency, as Onora O’Neill points out, is reflected in the ability to integrate the capacities of reason and action. Successful agency is reflected when these capacities are exerted independently of outside stimuli and individuals are able to achieve a desired and sought after end. Alastair MacIntyre elaborates further on this idea and notes, like O’Neill, the possibility of moral agency on the part of the individual. He points out that moral agency, beyond the ability to reason and act, incorporates the ideas of obligation and responsibility. Moral agents, generally speaking, exist in varying states of tension. They are aware of the ideals of morality and the challenge to ensure that political structures cater to the ends of a related account of justice. The role of the agent in light of any conceived moral and political tension is simple. They must challenge the immoral, or amoral, state of affairs and seek out political structures which align themselves with the ends of morality. This idea of moral agency hints at the pre-modern moral assumption of natural law. It is sympathetic to the ends of human engagement which structure ‘the political.’ Moreover, it is equally aware of the potential to create moral political structures wherever individuals coexist with one another. As the ensuing discussions will reveal, the natural law individual, described in Chapter 3, is particularly well suited to this task, due to the original ontological assumptions which structure her existence. A natural law account of agency begins with a discussion of methodology. The morality of natural law lends itself to the task of casuistry. A casuistic methodology  Onora O’Neill, Who can endeavor peace, Canadian Journal of Philosophy, 12, Supplementary Volume (1986), 41–73. Onora O’Neill, Agents of justice, Metaphilosophy, 32 nos. 1 & 2 (January 2001), 180–195.  Alasdair MacIntyre, Social structures and their threats to moral agency, Annual Lecture to the Royal Institute of Philosophy on February 24, 1999, Philosophy, 74 no. 289 (July 1999), 311–329.

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sustains the deliberate practices discussed by O’Neill and MacIntyre. It relies on the original edict, to do good and avoid evil, in order to support moral action. It draws on the freedom and autonomy of the individual and engages with the previously acquired moral habits stemming from an understanding of synderesis and the virtue of prudence. For a wide variety of reasons, casuistry does not feature prominently in many contemporary political discourses. As Stephen Toulmin and Albert Jonsen highlight in their investigations of casuistry in the late 1980s, it was a key feature in the moral deliberations of the individual and the community in medieval and pre-modern conceptions of ‘the political.’ Casuistry involves the development of a moral taxonomy established through a combination of human reason and experience. As individuals acquire the experience of living within a community they accumulate knowledge. This knowledge informs the values and practices which sustain the community and align with the ultimate ends of morality, a shared vision, or even faith. As a whole these experiences and ideas inform agency. This taxonomy is a second-order framework derived from the absolute ends shared within the community and remains open to the possibility of change. The most widely read account of casuistry and international politics is Michael Walzer’s work Just and Unjust Wars.10 In this major examination of the just war tradition Walzer demonstrates how casuistic deliberations can mediate accepted norms and values in order to render a politically pertinent argument to contemporary moral problems. He begins by questioning the role of sovereignty in international affairs and goes on to examine the norms of non-intervention and self-defense which, through the domestic analogy, are attributed to states, who are the primary actors in international politics. His examination of the community, which he argues is the pre-eminent political body in international relations, outlines a legalist paradigm which he concludes does not account for considerations of justice and prudence in international politics. He goes on to provide an argument for intervention that uses the idea of human rights to construct a moral decisionmaking paradigm. He then goes on to examine the war convention in order to determine when self-defense and war are reasonable actions to embark upon. In so doing he demonstrate how second-order constraints—human rights—can, when combined with human experience and reason, provide a method of moral agency at odds with standard accounts of politics. In this way Michael Walzer shares the same conclusions as Richard B. Miller. Miller is a scholar of ethics and religious studies who examines the intersection of religion and politics all the while arguing for the inclusion of casuistry, as a moral practice, in contemporary political discourse.11 He highlights the value   Jonsen and Toulmin, 1988. 10  Walzer, 1977. 11  See for example, Richard B. Miller, Casuistry and Modern Ethics: A Poetics of Practical Reasoning (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996). Richard B. Miller, Interpretations of Conflict: Ethics, Pacifism, and the Just-War Tradition (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991).

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of casuistry in light of the moral tensions faced by contemporary agents. His account of agency is similar to that of MacIntyre for he notes that the ends of moral institutional design may conflict with the secular aims and ends of modern political structures. For this reason he argues that casuistry can help an agent to determine when traditional practices are challenged by the moral aims and ends of agents within the community. Using a previously established moral taxonomy, agents can question the ends of a given social structure and, in light of their moral knowledge, act in a way which challenges the status quo and always seeks an improved moral atmosphere. In fact, Miller goes so far as to provide a mediated account of Walzer’s ‘politics of rescue.’12 In this endeavor he employs the absolute standard of natural law morality in order to highlight the shortcomings of Walzer’s alternative notion of humanitarian intervention. In so doing he demonstrates the value of casuistry to challenge the norm of international sovereignty and establish an atmosphere of trust and well-intentioned intervention at the global level.13 The suitability of a casuistic methodology and the morality of natural law are revealed to be particularly a propos. It incorporates the means/ends relationship of natural law morality, the relativity of ideas and actions, and the freedom and autonomy of the individual within the community. In this way the morality of natural law and the natural law individual complement the ends of casuistry itself. A vision of the informed casuist is provided by Jonsen and Toulmin. They write: Such a person possesses knowledge both of universal principle and of particular situations; is capable of drawing together memory of past experiences and foresight into future possibilities; and is able to recognize what is at issue in new and hitherto untried situations. The prudent person is aware that although the final end of human life is fixed by divine providence, the means to achieving that end are of manifold variety according to the variety of persons and situations.14

Casuistry, then, involves a moral individual sustained by his or her own experiences and the ability to reason. Experience comes from within the community and is the product of human engagement. This description of the casuistic individual reveals a certain amount of shared characteristics, abilities and affinities with the natural law individual, and the idea of a natural law agent as described by Aquinas. It incorporates both anthropological and political assumptions which stem from the agent’s ability to reason and which complement the idea of a mutual human 12 As an example of this argument see Michael Walzer, The politics of rescue, Dissent, Winter 1995, 35–41. He investigates a particular role for intervention when states fail to provide the necessary goods to their citizens as would be expected in a civil society. Miller challenges this idea and instead proposes a taxonomy based on the moral ends of natural law in order to justify state intervention. 13  Richard B. Miller, Humanitarian intervention, altruism, and the limits of casuistry, The Journal of Religions Ethics, 28 no. 1 (2000), 3–35. 14  Jonsen and Toulmin, 1988, 130.

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experience and are rooted in the shared desire to seek out the articulated ends of human well-being and development. Agency is tied to the notion of a goal. The morality of natural law articulates the ends of happiness or, in contemporary discourses, moral development. For Aquinas in particular the goals of agency begin at an ontological level and focus the deliberations of the agent on the ends of goodness. He writes that ‘every agent, whether it acts by nature or by will, tends towards a goal, though it doesn’t follow that every agent is aware of a goal or deliberates about it.’15 It is enough to understand that this goal is the original, and natural, teleological orientation of the individual which is complemented by the ability of the individual to act. It draws on the original relationship of the intellect and will which shapes the desires of the agent. These desires emerge within an awareness of synderesis which articulates the potential for moral reasonableness. Consequently, it is the original ontology of being, discussed in Chapter 3, which prefaces a natural law account of agency. For many contemporary scholars Aquinas’s account of natural law exists as a theory of moral action. According to Colleen McCluskey, this natural predisposition is evident in Aquinas’s account of human action. She writes that the availability of a Thomist framework within which to understand human action demonstrates that individual motion is neither aimless or without guidance.16 She hints at the moral framework established in Chapters 2 and 3 in order to demonstrate that human action is a result of the interaction of the will and the intellect. Individuals, she points, are conceptualized as rational self-movers. She invokes the original desires of the intellect, the desire for the good and the possibility of habitual moral development in order to engage as moral beings within the community. Her account of natural law agency is used to demonstrate the distinctions between an agent established through the moral framework articulated by Aquinas and that of the Aristotelian magnanimous man. What is revealed is a predisposition to communal living in which ethical habits, facilitated by practical reason, sustains an account of moral agency. The idea of natural law agency is likewise visible in the writings of Ralph McInerny. He is a Thomist scholar whose particular focus has been on the development of a theory of action within the works of Aquinas. He argues that Aquinas distinguishes between human acts (actus humani) and the acts of a human being (actus hominis). The former are actions which can be attributed to any human being: the ability to walk, talk, or even scratch one’s face. The latter are acts particular to the moral order which constitutes the quiddity of each and every

15  Thomas Aquinas, On the principles of nature (complete), text from De Principiis Naturae (Opera Omnia, Leonine edn., vol. xliii) in Thomas Aquinas: Selected Philosophical Writings, selected and translated by and with an Introduction and notes by Timothy McDermott (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993), 72. 16  Colleen McCluskey, Happiness and freedom in Aquinas’s theory of action, Medieval Philosophy and Theology, 9 (2000), 69–90.

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individual.17 McInerny, like McCluskey, goes some way to developing the moral, and reasonable ontology of being articulated by Aquinas in order to demonstrate the potential for human agency within the community. In so doing he demonstrates that Aquinas’s anthropological assumptions incorporate an account of agency within ‘the political.’ It was the only way to achieve the ends of the common good. McInerny, like MacIntyre, demonstrates the moral tensions that accompany the modern human political experience. Moreover, he demonstrates the critical value the morality of natural law plays for agents who seek to evaluate and improve on the moral structures of their community. The natural law individual is the embodiment of political and moral agency. The agent is able to acquire knowledge because of its rational and reasonable capacities, and it demonstrates an epistemonical capability. Moreover, as a social being, the agent understands the need for the required moral community structures in order to establish, and achieve, the ends of goodness. The innate desire for human interaction fosters this knowledge and provides the necessary sites of action, outside formal institutional structures, to affect such changes. In the end, the natural law agent facilitates the development of just political structures. By drawing on the daily interactions of individuals in their non-instrumental form, love and charity can challenge the dominance of power and authority. What is required is a political space open to the ends of practical reason. The capacity to reason ensures that natural law agents are capable of noting the discord within competing structures and acting, as obliged and responsible agents, to remedy the situation. One ought to recall at this point that to be an agent of justice is not only to be constituted by the capacity to deliberate and to act in a moral fashion. It also requires action in the face of tension and conflict in order to achieve a more just order. As free and autonomous beings, natural law individuals can draw on the casuistry of natural law in order to escape the traditional boundaries of politics and instigate creative and otherwise unexplored areas of agency.18 The natural law agent becomes a living example of the potential for a moral future which revolves around human development. Their actions are, in other words, the root source of morality. This is a responsibility that all individuals have the potential to shoulder. Morality relates to reason and action which all individuals, endowed in the natural law tradition, possess. Jean Porter reaffirms this point when she notes just how basic the ability to reason and will moral ends actually is. While reason is a skill to be developed, it exists in all individuals at the most human level and provides all individuals with a conceptual understanding of goodness, at both general and specific levels.19 Moreover, this account of 17  McInerny, 1993, 204 and 88. Ralph McInerny, Aquinas on Human Action: A Theory of Practice (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1992). 18 The importance of this account of agency is further revealed when the particulars of casuistry are developed in the final section of this chapter and the casuistry of well-being is articulated in Chapter 5. 19  Porter, 2003, 27–48.

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reasonableness complements the underlying idea of equality which is identifiable in all of nature’s creatures. Agency becomes a twofold endeavor. It highlights the ability of individuals to fulfill their particular roles within the community while at the same time they create and recreate just political structures. As Decrane makes clear in her work on Aquinas, this idea of equality not only fosters a sense of justice within the community, it also provides individuals with the capacity to become moral and virtuous.20 She, like Porter, highlights how all individuals, regardless of their skills and station in life, are gifted with the means of moral agency. Reasonableness is central to the natural law tradition. It also informs this account of agency and highlights the need for adaptability in particular situations both temporal and geographic. The casuistry of natural law provides the agent with the necessary flexibility and autonomy to ensure that the necessary information is assimilated into any decision-making process, thereby facilitating the most appropriate solution for all individuals involved in any decision-making outcome. Aquinas’s account of agency does not provide one single blueprint to be followed by all individuals. As the discussions of laws which featured in the second section of Chapter 2 reveals, its dynamic and open-endedness challenges many of the assumptions which sustain contemporary accounts of agency and institutional design; however, the autonomy and freedom attributed to the individual is always couched within the wider ends of the absolute ‘good’ of natural law morality. The same can also be said for the construction of the political community. This absolute, as Chapter 5 reveals, guards against recklessness. It reminds agents of their prudent desire to seek out ‘the good’ which befits the original teleological assumptions of natural law morality. Agency is very much an interactive and dynamic process which happens within the metaphysical space of ‘the political.’ The idea of ‘the political’ does not exist in space or time, but is the contemporary discursive recognition that individuals are social beings who require a community. The political then is the end result of individuals acting as agents, in common. It can be understood, according to Dallmyar, as ‘a constitutive, quasi-transcendental setting or matrix of political life.’21 Taking this idea one step further, the political is that space wherein the instrumental relationships of government and the non-instrumental relationships of individuals come together and form a community structure. This space is neither temporal nor geographical, but, rather, exists whenever two or more agents recognize a shared desire and support one another’s attempts to achieve an end. It complements the Weberian idea of faith, or shared ideas, which agents seek to achieve in common. In this account of human moral agency the ends of ‘the good’ reflect a normative desire for individual development which, as Chapter 5 reveals, is reflected in the development of a casuistry of well-being. This ethical framework exists within ‘the political’ and supports agency. The ends of such 20  Decrane, 2004. 21  Fred Dallmayr, Beyond Orientalism: Essays on Cross-Cultural Encounter (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1996), 193.

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agency are revealed in a particular understanding of ‘politics’—the unfolding of human interactions. To understand ‘the political’ in such a fashion challenges the modern distinction of public and private politics. Moreover, it challenges the idea that there exists a rational form of political deliberation at odds with the reasonable deliberations of agents. It is to note, as Anthony Lang, Jr does, that to engage in politics is a highly personal endeavor which inhabits a particular space ‘in the ambit of human life.’22 In other words, this account of ‘the political’ reflects the balancing of human vulnerabilities discussed in Chapter 2 and which defends the role of natural law within an account of international politics. It seeks to incorporate a balance of rational and reasonable epistemological assumptions in order to grapple with what it is to be a moral being within the community. There is no reason why this moral framework could not be applied to the decisions associated with high-power politics. Such an occurrence is exactly what Maritain discusses in his critique of Machiavellian politics.23 While it does not guarantee a stable and predictable outcome, it does represent a realistic support for the values and ideals which inform human life. The unique aspects of this account of agency are that it can exist outside the formal institutions of government and that it reflects the possibility of noninstrumental relationships informing the ends of being political. Agents can apply the same values and ideas which inform their daily lives to the communal expectations of their communities. This version of moral agency complements the account of commutative justice. Consequently, it recognizes the ability of all individuals to engage with others in order to achieve mutually sought after ends. Moreover, it emerges from and supports the natural equality originating in the objective dominion of the natural law individual. At the same time, this account of agency admits to the vulnerability of the human condition which stems from the social nature of all individuals; however, instead of denying this vulnerability it demonstrates how non-instrumental relationships foster a degree of knowledge which would seek to temper the negative outcomes of vulnerability. What this discussion of agency ought to reveal is that casuistry challenges many of the professed assumptions of modernity which inform contemporary interpretations of ‘the political.’ As Joseph Boyle, Jr notes, casuistry is not concerned with the ‘hard cases’ of morality. Instead, casuistry focuses on the daily lives of individuals and uses their experiences in order to apprehend the world in which they are a part and in which they live virtuous lifes.24 In this way casuistry is not focused on universal absolutes or a grand plan of design. Toulmin and Jonsen make this point very well and go on to note that such a methodology challenges 22  Anthony F. Lang, Jr, Agency and Ethics: The Politics of Military Intervention (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2002), ix. 23  Maritain, 2001. 24  Joseph Boyle, Just and unjust wars: casuistry and the boundaries of the moral world, Ethics & International Affairs, 11 (1997), 83–98.

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the assumption that moral decisions are moral because they adhere to the rules of an established society.25 Casuistry reinvigorates the ideal of perfectionism associated with pre-modern accounts of natural law. It also challenges the idea of static and established rules which inform human action and questions the value of stable political structures within the community. Instead of focusing on legal rules casuistry supports practical arguments which seek to align as closely as possible human deliberation and action in order to achieve practical solutions to human problems. In order to facilitate this process the casuistic tradition is mindful of the need for prudent, or wise, individuals to inform the reasoning processes of those engaged in the task of learning. Like the morality of natural law, casuistry builds on the symbiotic relationship of individuals and communities in order to ensure that this process can occur. It looks to the shared history of the community in order to inform agents of the important underlying values and ideals which relate to the ends of being moral. For this reason, if a casuistic methodology is to inform any interpretation of international politics it will require an alternative interpretation of ‘the political’ as well as the political community. An elaboration of these two interrelated ideas reveals the absolute and relative ends that a natural law account of international politics can achieve. In other words, the absolute end of human happiness, or moral development, having been revealed, what remains to be articulated are the normative structures which can support such an end and the potential benefits of this institutional endeavor. Relational Politics: Friendship, Love and Charity Natural law agency challenges the isolation and reciprocal disinterest which are two of the manifestations of current interpretations of politics. These consequences, as Chapter 1 demonstrated, are directly related to the institutional designs which have sought to achieve a degree of communal stability through a legal discourse associated with the morality of right and wrong. The cosmopolitan discourses discussed in the Introduction of this work represent one alternative interpretation of politics which engages with the problem of human vulnerability in contemporary international politics. Likewise so do the feminist care ethics outlined in the introduction to this chapter; however, each, in their own way, fails to provide a convincing account of institutional design that addresses the isolationist tendencies of international politics while providing, at the same time, a truly human interpretation of being political. In order to further extend the reality of the natural law agent this work turns now turns to the underlying normative structures which sustain ‘the political.’ It further develops the idea of love as obligation as articulated in Chapter 3 and the idea of charity in order to propose a relational account of being political. 25  Jonsen and Toulmin, 1988.

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The vulnerabilities of being human are directly related to the social and moral ontology of being. In order to redress the negative consequences of this vulnerability natural law agents are required to reveal themselves as individuals focused on the ends of goodness. The idea of self-revelation recalls the mutuality of being articulated first by Aquinas when he discusses his ontology of being. It is further developed by the Salamanca theologians when they discuss the nature of objective equality throughout their examination of the Spanish Conquest of America. The underlying theme of all of these examinations is the idea of reasonableness. If one can demonstrate the capacity and capability of dominion, be it actual or potential, then the possibility of a self-same moral ontology is present. This shared desire to know the good and to seek it out tempers the vulnerability associated with selfrevelation because, at the heart of the matter, the motivation to act is the same. Agency, beyond the individual conscience, free will and human autonomy, rests on the motivations of love. The idea of an ethic of love, or even love’s knowledge, is reasonableness. The primary obligation of the natural law agent is to love. When one loves, one is engaged in the task of reasoning which fosters deliberations and ultimately action. The idea of love sustains the moral taxonomy of the natural law agent and is reflected in the steadfast commitment to developing as a moral being. This commitment is made by any individual who seeks to better understand their own teleological nature, and provides a degree of stability in an atmosphere that is otherwise anarchical and tending towards chaos. Love is neither a passion, nor it is a human desire. It is simply a positive orientation toward an object which presupposes knowledge. An ethic of love, then, reflects the ability of an individual to recognize the self-same teleological orientation toward the good and the will to seek it further. This idea is simply stated by Grisez and Shaw who write that ‘love is a disposition which orients one to the good which fulfills.’26 This is a point also stressed by Jacques Maritain who points out that one loves the deepest hidden metaphysical components of being when one engages in loving relationships. On this subject he writes the following: We love the deepest, most substantial and hidden, the most existing reality of the beloved thing. This is a metaphysical center deeper than all the qualities and essence which can find and enumerate in the beloved. Love seeks out this center, not to be sure, as separated from its qualities, but as one with them. This is inexhaustible so to speak, of existence, bounty and action; capable of giving itself; another self as a gift, another self which bestows itself.27

There is a selflessness associated with this idea of love. The idea of giving oneself over to the power of another is at odds with current political practices. Yet it is an integral part of building relationships. It demonstrates not only a series of shared values, but also the intimate knowledge that is otherwise excluded from 26  Grisez and Shaw, 2001, 280. 27  Jacques Martian, 1966, 32.

