4 20 144 https://www.antipodean-antinuclearism.org/files/original/32f5493dacdd446e2ae9e35b3cc88d4d.pdf 9d3fc6065bb7275f9e8cd80f95ca58c2 PDF Text Text WORKING DRAFT AUSTRALIA'S DEFENCE PHILOSOPHY? Investigations of the nonexistent # MX504 'The opinions of philosophers, with regard to the conditions of the possibility of a public peace, shall be taken into consideration by states armed for war'' (Kant, 'A [the only] secret article for perpetual peace', p.158, an article flattering no doubt to philosophers, but neglecting their dominant bellicose tradition). A defence philosophy is much more than a defence policy. A policy can be merely by a list of directives as to what do in various given at even its philosophy policy best it need only involve practical into a theoretical setting, contrast, integration of a the which looks at the key concepts involved: security, stability, control, here, By wisdom. goes deeper and requires theoretical wisdom, circumstances; protection, defence, interests, national interests, intelligence, war, etc. Defence philosophy is a branch of political and social philosophy, and has long been treated as such, though under such more familiar and honest headings as "of war" and "of peace" (see Appendix Like most of philosophy it can be applied, parts in regional 3}. among ways others. defence A approaches to philosophy should embed appropriate defence arrangements war not merely and peace, or superficially into and "foreign policy", but into the way and intended way of life of a country, both into on­ going culture policy defence power and into the intended or planned typically takes prevailing socio-political structures for granted; questioning of merits cultural arrangements. arrangements a defence philosophy again penetrates or rejecting features of these structures, enquiring as things and institutions of which defence is planned, society should be defended by what sort of appropriate sort of what lengths. What, for instance, 1 is Australia what are A and deeper, to asking methods the what and Australi ans, �concerned to defend, aiming to defend? defending, How much of what others have, Abroad? region? defending, Does preserving? defending? Would Indonesians made anyone a Randwick stage a or what we have, Eagle or racecourse, last stand for is worth Farm, merit Estate? Oaks strike in Australia .just lightning In the Here in Australia? to If remove the B.jelke- Petersen, should we resist? of the necessary prerequisites have been adequately thought about in Few Australia, unplanned where muddling through immediate problem - reactive contingency 1 generous - is the main style of political "planning", life, immediate if you help to supply it with one or more, to problem want and ipso facto of be to defence Its phi1osophers Australia does not yet have a defence philosophy. planning. could from and to inject some depth into broader defence theorizing. 1. Australian defence inappropriate "policy"; incoherent, obsolescent American, Indeed Australia seems to lack even a clear and coherent defence This pol icy. charge (made even by friends of Defence commonplace interested in 2 obtaining extra public funding for defence and elements of C3I). The reasons is concern not merely the major unsolved issues of exactly what is being defended, what things and objects and what interests, and whose, what freedoms and values; and what role American defence facilities in Australia supposed to have in this - but a range of more detailed lacunae such as: of clearly-defined on what needs defending and how it is priorities accomplished; doubtful contingencies in are lack to be capacity of present defence forces to handle low-level and to the north of Australia and in maritime zones; and 1. The point, which is not uncontroversial, is argued in effect in Gilbert. 2. Amazingly, in the Strategic Basis Papers, Australia criticizes New Zealand because 'it has still developed no policy for national defence and tends to look to ... the US as its primary source of defence guidance'' (p.29) . Note that C3I abbreviates the mouthful , Command, Control, Communications and Intelligence. 2 �unsatisfactory (or no) defence civil and administration, arrangements and planning for use of protection civil infrastructure, key facilities and of "defence-in-depth", wartime mobilisation, areas, and for post-nuclear organization. is equally damaqinq, if its policy makers do have a coherent policy it 3 nowhere satisfactorily revealed to the peoples of Australia. It is left to .journalists And, what out installations may be for and to make various conjectures as defence the newspaper-watching academics to winkle and policy may Australian policy makers As to coherence, be. local to what have only recently found out that Australia has a (purely) regional defence role, one. global they were told by the Americans in Hashington to clarify commitments under treaty arrangements with the designed begins thus This to look as if Australia's defence policy is as much not a talks in It USA. determined abroad, by US policy makers, as it is locally in Australia. Much circumstantial evidence can be assembled to confirm the claim Australia defence policy can now be stamped Made in USA, the last Nor Id Har (and British abandonment), one thing, as it that before used, to be stamped Made in UK. Australia has had a bipartisan defence policy, For so it is claimed. That "policy" has however been essentially shaped by the Liberal party, has governed most of the time (as senior partner in a for ANZUS) Hashington the Liberal and still does. US and in of US The Strategic Basis give virtually unqualified support Military practices and to the American view of situation, the the latest package from packaged under a local cover. endorsed by the Labor Government, Papers, planned Party "Defence and Foreign Policy Unit" consists largely Defence Department material to For instance, But coalition). Party simply took over US arrangements for Australia (as Liberal which commit Australia to supporting, the global strategic without any due reservation, 3. An Australian policy should moreover fit with the genuine needs and shared aspirations of the people - to the extent, presumably, that these are commendable. 3 �4 American positions in world forums. be reached by more devious arguments. out it had a regional defence role? could longer no The same dependent policy conclusion can When, for example, did Australia find afford to police the world on their own and would delegate some of that role have to and offload some of the heavy associated costs, on towards and also after Labor took some faltering steps reliable dogs-bodies; they After the Americans had found that a broader foreign policy with some indigenous elements (Hayden was developing promptly flattened by Schultz). Australian but Iags it. respects, and foreign policy simply copies American older American defence policy, American war policy. American administration main in The Australian defence policy presented by the Labor to the extent that it is visible, government, with defence is conservative; and diverges from the new it coincides (.post-Reagan) the For Australian Labor defence policy supports what used to support, namely DI. nuclear Multilateral disarmament (within the framework of a series of treaties and agreements), and D2. Deterrence in the interim, deterrence through mutual The presence .justified assured destruction. of American military facilities in Australia is supposed to in the framework of these assumptions. For they are to assist be in making deterrence under D2 effective and to provide verification for the arms There is much reduction arrangements under DI (both stabilizing functions). evidence indicating however that American policy makers have both DI and D2 and any serious attempts at nuclear arms they 4. have now 5 control . moved on to the following highly destabilizing abandoned Certainly doctrines; namely For theJe amq^ing evidence that Australia falls into the inexact class of cl ient states the following Australian contribution is noteworthy: 'The US prefers to act as a member of a group, and a contribution by Australia can also assist in demonstrating to Congressional and public opinion that the objectives sought are significant enough to attract allied support' (SB, p.28) 5. As to DI and arms control, see, e.g. Mack PR. As to D2, 'USA has now an announced first-strike nuclear targeting policy' technologically reinforced (Hayes, p.4). The goal of the Reagan administration is superiority (a conveniently ambiguous term). 4 �war-fighting; Nuclear war American government, al 1 Labor 1985 may policy nuclear wars; Limited of these government. well be accepted by military doctrines, and Star the next this While wars. coalition Liberal are explicitly rejected by the Since the American "Joint" facilities in Australia also facilitate the rejected objectives, the problems concerning these dubious facilities are much aggravated. information withholding their particularly Government concerning the full range of war-fighting certainly unsatisfactory, the The Government's approach concerning them appears their functions, roles from Parliament and the as several of its members realise; in not atypical disarray, further public and - is and as a result grist for the incoherence theme. is a coherent Australian defence policy somewhere 6 public exposure, it is almost certainly an ol d American policy. If there away from But in that case it certainly lacks - what it in any case appears to lack - justification. 7 For American interests by no means coincide with Australian . Consider, for such instance, matters as enriching Americans, American business, for undercutting to Nicaragua, differently Allende's government in Chile to again, its escalation of the nuclear arms and all Europe Southern as Consider, practices methods. race. against Consider, consider Or the game- and decisi on-theoretic models concern just USA and its adversary USSR, which its its extensive export of arms and violent strategic planning, American American. promoting Americans and things American practices in Latin America (or elsewhere in the world), differently, from making conditions favourable part of the monolithic West, perhaps occasionally adding but rarely or never considering Hemisphere - so that either Australia is part of America as the Poland It had better be away from too much public exposure because Australians, no more* th-atffrNew Zealanders, mostly do not like being pushed around, even by Americans. 7. Nor, though this is a longer story , does Australian culture by any means coincide with American: see CPD. Thus a uniform treatment is entirely inappropriate. Similarly, a single overarching treatment for a mono­ lithic West is thoroughly inadequate. 5 �8 may be of Russia or it is nothing. Or consider American interests not merely in Soviet and communist containment, but. in containing socialism such as might (under more auspicious conditions) flourish in Australia. to answering inappropriate American interests is accordingly inappropriate for Australia, for their defence thinking applies also and to work out a policy appropriate Australian do Australians should Antipodean socialism. for Australia. representatives, political who implausible American views and begin on developing parroting and original ones.) local An American policy America, like Russia, own (That should stop genuinely some is busy meddling in Africa, (SB, p.24) . but 'Australian security interests are not directly involved'’ Should we be tagging along after the Americans in support of installation of the their free-enterprise (rip-off) capitalism everywhere feasible (i.e. socialists state seriously course - or of Much opposition governments, in has, freedom umbrella, active already this sort What 'keeping the free world of context, multiple what mainstream American culture to and undermining of social and socialist quite free7? Of meanings and admits mainstream Australian culture would exclude: bullying they control)? heavily is it laughingly - call freedom associations. don't that under the for instance, programs and of smal1 countries that impose barriers to US business part of "free enterprise"), etc. freedom Misinformation, agree about, to live and work where one chooses, on. These are certainly important freedoms, better upheld in some parts of the unaligned West (e.g. Sweden, Switzerland) of the Eastern Block. But many of the older freedoms century, such as freedom to travel, requires permits, 8. licences, than in most parts have to work and live abroad, passports, ... vanished etc.; And many more of these this now one former Australian planning should be looking at strategic models (game-theoretic and other) which include Australia. For, as argued below, adandoning the uniformity assumption of the monolithic West, of the West as one parish, makes very significant differences to the results yielded. 6 �are being or have been eroded; •freedoms restricted zones, nuclearism in soon it will be identity documents-, as already in parts of the "free ID cards, Now West". to protect, [the Greens] point to the new laws proposed in 1983 designed to keep citizens Europe 'is devouring the very freedom it is said assembling to protest deployment of the Pershing II and cruise missiles' from of security 'secrecy, the lack state, of Further structural changes required for pp.58-9). (Capra and Spretnak, incompatible with permanent commentability, freedoms, democratic emergency, the include of concentration authority, peacetime militarism, extensive apparatus of state intelligence and Nuclearism is not a smart strategy to preserve police'’ (Falk, in Feith p.24) . remaining freedoms. Inherited 2. other-reliance, and the populist and elitist___ cases—for patronaqe. Australia's defence rather than regularly policy, such as it is, (re)thought through. the legal method of precedence, may wel1, furthermore But that procedure - essentially and here does, applied to defence. exclude significant The unsatisfactory decision-making practices that will For al ternatives. be revealed in the of defence are by no means restricted to defence but are typical of case kind of advanced age (or aged) 1abours those both inheri.ted whatever its very limited satisfactoriness in legalistic decision making - is defective when precedence is under. Cock capi tali sm Australia operates under, has summed up these practices neatly in features of aged capitalism (what he calls the or rather setting the Corporate State) New Left and the Alternative Australia movements were the down which reacting revoI ting against: Decisions were made from the top and on the basis of vested political interests, rather than by rational goals and means that served public interests. The people were rarely consulted effectively before a decision and often only partially informed afterwards. Pl an ni ng..was. based on a mere extension of the present. ... activists felt they were given little opportunity to choose how they lived or worked. The availability of space, time, trees and air was also determined by others . ..(2/(p.l8 italics added). 7 or �As also is one's defence, military and civil, the matter of whether one lives in a nuclear target or not, etc. A major inherited assumption is that of other reliance, defence depends on other more powerful allies. Australia That ally was firstly Britain, but in any event the assumption is that to be and since World War II America; safe that Australia's needs a powerful patron, a protector. A corollary is that Australia adopts a suitably submissive relation to its patron, making expected And for the most part it has; 10 policy does not come cheap. concessions. The however such a defence insurance other-reliance assumption is unsound, important, it for several reasons. characteristically depends upon the following themes, Most all which lack solid foundation: 1. Austral i ar/ is threatened - or at least 1A. Australia/ is likely to be threatened in the near future. 2. Australia cannot defend itself. 3. It can however rely upon its patron (or ally?, i.e. upon the USA. three themes in fact make up what has been cal led the populist case for 11 the ANZUS alliance. It is very different from the elitist case for ANZUS, These said to hold sway with the Australian government, which, while insisting upon premiss 3, essentially rejects 1 and 2 and claims instead 4. Australia has a vital interest in global stability. 9, (From previous page) Cock goes on: 'These basic issues increasingly become lost in the array of consumer choices'. [Add Covernment__ react_ive poi n t]. 10. It costs not only money, but independence.'... the serf societies - more or less willingly - accept the status of "allies", i.e. protection with rights and duties as in feudal societies. They become client countries' (Galtung, p.169). 11. So-called by Mack PC. But the formulation presented follows G. Davidson's more satisfactory account in Canberra Times, Wednesday, May 8, 1985, p.2. Mack considers that what amounts to the elitist case is the 'altogether more sophisticated argument [which] holds sway ... in government' (p.l). 8 �Global 5. stability is under threat (constantly) by an expansionist Soviet Un ion. 6. Only USA can contain the Soviet threat and hold the global balance. But the USA technique for holding global balance is in part through a network of alliances like ANZUS. further Obviously premisses are required to reach the that conclusion Australia should be participating in an alliance, and what is more, hosting US defence facilities and so forth. A first such premise is no-shirking the theme that Australia should be contributing its part to "holding the balance". Even this first further step is pretty shaky; in a rather ramshackle case, (and since premisses 5 and 6 are decidedly 4 may involve some equivocation). Australia’s vital interests as we shall see, one shaky step are not dubious For it can be plausibly argued guaranteed by US techniques, that which threaten to upset the whole applecart, and can be obtained by alternative more satisfactory means outside of such soft alliances as ANZUS. contends, Mack it In any case, is unclear that our contribution enhances global as nuclear stability (see Davidson). There is a more pernicious regionalist version of the elitist which might be called the offshore el i t i st. position. Australia can defend itself against regional 2R)t. position, This position grants threats, and can look after i tself regional Iy. But it does not (as indeed other qualified elitist positions may 1A. Nhat the offshore position insists is 1AH. Since these interests companies abroad, internal Australian Australians or or whatever - may have little or nothing to do -perhaps security, concerned with this premiss trade, represents an extremely important shift (a shift not unrelated to the inverse bureaucratic shift war In grant Australia's interests could be threatened in the near future. Australian with not) to defence). extended form from It goes further than what has been called forward defence. the offshore position does call 9 for some sort of global �or police force ready to intervene whenever a "free port" policeman looks like closing its doors,. the elitist position is anywhere Part of the difficulty in getting to grips with that it tends to slide to through the offshore position (by way of now evident immediate positions). against both the populist and elitist cases, arguments The against virtually justify but a fairly brief outline of some of the main points course a just couple of themes 1 through 7 are but there have been through some indeed familiar sufficiently of defections from themes 1 both cases, defeat logically al 1 and Of involved. would 7 to serve repair interesting attempts, designed to float the arguments on diminished premisses. 3. The brief against the popular populist case. While Australia is not at present under notice of Contra 1 and 1A. veiled threat or harassment from abroad, appears to believe that it is. or parliamentary view, view as persists, kept deliberately parties are populist well case alliance (e.g. the public. in way in the dark (or even purposes. enough false, are aware that the misinformed), main main this because assumptions the to interest In particular they have gone out of their cast doubt upon the connected assumption that US is to the American are much more difficult to sell a reliable threats. Thus long-standing Australian psychological allowed suits underlying Accordingly the parties and Government have no political to been political Australian the reasons for which they support those of the elitist case) guarantor against all been informed, the The populace has it has. Although both undermining the populist case. not not it is worth inquiring why the popular the opinion polls reveal government bipartisan a (bare) majority of its population As the popular view is administrative, threat, stand,, and has informational and educational effort. 10 not been insecurity about security has assuaged In particular, by any requisite older attitudes to Asia �X persist not far below the surface of popular Australia: fear, and mistrust xenophobia, patched over by a pragmatic attachment to trade and tourism. This misplaced insecurity is fuelled by popular misconceptions of Australia and its place in the world: metaphorically, that Australia is a luscious plum ripe for instead of the Asian view that Australia, so far as they are Eastern picking, as a remote desiccated place perhaps good for some trade. aware of it at all, to get towards more concrete assumptions, Or, Australians apparently tend to view their country as affluent but underpopulated, resource rich but largely Yet not far to the north are Asian hordes who are impoverished, defenceless. 12 resource poor, etc. The view is seriously out of touch with reality. Parts of Asia are at least as affluent (on conventional economic indicators.) do not see themselves as overpopulated, as Australia. now They in a way that calls for mass exodus; and in those areas which are as overpopulated as Europe, such as Java, bribes and force are required to move people on transmigration programs to relatively unoccupied parts of the Indonesian empire. can So far as they require them, they purchase Australian resources - which are not unique - much more (even carrying significant local cheaply subsidies) and easily than they could obtain 13 them by seizure. For these sorts of reasons, and because Australia itself poses no threat, no other state has an interest in attempting to invade Australia. for interests, to launch so it is for capabilities. a successful invasion of Australia, capacity in the near future. TF. No regional As it is power has the capacity or is likely to have such a As the joint Parliamentary Committee concluded, The "Asian hordes" fd\dn one of the less spoken about successors to Yellow Peril, of immediate past days of the Asian communist threat the and the Domino theory. 13. As Stephenson argued, less fortunately, 20 years ago. Even when around World War II Japan, did have interest in access to strategic raw materials, the Japanese High Command decided against invading Australia because of the difficulty of dealing with the people - a point of much impor tance. 11 �Currently only the United States would have the physical launch a -full scale invasion of Australia, motive to do so (TAS, p.94) . to capacity and it clearly lacks any As the report also stated, quoting Synnot (former Chief of Defence Staff), ... to raise the sort of force which would be required for a mass invasion of Australia could not possibly be done in under five years by other than the superpowers (TAS) . But neither superpower is at all likely to expend effort or resources to such an end. obvious An which at once arises is: (A later serious question to entertain is: defence? on question security, collectively provided global forthwith to unilateral disarmament? now-standard telling bother Why with why not be a free-rider Why such as it is?) Mack for one, then not proceed having reassembled the for the case that Australia is not threatened 'now or foreseeable future', and so having broken the populist argument, is confronted by the awkward option of unilateral disarmament for Australia. proceeds and points to the dependence of premisses 1 and 1A on premiss retreat, hasty to claim that 'the populist case for ANZUS is without premisses 1 and 1A. While it sustained' assumptions which is approximating appears capabilities it decisive of potential 2, even may sometimes take it is true that the arguments against 1 and 1A resistance, a It is however a decidedly problematic retreat. for granted that Australia can look after itself to some some He stages far from clear that premiss 2. given the invaders. they Consider the (estimated) put up essentially on extent, depend no-interests argument, limited invasion very The main consideration adduced appears to depend in no essential way, indeed in no obvious way at all, on Australia s dynamic fighting forces. Australia mineral resources, for instance, obtained more readily and cheaply by market methods than simply be ones. What this seems to show is that a rather minimal military streamlined force, if any, would presently meet Australia's military requirements. 12 can �It is as not if Australia The whole nonmilitary defence is available on a continent well popular training in defence methods, character that apparatus of suited to its use, though requisite to Australia would be a difficult place govern, Australians a difficult lot to subjugate. Australian a But even without a population trained in its techniques. lacking without defenceless'’ 'entirely 1 ike a babe-in-arms. mi 1itary force, conventional is deterred It was such features of the the Japanese a on previous occasion ^If the invasion is attempted, the Australians, in view of their national character, would resist to the end. Also, because the geographical conditions of Australia present numerous difficulties in a military sense, it is apparent that a military venture in that country would be a diff icul t one** (.TAS, p.62) . The still hold good, points parts any such program of nonmilitary to putting and could be strengthened. defence: making it abroad (ideally with dinkum Australian exaggeration) it several There are happen, and that it has happened. the issue of alternative defence we are bound to To when Australia is not threatened, appropriate, is a good occasion to reconsider adapt defence arrangements. now, For return. and, if For example, it looks very much as if enormous sums, which could be valuably directed elsewhere, are being spent, But a much more effective and to make many Australians feel secure. largely inexpensive way to such results would be through requisite mass education therapy - with, psychological if it were well done, much more and satisfactory results, a more secure and better informa^~popu1 ace. Contra 2. As capabilities, basically enormous isolation. well in a a result of post-War developments in weapons systems and the military defence of Australia has become much easier. matter advantages strategic In advance of enhancing through robust particular, of and Australia enjoys by reliable virtue of systems through modern destroyed by precision guided munitions. radar warning It is the geographical any maritime invading force can now be arrival, C3I detected systems, and And any invaders that did manage to gain a foothold on Australian soil would face severe logistic problems, and be 13 �subject deal There is to disproportionate response -from local defence. Boys'’ of and weapon Own War Games stuff concerning contemporary great a which would serve to turn Australia into a pretty invulnerable systems C3I armed fortress, and into an extremely difficult territory even were the oceanic moat crossed and the fortress entered (see especially D. Martin). such Under invasion even armed neutrality and fortified Australia defence from outside the region by an inimical world resisted with reasonable prospect of success. to such an invasion; mount There is no power at all Nonetheless the threat their elected representatives. But the Soviet undertaken such a long-range massive force projection, so, be likely one ooviet a of is taken seriously not only by the larger populace but by committees invasion of could there is apparently (according to TAS) only the Australian population!). of power our good ally the USA (reckoned however a likely invader by power that could, 6-77. scenarios, has military never is ill-equipped to do lacks any plausible reason to try such a stunt (for details see e.g. and The only credible Soviet threat to Australia is in the context of D. Martin). a superpower war, when American facilities in Australia and perhaps Australian would be struck at by intercontinental missiles. cities, it is highly unlikely that it would be followed or accompanied by bad enough, an Soviet forces are once again not sufficent, invasion. sufficient elsewhere While this would be by the Soviets for that sort of diversion; in a superpower war; and not thought they would be required and they would be devastated, unless UoA is militarily even more incompetent than sometimes depicted. Contra 3. cannot be relied upon, rash What will be argued is not the negation of 3, but that premiss 3 is dubious, to place excess reliance on American protection. that the Americans and that it would That being so, be and other patrons being even less promising, Australia should look more to its own resources, as the American administration is kindly advising. Especially since the American "Vietnam debacle" and the fall of 14 Saigon, �things have changed in important ways which cast doubt on the reliability of American patronage. The relative economic and military strength of the USA has declined. a. no longer has such a large share of world product(ivity) a of policy, matter (see Appendix 1); US world warfighting aspirations have Its ability to act as, reduced. It as explicitly been and afford to be, global policeman has also significantly declined (see further Appendix 1) . b. The willingness of Americans to engage in foreign wars has correspondingly tumbled. hawks, sure, be to American administration includes the Although more people and Congress are no longer in the enough than for a /mood gratuitous foreign adventures, especially when the fun may not appear to be in American This "Vietnam syndrome" popular opposition to overseas military involvement. has major a as served strong US opinion polls regularly show Since Vietnam, interests. constraint on US military policy foreign and involvement. c. One Doctrine manifestation important called which 196'?, of the foregoing of elements upon US regional allies responsibility for their own defence in regional conflicts. to the is take Guam primary Another important are outcome is Defense statements to the pointed effect that before US troops committed abroad there must be reasonable assurance no US vital each and 'such is impossible to guarantee - especially for remote countries where national Certainly that Congressional As Mack comments, popular support (Weinberger, assurance of no interests are at stake''. more is assured under the ANZUS treaty which only signatory constitutional consultation; reported in PC p.14). 