ABSTRACT
The task of moral reasoning about international politics is not a simple one. The Realists deserved to win the debate with the shallow moralizing Idealists of the interwar years. There are good reasons why ethical behavior is more difficult to define and carry out in international than in domestic politics, and why the simple use of personal moral maxims in the international domain can have immoral consequences. The structure of moral language stresses universality and impartiality among individuals – “do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” But international politics occurs among individuals organized into states. We practice our daily moral habits in a sheltered space. Sovereign states provide enough domestic order to allow us to follow moral intentions, but many of our normal moral institutions are “off balance” in international politics. A simple-minded transposition of individual moral maxims to relations among states can lead to immoral consequences. A statesman who chooses to turn the other cheek may put his people’s lives in peril. When there are such gaps between our moral intuitions and the consequences of following them, it is easier tomoralize than to act morally. The Oxford students who in 1933 vowed never to fight may well have encouraged Hitler in his belief that Britain would not resist his aggression. A second problem rising from the existence of states is the prospect of ethical
egoism. Many moral philosophers admit the logical possibility of a totally amoral egoistic life, but believe it is extremely difficult for individuals to practice.1 On the other hand, amoral behavior may be more feasible for sovereign states. This is a point that Thomas Hobbes recognized three centuries ago when he argued that the roughly equal insecurity of individuals draws them out of the state of nature into government, but that once people are organized into states they feel safe enough in their daily lives that they would rather tolerate the state of nature than submit to the leviathan of a world government. Another problem growing out of the existence of states is the relationship
between order and justice. Both values are important. As Paul Ramsey points out, “order is a means to justice, but also justice is a means of serving order.” A well ordered domestic polity can concentrate its political debate and efforts on improving justice. But if efforts to promote justice internationally ignore the power
of states, they may promote disorder, which makes justice unachievable. As an instrumental value, some degree of order is necessary though not sufficient for justice. In Ramsey’s words, “there is an asymmetry between these values . . .we must attend to the preservation of an ordered polity and an orderly interstate system so that there can be the conditions for improving the justice actualized among men and between states.”2