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contemporary politics. It draws on the non-instrumental personal relationships of the individual which provide a more nuanced understanding of particular individuals. This revelation is facilitated by the structures of commutative justice which sustain human equality. Equality demands relationships of love and courts the role of the loved and beloved. It is aware of the precarious balance of power that exists within these two roles. The potential for abuse remains within these relationships, but the perfectionist assumptions of natural law, and the desire to engage with each other as equal beings in potential, serve to limit the fear of vulnerability and reiterate that love motivates agency in the first instance. It is both the reason to act and the act itself. An ethic of love, derived from the tradition of natural law, brings with it a constancy which is evident in the overarching commitment to the sought after ends of human development. It is a particular account of human development and well-being that is mutual. All individuals seek out the ends of an ethic of love. At the same time, the idea of love is plural. Agape development is open to the possibility that all individuals need, and ought, to develop in their own particular way. The commitment to love accommodates autonomy and freedom, all the while remaining unwavering in its ends. This permanence provides the backbone of an institutional structure which secures the well-being of the powerful and powerless alike. As Chapter 5 will reveal, the obligations of love limit the abilities of the powerful in light of the plight of the suffering other. This fact underscores the mutuality of human engagement and the social ontology of natural law itself. Furthermore, this idea of love does not endorse static political structures in order to achieve such an ideal. It articulates a normative political structure that is dynamic and open-ended. Consequently it is sympathetic to the development of casuistical structures and self-revelation. As this knowledge deepens, the underlying political structures must adapt to meet the correlative needs. Political and institutional change is welcomed and is not to be associated with fear, vulnerability and insecurity. Instead, change informed by loving knowledge secures the welfare of individuals in relations. The vulnerabilities associated with change, and likewise self-revelation, are safeguarded in the mutuality of being human. The mutuality of the human experience is both positive and negative. It is aware of the desire of all individuals to develop as moral beings. It is also informed of the possibility for moral failure on the part of the agent. Yet, the underlying support for this idea comes from the universal obligations and responsibilities of a love ethic. Building on the natural dominion of each and every individual, this institutional design embraces the objective equality of natural law agents. It recalls the original teleological and perfectionist aims of Thomist natural law accounts and seeks to introduce into this account of institutional design a specific role for individual agency guided by conscientious and prudent decision-making. It reaffirms the need for habitual practices, a learned community and the possibility of individual moral agency. For this reason, this institutional design finds itself at odds with the united account of the New Natural Lawyers and their requirements of practical reasonableness. In particular, it reinvigorates the teleology of being

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lost in liberal ideas of well-being and development, and for this reason it also finds itself at odds with Martha Nussbaum’s ideas of ‘capabilities’ that are supported by a Rawlsian idea of human nature. The obligations of love then provide the starting point for a discussion of institutional design which challenges the subjectivity of contemporary international politics. In order to further understand the pivotal role that love plays in this account of morality it is beneficial to look at the works of Gene Outka. Outka notes the mutuality of being evident in the idea of love.28 His work proposes to understand the idea of agape as ‘equal regard’ and assumes, like the Thomist tradition of natural law, the equality of being which demands that individuals have a respect for the needs and interests of another simply because of a shared humanity. One loves, according to Outka, independent of the benefits one may accrue in loving another. Moreover, in choosing to love another, one is not motivated by a pre-existing account of value or worth. What agape is minimally independent of, then, are particular attitudes and actions which constitute a condition for one’s actively regarding him at all. So we are told that love ‘abides,’ that it is limitless and unchanged, even if and when the object becomes changed. Its independence is unassailable precisely because it does not require reciprocity.29

Indeed, on Outka’s interpretation, and like that of natural law love, one loves for the sake of loving. Outka goes on to distinguish relationships of love which are personal and loving relationships which characterize the community. In his own particular way he is offering an account of the community which relies on the model of human non-instrumental relationships in what is traditionally a public, and therefore sterile, environment. Both types of relationships connote a degree of sharing and communication in and amongst persons, but Outka is clear, at the outset, that love as equal regard has an active interest in the well-being of another and has clear social implications. Its generality is not limited to the private relations of individuals, but rather it is able to engage and develop fellowship within the community. Outka’s description of love provides a first glimpse of moving beyond the challenges which face feminist scholars, and care ethics in particular. It is necessary to distinguish between direct and indirect relationships of care, or inter alia, love. This distinction is particularly important in Chapter 5. It demonstrates the value of natural law morality in international politics and employs the distinction within an account of ‘the political.’ Love, in the first instance, reflects the close relationships which structure the daily interactions of the agent. In order to understand the wider possibility of the obligations of love, in an institutionalized, or less direct fashion, one must look to the virtue of charity. Charity, it is claimed, responds to the parochialism within other relational accounts of ‘the political.’ Outka’s account of 28  Gene Outka, Agape: An Ethical Analysis (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1972). 29  Outka, 1972, 14.

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love, like the morality of natural law, is focused on the generalities of being human which, when coupled with the morality of natural law, highlight the possibility of habitual moral training. Chapter 5 reveals, through the institutionalization of charity, how these very habits sustain the distinction of close and distant relationships which can account for wider instances of collective agency. Charity reflects the self-same quality of being that are noted in the agape accounts of love; however, when charity is examined in light of the relationship it shares with the virtue of justice it demonstrates the institutional potential of a love ethic and articulates an account of philia love. Philia love reflects the ideas of civic friendship mediated through a Thomist account of charity and taking into consideration the natural equality of being sustaining the natural law agent within the community.30 The obligations of love ask of agents to love another even when the act itself is shunned by another. When one continues to love another, be they an enemy or simply one lacking faith in ‘the good,’ one displays the virtue of charity. Charity reflects the coming together of reasonableness, love and friendship, and is perhaps the best illustration of the steadfast and continuous nature of love’s obligations. A return to the original writings of Aquinas provides a helpful means of understanding this relationship. The friendship that is based on the virtuous is directed to none but a virtuous man the principal person, but for his sake we love those who belong to him, even though they be not virtuous, [writes Aquinas] in this way charity, which above all is friendship based on the virtuous, extends to sinners, whom, out of charity, we love for God’s sake.31

The commitment to love, as evidenced in the virtue of charity, provides a first glimpse of an alternative account of being political. It provides a nuanced understanding of the equal capacity of the individual to do both good and evil and in so doing is well informed of the wayward nature of being human. It recognizes that individuals may not wish to become involved in the pursuit of ‘the good’ for its own sake. It is also well aware of the simplicity of remaining within a system of global governance which purports to cater to the development of the individual, albeit it a development which occurs in isolation. At the same time, it is also aware, owing to the critical capacity of natural law morality, of the human harm which occurs at the hands of such political structures. It balances these observations with outstanding examples of human achievement and in so doing provides examples of individuals 30  Philia love is discussed in some detail by Paul Tillich. Paul Tillich, Love, Power, and Justice: Ontological Analyses and Ethical Applications (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1954). He notes the relationship of agape, eros and philia and demonstrates how philia love complements agape as it highlights the value of friendship among equals. This is an account of equality which draws on the ideas of agape love discussed by Outka and reflected in the natural law works of Maritain and Grisez. 31  Aquinas, IIa–IIae, 23.1.

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who, when recognizing moral tensions, seek to ameliorate the human condition, and thereby challenge the pervasive negative assumptions of human nature. The potential of charity, as a cornerstone of institutional design, has received little attention in the fields of politics and ethics. Alan Buchanan provides one interpretation of the role of charity in these fields and is skeptical, if not dismissive, of its transformative capacity.32 His work identifies four different interpretations of charity as a political ideal. First, he claims, justice can reflects negative duties, and charity positive duties; second, duties of justice can be enforced, whereas duties of charity cannot; third, duties of justice are perfect duties, whereas charity duties are imperfect; and finally, justice reflects matters of rights, and charity does not. He goes on to conclude that, in light of these various interpretations, the absence of charity in ethical discourses is not a problem and that, on the whole, reflections of charity offer little to ethical principles that guide the actions of the agent. Buchanan’s conclusions reflect his original assumption; namely, that charity can only be interpreted as one form of justice. In fact, the subjectivity which continues to dominate contemporary politics, and its associated pragmatic morality and proportional justice, owes much to the inability of agents and institutions to enforce imperfect duties. However, justice is not a form of charity and Buchanan has largely misinterpreted the ends of loving reasonableness which support this virtue. Charity, as the discussions of the virtuous soldier in Chapter 5 reveal, is reflected in the moral habits of individuals which generate just political structures.33 The order of charity, like the ethic of love, demonstrates the point made by Jean Porter; namely, that natural law, beyond a reasonable ordering principle guiding agents, is also capable of articulating an order within the community.34 This is achieved through the development and implementation of commutative justice. It takes, as a primary cue, the habitual actions of individuals which are learned, and expressed in turn, through non-instrumental relations. These acts facilitate agency within the wider structures of ‘the political’ and exert a degree of influence in situations which fail to conform to pre-existing rules and laws. In such instances, individuals draw on their moral training and act in the spirit of moral ends. In this way they engage with pre-existing political structures which challenge them as well. These situations can sustain social change and facilitate the inclusion of commutative justice. Commutative justice is both interpersonal and inter-communal and complements both the personal and communal relationships identified by Outka. This depiction of moral agency demonstrates how just political structures originate in the ability to love, and extend into the wider institutions and practices of the community, through the habitual actions of agents. These practices reflect the close community of the individual, as evidenced by familial relations, and the wider institutions which sustain the community. Yet, in the same 32 Allen Buchanan, Justice and charity, Ethics, 97 no. 3 (1987), 558–575. 33  Darrell Cole, Thomas Aquinas on virtuous warfare, Journal of Religious Ethics, 27 no. 1 (Spring 1999), 57–80. 34  Porter, 1996.

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way, these just relations are also conceptually available to agents working within those international and transnational institutions and corporations that sustain the discourses of international politics. The tradition of natural law highlights the fact that politics is a natural activity for a social and moral agent. Moreover, it recognizes that within the relationships sustaining the community there exists a space whereby individuals, as agents of justice, can demonstrate alternative modes of being political. Such an account reveals the possibility of a unified human purpose sustained by the discourses of love. Relationships not only allow the individual to define her natural potential, they provide the agent with the means to help others achieve that self-same goal of integral human fulfillment. To that end, relationships outline the obligations and responsibilities of the agent both in their general and particular form. Furthermore, when placed alongside the goals of mutual well-being and integral human fulfillment a discourse of love explicitly articulates that one is obliged to help others achieve this self-same goal of development. This obligation is rooted in the sameness of self; a sameness of self that promotes love and fosters a moral community. Loving relations, as F. Earle Fox wites, support obligations in and of themselves owing to their mutual nature.35 Justice, on this account, is dependent on the depiction of the agent and the relationships that the agent develops from within a particular understanding of morality. In light of this understanding the virtuous agent increases in importance. The loving agent is the only being capable of generating the mutual relationship associated with natural law morality. These relationships, as Stephen J. Pope points out, ‘retains and perfects rather than eliminates or degrades our humanity.’36 This metaphysical account of love explains the motivation to act in a more personal manner and aware of the obligations to those individuals, distant and local, bearing the burden of suffering. Moreover, it is indicative of an alternative understanding of being political that is premised on the objectivity of natural dominion, and that articulates a more personal form of individuals relating to one another as beings in common. As a social and moral being the natural law agent is predisposed to engage in politics. The political endeavors of the agent reflect the idea that politics is that metaphysical space whereby individuals produce and reproduce social structures and practices which coordinate their lives in common. Yet the structures of contemporary international politics have unwittingly limited this natural tendency toward unity thus hindering the possibility of forging human relations. Suffering, so the argument goes, is directly related to this isolation which denies the possibility of understanding individuals as persons in relations. Agape and philia relations represent a particular understanding of love that sustains an objective account of political action. An objective account of politics premised on an ethic of love 35  F. Earl Fox, Defining ‘oughtness’ and ‘love,’ The Journal of Religion, 39 no. 3 (July 1959), 174. 36  Stephen J. Pope, Expressive individualism and true self-love: a Thomistic perspective, The Journal of Religion, 71 no. 3 (July 1991), 397.

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stresses unity. Love seeks to bring agents together in order to achieve a higher understanding of being in common and in so doing understand and work within the vulnerabilities associated with genuine human experiences. An ethic of loving reasonableness highlights the centrality of human sociability and the role that noninstrumental relationships play in the development of moral political structures. The value of charity in this particular description of ‘the political’ lies in its overt critique of the traditional boundaries of order. It seeks a unified human experience which stands in contrast to the polarities of ‘inside’ and ‘outside,’ as well as ‘public and private,’ and seeks to revitalize the relativity of pre-modern accounts of institutional design. Charity extends the obligations of relationships and an ethic of love beyond the local area of the agent into the wider interests which constitute the community. Moreover, it further distinguishes this interpretation of natural law morality from that of the New Natural Lawyers. The emphasis placed on charityand agency-led initiatives facilitated through the interweaving of natural law and casuistry go a long to challenging the rationality of the requirements of practical reasonableness which emphasize the moral development which occurs when agents participate in non-instrumental relationships. The relationship of charity and justice, in light of this fact, is intrinsically important. It provides the primary means of articulating an alternative account of justice that reflects the relational ontology of the agent and the community. The relationship of charity and justice challenges the isolated ends of politics. It highlights the potential of persons in relations to achieve the ends of natural law morality and endorse an unbounded account of the moral community. Moreover, it seeks to reinvigorate a faithfulness in the shared experiences of being human in common which identify individuals as unique reasonable beings. A Natural Law Community The community, within the natural law tradition, is premised on the same ontology which sustains the individual. It highlights the innately social nature of the individual and the importance of non-instrumental relationships which ultimately facilitate moral development. This moral development is articulated in the idea of happiness and provides a unifying goal for all individuals committed to these selfsame ends. The community reflects the importance of the common good as well as the shared commitments and values emerging out of the daily experiences of agents. According to Grisez and Shaw, one can understand a community in terms of the commitments made by its members. Each individual has a particular skill and role which, when successfully integrated within the larger whole, sustains both their own development and the development of others.37 There is a mutuality to this social experience. A natural law community is the outcome of myriad human relationships and engagements oriented around the moral constitution of 37  Grisez and Shaw, 1980, 56.

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the natural law individual, and highlights the central elements of commutative justice; namely, equality, freedom and autonomy. The community, according to natural law morality, is the unity of agents living in relations. Underpinning these relationships is a commitment, made on the part of the agent, to live a life according to the ends of ‘the good.’ Therefore a good community is established and maintained when individuals act with the ends of ‘the good’ in mind. Conversely, a bad community is one which perverts the ends of natural law morality. There are no limits to the possibility of such a community. It takes its cue from the original equality of being and notes that the individual who is predisposed to the value of life, and its moral development, is invited to participate, further develop, and enjoy the benefits of loving reasonableness, in common. The political community, on this interpretation of natural law morality, is unbounded and open-ended. In this way it mirrors the original teleological morality discussed in Chapter 2. It incorporates the pre-modern assumption of perfectionism with moral development. Moreover, it adapts its political structures to the needs of the individuals located therein. The implications of this political vision challenge many of the central assumptions of international politics. In the first instance, a political community is not defined by the geographical and territorial limitations which sustain the boundaries of ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ politics. Instead it focuses on the unity of shared interests and the ideals which exist to support them. This open-ended and all-inclusive vision of the political community means that the individual must remain actively involved in the decisions made, and actions taken, on behalf of the community. The works of Germain Grisez, and his idea of the good community, are particularly poignant. He provides an interpretation of the community which draws on the idea of love and the social nature of being human. He writes: Genuine community is formed by unselfish love which unites two or many persons. Those who share in community are one insofar as they love the same good; they are disposed together to a common fulfillment. The one which is the real community is also many insofar as it fulfills its members in their diverse and complementary possibilities. In true community unity is not lessened by the ever-increasing uniqueness of the members, and their individuality is not compromised by the ever-growing solidarity of their common life. Both the uniqueness of each individual and the solidarity of all increases as the good loved in common is effectively desired, pursued, and enjoyed by each and all.38

This idea of community endorses the ends of goodness while reiterating the need for freedom and autonomy at the personal level. Moreover, it highlights a particular role for non-instrumental relationships in securing the longevity of the community itself. In a very similar fashion Jacques Maritain provides an interpretation of the political community which draws on the ends of goodness while at the same 38  Grisez, 1983, 577.

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time reiterating the specific need for pluralism in order to achieve the necessary inclusivity to foster the unified ends of natural law. Maritain focuses on the idea of idea of civic friendship in order to offer a description of the Humanism of the Incarnation.39 This account of the community reflects the idea of morality and justice which sustain the Thomist idea of civic friendship and the order of charity. This humanism assumes at the outset the freedom and autonomy of the individual. In so doing it remains allied to the twofold distinction of first-order absolutes and second-order normative claims associated with natural law morality. It is steadfast in its desire to achieve the ends of human happiness, or, the good, and at the same time is mindful of the necessary plurality of means which can be adopted in order to achieve these ends. With this in mind, Maritain’s humanism is simultaneously personal and communal, plural and, above all else, Christian. Yet this overt Christianity does not limit the participation of other non-Christian individuals in the community. Like the natural law individual articulated in Chapter 2, Maritain assumes that individuals who are committed to the ends of his humanism act as living examples of a life which respects a basic level of human equality and is therefore open to the ends of friendship and charity. Consequently, the community eagerly incorporates those who share a commitment to such ends. Maritain can thus claim that his is an all-encompassing and open community which cares not only for the elites, but the masses as well. Maritain’s account of the common good reflects the interweaving of friendship, love and charity, and notes, at the outset, the value of political pluralism. There is diversity within plurality and consequently myriad means through which individuals can experience the good, all of which is focused on the unity of friendship.40 Friendship rooted in love respects the distinct characteristics of the agent, and justice furthers the development of both the agent and the community. Friendship then provides a nuanced account of the common good. This common good is at once material, intellectual and moral, and principally moral, as man himself is; it is a common good of human persons. Therefore, it is not only something useful—an ensemble of advantages and profits—it is essentially something good in itself—what the Ancients termed bonum honestum. Justice and civic friendship are its cement.41

These relationships reflect a commitment to love and care according to a relational ontology of being which seeks out, and is attracted to, the good evidenced in another. The value of pre-modern natural law is again evident at this point. It notes the symbiotic relationship of the individual and the community. Both entities are conceptualized as moral beings that work together in order to achieve a greater 39  Maritain, 1938. 40  Maritain, 1938, 167. 41  Maritain, 1942, 10.

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degree of moral knowledge. In other words, the individual is inherently moral and the community is that space in which moral development can occur. The diversity of interests which shape the natural law individual is exceptionally important in light of this notion of community and is well noted by John Haldane. His discussion of natural law morality points out that within any one individual there exists activityspecific values and virtues which can be understood as single entities, but when viewed in their totality represent a greater whole which is human life itself. He furthermore makes the point that this account is possible as value resides in nature which understands that each form has a variety of functions, thus making it possible to provide an account of ethical pluralism that is, in and of itself, foundational.42 Each area of interest, within the individual, represents a potential site for relationships to develop. These relationships sustain the notion of community and provide a site outside of formal political institutions for knowledge sharing. This process is critical to a natural law account of politics because within this place the intentions, aims and ends of agents, conceptualized as agents of justice, emerge. Drawing on this particular interpretation of the community, one can infer a few implications. First, the relationships of influence are at odds with the ordering principles associated with bounded political communities. Instead of reflecting the hierarchical relationships associated with civil society, the relationships of the agent are best visualized as a web-like fashion. At the center of this web sits the agent who is surrounded by diverse and multiple sites of action. These sites reflect the original requirements of a relational ontology oriented toward a theory of action. The ongoing engagement of agents within the community is reflected in the assimilation of new and possibly otherwise excluded information. This knowledge contributes to dynamic and ever-changing political structures which accommodate the practices related to moral development. It is one method by which individuals can, in their own particular way, affect the distribution and redistribution of political goods. The idea that such ‘spheres of influence’ can affect moral political change corresponds to the ideas of agency previously articulated in Chapter 3, and by O’Neill and MacIntyre. Recall that natural law agency identifies the possibility of moral reasonableness as the cornerstone of natural law agency along with a commitment to the ends of the good, and that these requirements are the self-same requirements as for membership within the political community. The identification of the community, as a web-like structure, may prove difficult to envision. The state, as it is traditionally understood, reflects a series of hierarchical relationships. Yet the relativity of pre-modern natural law highlights an institutional design that endorses both accepted and alternative modes of institutionalization. Within the formal idea of the state there are sites of activities and agencies which reflect the possibility of trans-communal relations, both within the state and beyond its territorial borders. Perhaps most tellingly is the example of the church, as an institution. The Papacy exists alongside the traditional actors of international politics, but it offers an alternative idea of community engagement. 42  Haldane, 2004.

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As the Papal encyclicals demonstrate, their vision of the community is one which engages with individuals and one which is premised on the idea of love and solidarity.43 The idea of a caring community within the state is also evidenced when one investigates the role of community activity groups, for example, Scouts. The mission statement of the Scout Association is as follows: The aim of the Association is to promote the development of young people in achieving their full physical, intellectual, social and spiritual potential, as individuals, as responsible citizens and as members of their local, national and international communities.44

The mission statement of this organization reflects the developmental potential of all youths, both domestically and internationally. They act within the confines of the territorial state and grow out of local communities; however, they also demonstrate simultaneous international and trans-communal relations through the use of newly emerging global communications technologies. In this particular case, the value of the World Wide Web is of instrumental value. The reality of the global environment is such that individuals today are interconnected at a higher level then ever before in history. This is not to bring into the fold the notion of globalization and the associated homogeneity criticisms it fosters. Rather, the reiteration of the interconnected lives that a majority of individuals, living within the domestic state, share is to note the newly developing capacities of individuals acting as agents of justice. This agency can be individually motivated, or it can occur within pre-existing non-governmental associations. Throughout history the state was a purposeful actor as it was the sole means by which the activity of international engagement could be conceptualized. This is no longer the case. Scholars engaged with the idea of discursive democracy have quickly demonstrated the value of newly emerging technologies in the globalized world. While a natural law account of institutional design is at odds with a variety of the ideas that authors such as John Dryzek articulate, it demonstrates the possibility that moral relationships can provide a flexible and dynamic interpretation of governance outside the traditional sites of power and authority.45 Is such an account of the community a viable one within the field of international politics? If one draws on the works of Midgley, dicussed in Chapter 2, the feasibility of this account gains clarity. He, like Grisez and Maritain, endorses a Thomist account of the common good which is oriented around the perfection of individual happiness. In light of the commutative ends of justice, and the potential 43  See in particular the works of Pope John Paul II. Redemptor hominis, given at Rome, at Saint Peter’s, on the fourth of March, the First Sunday of Lent, in the year 1979. 44 The Scout Association, http://scouts.org.uk/cms.php?pageid=131 (accessed 29 May 2009). 45  John Dryzek, Deliberative Global Politics, Discourse and Democracy in a Divided World (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2006).