'act to meet the common danger in accordance processes' (article 4). All reassurances? 15 its is Isn't the treaty backed None that are not undermined by in American administrative multiple-speak. with the treaty strictly requires there is no undertaking or commitment. up by informal verbal provide others, �the elite view is that Australia has to 'work ... Even 'the threshold of direct US combat involvement could be quite For the of US support'" and that the Americans cannot be counted upon always. prospect to help Australia in other ways'". a However special case has been made American for military undertakings (in Vietnam, Cambodia, Iran) common friendship, and shared values and democratic interests, second, and, culture earlier traditions. as first, and slow constitutional already indicated, the basis is shaky. And here, a common pleading: hardly sustains the adequacy of the basis evidence in to as to the adequacy of the basis for the possibility the American people, Congress, cases. reliability - on the basis of permanent There are two difficul ties with this type of special His tori cal (SB, pp. 29-30) . case - as opposed to examples of American abandonment of Australia's and cannot rely upon Ub support in a ... defence emer qen c y ar i s i n g w i t h i n ou r own n e i gh bou r h ood' the basis, high, at the time could significantly limit US willingness or ability circumstances a to maximize significantly on quite crucial issues. rather America: shared by Australia and processes. analogous in For there is not values diverge interests always common, Even as missile testing and nuclear ships issues in the South Pacific have recently confirmed. Common Indonesia opposing did not appear wheir? Australia was interests claim to West Papua. It is dubious at considering least that American interests would coincide with Australian in disputes or confrontation with Asian nations to the North, e.g. Indonesia, Japan, etc. special case argument did hold water, Australia and America really were mates, There was in fact no treaty in operation in then the treaty would be otiose. 1942; Of course if the but by then American interests in countering the are at present Japanese were independently aroused. 14. Although neighbourhood contingencies ... impossible', as the pauper ap-i+e-’ 16 assessed a �4. Other-reliance and regional self-reliance A major problem with other-reliance for defence is then that it cannot be entirely reliable, deemed be tolerated. yet this is a place where unreliability can hardly for When the Indonesians are rolling into Brisbane it won't do Defence to call up with a message like that from Services, "We can't get there tomorrow", till "Or until after Congress meets". More seriously, handing defence over to others means handing control of our lives over to others, nuclear defence, given very which Antipodean administrations have opted means for many of us handing our lives likely In principle, Another problem is its cost. over, and for, it literally. quite if a btate hires out its defence it would no doubt look, other things being equal, for the cheaper bidder - if, that defence is, meterological market is complexion is a services, monopolistic, 15 , who commodity a sort, like The trouble with global etc. with currently only one at a national level, All shipping, national of supplier right the i • making and has this part of the case, the that defence is accordingly can exact a very high price, the whole country a nuclear target. appreciated of enough well, for not trying to force defence, which is plainly a collective good, into a marketable commodity. When a country can provide its own defence, it certainly makes very good for it to do so, since it normally has a stronger interest in sense its own defence than matter, then self-reliance not Just makes good sense but pays; other-reliance does not. most other parties. Should it also be cheaper in costs that But in that event, it does not need nuclear patrons, or to farm out some of its defence. 15. The French, who operate a global network second only to the Americans and more extensive than the Russians, with many forces in the Pacific region, have never been seriously considered. Yet in certain significant respects French social and cultural arrangements are closer to Antipodean ones than American arrangements are. In these days of technological warfare, the post-Waterloo loss record of the French should not be given too much weight; we don't after all look very hard at the American record of defeats and incompetence. 17 �r self-reliance Such as ANZUS and much of the apparent point such alliances undermines an important part of the older such of alliances. newer bipartisan approaches to defence try to combine them (thus e.g. However Beazley as reported by Davidson) - approaches which thus begin to empty of what content it had. little understanding, content, a but are merely vague ANZUS clear no contain of articles simple course is of course to allow them to be emptied an expensive and outdated insurance that the alliance, so Since the arrangements consultations beyond commitments of policy, It may however be death by seizure or convulsion should dies a natural death. American defence facilities American nuclear equipped or powered transport be excluded passage be c1osed or internationalised and from of Australia. treaty would no doubt sacrifice the deterrence and other advantages the That for case 16 supposedly affords , while making way for the greater advantages o+ neutralized nonalignment, of no longer being a nuclear target, etc. self-reliance pure and simple is insufficient. But consist of separable isolated pieces, dramatically, picture Australia will self-sufficient not as becomes increasingly evident. Most winter. The such as plants which are not not escape the effects of nuclear is much the same as for other objects, internally The world does but depend crucially on their environment - and indeed as for States themselves. The question then is what form the additional holistic component of policy should take? that appropriate the cricket game move is not taking sides (as in a kids' that is already set up) and doing one's bit for For that will not contribute to stability, rather to Put this way, it is almost obvious sectionalism and fragmentation, war game or confrontation. to a proper holistic approach, but and to bringing nuclear winter cIoser . 757 If Australia is not likely to be threatened there is no real deterrence advantage because nothinq to deter. Other advantages of the ANZUS alliance such as access to high-level intelligence are not only dubious (see PC, Martin) but not always guaranteed by the alliance as the black out of New Zealand shows. 18 �Other-re 1iance and self-reliance typically present a false contract, certainly do with pure self-reliance - a false contrast like that of partism and (EE, or p.223), at a particular level of and holism versus dependence In between lie a range of positions, one of which - favoured by isolationism. a long line of peacefully-disposed philosophers from Rousseau and Kant onwards - might be called integrated reliance or federated reliance. reach only certain inadequate levels, may which alignment, the monolithic East (or West). 5. Against elitist arguments stability, very as related arguments revolve around that securi ty and side, are value-laden terms, of are which But security. not cultural What stability comprehends in American administrative perception invariants. is other and 4 and 5 of the elitist argument turn around the crucial notion Premisses stabi1i ty the level of modern alliances are essentially coupled with opposition to an e.g. of But integration different from what highland villagers take it to include. In each case a system is stable if it returns to a given stationary state But relevant states and under perturbations of sufficiently small magnitude. the stationary among them are both relative to given frames of reference, /e.g, what is stable at a macrolevel may well not be at a microlevel. said of the superpowers, even remote events can threaten their interests or their associates ' and stability. disturb Trudeau As 'they share a global perception according to But lesser states or people, not counting which (p.10) remote IVA business or military^ as invariably view stability; by relevant, report bombs a* necessary to stability, contrast philosophers increasingly terrorism and as characteristically antithetical ad 4: a vital no and the see nuclear bombs as fix a* tools of to peace. interest in global stability and secur i ty? 1? Bureaucrats instability. Of course Australia �have, does what sizeable nation does not. interpretation conceals crucial differences, For Australia. in highly material to the argument. stability may well mean something different in USA from global means Certainly vitai interests are different. interested in containing socialism (in Australia as elsewhere), in rhetoric at least, popular more to socialism (or Mon-Soviet communism) global upset to containing equate communism and both with Soviet containment. containing motherhood But the determinable stability on American in Latin America, it America is and it tends, wi th socialism A continental swing or i n Africa, wou 1 d indeed wou I d and perception what significant effects on US business and investment; but it wou 1 d not on its own or affect most Australians or directly threaten upset and it certainly need not affect nuclear stability. Antipodean stability, Australians generally are not opposed in principle to socialism or notably interested in containing perhaps the opposite). (indeed spread not ought to be interested in defence of the the in system, Australia is not interested defence (American) it in, or enterprise" “free wherever of advanced capitalism its is presently initiated or imposed. It can be conceded, without granting the main thrust of the premiss Contra 5. that the Soviets are expansi onistic, in interested empires, extending their influence where they can. including American academics and sales people). spread, Marxism-Leninism, everywhere. in at least a weak sense that they The and are So also are most matter are many Indonesian (so for that But the Soviets have an ideological message an ideology they anticipate Americans also have a capitalist message, being installed free enterprise, which they are working to sell pretty much everywhere accessible to them; they need to be expansi onistic to have it adopted, Chinese little would and whereas the Russians and need simply wait for history to take its determined course (though assistance surely - reflecting legitimate doubt about spread progress wi thou t interfering). message is pernicious: this a determinism? Bu t (^he\^jreb^ Russian both are pernicious (for familiar reasons; 20 to see e.g., �Erlichs). some in threatens, proper question is whether Soviet international activity The damaging way, stability. global Soviet-American doubt No confrontation, as in the Cuba missile affair, does threaten stability; but not in way that has any bearing on Australian defence. a expansionary none Australia, military tendency, or has otherwise, fact In direct a of significance reaches into the Antipodes. Russian no effect on bo what is all the local excitement and anticipation about? The effect of Soviet expansionism is much exaggerated and from the Antipodes it is hardly a problem, Viewed qet locked addressed. of into unless the Soviets confrontation with USA - a real military internationalism, be hardly the heavies But confrontation apart, Soviet a great success story, does not seriously disturb stability, as seen from Australia. should distinguished be military access, involvement World control involving anything since influence. War II, In actual of global on the militarily, that of Afghanistan, have accomplished, especially in Europe. but success in western strategic lacks Europe, has they the force ratio And 21 case little had concerns might. not attempt lacking much plausibility. needed to be assured of both by their own standards of what is required standards. by But the idea of Soviet military adventure Europe is a Western invention and bogey, military what striking conspicuous The usual Western apprehension stability. and expansion the Russian record is hardly new territory, Soviets military The one with influence military, with the USA or several other states. comparison effect mere and potential -military, expansion types of a proper assessment of Soviet internationalism, For Soviet to problem a third nonaligned group which helps to referee and to prize global should With that problem however, the Antipodes can better assist as part apart, not by seconding and inciting the USA. in overexploited. the Soviets have no good The military and by reasons or �in undertaking such an exercise which would draw them into interests war. They client nuclear already -Face economic difficulties and trouble with East European states which they cannot control satisfactorily. The of Soviet inf1uence has largely been in the Third extension But it has hardly been successful, with as many failures and losses to record as Soviet "gains" - gains which add to the imperial burden countries wracked with problems, world. such as Uietnam. since they involve The Third World exercises are marred by Soviet ineptitude and limited by the state of their own economy. They scarcely displace the global structure enough to test its stability; and they produce no shock waves or even ripples in the Antipodes. 6. Contra the dancers the in East-West dance confrontation between the lead dancers. have destabilizing new weapons arms tension control an from escalating the With this US policies and Recent US practices and indeed highly destabilising, and weapons systems, because of rejection of arms race on earth and begin a new one in space. A vast practices more are because of control and because of star wars preparation which both and accelerate increase in and suspicion accompanies the arms race which is in large measure due to US intransigence and US war-fighting doctrines, built-in but than Soviet ones, Soviet proposals, the death, of as much to do as USSR ones. least at of The main current threat to world stability comes not from one incentives (see FAC). alliance or for pre-emption, new weapons systems, and deliberate abandonment of with arms Such considerations duly assembled demolish the theme that alignment with USA helps increase stability. American practices are to be resisted as much as Soviet. 6. The East-West balance argument; alignment versus neutrality. The need for Australian alignment with the USA is supposed to be shown by the East-W^st balance argument. This balance argument, which 17 premisses with the related elitist argument, runs as follows ; 7. Global stability is the key to world peace. shares key �8. of the international order is a matter of maintaining a Stability global But balance. 5. The global balance is constantly threatened by an expansionist USSR. The threat is [only] checked by the USA, which (6A.1) guarantees an open 6A. and pluralistic international ■?. order. indeed most vital Australia's primary security concern, is this interest, stability. Hence Australia's 10. role is to help America maintain the balance. The rest of Australia's in tervolvement to follow. taken then before practical assumes much that has already been rebutted, argument threat argument But there are many reasons for halting the reaches this stage of moral and it Soviet with American military arrangements is thesis is correct (i.e. detail. The for instance that the stabilizing 5) and that US policy is It also takes for granted, balance what now is at least (part of 6A). doubt, that American policy is directed at balance and deterrence, rather than serious in what the administration appears to be aiming at, straight superiority. event, that is not really engaged Australia balancing in some longer term so much as in helping USA win a nuclear war, feat, But in contradicting the goal of world peace of premiss 7. and its derivation. Contra 10 follow that strength is indicate, the Ta role is such a lackey's one. leaning America's direction, in as be If most the Presumably premiss balance of seems to evidence 5A.1 is designed to exclude putting its weight where it is effective, this not does team (that is what such images as the balanced tug-of-war of Australia teaming up with totalitarians. thouqht, should Australia's it then Australia should surely be throwing its slight weight in Eastern suggest). The derivation is inadequate; with would deplorable Nevertheless Australia given its own broader (From previous page) After some reconstruction, that is. For the argument, curiously referred as that of "central balance in newspaper level publications of academics, is never presented in requisite detail which is one reason why it has proved hard to criticise and refute. �interests objectives, could Australia fulfil and principles. which would enable it to make to world peace, contribution There are several satisfactory more among them nonalignment and neutrality. A more direct approach may Thus 10 is hardly wel1-supported or evident. be a better than throwing our Australian weight unrefIectively on one the balance. roles different of side the balance images and argument As a little reflection attests, points not in the direction intended, but towards nonalignment. Contra 4A (and peace, the preserves if of course false. USSR in this munitions dance, the escalation (the USSR relation). balance, hence and Again it takes two at least to checks the the history of the dance reveals that pace flowed from the interaction of the one partner of with the but for the USA, the USA would not be required to check the That is, other. the it can be granted that the USA is interlocked with and While tango. The theme that US maintains 4). interaction is two-way as with Hegel's master-slave famous Furthermore it looks as if, on a different historical trajectory, the main states of Western Europe could match the Soviet Union militarily (for they have comparable combined GNP, etc.) Thus it is doubtful see Appendix 1, resources, technological that the current Soviet build-up, produced in interaction with the USA, could only be, or have been, checked by the US. de 6A.1. As the premiss is only of marginal relevance to the argument, need only be noted that the international order the USA helps maintain very much to be desired. In its intervention, militarily, it leaves economically and indirectly, USA has assisted substantially in reducing plurality and openness, as well as in establishing or propping up rotten regimes, side of American imperialism is well enough documented, etc. The negative if not widely enough read or known by Americans. ad 8 and maintaining pass, the the equivocation on the balance. While balance is one stabi1i ty in the world arrangements that have presently balance structure can only carry so much loading. 24 way of come to Add too much �weight (of arms, and so forth) tension, The increasing probability of catastrophic probably catastrophically. fail, to both sides and the structure will breakdown, for a variety of reasons (accident, miscalculation, computer error, human interference, etc.), has been argued elsewhere (e.g. WPI) . While a certain neither overloaded nor overstressed balance may serve for stability, the present increasingly stressed balance will probably not. however, balance argument, neglects this dynamical situation, illegitimately balance switching from a (certain) balance in premiss 8 to the (on-going) subsequent premisses. The balance argument itself The breaks in down through of removing equivocati on. What dynamic picture also indicates is the importance the weight -from the balance, some reduction. position It most obviously by arms limitation and tension to a neutral points to a different role for Australia, too within the nonaligned grouping. It is to the emerging case for a different role for Australia, and to action for achieving this different role, that the positive argument will now gradually swing. The attacks inadequate upon East-West proposals (its to repair it. alleged good administrators This For example, Australia than with American trade argue, is a nonsequitur, and lots to the argument, and do not against nonalignment or neutralism is set pervasiveness of nuclear winter. for for The additions are inessential confusion and dust. the for a different role combined The main effect of these additions is to generate extra alliance and service. serve balance argument is typically of other He might as well things), so aligned be our sagacious because if the control balance fails we are all worse than ex nihilo quodlibet (for it also that balance is necessary for the stability). dead. suggests But, in the main, the attack is irrelevant because the point of nonalignment, is to help remove overload and to break down confrontation and its escalation to war; before winter descends, it is a thing to do to delay or halt its descent, 25 now, and most important, to �reduce its severity. Australia's weight may be slight, another irrelevant addition goes, psychologically it is important for the West. disease" would show the weakening f or Sovi e t ex pan s i on ism. virtual 1y alignment, Australi a gives the Bell, Any further spread of the "Kiwi of Western resolve, and give the green light a leading exponent of the balance argument, impression that if Australia dropped through the isles to Russians would be on the road down 18 the tomorrow. Much of this sort of rhetoric i =■ reminiscent of f such military interests, set route, major American of out the The Russians have no baseless fear-mongering of an earlier pre-Uietnam time, and but out, t ie or present capabli A of they would be met by substantial resistance along most the for one, has and the resistance obtaining Western assistance. interests, Philippines, strengthening And if they were to gear up different as well the from Australia's, as elsewhere in East Asia. depends, argument, in For America, Indonesia in both The addition, its "green light from so far for expansion" comparison, on the previously faulted premiss 5 of Soviet expansionism. or another In fact most of the case against alignment of one sort it is argued. for often nonalignment and neutrality are, au th or i tar i an assumptions. style, Cat 1ey, simply for denounced example, - turns - when in good old-fashioned upon al ready another exponent of "central fau1 ted balance", presents the following 'consideration'': ... whatever the Swedes or Swiss may think about the matter, Australia is locked by considerations of culture, economics, and political philosophy into the defence of the Western world. It has both an obligation and a duty to contribute its share to that cannot easily be defence if necessary by hosting facilities which located elsewhere (p.15). The premiss is false for reasons essentially indicated: Nay sustains the conclusion, prescriptive 18. and the premiss in no the argument involving among other things, (is-ought) fallacy. Consider the premiss. Australia is See the discussion of Bell's claims in D. Martin and in Mack PC. 26 the not, �k unless Catley has information withheld from most of the rest of us,locked into Western nuclear defence, its but in principle free to reconsider and rethink use of the "facilities" is not irrevocable, and shortly options. (American comes up . >, economics and political philosophy provide locks and chains for Australia but f©.r reconsideration.) in principle at least, not for nonaligned Western European states? part USA or altogether a client of frameworks economic and They do not: state; and philosophies political significantly different (for details, defence (as, practices e.g., ANZUS in al 1 of culture, Australia is not a cultures, the interests, are nations two But even if the ideological see CPD) . frameworks were much more similar than they are, the How do that would not entail its weakness similar nor shows), any defence obligations. of Most worse. the arguments against nonalignment are of Catley Fortunately, calibre - or the case against nonalignment is (as with several then, o-f the above points) developed in detail elsewhere, especially by 0. Martin in his examination of counter-arguments to Australian armed neutrality, legally recognised nonbelligerent form of nonalignment he favours. al 1 of Martin's argument is couched in negative form; very brief. make this his positive brief us secure against such dangers as we may one day have to meet, needlessless is exposes to other dangers, correct enough, Virtual 1y alignment or alliance with the USA It reduces to thi including nuclear war' and in need of wide propagation, exhausts the positive case for nonalignment. posi t ive case of much theoretical interest, the it cannot while means no In particular there is a to be drawn from the it Wh i 1 e (p.l). by is more burgeon i ng theory of collective goods and action. 7. Free riding, group size, and increasing variety. The with strategic more convenience) world situation we now confront can be viewed as than 100 players, major a game counting in nation-states and leaving out (for organisations such as the largest 100 transnational �These compan i es. organisational players align themselves around two arge poles. East and West, as indicated: EAST NON-ALIGNED N WEST N India N Sweden# Swi tzer 1 and# Tanzani a Most Latin . American States! ## Costa Rica State commmun i st State capitali st N: Nuclear weapons states #: Neutral states ##: Nonmi 1i tary states Key: There are various - a great many - games these state players are playing, Some of these of which are practically important for peace and for stability. such games, as representation), World are Empire and Chicken (already There are several problems about East-Nest games: have, the Russian what under played played essentially between the East-Nest representation negative sum characters of some games. may, as they will with the Big One), end after one round, And the monolithic East - way simplifications may). So game theoretical representation they like the monolithic Nest dichotomy is misleading, and, as will appear, discards crucial detail the one superplayers. repeatability of the games (clearly some nuclear games roulette, =ome will (in be approached differently and more obliquely. Nor 1d security, (technically, in like regional and local joint security, is a collective good supply and precluding exclusion). 