ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to survey the main general approaches to ethics and international politics and explain the qualified state moralist position on which the author's argument is based. It focuses on three arguments about international involvement in land reform; arguments in principle, arguments based on consequences, and arguments about competing moral claims and balance of rights. From a state-moralist viewpoint, international involvement in land reform may be legitimate but only if it conforms with international law and is welcomed by the government of the host nation. The search for perfect equality of land holding might actually increase suffering in circumstances in which there is increasing population pressure on the land. The chapter argues that the ethical dimensions of international involvement in land reform are not so simple as they might first appear. It summarizes the ethical case for international involvement in land reform.