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for transnational relationships and agency, the viability of an international account of the common good can sustain a particular vision of moral global governance provided it is premised on the principle of subsidiarity. Midgley writes: The principle of subsidiarity excludes the idea that the particular state should take over the whole competence of the individual or the family or the viable group. The State, in so far as its authority is ordered to the common good, will help the individuals and the families and other groups to attain their ends.46

In other words, national governments that are able to meet the needs not only of their own population, but also of other foreign populations, should be empowered to do so. This international coordination mirrors the symmetry of domestic relationships that constitute civil society; namely, non-profit organizations, faithbased groups, and even community-interest activities. Moreover, it hints at a possible engagement of both instrumental and non-instrumental relations within a wider framework of agency. This notion of empowered agency is presently emerging within international politics. The ideal of sovereignty, state supremacy and the norm of non-intervention are currently in flux as the idea of the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) continues to challenge the traditional rights of states.47 The R2P is clear that states ought no longer be admitted into an international civil society simply because of their sovereign right of existence. Admission into this particular club requires that states accept and support the moral rights of their citizens which are discourses derived from the Universal Human Rights.48 The rights of sovereignty vis-á-vis the R2P come with an associated responsibility to protect, which is a point well noted by Terry Nardin. When states are unable to address the needs of their populations because of a lack of basic resources, the duty to provide the basic goods rests with other states in the international arena.49 The norm of non-intervention is being challenged and in the process a new norm, the right of intervention, is being developed which will guide when and where humanitarian intervention is required.50 While this duty of intervention is not explicitly the idea of subsidiarity 46  Midgley, 1975. 47 International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty, The Responsibility to Protect (Ottawa: International Development Research Centre, 2001). 48 See for example The United Nations, The Charter of the United Nations, http:// www.un.org/aboutUN/Charter (accessed November 24, 2005); The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu3/b/a_ccpr.htm (accessed November 24, 2005); and, The Declaration of Human Rights,http://www.un.org/Overview/ rights.html (accessed July 11, 2005). 49  Terry Nardin, International political theory and the question of justice, International Affairs, 82 no. 3 (2006), 449–465. 50  Janne Haalland Matlary, Cannon before canon: the dynamics of ad bellum rule change, in War, Torture and Terrorism: Rethinking the Rules of International Security, Anthony F. Lang, Jr and Amanda Russell Beattie, eds (London: Routledge, 2008) 69–84.

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as proposed by Midgley it does highlight a central theme of natural law morality; namely, that those best placed to act and safeguard the well-being and develop of others ought to do so. The consequences of this doctrine ask for a rearticulation of the idea of international order and the idea of the state, a discourse which the morality of natural law, and its associated idea of the political community, is best placed to address. The ideas associated with the R2P remain challenged by the issue of legitimacy. There is, at the international level, no formally recognized institution which can mandate international intervention on the part of empowered states. While the discourse highlights a central role for the United Nations, the authority and legitimacy of the UN has been called into question in light of recent moral and political failures.51 The legitimacy of moral international order premised on the common good and the principle of subsidiarty rests chiefly on agency. If one has the means to act and cater to the moral development of individuals, then one is legitimately able to do so. This legitimacy rests on the shared assumption of moral perfectionism and the innate teleological orientation to goodness which presupposes this account of order. There are two interrelated corollaries to this point which Midgley highlights well. First, agency demonstrates intentions; therefore when states act they will not only secure social and political sufficiency, but they will also reveal a commitment to shared moral intentions. Second, the sufficiency which will arise in such an institutional pattern can provide the necessary means of overcoming the negative consequences of international disputes. In other words, it will challenge the dominance of anarchy and the associated fear and insecurity which pervades international politics. What ought to be clear about this particular discussion of the community is its non-exclusivity. In order to be admitted into this fellowship of communities one need only profess a commitment to the ends of moral development. For this reason alone, this account of the political community is at odds with more contemporary accounts of order and society. Nicholas Rengger comments on the traditional structures of international order and notes how they are defined chiefly in relation to an ‘inside’ which is ordered and an ‘outside’ which is anarchical.52 Andrew Linklater describes how the internal ordering of political communities is achieved.53 The longevity and steadfastness they demonstrate is generally the 51 The list of these failures is long and, in general, contributes to the problems of human suffering. For instance, the United Nations sought to avoid military conflict in Iraq and imposed economic sanctions which hurt the domestic population. When it failed to intervene in Rwanda, genocide ensued in which over 1,000,000 individuals died. Finally, the Security Council remains captured by high-power politics and the ability of the permanent five to exercise their veto or, at other times, act unilaterally. This was in evidence in the lead-up the war in Iraq when the United States, along with Great Britain, articulated the idea of a coalition of the willing in the absence of a United Nations mandate for military force. 52  Rengger, 2000. 53 Andrew Linklater, The Transformation of Political Communities: Ethical Foundations of the Post-Westphalian Era (Oxford: Polity Press, 1998).

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result of exclusive myth-making and storytelling. The underlying shared histories are, more often than not, histories and myths which arise out of the bonds of violent conflict or war, or ‘in the unifying struggles for national independence.’ Violent origins do little in the way of tempering the insecurity and vulnerability which exists in the absence of legitimate political authority. Indeed, the exclusivity of state borders, and the limited availability of genuine membership, challenge the ideals of human integral fulfillment and the unity of the loved and beloved which is characteristic of the good moral community. The unbounded and open-ended idea of the natural law community stands in stark contrast to this observation and provides the necessary institutional structures which admit the possibility of mutual self-revelation, trust and ultimately a unified purpose. This unity not only provides for an individual sense of purpose but it also offers one particular means of challenging the instability and vulnerability associated with contemporary politics at the international level. As Paul Tillich’s work points out, within an ethic of love both for the lover and beloved seek unity.54 The process of loving, that is to say the recognition of another’s ability to love and be loved in return, is directed towards one end: the coming together of the individual with a complete knowledge of the good. Owing to the relationality of their being, individuals can only achieve this unity through the fellowship which, as was argued in the previous section, occurs within the relationships of loving reasonableness. In order to achieve genuine fellowship that tends toward the unified whole of ‘the good,’ agents must engage in the practice of self-revelation. There is a distinct vulnerability associated with such self-revelation, and as John MacMurray has demonstrated in his poignant critique of contemporary accounts of ‘the political,’ there exists little motivation for individuals to engage in such a manner.55 The pervasive exclusivity of the human community, coupled with the dominance of power relationships, generates a climate of fear and self-enclosure which denies the space for the development of human relationships. As this sense of fear continues to permeate the structures of politics at every level, there exists little incentive for individuals to engage as reasonable and loving agents. The natural law community, however, facilitates this incentive. It draws on the mutuality of the human experience and articulates an account of mutual selfrevelation. On this account both the lover and the beloved must reveal distinct aspects of their personality and individuality to each other. The vulnerability with which politics is chiefly interested exists at the point when the agent initiating the relationship reveals parts of his or her self. For at that particular moment one does not know if such an act will be reciprocated. Herein lies the insecurity which preoccupies scholars engaged in the discourses of power politics and the associated discourses of security in international affairs. As Annette Baier has noted, little work has focused its attention on the nature of this mistrust and on how best to move beyond this particular impasse. She notes that to trust another is 54  Tillich, 1954. 55  MacMurray, 1961.

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‘to accept vulnerability to another’s possible but not excepted ill will (or lack of good-will) toward one.’56 Nicholas Rengger further elaborates on this idea noting that trust ‘should be understood as the exercise of discretionary power by some agent (individual or artificial) on behalf of another over matters that the trusting agent cares about.’57 Traditional responses to this vulnerability are reflected in the discourses of the security dilemma which provide a set of rational choice deliberations which, in the face of destruction, advocate that actors act in their own self-interest as they are unable to predict the actions and reactions of their adversaries. It is a course of action which, on the surface, seems to guarantee a modicum of survival in an anarchical environment. On the other hand, the natural law tradition, as it is interpreted throughout this work, envisions an altogether different set of reasonable deliberations on the part of the agent. The charitable relations of friendship demand that individuals love another regardless of the particular ends, and even setbacks, which may occur in the short term. The commitment to an ethic of love, and its wider institutionalization in the order of charity, demands that individuals remain steadfast in their loving disposition regardless of whether the bonds of fellowship and love are reciprocated. Moreover, by loving in the absence of reciprocated love natural law agents are providing an example of the obligations of love in action. In other words, their agency, beyond intentions and discourse, provides a genuine example of their commitment. It is this commitment which tempers insecurity. Owing to the original obligations of love, natural law agents are not only willing, but must endeavor, to engage in the vulnerabilities associated with political communities and it is this willingness to engage, in the face of potential conflict, which challenges the skeptics of a natural law morality. The seeming lack of fear, and the potential for instability and political change, which generally brings about fear, is tempered by the underlying teleology of being which recognizes the ends of ‘the good’ and notes that it provides an underlying anchor of stability within the community. Underlying the commitments of the loving agent is the natural law idea of choice. Individual choice sustains the necessary freedom and autonomy of the agent. Moreover, it ensures one’s own personal moral development. As Grisez writes: Moral goodness resides centrally in a person’s choice. One is not considered morally good merely for having made a few good choices, but for making a set of morally upright commitments and living by them consistently.58

Yet individual choice also recalls the mutuality of being human in common. If agents choose to live according to a natural law taxonomy which highlights 56  Annette C. Baier, Moral Prejudices: Essays on Ethics (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1995) 99. 57 Nicholas Rengger, The ethics of trust in world politics, International Affairs, 73 no. 3 (July 1997), 472. 58  Grisez, 1983, 128.

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goodness, they demonstrate their own commitment to the larger social goals of natural law morality. This idea is also highlighted by Outka’s account of agape as equal regard. He, like Grisez, demonstrates the need for repeated loving actions in order for others to understand the moral taxonomy guiding the agent in question. He writes: In order to judge that an agent is loving we need more than one notable performance, and more than a limited class of actions which he habitually performs or refrains from performing. There ought to be a variety of exemplifications which reflect a long-range policy. The policy persists through time and integrates a cluster of specific objectives. Love ought to be genuinely inward, so that the more one comes to know the agent, the less on sense a discrepancy between manifest operations and deeper aims.59

A commitment to love others and to live according to a loving disposition affirms the general approach to human interaction. It revolves around a long-term commitment to the ends of the good which, in the day to day actions of each and every agent, is reflected in reasonable choices. The ability to choose and engage in such a manner is available to all individuals, who are conceptualized as moral agents in potential. Moreover, the central emphasis on choice demonstrates the unity of thick and thin accounts of natural morality and the possibility of a natural law framework within international politics and the discourses of international relations. It is this self-same teleology of being which, when examined alongside the loving agency of the natural law agent, demonstrates how both thick and thin accounts of morality can coexist side by side. Beyond the varying ontological and epistemology assumptions held by both schools, agency provides a methodological approach which demonstrates how, regardless of the originating assumptions which guide the agent, the actual focus ought to be the engagements, and repeated engagements, which sustain the political community. In other words, love’s knowledge provides a methodological framework within which the ontology and epistemology of loving reasonableness can set a precedent that paves the way for mutual self-revelation leading to human development, well-being and, in the end, the unity of fulfillment. Love’s knowledge then, has the capacity to challenge the fear of contemporary political societies thus paving the way for an account of international politics premised on the institutional design facilitated by the morality of natural law.

59  Outka, 1972, 132.

Chapter 5

The Morality of Natural Law and International Politics: Unbounded Moral Communities and Collective Moral Agency Introduction This work articulated, in the opening pages, the pervasive problem of human suffering in international politics. Moreover, it identified the discourse of cosmopolitanism as the primary moral framework which scholars and practitioners engage with when addressing this problem. It identified two problems within this approach: the self-sufficiency of the individual and a lack of relationality or mutuality within its ontology of being. This particular ontology fails to provide a convincing argument for the embedded, or communal, nature of the individual as a means of overcoming the state-based interpretations of international politics. Consequently, this work engaged in the development of a natural law framework in order to first critique the current institutional structures of international politics as was developed in Chapter 1. Chapter 2 went on to describe the tradition of natural law in order establish a latent natural law presence within IR to demonstrate the viability of such a framework. Chapter 3 went on to articulate a viable account of natural law morality in order to develop, in Chapter 4, an account of agency and the moral community. This, it was claimed, provided the tools necessary to modify, while existing within, the dominant structures of international politics. This final chapter seeks to bring all of these various pieces together and offer a particular interpretation of international institutional design which draws on the morality of natural law. Robert Goodin’s work The Theory of Institutional Design outlines the idea of institutional design. It is part and parcel of political agency. Institutional design, he claims, encourages experimentation on the part of agents in order to develop alternative structures in different realms of ‘the political.’ He goes on to challenge the myth of the institutional designer and notes the rarity of a tabula rasa within international political institutional design. Instead, one ought to understand the task   Robert E. Goodin, Institutions and their design, in The Theory of Institutional Design, Robert E. Goodin, ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 42.   For a detailed account of the breakdown and reconstruction of world order see Andrew Williams, Failed Imagination? New World Orders of the Twentieth Century

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of institutional design occurring within pre-existing social and political structures. With this in mind this work draws the ideas of Goodin in order to demonstrate how the natural law agent is perfectly situated to engage in such a task. It draws on both the natural law agent and the natural law account of the community in order to identify particular spaces wherein agents are actively political. It proposes a reconception of the theater of international politics which is labeled ‘the international.’ This space, it is argued, can be conceptualized as open-ended and unbounded, thereby facilitating the development of wider communities of interest. It supports this claim through a descriptive account of ‘the personal’ which, among other things, envisions a particular role for non-instrumental relations within the formal practices and discourses of international politics. It draws particular strength from a reimagination of human rights and intervention in order to provide a working example of moral institutional design which impacts traditional interpretations of international politics. These small-scale changes reflect a wider challenge to the impartial and technical conception of political activity. The outcome of this thought experiment, it is hoped, is not to theorize on the idea of institutional design per se, but rather, to create the space whereby positive agency promotes such a conception of commutative justice relevant to the discourses of international politics. Moreover, it seeks to demonstrate how trans-communal and interpersonal accounts of justice are pertinent to the mainstream of international politics, thus demonstrating, above all else, that individuals conceptualized as agents of justice are honing and developing their capacities and capabilities to affect change. It seeks to put forth an account of living ethically within a community that understands the appeal of universally upheld rules while understanding the limitations of an unquestioned and universally accepted rule-based methodology. This chapter draws on the critical possibility of natural law morality in order to articulate a more partial, relative and personal approach to relations within the international. In so doing, it seeks to provide a tempered critique of international relations, and thus offers a proactive account of international affairs which incorporates both theoretical and practical knowledge as a means to both understand and explain its events. Morality and justice, rooted in an ontological equality of being, articulate an ethic of love all of which cumulatively represents an objective account of politics. This account of ‘being political’ is premised on practical reason. It demonstrates how human action challenges contemporary political structures and draws on the works of Toulmin in order to challenge the dominance of the state. It focuses on the persuasive abilities of the individual in lieu of the powerful rhetoric of (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1988). He describes the decay of one order and the emergence of another. He can identify four time periods when a potentially blank slate was available to world leaders. The 100 years peace is one example, as is the reconstruction which occurred with the termination of WWII. It is an interesting juxtaposition in light of the fact made by Robert Goodin, which notes the rarity of those engaged in institutional design being provided with a clean slate with which to proceed.   Toulmin, 1990.

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international politics. In order to achieve this end it draws on the previous emphasis of relational and mutual politics and the particular role for human, non-instrumental relationships. Moreover, it highlights the teleology of being, or the developmental potential of agency, in order to strengthen the idea of commutative justice within international politics. It then goes on to develop the idea of ‘the personal’ and draws on the works of John MacMurray in order to provide a nuanced response to the parochial problems that previous feminist interpretations of ‘the political’ have faced. Fred Dallmayr writes that the current state of affairs requires a previously elusive imaginative quality in order to redress the moral failings of contemporary politics. The creative ends which can emerge from previously marginalized avenues of experimentation will, he claims, provide a balanced appraisal of the relationship between the governed and the government. This final chapter seeks to do just this. It builds on the relational ontology of natural law morality in order to articulate an account of politics that is objective and ‘truly human.’ It demonstrates that politics is, in reality, a decidedly personal process which engages both the rational and reasonable facets of being human. Moreover, it describes a vision of international politics which can engage with the morality of being human, all the while remaining aware of the vulnerabilities associated with self-interest agency and the desire for power. It draws on the original notion of ‘the good’ in order to articulate an unbounded understanding international political justice which is simultaneously intrapersonal, international and intranational, and demonstrates along the way the very real power of a unified community, or human fellowship, to achieve mutually sought after ends. ‘The International’ A wide variety of institutional designs have been explored throughout this work. These different designs fall broadly under the heading of normative political theory and concern themselves with themes of an international sort. The Introduction outlined a wide variety of cosmopolitan interpretations of international politics which were contrasted, in turn, by the notion of an English School interpretation. Furthermore, Chapter 1 investigated, in some depth, the possibility of a normative realist interpretation of tragedy in order to grapple with the relationship of morality, ethics and international politics. Broadly speaking, these interpretations reflect an underlying theme of human vulnerability, fear and the challenge of living peacefully amidst anarchy. Each description concluded with a vision of how best to achieve this aim. In particular, the Introduction openly addressed the aims and ends of cosmopolitan political thought in international politics and challenged the primacy it enjoys as one of the leading ethico-political approaches within the wider   MacMurray, 1953 and 1961.   Dallmayr, 1996, 218 and 219.

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discourses of IR. The Introduction acknowledged the variety of cosmopolitan interpretations and identified a first wave of thinkers who were largely concerned with a human rights agenda, as well as a second generation of international political theorists. These second-generation thinkers, one ought to recall, attempt to improve upon the criticisms of impartiality, universality and imperialism which challenge cosmopolitan human rights ideas and focus, in particular, on the idea of ‘embedded cosmopolitanism.’ It is helpful, at this point, to once again highlight the central idea of embedded cosmopolitanism, if only to make it clear how an institutional design premised on the assumptions of pre-modern natural law, improves on the identified problems. Embedded cosmopolitanism, as articulated by Toni Erskine, seeks to move beyond the impartiality and imperial nature of first generation cosmopolitan scholars by locating a myriad of interests and characteristics within the individual. These unique traits facilitate the individual’s involvement in communities beyond the community’s traditional territorial demarcation. Individuals can, but do not have to, become members of any community which provides a vision of a dislocated, but global, community which can, but need not, intersect with one another. This generates a series of web-like intersections not unlike the proposed natural law community. Consequently, there is little within this account of institutional design that a natural law scholar would challenge. The ideas broadly reflect the idea of the individual, conceptualized as an agent of justice, and constituted by multiple ideas, interests and activities; however, a natural law scholar would offer up with the following query. How does such an account maintain its aims and ends, couched, as it is, in a cosmopolitan framework largely reliant on the Kantian, and modern, idea of individual self-sufficiency? Furthermore, how does one explain the desire to exist within a community if one can attain moral standing as a solitary individual? With this in mind this work has sought to demonstrate how a natural law framework, premised on the pre-modern ideas of Aquinas and the Salamanca scholars, provides an account of human sociability. The contentions of this work, and the particular aims of this concluding chapter, seek to demonstrate how this notion of sociability engenders a relational account of ‘the political’ in order to engage critically with the institutional designs of embedded cosmopolitanism. The problems relating to a self-sufficient understanding of the individual unfurl throughout the Introduction. In addition, Chapters 3 and 4 provide a descriptive account of natural law, and a natural law account of being political which both parallels and challenges the ideas of a cosmopolitan discourse. Within the contents of these two chapters the idea of a social ontology emerges, sustaining what is referred to as a relational account of politics. Such a relational interpretation of politics is underscored by an innate sociability which presupposes a natural law account of morality. This sociability is present within any account of natural morality, such as those featured in Chapter 2, and, in particular, the works of Aquinas and his followers, which are the subjects of Chapter 3 and 4. It articulates   Erskine, 2009.