28 That is not of �to course say that there are not conditions under which security for instance where security is guaranteed by a narrow and much to be desired, intolerant despotism; provisioning, it can be argued, but then, not the particular product. collection of N nation-states. It is, the trouble lies with the It is a collective good G for the furthermore, a collective good permits the possibility of free-riding by nation-states. perspective the American complaint about its allies, insufficient expenditure on defence, their leave may which Looked at from this and Japan for example, is a complaint about their free riding. Within the balance of power framework the conditions for free-riding extracted by Pettit) are satisfied, disarming states. For to the achievement (or maintenance) of G by any will make every member­ and any, unilaterally is available to all N members of the collective if it is available G 1. for instance by neutral and (as better off. 2. G is achieved iff some number m^K contribute towards its provision, where under the balance of power assumption IICTK^N and II = (USA, USSR}. The 3. expected value of contributing to G or its maintenance is less than the expected value of not doing so, i.e. likely costs exceed likely benefits except for perhaps members of II given that G is provided by II. is There pegged by what free-rider problem, members of II for whom the free-rider option is not open - within ran be called a pegged (or asymmetric) the confines of the balance of power assumption - and for whom condition 3 only satisfied under certain ways of looking at the matter (e.g. a war 10 years down the road so the expected costs each—year is there will be exceed the expected benefits). There regional) is a straightforward case for recommending free riding on the balance of power provision of 6. 2? Australian (and Some arguments, �beyond or adding to those already in effect presented, are these:- Either If it does then the region is better off than it would be if or it does not. (strongly) the as and there is a large-scale war stability breaks down catastrophically aligned because it is unlikely to be (so heavily) targetted. (Here dreadful new argument that nuclear winter means that the Antipodes might well be involved gets challenged and rejected: see MF). doesn't break down then the region has the benefits in any case, enhances global USA stability, indeed, as remarked and wi11 etc.; regional weight significant? of delusional the in That power? framework. Ne shouldn't: we believe seriously it and if we do we're is the in living in a Australia has been left out of the picture in virtually strategic planning exercises, all do Australian voice makes much real difference the Northern Western block, be As regards Australasian further argued, the evidence points to the contrary. halls the without For there is no clear evidence that our alignment and cooperation with costs. the stability If most difference-making peace initiative^, etc., etc. Now riding, Eastern rather countries would hardly block th an suppor t of f ering object (h owever to free Antipodean c omf or t trifling), an d Furthermore free riding is how the Americans, incitement to their opposition. the rational would expect Australia to act, on their theoretical principles self interested procedure (see CPD). It is economically rational; contributing is not. But won't the Americans make things economically dear for Australia? In threats and theory, do yes; but in practice, no more than they threatened already in the case of New Zealand with the nuclear-ships issue. short term arrangements: aberrations, America will never give up trade But or to for market one gets the impression that America would trade with the Devil Himself if it could open some new markets in Hell. Despite its political stigma, way immoral or irregular. voluntary payment system, free riding need be no problem, Perhaps the buses are free; perhaps there to which only some need contribute, 30 or in any etc. i => a Hi th the �contributing is not (see nuclear fix, free riding is indeed the moral course; HPI). Free riding, though often portrayed as a problem, is only a problem in certain and desirable sufficiently riders. collective of cases is This in Australia stays the the escalating treadmill or gets is, off is involved many too free which will whether or security, and precarious way that it curious on good will not be provided because of the situation with global not the provided, where provisioning, rides and be not free. Australia's free riding may be a problem for America; it is not for Australia. Interests diverge again. of stability by building, tripod or bipedal one, for example, if it is a wind tower or of supports increases stability. instance in the theory of "spreading the risks" certain a cybernetics. free The increases and by similar Then a than a has in diversity ecology, for The related theme, (see EH). stability, that theme The elaborated been in core eco-systemic idea to be developed is that Australia's and consequent nonalignment in defence riding variety, variety topple point the Increasing the diversity, with stability has been sharpened and confirmed correlates that ground. a quadrapod tower is much less likely to and requires less guying to stay up. variety, certain increasing its rigid ties or supports to the better terms, pictorial structure is typically increased up to a it more adequately; securing or a In riding increases stability. free Judicious enhances diversity accordingly increases stability (especially if done in and concert with other client states). Two hardly interlocked well precarious guyed, structure well dug in but stability of the Hhat makes engineering sense is not supports in tension, are inadequate of world peace. East and Hest, for the long term however strengthening the supports that are there, balance is disturbed by the Host's surging ahead and likely overburdening the structure, helping the East when the but increasing the variety of supports, enlarging and diversifying 31 �group size. East-monolithic monolithic The West picture misconceptualism perhaps convenient ■for some players. in conceptualism, main reason for mistakes concerns group size. collective but is significantly differs behaviour of large groups theory in group size is a highly significant factor (though group ■from that of smal I One Whereas 11+ = (West, East) is a N of nation-states is not. number the group, a It may ■force mistakes convenient simplification, e.g. for strategic thinking. smal1 than more much is i t s pr ec i se i mpor t is increasingly contested). N of nation-states is a large group The group, of interested parties, indeed of substantially economic actors. the American theory of collective action applies: that interest, counterintuitive way. a in behave self essentially So we may expect wi 1 1 that the groups Though expec ted to act in the to obtain security in particular, the collection will not. common On this account (that elaborated by Olson), the common interest can only be guaranteed by outside influence or imposition (coercion in Olson's rapid thinking). there is, as experience has shown, no outside with the collective of nations, mediator collective or influence good. The But of sufficient authority to ensure attainment prognosis looks very gloomy: this of the important most (though far from unique) collective good will not be provided. Fortunately the reasoning, has been containing shift economic virtually (subjectively) back actors though large. highly is to basics, all privileged, for whom costs of war exceed benefits in perspective from the earlier free riding condi t i on important that The group, too swift. several like much of the "logic" of collective action, 3). effect of the knowledge of an ominous nuclear actors involved should now be expected in that (note in the Indeed an winter is posit i on; costs of nuclear war have become very high. for go Olson's grand theory is based on the accountants/-----tautology (defining 'net') 32 �gross agent benefits - gross agent costs. net agent benefit i.e. A for each agent or actor i ymbols, in show i for virtually all that in N. is positive for some i is privi1eqed if A group (in collective N) , European to benefi t s of global security are decidedly positive (e.g. respective future GDPs would expectedly fal 1 needs 1 the net wi th a nuclear war nation-states argument their It to near zero). The fact the group of nation-states is privileged does not however imply that the that good i nvo1ved, c o1 Iec t i ve longer term. error, stability ■ JI instabi1i ty. dynamics, An achieved improved particularly in wi11 be supplied, secur i ty, dynami c ; it takes no account of mistake. through superiority modelling or intermediate - which can take some account iterated games — is gained by returning to through the the of game theoretic ground A free rider "problem" is tantamount to a dilemma of some sort; according to conventional wisdom, the contrast Taylor and Hard). it is a prisoners' (cf. dilemma The argument can go this but Pettit, way;- a free rider problem or issue is defined in terms of the provisioning of a collective good; theory the but of collective goods is equivalent to that of a prisoners 20 dilemma. dilemma; in detail which more Certainly the global nuclear situation as much is a commonplace claim. appears Elsewhere (HPI) that it does indeed present a moral dilemma. to present a it has been argued Here the argument can proceed through the theoretical route just sketched above or in the piecemeal way to be indicated - is that it is also a prudential dilemma 21 (for members of N). 19. The less than perspicuous symbolism is that used in Hardin (82, p.20, p.39), but with agents' costs or contributions, C, duly agent relativized. Hardin misleadingly treats C as a fixed parameter, thus strictly falsifying the tautology. 20. Thus Hardin who (in 82) claims to 'demonstrate the equivalence of the logic of collective action and the Prisoners' Dilemma' (p.4). The demonstration, which will be contested elsewhere, is given on p.x.5ff. 21. But of course the two types of dilemma interconnect. �the range of apparent two party games being played by the US Hardin 83), Union Soviet (labelled US and SU respectively) administration regards the moves of further nuclear armament. (It is supposed, A, from the or nuclear disarmament, N. It is important here, as other French that The American people seem rather more were clearly opposed to the new nuclear missiles their people the towards nuclear disarmament than their administration; inclined to proceeded German administration The strategy games involved are then install. shots It is administrations or governments etc. take people into war; to places, administration - which for the most part calls the the society and the people. generally as that the game is set in some background context, naturally, Chinese nuclear armament). distinguish and 1985 in nuclear disarmament is not considered in isolation from on-going e.q. and (e.q. since these have obtained some discussion us consider -first, Let administration which we can suppose to be played over successive time intervals, e.q. games, years; so there is interaction and feedback as the games go on - until the Big Ones explode. The apparent games of US and SU are those diagrammed next: Pr i soners' A 4,1 D 2,2 O 1,4 this being played. According professions!1ez the A 1,4 CP presumably also represented US policy, it no aggressive, D A 4,1 D 3,2 US CP 1,4 to Hardin, 'giving evidence of Dilemma Prisoners' ordering of virtually all that A 4,1 that simplistic setting those represent the apparent games Within and D D 3,3 US IJS A SU SU SU D New Initial Game Revised Game Dilemma Game in (PD) 'represents [his] deformation the preference the articulate policy analysts in the United the Soviet Union' (p.248) . While PD there is considerable evidence (as already longer does, war-fighting, 34 That is, the US has States may have indicated) that the US administration has shifted to phase. are a interchanged more its �rankings of (D,D) Soviets, The have who been much more consistent no (and bound to try to keep up with the Americans, their changed However they are have stuck with deterrence and no-first-strike. but better doubt appear not to have in their policy pronouncements, censored) game, and (A,A), presumably some time between 1978 and 1984 games. and so pushed towards the Revised Game shown, which p1easan11y restores symmetry. Stable or equilibrium outcomes for each game are circled. said be to stable if neither player has unilaterally on the strength of the game, influencing provide in broad sense, a and dangerous outcome. strategy for each player; dominant that equilibirum In all All strategies. is hence its economic fascination. results which are socially suboptimal (and games that might plausibly be taken to represent situation, and A recognisably guaranteed by the independent "stable" strategies. substantial to political substantially the games satisficing the suboptimal superpower outcome socially superior is there are What is worse, and military incentives for the superpower players adjust their preferences in after repeated games, an And the same applies to suggested alternative Chicken. other a below all as in Pareto- even But as the threshold), such achieved yet in the PD game that is these games are di 1emmas. games these the apparent games arming is and suboptimal, strategies switch i.e. to alter the outcome except by player also to alter other dilemmas undesirable deliver the to incentive An outcome is not directions but to do what the US appears to have done, to make the situation worse. socially preferable would be change to a coordination game of Much some sort, for instance, to the game which neutrals tend to play (and which Lackey, in contrast to other more bellicose utilitarians, sees utilitarian superpowers playing; hence Hardin's label diagrammed, WN inclined neutral represents a for this game, 'Lackey's Game'). Western-inclined (e.g. Yugos1avi a): neutral and EN In the game an Eastern �A 3,2 D D (D A 2,3 NN Now 4,4 dilemmatic and coordination games are not played in the integrated since [Other coordination games, with (D,D) assigned (1,1) 1 in settings such as Uni ted Nations' committees games coordination are (and games peoples' -frequently but isolation, elsewhere, as well). Superimposing the games, as applied to US and SU games, leads to the following augmented games: SU SU SU A D A 2,2 4,1 1 2/3 3,3 • 1 4,1 . 2/3 1,4 • 2/3 2,2 D J,3 ■ 4 1,4 ■ A 2/3! A m represents a sequence of ms, and 3s in some order. As the agumented games reveal, a stable deadlock. on the superpowers. 4 i ■ e? ■ 2/3 4 ■ 2/3 a sequence of 2s m < m w rn in fact in several ways. on For example, would For one, enough significant much greater as a Superpower militarism Australia's nonaligned free impact, rider for disarmament and regional nuclear freedom (instead of by wash polemics and token ambassadors, US support) . 36 strategy with less support, unilateral action by US arms build-up can be exposed. be in much more pressure can be brought to bear- power excursions would stand naked, and unsupported. seriously <2,3 to play with a superpower is to help reinforce For another, towards disarmament. particular, 1,4 A a coordination game can alter the overall dominant playing administration 4,1 • 2/3 But playing an independent coordination game can help breaking the deadlock, players 3,2 ■ D 1 US US US A D D D New Game, Augmented Revi sed Game, Augmented Prisoners" Dilemma Augmented and in pressing white­ undermined by a none-too-tacit policy of �8. On the need for, possibility of, and prospect of basic structural change- The peace (in world has changed enormously since the time of Kant's proposals and even since the time of Veblen's more cynical (of 1795), additions Hard science and destructive power have grown enormously; and even 1917). especially that admitting knowledge of collective behaviour, theoretical game-theoretic treatment, what for though still has increased markedly. slight, be accomplished politically has in certain can little, since Rousseau complained (around 1761) of respects But changed very that governments were probably too short-sighted to appreciate the merits of his project for perpetual peace. Governments have obstacles to peace. long of source been seen as Xthe main (contingent) if the peace is Thus Veblen rightly maintains that ' ... to be kept it will have to come about irrespective of governmental management, - in spite of the State rather than by its good offices'- (p.7) . against the State on the basis that 'governmental Veblen argues and establishments powers ... are derived from feudal establishments of the Middle Ages; which in turn, However a predatory origin and of an irresponsible of are character Christian-feudal origin of the State provides only one the (p.r). - and a coercive - evolutionary pattern of organisation (pp. 12-13). There are major blockages to peace proposals and projects at two main and critical levels of organisation, that, organisation of collectives of states and, organisation deep, and domination of removal and to nothing set in part by devolution, themselves. these blockages, and exploitation of other forms, sights rather lower, short organisation of states, upon, The problems involved ones intertangled appears to call genuine global appear adequate. impossible in present political climates. 37 Yet even much the for are concerning extensive reached, to be attained, levels of political stability of extensive structural changes at both would of that of the Indeed if a permanent and satisfactory peace is to be adjustments. or individual focussed already smaller changes look �There is little doubt that certain sorts of structural change are to conducive peace and that certain fundamental permanent peace. for changes would be With that in view they have long been least from Rousseau and Kant onwards. transform the structures that lead to war'- (B. theme immune to criticisms, obvious further desiderata, modest material freedoms, ~ at advocated for 'it is also necessary instance to To render this Martin, p.12). that straightforward extension of certain established structures could bring an authoritarian to war, sufficient But it has also long been supposed that such changes are necessary for lasting peace: some highly end typically presupposed, are invoked, e.g. certain standards of life, etc., and the type of necessity involved is set at some lower technical level (not excluded however by present These adjustments make the necessity theme more difficult to practicalities). assess, but also difficult to sustain. are There part, critical positive part, part negative According marxist demolishing and range of arguments a defence, from a negative determinism, of comprising direct arguments for the theme. 22 this enterprise will simply be illustrated. to deterministic and mechanistic approaches, technological determinism, human nuclear weapons, The large such as that like of megamachines They are an integral part of the business of generally, are no aberration. industrial and ecological conquest, a further stage in human intervention which has already involved substantial disruption through pesticides, etc. The argument tends to the fatalistic. made, and once made they wi11 22. and etc., that arrangements have to be more or less the way they are, and nature, a parts to its assessment two be used. wastes, The megamachines of conquest are No change in political arrangement, More of the negative enterprise is attempted elsewhere, e.g. a critique of the supposed strait-jacket of human nature is begun in CPD. From Plato through Hegel and into contemporary times it has been supposed that war, like aggression, is part of human nature, that war is a permanent condition of human and social existence. 38 �would which enthusiasts any make difference, possible. is their position and luck, push While there is, unfortunately, a induction from the manufacture of weapons, batches machines are to this one, depl oyed) , never (and organisation deterministic position would possible either; political not frustrate the and other, is false, Different political arrangements, been have inductions. broader The are changes arrangements too, like the rest of social not life, are But (nonanalytical) determinism, technologically or economically determined. technological many that a change in background of course that such background is made of But even the good inductions do not that weapons of various sorts must be used, political many invention from induction's:- machines that do eventually get many reinvented or independently discovered). show of any given type (for or the like to their manufacture are unreliable and subject to counterexamples or weapon there is no stopping progress. But in doing so they overextend themsleves. fair technological that a even further, once invented by humans will be used: device Sometimes so it is argued which alleviate problems, are possible and would be different in differently evolved worlds. CPD). (JB, elsewhere technically Things did not and do not have to be the way they are or the social and political sort of way they are. Many routes, dominant require none of deductive strength, political extensive lead to the conclusion that the structures of our time, evolved from feudal structural alteration. In particular, institutions, they need to superseded by alternative structures which do not promote or lead to war. theme has been argued directly from the nuclear fix (see e.g. But suppose, improbable as it may seem, thereby removing the current nuclear fix; quietly seif-destructing,or nuclear disarmament HF I, p.4/ft.). that nuclear weapons all vanished, for instance, thermodynamic actually took place. The they turned out to be miracle occurred, or not be The problem of war would t-hat of nuclear war would only be given a short respite. 23 Conventional the structural arrangements for war would remain intact. removed For a massive be and even 3'? �remain, weapons would weapons such as chemical and biological ones, were they prevent the in sot ar 3S could seem be Nu clear weapon s, if nuclear power plants remained especially nothing and intact; development of (Star wars) weapons more nuclear- as dangerous caches are easily hidden away), removed ("for smal 1 replaced, would along with weapons perhaps as than diabolical nuclear ones. War cannot be eliminated while leaving the rest of society as it is by freezing the status quo. ... The structural conditions for war need to be removed - not reinforced as appeals to elites may do - and superseded by alternative structures which do not lead to war (B. Martin, p.12). Structural adjustments peace. An can provide conditions for Kantian initial for the argument satisfactory lasting proposition that is peace possible, presented by Latta (introducing Permanent Peace), runs as follows:Peace, perpetual peace, is an ideal, not merely of a speculative kind but a practical ideal, a moral principle. ought to be realised, i.e. there ought (morally) Hence this ideal to be peace. But ought entails can; therefore peace is possible. From Heracleitus philosophers by 24 be with war as one limit, is essential swarm more widely conceded, ought to though often not on of Some are even captivated stop, to motion and progress. the recent shift in philosophical fashions the second premiss would Kantian grounds, now but Such grounds do support the theme that peace ...is—desirable be realised, indicate what sort of peace. but are more discriminating in Unfortunately, premiss does not sustain the conclusion, 23? impressive such extravagant counter-claims as that with peace everything would consequentialist. and there buzzes an Hegel who have rejected the second premiss. that competition, With through that they help however/ it is done, the second ought does not entail can, as many (From previous page) As B. Martin, who uses this important form of argument for institutional change to get his thick book started, points ou t (pp. 12-13). 24. The swarm includes some anomalies, ecology, Spinoza: see Appendix 3. 40 such as that tarnished hero of deep �dilemmas reveal moral Fortunately (see MD) . conclusion that peace is possible, method of (semantical) modelling: societies where recall persists present in detail scenarios of it may be necessary to (for the sceptical with n = 1 or n = 0). n-human models, the to That is the more and indeed is feasible. elaborate peace route a more satisfactory and revealing is there This sort of thing is of course in more pleasing fashion than logicians could hope to emulate if 25 less precisely, by novelists. Hhat all these scenarios point to, already done, rather however, are societies considerably different from our own, not in the people involved who have their weaknesses, forth, and so their power drives, but because of significant structural alterations in the societies depi c ted. way of such modellings we can not merely argue to the feasibi1i ty By peace, sorts restructured push ahead with the argument - that societies but desirable alternatives to contemporary are For those of us industrial arrangements. pacific the alternatives, Heilbroner is has and possible said thoroughly entrenched, of the desirable, human and enforced, power. That has not deterred social before him and many after him, Kant, 25. in his search these military or then who want to move towards such from inference, feasibility and we shou1d begin on the real work of structural change. desirability is clear: Peace practical of of but the prospect). prospects Present poor (as arrangements are are both ideologically and by much physical theorists such as Kant, who like Rousseau were concerned with obtaining lasting for the indispensible conditions peace. for__ 1 asting—peace, Perhaps Kant had some such modellings in view in his theme that peace is empirically possible, which he coupled with his striking claim that it is morally and rationally imperative. The latter claim, running in direct opposition to the longline of bellicose philosophers, really relies on the correct but controversial assumption that states are subject to the same moral relations as individual persons. Both then have an obligation to seek peace derived from forms of the categorial morality, notably from rational autonomy , the universality of maxims, and the ultimate value of persons (or, more chauvinistically, of humanity). 41 �claimed, others as have claimed since, that peace is not possible present structural arrangements of a competing nation-states kind. times changed, have and so have state structural In particular there is now, under To be sure since arrangements, in the shape of the United Kant Nations, a very weak reflection of what Kant looked for, a world (or European) federation of nations. namely, But crucial the at ingredients in Kant's resolution are still upper level, what is required for a standard resolution Dilemma type situations - some surrender of Prisoners lacking:- of sovereignty, national 26 especially as regards war; Much has now accumulated that more evidence the and, at the lower level, "republican" state*. nation-state level far-reaching changes if peace is to be secured, or required at movement is even to get its message through already fixed channels control systems. succeed, tn informational and democratic are practical 27. and not (p.52) , to alter which the theoretical arguments for not that it has fallen very Kant's claim, as well as arguments of an inductive sort. Such is also the new message from America: for the peace movement to get through to the administration, American democracy must be overhauled and revitalised, capitalist democracy superseded by true democracy or "republicanism" (see e.g. Cohen and Ragers). But the message, like the US peace movements'" very limited demands for peace, leaves the state, as the bringer of wars, and the main source of violence, essentially intac.; the structural changes suggested, which will be slow to achieve, are much too narrowly conceived. 