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at once how individuals, in order to develop as moral beings, must live within the community. Only within the community will individuals discover a genuine account of ethical living, provided that the community is produced through an intricate balance of instrumental and non-instrumental relationships. In this first instance, a natural law account of being political identifies itself outside traditionally accepted accounts of international relations because of the balance struck between these two types of relationships which, it argues, are key to the human experience. It redresses the imbalance which typifies international politics, stressing as the discourses do, the instrumentality of power amidst anarchy. Natural law accepts instrumental relationships as they relate to the structures of formal government yet it stresses a role for non-instrumental relationships. Such relationships, within a Thomistic account of natural law, focus on the manner in which individuals can relate to each other as equal beings. As Chapter 4 revealed, these relationships are guided by the ideals of friendship which are infused by the value of charity, itself the institutional representation of love. Chapter 4 revealed to the reader that to love another is to engage in the skill of practical reasoning. It reflects the recognition of equality, at the most basic of levels. This notion of equality is rooted in the capacity and capability of all individuals to reason as moral beings in potential. Moreover, as Chapter 4 likewise articulated, this moral development can only occur within the context of non-instrumental relationships situated within the more formal governance structures of power and authority. It highlights the inherent assumption that individuals require the community in order to understand how it is to live as ethical beings in common. Herein lies the largest difference between a natural law and cosmopolitan approach to moral institutional design. Both the Liberal and Kantian cosmopolitan frameworks investigated in the Introduction articulate the possibility of reasonableness on the part of individuals. Immanual Kant speaks of the idea of practical reason. Likewise, John Rawls describes a reasoning process which ends in a state of reflective equilibrium not unlike the reason processes of the casuistic natural law agent. Yet these cosmopolitan accounts insist that individuals can develop this skill in isolation. This engenders what Erskine refers to as the ‘pre-social man’ or what scholars in political and moral philosophy describe as Kantian self-sufficiency. As Richard Rorty has written, this is a decidedly modern phenomenon and is linked to the changing nature of the relationship between the individual and the state. As individuals have had, in modern times, to rely increasingly on their own prowess to survive, so too has the idea of practical reason found itself outside the traditional roles of government. Individuals are now asked to look within themselves in order to develop the skills of moral reasonableness. In light of this idea, Rorty’s metaphorical use of the  Immanuel Kant, Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals, Allen W. Wood, trans. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2002).   Rawls, 1971.   Erskine, 2009.

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mirror in order to look inside one’s self and discover what it is to be moral, and understand Kant’s modern influence on politics, is particularly a propos.10 A natural law account challenges this notion of self-sufficiency and puts forward an intimate account of individual neediness. It challenges the idea of a singular political experience and instead reveals the ties that bind individuals to one another. John Haldane’s work on natural law within the Christian tradition provides a telling interpretation of this relationship. He describes an account of the natural law which highlights the centrality of perfectionism within the daily ambit of human life. He notes how this account reflects the most basic of human desires— namely, to form relationships. Individuals all share the desire to find a mate, rear a family and participate within their local communities. All of these practices, it ought to be noted, exist and develop within the wider structures of the state and governmental institutions. He goes one step further however and identifies, within each and every individual, a microcosmic natural law community. ‘Natural law,’ he writes, ‘recognizes that life has departments, and thus that there are activityspecific values and virtues. On the other hand it sees that departments can only be viewed as such when seen as parts of a greater whole. That greater whole, is human life.’11 This account of the individual and the community is not unlike the embedded cosmopolitan individual; however, one can identify two significant alternatives. First, it provides an explanation of why individuals would be motivated to engage with dislocated communities beyond the original social ontology of being. In order to develop as moral beings individuals must engage with others as reasonable beings. Consequently, one engages as a member of the community in order to develop the skills of practical reason. The drawback of this change is revealed in the discussions of human vulnerability which are discussed in the final section of this chapter; however, a second benefit of this natural law interpretation is revealed through the possibility of an unbounded account of international politics. Cosmopolitan discourses, as revealed in the Introduction, remain firmly entrenched within a state-based account of international politics. If we remain focused on the works of Erskine, even her account of dislocated communities seems to accept, on a basic level, the distinction of inside/outside.12 A wide variety of scholars have investigated this idea in some detail and it can be related back to the influential role that the social contract, through the domestic analogy, plays within IR.13 One can distinguish, within the state, a measure of order, justice and legitimate government. At the international level, on the other hand, there is an absence of legitimate political authority. Consequently, the idea of law, order, and 10  Rorty, 1980. 11  Haldane, 2004, 35. He furthermore makes the point that this account is possible because value resides in nature which understands that each form has a variety of functions thus making it possible to provide an account of ethical pluralism that is, in and of itself, foundational. 12  Rengger, 2000. 13  The idea of a domestic analogy is represented in the works previously articulated. For example, Toumlin, 1990, Beitz, 1979, and Suganami, 1986.

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justice is difficult, if not impossible, to attain. Any attempt to develop an account of justice in and amongst states, and which challenges the bounded conception of the state, faces an uphill battle for acceptance. As the Introduction and Chapter 1 revealed, cosmopolitan interpretations of global justice remain challenged by this fact. In order to address this problem, this work claims that an unbounded and open-ended account of being political is needed. Consequently, this account of natural law politics moves beyond the primacy of the state within international politics. While it recognizes the importance that the state, as an institution, plays within the formal structures of global governance, it argues that this role must be coupled with an emerging role for agents outside its formal patterns of interaction. It is for this reason that Chapter 4 revealed an account of agency which draws on the ontological assumptions of natural law. The scholarly works of philosophers such as O’Neill14 and MacIntyre15 were presented alongside the theological ideas of McInerny16 and McCluskey17 in order to demonstrate how agency is part and parcel of the political experience. These works develop the original ideas of Aquinas who articulated an account of agency within his idea of being political. This work goes on to engage with the ideas of more mainstream political thinkers in order to demonstrate the viability of natural law agency alongside the traditional accounts of political agency. The role of the individual, as an agent of justice, receives a greater degree of attention throughout this work. This ought not to be interpreted as a discounting of the state. Instead, the overarching emphasis on the role that individuals can play, if properly empowered, seeks to redress the balance of the current status quo. The viability of this synthesis rests on the acceptance of the aforementioned idea of faith which is premised on the idea of a shared desire for human moral development. This acceptance rests on the positive affirmation of scholars and practitioners to accept the synthesis of Weber’s Politics as a Vocation18 alongside the political ideas of the Papacy which are articulated in the writings of various Popes, in particular Pope John Paul II.19 If one can accept this idea, in light of the engagement of thick and thin accounts of morality articulated in Chapter 2, this natural law account moves further beyond the articulated aims and ends of second generation cosmopolitan scholars. It incorporates an account of agency alongside the possibility of non-territorial communities of interest. These two particular components feature prominently in the institutional design offered throughout this work. The characteristics of agency explain how it is that individuals locate themselves, in the first instance, within communities: namely through a recognition 14  O’Neill, 2001, 2000, 1986a, 1986b. 15  MacIntyre, 1999. 16  Ralph M. McInerny, Ethica Thomistica: The Moral Philosophy of Thomas Aquinas (The Catholic University of America Press, 1997), 1993, 1992. 17  McCluskey, 2000. 18  Weber, 1946. 19  Pope John Paul II, 1979.

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of the self-same desires for moral development within another. It furthermore demonstrates how through communal activities such communities are strengthened and developed. Consequently, this idea of moral agency, the idea of the community, and the mutually constitutive role that the individual and community enjoy with each other provide a first glimpse of a reimagined international politics. In the same way that a natural law community challenges the territoriality of the state, so too does it challenge the traditional demarcation of ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ within accepted accounts of world order and global governance.20 Much like the natural law community within the territorial state, a natural law account of international politics would similarly be open-ended with dynamic and constantly evolving structures of governance. It draws on the discussion of laws in Chapter 3. It was argued that laws are a reflection of reasonable processes of agency which go on to structure the moral community. This idea, which is referred to as ‘the international,’ reflects the equal importance of instrumental and non-instrumental relationships alike. It argues that with the assimilation of the values of care, love and charity, an alternative means of understanding the role of morality within the theater of international politics is possible. 20 Contemporary accounts of international order rely heavily on this interpretation of international politics. International order, broadly conceived, combines actual events and theoretical ideas in order to explain and understand the constitutive structures of, and actors in, international affairs. See for example, the point made by Raymond Aron, that order among other things is both empirical and normative and it relies not just on actions, but also on the ideals and values that shape the community. Raymond Aron, Paix et guerre entre les nations (Paris: Calman-Levy, 1961) translated as Peace and War: A Theory of International Relations, Richard Howard and Annette Baker Fox, trans. (New York: Doubleday, 1966). Realist discourses articulate ideas relating to the balance of power, or, inter alia, the hegemonic stability theory in order to quell the self-interested and survival related ends of states. G. John Ikenberry, After Victory. Institutions, Strategic Restraint, and the Rebuilding of Order After Major Wars (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2000). Liberal versions of order note the problems of anarchy and articulate a particular role for institutions and a doctrine of reciprocal domestic disinterest which allows states to achieve their own individual ends. See for example, Williams, 1988. For scholars within the English School, international order is likened to an international society of states which focuses on rules, institutions and jurisprudence in order to outline acceptable modes of behavior. See for example Bull, 1977. Critical theorists, on the other hand, understand order as that which produces and reinforces shared understanding in and among states at the international level. They are skeptical of the idea of order and focus instead on the relationship of structure and agency and argue that agents are capable of overcoming the problem of anarchy in order to develop a universal community of individuals. Janice Bailly Mattern, Ordering International Politics, Identity, Crisis and Representation Force (New York: Routledge, 2005). Regardless of the definition adopted, order, at the international level, distinguishes between governance and government and focuses on power politics, institutional design and the relationships of agents and structures in order to achieve a particular end: namely, stability. In order to do so the idea of flexibility and unbound politics is forsaken. The viability of non-instrumental and dynamic relationships of interest is otherwise absent.

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The idea of ‘the international’ reflects the original teleology of being associated with pre-modern accounts of natural law. It remains firmly focused on the ends of moral goodness and, like the natural law community articulated in Chapter 4, is flexible, dynamic and open-ended. The ‘international’ exists to facilitate relationships of interest which sustain the transborder relationships which link the original communities of individual agents within the state. In other words, it provides an international element to the non-instrumental relationships associated with being human in common and can be conceptualized as community, in the widest possible scope. It is perhaps difficult, and can seem bizarre, to begin to grasp the nature of such a concept. At this stage it is helpful to borrow from the conceptual structures of Carl Schmitt in order to understand exactly what is meant by ‘the international.’21 Schmitt sought to highlight what was most real in the realm of politics. He established the dichotomy of friend and foe in order to understand the fragility of life and the very real and unescapable fact of human death. What was clear to Schmitt however was that individuals, situated within the liberal state, would struggle to understand this contradiction because the value orientation of the institution, he claimed, remained at odds with real life. Consequently, the liberal state is ill-equipped to understand the friend/enemy distinction within politics. Hence he employs the very metaphysical terminology of ‘the political.’22 It is this metaphysical element which is required in order to understand the idea of ‘the international.’ It represents an account of international politics which is unbounded in order to grasp the underlying vulnerability of the human condition, much in the same way that Schmitt characterizes his own friend/enemy distinction. It proposes that if one can begin to understand community—beyond a territorially bound concept—one can begin to envision an account of international politics which can engage with this notion of vulnerability in an ethical and moral fashion. As it does not exist in space or time, the idea of ‘the international’ is very much a metaphysical entity. One cannot grasp it, nor can one witness it in motion. As the product of the relations of its constitutive members, the international is a dynamic entity sustaining its own teleological ends which are derived from the essence and being of the individual as an agent of justice. As fluid entity, the international changes and adapts to the ever-evolving values and ideals as they relate to the constantly changing requirements of the individual pursuing her own individual well-being. To that end, ‘the international’ fails to conform to traditional ideas of world order. It is neither a system nor a society, but is rather a structure that is created, supported and maintained by the wide variety of agents that constitute its very being. It has an ontological status derived from the same ontology that supports the essence and being of the individual. But that is not to 21 Carl Schmidtt, The Concept of the Political, George Schwab, trans., with Leo Strauss’s notes on Schmitt’s essay; translated by J. Harvey Lomax; forward by Tracy B. Strong (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996). 22  Charles E. Frye, Carl Schmitt’s concept of the political, The Journal of Politics, 28 no. 4 (November 1966), 818–830.

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say that the international is only the sum of its individual parts. Emanating out of that particular ontology is an independent teleology that understands the actions and motivations of individuals and seeks to ensure that as political agents they have the resources to act as agents of justice. As the final section of this chapter will reveal, ‘the international’ facilitates the unity, or fellowship, of individuals throughout the world. The upcoming explanation of ‘the personal,’ which features alongside ‘the international,’ reveals the possibility of the international bonds of charity and friendship which add strength and purpose to coordinated human action. At the most basic of levels however, ‘the international’ functions much like the pre-modern natural law community. It exists so as to sustain the mutuality of the individual and the community in its largest conception in order to achieve a greater understanding of ‘the good.’ ‘The international’ is not an account of global government, nor does it articulate structures for governance. It simply represents the widest possibility of relationships of interest. Consequently it is not focused on static political structures. It openly courts the possibility of change which is reflected in the constantly evolving ideas, aims and ends of the particular individual. In this way it reflects the epistemological assumptions that support the social ontology previously described. Like the original natural law community, ‘the international’ changes as the tone and temper of non-instrumental relationships react to the needs of various individuals. At the same time however, it goes one step further and recognizes that, at times, communities can also be agents of justice. It allows for the possibility of individual agency or agency in concert.23 This flexibility provides the necessary freedom and autonomy of reactions when individuals are required to act as agents of justice. It allows for the best-placed agent, or agents, at a particular moment in time, to act as best fits the particular situation. This flexibility sustains the idea of legitimacy established in Chapter 4; namely, that when agency is required in order to respond to the immoral structures which deny human development, it is the best placed agent who is required to act. Critics will respond to this claim by noting the possibility of individual recklessness and the unpredictability of potentially negative consequences; however, this seeming problem is tempered by the very account of agency and morality which the tradition of natural law endorses.24 The morality of natural law, as demonstrated in Chapter 3, offers a casuistic methodology within its account of agency. This moral taxonomy, one will recall, develops as individuals engage with others. It is at this point where the importance of non-instrumental relationships emerge within the more formal requirements associated with ‘politics.’ Through these relationships one is invited to understand 23 See for example Toni Erskine, Assigning responsibilities to institutional moral agents: the case of states and ‘quasi-states,’ in Can Institutions Have Responsibilities? Collective Moral Agency and International Relations, Toni Erskine, ed. (Houndsville: Palgrave MacMillan, 2003), 24. 24  Jonsen & Toulmin, 1988, highlight the challenges of solipsism which casuistry has faced throughout the ages and provide a summary overview of such criticisms.

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the underlying equality of being human—the possibility of moral development couched within an understanding of our shared vulnerabilities. The familial and friendly relationships which sustain individuals throughout their quotidian existence engage the individual and through this engagement individuals come to learn the expected moral obligations and responsibilities they have toward themselves and others. There is, within this taxonomy, a mutuality which manifests itself in an overt interest in the well-being and development of another. This mutuality is expressed, for the natural law agent, in the idea of an ethic of love, as articulated in Chapter 4. For those skeptics who fail to understand the motivation of such a benevolent act, the response to this challenge is quite simple. Underlying this social benevolence is an underlying self-interest. As was made clear in Chapter 4, individuals can only develop provided that other individuals, within their own local, as well as distant, communities, are able to thrive and develop. Consequently, the original assumptions of sociability which explain the motivation to live within a community also explain how it is that natural law agents come to take an interest in the well-being and development of another. To abide by the casuistry of natural law is to note and care for other less empowered individuals. Additionally, it fosters the development of lifelong habits of moral action. The central claim of the yet to be expounded idea of ‘the personal’ is that such habits are developed through social learning. Individuals, within the community, learn the expectations of other similarly constituted beings which explains the need for a more central role for non-instrumental relationships. This knowledge informs the decision-making paradigm of the empowered agent. It complements the casuistic methodology associated with the agent, and is evidenced in the commitment to the ends of natural law morality. The casuistry of natural law which requires individuals to commit to the loving and reasonable ends of moral development ensures that, in the face of potential or actual human suffering, it will be addressed. It is this commitment which guards against the possibility of reckless agency. While casuistry, in and of itself, cannot respond to the vagaries of unanticipated consequences, the idea of tragedy, investigated in Chapter 2, articulates how moral agents ought to engage with the unanticipated negative consequences of benevolent agency. They can not be ignored, but rather, after a period of thoughtful reflection, and perhaps even mourning, the relevant information is assimilated within the pre-existing moral taxonomy in order to act with an awareness of potential moral failures in future situations. In order to provide an illustrative example of this particular idea, the ensuing section reimagines the idea of a human rights discourse. It investigates alternative interpretations of well-being and development and seeks to respond to this particular critique. It articulates a relationship, premised on practical reason, between human rights, and conceptualized as a casuistic methodology, and discusses how it can, in theory, provide a means of using agency in a proactive manner that fits with the aims and ends of natural law institutional design. The potential for an unbounded vision of international politics is fully revealed when one begins to engage with the previously existing discourses that fall

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broadly under the heading of normative Westphalia. As Richard Falk has noted in his work, there has existed, since the end of the Cold War, a desire among scholars and practitioners to envision a more just and equitable account of international relations.25 This idea became particularly apparent with the now famous speech given by then President Bush (Sr) who called, in the absence of Cold War tensions, for a world premised not on the pillars of security, power and fear, but on the original aims and ends of the human rights movement.26 At the end of the 1990 Gulf War, the former two superpowers, the United States of America and the former Soviet Union, had reignited their political relationships with each other and the ensuing result was a thawing of diplomatic relations, which was perhaps best evidenced in the diplomatic channels of the United Nations. There was a degree of hope and optimism that, finally, international politics could realistically engage in an openly ethical and moral manner and seek the ever elusive, sought after peace. What could not have been predicted, however, was the negative consequences associated with the interventions in Somalia and the disintegration of the former Yugoslavia into a conflict typified by identity politics and violent warfare.27 The cumulative effect of these violent catastrophes only further deadened the ability of states and institutions to respond to the emerging Rwandan genocide.28 The wholesale institutional failure which marks the Rwandan genocide remains a painful reminder to the international community of their moral culpability in the face of human suffering. It is but one reminder of the wider problem of suffering which exists within the structures of international politics. Many explanations as to why states fail to act in the face of tragedy exist. One can look to the boundaries of international order previously examined. The primacy of state sovereignty, and its associated norm of non-intervention should, on the surface, deny the opportunity to empowered stated to intervene in the affairs of another state. Similarly, the egoism associated with state survival has conditioned a response which places one’s own self-interest above and beyond those of other ‘distant’ strangers. The ties that bind one another do not feature in the mainstream accounts of international politics which facilitate an easy dismissal of the plight of other human beings. Yet even in the face of these arguments, ethical demands feature throughout international 25 Richard Falk, The Declining World Order: America’s Imperial Geopolitics (New York: Routledge, 2004). 26  George Bush, Sr, March 6, 1991. Speech to Congress. http://www.al-bab.com/ arab/docs/pal/pal10.htm (accessed July 28,2009). 27  For a particularly detailed and in-depth account of the atrocities see Philip Gourevitch, We Wish to Inform You that Tomorrow We Will be Killed with Our Families: Stories from Rwanda (London: Picador, 2000). Scott Peterson, Me Against my Brother: At War in Somalia, Sudan, and Rwanda—A Journalist Reports from the Battlefields of Africa (London: Routledge, 2000). 28  Many works provide a detailed account of the institutional failure surrounding the Rwandan genocide. One work in particular combines both a personal and institutional account of this event. Romeo Dallaire, Shake Hands with the Devil: The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda (Toronto: Vintage Canada, 2004).

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politics. Normative political theorists within the discipline of IR represent not only this demand, but also provide answers; however, these ethical and moral demands will only be realistically met when an account of international politics which actively engages with the unpredictable contingencies of being human is openly addressed. Such is the value of natural law morality. Its engagement with human vulnerability within a hopeful notion of human moral potential provides one particular articulation of international politics which addresses the possibility of human moral development. A Casuistry of Well-being Human Rights: A Critique and Overview The discourse of universal human rights originates at the end of the Second World War (WWII) and represents, in the formal discourses of IR, the chief means of addressing human well-being and development.29 While the idea of rights has existed throughout human history, contemporary interpretations of rights reflect the language of law and the enshrinement of those rights in legal treaties.30 Rights outline the various relationships of individuals; in particular, those with other human beings and the government. These formal relationships are guided by the discourse of negative liberty.31 The contemporary interpretation of international human rights was first inspired by the horrors of WWII and the atrocious acts of 29  See for example Micheline R. Ishay, The History of Human Rights: From Ancient Time to the Globalization Era (Berkley, Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2004); Thomas Buergental, International Human Rights, in a Nutshell (Minnesota: West Publishing Co., 1995); Jack Donnelly, Universal Human Rights in Theory and Practice, 2nd edn (Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press, 2003); David P. Forsythe, Human Rights in International Relations (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006); Henry Shue, Basic Rights: Subsistence, Affluence, and US Foreign Policy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996). 30 A good overview of the legality of human rights documents is given by Andrew Linklater when he seeks to develop an account of harm conventions in relation to his critical interpretation of cosmopolitan ethics. See for example: Andrew Linklater, The problem of harm in world politics: implications for the sociology of states-systems, International Affairs, 7 no. 2 (2202), 319–338; Andrew Linklater, Cosmopolitan political communities in international relations, International Relations, 16 no. 1 (2002), 135–150; Andrew Linklater, Citizenship, humanity and cosmopolitan harm conventions, International Political Science Review, 22 no. 3 (2001), 261–267. 31 As Isaiah Berlin has so famously pointed out, the tradition they structured has evolved so that contemporary theorists now endeavor to determine a response to the question ‘What is the area within which the subject—a person or groups of persons—is or should be left to do or be what he is able to do or be, without interference by other persons?’ Two Concepts of Liberty. An Inaugural lecture Delivered before the University of Oxford

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the Nazi regime. The shockwaves associated with this tragedy sustained a ‘never again’ mentality throughout international community. That the nations comprising this community had allowed for such gross violations to occur against any one single individual, let alone an entire race of people, fostered a collective sense of disgust. Moreover, a collective fear emerged with the realization that individuals, conceptualized as part of a universal moral community, could be so denigrated and treated in such a wholly unlawful and inhumane manner. The Holocaust highlighted the vulnerability of the human experience and the particular role that unfettered power, in the hands of evil, could sustain. Consequently, there was an overarching sense of urgency during this period to document the idea of human rights and create a structure which would protect the individual and highlight the inherent sanctity of life itself. As a direct result of this idea, The Universal Declaration of Human Rights came into being in December 1948.32 This initiative was lead by Eleanor Roosevelt at the behest of the newly formed United Nations.33 It drew, in an informal manner, on the modern traditions of natural rights and natural law.34 This tradition ensured the dominance of a subjective ontology, previously discussed in Chapter 4.35 Moreover, the overt influence of international law at that particular moment in time ensured a highly legalistic interpretation of the individual. This particular notion of the individual is well documented in the Introduction of this work, and takes the particular shape of the cosmopolitan, rights-bearing agent.36 Because rights discourses and cosmopolitan discourses share a similar developmental history many of the critiques of the latter are equally applicable to the former. In particular, human rights discourse, much like their cosmopolitan relatives, suffer from the criticisms of impartiality, universality and imperialism.37 However, what on October 31, 1958 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), 169. This idea is likewise documented in Middleton (2005) and Jung (2002). 32  The Declaration of Human Rights. 33 A detailed description of the role the Eleanor Roosevelt played is provided by Mary Ann Glendon, A World Made New: Eleanor Roosevelt and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (USA: Random House USA Inc., 2003). 34  Tierney, 2001. 35  Brett, 1997. 36  See again Rawls, 1999; Beitz, 1978; Pogge, 2002. 37  The idea of human rights, in and of themselves, is critiqued by Chris Brown, Universal human rights: a critique, The International Journal of Human Rights, 1 no. 2 (1997), 41–65. Neil Stammers’s article, A critique of social approaches to human rights, Human Rights Quarterly, 17 (1995), 488–508, argues against the universality of rights, and pays particular attention to the detrimental role that social relations of power within the state exhibit. Writing from a feminist perspective, V. Spike Jones investigates the influence of particular ideas of human nature and the ontological assumptions they bring to bear on normative conceptions of politics; see Whose rights? A critique of the ‘givens’ in human rights discourse, Alternatives, 15 no. 3 (1990), 303–344. Finally, Makau Mutua provides a glimpse of the imperial and cultural critiques which one can locate in the discourses of human

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ought to be highlighted at this point is the virtuous intentions of the document itself. The Declaration sought to protect each and every person from the tyranny of oppression and guard the sacrosanct right to life. It coalesced around a common understanding of, and commitment to, the dignity and respect for the value of life itself.38 Having noted this original benevolence, one must also be noted that the idea of a rights discourse is not without its problems. The implications of a legal framework of rights is noted by Chris Brown. He highlights the lack of an ontological foundation for rights in their contemporary conception. Rights are a by-product of a particular understanding of political society which, he claims, is guided by the rule of law and draws a sharp distinction between ‘the state,’ ‘civil society’ and ‘family.’ Furthermore, it is an institutional design which clearly demarcates the public and private realms of human engagement.39 Brown’s critique of human rights finds a degree of synergy with the key argument of this work. While he would most likely challenge the natural law approach articulated herein, his description of the rights-bearing individual, and the problems of rights in and of themselves, finds a sympathetic audience within this text in as much as it challenges the notion of a public realm of politics and the image of the individual as a rights-bearing subject. It takes this argument one step further however, challenging the overt absence of non-instrumental relationships which, it is claimed, provide key support to the development of moral beings. Likewise, this work champions the idea that the ‘private’ realm might influence, in a positive fashion, politics. It concludes, much like Brown, that this understanding of ‘the political’ is disjointed and, ultimately, lacks a unified concept of what it is to be a social, moral, and political being. Costa Douzinas’s work, The End of Human Rights, Critical and Legal Thought at the End of the Century picks up on the centrality of law in political society as highlighted by Brown. Douzinas—an international lawyer—is extremely critical of the human rights regime and the goals which it seeks to further. He adopts a postmodern point of view and through the language of psychoanalysis points out that the modern human rights discourse has done nothing but dismember the image of what it is to be a human being. He writes: Becoming a legal subject denies in a similar fashion, as we saw, the bodily wholeness of the person and replaces it with partial recognitions and incomplete entitlements. Rights by their nature cannot treat the whole person; this is the reason why no right to rights exists. Such a right would be the right of a person to be himself or herself, a unique human being in common with others, a right rights in her work Human Right: A Political & Cultural Critique (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2002). These are but some of the problems associated with contemporary human rights discourses; more will feature throughout this section. 38  Rhona K.M. Smith, Textbook on International Rights (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003), 205. 39  Brown, 1997.

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In the end, the idea of rights, he claims, ought to function as a critique of law and politics. If they are to function as a measure of human development and wellbeing the ultimate ends which rights seek must be reimagined and articulated in an alternative fashion. Contemporary scholars of international relations, aware of this ontological problem, have turned their attention to theories of human nature. An examination of moral and philosophical accounts of human nature provide, they claim, the otherwise absent foundational account of human dignity. Such an account can guard against rights violations. This idea is well documented by Jack Donnelly. He argues that an examination of an individual’s capability for deliberation, reflection and action identifies them as being worthy of moral considerations.41 Yet, as Dunne and Wheeler point out, this defense does not sufficiently counter the argument put forward by Brown. They argue that turning to natural law or natural rights theories, in order to gain moral foundations for rights, does not engender an acceptable account of human nature.42 Their critique is supported by the ideas of Robert Pasnau whose work exists within the intersection of Aquinas’s moral theology and the idea of human nature. He highlights the artificiality of human dignity, and demonstrates that it the created ends of human practice. In other words, dignity derived from human nature is a material, and not an ethereal, creation.43 Consequently, it can, when needed, be cast aside or even destroyed. In a similar fashion, Bhikhu Parekh challenges the idea of dignity within the rights discourse. He writes: Human beings do not have dignity in the way that they have eyes and ears. It is a human practice, something they choose to confer on themselves and each other because of their mutual acknowledgment of their uniquely shared capacities. They have dignity because they have capacities which non-humans do not have and which they consider so significant as to make them the basis of an appropriate and moral practice.44 40 Costa Douzinas, The End of Human Rights, Critical and Legal Thought at the Turn of the Century (Oxford: Hart Publishing, 2000), 335. 41  Jack Donnelly, International Human Rights (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1993), 21. 42  Tim Dunne and Nicholas J. Wheeler, Introduction: human rights and the fifty years’ crisis, in Human Rights in Global Politics, Tim Dunne and Nicholas J. Wheeler, eds (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 1–28. 43  Pasnau, 2002. 44  Bhikhu Parekh, Non-ethnocentric universalism, Human Rights in Global Politics, Tim Dunne and Nicholas J. Wheeler, eds (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 147.

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Dignity relates both to the rational capacities of the individual and the social roles to which they conform as legal entities within the state. It is insufficient for the task at hand: namely, protecting the welfare and development of individuals throughout the world. Dignified human beings provide a telling example of the dislocated and partial construction of the person within Douzinas’s examination of human rights. It speaks to a misunderstanding of what it is to be a moral and social being in much the same way that MacIntyre’s critique of the Enlightenment project criticizes modern notions of morality.45 He, like Douzinas, locates in the language of rights an absence of historical ideas which, as Chapter 2 described, are necessary if individuals want to understand why they fulfill certain roles in society. Douzinas calls for a reimagination of the ends of human rights ideas in order to address this shortcoming. On the other hand, MacIntyre locates his faith in the notion of traditions. Traditions, he claims, provide moral meaning for agency. Traditions function, within this account, much like the role ascribed to non-instrumental relations within a natural law institutional design. They instruct agents, outline habitual moral action and provide an articulated end which unifies individuals. On the other hand, the liberal rights scholar claims that dignity provides an understanding of what it is to be a fulfilled rights-bearing agent. Moreover, if one recalls Donnelly’s argument, dignity when accompanied by a moral and ethical interpretation of human nature can bridge the gap which emerges in a society of isolated individuals. The ability to deliberate, and act, morally implies on some level a reciprocal recognition of ethical treatment in individuals’ relations with one another.46 The concept of mutuality and relationality, however, is otherwise absent from a liberal account of institutional design and is noted by Onora O’Neill. She describes a culture of recipience wherein individuals are unable to grasp the inherent relationship of rights and duties. In the contemporary climate, she notes, individuals are well aware of their particular rights, but fail to grasp the inherent duties and obligations which accompany them. As she writes: The Declaration approaches justice by proclaiming rights. It proclaims what is to be received, what entitlements everyone is to have; but it says very little about which agents and agencies must do what if these rights are to be secured. Like other charters and declarations of rights, the Universal Declaration looks at justice from the recipient’s perspective: its focus is on recipience and rights rather than on action and obligation.47

O’Neill’s account of recipience provides one final analysis of the isolated state of individuals in contemporary notions of political society. As befits her Kantian 45  MacIntyre, 1981. 46  Donnelly, 1993, 21. 47  O’Neill, 2001, 183.

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framework, her proposed response to this phenomenon is an examination of the correlative individual duties and obligations, What ought to be drawn from this critique, however, is the manner in which the dignified, yet isolated, conception of the individual also has a bearing on the development of political communities. Such individuals are unable to relate to each other as ethical and moral beings. Consequently, liberal institutional designs remain challenged by the self-interested nature of human beings who are unaware of their inherent need for other people in order to thrive as moral beings. Human Rights: A Natural Law Response Throughout this work has been proposed the idea of a relational politics which highlights the possibility of capable individuals, acting as agents of justice, in order to affect political change. Moreover, it offered the particular methodological skill of casuistry as one means of achieving this particular vision. The examination of human rights, as an idea for well-being and development, as documented above, provides the perfect locus to demonstrate how this notion can come to be. Having identified the lack of relationality and mutuality within the traditional liberal idea of human rights, and rights-bearing agents, this section returns to the work of one particular natural law scholar, Jacques Maritian, in order to demonstrate an alternative natural law response to the above-noted problems. The works of Maritian outline how, in theory, the idea of rights can inform a casuistry of well-being within which agents can deliberate in order to engage with the wider problem of human suffering. This section draws on his original writings that are associated with the development of the Declaration in order to demonstrate how a casuistry of rights, premised on practical reason, can emerge. It then links this idea to the previously discussed ideas of the New Natural Lawyers (NNL) in order to establish a viable moral taxonomy for individuals who are conceptualized as moral agents. It concludes by way of an examination of the premodern just warrior in order to argue that the moral habits of love and charity are better situated to guide moral agency. Jacques Maritain was a key member of the original United Nations Economic and Social Committee (UNESCO) which was responsible for the development of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.48 What is instructive at this point, 48  Jacques Maritain represents one scholar, out of many, writing about the natural law in both a historical and contemporary form. Other scholars, whose work is cited throughout this work, include Etienne Gilson, Yves R. Simon, and Mortimer J. Alder. It was a continuation of the modern debate concerning the preeminence of epistemology to the detriment of ontology, leading to the contemporary problem of ‘being.’ Each of these authors sought to redress this problem in their own particular way. Maritain is of intrinsic importance here because he professed the value of a Thomist interpretation, beyond the historical understanding of his work, and sought, throughout his lifetime, to develop a contemporary philosophical interpretation of the works of Aquinas to analyze contemporary

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for the development of a casuistry of well-being, is to look beyond the completed document to the discussions and ideas which preceded its legal formalization. For Maritain, and his collaborators, human rights reflected a combination of knowledge, both theoretical and practical, and emphasized the equal capacity all individuals have for reasonableness. Reasonableness, it was claimed, facilitated the ability of individuals, regardless of their geographic location in the global community, to understand the vulnerability of the human condition. To go beyond this claim and provide a foundational account for rights was, according to Maritian, a fruitless endeavor. Writing on this matter he claims the following: It would doubtless not be easy, but it would be possible, to establish a common formulation of these practical conclusions or, in other words, of the different rights recognized as pertaining to the human being, in his personal and social existence. On the other hand, it would be quite hopeless to look for a common rational justification of those practical conclusions and of those rights.49

This statement challenges many of the desires of contemporary institutional designs which, as this work has demonstrated, seek longevity through static institutional structures. As Maritian’s writings reveal, rights ought to be construed as fluid and dynamic entities. This would facilitate the possibility of reinterpretation in order to achieve two interrelated ends of casuistry: namely, the assimilation of newly acquired information leading to a unified vision of well-being and development articulated through the formation of the community. As Jonsen and Toulmin’s work on casuistry reveals, this methodology only functions when it can properly assimilate new information within pre-existing moral frameworks.50 For the framers of the Declaration, knowledge played a key role both in structuring a framework of rights and providing an account of how this framework could, in theory, become universally accepted. At an individual level, the ability to learn moral and ethical responses to the plight of others is well documented in the writings of Gandhi to Maritain. Individuals learn, on the knee of their mother, what it is to experience love and care and to reciprocate in turn. Gandhi claims that this is a universal experience which goes on to instruct agents on their larger roles in the community.51 Moreover, it provides a framework problems. See for example, John F.X. Kansas, ed., Jacques Maritain: the Man and His Metaphysics, [Vol. IV of Etudes maritainiennes/Maritain Studies] (Mishawaka, IN: American Maritain Association, 1988). He was, in his own way, involved in the task of institutional design. 49  Jacques Maritain, 1947. 50  Jonsen and Toulmin, 1988. 51  Mahatha Gandhi, A Letter Addressed to the Director-General of UNESCO, Human Rights, Comments and Interpretations. A symposium edited by UNESCO with an introduction by Jacques Maritain. The United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization, eds (London & New York: Allan Wingate, 1948), 3–4.

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within which to assimilate one’s experiences, both positive and negative. There is, within this account, a degree of symmetry with the feminist avocations of care ethics within the political; however, very quickly it moves beyond the local and anecdotal in order to demonstrate how knowledge can also address the cultural disparities which sustain the cultural critique of liberal human rights agendas. The contributions of Arnold J. Lien to the development of the Declaration prove insightful at this particular juncture.52 He, like his contemporaries, was actively engaged in the task of institutional design. His work, however, is unique because it highlights the self-interested nature of both individuals and states in the newly emerging post-WWII world order. He is aware of the political stakes involved in the development of a rights-based institution. What his contribution to Maritian’s edited text reveals, however, is the instrumental role that knowledge can play in bringing together myriad individuals who constitute the world community. He begins his vision at the individual level and notes how, through the accumulation and assimilation of knowledge, the individual wills of particular individuals can become increasingly linked through an accepted idea of the common good. He writes: Education seems to be the only key that can release the creative energies of the individual for the new era. Self-interest is the force of gravity which draws individuals together. That is the force on which the new order must be built. As individuals grow in knowledge, understanding and wisdom, their perspectives will be more complete, their horizons wider and their vision clearer. Their selfinterest will find itself on ever higher levels until it ultimately coincides with the common interest of all.53

There is, within this particular account of human agency, a synergy not only with Maritian’s idea of rights, but also with the previously examined ideas of E.B.F. Midgely.54 Both Lien and Midgely premise their accounts of institutional design within the traditional demarcations of world order. They accept the demarcation of order within the state and the anarchy which exists outside its borders. Whereas Midgley focuses on the particular role of governmental institutions in light of their capabilities within an account of global governance, Lien focuses on how individuals, engaging in relationships, can come to understand the particular nuances of individuals living within their own particular local community. Whereas Midgley points to the principle of subsidiarity to guide the best-placed state to act in the face of human suffering, Lien’s interpretation reveals how an account 52  Arnold J. Lien, A fragment of thoughts concerning the nature and the fulfilment of human rights, Human Rights, Comments and Interpretations. A symposium edited by UNESCO with an introduction by Jacques Maritain, The United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization, ed. (London & New York: Allan Wingate, 1948), 11–18. 53  Lien, 1948. 54  Midgely, 1975.

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of moral agency, like that offered in Chapter 4, can empower agents because it facilitates the acquisition of knowledge of the other. The role given to knowledge in Lien’s interpretation of order demonstrates some synergies with the original idea of natural dominion, discussed in Chapters 3 and 4. The cognitive capacities of the individuals are of intrinsic importance. These capacities not only sustain an account of human equality, but also indicate, through the reciprocal obligations of love and care, the possibility of human agency and the ability of individuals to contribute and engage with casuistic political structures. There is, within a casuistry of well-being, a very real sense of renewal. As individuals experience the world around them—that is to say, engage in relationships—they acquire new information about themselves and others. This is part and parcel of a natural law interpretation of ‘the political.’ This idea, moreover, is routinely expressed in the original notion of human rights. As Maritian points out: No declaration of the rights of man can ever be exhaustive and final. It must always be expressed in terms of the state of the moral conscience and of civilization at any given moment in history. And it is just for this reason that, since the considerable success achieved at the end of the eighteenth century by the first written declarations, it has always been a matter of major interest for men to renew these declarations from age to age.55

Rights, on this conception, are not absolute. Consequently, they do not require the ontological support which, as Brown and Douzinas note, is otherwise absent. Instead, rights, ought to be conceptualized as second-order normative claims which, in light of their renewable quality, reveal an important relationship with both theoretical and practical reason. This interpretation is at odds with the legal codification of rights within international politics and reflects instead a fluidity and dynamism which supports the teleological moral development of natural law agents. Moreover, such a normative structure can accommodate the disparate political practices within particular communities sustained within an accepted account of ‘the international.’ The relationship of ‘the international’ and this casuistry of well-being ought to become increasingly clear. Within ‘the international’ the absolute ends of goodness are accepted by those who work within this account of the community. This structure then goes on to facilitate the development of a casuistry of well-being which reflects the accepted absolute, all the while acknowledging the freedom and autonomy of particular individuals and cultures to achieve this end. This plurality and diversity grows in importance in the final section of this chapter which reveals an account of ‘the personal’ which brings together the previously offered idea of ‘the international,’ the possibility of coordinated individual agency and the potential for a natural law interpretation of politics within IR. 55  Maritain, 1947.

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A Casuistry of Well-being A casuistry of well-being which draws on the original idea of human rights begins with the expression of human vulnerability. As the Introduction to this work, along with Chapters 1 and 2 document, as human beings our shared vulnerabilities, which originate in both the contingent and inexplicable events of human life, are some of the most basic, and shared, human experiences. A desire to engage with this vulnerability in an ethical framework finds its expression in the potential for moral goodness. This potential is central to our natural dominion and accompanies, as was noted in Chapter 4, our capacity for practical reason. These ideas are represented in the idea of human equality which holistically represents the central assumptions of the natural law tradition. If one accepts these assumptions, the absolute and inviolable moral standard which prefaces a casuistry of well-being is expressed as follows: that good is to be done and evil avoided.56 Human relationships, both in their instrumental and non-instrumental form, coalesce around this absolute and provide a second-order normative structure which informs, and guides, moral agency. Drawing on the previously examined letter that Gandhi wrote to Maritain, this structure is visible in the most informal manner within the family.57 Parental authority provides the rules within which children develop and learn their social roles which allow them to participate, in a positive way, to the institutions of the community. On the other hand, an instrumental framework of rules is provided by MacIntyre’s examination of social structures and agency. In his 1999 article he notes that individuals exist within a state of tension and it is the ethical individual who exercises practical reason and, drawing on personal knowledge of moral and ethical expectations, evaluates pre-existing structures in order to determine an appropriate moral response to a particular situation.58 The foremost natural law expression of such a normative framework was described in Chapter 2.59 The NNL provide an account of the ‘requirements of practical reasonableness,’ which are eight standards by which individual agents can judge the soundness of their actions.60 Agents are provided a list of eight criteria—a coherent plan of life; detachment and commitment; no arbitrary preferences amongst values, no arbitrary preferences amongst persons; the (limited) relevance of consequences: efficiency, within reason; efficiency in pursuing the definite goals which we adopt 56  Finnis, et al., 1987. 57  Gandhi, 1948. 58  MacIntyre, 1999. 59 One could, at this point, also use the works of Nussbaum and her capabilities approach. As Chapter 2 revealed, this idea reflects an Aristotelian natural morality that is related to a natural law morality. It too displays some problems which were previously noted. In particular, her emphasis on a pre-social individual drawn from the works of John Rawls would be problematic in light of the argument being made in this concluding chapter. However, the parallels between her capabilities and the requirements of practical reason ought to be noted. See for example Nussbuam, 2000, 1999, 1997–1998. 60  Finnis, et al., 1987.