28. state has traced some of the economic consequences of 'the rise and subsequent fall of the American imperium'’ There to The significant decline of the American imperium Heilbroner 26^ peace Movements on a single front, such as peace, are unlikely to channels, 27 character and membership of state control system^. widen APPENDIX 1; a need to be linked into a broader plurality of movements, but are My thanks for information to David Bennett and Andrew Mack. �'Empires f ar . empire was no Thp =h<=pr military cost ... for the United States a 1 one ... 12 px c e p t i on « is always been expensive and the American have ten roughly imperial American dol1ars)". GNP for the last 25 years ... percent of supplemented spending enhanced poverty, countries fueled inflation, what it was represented as required by, $2X10 in capitalist other by 1972 etc., and was complemented by, counterexpenditure and efforts by the USSR. establishment of an American hegemony [consisted and] resulted 'The just in American large very capital American-owned billion" payments and Between 1950 and 1970, equipment abroad 1 eaped from $ 12 (negative build-up of value of the to billion "capital flows" and balances), and a $78 growing On this sort of basis Heilbroner speculates that of IOUs. operation rapid A result of the expenditure abroad was a serious balance of problem accumulation mere investments abroad. plant (p.54). but in the military expenditures, not of the American imperium by itself - deemed of such 'the critical importance to preserve the peace and security of the capitalist world - was in likelihood all a inflationary phenomena' the for the globalisation of the (p.57 with insert from p.56). According to Heilbroner, that condition sufficient 'Long before the Vietnam debacle, it was clear American arms could not prevent the rise of revolutionary governments in under-developed collapse there world" (p.57). is presented by Heilbroner; But and seemingly there little is evidence little. is more substantial evidence for is the marked dec H ng of *he imperium in the period (1973-3) concerned. decline really very in America's select leading national share of World GDP, economies: 43 of What American One piece of evidence is the sharp shown in the following table of �POPULATION SHARE (1984 est) SHARE OF WORLD GDP (X) RANK 1968 1975 1984 USA 1 35.0 24.3 25.0 5.2 USSR 2 11.1 11.0 13.8 6.2 .JAPAN 3 5.2 3.0 9.5 2.7 GERMANY FDR 4 5.1 6.7 5.7 1.5 FRANCE 5 4.6 5.4 4.4 1.3 CHINA 6 2.9 4.8 4.3 22.6 UK 8 2.8 2.8 2.3 1.3 INDIA 12 1.3 1.5 1.1 15.1 AUSTRALIA 15 1.1 1.4 1.0 0.3 COUNTRY The qrand table empire, also make it clear that if the USA cannot should nor can the USSR. sustain A totalitarian Pax Sovietica is even a le=s likely than a capitalistic Pax Americana was. APPENDIX 2: A pluralistic framework for defence policy The policy (broadeni ng Cami11 er izs suggest ions) 1. ensures Australian security to some minimal but reasonable extent; 2. is entirely non-nuclear (.and so is not aligned); 3. is defensive in posture with weapons system devoid of offensive application and capacity, focussing on direct defence of Continent, is decentralised, comprising wel1-trained, dispersed but coordinated small units. is partly at least social, defence, nonmilitary deploying, in combination [?] with territorial forms of popular resistance trained in noncooperat i on. 44 sabotage a �APPENDIX 3? The philosophical record; a preliminary tabulation. Reflection on war and peace has had a strong polarising effect, dividing philosophers into two main groups: Group B. Those who regard war as inevitable, perhaps even as desirable; Group G. Those who consider war an evil, capable of being replaced by lasting and peace through goodwill or improved social arrangements. The groups are not however exhaustive; fence-sitters; and there are there are ambivalent philosophers, and those who have the supported battered themes of a war to end wars and of world empire. at one stage in his development, to a despotic world state, peace. Russell, idealists. reached by imposition or war, B and G are sometimes described, But while Thus, for example, who looked, like Dante before him, So strictly the classification is (once again) Groups historically- as a guarantor of four valued. respectively, as realists and these overworked terms reflect accurately enough the historic human condition and the present prospects, they are prejudicial, and they conflict with other classifications using these terms; for instance, both Plato and Hegel, condition of human existence. idealists would Northedge, accept war as normally accounted idealists, have been a Such concoctions as war-realists preferable to the labels from whom much of the record is drawn, the c on serva t i ve t r ad i t i on a n d aboli t i on i sts. the concoctions, 45 terms and of sets the contrast: peace- which namely We shall prefer adaptions namely war-riors and peace-niks, simply (real) baddies and goodies. in permanent or, not to be of partisan, �DEFINING POLES R adi c a 1 s GROUP 8: war-riors RESIDUE GROUP GROUP G peace-niks Virtually all classic Greek phi1osophers except early Stoics: especially Heracleitus, Plato (P) Author of Revel at ions Early Christians (non-violence pr i n c i p 1 e) Dubois (1306); but with anti­ Musi im aim Erasmus ( 1570) Cruce (1623; early world order model Roman Stoics and Christians Scholastics: Aquinas (P) Dante •Just war theorists: (Au Qu s t i n e) , SuIr ez, Grotius (1425) IJ t op i an s: More (war­ games of modern utopias in direct descen t) European peace projects, some extended to (Christian) wor1d: Bel 1ers ( 1710), Penn (1693), abb£ de Saint-Pierre (1713) European peace and hegemony: Duke of Sully (1620) Nation-state theorists Machiave1 1 i, Hobbes, Locke, Spinoza I-<2'1 b n /f’-j German idealists: Hegel, Schopenhauer Perpetual peace: Rousseau, Kant Mili t ar i st s: Nietzsche; Treitschke, Bernhardi, Clausewi tz Some utili tar i ans: Bentham, the Mil Is, Bren tano Some anarchists and 1ibertarians: Kropotkin (?), Spencer Russel 1 ■James Hi t tgenstei n Key: In Dewey P, peace a prime objective. sort of investigation there are disappointments as this Spinoza was admiration madness to a major disappointment, of Greek thought, allow Brentano a find. well For, as finds. despite his 'Brentano was a decided pacifist and thought it questions of international fortunes of war'- (Kraus in Brentano, p.122). 46 justice to be decided by the �REFERENCES H.G. Andrewortha Birch, and L.C. University of Chicago The Ecological Neb, 1984. Press, H.R. Ashby, Design -for a Brain, Second edition. Hi ley. New York, I960. S. Beer, Desiqninq Freedom, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Toronto, F. Brentano, The Origin of our Knowledge of Right and Wrong, Keegan Paul, London 1969. 'Setting the J. Camilleri, disarmament agenda", l?/4. Routledge and Peace------ Studies 9, ( 1984) ,17-19. F. Capra and C. Spretnak, Green Politics, Hutchinson, London, R. Catley, with the Bomb ... 'Along Australian Magazine, 7-8 April, (Review o-f 1984. Martin), D. The—Weekend 1984. 1979. P. Cock, Alternative Australia, Qu ar t er Book s, Me1 hourn e, J. Cohen and J. Rogers, On Democracy, Penguin, New York, 1984. P. and A. Erlich, Popu1 ation, Resourses, Environment, Second edition, Freeman, San Francisco, H. Feith, 197x. 'Richard Falk, Peace Studies 24 (June 1985) World order radical', 24-5. J. Galtung, There are Alternatives, Spokesman, Nottingham, 17’84. A. Gilbert, 'The state and nature in Australia', Au s t r a 1i an Cu 1 t yral—Hist or 1981 (ed. S. Goldberg and F.B. Smith), Canberra, 1982, pp.9-28. R. Hardin, Co 1 1 ec 1 tive Action , Resources -for the Future, Washington, R. Hardin, M.D. Hayes, Ph i 1 osop_hy—and—Pub He 236-254. 'Defending September 1983) mutual disarmament', versus 'Unilateral Affairs 12 (1983) the sunburnt country', Chain Reaction 33 (August 11-17. R.L. Heilbroner, Beyond Boom and Bust, Norton, New York, 19/8. I. Kant, Perpetual Peace (trans, and introd. M. Campbell Sonnerschein, London, 1903 (first published 1795). A. Mack, 'Farewell 1?82. Smith), Swan to Arms Controls' 9 (1984) 9ff. A. Mack, 'The pros and cons of ANZUS', Fabian ANZUS Conference, Lome, 4-5 May 1985; referred to as PC. B. Martin, Uprooting War, Freedom Press, London, 1984. D. Martin, Armed Neutrality for Australia, Drummond Books, Melbourne, 47 1984. �Northedge, 'Peace , war and philosophy', in Encyclopedia of Phi 1osophy (ed. P. Edwards), Volume 6, Macmillan, New York, 1767, 63 t>< . M. Olson, The Logic of Collective Action, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1965. P. Pettit, 'Tree riding and foul dealing', typescript, Canberra, J.-J. Rousseau, A Project for Perpetual Peace C trans. 1927 (first published 1761). E.M. 1985 Nut tai), London, large-scale nuclear war and nuclear deterrence, 'On the ethics of R. Rout ley, out' , Discussion__ Papers__ in Environmental and the political fall School of Social Sciences, Australian National Ph i1osophy #5, Research University, 1984. R. R. Routlpy, 'Metaphysical fall-out from the nuclear predicament', 1 Ph 11osophy "and 1 Social Criticism 3/4 ( 1984) 19-34; referred to as MF. Rout ley and V. Plumwood, 'Moral dilemmas and the logic of deontic^notions , 'ni\r,.^.ign Papers in Environmen tai ..Philosophy #4, Research School of SociaT~Sciences, Australian National University, 1984; referred to as MD. P.R. Stephen son, The Foundation s of Cu1t u r e, N.J. M i1es, oydn ey, R. Sylvan, 'Culture Canberra, 1985; and the roots of political divergence', 1 ? 36. typescript, referred to as CPD. M. Taylor and H. Hard, 'Chickens, whales, and bumpy goods: al ternative models of public-goods provision', Poli tical Studies 30 (19821 350 370. The Strategic Basis of Australian Defence .Policy, the National Times, March 30-April 5, leaked extracts published in 1984, 23-30. to Australian Security, Pariiamentary Joint Committee for Foreign Affairs and Defence, Australian Government Printer, Canberra; referred .o 3. s TAS. T. Veblen, An Inquiry into the Nature of Peace and the Terms of Perpetuation, Viking Press, New York, 1945 (first published 191,). 48 its � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Draft Papers Description An account of the resource Sylvan's literary executor encountered an archive in which “all his projects were current", since manuscripts were undated and unattributed. Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Text Any textual data included in the document WORKING DRAFT AUSTRALIA'S DEFENCE PHILOSOPHY? Investigations of the nonexistent # MX504 'The opinions of philosophers, with regard to the conditions of the possibility of a public peace, shall be taken into consideration by states armed for war'' (Kant, 'A [the only] secret article for perpetual peace', p.158, an article flattering no doubt to philosophers, but neglecting their dominant bellicose tradition). A defence philosophy is much more than a defence policy. A policy can be merely by a list of directives as to what do in various given at even its philosophy policy best it need only involve practical into a theoretical setting, contrast, integration of a the which looks at the key concepts involved: security, stability, control, here, By wisdom. goes deeper and requires theoretical wisdom, circumstances; protection, defence, interests, national interests, intelligence, war, etc. Defence philosophy is a branch of political and social philosophy, and has long been treated as such, though under such more familiar and honest headings as "of war" and "of peace" (see Appendix Like most of philosophy it can be applied, parts in regional 3}. among ways others. defence A approaches to philosophy should embed appropriate defence arrangements war not merely and peace, or superficially into and "foreign policy", but into the way and intended way of life of a country, both into on­ going culture policy defence power and into the intended or planned typically takes prevailing socio-political structures for granted; questioning of merits cultural arrangements. arrangements a defence philosophy again penetrates or rejecting features of these structures, enquiring as things and institutions of which defence is planned, society should be defended by what sort of appropriate sort of what lengths. What, for instance, 1 is Australia what are A and deeper, to asking methods the what and Australi ans, concerned to defend, aiming to defend? defending, How much of what others have, Abroad? region? defending, Does preserving? defending? Would Indonesians made anyone a Randwick stage a or what we have, Eagle or racecourse, last stand for is worth Farm, merit Estate? Oaks strike in Australia .just lightning In the Here in Australia? to If remove the B.jelke- Petersen, should we resist? of the necessary prerequisites have been adequately thought about in Few Australia, unplanned where muddling through immediate problem - reactive contingency 1 generous - is the main style of political "planning", life, immediate if you help to supply it with one or more, to problem want and ipso facto of be to defence Its phi1osophers Australia does not yet have a defence philosophy. planning. could from and to inject some depth into broader defence theorizing. 1. Australian defence inappropriate "policy"; incoherent, obsolescent American, Indeed Australia seems to lack even a clear and coherent defence This pol icy. charge (made even by friends of Defence commonplace interested in 2 obtaining extra public funding for defence and elements of C3I). The reasons is concern not merely the major unsolved issues of exactly what is being defended, what things and objects and what interests, and whose, what freedoms and values; and what role American defence facilities in Australia supposed to have in this - but a range of more detailed lacunae such as: of clearly-defined on what needs defending and how it is priorities accomplished; doubtful contingencies in are lack to be capacity of present defence forces to handle low-level and to the north of Australia and in maritime zones; and 1. The point, which is not uncontroversial, is argued in effect in Gilbert. 2. Amazingly, in the Strategic Basis Papers, Australia criticizes New Zealand because 'it has still developed no policy for national defence and tends to look to ... the US as its primary source of defence guidance'' (p.29) . Note that C3I abbreviates the mouthful , Command, Control, Communications and Intelligence. 2 unsatisfactory (or no) defence civil and administration, arrangements and planning for use of protection civil infrastructure, key facilities and of "defence-in-depth", wartime mobilisation, areas, and for post-nuclear organization. is equally damaqinq, if its policy makers do have a coherent policy it 3 nowhere satisfactorily revealed to the peoples of Australia. It is left to .journalists And, what out installations may be for and to make various conjectures as defence the newspaper-watching academics to winkle and policy may Australian policy makers As to coherence, be. local to what have only recently found out that Australia has a (purely) regional defence role, one. global they were told by the Americans in Hashington to clarify commitments under treaty arrangements with the designed begins thus This to look as if Australia's defence policy is as much not a talks in It USA. determined abroad, by US policy makers, as it is locally in Australia. Much circumstantial evidence can be assembled to confirm the claim Australia defence policy can now be stamped Made in USA, the last Nor Id Har (and British abandonment), one thing, as it that before used, to be stamped Made in UK. Australia has had a bipartisan defence policy, For so it is claimed. That "policy" has however been essentially shaped by the Liberal party, has governed most of the time (as senior partner in a for ANZUS) Hashington the Liberal and still does. US and in of US The Strategic Basis give virtually unqualified support Military practices and to the American view of situation, the the latest package from packaged under a local cover. endorsed by the Labor Government, Papers, planned Party "Defence and Foreign Policy Unit" consists largely Defence Department material to For instance, But coalition). Party simply took over US arrangements for Australia (as Liberal which commit Australia to supporting, the global strategic without any due reservation, 3. An Australian policy should moreover fit with the genuine needs and shared aspirations of the people - to the extent, presumably, that these are commendable. 3 4 American positions in world forums. be reached by more devious arguments. out it had a regional defence role? could longer no The same dependent policy conclusion can When, for example, did Australia find afford to police the world on their own and would delegate some of that role have to and offload some of the heavy associated costs, on towards and also after Labor took some faltering steps reliable dogs-bodies; they After the Americans had found that a broader foreign policy with some indigenous elements (Hayden was developing promptly flattened by Schultz). Australian but Iags it. respects, and foreign policy simply copies American older American defence policy, American war policy. American administration main in The Australian defence policy presented by the Labor to the extent that it is visible, government, with defence is conservative; and diverges from the new it coincides (.post-Reagan) the For Australian Labor defence policy supports what used to support, namely DI. nuclear Multilateral disarmament (within the framework of a series of treaties and agreements), and D2. Deterrence in the interim, deterrence through mutual The presence .justified assured destruction. of American military facilities in Australia is supposed to in the framework of these assumptions. For they are to assist be in making deterrence under D2 effective and to provide verification for the arms There is much reduction arrangements under DI (both stabilizing functions). evidence indicating however that American policy makers have both DI and D2 and any serious attempts at nuclear arms they 4. have now 5 control . moved on to the following highly destabilizing abandoned Certainly doctrines; namely For theJe amq^ing evidence that Australia falls into the inexact class of cl ient states the following Australian contribution is noteworthy: 'The US prefers to act as a member of a group, and a contribution by Australia can also assist in demonstrating to Congressional and public opinion that the objectives sought are significant enough to attract allied support' (SB, p.28) 5. As to DI and arms control, see, e.g. Mack PR. As to D2, 'USA has now an announced first-strike nuclear targeting policy' technologically reinforced (Hayes, p.4). The goal of the Reagan administration is superiority (a conveniently ambiguous term). 4 war-fighting; Nuclear war American government, al 1 Labor 1985 may policy nuclear wars; Limited of these government. well be accepted by military doctrines, and Star the next this While wars. coalition Liberal are explicitly rejected by the Since the American "Joint" facilities in Australia also facilitate the rejected objectives, the problems concerning these dubious facilities are much aggravated. information withholding their particularly Government concerning the full range of war-fighting certainly unsatisfactory, the The Government's approach concerning them appears their functions, roles from Parliament and the as several of its members realise; in not atypical disarray, further public and - is and as a result grist for the incoherence theme. is a coherent Australian defence policy somewhere 6 public exposure, it is almost certainly an ol d American policy. If there away from But in that case it certainly lacks - what it in any case appears to lack - justification. 7 For American interests by no means coincide with Australian . Consider, for such instance, matters as enriching Americans, American business, for undercutting to Nicaragua, differently Allende's government in Chile to again, its escalation of the nuclear arms and all Europe Southern as Consider, practices methods. race. against Consider, consider Or the game- and decisi on-theoretic models concern just USA and its adversary USSR, which its its extensive export of arms and violent strategic planning, American American. promoting Americans and things American practices in Latin America (or elsewhere in the world), differently, from making conditions favourable part of the monolithic West, perhaps occasionally adding but rarely or never considering Hemisphere - so that either Australia is part of America as the Poland It had better be away from too much public exposure because Australians, no more* th-atffrNew Zealanders, mostly do not like being pushed around, even by Americans. 7. Nor, though this is a longer story , does Australian culture by any means coincide with American: see CPD. Thus a uniform treatment is entirely inappropriate. Similarly, a single overarching treatment for a mono­ lithic West is thoroughly inadequate. 5 8 may be of Russia or it is nothing. Or consider American interests not merely in Soviet and communist containment, but. in containing socialism such as might (under more auspicious conditions) flourish in Australia. to answering inappropriate American interests is accordingly inappropriate for Australia, for their defence thinking applies also and to work out a policy appropriate Australian do Australians should Antipodean socialism. for Australia. representatives, political who implausible American views and begin on developing parroting and original ones.) local An American policy America, like Russia, own (That should stop genuinely some is busy meddling in Africa, (SB, p.24) . but 'Australian security interests are not directly involved'’ Should we be tagging along after the Americans in support of installation of the their free-enterprise (rip-off) capitalism everywhere feasible (i.e. socialists state seriously course - or of Much opposition governments, in has, freedom umbrella, active already this sort What 'keeping the free world of context, multiple what mainstream American culture to and undermining of social and socialist quite free7? Of meanings and admits mainstream Australian culture would exclude: bullying they control)? heavily is it laughingly - call freedom associations. don't that under the for instance, programs and of smal1 countries that impose barriers to US business part of "free enterprise"), etc. freedom Misinformation, agree about, to live and work where one chooses, on. These are certainly important freedoms, better upheld in some parts of the unaligned West (e.g. Sweden, Switzerland) of the Eastern Block. But many of the older freedoms century, such as freedom to travel, requires permits, 8. licences, than in most parts have to work and live abroad, passports, ... vanished etc.; And many more of these this now one former Australian planning should be looking at strategic models (game-theoretic and other) which include Australia. For, as argued below, adandoning the uniformity assumption of the monolithic West, of the West as one parish, makes very significant differences to the results yielded. 6 are being or have been eroded; •freedoms restricted zones, nuclearism in soon it will be identity documents-, as already in parts of the "free ID cards, Now West". to protect, [the Greens] point to the new laws proposed in 1983 designed to keep citizens Europe 'is devouring the very freedom it is said assembling to protest deployment of the Pershing II and cruise missiles' from of security 'secrecy, the lack state, of Further structural changes required for pp.58-9). (Capra and Spretnak, incompatible with permanent commentability, freedoms, democratic emergency, the include of concentration authority, peacetime militarism, extensive apparatus of state intelligence and Nuclearism is not a smart strategy to preserve police'’ (Falk, in Feith p.24) . remaining freedoms. Inherited 2. other-reliance, and the populist and elitist___ cases—for patronaqe. Australia's defence rather than regularly policy, such as it is, (re)thought through. the legal method of precedence, may wel1, furthermore But that procedure - essentially and here does, applied to defence. exclude significant The unsatisfactory decision-making practices that will For al ternatives. be revealed in the of defence are by no means restricted to defence but are typical of case kind of advanced age (or aged) 1abours those both inheri.ted whatever its very limited satisfactoriness in legalistic decision making - is defective when precedence is under. Cock capi tali sm Australia operates under, has summed up these practices neatly in features of aged capitalism (what he calls the or rather setting the Corporate State) New Left and the Alternative Australia movements were the down which reacting revoI ting against: Decisions were made from the top and on the basis of vested political interests, rather than by rational goals and means that served public interests. The people were rarely consulted effectively before a decision and often only partially informed afterwards. Pl an ni ng..was. based on a mere extension of the present. ... activists felt they were given little opportunity to choose how they lived or worked. The availability of space, time, trees and air was also determined by others . ..(2/(p.l8 italics added). 7 or As also is one's defence, military and civil, the matter of whether one lives in a nuclear target or not, etc. A major inherited assumption is that of other reliance, defence depends on other more powerful allies. Australia That ally was firstly Britain, but in any event the assumption is that to be and since World War II America; safe that Australia's needs a powerful patron, a protector. A corollary is that Australia adopts a suitably submissive relation to its patron, making expected And for the most part it has; 10 policy does not come cheap. concessions. The however such a defence insurance other-reliance assumption is unsound, important, it for several reasons. characteristically depends upon the following themes, Most all which lack solid foundation: 1. Austral i ar/ is threatened - or at least 1A. Australia/ is likely to be threatened in the near future. 2. Australia cannot defend itself. 3. It can however rely upon its patron (or ally?, i.e. upon the USA. three themes in fact make up what has been cal led the populist case for 11 the ANZUS alliance. It is very different from the elitist case for ANZUS, These said to hold sway with the Australian government, which, while insisting upon premiss 3, essentially rejects 1 and 2 and claims instead 4. Australia has a vital interest in global stability. 9, (From previous page) Cock goes on: 'These basic issues increasingly become lost in the array of consumer choices'. [Add Covernment__ react_ive poi n t]. 10. It costs not only money, but independence.'... the serf societies - more or less willingly - accept the status of "allies", i.e. protection with rights and duties as in feudal societies. They become client countries' (Galtung, p.169). 11. So-called by Mack PC. But the formulation presented follows G. Davidson's more satisfactory account in Canberra Times, Wednesday, May 8, 1985, p.2. Mack considers that what amounts to the elitist case is the 'altogether more sophisticated argument [which] holds sway ... in government' (p.l). 8 Global 5. stability is under threat (constantly) by an expansionist Soviet Un ion. 6. Only USA can contain the Soviet threat and hold the global balance. But the USA technique for holding global balance is in part through a network of alliances like ANZUS. further Obviously premisses are required to reach the that conclusion Australia should be participating in an alliance, and what is more, hosting US defence facilities and so forth. A first such premise is no-shirking the theme that Australia should be contributing its part to "holding the balance". Even this first further step is pretty shaky; in a rather ramshackle case, (and since premisses 5 and 6 are decidedly 4 may involve some equivocation). Australia’s vital interests as we shall see, one shaky step are not dubious For it can be plausibly argued guaranteed by US techniques, that which threaten to upset the whole applecart, and can be obtained by alternative more satisfactory means outside of such soft alliances as ANZUS. contends, Mack it In any case, is unclear that our contribution enhances global as nuclear stability (see Davidson). There is a more pernicious regionalist version of the elitist which might be called the offshore el i t i st. position. Australia can defend itself against regional 2R)t. position, This position grants threats, and can look after i tself regional Iy. But it does not (as indeed other qualified elitist positions may 1A. Nhat the offshore position insists is 1AH. Since these interests companies abroad, internal Australian Australians or or whatever - may have little or nothing to do -perhaps security, concerned with this premiss trade, represents an extremely important shift (a shift not unrelated to the inverse bureaucratic shift war In grant Australia's interests could be threatened in the near future. Australian with not) to defence). extended form from It goes further than what has been called forward defence. the offshore position does call 9 for some sort of global or police force ready to intervene whenever a "free port" policeman looks like closing its doors,. the elitist position is anywhere Part of the difficulty in getting to grips with that it tends to slide to through the offshore position (by way of now evident immediate positions). against both the populist and elitist cases, arguments The against virtually justify but a fairly brief outline of some of the main points course a just couple of themes 1 through 7 are but there have been through some indeed familiar sufficiently of defections from themes 1 both cases, defeat logically al 1 and Of involved. would 7 to serve repair interesting attempts, designed to float the arguments on diminished premisses. 3. The brief against the popular populist case. While Australia is not at present under notice of Contra 1 and 1A. veiled threat or harassment from abroad, appears to believe that it is. or parliamentary view, view as persists, kept deliberately parties are populist well case alliance (e.g. the public. in way in the dark (or even purposes. enough false, are aware that the misinformed), main main this because assumptions the to interest In particular they have gone out of their cast doubt upon the connected assumption that US is to the American are much more difficult to sell a reliable threats. Thus long-standing Australian psychological allowed suits underlying Accordingly the parties and Government have no political to been political Australian the reasons for which they support those of the elitist case) guarantor against all been informed, the The populace has it has. Although both undermining the populist case. not not it is worth inquiring why the popular the opinion polls reveal government bipartisan a (bare) majority of its population As the popular view is administrative, threat, stand,, and has informational and educational effort. 10 not been insecurity about security has assuaged In particular, by any requisite older attitudes to Asia X persist not far below the surface of popular Australia: fear, and mistrust xenophobia, patched over by a pragmatic attachment to trade and tourism. This misplaced insecurity is fuelled by popular misconceptions of Australia and its place in the world: metaphorically, that Australia is a luscious plum ripe for instead of the Asian view that Australia, so far as they are Eastern picking, as a remote desiccated place perhaps good for some trade. aware of it at all, to get towards more concrete assumptions, Or, Australians apparently tend to view their country as affluent but underpopulated, resource rich but largely Yet not far to the north are Asian hordes who are impoverished, defenceless. 12 resource poor, etc. The view is seriously out of touch with reality. Parts of Asia are at least as affluent (on conventional economic indicators.) do not see themselves as overpopulated, as Australia. now They in a way that calls for mass exodus; and in those areas which are as overpopulated as Europe, such as Java, bribes and force are required to move people on transmigration programs to relatively unoccupied parts of the Indonesian empire. can So far as they require them, they purchase Australian resources - which are not unique - much more (even carrying significant local cheaply subsidies) and easily than they could obtain 13 them by seizure. For these sorts of reasons, and because Australia itself poses no threat, no other state has an interest in attempting to invade Australia. for interests, to launch so it is for capabilities. a successful invasion of Australia, capacity in the near future. TF. No regional As it is power has the capacity or is likely to have such a As the joint Parliamentary Committee concluded, The "Asian hordes" fd\dn one of the less spoken about successors to Yellow Peril, of immediate past days of the Asian communist threat the and the Domino theory. 13. As Stephenson argued, less fortunately, 20 years ago. Even when around World War II Japan, did have interest in access to strategic raw materials, the Japanese High Command decided against invading Australia because of the difficulty of dealing with the people - a point of much impor tance. 11 Currently only the United States would have the physical launch a -full scale invasion of Australia, motive to do so (TAS, p.94) . to capacity and it clearly lacks any As the report also stated, quoting Synnot (former Chief of Defence Staff), ... to raise the sort of force which would be required for a mass invasion of Australia could not possibly be done in under five years by other than the superpowers (TAS) . But neither superpower is at all likely to expend effort or resources to such an end. obvious An which at once arises is: (A later serious question to entertain is: defence? on question security, collectively provided global forthwith to unilateral disarmament? now-standard telling bother Why with why not be a free-rider Why such as it is?) Mack for one, then not proceed having reassembled the for the case that Australia is not threatened 'now or foreseeable future', and so having broken the populist argument, is confronted by the awkward option of unilateral disarmament for Australia. proceeds and points to the dependence of premisses 1 and 1A on premiss retreat, hasty to claim that 'the populist case for ANZUS is without premisses 1 and 1A. While it sustained' assumptions which is approximating appears capabilities it decisive of potential 2, even may sometimes take it is true that the arguments against 1 and 1A resistance, a It is however a decidedly problematic retreat. for granted that Australia can look after itself to some some He stages far from clear that premiss 2. given the invaders. they Consider the (estimated) put up essentially on extent, depend no-interests argument, limited invasion very The main consideration adduced appears to depend in no essential way, indeed in no obvious way at all, on Australia s dynamic fighting forces. Australia mineral resources, for instance, obtained more readily and cheaply by market methods than simply be ones. What this seems to show is that a rather minimal military streamlined force, if any, would presently meet Australia's military requirements. 12 can It is as not if Australia The whole nonmilitary defence is available on a continent well popular training in defence methods, character that apparatus of suited to its use, though requisite to Australia would be a difficult place govern, Australians a difficult lot to subjugate. Australian a But even without a population trained in its techniques. lacking without defenceless'’ 'entirely 1 ike a babe-in-arms. mi 1itary force, conventional is deterred It was such features of the the Japanese a on previous occasion ^If the invasion is attempted, the Australians, in view of their national character, would resist to the end. Also, because the geographical conditions of Australia present numerous difficulties in a military sense, it is apparent that a military venture in that country would be a diff icul t one** (.TAS, p.62) . The still hold good, points parts any such program of nonmilitary to putting and could be strengthened. defence: making it abroad (ideally with dinkum Australian exaggeration) it several There are happen, and that it has happened. the issue of alternative defence we are bound to To when Australia is not threatened, appropriate, is a good occasion to reconsider adapt defence arrangements. now, For return. and, if For example, it looks very much as if enormous sums, which could be valuably directed elsewhere, are being spent, But a much more effective and to make many Australians feel secure. largely inexpensive way to such results would be through requisite mass education therapy - with, psychological if it were well done, much more and satisfactory results, a more secure and better informa^~popu1 ace. Contra 2. As capabilities, basically enormous isolation. well in a a result of post-War developments in weapons systems and the military defence of Australia has become much easier. matter advantages strategic In advance of enhancing through robust particular, of and Australia enjoys by reliable virtue of systems through modern destroyed by precision guided munitions. radar warning It is the geographical any maritime invading force can now be arrival, C3I detected systems, and And any invaders that did manage to gain a foothold on Australian soil would face severe logistic problems, and be 13 subject deal There is to disproportionate response -from local defence. Boys'’ of and weapon Own War Games stuff concerning contemporary great a which would serve to turn Australia into a pretty invulnerable systems C3I armed fortress, and into an extremely difficult territory even were the oceanic moat crossed and the fortress entered (see especially D. Martin). such Under invasion even armed neutrality and fortified Australia defence from outside the region by an inimical world resisted with reasonable prospect of success. to such an invasion; mount There is no power at all Nonetheless the threat their elected representatives. But the Soviet undertaken such a long-range massive force projection, so, be likely one ooviet a of is taken seriously not only by the larger populace but by committees invasion of could there is apparently (according to TAS) only the Australian population!). of power our good ally the USA (reckoned however a likely invader by power that could, 6-77. scenarios, has military never is ill-equipped to do lacks any plausible reason to try such a stunt (for details see e.g. and The only credible Soviet threat to Australia is in the context of D. Martin). a superpower war, when American facilities in Australia and perhaps Australian would be struck at by intercontinental missiles. cities, it is highly unlikely that it would be followed or accompanied by bad enough, an Soviet forces are once again not sufficent, invasion. sufficient elsewhere While this would be by the Soviets for that sort of diversion; in a superpower war; and not thought they would be required and they would be devastated, unless UoA is militarily even more incompetent than sometimes depicted. Contra 3. cannot be relied upon, rash What will be argued is not the negation of 3, but that premiss 3 is dubious, to place excess reliance on American protection. that the Americans and that it would That being so, be and other patrons being even less promising, Australia should look more to its own resources, as the American administration is kindly advising. Especially since the American "Vietnam debacle" and the fall of 14 Saigon, things have changed in important ways which cast doubt on the reliability of American patronage. The relative economic and military strength of the USA has declined. a. no longer has such a large share of world product(ivity) a of policy, matter (see Appendix 1); US world warfighting aspirations have Its ability to act as, reduced. It as explicitly been and afford to be, global policeman has also significantly declined (see further Appendix 1) . b. The willingness of Americans to engage in foreign wars has correspondingly tumbled. hawks, sure, be to American administration includes the Although more people and Congress are no longer in the enough than for a /mood gratuitous foreign adventures, especially when the fun may not appear to be in American This "Vietnam syndrome" popular opposition to overseas military involvement. has major a as served strong US opinion polls regularly show Since Vietnam, interests. constraint on US military policy foreign and involvement. c. One Doctrine manifestation important called which 196'?, of the foregoing of elements upon US regional allies responsibility for their own defence in regional conflicts. to the is take Guam primary Another important are outcome is Defense statements to the pointed effect that before US troops committed abroad there must be reasonable assurance no US vital each and 'such is impossible to guarantee - especially for remote countries where national Certainly that Congressional As Mack comments, popular support (Weinberger, assurance of no interests are at stake''. more is assured under the ANZUS treaty which only signatory constitutional consultation; reported in PC p.14). 'act to meet the common danger in accordance processes' (article 4). All reassurances? 15 its is Isn't the treaty backed None that are not undermined by in American administrative multiple-speak. with the treaty strictly requires there is no undertaking or commitment. up by informal verbal provide others, the elite view is that Australia has to 'work ... Even 'the threshold of direct US combat involvement could be quite For the of US support'" and that the Americans cannot be counted upon always. prospect to help Australia in other ways'". a However special case has been made American for military undertakings (in Vietnam, Cambodia, Iran) common friendship, and shared values and democratic interests, second, and, culture earlier traditions. as first, and slow constitutional already indicated, the basis is shaky. And here, a common pleading: hardly sustains the adequacy of the basis evidence in to as to the adequacy of the basis for the possibility the American people, Congress, cases. reliability - on the basis of permanent There are two difficul ties with this type of special His tori cal (SB, pp. 29-30) . case - as opposed to examples of American abandonment of Australia's and cannot rely upon Ub support in a ... defence emer qen c y ar i s i n g w i t h i n ou r own n e i gh bou r h ood' the basis, high, at the time could significantly limit US willingness or ability circumstances a to maximize significantly on quite crucial issues. rather America: shared by Australia and processes. analogous in For there is not values diverge interests always common, Even as missile testing and nuclear ships issues in the South Pacific have recently confirmed. Common Indonesia opposing did not appear wheir? Australia was interests claim to West Papua. It is dubious at considering least that American interests would coincide with Australian in disputes or confrontation with Asian nations to the North, e.g. Indonesia, Japan, etc. special case argument did hold water, Australia and America really were mates, There was in fact no treaty in operation in then the treaty would be otiose. 1942; Of course if the but by then American interests in countering the are at present Japanese were independently aroused. 14. Although neighbourhood contingencies ... impossible', as the pauper ap-i+e-’ 16 assessed a 4. Other-reliance and regional self-reliance A major problem with other-reliance for defence is then that it cannot be entirely reliable, deemed be tolerated. yet this is a place where unreliability can hardly for When the Indonesians are rolling into Brisbane it won't do Defence to call up with a message like that from Services, "We can't get there tomorrow", till "Or until after Congress meets". More seriously, handing defence over to others means handing control of our lives over to others, nuclear defence, given very which Antipodean administrations have opted means for many of us handing our lives likely In principle, Another problem is its cost. over, and for, it literally. quite if a btate hires out its defence it would no doubt look, other things being equal, for the cheaper bidder - if, that defence is, meterological market is complexion is a services, monopolistic, 15 , who commodity a sort, like The trouble with global etc. with currently only one at a national level, All shipping, national of supplier right the i • making and has this part of the case, the that defence is accordingly can exact a very high price, the whole country a nuclear target. appreciated of enough well, for not trying to force defence, which is plainly a collective good, into a marketable commodity. When a country can provide its own defence, it certainly makes very good for it to do so, since it normally has a stronger interest in sense its own defence than matter, then self-reliance not Just makes good sense but pays; other-reliance does not. most other parties. Should it also be cheaper in costs that But in that event, it does not need nuclear patrons, or to farm out some of its defence. 15. The French, who operate a global network second only to the Americans and more extensive than the Russians, with many forces in the Pacific region, have never been seriously considered. Yet in certain significant respects French social and cultural arrangements are closer to Antipodean ones than American arrangements are. In these days of technological warfare, the post-Waterloo loss record of the French should not be given too much weight; we don't after all look very hard at the American record of defeats and incompetence. 17 r self-reliance Such as ANZUS and much of the apparent point such alliances undermines an important part of the older such of alliances. newer bipartisan approaches to defence try to combine them (thus e.g. However Beazley as reported by Davidson) - approaches which thus begin to empty of what content it had. little understanding, content, a but are merely vague ANZUS clear no contain of articles simple course is of course to allow them to be emptied an expensive and outdated insurance that the alliance, so Since the arrangements consultations beyond commitments of policy, It may however be death by seizure or convulsion should dies a natural death. American defence facilities American nuclear equipped or powered transport be excluded passage be c1osed or internationalised and from of Australia. treaty would no doubt sacrifice the deterrence and other advantages the That for case 16 supposedly affords , while making way for the greater advantages o+ neutralized nonalignment, of no longer being a nuclear target, etc. self-reliance pure and simple is insufficient. But consist of separable isolated pieces, dramatically, picture Australia will self-sufficient not as becomes increasingly evident. Most winter. The such as plants which are not not escape the effects of nuclear is much the same as for other objects, internally The world does but depend crucially on their environment - and indeed as for States themselves. The question then is what form the additional holistic component of policy should take? that appropriate the cricket game move is not taking sides (as in a kids' that is already set up) and doing one's bit for For that will not contribute to stability, rather to Put this way, it is almost obvious sectionalism and fragmentation, war game or confrontation. to a proper holistic approach, but and to bringing nuclear winter cIoser . 757 If Australia is not likely to be threatened there is no real deterrence advantage because nothinq to deter. Other advantages of the ANZUS alliance such as access to high-level intelligence are not only dubious (see PC, Martin) but not always guaranteed by the alliance as the black out of New Zealand shows. 18 Other-re 1iance and self-reliance typically present a false contract, certainly do with pure self-reliance - a false contrast like that of partism and (EE, or p.223), at a particular level of and holism versus dependence In between lie a range of positions, one of which - favoured by isolationism. a long line of peacefully-disposed philosophers from Rousseau and Kant onwards - might be called integrated reliance or federated reliance. reach only certain inadequate levels, may which alignment, the monolithic East (or West). 5. Against elitist arguments stability, very as related arguments revolve around that securi ty and side, are value-laden terms, of are which But security. not cultural What stability comprehends in American administrative perception invariants. is other and 4 and 5 of the elitist argument turn around the crucial notion Premisses stabi1i ty the level of modern alliances are essentially coupled with opposition to an e.g. of But integration different from what highland villagers take it to include. In each case a system is stable if it returns to a given stationary state But relevant states and under perturbations of sufficiently small magnitude. the stationary among them are both relative to given frames of reference, /e.g, what is stable at a macrolevel may well not be at a microlevel. said of the superpowers, even remote events can threaten their interests or their associates ' and stability. disturb Trudeau As 'they share a global perception according to But lesser states or people, not counting which (p.10) remote IVA business or military^ as invariably view stability; by relevant, report bombs a* necessary to stability, contrast philosophers increasingly terrorism and as characteristically antithetical ad 4: a vital no and the see nuclear bombs as fix a* tools of to peace. interest in global stability and secur i ty? 1? Bureaucrats instability. Of course Australia have, does what sizeable nation does not. interpretation conceals crucial differences, For Australia. in highly material to the argument. stability may well mean something different in USA from global means Certainly vitai interests are different. interested in containing socialism (in Australia as elsewhere), in rhetoric at least, popular more to socialism (or Mon-Soviet communism) global upset to containing equate communism and both with Soviet containment. containing motherhood But the determinable stability on American in Latin America, it America is and it tends, wi th socialism A continental swing or i n Africa, wou 1 d indeed wou I d and perception what significant effects on US business and investment; but it wou 1 d not on its own or affect most Australians or directly threaten upset and it certainly need not affect nuclear stability. Antipodean stability, Australians generally are not opposed in principle to socialism or notably interested in containing perhaps the opposite). (indeed spread not ought to be interested in defence of the the in system, Australia is not interested defence (American) it in, or enterprise" “free wherever of advanced capitalism its is presently initiated or imposed. It can be conceded, without granting the main thrust of the premiss Contra 5. that the Soviets are expansi onistic, in interested empires, extending their influence where they can. including American academics and sales people). spread, Marxism-Leninism, everywhere. in at least a weak sense that they The and are So also are most matter are many Indonesian (so for that But the Soviets have an ideological message an ideology they anticipate Americans also have a capitalist message, being installed free enterprise, which they are working to sell pretty much everywhere accessible to them; they need to be expansi onistic to have it adopted, Chinese little would and whereas the Russians and need simply wait for history to take its determined course (though assistance surely - reflecting legitimate doubt about spread progress wi thou t interfering). message is pernicious: this a determinism? Bu t (^he\^jreb^ Russian both are pernicious (for familiar reasons; 20 to see e.g., Erlichs). some in threatens, proper question is whether Soviet international activity The damaging way, stability. global Soviet-American doubt No confrontation, as in the Cuba missile affair, does threaten stability; but not in way that has any bearing on Australian defence. a expansionary none Australia, military tendency, or has otherwise, fact In direct a of significance reaches into the Antipodes. Russian no effect on bo what is all the local excitement and anticipation about? The effect of Soviet expansionism is much exaggerated and from the Antipodes it is hardly a problem, Viewed qet locked addressed. of into unless the Soviets confrontation with USA - a real military internationalism, be hardly the heavies But confrontation apart, Soviet a great success story, does not seriously disturb stability, as seen from Australia. should distinguished be military access, involvement World control involving anything since influence. War II, In actual of global on the militarily, that of Afghanistan, have accomplished, especially in Europe. but success in western strategic lacks Europe, has they the force ratio And 21 case little had concerns might. not attempt lacking much plausibility. needed to be assured of both by their own standards of what is required standards. by But the idea of Soviet military adventure Europe is a Western invention and bogey, military what striking conspicuous The usual Western apprehension stability. and expansion the Russian record is hardly new territory, Soviets military The one with influence military, with the USA or several other states. comparison effect mere and potential -military, expansion types of a proper assessment of Soviet internationalism, For Soviet to problem a third nonaligned group which helps to referee and to prize global should With that problem however, the Antipodes can better assist as part apart, not by seconding and inciting the USA. in overexploited. the Soviets have no good The military and by reasons or in undertaking such an exercise which would draw them into interests war. They client nuclear already -Face economic difficulties and trouble with East European states which they cannot control satisfactorily. The of Soviet inf1uence has largely been in the Third extension But it has hardly been successful, with as many failures and losses to record as Soviet "gains" - gains which add to the imperial burden countries wracked with problems, world. such as Uietnam. since they involve The Third World exercises are marred by Soviet ineptitude and limited by the state of their own economy. They scarcely displace the global structure enough to test its stability; and they produce no shock waves or even ripples in the Antipodes. 6. Contra the dancers the in East-West dance confrontation between the lead dancers. have destabilizing new weapons arms tension control an from escalating the With this US policies and Recent US practices and indeed highly destabilising, and weapons systems, because of rejection of arms race on earth and begin a new one in space. A vast practices more are because of control and because of star wars preparation which both and accelerate increase in and suspicion accompanies the arms race which is in large measure due to US intransigence and US war-fighting doctrines, built-in but than Soviet ones, Soviet proposals, the death, of as much to do as USSR ones. least at of The main current threat to world stability comes not from one incentives (see FAC). alliance or for pre-emption, new weapons systems, and deliberate abandonment of with arms Such considerations duly assembled demolish the theme that alignment with USA helps increase stability. American practices are to be resisted as much as Soviet. 6. The East-West balance argument; alignment versus neutrality. The need for Australian alignment with the USA is supposed to be shown by the East-W^st balance argument. This balance argument, which 17 premisses with the related elitist argument, runs as follows ; 7. Global stability is the key to world peace. shares key 8. of the international order is a matter of maintaining a Stability global But balance. 