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for ourselves and in avoiding the definite harms which we choose to regard as unacceptable; respect for every basic value in every act; the requirements of the common good; following one’s conscience—in order to determine whether or not their actions are in line with the ends of natural law morality.61 The NNL, as Chapter 2 revealed, used the moral absolute in combination with the requirements of practical reason in order to protect individuals from the threats posed by a nuclear deterrent security policy.62 This work, in and of itself, embodies a casuisitic reasoning process and reveals how ethically informed agents, in this instance, two theologians and an international lawyer/ethicist, engage in the evaluation of political practices in order to determine their unsound nature. As Chapter 2 revealed, their investigation of a nuclear deterrent strategy guided by the ‘requirements of practical reasonableness’ revealed a political strategy which violated the requirement of life. Consequently, Mutually Assured Destruction and City Swapping, two key elements of a Cold War defense policy, were declared immoral. The conclusions of the New Natural Lawyers demonstrate the immorality of nuclear deterrence as a security strategy and the critical possibility of natural law morality. Moreover, the methodological and epistemological assumptions which frame this investigation reveal a particular role of natural law morality with in the structures of international politics; however, the absence of teleological assumptions with the works of the New Natural Lawyers, which were examined in Chapter 2, remain a problem. Nuclear Deterrence, Morality and Realism remains heavily influenced by the procedural methodology associated with a rights-based tradition of politics. Consequently, it is difficult to locate within this structure the teleological and perfectionist ends associated with the morality of natural law. This problem can, however, be addressed and, in the process, the value of this normative structure can be revealed. In the same vein as Maritian’s account of rights, these requirements focus on the fragility of human life and its need for protection and provide an interesting framework for a casuistry of well-being if, and only if, accompanied by the idea of the natural law agent described in Chapters 3 and 4. Such an agent moves beyond the problems of the cosmopolitan rights-bearing subject and reveals a predisposition to use their conscience. One’s conscience, as Chapter 3 described, reflects the combination of theoretical and practical knowledge of any single individual. It facilitates a structured use of practical reason in order to engage as moral agents. The role that is proscribed to an agent’s conscience reinvigorates the teleology of natural law morality and the perfectionist ends which it espouses. It reflects the key relationship between the will and the intellect and renews the most basic first principles of natural law morality. In addition, this symbiotic relationship between the intellect and the will mirrors that of the individual within the community. They are mutually constitutive entities which reinforces individual values within the wider community, thus facilitating a parallel second-order normative framework, in other words, a casuistry of well-being. 61  Grisez, 1983, 124. 62  Finnis, et al., 1987

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For this very reason only the natural law agent will suffice within this account of casuistry. The agent is the locus in which the first principles of natural law morality will root themselves in the community, facilitated, in the first instance, by the non-instrumental relationships of being. Moreover, it is these relationships which go on to structure the community and it is only within this particular conception of the community that such an account of casuistry will function. In order to make this point clear it is helpful to incorporate, at this point, the works of Darren Cole. Cole’s work examines the ethics of Aquinas in order to grapple with the problem of ethical warfare. He writes that Aquinas was not against the use of war as a political tool and pointed out that some political orders can be so at odds with the ends of peace that it was the duty of Christian princes to engage in war. What made such a practice acceptable are the loving intentions which motivate war. Within the obligations of love rested the possibility of virtuous warfare and the added benefit of the charitable soldier. What Cole’s work highlights, and what is particularly important at this juncture, is how soldiers developed the necessary habits to wage war in an ethical manner. His examination of the relationship of moral practice and customary rules of engagement is insightful in light of the casuistry of well-being being articulated in this work. It provides individuals with the necessary training in ethical deliberation to use in times of moral tension. Agents, Cole points out, learn moral practices within a master-slave type of relationship. What it represents, however, is an awareness of relationships of power and authority and the responsibilities that powerful individuals have towards other, less able and knowledgeable beings. Within the context of non-instrumental relationships the beloved is instructed by the lover in the expected moral habits of the community. Within these relationships there is a reciprocal role for the beloved to inform the lover of his or her own unique desires and characteristics. This reciprocality is less easily discerned within the more formal political relationships of power and authority. Within this structure, as highlighted by Cole, individuals are instructed on their wider political cum moral behavior. What they reveal is that through relationships, in both their instrumental and non-instrumental formations, individuals develop an awareness of the moral absolutes which are inviolable and structure a moral taxonomy. They are, in other words, absolute. Cole also identifies a secondary ordering of rules which are open to interpretation and rely heavily on the conscientious deliberations of the agent in order to determine the best course of action, at a particular moment in time. For soldiers, these secondary rules apply in times of war. The theater of war remains an unpredictable environment in which soldiers, acting as agents of justice, will face tough moral challenges. The rigorous training they receive at the hands of their superiors ought to facilitate a degree of independent thought and action which accommodates previously unexperienced situations which may, at times, require breaking the rules while keeping the spirit of the moral absolute firmly in place. This account, provided by Cole, highlights the centrality of human conscience in lieu of rigid rules and standard operating procedures. He writes:

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In summation, we can say that training rules are a means of developing excellence in a practice, but excellence in a practice cannot be reduced to any set of rules; thus, as excellence grows, so does the freedom to depart from the formative rules by which the skill was nurtured.63

One can draw parallels between the notion of virtuous warfare and the requirements of practical reasonableness. Absent the natural law agent, these requirements reflect the rigidity of codified rules which protect the individual. They are inviolable. This fails to accommodate the contingent factors of being human in common, which can challenge our understanding and response to instances of human suffering. This inability to react appropriately antagonizes the pre-existing potential for tragedy within the political. On the other hand, the provision of the natural law individual, conceptualized as a morally trained habitual agent of justice, provides a required flexibility and autonomy in situations of acute suffering. One’s conscience facilitates the integration of previously unavailable knowledge and provides adaptable responses to the needs of the suffering other, and in so doing responds to situations of tragedy with previously unavailable nuance and subtlety. The thematic undertone of Cole’s work is the virtue of charity. Charity, he notes, is the embodiment of love, which is a view that reflects many of the claims made in Chapter 4. It articulates the obligation, on the part of the agent, to engage with others in order to develop both as individuals and within the community. This theme of charitable agency reveals key parallels between Cole’s account of virtuous warfare and the casuistry of well-being. Both the ensuing parallels and divergences are instructive in order to conclude this description of a casuistry of well-being. Both accounts articulate a vision of the individual who is actively interested in the well-being of another thereby facilitating a relational component within the political. Within the theater of war this relationality is used to justify the use of violence in order to achieve peace. A natural law institutional design uses this relationality in order to understand the need for the community in order to develop as moral beings. The ends of both of these explanations is therefore similar: to achieve the ends of ‘the good.’ Similarly, both accounts of charitable agency proscribe to a particular interpretation of being political which is founded on the social and moral ontology of Aquinas’s political writings. For Cole, the virtuous soldier challenges the assumption which claims that in times of war the laws are silent. He invokes an ethical casuistry premised on the development of moral habits guiding the individual actions of soldiers in times of moral crisis. This moral training is likewise reflected in the account of the natural law agent who, as this chapter reveals, employs a casuistry of well-being in order to identify sites of moral failure, or human suffering, in order to engage as a loving reasonable being. The particular value of this agent rests on the reasonable use of his or her conscience in order to reinvigorate the teleological ends of natural law goodness. One’s conscience, 63  Cole, 1999, 69.

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as was previously described, caters to the original freedom and autonomy of the individual who is, on this account, best able to engage with other, similarly constituted, beings. This engagement sustains social learning and the ongoing renewal of casuistical structures within the community. As a whole these different component parts reveal the original intentions of a rights-based discourse which was espoused by the UNESCO team, and which could, potentially, accommodate diversity within the theatre of international politics. The distinctions which exist within Cole’s account of virtuous warfare and the natural law account of institutional design emerge only in light of the different practices used to exemplify the arguments being made. Whereas Cole chooses to focus on the nature of warfare, and engage with the tradition of just war, this work begins with an account of individual moral agency in order to demonstrate the moral potential of individuals to affect political change. It locates this account of agency within a particular depiction of ‘the political’ which draws on the natural law interpretation of the community. It then broadens this interpretation as it engages with the ideas of world order in order to demonstrate the viability of an international institutional design premised on the assumptions of natural law. It describes the theater of international politics with reference to the metaphysical idea of ‘the international’ in order to argue that an open-ended and unbounded account of international politics will facilitate alternative forms of agency outside the boundaries of the state. ‘The international,’ it is argued, reflects in the broadest of terms, the coalescing of individual wills focused on the absolute ends of moral goodness and provides the necessary structural arrangements within which to situate a casuistry of well-being within international politics and engage with the vulnerabilities of being human, in common. It invokes an important role for non-instrumental relationships, alongside the instrumental relationships of power and authority, in order to facilitate knowledge beyond the local and facilitate the constant renewal of natural law morality. It moves beyond the jus ad bellum requirements of the just war tradition, aware of the fact that the virtuous soldier is one example of the natural law agent in practice, and focuses instead on the natural law agent, who could be any person at any particular point in time. This change of focus furthers the idea that individuals, conceptualized as agents of justice, can facilitate political change outside traditional sites of power and authority when provided with the requisite structures for moral and political agency. While the structure and methodology has been provided it remains to be determined exactly how the necessary knowledge will be acquired. Such is the final focus of this concluding chapter. Establishing ‘the Personal’ The Politics of Influence In Chapter 1 this work provided a summary critique of modern political thought. It drew on the writings of Stephen Toulmin, in particular Cosmopolis, in order

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to identify some parallel themes evident in post-Enlightenment thinking which challenge current ethico-political normative accounts of international politics.64 This work openly acknowledged that the concept of ‘modern political thought’ is a contested one and therefore looked to a variety of interpretations in order to highlight the themes which it sought to address.65 It serves as a useful reminder to highlight these themes one again. In the first instance, it highlighted a subjective turn in political philosophy which denied to the individual the authority to interpret the political world. This authority, as described in the works of Hobbes, was placed in the hands of the governing authority.66 Acceptable political behavior, and moral discourse in general, was likened to a legal discourse of right and wrong which proscribed a course of action for all individuals, conceptualized as political subjects.67 This subjective ontology was traced throughout the social contract tradition and the relationship that the social contract tradition bears with the negative discourse of liberty was debated.68 This in turn led to the unfolding of an isolated individual within the community which in turn generated a discourse of self-sufficiency, perhaps best noted in the writings of Immanuel Kant.69 These themes, the subject of Chapter 1, are all present in the various investigations of modernity presented at the outset of this work. Each, in their own way, documents the challenge of individuals, conceptualized as agents of justice, to react to situations of political and moral tension and, as reasonable beings, to address it. While this work has sought to remedy this particular picture of ‘the political’ by providing a natural law account of institutional design it has yet to demonstrate how one single individual can affect wholesale political change. In order to broach this final theme it is instructive to turn, one final time, the writings of Toulmin. Cosmopolis identified a social malaise which prompted a series of institutional designs which loosely coalesce within the title of modernity. These interpretations, as Chapter 1 described, influenced contemporary social and political structures. Toulmin’s original works reflect upon this malaise and conclude by noting how there is, in contemporary political societies, a similar discontent which must be addressed. He proposes his own institutional design—an ecology of institutions– which articulates one mode of future political engagement. This design highlights the centrality of individual choice and parallels many of the arguments of a natural law approach. He echoes the ideas of Dallmayr when he calls on agents, who are aware of this unrest, to engage in the development of new and alternative political ideas in order to voice their political discontent.70 He offers a tempered account of political change; however, Toulmin is also aware of the equal possibility that 64  65  66  67  68  69  70 

Toulmin, 1990. See Toulmin, 1990. Macpherson, 1964 and 1974. Onuf, 1998. MacIntyre, 1981. Hobbes, 1961a. d’Entreves, 1956. See for example, Berlin, 2002. Beitz, 1979. Suganami, 1986. Rorty, 1980. Dallmayr, 1996.

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individuals will, in the face of possible change, do nothing. His summary of individual political capabilities provides the first of many parallels of his, and a natural law’s, call to agency. Similarly, his hopeful, albeit realistic, appraisal of human motivation recalls the social ontology of pre-modern natural law individuals which complements his multidisciplinary framework within which agents can engage with one another as reasonable beings. Toulmin’s ecology of institutions chooses to focus on the possibility of change. He provides an account of future agency which envisions a decreasing role for the state as the primary actor in international politics. The focus of future institutional design ought not to be power, understood within the traditional relationships of security and authority associated with a Westphalian account of international order. Instead, like the Lilliputian characters of Gulliver’s Travels, institutional change, he claims, will be the result of political influence. Individuals, working in concert, can challenge the primacy of the state, thus demonstrating alternative site of authority and modes of agency. Again the symmetry of this, and a natural law account, of politics is revealed. Single individuals, regardless of their capacity for moral agency, will remain daunted by the task of challenging the primacy of the political state; however, if they are able to act in concert, the possibility of alternative modes of agency generating the necessary momentum and influence becomes a distinct possibility. In this final section the idea of ‘the personal’ is proposed. It functions, much like Toulmin’s ecology of institutions linking the proposed ideas of ‘the international’ and a casuistry of well-being, because it provides the necessary unity of human purpose which, the argument claims, unites individuals. This unity of purpose not only sustains the original natural law community, but it invigorates the ends of ‘goodness’ within the wider realm of international politics. In order to establish the conception of ‘the personal,’ the works of John MacMurray, as opposed to feminist interpretations of ‘the personal,’ will be drawn on.71 MacMurray’s work finds symmetry with both feminist care ethics, outlined in Chapter 4, as well as the morality of natural law. All three share a relational ontology and emphasize the mutuality of the human experience. However, the particular value of MacMurray’s institutional design rests in the ideal of human fellowship which emerges from his account of the political community. As will be documented below, fellowship represents the bonds of love and mutual regard 71  MacMurray, 1953 and 1961. For feminist interpretations of ‘the personal,’ see for example, Iris Marion Young, Impartiality and the civic public: some implications of feminist critiques of moral and political theory, Praxis International, 5 no. 4 (1986), 381– 401; Tronto, 1993; Susan Okin, Women in Western Political Thought (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1978); Jean Elshtain, Public Man, Private Woman (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1981); Alison Jaggar, Human Nature and Feminist Politics (Totowa, NJ: Rowinan and Allenhled, 1983); Carole Pateman, Feminist critiques of the public/private dichotomy, in S.I. Benn and G.F. Gaus, eds, Public and Private in Social Life (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1983), 281–303.

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which, much like the virtue of charity and the reasonableness of love, provide an explanation for the unity of human purpose. It is this overarching potential for unity, couched within his notion of the political community, which exhibits a higher degree of synergy with a natural law account of being political. While moves have been made by feminist scholars, in particular Fiona Robinson and Sibyl A. Schwarzenbach, to address the challenge of parochialism, their responses are less in tune with the ends of natural law morality than those of MacMurray.72 The focus which scholars of care ethics place on the female political experience challenges the underlying natural dominion typical of natural law morality. An examination of MacMurray’s work alongside ‘the international’ facilitates the dissemination of information in the wider channels of the community. The potential for this knowledge-sharing emphasizes the natural equality of being which, when properly developed, provides the much needed sense of unity hinted at in Toulmin’s ecology of institutions. ‘The Personal’ John MacMurray is a theologian who, upon his return from WWII, found himself disillusioned by the social, political and religious structures which characterized British society. His work reflects a desire to regain his faith in humanity which, he went on to argue, is rooted in human relationships.73 His work does not feature prominently in the mainstream normative discourses of international politics although his relational approach has facilitated his being labeled, by those who have read his works, as a communitarian thinker.74 According to MacMurray, 72  Robinson, 1999. Her work features in Chapter 4. It details a phenomenological account of care which is then applied to the practice of humanitarian intervention in order to challenge many of the problems associated with its practice. For example, it challenges the military-based standard operating procedures in lieu of particular information which is culturally specific. Likewise, Sybil Schwarzenback draws on the Aristotelian idea of civic friendship in order to show how alternative notions of community, which stand in stark contrast to military-led initiatives, can offer alternative interpretations of agency and intervention. See for example: Sibyl A. Schwarzenbach, Civic friendship: a critique of recent care theory, Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy, 10 no. 2 (June 2007), 233–255; Sibyl A. Schwarzenbach, On civic Friendship, Ethics, 107 no. 1 (October 1996), 97–128. 73  His first Gifford Lecture, The Self as Agent, reflects the influence that Hobbes, Locke and Kant had on modern and contemporary interpretations of the political. This work informs his account of ‘the personal,’ but does not focus explicitly on persons in relations as his second Gifford Lecture does. It is important to note this relationship and the symmetry which exists between Volume 1 and the wider arguments of this work, but for the specific purposes of ‘the personal’ Volume 2 will be the primary focus owing to the concluding thoughts it offers on fellowship. 74 See for example, Sarah Hale, Professor MacMurray and Mr Blair: the strange case of the communitarian Guru that never was, Political Quarterly, 73 no. 2 (December

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individuals can not exist in isolation. It is anathema. Rather, individuals can only be conceptualized as one part of an ‘I’–‘You’ relationship. This relationality, which finds itself at odds with contemporary understandings of the political community, structures human engagement which go on to preface his account of agency. For MacMurray, much of the political can be understood with reference to agency as it facilitates an understanding of us both as subjects and objects. Through these roles individuals acquire knowledge—of persons as persons and persons as objects. Whereas the latter knowledge type refers to the scientific methodology associated with modern desires for purity and impartiality, the former knowledge type leads to the development of a ‘philosophy of the personal.’ A philosophy of the personal is premised on the ‘I’–‘You’ relationships of particular individuals. Each individual relationship is, according to MacMurray, both friendly and loving and reflects the mutual equality of all individuals. It is this interpretation of the individual, as a person in relation, which prefaces his account of the community. In its fullest realization the community reflects the interweaving of all possible pairings of relationships which, when positively aligned, reflect the ultimate realization of ‘the personal.’ ‘The personal,’ according to MacMurray, reflects the equality of all persons who engage with each other as loving beings. Consequently, the community reflects an atmosphere of mutual regard. It is this sense of community which provides MacMurray with a renewed sense of faith in humanity. It provides an interpretation of religion which reflects a devotion to the relational capabilities of individuals. Our love for one another, embodied in the mutual regard of the community, provides a foundational account for the ethical treatment of all human beings throughout the world. MacMurray’s account of religion finds its ultimate expression in the idea of communion. Communion, in this particular interpretation, reflects the abilities of individual to build communities. This expression of community is unlike the contemporary understanding of political society.75 Societies, according to MacMurray, are instrumental. They exist to constrain and control human behavior through the use of laws. Communities, on the other hand, facilitate human interaction in order to achieve the greatest possible extension of human relationships. The most successful expression of this idea is reflected in the ideal of human fellowship. Human fellowship represents the successful realization of the community. It sustains the ideal of human equality supported by a loving attitude reflected in 2002), 191–197. M. Bevir and D. O’Brien, From idealism to communitarianism: the inheritance and legacy of John MacMurray, History of Political Thought, 24 no. 2 (2003), 305–329. A more general overview of his influence is offered by Frank C. Kirkpatrick, John MacMurray: Community beyond Political Philosophy (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2005). 75 This is not a traditional rendition of ‘religion’ and it relates to MacMurray’s experiences during WWII. He became disillusioned not only with society, but also the manner in which religious institutions colluded in the wartime propaganda. With this in mind, MacMurray set out on a course of study which would reinvigorate his faith in humanity and provide him with an alternative understanding of religion within the community.

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a discourse of mutual regard. If ‘the personal’ is successfully adopted within the community, and this ideal is allowed to take root, the community is an empowering environment for individuals. Such an environment, according to MacMurray, ought to generate a series of knowledge sharing patterns. He articulates this idea in a discussion of mutual self-revelation. Individuals, as one part of a relationship, are called, in concert to reveal aspects of their personality and character. This revelation is conceptualized as a personal engagement. Such an engagement enlightens individuals of their united purpose, thereby sustaining the personal nature of the community while simultaneously extending the possibility of communion to other individuals. Human fellowship is instrumental in both MacMurray’s institutional design and the ends of natural law politics. It sustains both information generation and sharing and sustains human agency with a view to community building. As he writes: For the knowledge of one another, and so of ourselves, can be realized only through a mutual self-revelation; and this is possible only when we love one another. If we fear one another we must defend and hide ourselves. Moreover, since our knowledge of one another conditions all our activities, both practical and reflective, we find here the ultimate condition of all our knowing and of all our action.76

The transferring of knowledge is instrumental in both the philosophy of ‘the personal’ and a natural law account of ‘the personal.’ Both emphasize the need for knowledge sharing in order to achieve their particular aims and ends. MacMurray requires an understanding of mutual self-revelation in order to realize the ends of communion and the ideal of fellowship. A natural law account of being political likewise requires revelation in order to construct an appropriate casuistry of wellbeing. The personal nature of knowledge which is revealed when fellowship is achieved provides the necessarily nuanced interpretations of individual wellbeing. This information must remain couched within a wider understanding of the desired ends of human moral development. This practice, in and of itself, tends toward a further unity within the community. It reveals the positive benefits of shouldering the vulnerability of being human, in common. This practice, and its ensuing knowledge, has been difficult to achieve within standard accounts of international politics. Both Chapter 4, as wells as the previously drawn on ideas of Lien, noted the value of self-interested individuals seeking to preserve their own survival.77 Drawing on the works of MacMurray provides a means of overcoming the self-interested and egotistical motivations which challenge the development of fellowship. ‘The personal’ draws on this unifying potential of MacMurray’s 76  MacMurray, 1961, 212. 77  Lien, 1948.