5. The global balance is constantly threatened by an expansionist USSR. The threat is [only] checked by the USA, which (6A.1) guarantees an open 6A. and pluralistic international ■?. order. indeed most vital Australia's primary security concern, is this interest, stability. Hence Australia's 10. role is to help America maintain the balance. The rest of Australia's in tervolvement to follow. taken then before practical assumes much that has already been rebutted, argument threat argument But there are many reasons for halting the reaches this stage of moral and it Soviet with American military arrangements is thesis is correct (i.e. detail. The for instance that the stabilizing 5) and that US policy is It also takes for granted, balance what now is at least (part of 6A). doubt, that American policy is directed at balance and deterrence, rather than serious in what the administration appears to be aiming at, straight superiority. event, that is not really engaged Australia balancing in some longer term so much as in helping USA win a nuclear war, feat, But in contradicting the goal of world peace of premiss 7. and its derivation. Contra 10 follow that strength is indicate, the Ta role is such a lackey's one. leaning America's direction, in as be If most the Presumably premiss balance of seems to evidence 5A.1 is designed to exclude putting its weight where it is effective, this not does team (that is what such images as the balanced tug-of-war of Australia teaming up with totalitarians. thouqht, should Australia's it then Australia should surely be throwing its slight weight in Eastern suggest). The derivation is inadequate; with would deplorable Nevertheless Australia given its own broader (From previous page) After some reconstruction, that is. For the argument, curiously referred as that of "central balance in newspaper level publications of academics, is never presented in requisite detail which is one reason why it has proved hard to criticise and refute. interests objectives, could Australia fulfil and principles. which would enable it to make to world peace, contribution There are several satisfactory more among them nonalignment and neutrality. A more direct approach may Thus 10 is hardly wel1-supported or evident. be a better than throwing our Australian weight unrefIectively on one the balance. roles different of side the balance images and argument As a little reflection attests, points not in the direction intended, but towards nonalignment. Contra 4A (and peace, the preserves if of course false. USSR in this munitions dance, the escalation (the USSR relation). balance, hence and Again it takes two at least to checks the the history of the dance reveals that pace flowed from the interaction of the one partner of with the but for the USA, the USA would not be required to check the That is, other. the it can be granted that the USA is interlocked with and While tango. The theme that US maintains 4). interaction is two-way as with Hegel's master-slave famous Furthermore it looks as if, on a different historical trajectory, the main states of Western Europe could match the Soviet Union militarily (for they have comparable combined GNP, etc.) Thus it is doubtful see Appendix 1, resources, technological that the current Soviet build-up, produced in interaction with the USA, could only be, or have been, checked by the US. de 6A.1. As the premiss is only of marginal relevance to the argument, need only be noted that the international order the USA helps maintain very much to be desired. In its intervention, militarily, it leaves economically and indirectly, USA has assisted substantially in reducing plurality and openness, as well as in establishing or propping up rotten regimes, side of American imperialism is well enough documented, etc. The negative if not widely enough read or known by Americans. ad 8 and maintaining pass, the the equivocation on the balance. While balance is one stabi1i ty in the world arrangements that have presently balance structure can only carry so much loading. 24 way of come to Add too much weight (of arms, and so forth) tension, The increasing probability of catastrophic probably catastrophically. fail, to both sides and the structure will breakdown, for a variety of reasons (accident, miscalculation, computer error, human interference, etc.), has been argued elsewhere (e.g. WPI) . While a certain neither overloaded nor overstressed balance may serve for stability, the present increasingly stressed balance will probably not. however, balance argument, neglects this dynamical situation, illegitimately balance switching from a (certain) balance in premiss 8 to the (on-going) subsequent premisses. The balance argument itself The breaks in down through of removing equivocati on. What dynamic picture also indicates is the importance the weight -from the balance, some reduction. position It most obviously by arms limitation and tension to a neutral points to a different role for Australia, too within the nonaligned grouping. It is to the emerging case for a different role for Australia, and to action for achieving this different role, that the positive argument will now gradually swing. The attacks inadequate upon East-West proposals (its to repair it. alleged good administrators This For example, Australia than with American trade argue, is a nonsequitur, and lots to the argument, and do not against nonalignment or neutralism is set pervasiveness of nuclear winter. for for The additions are inessential confusion and dust. the for a different role combined The main effect of these additions is to generate extra alliance and service. serve balance argument is typically of other He might as well things), so aligned be our sagacious because if the control balance fails we are all worse than ex nihilo quodlibet (for it also that balance is necessary for the stability). dead. suggests But, in the main, the attack is irrelevant because the point of nonalignment, is to help remove overload and to break down confrontation and its escalation to war; before winter descends, it is a thing to do to delay or halt its descent, 25 now, and most important, to reduce its severity. Australia's weight may be slight, another irrelevant addition goes, psychologically it is important for the West. disease" would show the weakening f or Sovi e t ex pan s i on ism. virtual 1y alignment, Australi a gives the Bell, Any further spread of the "Kiwi of Western resolve, and give the green light a leading exponent of the balance argument, impression that if Australia dropped through the isles to Russians would be on the road down 18 the tomorrow. Much of this sort of rhetoric i =■ reminiscent of f such military interests, set route, major American of out the The Russians have no baseless fear-mongering of an earlier pre-Uietnam time, and but out, t ie or present capabli A of they would be met by substantial resistance along most the for one, has and the resistance obtaining Western assistance. interests, Philippines, strengthening And if they were to gear up different as well the from Australia's, as elsewhere in East Asia. depends, argument, in For America, Indonesia in both The addition, its "green light from so far for expansion" comparison, on the previously faulted premiss 5 of Soviet expansionism. or another In fact most of the case against alignment of one sort it is argued. for often nonalignment and neutrality are, au th or i tar i an assumptions. style, Cat 1ey, simply for denounced example, - turns - when in good old-fashioned upon al ready another exponent of "central fau1 ted balance", presents the following 'consideration'': ... whatever the Swedes or Swiss may think about the matter, Australia is locked by considerations of culture, economics, and political philosophy into the defence of the Western world. It has both an obligation and a duty to contribute its share to that cannot easily be defence if necessary by hosting facilities which located elsewhere (p.15). The premiss is false for reasons essentially indicated: Nay sustains the conclusion, prescriptive 18. and the premiss in no the argument involving among other things, (is-ought) fallacy. Consider the premiss. Australia is See the discussion of Bell's claims in D. Martin and in Mack PC. 26 the not, k unless Catley has information withheld from most of the rest of us,locked into Western nuclear defence, its but in principle free to reconsider and rethink use of the "facilities" is not irrevocable, and shortly options. (American comes up . >, economics and political philosophy provide locks and chains for Australia but f©.r reconsideration.) in principle at least, not for nonaligned Western European states? part USA or altogether a client of frameworks economic and They do not: state; and philosophies political significantly different (for details, defence (as, practices e.g., ANZUS in al 1 of culture, Australia is not a cultures, the interests, are nations two But even if the ideological see CPD) . frameworks were much more similar than they are, the How do that would not entail its weakness similar nor shows), any defence obligations. of Most worse. the arguments against nonalignment are of Catley Fortunately, calibre - or the case against nonalignment is (as with several then, o-f the above points) developed in detail elsewhere, especially by 0. Martin in his examination of counter-arguments to Australian armed neutrality, legally recognised nonbelligerent form of nonalignment he favours. al 1 of Martin's argument is couched in negative form; very brief. make this his positive brief us secure against such dangers as we may one day have to meet, needlessless is exposes to other dangers, correct enough, Virtual 1y alignment or alliance with the USA It reduces to thi including nuclear war' and in need of wide propagation, exhausts the positive case for nonalignment. posi t ive case of much theoretical interest, the it cannot while means no In particular there is a to be drawn from the it Wh i 1 e (p.l). by is more burgeon i ng theory of collective goods and action. 7. Free riding, group size, and increasing variety. The with strategic more convenience) world situation we now confront can be viewed as than 100 players, major a game counting in nation-states and leaving out (for organisations such as the largest 100 transnational These compan i es. organisational players align themselves around two arge poles. East and West, as indicated: EAST NON-ALIGNED N WEST N India N Sweden# Swi tzer 1 and# Tanzani a Most Latin . American States! ## Costa Rica State commmun i st State capitali st N: Nuclear weapons states #: Neutral states ##: Nonmi 1i tary states Key: There are various - a great many - games these state players are playing, Some of these of which are practically important for peace and for stability. such games, as representation), World are Empire and Chicken (already There are several problems about East-Nest games: have, the Russian what under played played essentially between the East-Nest representation negative sum characters of some games. may, as they will with the Big One), end after one round, And the monolithic East - way simplifications may). So game theoretical representation they like the monolithic Nest dichotomy is misleading, and, as will appear, discards crucial detail the one superplayers. repeatability of the games (clearly some nuclear games roulette, =ome will (in be approached differently and more obliquely. Nor 1d security, (technically, in like regional and local joint security, is a collective good supply and precluding exclusion). 28 That is not of to course say that there are not conditions under which security for instance where security is guaranteed by a narrow and much to be desired, intolerant despotism; provisioning, it can be argued, but then, not the particular product. collection of N nation-states. It is, the trouble lies with the It is a collective good G for the furthermore, a collective good permits the possibility of free-riding by nation-states. perspective the American complaint about its allies, insufficient expenditure on defence, their leave may which Looked at from this and Japan for example, is a complaint about their free riding. Within the balance of power framework the conditions for free-riding extracted by Pettit) are satisfied, disarming states. For to the achievement (or maintenance) of G by any will make every member­ and any, unilaterally is available to all N members of the collective if it is available G 1. for instance by neutral and (as better off. 2. G is achieved iff some number m^K contribute towards its provision, where under the balance of power assumption IICTK^N and II = (USA, USSR}. The 3. expected value of contributing to G or its maintenance is less than the expected value of not doing so, i.e. likely costs exceed likely benefits except for perhaps members of II given that G is provided by II. is There pegged by what free-rider problem, members of II for whom the free-rider option is not open - within ran be called a pegged (or asymmetric) the confines of the balance of power assumption - and for whom condition 3 only satisfied under certain ways of looking at the matter (e.g. a war 10 years down the road so the expected costs each—year is there will be exceed the expected benefits). There regional) is a straightforward case for recommending free riding on the balance of power provision of 6. 2? Australian (and Some arguments, beyond or adding to those already in effect presented, are these:- Either If it does then the region is better off than it would be if or it does not. (strongly) the as and there is a large-scale war stability breaks down catastrophically aligned because it is unlikely to be (so heavily) targetted. (Here dreadful new argument that nuclear winter means that the Antipodes might well be involved gets challenged and rejected: see MF). doesn't break down then the region has the benefits in any case, enhances global USA stability, indeed, as remarked and wi11 etc.; regional weight significant? of delusional the in That power? framework. Ne shouldn't: we believe seriously it and if we do we're is the in living in a Australia has been left out of the picture in virtually strategic planning exercises, all do Australian voice makes much real difference the Northern Western block, be As regards Australasian further argued, the evidence points to the contrary. halls the without For there is no clear evidence that our alignment and cooperation with costs. the stability If most difference-making peace initiative^, etc., etc. Now riding, Eastern rather countries would hardly block th an suppor t of f ering object (h owever to free Antipodean c omf or t trifling), an d Furthermore free riding is how the Americans, incitement to their opposition. the rational would expect Australia to act, on their theoretical principles self interested procedure (see CPD). It is economically rational; contributing is not. But won't the Americans make things economically dear for Australia? In threats and theory, do yes; but in practice, no more than they threatened already in the case of New Zealand with the nuclear-ships issue. short term arrangements: aberrations, America will never give up trade But or to for market one gets the impression that America would trade with the Devil Himself if it could open some new markets in Hell. Despite its political stigma, way immoral or irregular. voluntary payment system, free riding need be no problem, Perhaps the buses are free; perhaps there to which only some need contribute, 30 or in any etc. i => a Hi th the contributing is not (see nuclear fix, free riding is indeed the moral course; HPI). Free riding, though often portrayed as a problem, is only a problem in certain and desirable sufficiently riders. collective of cases is This in Australia stays the the escalating treadmill or gets is, off is involved many too free which will whether or security, and precarious way that it curious on good will not be provided because of the situation with global not the provided, where provisioning, rides and be not free. Australia's free riding may be a problem for America; it is not for Australia. Interests diverge again. of stability by building, tripod or bipedal one, for example, if it is a wind tower or of supports increases stability. instance in the theory of "spreading the risks" certain a cybernetics. free The increases and by similar Then a than a has in diversity ecology, for The related theme, (see EH). stability, that theme The elaborated been in core eco-systemic idea to be developed is that Australia's and consequent nonalignment in defence riding variety, variety topple point the Increasing the diversity, with stability has been sharpened and confirmed correlates that ground. a quadrapod tower is much less likely to and requires less guying to stay up. variety, certain increasing its rigid ties or supports to the better terms, pictorial structure is typically increased up to a it more adequately; securing or a In riding increases stability. free Judicious enhances diversity accordingly increases stability (especially if done in and concert with other client states). Two hardly interlocked well precarious guyed, structure well dug in but stability of the Hhat makes engineering sense is not supports in tension, are inadequate of world peace. East and Hest, for the long term however strengthening the supports that are there, balance is disturbed by the Host's surging ahead and likely overburdening the structure, helping the East when the but increasing the variety of supports, enlarging and diversifying 31 group size. East-monolithic monolithic The West picture misconceptualism perhaps convenient ■for some players. in conceptualism, main reason for mistakes concerns group size. collective but is significantly differs behaviour of large groups theory in group size is a highly significant factor (though group ■from that of smal I One Whereas 11+ = (West, East) is a N of nation-states is not. number the group, a It may ■force mistakes convenient simplification, e.g. for strategic thinking. smal1 than more much is i t s pr ec i se i mpor t is increasingly contested). N of nation-states is a large group The group, of interested parties, indeed of substantially economic actors. the American theory of collective action applies: that interest, counterintuitive way. a in behave self essentially So we may expect wi 1 1 that the groups Though expec ted to act in the to obtain security in particular, the collection will not. common On this account (that elaborated by Olson), the common interest can only be guaranteed by outside influence or imposition (coercion in Olson's rapid thinking). there is, as experience has shown, no outside with the collective of nations, mediator collective or influence good. The But of sufficient authority to ensure attainment prognosis looks very gloomy: this of the important most (though far from unique) collective good will not be provided. Fortunately the reasoning, has been containing shift economic virtually (subjectively) back actors though large. highly is to basics, all privileged, for whom costs of war exceed benefits in perspective from the earlier free riding condi t i on important that The group, too swift. several like much of the "logic" of collective action, 3). effect of the knowledge of an ominous nuclear actors involved should now be expected in that (note in the Indeed an winter is posit i on; costs of nuclear war have become very high. for go Olson's grand theory is based on the accountants/-----tautology (defining 'net') 32 gross agent benefits - gross agent costs. net agent benefit i.e. A for each agent or actor i ymbols, in show i for virtually all that in N. is positive for some i is privi1eqed if A group (in collective N) , European to benefi t s of global security are decidedly positive (e.g. respective future GDPs would expectedly fal 1 needs 1 the net wi th a nuclear war nation-states argument their It to near zero). The fact the group of nation-states is privileged does not however imply that the that good i nvo1ved, c o1 Iec t i ve longer term. error, stability ■ JI instabi1i ty. dynamics, An achieved improved particularly in wi11 be supplied, secur i ty, dynami c ; it takes no account of mistake. through superiority modelling or intermediate - which can take some account iterated games — is gained by returning to through the the of game theoretic ground A free rider "problem" is tantamount to a dilemma of some sort; according to conventional wisdom, the contrast Taylor and Hard). it is a prisoners' (cf. dilemma The argument can go this but Pettit, way;- a free rider problem or issue is defined in terms of the provisioning of a collective good; theory the but of collective goods is equivalent to that of a prisoners 20 dilemma. dilemma; in detail which more Certainly the global nuclear situation as much is a commonplace claim. appears Elsewhere (HPI) that it does indeed present a moral dilemma. to present a it has been argued Here the argument can proceed through the theoretical route just sketched above or in the piecemeal way to be indicated - is that it is also a prudential dilemma 21 (for members of N). 19. The less than perspicuous symbolism is that used in Hardin (82, p.20, p.39), but with agents' costs or contributions, C, duly agent relativized. Hardin misleadingly treats C as a fixed parameter, thus strictly falsifying the tautology. 20. Thus Hardin who (in 82) claims to 'demonstrate the equivalence of the logic of collective action and the Prisoners' Dilemma' (p.4). The demonstration, which will be contested elsewhere, is given on p.x.5ff. 21. But of course the two types of dilemma interconnect. the range of apparent two party games being played by the US Hardin 83), Union Soviet (labelled US and SU respectively) administration regards the moves of further nuclear armament. (It is supposed, A, from the or nuclear disarmament, N. It is important here, as other French that The American people seem rather more were clearly opposed to the new nuclear missiles their people the towards nuclear disarmament than their administration; inclined to proceeded German administration The strategy games involved are then install. shots It is administrations or governments etc. take people into war; to places, administration - which for the most part calls the the society and the people. generally as that the game is set in some background context, naturally, Chinese nuclear armament). distinguish and 1985 in nuclear disarmament is not considered in isolation from on-going e.q. and (e.q. since these have obtained some discussion us consider -first, Let administration which we can suppose to be played over successive time intervals, e.q. games, years; so there is interaction and feedback as the games go on - until the Big Ones explode. The apparent games of US and SU are those diagrammed next: Pr i soners' A 4,1 D 2,2 O 1,4 this being played. According professions!1ez the A 1,4 CP presumably also represented US policy, it no aggressive, D A 4,1 D 3,2 US CP 1,4 to Hardin, 'giving evidence of Dilemma Prisoners' ordering of virtually all that A 4,1 that simplistic setting those represent the apparent games Within and D D 3,3 US IJS A SU SU SU D New Initial Game Revised Game Dilemma Game in (PD) 'represents [his] deformation the preference the articulate policy analysts in the United the Soviet Union' (p.248) . While PD there is considerable evidence (as already longer does, war-fighting, 34 That is, the US has States may have indicated) that the US administration has shifted to phase. are a interchanged more its rankings of (D,D) Soviets, The have who been much more consistent no (and bound to try to keep up with the Americans, their changed However they are have stuck with deterrence and no-first-strike. but better doubt appear not to have in their policy pronouncements, censored) game, and (A,A), presumably some time between 1978 and 1984 games. and so pushed towards the Revised Game shown, which p1easan11y restores symmetry. Stable or equilibrium outcomes for each game are circled. said be to stable if neither player has unilaterally on the strength of the game, influencing provide in broad sense, a and dangerous outcome. strategy for each player; dominant that equilibirum In all All strategies. is hence its economic fascination. results which are socially suboptimal (and games that might plausibly be taken to represent situation, and A recognisably guaranteed by the independent "stable" strategies. substantial to political substantially the games satisficing the suboptimal superpower outcome socially superior is there are What is worse, and military incentives for the superpower players adjust their preferences in after repeated games, an And the same applies to suggested alternative Chicken. other a below all as in Pareto- even But as the threshold), such achieved yet in the PD game that is these games are di 1emmas. games these the apparent games arming is and suboptimal, strategies switch i.e. to alter the outcome except by player also to alter other dilemmas undesirable deliver the to incentive An outcome is not directions but to do what the US appears to have done, to make the situation worse. socially preferable would be change to a coordination game of Much some sort, for instance, to the game which neutrals tend to play (and which Lackey, in contrast to other more bellicose utilitarians, sees utilitarian superpowers playing; hence Hardin's label diagrammed, WN inclined neutral represents a for this game, 'Lackey's Game'). Western-inclined (e.g. Yugos1avi a): neutral and EN In the game an Eastern A 3,2 D D (D A 2,3 NN Now 4,4 dilemmatic and coordination games are not played in the integrated since [Other coordination games, with (D,D) assigned (1,1) 1 in settings such as Uni ted Nations' committees games coordination are (and games peoples' -frequently but isolation, elsewhere, as well). Superimposing the games, as applied to US and SU games, leads to the following augmented games: SU SU SU A D A 2,2 4,1 1 2/3 3,3 • 1 4,1 . 2/3 1,4 • 2/3 2,2 D J,3 ■ 4 1,4 ■ A 2/3! A m represents a sequence of ms, and 3s in some order. As the agumented games reveal, a stable deadlock. on the superpowers. 4 i ■ e? ■ 2/3 4 ■ 2/3 a sequence of 2s m < m w rn in fact in several ways. on For example, would For one, enough significant much greater as a Superpower militarism Australia's nonaligned free impact, rider for disarmament and regional nuclear freedom (instead of by wash polemics and token ambassadors, US support) . 36 strategy with less support, unilateral action by US arms build-up can be exposed. be in much more pressure can be brought to bear- power excursions would stand naked, and unsupported. seriously <2,3 to play with a superpower is to help reinforce For another, towards disarmament. particular, 1,4 A a coordination game can alter the overall dominant playing administration 4,1 • 2/3 But playing an independent coordination game can help breaking the deadlock, players 3,2 ■ D 1 US US US A D D D New Game, Augmented Revi sed Game, Augmented Prisoners" Dilemma Augmented and in pressing white­ undermined by a none-too-tacit policy of 8. On the need for, possibility of, and prospect of basic structural change- The peace (in world has changed enormously since the time of Kant's proposals and even since the time of Veblen's more cynical (of 1795), additions Hard science and destructive power have grown enormously; and even 1917). especially that admitting knowledge of collective behaviour, theoretical game-theoretic treatment, what for though still has increased markedly. slight, be accomplished politically has in certain can little, since Rousseau complained (around 1761) of respects But changed very that governments were probably too short-sighted to appreciate the merits of his project for perpetual peace. Governments have obstacles to peace. long of source been seen as Xthe main (contingent) if the peace is Thus Veblen rightly maintains that ' ... to be kept it will have to come about irrespective of governmental management, - in spite of the State rather than by its good offices'- (p.7) . against the State on the basis that 'governmental Veblen argues and establishments powers ... are derived from feudal establishments of the Middle Ages; which in turn, However a predatory origin and of an irresponsible of are character Christian-feudal origin of the State provides only one the (p.r). - and a coercive - evolutionary pattern of organisation (pp. 12-13). There are major blockages to peace proposals and projects at two main and critical levels of organisation, that, organisation of collectives of states and, organisation deep, and domination of removal and to nothing set in part by devolution, themselves. these blockages, and exploitation of other forms, sights rather lower, short organisation of states, upon, The problems involved ones intertangled appears to call genuine global appear adequate. impossible in present political climates. 37 Yet even much the for are concerning extensive reached, to be attained, levels of political stability of extensive structural changes at both would of that of the Indeed if a permanent and satisfactory peace is to be adjustments. or individual focussed already smaller changes look There is little doubt that certain sorts of structural change are to conducive peace and that certain fundamental permanent peace. for changes would be With that in view they have long been least from Rousseau and Kant onwards. transform the structures that lead to war'- (B. theme immune to criticisms, obvious further desiderata, modest material freedoms, ~ at advocated for 'it is also necessary instance to To render this Martin, p.12). that straightforward extension of certain established structures could bring an authoritarian to war, sufficient But it has also long been supposed that such changes are necessary for lasting peace: some highly end typically presupposed, are invoked, e.g. certain standards of life, etc., and the type of necessity involved is set at some lower technical level (not excluded however by present These adjustments make the necessity theme more difficult to practicalities). assess, but also difficult to sustain. are There part, critical positive part, part negative According marxist demolishing and range of arguments a defence, from a negative determinism, of comprising direct arguments for the theme. 22 this enterprise will simply be illustrated. to deterministic and mechanistic approaches, technological determinism, human nuclear weapons, The large such as that like of megamachines They are an integral part of the business of generally, are no aberration. industrial and ecological conquest, a further stage in human intervention which has already involved substantial disruption through pesticides, etc. The argument tends to the fatalistic. made, and once made they wi11 22. and etc., that arrangements have to be more or less the way they are, and nature, a parts to its assessment two be used. wastes, The megamachines of conquest are No change in political arrangement, More of the negative enterprise is attempted elsewhere, e.g. a critique of the supposed strait-jacket of human nature is begun in CPD. From Plato through Hegel and into contemporary times it has been supposed that war, like aggression, is part of human nature, that war is a permanent condition of human and social existence. 38 would which enthusiasts any make difference, possible. is their position and luck, push While there is, unfortunately, a induction from the manufacture of weapons, batches machines are to this one, depl oyed) , never (and organisation deterministic position would possible either; political not frustrate the and other, is false, Different political arrangements, been have inductions. broader The are changes arrangements too, like the rest of social not life, are But (nonanalytical) determinism, technologically or economically determined. technological many that a change in background of course that such background is made of But even the good inductions do not that weapons of various sorts must be used, political many invention from induction's:- machines that do eventually get many reinvented or independently discovered). show of any given type (for or the like to their manufacture are unreliable and subject to counterexamples or weapon there is no stopping progress. But in doing so they overextend themsleves. fair technological that a even further, once invented by humans will be used: device Sometimes so it is argued which alleviate problems, are possible and would be different in differently evolved worlds. CPD). (JB, elsewhere technically Things did not and do not have to be the way they are or the social and political sort of way they are. Many routes, dominant require none of deductive strength, political extensive lead to the conclusion that the structures of our time, evolved from feudal structural alteration. In particular, institutions, they need to superseded by alternative structures which do not promote or lead to war. theme has been argued directly from the nuclear fix (see e.g. But suppose, improbable as it may seem, thereby removing the current nuclear fix; quietly seif-destructing,or nuclear disarmament HF I, p.4/ft.). that nuclear weapons all vanished, for instance, thermodynamic actually took place. The they turned out to be miracle occurred, or not be The problem of war would t-hat of nuclear war would only be given a short respite. 23 Conventional the structural arrangements for war would remain intact. removed For a massive be and even 3'? remain, weapons would weapons such as chemical and biological ones, were they prevent the in sot ar 3S could seem be Nu clear weapon s, if nuclear power plants remained especially nothing and intact; development of (Star wars) weapons more nuclear- as dangerous caches are easily hidden away), removed ("for smal 1 replaced, would along with weapons perhaps as than diabolical nuclear ones. War cannot be eliminated while leaving the rest of society as it is by freezing the status quo. ... The structural conditions for war need to be removed - not reinforced as appeals to elites may do - and superseded by alternative structures which do not lead to war (B. Martin, p.12). Structural adjustments peace. An can provide conditions for Kantian initial for the argument satisfactory lasting proposition that is peace possible, presented by Latta (introducing Permanent Peace), runs as follows:Peace, perpetual peace, is an ideal, not merely of a speculative kind but a practical ideal, a moral principle. ought to be realised, i.e. there ought (morally) Hence this ideal to be peace. But ought entails can; therefore peace is possible. From Heracleitus philosophers by 24 be with war as one limit, is essential swarm more widely conceded, ought to though often not on of Some are even captivated stop, to motion and progress. the recent shift in philosophical fashions the second premiss would Kantian grounds, now but Such grounds do support the theme that peace ...is—desirable be realised, indicate what sort of peace. but are more discriminating in Unfortunately, premiss does not sustain the conclusion, 23? impressive such extravagant counter-claims as that with peace everything would consequentialist. and there buzzes an Hegel who have rejected the second premiss. that competition, With through that they help however/ it is done, the second ought does not entail can, as many (From previous page) As B. Martin, who uses this important form of argument for institutional change to get his thick book started, points ou t (pp. 12-13). 24. The swarm includes some anomalies, ecology, Spinoza: see Appendix 3. 40 such as that tarnished hero of deep dilemmas reveal moral Fortunately (see MD) . conclusion that peace is possible, method of (semantical) modelling: societies where recall persists present in detail scenarios of it may be necessary to (for the sceptical with n = 1 or n = 0). n-human models, the to That is the more and indeed is feasible. elaborate peace route a more satisfactory and revealing is there This sort of thing is of course in more pleasing fashion than logicians could hope to emulate if 25 less precisely, by novelists. Hhat all these scenarios point to, already done, rather however, are societies considerably different from our own, not in the people involved who have their weaknesses, forth, and so their power drives, but because of significant structural alterations in the societies depi c ted. way of such modellings we can not merely argue to the feasibi1i ty By peace, sorts restructured push ahead with the argument - that societies but desirable alternatives to contemporary are For those of us industrial arrangements. pacific the alternatives, Heilbroner is has and possible said thoroughly entrenched, of the desirable, human and enforced, power. That has not deterred social before him and many after him, Kant, 25. in his search these military or then who want to move towards such from inference, feasibility and we shou1d begin on the real work of structural change. desirability is clear: Peace practical of of but the prospect). prospects Present poor (as arrangements are are both ideologically and by much physical theorists such as Kant, who like Rousseau were concerned with obtaining lasting for the indispensible conditions peace. for__ 1 asting—peace, Perhaps Kant had some such modellings in view in his theme that peace is empirically possible, which he coupled with his striking claim that it is morally and rationally imperative. The latter claim, running in direct opposition to the longline of bellicose philosophers, really relies on the correct but controversial assumption that states are subject to the same moral relations as individual persons. Both then have an obligation to seek peace derived from forms of the categorial morality, notably from rational autonomy , the universality of maxims, and the ultimate value of persons (or, more chauvinistically, of humanity). 41 claimed, others as have claimed since, that peace is not possible present structural arrangements of a competing nation-states kind. times changed, have and so have state structural In particular there is now, under To be sure since arrangements, in the shape of the United Kant Nations, a very weak reflection of what Kant looked for, a world (or European) federation of nations. namely, But crucial the at ingredients in Kant's resolution are still upper level, what is required for a standard resolution Dilemma type situations - some surrender of Prisoners lacking:- of sovereignty, national 26 especially as regards war; Much has now accumulated that more evidence the and, at the lower level, "republican" state*. nation-state level far-reaching changes if peace is to be secured, or required at movement is even to get its message through already fixed channels control systems. succeed, tn informational and democratic are practical 27. and not (p.52) , to alter which the theoretical arguments for not that it has fallen very Kant's claim, as well as arguments of an inductive sort. Such is also the new message from America: for the peace movement to get through to the administration, American democracy must be overhauled and revitalised, capitalist democracy superseded by true democracy or "republicanism" (see e.g. Cohen and Ragers). But the message, like the US peace movements'" very limited demands for peace, leaves the state, as the bringer of wars, and the main source of violence, essentially intac.; the structural changes suggested, which will be slow to achieve, are much too narrowly conceived. 28. state has traced some of the economic consequences of 'the rise and subsequent fall of the American imperium'’ There to The significant decline of the American imperium Heilbroner 26^ peace Movements on a single front, such as peace, are unlikely to channels, 27 character and membership of state control system^. widen APPENDIX 1; a need to be linked into a broader plurality of movements, but are My thanks for information to David Bennett and Andrew Mack. 'Empires f ar . empire was no Thp =h<=pr military cost ... for the United States a 1 one ... 12 px c e p t i on « is always been expensive and the American have ten roughly imperial American dol1ars)". GNP for the last 25 years ... percent of supplemented spending enhanced poverty, countries fueled inflation, what it was represented as required by, $2X10 in capitalist other by 1972 etc., and was complemented by, counterexpenditure and efforts by the USSR. establishment of an American hegemony [consisted and] resulted 'The just in American large very capital American-owned billion" payments and Between 1950 and 1970, equipment abroad 1 eaped from $ 12 (negative build-up of value of the to billion "capital flows" and balances), and a $78 growing On this sort of basis Heilbroner speculates that of IOUs. operation rapid A result of the expenditure abroad was a serious balance of problem accumulation mere investments abroad. plant (p.54). but in the military expenditures, not of the American imperium by itself - deemed of such 'the critical importance to preserve the peace and security of the capitalist world - was in likelihood all a inflationary phenomena' the for the globalisation of the (p.57 with insert from p.56). According to Heilbroner, that condition sufficient 'Long before the Vietnam debacle, it was clear American arms could not prevent the rise of revolutionary governments in under-developed collapse there world" (p.57). is presented by Heilbroner; But and seemingly there little is evidence little. is more substantial evidence for is the marked dec H ng of *he imperium in the period (1973-3) concerned. decline really very in America's select leading national share of World GDP, economies: 43 of What American One piece of evidence is the sharp shown in the following table of POPULATION SHARE (1984 est) SHARE OF WORLD GDP (X) RANK 1968 1975 1984 USA 1 35.0 24.3 25.0 5.2 USSR 2 11.1 11.0 13.8 6.2 .JAPAN 3 5.2 3.0 9.5 2.7 GERMANY FDR 4 5.1 6.7 5.7 1.5 FRANCE 5 4.6 5.4 4.4 1.3 CHINA 6 2.9 4.8 4.3 22.6 UK 8 2.8 2.8 2.3 1.3 INDIA 12 1.3 1.5 1.1 15.1 AUSTRALIA 15 1.1 1.4 1.0 0.3 COUNTRY The qrand table empire, also make it clear that if the USA cannot should nor can the USSR. sustain A totalitarian Pax Sovietica is even a le=s likely than a capitalistic Pax Americana was. APPENDIX 2: A pluralistic framework for defence policy The policy (broadeni ng Cami11 er izs suggest ions) 1. ensures Australian security to some minimal but reasonable extent; 2. is entirely non-nuclear (.and so is not aligned); 3. is defensive in posture with weapons system devoid of offensive application and capacity, focussing on direct defence of Continent, is decentralised, comprising wel1-trained, dispersed but coordinated small units. is partly at least social, defence, nonmilitary deploying, in combination [?] with territorial forms of popular resistance trained in noncooperat i on. 44 sabotage a APPENDIX 3? The philosophical record; a preliminary tabulation. Reflection on war and peace has had a strong polarising effect, dividing philosophers into two main groups: Group B. Those who regard war as inevitable, perhaps even as desirable; Group G. Those who consider war an evil, capable of being replaced by lasting and peace through goodwill or improved social arrangements. The groups are not however exhaustive; fence-sitters; and there are there are ambivalent philosophers, and those who have the supported battered themes of a war to end wars and of world empire. at one stage in his development, to a despotic world state, peace. Russell, idealists. reached by imposition or war, B and G are sometimes described, But while Thus, for example, who looked, like Dante before him, So strictly the classification is (once again) Groups historically- as a guarantor of four valued. respectively, as realists and these overworked terms reflect accurately enough the historic human condition and the present prospects, they are prejudicial, and they conflict with other classifications using these terms; for instance, both Plato and Hegel, condition of human existence. idealists would Northedge, accept war as normally accounted idealists, have been a Such concoctions as war-realists preferable to the labels from whom much of the record is drawn, the c on serva t i ve t r ad i t i on a n d aboli t i on i sts. the concoctions, 45 terms and of sets the contrast: peace- which namely We shall prefer adaptions namely war-riors and peace-niks, simply (real) baddies and goodies. in permanent or, not to be of partisan, DEFINING POLES R adi c a 1 s GROUP 8: war-riors RESIDUE GROUP GROUP G peace-niks Virtually all classic Greek phi1osophers except early Stoics: especially Heracleitus, Plato (P) Author of Revel at ions Early Christians (non-violence pr i n c i p 1 e) Dubois (1306); but with anti­ Musi im aim Erasmus ( 1570) Cruce (1623; early world order model Roman Stoics and Christians Scholastics: Aquinas (P) Dante •Just war theorists: (Au Qu s t i n e) , SuIr ez, Grotius (1425) IJ t op i an s: More (war­ games of modern utopias in direct descen t) European peace projects, some extended to (Christian) wor1d: Bel 1ers ( 1710), Penn (1693), abb£ de Saint-Pierre (1713) European peace and hegemony: Duke of Sully (1620) Nation-state theorists Machiave1 1 i, Hobbes, Locke, Spinoza I-<2'1 b n /f’-j German idealists: Hegel, Schopenhauer Perpetual peace: Rousseau, Kant Mili t ar i st s: Nietzsche; Treitschke, Bernhardi, Clausewi tz Some utili tar i ans: Bentham, the Mil Is, Bren tano Some anarchists and 1ibertarians: Kropotkin (?), Spencer Russel 1 ■James Hi t tgenstei n Key: In Dewey P, peace a prime objective. sort of investigation there are disappointments as this Spinoza was admiration madness to a major disappointment, of Greek thought, allow Brentano a find. well For, as finds. despite his 'Brentano was a decided pacifist and thought it questions of international fortunes of war'- (Kraus in Brentano, p.122). 46 justice to be decided by the REFERENCES H.G. Andrewortha Birch, and L.C. University of Chicago The Ecological Neb, 1984. Press, H.R. Ashby, Design -for a Brain, Second edition. Hi ley. New York, I960. S. Beer, Desiqninq Freedom, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Toronto, F. Brentano, The Origin of our Knowledge of Right and Wrong, Keegan Paul, London 1969. 'Setting the J. Camilleri, disarmament agenda", l?/4. Routledge and Peace------ Studies 9, ( 1984) ,17-19. F. Capra and C. Spretnak, Green Politics, Hutchinson, London, R. Catley, with the Bomb ... 'Along Australian Magazine, 7-8 April, (Review o-f 1984. Martin), D. The—Weekend 1984. 1979. P. Cock, Alternative Australia, Qu ar t er Book s, Me1 hourn e, J. Cohen and J. Rogers, On Democracy, Penguin, New York, 1984. P. and A. Erlich, Popu1 ation, Resourses, Environment, Second edition, Freeman, San Francisco, H. Feith, 197x. 'Richard Falk, Peace Studies 24 (June 1985) World order radical', 24-5. J. Galtung, There are Alternatives, Spokesman, Nottingham, 17’84. A. Gilbert, 'The state and nature in Australia', Au s t r a 1i an Cu 1 t yral—Hist or 1981 (ed. S. Goldberg and F.B. Smith), Canberra, 1982, pp.9-28. R. Hardin, Co 1 1 ec 1 tive Action , Resources -for the Future, Washington, R. Hardin, M.D. Hayes, Ph i 1 osop_hy—and—Pub He 236-254. 'Defending September 1983) mutual disarmament', versus 'Unilateral Affairs 12 (1983) the sunburnt country', Chain Reaction 33 (August 11-17. R.L. Heilbroner, Beyond Boom and Bust, Norton, New York, 19/8. I. Kant, Perpetual Peace (trans, and introd. M. Campbell Sonnerschein, London, 1903 (first published 1795). A. Mack, 'Farewell 1?82. Smith), Swan to Arms Controls' 9 (1984) 9ff. A. Mack, 'The pros and cons of ANZUS', Fabian ANZUS Conference, Lome, 4-5 May 1985; referred to as PC. B. Martin, Uprooting War, Freedom Press, London, 1984. D. Martin, Armed Neutrality for Australia, Drummond Books, Melbourne, 47 1984. Northedge, 'Peace , war and philosophy', in Encyclopedia of Phi 1osophy (ed. P. Edwards), Volume 6, Macmillan, New York, 1767, 63 t>< . M. Olson, The Logic of Collective Action, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1965. P. Pettit, 'Tree riding and foul dealing', typescript, Canberra, J.-J. Rousseau, A Project for Perpetual Peace C trans. 1927 (first published 1761). E.M. 1985 Nut tai), London, large-scale nuclear war and nuclear deterrence, 'On the ethics of R. Rout ley, out' , Discussion__ Papers__ in Environmental and the political fall School of Social Sciences, Australian National Ph i1osophy #5, Research University, 1984. R. R. Routlpy, 'Metaphysical fall-out from the nuclear predicament', 1 Ph 11osophy "and 1 Social Criticism 3/4 ( 1984) 19-34; referred to as MF. Rout ley and V. Plumwood, 'Moral dilemmas and the logic of deontic^notions , 'ni\r,.^.ign Papers in Environmen tai ..Philosophy #4, Research School of SociaT~Sciences, Australian National University, 1984; referred to as MD. P.R. Stephen son, The Foundation s of Cu1t u r e, N.J. M i1es, oydn ey, R. Sylvan, 'Culture Canberra, 1985; and the roots of political divergence', 1 ? 36. typescript, referred to as CPD. M. Taylor and H. Hard, 'Chickens, whales, and bumpy goods: al ternative models of public-goods provision', Poli tical Studies 30 (19821 350 370. The Strategic Basis of Australian Defence .Policy, the National Times, March 30-April 5, leaked extracts published in 1984, 23-30. to Australian Security, Pariiamentary Joint Committee for Foreign Affairs and Defence, Australian Government Printer, Canberra; referred .o 3. s TAS. T. Veblen, An Inquiry into the Nature of Peace and the Terms of Perpetuation, Viking Press, New York, 1945 (first published 191,). 48 its  Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Box 71, Item 1: Working draft of Australia's defence philosophy: investigations of the nonexistent # MX504 Subject The topic of the resource Computer printout of working draft. Paper published, Routley R (1984) 'On the alleged inconsistency, moral insensitivity and fanaticism of pacifism', Inquiry (Oslo), 27(1): 117-136. https://doi.org/10.1080/00201748408602030. Description An account of the resource Unnumbered paper from collection, item number assigned by library staff Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org/items/browse?search=Richard+Sylvan&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bjoiner%5D=and&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=&amp;range=&amp;collection=&amp;type=&amp;user=&amp;tags=&amp;public=&amp;featured=&amp;exhibit=&amp;geolocation-mapped=&amp;geolocation-address=&amp;geolocation-latitude=&amp;geolocation-longitude=&amp;geolocation-radius=10&amp;submit_search=Search+for+items">Richard Sylvan</a> Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <span class="MuiTypography-root-125 MuiTypography-body2-126">The University of Queensland's <a data-testid="rek-series" href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/records/search?page=1&amp;pageSize=20&amp;sortBy=score&amp;sortDirection=Desc&amp;searchQueryParams%5Brek_series%5D%5Bvalue%5D=Richard+Sylvan+Papers%2C+UQFL291&amp;searchMode=advanced">Richard Sylvan Papers UQFL291</a></span>, Box 71, Item 1 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org">Antipodean Antinuclearism: (Re)constructing Richard Routley/Sylvan's Nuclear Philosophy</a> Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource This item was identified for digitisation at the request of The University of Queensland's 2020 Fryer Library Fellow, <a href="https://najtaylor.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr. N.A.J. Taylor</a>. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource For all enquiries about this work, please contact the Fryer Library, The University of Queensland Library. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource [48] leaves. 32.19 MB. Type The nature or genre of the resource Manuscript Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context <a href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:d048645">https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:d048645</a> Box 71: Unlisted and Untitled Boxes https://www.antipodean-antinuclearism.org/files/original/382a1128067b3cf4c3bcc193ab4cac7d.pdf b45dc2ea94eb2ca3936e966fc7a70ea7 PDF Text Text ETHICS PROJECTS AND ISSUES 1 l That of putting together and justifying as largely evaded Aristotelean, outside one of two . whole a svstem of ethics. ~t ask is ~ One traditions. which sets out with a 74. R where it is tackled is the conception of Man's end or uJ timate good, and ),J( / .' )(~ then endeavours to show that the virtuous life - which is what ethics concerns - wilJ 1 ff/f'O fulfil this or realise it. By contrast, Cicero begins with a fairly full-fledp-ed colJ ection of duties and makes some attempt at showing personal advantage will not clash with those. for Duty's together: sake requires a .iustification. And collections ,-e_ 9. ~ ,; ~ru.:t: there is a ~grneu-+: of coherence on ethical svstems . 21 Why want fallacies, such as those fallacies? be. J abel1ec'l have naturaJ ism and to But nuty be pulled prescriptive, RR Because if they weren't fallacies too much that is not determined would Briefly, one would not expect that is ohligatory or good to fol low from the scientific facts, because that would determine which value system to adhere to . But there is not a fina1 unique system delivered from the facts. 31 Def ea ting objections achieved by to consequentionalist objections reliance on principles ( act - ) utilitarianism is that to deontics . sometjmes a One of the frequent better outcome or like act consequentialism , that ob,jection no longer carries any weight . can be Under satisizing It is· enough , at most , that application of the principle yields a sufficiently good outcome . T � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Notes, Correspondences and Marginalia Description An account of the resource In one obituary, Sylvan's handwriting was said to have "looked like the oscilloscope for a patient in intensive care", and thus "not for the timid". Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Text Any textual data included in the document ETHICS PROJECTS AND ISSUES 1 l That of putting together and justifying as largely evaded Aristotelean, outside one of two . whole a svstem of ethics. ~t ask is ~ One traditions. which sets out with a 74. R where it is tackled is the conception of Man's end or uJ timate good, and ),J( / .' )(~ then endeavours to show that the virtuous life - which is what ethics concerns - wilJ 1 ff/f'O fulfil this or realise it. By contrast, Cicero begins with a fairly full-fledp-ed colJ ection of duties and makes some attempt at showing personal advantage will not clash with those. for Duty's together: sake requires a .iustification. And collections ,-e_ 9. ~ ,; ~ru.:t: there is a ~grneu-+: of coherence on ethical svstems . 21 Why want fallacies, such as those fallacies? be. J abel1ec'l have naturaJ ism and to But nuty be pulled prescriptive, RR Because if they weren't fallacies too much that is not determined would Briefly, one would not expect that is ohligatory or good to fol low from the scientific facts, because that would determine which value system to adhere to . But there is not a fina1 unique system delivered from the facts. 31 Def ea ting objections achieved by to consequentionalist objections reliance on principles ( act - ) utilitarianism is that to deontics . sometjmes a One of the frequent better outcome or like act consequentialism , that ob,jection no longer carries any weight . can be Under satisizing It is· enough , at most , that application of the principle yields a sufficiently good outcome . T  Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Box 59, Item 683: Draft of Ethics projects and issues Subject The topic of the resource Typescript draft, with emendations and annotations. Description An account of the resource Note, one of three papers digitised from item 683. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org/items/browse?search=Richard+Sylvan&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bjoiner%5D=and&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=&amp;range=&amp;collection=&amp;type=&amp;user=&amp;tags=&amp;public=&amp;featured=&amp;exhibit=&amp;geolocation-mapped=&amp;geolocation-address=&amp;geolocation-latitude=&amp;geolocation-longitude=&amp;geolocation-radius=10&amp;submit_search=Search+for+items">Richard Sylvan</a> Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <span class="MuiTypography-root-125 MuiTypography-body2-126">The University of Queensland's <a data-testid="rek-series" href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/records/search?page=1&amp;pageSize=20&amp;sortBy=score&amp;sortDirection=Desc&amp;searchQueryParams%5Brek_series%5D%5Bvalue%5D=Richard+Sylvan+Papers%2C+UQFL291&amp;searchMode=advanced">Richard Sylvan Papers UQFL291</a></span>, Box 59, Item 683 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org">Antipodean Antinuclearism: (Re)constructing Richard Routley/Sylvan's Nuclear Philosophy</a> Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource This item was identified for digitisation at the request of The University of Queensland's 2020 Fryer Library Fellow, <a href="https://najtaylor.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr. N.A.J. Taylor</a>. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource For all enquiries about this work, please contact the Fryer Library, The University of Queensland Library. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource [1] leaf. 794.1 KB. Type The nature or genre of the resource Manuscript Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context <a href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:fa52764">https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:fa52764</a> Box 59: Nuclear Como House Como House > Cupboard > Pile 3 https://www.antipodean-antinuclearism.org/files/original/9a0eaf07f4febb1ac32bde2cd9f153e1.pdf 05c51d75c317aed7f6e3c1eb1eb7d7d6 PDF Text Text UTILITARIANISM AS SUPEREROGATION: Maximizing versus satisizing in value theory One ought always to act in such a way as to maximi2e utility - or, in more Kantian imperatival form: Act only in such a way that you action would serve to maximize net expected utility. or explained j The5 e are ways utilitarianism is sometimes put naturally these preliminaries have to be followed up by a lot of { pt9rl.