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work. It notes the original loving intentions of the agent and the community alike and deepens these relationships, thus generating an atmosphere of love and charity which, it is hoped, tempers the vulnerability of a social existence. Knowledge, its acquisition, assimilation and wider dissemination are integral to this account of institutional design. As Chapter 4 demonstrated, sharing knowledge of a personal nature reveals the underlying intentions of agents. Moreover, the practice of self-revelations can help overcome the traditional security dilemma of international politics. Personal knowledge encourages the development of trust which can mitigate the negative consequences of anarchy.78 The possibility of a trusting international environment could potentially ease the strict demarcation of state territoriality, thereby providing an environment in which the unbounded assumptions of ‘the international’ would not fall on deaf ears. Within this environment states and individuals alike could be persuaded to move beyond their egotistical and self-interested natures.79 The philosophy of the personal reveals a further sense of purpose. Within this account of being political MacMurray identifies two different types of human relationships: direct and indirect. This distinction differentiates between those relationships which facilitate intimate engagements with others in lieu of more distant conceptualized relationships with ‘the other.’ This is not unlike the distant relationships of strangers which are broadly construed as ‘others’ within the discourses of normative international politics. Bounded accounts of international politics highlight centrality of the state, and the norm of non-intervention (in theory) into the affairs of states and the inability of empowered actors to come to the aid of others.80 His understanding of intention and action and how they both influence indirect personal relationships demonstrates how to address the territorial and geographical challenges of international politics and engagement. Normative interpretations of international relations, like the cosmopolitan and feminist interpretations previously examined, challenge this norm and identify instances when intervention is a feasible option.81 The added value of MacMurray’s philosophy of ‘the personal’ reveals how a relational interpretation of politics can engage with close neighbors and distant strangers alike. His understanding of 78  Baier, 1995. Rengger, 1997. 79 The self-interest and egoism of states referred to here is found in the realist accounts of politics featured in Chapter 1. See for example, Clausewitz, 1993; Morgenthau, 1973; Waltz, 1979; Walt, 1987; Mearsheimer, 2001. 80  A detailed examination of the centrality of the state is offered by Hobson, 2000. Also, an interesting examination of sovereignty and the state is offered by Robert H. Jackson, Quasi-states, dual regimes, and neoclassical theory: international jurisprudence and the Third World, International Organization, 41 no. 4 (Autumn 1987), 519–549. 81  The works of Charles Beitz, examined in Chapter 1, are instructive here. He shows how an economic role for political institutions, in light of human underdevelopment, can make a case for intervention in the affairs of states. See Beitz, 1979. This is but one of many accounts. Likewise, Robinson, 1999, and Schwarzenbach, 2007, are instructive in this practice.

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intention and action and its bearing on indirect personal relationships demonstrate how to address the territorial and geographical challenges of international political engagement. MacMurray is skeptical of the modern dichotomy of rational and reasonable knowledge. This skepticism not only informs his philosophy of the personal, but it also shapes his understanding of the individual and their capacity as a reasonable being. He locates the capacity for rationality not in the cognitive abilities of individuals, but in their capacity for agency. Action, in keeping with the desire to build communities, becomes the primary means of understanding the intentions of the agent, whereas theoretical deliberation is, for MacMurray, a secondary consideration. Underlying the theoretical and practical abilities of all individuals is an innate desire to develop communities. Consequently one can understand any individual’s intentions, either theoretical or practical, as tending toward the development of communities. This is the underlying absolute value which supports his entire institutional design. It affects his understanding of morality, which can only be but social, and it influences his interpretation of autonomy and freedom. They are linked to the actions and consequences of another’s agency. While this idea may initially seem quite limiting—indeed it challenges the isolationist tendencies of modern society—it is in fact, for MacMurray, quite the opposite. For MacMurray the personal represents a universal community of persons who demonstrate a reciprocal care for each other. This reciprocity is reflected, as MacMurray writes, in ‘a full realization of his capacity to act-for every person.’82 What it reveals is that the consequences of agency ought to support human freedom and development. This notion of freedom is the ultimate expression of relationality which prompts MacMurray’s faith in the ability of human agents to live together as moral and ethical beings. Furthermore, this notion of intentionality, when linked to the indirect relationships at an international level, reveals how ‘the personal’ can facilitate, within ‘the international,’ a wider sense of human purpose and unity needed to institutionalize the casuistry of well-being within the theater of international politics. What the philosophy of the personal indicates is that the problem of engaging with distant strangers is not a geographical one. Rather, it lies in the dissemination of knowledge which, as MacMurray reveals, is available to any individual. It can come on a personal level of engagement before agency or it can be revealed in a more indirect manner through the example of agency and the underlying intentions of the agent. The parochial problem of care ethics is easily sidestepped by MacMurray’s association of intention and indirect human agency. Such a relationship can be seen in a natural law framework as well. At this point the importance of any single individual’s commitment to the obligations of love is yet again revealed. It reveals the acceptance of a social and moral ontology by the agent and the ensuing commitment to the ends of moral goodness, supported by the moral absolute of natural law, and to do good and avoid evil. This commitment is discussed both 82  MacMurray, 1961, 159.

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by Outka83 and Grisez.84 They write that one’s commitment to the ends of love is reflected not in one particular action, but rather, in a series of repeated actions. This repetition, it is claimed, is indicative of the wider intentions of the natural law agent; namely, to engage within political institutions in order to generate a higher standard of moral development throughout the political community broadly conceived. While individuals within the local community benefit from a direct involvement in such institutional building practices, distant strangers, much like the indirect relationships described by MacMurray, can look at the intentions and ends of natural law agency. The manner in which a casuistry of well-being supports wellintentioned agency, and the way it incorporates both the intended and unintended consequences of agency in its wider framework, is indicative of the underlying intentions of agents, regardless of their territorial location. These intentions provide a starting point for human engagement. They can provide an initial sense of security and care within international politics which can potentially establish a wider sense of unity within the theater of international politics. MacMurray locates intention in one’s desire to form a community. At this point, a natural law account diverges slightly. Intention, on the part of the natural law agent, remains focused on the ends of ‘goodness.’ Consequently, one’s intentions are rooted in the obligations of love noted in Chapter 4 and are reflected in the normative casuistry of well-being previously articulated. Regardless of the direct or indirect nature of the relationships of particular agents, the node which links the wider web of relationships within the natural law community rests on an understanding of intention conceptualized as relational well-being. Like MacMurray’s philosophy of ‘the personal,’ the natural law interpretation of ‘the personal’ highlights the mutuality of the human experience. It draws on the original social ontology of pre-modern natural law in order to demonstrate how the moral development of one individual is intimately tied to the development of another. Consequently, the level of development that one individual can obtain rests explicitly on the development of others within the community. Therefore, moral development can only rise to the lowest common denominator within the community, broadly conceived. This idea of mutual moral development reflects the original equality noted in a commutative account of justice offered in Chapter 4. Moreover, mutual moral development provides an explanation for the original motivation for moral agency. It notes the self-interested benevolence of the natural law agent, but draws inter alia on the idea of Lien and Midgely in order to explain the wider motivations for action.85 While individuals may begin to act in order to achieve their own personal development, knowledge sharing caters to the ongoing sense of renewal which not only highlights the needs of others and includes these desire within a casuistry of well-being, it also generates symmetry between the needs of one and the needs of others. As indirect relationships become 83  Outka, 1972. 84  Grisez and Shaw, 1980. 85  Lien, 1948; Midgely, 1975.

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increasingly personal in nature they reveal to agents the similarity of their desires which deepens in turn the original motivations of goodness expressed within the morality of natural law. Engaging with Traditional International Relations The relationships of agency, ‘the international’ and ‘the personal’ provide a nuanced alternative to the ecology of institutions outlined by Toulmin. ‘The international’ creates the metaphysical space where the politics of influence can take hold. ‘The personal’ links individuals, both directly and indirectly, through their well-intentioned potential agency which, so the argument goes, facilitates relationships both directly and indirectly. The intentions of the agent provide the first level of engagement which begins to unite individuals in the shared ends of moral development. This, in turn, deepens the original relationship, thus facilitating the possibility of agency in concert. This unity of purpose, in the event of human suffering, empowers those agents who are best situated to act appropriately to engage with the vulnerabilities of being human. At times, this agency is an individual engagement and at other times it draws on the wider collective in order to achieve wider levels of institutional change. Such is the descriptive beginnings of the politics of influence. It recognizes that politics is moving beyond its conceptualization as a technical and theoretical activity which serves to constrain human behavior. The politics of influence draws on the objective description of the natural law agent in order to highlight the centrality of habitually moral practices. It engages with the casuistry of natural law in order to explain that at times proscribed rules and expectations will be unable to address the situation at hand. It provides the necessary flexibility and dynamism to accommodate the unpredictable outcomes of individuals living together, while it acknowledges that, at times, moral luck can have a direct bearing on the moral potential of individuals. Relationships, in their non-instrumental and instrumental formation, provide the much needed moral training to facilitate this flexibility on the part of the agent. Not only do they educate individuals on the proscribe expectations of love and charity, they provide unique information. This information is pertinent to the particular situation and can facilitate dynamic action; however, it also contributes to the further renewal of the rules which are part and parcel of an ethical casuistry. The autonomy of the agent which is evident in this account of political influence tends to challenge the depiction of a scientific explanation of politics. It acknowledges the ‘the art of politics’ which, as Lisa Sowle Cahill claims, blends the creative energies and reasonable capacities of individuals.86 It is an interpretation of ‘the political’ which finds resonance in the writings A.P. d’Entreves.87 He, like 86 Lisa Sowle Cahill, Love Your Enemies: Discipleship, Pacifism, and Just War Theory (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1994). 87  A.P. d’Entreves, Aquinas: Selected Political Writings, J.G. Dawson, trans. (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1959).

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Cahill, challenges the technicality of law and politics, and argues for an account of politics which engages with the willing, reasonable and purposeful agent. This typology finds resonance in the distinction of Hollis and Smith which recognizes in the wider realm of international politics both a descriptive and explanatory interpretation of international relations.88 The normative account of international politics which has emerged throughout this work demonstrates how natural law morality can facilitate an understanding of the events of international politics. Having located a latent natural law influence within international relations in Chapter 2, this work has gone on to provide an account of international politics which draws on the assumptions of natural law morality.89 It argues that natural law bridges the theoretical distinction, proposed by Brown, between cosmopolitan and communitarian moral frameworks.90 It locates, in the pre-modern assumptions of natural law morality, a symbiotic and mutually rewarding relationship between the individual and the community.91 This relationship, it is claimed, goes some way to explaining how the cosmopolitan individual, articulated by Erskine, can be embedded within her idea of the dislocated community. This work engages with communitarian assumptions.92 It openly acknowledges the important role that the community plays in the development of the necessary moral habits. This work endorses an equal role for instrumental and non-instrumental relationship alike. It is within these relationships that individuals acquire the moral habits needed to develop as moral agents. As this chapter draws to a close it demonstrates how these habits can facilitate a particular relationship of morality and ethics within the wider theater of international politics and it envisions a role for natural law beyond the critical engagement with cosmopolitan theory articulated throughout this work. The anarchy of war is used, by realists, to describe the experience of international politics.93 Drawing on Hobbes’ account of the state of nature, many of the realist scholars described in Chapter 1 note the parallels of this account with the anarchy of international politics.94 States situated in an anarchical environment are provided through the rhetoric of political sovereignty with the freedom and autonomy needed to achieve their own self-preservation and survival. Very often, as was noted above, this survival is couched in a discourse of self-interested egoism which, it is claimed, denies a central role for moral and ethical considerations. E.H. Carr challenged the idea of moral politics and noted how international relations should instead be characterized as a struggle between utopian ideals and self-centered 88  Hollis and Smith, 1990. 89  Recall the various works of Nussbaum; MacIntyre; Midgely; Maritain; and finally, Finnis et al. 90  Brown, 1992. 91  Tierney, 2001. 92  See for example Frost, 1998; MacIntyre, 1981; Walzer, 1977. 93  See Donnelly, 2000. 94  See for example Mearsheimer, 2001; Waltz, 1979; and Beitz, 1979.

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awareness.95 Similarly, Hans Morgenthau distinguished two types of morality, one central to individual human lives, and another focused on the national interest of the state. Recall that he concluded that a failure to secure one’s survival was, in the realm of the political, a moral failure.96 Finally, Reinhold Neibuhr challenged the possibility of moral international politics owing to the absence of a collective moral conscience.97 He, like Morganthau, could not conceptualize any notion of international community and therefore discounted the idea of a moral international politics focused on well-being and development. The particular interpretation of natural law offered herein does not, like Midgely, articulate an account of world order or global governance. Moreover, it does not provide a traditional account of an international moral community. Like the twofold relationship of absolute ends and normative rules, it envisions an overarching arena, ‘the international,’ within which a variety of distinct and multiple agents can work in concert to achieve political and moral ends. It emphasizes the development of moral habits, of individual agents who, owing to the incorporation of ‘the personal,’ work together in order to develop a moral environment within ‘the international.’ The politics of influence hinted at by Toulmin and further developed within a natural law framework challenges the realist summation of international politics. Coordinated human agency, this work claims, can facilitate the development of moral political structures within the theater of international politics. An examination of Toni Erskine’s work on moral agency is instructive in this particular argument. She provides a summary list of the criterion needed for collective moral agency. She claims that collective agency does not require determinate memberships which accommodates the natural law vision of ‘the international.’ Recall that ‘the international,’ much like the natural law community itself, is dynamic and porous and never enjoys a permanent and lasting constituency. Collective agency does however require an identity that is more than the sum of the constitutive identities; a decision-making structure—an identity over time—and, finally, a concept within the group itself, as a unit.98 This account of moral agency shares many of the attributes of agency articulated by O’Neill, MacIntyre, McInerny and McCluskey.99 It highlights within the collective, as opposed to the individual, a need to deliberate and act in a practical manner in order to achieve set out ends. This idea of collective agency provides the first theoretical glimpse of how the personal relationships of local communities can engage with the indirect relationships characteristic of ‘the international.’ Moreover, it reaffirms the importance of ‘the personal.’ Much like the natural law agent who, in the face of moral tension, deliberates and pursues a course of action, collective moral agency is reflected in the deliberations of 95  96  97  98  99 

Carr, 1946. Morgenthau, 1973. Niebuhr, 1974. Erskine, 2003, 24. O’Neill, 2001; MacIntyre, 1999; McInerny, 1997; and, McCluskey, 2000.

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wider groups of individuals. This deliberative process is likewise guided by the casuistry of well-being and therefore indicates the underlying intentions of the agent. These intentions, as previously described, indicate the loving intentions underlying agency, and provide an initial space for the engagement of direct and indirect relationships. As this space widens, previously unavailable information is revealed thus facilitating the accommodation of more appropriate engagements with vulnerability others. Beyond the theoretical articulation of political engagement which emerges from the politics of influence one can begin to envision this idea in practice. Chapter 4 briefly highlighted the ‘responsibility to protect.’100 This idea, it was argued, shares some similarities with the morality of natural law. It calls on states to act as moral agents when other, less empowered, states are unable to meet the needs of their domestic populations. The assumptions of intervention of the R2P reflect a casuistry of care which draws chiefly on the jus ad bellum assumptions of the just war tradition, which is an idea which has found resonance in the wider normative discourses of international politics. Terry Nardin draws explicitly on the R2P in order to articulate a duty to protect.101 Similarly, Michael Walzer develops an account of the politics of rescue in order to address the suffering of others.102 On the other hand, Richard B. Miller marries the jus ad bellum requirements with the morality of natural law in order to articulate an interpretation of moral intervention.103 Finally, Jean Elshtain marries the military institutions of the state with a discourse of equal regard in order to move beyond the traditional militaryled interventions.104 There are both positive conclusions and negative consequences to these discourses. Jus ad bellum requirements reflect a casuistry of warfare, not well-being.105 Consequently, they are not particularly well-suited to address the challenge of human vulnerability. On the other hand, the casuistry of well-being is particularly well suited to guide the practice of intervention. What is required is a more formal vision of the politics of influence which can function much like pre-existing state institutions. It is instructive, one final time, to turn to the works of feminist scholars, in particular Sibyl A. Schwarzenbach, in order to envision how this could be possible. She situates her work within an Aristotelian framework and draws on his idea of civic friendship and practical reason to articulate an account of reproductive praxis which offers a vision of an international civil service premised on caring relations. 100  International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty, 2001. 101  Nardin, 2006, 449–465. Terry Nardin, The moral basis of humanitarian intervention, Ethics & International Affairs, 16, no. 2 (2002), 63. 102  Michael Walzer, The argument about humanitarian intervention, Dissent, 49 no. 1 (Winter 2002), 29–37. Walzer, 1995, 35–41. 103  R.B. Miller, 2000, 3–35. 104  Jean Bethke Elshtain, International justice as equal regard and the use of force, Ethics & International Affairs, 17, no. 2 (2003), 63–75. 105  Rengger, 2002, 353–363.

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Schwarzenbach’s civil service reflects many of the underlying assumptions of the politics of influence. It challenges the boundaries of sovereignty and the traditional mandate of the state’s military institutions. Moreover, the aims and ends of this intervention parallel many of the ends noted in a natural law casuistry of wellbeing. Her own writing provides ample evidence of these symmetries. Above all else, such a service would explicitly now stress the emotional and perceptual competence central to politike philia: the capacity not only to perceive and to understand, but to respond with goodwill (both abstractly and in concrete practice) to other persons who are very different from oneself. And such training in philia could not help but affect a nation’s relations outwards as well.106

This interpretation of intervention, like the casuistry of well-being, distances itself from more formal and technical interpretations of politics. Similarly, this account, like a natural law account of being political, notes the possibility of coordinated individual agency. Its value lies explicitly in the relationship it envisions for individuals situated within the state and its institutions. A caring civil service unites the ends of instrumental and non-instrumental relationships. It draws on the power and legitimacy of the state in order to facilitate the potential for collective moral agency. It is this type of agency which is envisioned through an interweaving of ‘the international’ and ‘the personal.’ This relationship sustains coordinated human agency as embodied in the communities of interests associated with the morality of natural law. The idea of communities of interest does not reflect traditional territorial notions, nor does it facilitate the development of a moral conscience; however, it is indicative of the wider potential for moral deliberation and agency within the theater of international politics. The casuistry of well-being reveals a predisposition to train agents in moral habits. Such habits, it is argued, arise within moral communities and serve a particular purpose. They ensure that agents, when faced with new experiences which fail to conform to pre-existing rules, or when rules are non-existent, can act within the spirit of a previously articulated interpretation of morality. Moral habitual actions, set within a casuistry of wellbeing, in light of the ideas of Schwarzenbach, provide a response to the claims of realist scholars who profess a need for both an international community and conscience in order to frame an account of moral international politics. It demonstrates that, in the absence of formal constraints, moral deliberation and action is a possibility. A further alignment between realism and a natural law account of international politics is possible. Realists repeatedly articulate the assumptions of self-interest and egoism on the part of states. Self-interest and egoism reflects, as previously mentioned, a response to the vulnerability of individuals living in common. A return to the domestic analogy reveals that states, likewise, suffer from this selfsame vulnerability. Traditional accounts of realist politics reply to this vulnerability 106  Schwarzenbach, 2007, 252.

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and in so doing articulate the primacy of the sovereign state and the norm of nonintervention. A casuistry of well-being challenges these two norms; however, it does facilitate a moral response to the vulnerability of states as articulated in the idea of moral intervention. The casuistic theme of this account reflects some ideas which actually exist within more contemporary normative realist works. Scholars like Lebow, Brown, Rengger and Euben, who were discussed in Chapter 1, highlight the tragedy of international relations and the inability of states, like individuals, to grasp the contingent, and therefore unpredictable, moral tragedies within international relations.107 Moreover, their works hint at the possibility, albeit it a tempered one, of a moral vision of international politics. Collectively their works engage critically with the historical realists whose works predate their own, and while authors like Brown, Rengger and Euben do not formally fall within the realist label their works provide a renewed understanding of a social and moral politics. These scholars argue that the theme of tragedy is one vehicle to understand why, at times, morality is forsaken within international politics. Owing to the inexplicable factors of living together in communities there will always be situations which fail to conform to pre-existing rules of conduct. Hence, the vulnerability identified within the morality of natural law is also present in this interpretation of international politics. In situations where individuals err and morality is forsaken, tragedy facilitates a means of understanding this predicament. As Euben’s work points out, tragedy prefaces a wide variety of relationships which impact, and inform, the life of the agent; for example, violence and peace, old and young, politics and power. What is important, in this interpretation, is that the individuals mourn the tragic consequences of their action or inaction.108 This conclusion reflects the classical discipline in which Euben works and which is sympathetic to the early work of Nussbaum, detailed in Chapter 2.109 Classical works accept the inability of human beings to perfectly control their particular situation. Instead, they must simply accept unforeseen consequences. There is, in this account, an overt absence of perfectionist ends which mirrors the conclusions of Rengger. His anti-pelagian framework was also documented in Chapter 1. It argues for a particular conception of morality within international politics which accepts the potential for moral failure, yet remains deeply skeptical that one can draw further lessons from human action. Agency will always be, according to Rengger, simply a demonstration of human action.110 These two combined interpretations articulate a moral casuistry for human action and parallel the ethical structure of natural law morality. They differ however because of the lack of perfectionism on the part of Euben and the lack of teleology as proscribed by Rengger. There is, in these two 107  Brown, 2007; Rengger, 2007; J Peter Euben, The tragdy of Tragedy, International Relations, 21 no. 1 (2007), 15–22. 108  Euben, 2007. 109  Nussbaum, 2001. 110  Rengger, 2005.

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works, an absence of hope which can be located within a natural law account of international politics. This work draws to a close with an analysis of this hope and how a natural law interpretation of international politics provides a middle road between the different interpretations offered by realist and cosmopolitan scholars alike.

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Epilogue A natural law casuistry begins with an awareness of human vulnerability, in much the same way as the work of cosmopolitan and realist scholars; however, the morality of natural law provides a distinct interpretation of normative international politics. The teleological and perfectionist assumptions offer an alternative means of engaging with normative discourses of contemporary international political thought. These two assumptions frame an account of agency which reflects an account of hope. It draws on the moral potential of individuals, evident in the idea of objective natural dominion, in order to understand the equal capacity that individuals have to engage in moral agency and, likewise, to do nothing. Its underlying discourse of hope reflects the idea that if individuals are provided with the necessary habitual training they will chose to act. As this work has revealed, it is this type of agency which facilitates an engagement with the vulnerabilities of being human. Natural law agency remains aware of the fallible nature of individuals and the uncontrollable outcomes of agency. Consequently, it reflects a modified interpretation of human progress. Progress, it was argued, is evident in the modern cosmopolitan discourses and reflects the underlying assumption that human agency can establish political structures which, when found wanting, are subject to renewal and change. Instead, the morality of natural law articulates a journey of moral awareness in which the positive and negative experiences of individuals contribute to their moral development which can be both positive and negative. The morality of natural law reveals an inherent predisposition towards moral development which remains aware of the contingent factors of moral luck to challenge the ends of being human; however, situations of moral failure do not challenge the modern notion of progress. Like positive consequences, negative ones also contribute to a wider sense of what it is to be a moral and social being engaging in politics. A natural law approach does not abandon the reality of the realist world view. Realists scholars, normative and explanatory alike, highlight the inherent selfinterest of political actors which, it has been claimed, reflects one engagement with human vulnerability. The morality of natural law, much like the warnings heeded by Toulmin, remains aware of the potential for self-interested agency. Its morality openly engages with this challenge and notes the possibility of doing good and/or evil. The possibility of human inaction, in the face of tragic moral   See O’Neill, 2001; Beitz, 1979; Pogge, 2005; Erskine, 2009; Lu, 2005. For realist works see, in particular, Lebow, 2003. For the wider discourses of tragedy see Rengger, 2005; Brown, 2007; Euben, 2007.

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dilemmas, remains a very real possibility within this particular institutional design. Yet the discourse of natural law counters the potential for negative agency in two interrelated fronts. It locates individuals within the moral community. This community, as has been demonstrated, reflects the non-instrumental relationships of care and love. These relationships, it was further argued, instill the necessary moral habits which engender upright moral action. Habitual moral action, it was claimed, functions both within pre-existing rule structures, but also in the absence of formal accounts of morality and justice. Consequently, individuals are always equipped with the necessary skills of practical reason through the development of their own conscience. The conscientious decisions associated with collective moral agency reveal an affinity for the task of which realist scholars like Niebuhr remain sceptical thus facilitating the possibility of moral international politics. Hope reflects a balanced appraisal of the positive and negative motivations for human agency. It distinguishes a natural law institutional design form other ethical frameworks and draws on the first principles of morality. It demonstrates the potential for practical reason and highlights, one final time, the principle of synderesis which informs all individuals of the potential for moral goodness. Implicit within this ethical framework is the objective natural dominion which arises within the social and moral ontology which sustains the individual and the community alike. This ontological understanding of the individual locates itself within a dichotomy of positive and negative and human nature and offers a balanced appraisal of individual capacities and capabilities. The politics of potential, reflected in the discourse of hope, reflects this balanced appraisal which, it claims, demands an account of ethical casuistry. A casuistic methodology provides a further reinforcement for the individual to develop as a moral agent. It extends the development of habitual moral action beyond the local community and is aware of the potential for moral failure. Its value rests chiefly in its ability to incorporate the knowledge acquired through both successful moral engagements and institutional failure. Moral failure, it is argued, provides an equally important series of knowledge transfers which deepen our understanding of what it is to be a moral person in a way which normative international political thought would otherwise ignore. It establishes how, in light of the possibility of moral failure, future contributions to the community can more effectively be made. The politics of potential reflects the unity of ‘the personal’ and ‘the international’ and brings together the idea of charitable institutional design. It draws on the morality of natural law in order to provide both an absolute and relative understanding of the role that morality can play in the realm of international politics. It demonstrates how an outward commitment to the ends of loving reasonableness, as evidenced in the particular ideas of agency, can generate revelation, or mutual self-revelation, within relationships of equality and thereby safeguard the existence of unempowered beings. In so doing it provides an alternative means of engaging with the problems of human suffering throughout the world. It carves out a niche for the role of emotional responses of agents and reflects the metaphysical bond both

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beings share. On this account, suffering remains firmly embedded in the human experience and is intrinsically caught up in the relationships of action, knowledge and agency itself. Moreover, this work argues that to suffer is part and parcel of the human experience which is revealed through an informed understanding of what it is to be a moral and political agent. Suffering is the manifestation of human vulnerabilities which emerge when individuals live within political communities. It is directly related to the social nature of the human existence. The assumptions of natural law morality which frame this understanding of suffering reveal that in and of itself it is part of the human moral experience. Consequently, one cannot discount the relationship of ethics and morality in the sphere of ‘the political.’ To do so would deny the acquisition of knowledge needed to engage fully with this particular human phenomenon. For this reason natural law is well equipped to respond to the plight of the suffering other. It reintroduces the idea of human vulnerability along with the social aspects of being human within a wider moral framework. The politics of potential, like the ideal of human happiness, represents an ideal type. It is not out of the realms of possibility that such a complete community can be achieved, but its achievement is a long and arduous process. Recalling the skepticism originally faced by feminist scholars, who advocated agency to achieve a more open and inclusive society, one is mindful of the capacity for otherwise relegated ideas to affect political and social change in light of the achievements of feminist agents to date. For this reason the discussions throughout this work represent the hope of the capacity and capability of individuals, as agents of justice, to achieve greater things; however, it is a hope which, unlike the Enlightenment ideals of progress, is very much aware of the fallible nature of human reasoning. Bearing all of this in mind, this particular thought process and foray into the institutional design of international politics represents, above all else, a critique of the subjective account of international engagements that sustain the isolated and self-sufficient rights-bearing subject. The ideal of sovereignty, and its associated order, represent one particular reading of international politics that mitigates the abuse of power while simultaneously protecting the right of each and every state to coexist in a cooperative manner at the international level. Yet the boundaries it sustains and the practices it endorses contribute to the ongoing suffering of individuals. The appeal of the natural law account of agency and agents and the objective account of being political it sustains lies in its ability to check the ends of this particular arrangement while being mindful of the original ends they sought to achieve. Ultimately this account is but a brief appraisal of the need for alternative accounts of international relations that challenge accepted modes of practice in light of injustice and immorality therein. As the awareness of shared vulnerabilities reveals, the ultimate ends of human moral development are not being met. It is thus necessary to determine why this is and seek to rectify this particular problem. Natural law not only provides an interesting series of assumptions to pose these questions, it also highlights an account of the good life. Such an account articulates

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the pre-eminent value of being human, in common, which can go on to provide an alternative account of international political order.

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Index

absolute ends and relative means distinction in natural law 51, 59 agape 122, 123, 124, 126–7, 136, 143–4 agency collective 173–4, 175 female 111–12 goal of 116 natural law 113–20, 179–82 political and moral 9–11, 15, 16–17, 25, 33 Christian tradition 59–60 Thomist and Aristotelian accounts 64, 69–70, 75, 76, 77, 79–80 social and moral 82–3, 97, 126 and suffering 13–14 American Indian community 102–9 Ancient Greece 11, 48 ancient natural law 52–5 anthropocentrism of modernity 64 Antigone (Sophocles) 52–3 Aquinas, Thomas 51, 52, 55, 56, 57, 62, 66, 67, 77–8, 79, 85–109, 111, 115, 116–17, 118, 121, 124, 160 Aristotle 51, 53–4, 61–2, 69, 70–1, 72, 73, 74, 77, 79, 88, 95, 96 St Augustine 51–2, 89 autonomy 9, 25–6 freedom and 80–1, 82, 90, 97, 129, 135 balance of power 39–40, 45 being and morality 86–7 mutuality of 122–3, 147 beings in common 1–2, 12–13 Beitz, Charles 8, 15, 46 Boyle, Joseph, Jr. 78, 81, 119 Brown, Chris 5, 6, 14, 47–8, 151, 172 Buchanan, Alan 125 Bull, Hedley 3, 4, 67–8, 75–6, 77 Butterfield, Herbert 3–4

Buzan, Barry and Little, Richard 4 Byers, Michael 37 Cahill, Lisa Sowle 171–2 ‘capabilities approach’ to human rights 70–1 care ethics, feminist 112, 120, 164–5 Carr, E.H. 42–3, 67, 172–3 Casti Connubii 60 casuistry 113–20, 146–7 of well-being 149–62, 174–6 Catholicism 58–61, 63, 76–7, 103, 106, 131 charity 92, 96, 99, 123–5, 127, 161 Christian religion 23–4, 43, 51–2, 142 Catholicism 58–61, 63, 76–7, 103, 106, 131 and humanism 129 see also Aquinas, Thomas church–state relationship 59 Cicero, Marcus Tullius 54 civic friendship 54, 63, 65, 124, 129 civil service 174–5 Cold War 3, 4, 45, 46, 60 post-Cold War international relations 148 Cole, Darrell 160–2 collective moral agency 173–4, 175 common good 65, 67, 70, 81, 82, 129, 131–2 ‘common judge’ 27 community 97–9, 100, 166–7 American Indian 102–9 ethical 5 and individuals 15, 20, 21–2 international 142, 143–4, 145 natural law 127–36 political 67, 73–4, 100–1 web-like structure of 130–1 see also cosmopolitanism commutative justice 99–100, 125–6, 131–2 conscience 89–90, 92, 160–2

202

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cosmopolitanism 6–10, 12–13, 162–5, 172 embedded 14, 15, 16, 140, 142 and natural law 14–15, 16–17, 75, 76, 141 customs and treaties 39–40 d’Entreves, A.P. 21, 22, 86, 171–2 Descartes, Rene 19, 20 dignity 76 human rights discourse 151, 152–3 diplomacy 42, 43, 44 distributive justice 99 dominion 56, 57–8, 89 Douzina, Costa 151–2, 153 economic theory 26–7 egoism 46–7, 75, 167–8, 172–3, 175–6 embedded cosmopolitanism 14, 15, 16, 140, 142 English School 3–5, 68 Enlightenment political philosophy 23–31 epikeia (equity) 99 equality/inequality 9–10, 99, 100, 118 Erskine, Toni 5, 6–7, 14–15, 16–17, 140, 142, 172 ethical communities 5 Euben, Peter 48, 176–7 Eudiamon (virtuous person) 69, 72, 73 feminist perspective 15, 30–1, 111–12 care ethics 112, 120, 164–5 Finnis, John 82 et al. 77–8, 79, 81 frailty of human condition see vulnerability freedom as absence of constraint and of necessitation 90–1 and autonomy 80–1, 82, 90, 97, 129, 135 friend/enemy distinction 145 friendship/fellowship 53–4, 63, 65, 94, 95–7, 99, 100, 124, 129, 146 see also community Frost, Mervyn 5, 6 George, Robert P. 78 Ghandi, M.K. (Mahatma) 155, 158 global governance 9–10, 67, 131–2, 143, 144

Goodin, Robert 137–8 goodness/virtue ancient account 11, 53–4, 59 common good 65, 67, 70, 81, 82, 129, 131–2 Thomist account 87–9, 92, 93–4, 97 and Aristotelian account 63–75 passim, 80, 81, 82 goods basic 70, 79–80, 81, 99 hierarchy of 67 Grisez, Germain 78, 81, 83, 128, 135 and Shaw, Russell 82–3, 127 Grotius, Hugo 32–5, 36, 37, 38, 40, 42 happiness and goodness 88–9, 93–4 as teleology of natural law 51, 52, 75, 94 Hart, H.L.A. 74 Hayden, Patrick 7 Helpern, Cynthia 10, 13, 30–1 Hobbes, Thomas 23–7, 28, 29, 30, 31, 35, 36, 37, 42, 46, 58, 102, 163, 172 human actions and acts of human beings 116–17 human rights ‘capabilities approach’ 70–1 critique and overview 149–54 natural law response 154–7 humanism 63, 129 humanitarian intervention 112, 115, 132–3 ‘I’–‘You’ relationship 166 ideal and ontological morality of natural law 62–3 Immortale Dei 59–60 individual(s) and community 15, 20, 21–2 rights 7–8 state of nature vs civil society 24, 25–7 Thomist account 86–92 see also agency; social nature inequality see equality/inequality institutional design 10, 11, 12 charity 125 Enlightenment political philosophy 23–31

Index international political theory 32–49, 137–8, 139–40, 141, 143–4 natural law 68, 70–1, 74, 81 response to human rights 155, 156 Papal encyclicals 58–9, 60–1, 131 and virtuous warfare 162 web-like structure of community 130–1 instrumental and non-instrumental relationships 2, 10, 12, 13–14, 16, 27–8, 43–4, 65, 82–3, 98–9, 141 intellect and will 87–8, 89–90, 91, 93, 99, 116 international politics casuistry of well-being 149–62 establishing ‘the personal’ 162–77 theory 2–17, 32–49, 139–49 interwar years, political theory in 42–3 ius gentium (law of nations) 21, 31, 33, 37–40, 57, 65 Jonsen, A.R. see Toulmin, Stephen just war theory 92, 114, 174 Kant, Immanuel 7, 9, 11, 14, 20, 141–2, 163 labor and economic theory 26–7 Las Casas, Bartoloméo de 55–6, 101, 102, 103, 105–9 law(s) and civil society 29–30 as institutionalization of moral habits 98 in international political theory 42–3, 44–5 ius gentium (law of nations) 21, 31, 33, 37–40, 57, 65 Thomist perspective 97–8 see also institutional design Lebow, Ned 46–7, 48 legal and moral cosmopolitanism 7–8 legitimate political authority see political authority liberal interpretations of cosmopolitanism 7–8, 14, 141 Lien, Arnold J. 156–7 Locke, John 26–8, 29, 30, 31 love/loving reasonableness 63–4, 82, 105, 169–70 agape 122, 123, 124, 126–7, 136, 143–4 Christian tradition 60

203

feminist care ethics 112, 120, 164–5 natural law community 129, 134, 135 relational politics 121–4 Thomist account 94–5, 96–7 Lu, Catherine 14–15 Machiavellian account of politics 65, 70 McInerny, Ralph 116–17 MacIntyre, Alastair 6, 31, 61–2, 71–4, 75, 77, 87, 113–14, 115, 117, 130, 153, 158 MacMurray, John 21–2, 28, 139, 164–70 Macpherson, C.B. 27 Maritain, Jacques 20–1, 62–5, 90, 128–9, 154–5, 157, 158 Aristotelian and Thomist accounts, comparison with 61–2, 66, 68, 70, 71, 72, 74, 75 Mearsheimer, John 45–6 Middle Ages see scholastic natural law Midgley, E.B.F. 4–5, 20–1, 57, 61–2, 66–9, 71, 72, 74, 75–6, 77, 101, 131–3, 156, 173 Miller, Richard B. 114–15, 174 modernity anthropocentrism of 64 critique of 71–2 notions of 19–21, 22 see also Enlightenment political philosophy Montesino, Antonio de 102–3 moral agency see agency moral development 55, 74, 75, 170–1 moral habits 91–2, 93, 98 moral and legal cosmopolitanism 7–8 moral luck and social nature 10–13, 16, 65, 69–70, 71, 75 Morgenthau, Hans J. 44–5, 46, 47, 65, 173 mutual moral development 170–1 mutual self-revelation 166–7 mutuality of being 122–3, 147 narrative/storytelling 72–3, 133–4 natural law account of politics 12, 20–1 and cosmopolitanism 14–15, 16–17, 75, 76, 141 English School challenge 4

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framework 16–17 history of 52–61 New Natural Lawyers 74–83, 122–3, 127, 158–9 scholastic 55–8, 62, 96, 101–9 Thomist account 92–101 of the individual 86–92 thick and thin (Aristoteleanism) morality 61–83 see also international politics; relational account necessary and voluntary law of nations 38–40 neorealism 45 New Natural Lawyers 74–83, 122–3, 127, 158–9 Niebuhr, Reinhold 43–4, 45 normative international politics 5–6, 15, 66 Nuclear Deterrence, Moralty and Realism (Finnis et al.) 78, 79, 81, 83, 159 Nussbaum, Martha 6, 11, 12, 61–2, 69–71, 72, 74, 75, 80 obligations 35–6, 44–5, 57, 58 and responsibility 56, 60 see also love offensive realism 45–6 O’Neill, Nora 9, 15, 113–14, 130, 153–4 Onuf, Nicholas 19, 37, 39, 58 Outka, Gene 123–4, 125, 136 Pagden, Anthony 101, 106, 107 Papacy encyclicals 58–61, 131 and Spanish Crown 103, 106 Parekh, Bhikhu 152 perfectionist aims of natural law 55, 56, 64, 68, 77, 94, 120, 142 and international political theory 34–5, 36, 37, 40–1, 48 ‘the personal’ 162–77 Pogge, Thomas 8, 15 political agency see under agency political authority 23, 25, 26, 29–30 natural law 59, 64, 67 survival of states in absence of 45–6 political community 67, 73–4, 100–1 political order, positive and natural law 33–4

political philosophy, Enlightenment 23–31 political sovereignty see sovereignty politics of influence 162–5 ‘the political’ 57, 58, 59–60, 61, 118–19 see also instrumental and noninstrumental relationships; international politics; power; relational account Pope John Paul II 60, 76–7, 143 Pope, Stephen 96, 126 Porter, Jean 56, 94, 102, 117–18, 125 positive and natural law 33–4 post-Cold War international relations 148 power 24, 39–41, 44–5, 46, 75–6, 100 see also instrumental and noninstrumental relationships practical reason, requirements of 80–1, 158–9 pragmatism 28, 39, 40 progress, notion of 10 prudence 91, 92 public–private demarcation 20 Pufendorf, Samuel 32, 35–7, 38, 40, 42 punishment 36–7, 42 Rawls, John 7–8, 9, 11, 15, 71, 141 realism 41–2 and idealism 67 and natural law 175–6 neorealism 45 offensive 45–6 political and moral 65 reason/rationality 54, 61, 68–9, 77, 97–8, 100, 141 natural law agency 117–18 relational politics 121, 122–3 requirements of practical reason 80–1, 158–9 ‘reasons of state’ 36 recipience in human rights and duties 153–4 Redemptor Hominis 60 relational account 111–13 natural law agency 113–20, 179–82 natural law community 127–36 politics 120–7 see also instrumental and noninstrumental relationships

Index relational being 16–17, 140–1 religion see Christian religion Rengger, Nicholas 4–5, 68, 133, 135, 176–7 Responsibility to Protect (R2P) 132–3, 174 Robinson, Fiona 112, 165 Rorty, Richard 20, 141–2 Rousseau, Jean-Jacques 28–30, 31 Rwandan genocide 148 Salamanca Theologians 56, 93, 101–9, 121 Schmitt, Carl 145 scholastic natural law 55–8, 62, 96, 101–9 Schwarzenbach, Sibyl A. 174–5 science and politics 23–4 Scout Association 131 security 36–7 self-defense 114 self-interest and education 156 egoism and 46–7, 75, 167–8, 172–3, 175–6 of isolated individuals 20, 22, 31 love as 96 mutual moral development 170–1 of states 37, 41–3, 45–6 self-revelation 121, 122, 134, 166–7 self-sufficiency 29, 75, 137, 140, 141, 142 social contract 28–9, 32, 36–7, 38 critique 30–1 international law 39 social learning 26–7, 48 social and moral agency 82–3, 97, 126 social nature 35, 38, 63, 66–7, 79 and moral luck 10–13, 16, 65, 69–70, 71, 75 relational being 16–17, 140–1 see also community; relational account Somalia 148 Sophocles 52–3 soul, primacy of 86, 87 sovereignty 31, 64–5, 66, 68, 114 international political theory 34, 35, 36, 44 Responsibility to Protect (R2P) 132–3 Spanish colonialism 102–3, 105, 106 statecraft (rules of political engagement) 40, 42–3, 44

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state(s) –church relationship 59 ‘reasons of state’ 36 self-interest of 37, 41–3, 45–6 Stoics 54 storytelling 72–3, 133–4 Suarez, Francisco 57, 101 subjective world view 31, 58 subsidiarity principle 67, 132–3 suffering/tragedy 11–12, 13–14, 16, 17, 46–9, 70, 75, 76, 176 see also vulnerability synderesis 89, 91, 92, 93, 94, 116, 143 teleology agency 87–8, 116 Christian perspective 59, 61, 90 commutative justice 99, 100 friendship 96 happiness 51, 52, 75, 94 moral development 55, 74, 75 narrative/storytelling 72–3 and perfectionism assumptions 68, 77 thick (Thomism) and thin (Aristoteleanism) morality 61–83 Thomism see Aquinas, Thomas Thucydides 42, 47 Toulmin, Stephen 19, 162–5 and Jonsen, A.R. 54, 119–20 Jonsen, A.R. and 115, 155 tragedy see suffering/tragedy; vulnerability treaties and customs 39–40 UN 148, 150 UNESCO 64, 154–5, 162 Universal Declaration of Human Rights 64, 150–1, 153–5 unpredictability 72–3, 91 utility 33–4, 37 Vattel, Emmerich de 32, 37–40, 44, 57 violence see war virtue see goodness/virtue Vitoria, Franciscus de 55–6, 101, 102, 103–5, 107, 108 voluntary and necessary law of nations 38–40

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vulnerability 9–10, 12–15, 77, 78–9 international political thought 33, 34, 40–1, 47–9 moral luck and social nature 10–13, 16, 69–70, 71, 75 natural law community 134–5 pragmatism 28 relational politics 121, 122, 127 see also suffering/tragedy Waltz, Kenneth 45–6 Walzer, Michael 6, 15, 114, 115, 174

war 23, 24, 29, 34, 36–7, 44, 57 community myth-making and storytelling 133–4 ethical 160–2 just war theory 92, 114, 174 WWII 149–50 see also Cold War Weber, Max 76–7, 143 well-being, casuistry of 149–62, 174–6 Wight, Martin 3, 67, 68 will and intellect 87–8, 89–90, 91, 93, 99, 116