~1:) :u~/J work trying to cash out utility in terms of.,\features - such as pleasure or happiness - of members of some other base class. But the further detail s are not the present concern - which is with the maximisation principles which are in fact corrnnon to often confused utilitarianism and other positions, such as consequentialism, with utilitarianism. To maximize is however often to go far beyond what is required . Utilitarianism is now, its main revolutionary force spent, treated with a gen tle toleration it does not really deserve. Certainly its application can still serve for the underwriting of worthwhile causes, such as opposition to racism or nuclear escalation: so however can most rival ethical positions. But its application can also serve a numb er of undesirable, or even pernicious ends, and not merely with ~aJ e: directions. its serious adoption forces adherents in these Examples include approaches to world population, the maximization of numbers being a constrained utilitarian objective, and on Lhe natural environ- ment, it being a mere instrument for human (or creature) uti)ity under ut i litarianism. So, for those with environmental perception and respect, utilitarianism should not be simply tolerated, as a reasonable and respectable ethical position: it shou ld be rejected, and bette:, actively resisted. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Notes, Correspondences and Marginalia Description An account of the resource In one obituary, Sylvan's handwriting was said to have "looked like the oscilloscope for a patient in intensive care", and thus "not for the timid". Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Text Any textual data included in the document UTILITARIANISM AS SUPEREROGATION: Maximizing versus satisizing in value theory One ought always to act in such a way as to maximi2e utility - or, in more Kantian imperatival form: Act only in such a way that you action would serve to maximize net expected utility. or explained j The5 e are ways utilitarianism is sometimes put naturally these preliminaries have to be followed up by a lot of { pt9rl.~1:) :u~/J work trying to cash out utility in terms of.,\features - such as pleasure or happiness - of members of some other base class. But the further detail s are not the present concern - which is with the maximisation principles which are in fact corrnnon to often confused utilitarianism and other positions, such as consequentialism, with utilitarianism. To maximize is however often to go far beyond what is required . Utilitarianism is now, its main revolutionary force spent, treated with a gen tle toleration it does not really deserve. Certainly its application can still serve for the underwriting of worthwhile causes, such as opposition to racism or nuclear escalation: so however can most rival ethical positions. But its application can also serve a numb er of undesirable, or even pernicious ends, and not merely with ~aJ e: directions. its serious adoption forces adherents in these Examples include approaches to world population, the maximization of numbers being a constrained utilitarian objective, and on Lhe natural environ- ment, it being a mere instrument for human (or creature) uti)ity under ut i litarianism. So, for those with environmental perception and respect, utilitarianism should not be simply tolerated, as a reasonable and respectable ethical position: it shou ld be rejected, and bette:, actively resisted.  Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Box 59, Item 683: Draft appendix, notes and cutting on utilitarianism Subject The topic of the resource Typescript draft, with emendations and annotations. Includes photocopy of pages from publication by Hutcheson, with a note from Charles to Richard. Hutcheson F (1755) System of moral philosophy. A System of Moral Philosophy, Volume 2, Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139583688.019 Description An account of the resource Note, one of three papers digitised from item 683. Title in collection finding aid: Appendix: ts + ms draft - attached to xc from Hutcheson 'Adventitious Rights'. Published work redacted from access file (PDF) due to copyright restrictions. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org/items/browse?search=Richard+Sylvan&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bjoiner%5D=and&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=&amp;range=&amp;collection=&amp;type=&amp;user=&amp;tags=&amp;public=&amp;featured=&amp;exhibit=&amp;geolocation-mapped=&amp;geolocation-address=&amp;geolocation-latitude=&amp;geolocation-longitude=&amp;geolocation-radius=10&amp;submit_search=Search+for+items">Richard Sylvan</a> Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <span class="MuiTypography-root-125 MuiTypography-body2-126">The University of Queensland's <a data-testid="rek-series" href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/records/search?page=1&amp;pageSize=20&amp;sortBy=score&amp;sortDirection=Desc&amp;searchQueryParams%5Brek_series%5D%5Bvalue%5D=Richard+Sylvan+Papers%2C+UQFL291&amp;searchMode=advanced">Richard Sylvan Papers UQFL291</a></span>, Box 59, Item 683 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org">Antipodean Antinuclearism: (Re)constructing Richard Routley/Sylvan's Nuclear Philosophy</a> Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource This item was identified for digitisation at the request of The University of Queensland's 2020 Fryer Library Fellow, <a href="https://najtaylor.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr. N.A.J. Taylor</a>. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource For all enquiries about this work, please contact the Fryer Library, The University of Queensland Library. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource [8] leaves. 1.93 MB. Type The nature or genre of the resource Manuscript Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context <a href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:7aded01">https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:7aded01</a> Box 59: Nuclear https://www.antipodean-antinuclearism.org/files/original/b53260d8b71b1e884c7cd83c19548c36.pdf 05c51d75c317aed7f6e3c1eb1eb7d7d6 PDF Text Text UTILITARIANISM AS SUPEREROGATION: Maximizing versus satisizing in value theory One ought always to act in such a way as to maximi2e utility - or, in more Kantian imperatival form: Act only in such a way that you action would serve to maximize net expected utility. or explained j The5 e are ways utilitarianism is sometimes put naturally these preliminaries have to be followed up by a lot of { pt9rl.~1:) :u~/J work trying to cash out utility in terms of.,\features - such as pleasure or happiness - of members of some other base class. But the further detail s are not the present concern - which is with the maximisation principles which are in fact corrnnon to often confused utilitarianism and other positions, such as consequentialism, with utilitarianism. To maximize is however often to go far beyond what is required . Utilitarianism is now, its main revolutionary force spent, treated with a gen tle toleration it does not really deserve. Certainly its application can still serve for the underwriting of worthwhile causes, such as opposition to racism or nuclear escalation: so however can most rival ethical positions. But its application can also serve a numb er of undesirable, or even pernicious ends, and not merely with ~aJ e: directions. its serious adoption forces adherents in these Examples include approaches to world population, the maximization of numbers being a constrained utilitarian objective, and on Lhe natural environ- ment, it being a mere instrument for human (or creature) uti)ity under ut i litarianism. So, for those with environmental perception and respect, utilitarianism should not be simply tolerated, as a reasonable and respectable ethical position: it shou ld be rejected, and bette:, actively resisted. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Notes, Correspondences and Marginalia Description An account of the resource In one obituary, Sylvan's handwriting was said to have "looked like the oscilloscope for a patient in intensive care", and thus "not for the timid". Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Text Any textual data included in the document UTILITARIANISM AS SUPEREROGATION: Maximizing versus satisizing in value theory One ought always to act in such a way as to maximi2e utility - or, in more Kantian imperatival form: Act only in such a way that you action would serve to maximize net expected utility. or explained j The5 e are ways utilitarianism is sometimes put naturally these preliminaries have to be followed up by a lot of { pt9rl.~1:) :u~/J work trying to cash out utility in terms of.,\features - such as pleasure or happiness - of members of some other base class. But the further detail s are not the present concern - which is with the maximisation principles which are in fact corrnnon to often confused utilitarianism and other positions, such as consequentialism, with utilitarianism. To maximize is however often to go far beyond what is required . Utilitarianism is now, its main revolutionary force spent, treated with a gen tle toleration it does not really deserve. Certainly its application can still serve for the underwriting of worthwhile causes, such as opposition to racism or nuclear escalation: so however can most rival ethical positions. But its application can also serve a numb er of undesirable, or even pernicious ends, and not merely with ~aJ e: directions. its serious adoption forces adherents in these Examples include approaches to world population, the maximization of numbers being a constrained utilitarian objective, and on Lhe natural environ- ment, it being a mere instrument for human (or creature) uti)ity under ut i litarianism. So, for those with environmental perception and respect, utilitarianism should not be simply tolerated, as a reasonable and respectable ethical position: it shou ld be rejected, and bette:, actively resisted.  Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Box 59, Item 683: Draft of Utilitarianism as supererogatory: maximizing versus satisizing in value theory Subject The topic of the resource Typescript draft, with emendations and annotations. Description An account of the resource Note, one of three papers digitised from item 683. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org/items/browse?search=Richard+Sylvan&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bjoiner%5D=and&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=&amp;range=&amp;collection=&amp;type=&amp;user=&amp;tags=&amp;public=&amp;featured=&amp;exhibit=&amp;geolocation-mapped=&amp;geolocation-address=&amp;geolocation-latitude=&amp;geolocation-longitude=&amp;geolocation-radius=10&amp;submit_search=Search+for+items">Richard Sylvan</a> Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <span class="MuiTypography-root-125 MuiTypography-body2-126">The University of Queensland's <a data-testid="rek-series" href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/records/search?page=1&amp;pageSize=20&amp;sortBy=score&amp;sortDirection=Desc&amp;searchQueryParams%5Brek_series%5D%5Bvalue%5D=Richard+Sylvan+Papers%2C+UQFL291&amp;searchMode=advanced">Richard Sylvan Papers UQFL291</a></span>, Box 59, Item 683 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org">Antipodean Antinuclearism: (Re)constructing Richard Routley/Sylvan's Nuclear Philosophy</a> Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource This item was identified for digitisation at the request of The University of Queensland's 2020 Fryer Library Fellow, <a href="https://najtaylor.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr. N.A.J. Taylor</a>. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource For all enquiries about this work, please contact the Fryer Library, The University of Queensland Library. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource [1] leaf. 503.45 KB. Type The nature or genre of the resource Manuscript Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context <a href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:da9203b">https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:da9203b</a> Box 59: Nuclear Como House Como House > Cupboard > Pile 3 https://www.antipodean-antinuclearism.org/files/original/751b703fda71fa9f2929cc0337db77cb.pdf 1419dad761d2e92700a8b87ce6cff449 PDF Text Text ff/(E~,r/f# . - c" : { ~7 / ~~c;.- l1fC~ / · 00682 1 �-- - t - ,...,, ..,, ? ., .. ..,,, ~ rr r,~ "4• -~11,1fL ~ • r~~ .u"1 .5 . ,...,,-,.,~ r;•_ eJry- 1V'lit .. rI .--, -.Hl,_ °",' .::_-.,"tt/,,,,- r-.:'1 ~llA~ f'r°' Iy,-~ - ~ ~•,'f _,., Y-"'" - ';,--~~J - w,f - /4- ~ r~ r --"""""""le - - ~vn,)'l - ',1 . - -,,y ""r,tiVJ~ra-n() -r- ·i 1tr'-lll#-J -- ,r ---,vv,7n - I -'- ---- -- ----~ ~- "',J,"0 --""11- - . , f ~ f' __ ,_ ,.,.,,,..,an, -; . . .-, -,,,,..,..,,,,~JKT- r,,..if,~A'F-:. - ..,·....,or--7 - = u<-1..,)"'<'1 . -r --f -- - ~ - - - ··- ~ - =-- ,...__,_...,,, "1 --- ~ CJ - r.• - C...0,7 0""1?' 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"'~ .,, ·u -- ~ » 7, ✓t:C,//,d , y ... ?..,., 1 7, r •- 'f/,, J'(_) �Brentano could hardly have reMaLned LndLscrLMi,nate apptaudLng u~ LlLtarLanLsM (such as of pte.3sures BenthaM's); Lntellectually or "posi,tLve" coMfortabLe E>nJc, Hon wLth of stLl,I, 1,ess coutd /4e ever ctLMb down to a MaterLal,LstLc eMpLrLcLsM whLch reMoved entLreLy the LdeaLLsM of CathoLLcLsM. though a strong eMpLrLcLst pas Lt Lon one. of C~ ~~ i..c eMp_i..: i..c LsM i,s .3n uns t.3b Le one_ Bren t.3no ach i,eved so Me teMporary stabi..LLty by spLrLtual So drLve Ls at work Ln Brentano, whLch Ls ManLfested especLaLLy Ln hLs exLstentLaL reductLon prograM, Lt Ls a heavLLy qualLfLed The the reaLM, where a two God world dLstLnctLon, between theoretLcaL or was the greatest good, and a practLcaL or secular reaLM, where utLLLtarLanLsM prevaLLed. 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M0 t~V7...:.7L1-.L..: . ~< VG~1/~~~ ;//;;_~ ~ ' Jf/C-?.-.Y- o/.J tiof is 1e of e- e S- e is of is 's 's 's s, re d at to re to et of is er of re id n d e in If r. / The correctness of loving and hating, like that of truly, or correctly, then the hypothetical judgment bejudging, is objective in that it' is impossible for anyone to comes: "He apodictically rejects judgers who are both correctly what anyone else hat.es correctly or to love love disjuncThe correct A-acceptors and correct B-rejectors." what anyone else hates incorrectly. incorrectly there or A's are there either that judges "He tive judgment Ethics must make use of the comparative concept bet• are B's" could then become "He apodictically . rejects ~ ;11r\ ter than, for which there is no analogue in the theory of judgers who are both correct A-rejectors and correct B1 . ~ ) knowledge. "A is better than B," according to Brentano, rej:.!ctors." h..1 ,- • means that it is correct to prefer A, as an end, to B. The philosophical consequences of this nonpropositionEvidence and truth. Brentano's views on evidence and ~___,.al theory of judgment are far-reaching. One consequence is · truth may be found in the posthumously published ~ an interpretation of Kant's dictum that "existence" is not a Wahrheit und Evidenz (Oskar Kraus, ed., Leipzig, W30). ( predicate. According to Brentano, when we say that A The distinction between judging on the basis of evidence 'exist: of attribute an exists, "it is not the conjunction of and judging "blindly" is not to be described in terms of ence' with 'A,' but 'A' itself which we affirm." The word instinct, feelings, degree of convictio.n, or impulse to be"exists" is a synsemantic tern1 that is used to express the lieve. We arrive at the general concept of being evident, act of judgment. according to Brentano, in the same way we arrive at the All of the doctrines set forth above fall within the provconcept of a correct emotion: by contemplating actual Unpsychology. ince of what Brentano called descriptive instances of the concept, in this case actual instances of and genetic ng psychology-includi experimental like evident judgments and of blind judgments. physiological psychology-descrip tive psychology, accordEvery evident judgment is either directly or indirectly ing to Brentano, is an exact science, capable of arriving at if a judgment is indirectly evident, tts evidence is evident; laws that hold true universally and not merely . "for the ultimately, by judgments that are directly eviconferred, even is and philosophy all for basis most part." It is the dent. Directly evident judgments are of two kinds. First, capable of providing a characteristica universalis of the there are the judgments of "inner perception," such as the sort that Leibniz had conceived. J)escriptive psychology is that I am now judging in a certain way, that I judgments closely related to what Husser! was to call phenomenolsuch-and-such, that I think I remember so-andsee to seem from Vienna in ogy. Husser! had studied with Brentano so. Second, there are judgments of reason or insights (Ei111884 to 1886, when Brentano used the expression besichten), such as the judgments that two things are more schreibende Phiinomenologie ("descriptive phenomenolthan one thing; that that which is red is, as such, other than ogy") as an alternative name for descriptive psychology. that ·which is green; that there cannot be a triangle with of doctrine Brentano's (Husser! later wrote that without four sides; or that a whole cannot exist if its parts do not intentionality, "phenomenology could not have come into exist. being at all.") Brentano's conception of psychology has led Every judgment that is evident is true, but not every some of his critics to accuse him of what Frege and Husthat is true is evident. Most judgments of "outer judgment does serl called psychologism. However, this accusation (of the external world), Brentano believed, are perception" his and evidence of theory Brentano's account not take into true, but all of them are "blind"; they are not evident. He moral philosophy, both of which he took to be branches of argued, howeve r, that the hypoth esis of a three-dimendescriptive psychology. sional external world , with its familiar details concerning Moral philosophy. Brentano's ethical views are set forth physical bodies, has an "infinitely greater probability" ed., 3d 1889; (Leipzig, Erkenntnis in Ursprung sittlicher than any of its alternative s. Judgments based on memory, Oskar Kraus, ed., 1934), translated by Cecil Hague as The too, are "blind"; but many of them confirm each other, and Origin of Our Knowledge of Right and Wrong (London, they are worthy of our confide nce. 1902), and in Grundlegung und Aujbau der Ethik ("The In WahrheU und Evidenz Brentano characterized truth ed., Mayer-Hillebrand, . Basis and Structure of Ethics," F reference to evidence: "Truth pertains to the judgment by assumpthe upon ethics his based Bern, 1952). Brentano of the person who judges correctly ... hence it pertains tion that the members o( the third class of mental pheto the judgment of one who asserts what the person who nomena, loving and hating, may be said to be correct or judges with evid e nce would as sert" (p. 130). In addition, incorrect, just as judgments may be said to be correct or into say that A exists is to say that anyone who judged about correct. To say that something,_!\, is good is to say that it ') lrl' with evidence would accept A, and to say that A does not A ~~I , apodictiis it is, that is impossible to love A incorrectly; exist is to say that anyone who judged about A with evi / ~ .> cally to reject incorrect lovers of A Analogously, to say that dence would reject A The "measure of all things," then, is rect haters of A A is bad is apodictically to ga· the man who judges with evidence. The only way to grasp the concept of correct emotion, However, these statements, relating truth to evidence, emoof cases actual according to Brentano, is to contrast not give us the whole of Brentano's theory of truth . do emotions of cases with correct" as "qualified are tions that "Evident" is said to be predicate in the strict sense of the that are not. This is analogous to the way in which we term, but "true" and "exists" are not, being only synseunderstand, for example, what it is to be red and what it is mantic. This brings us to Brentano's theory of categories. · to be colored. Thus we learn that knowledge is good, joy Theory of categories. The basic theses of Brentano's enrichment every bad), is what in is good (unless it is joy theory of categories may be stated as (I) there is nothing within the realm of ideas is good, love of the ood is ood, IJJI other than concrete particular things, and (2) every judglove of the a is bad and the ri ht end in life is to choose prr I ..1 l __,,,..._...._4 ..-........ _...._.... .•.Jl &.t. ! .._... t...l ...... ---- _____ .i~ :hP f'C lliO.t..!l.nCP n. thP u>iP •tinn of. c;_on1P �The following has been redacted from access file (PDF) due to copyright restrictions. Photocopy of title page and two pages from McAlister L L (ed) (1976) The philosophy of Brentano, Duckwort, 36-37. 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"'~ .,, ·u -- ~ » 7, ✓t:C,//,d , y ... ?..,., 1 7, r •- 'f/,, J'(_) Brentano could hardly have reMaLned LndLscrLMi,nate apptaudLng u~ LlLtarLanLsM (such as of pte.3sures BenthaM's); Lntellectually or "posi,tLve" coMfortabLe E>nJc, Hon wLth of stLl,I, 1,ess coutd /4e ever ctLMb down to a MaterLal,LstLc eMpLrLcLsM whLch reMoved entLreLy the LdeaLLsM of CathoLLcLsM. though a strong eMpLrLcLst pas Lt Lon one. of C~ ~~ i..c eMp_i..: i..c LsM i,s .3n uns t.3b Le one_ Bren t.3no ach i,eved so Me teMporary stabi..LLty by spLrLtual So drLve Ls at work Ln Brentano, whLch Ls ManLfested especLaLLy Ln hLs exLstentLaL reductLon prograM, Lt Ls a heavLLy qualLfLed The the reaLM, where a two God world dLstLnctLon, between theoretLcaL or was the greatest good, and a practLcaL or secular reaLM, where utLLLtarLanLsM prevaLLed. 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M0 t~V7...:.7L1-.L..: . ~< VG~1/~~~ ;//;;_~ ~ ' Jf/C-?.-.Y- o/.J tiof is 1e of e- e S- e is of is 's 's 's s, re d at to re to et of is er of re id n d e in If r. / The correctness of loving and hating, like that of truly, or correctly, then the hypothetical judgment bejudging, is objective in that it' is impossible for anyone to comes: "He apodictically rejects judgers who are both correctly what anyone else hat.es correctly or to love love disjuncThe correct A-acceptors and correct B-rejectors." what anyone else hates incorrectly. incorrectly there or A's are there either that judges "He tive judgment Ethics must make use of the comparative concept bet• are B's" could then become "He apodictically . rejects ~ ;11r\ ter than, for which there is no analogue in the theory of judgers who are both correct A-rejectors and correct B1 . ~ ) knowledge. "A is better than B," according to Brentano, rej:.!ctors." h..1 ,- • means that it is correct to prefer A, as an end, to B. The philosophical consequences of this nonpropositionEvidence and truth. Brentano's views on evidence and ~___,.al theory of judgment are far-reaching. One consequence is · truth may be found in the posthumously published ~ an interpretation of Kant's dictum that "existence" is not a Wahrheit und Evidenz (Oskar Kraus, ed., Leipzig, W30). ( predicate. According to Brentano, when we say that A The distinction between judging on the basis of evidence 'exist: of attribute an exists, "it is not the conjunction of and judging "blindly" is not to be described in terms of ence' with 'A,' but 'A' itself which we affirm." The word instinct, feelings, degree of convictio.n, or impulse to be"exists" is a synsemantic tern1 that is used to express the lieve. We arrive at the general concept of being evident, act of judgment. according to Brentano, in the same way we arrive at the All of the doctrines set forth above fall within the provconcept of a correct emotion: by contemplating actual Unpsychology. ince of what Brentano called descriptive instances of the concept, in this case actual instances of and genetic ng psychology-includi experimental like evident judgments and of blind judgments. physiological psychology-descrip tive psychology, accordEvery evident judgment is either directly or indirectly ing to Brentano, is an exact science, capable of arriving at if a judgment is indirectly evident, tts evidence is evident; laws that hold true universally and not merely . "for the ultimately, by judgments that are directly eviconferred, even is and philosophy all for basis most part." It is the dent. Directly evident judgments are of two kinds. First, capable of providing a characteristica universalis of the there are the judgments of "inner perception," such as the sort that Leibniz had conceived. J)escriptive psychology is that I am now judging in a certain way, that I judgments closely related to what Husser! was to call phenomenolsuch-and-such, that I think I remember so-andsee to seem from Vienna in ogy. Husser! had studied with Brentano so. Second, there are judgments of reason or insights (Ei111884 to 1886, when Brentano used the expression besichten), such as the judgments that two things are more schreibende Phiinomenologie ("descriptive phenomenolthan one thing; that that which is red is, as such, other than ogy") as an alternative name for descriptive psychology. that ·which is green; that there cannot be a triangle with of doctrine Brentano's (Husser! later wrote that without four sides; or that a whole cannot exist if its parts do not intentionality, "phenomenology could not have come into exist. being at all.") Brentano's conception of psychology has led Every judgment that is evident is true, but not every some of his critics to accuse him of what Frege and Husthat is true is evident. Most judgments of "outer judgment does serl called psychologism. However, this accusation (of the external world), Brentano believed, are perception" his and evidence of theory Brentano's account not take into true, but all of them are "blind"; they are not evident. He moral philosophy, both of which he took to be branches of argued, howeve r, that the hypoth esis of a three-dimendescriptive psychology. sional external world , with its familiar details concerning Moral philosophy. Brentano's ethical views are set forth physical bodies, has an "infinitely greater probability" ed., 3d 1889; (Leipzig, Erkenntnis in Ursprung sittlicher than any of its alternative s. Judgments based on memory, Oskar Kraus, ed., 1934), translated by Cecil Hague as The too, are "blind"; but many of them confirm each other, and Origin of Our Knowledge of Right and Wrong (London, they are worthy of our confide nce. 1902), and in Grundlegung und Aujbau der Ethik ("The In WahrheU und Evidenz Brentano characterized truth ed., Mayer-Hillebrand, . Basis and Structure of Ethics," F reference to evidence: "Truth pertains to the judgment by assumpthe upon ethics his based Bern, 1952). Brentano of the person who judges correctly ... hence it pertains tion that the members o( the third class of mental pheto the judgment of one who asserts what the person who nomena, loving and hating, may be said to be correct or judges with evid e nce would as sert" (p. 130). In addition, incorrect, just as judgments may be said to be correct or into say that A exists is to say that anyone who judged about correct. To say that something,_!\, is good is to say that it ') lrl' with evidence would accept A, and to say that A does not A ~~I , apodictiis it is, that is impossible to love A incorrectly; exist is to say that anyone who judged about A with evi / ~ .> cally to reject incorrect lovers of A Analogously, to say that dence would reject A The "measure of all things," then, is rect haters of A A is bad is apodictically to ga· the man who judges with evidence. The only way to grasp the concept of correct emotion, However, these statements, relating truth to evidence, emoof cases actual according to Brentano, is to contrast not give us the whole of Brentano's theory of truth . do emotions of cases with correct" as "qualified are tions that "Evident" is said to be predicate in the strict sense of the that are not. This is analogous to the way in which we term, but "true" and "exists" are not, being only synseunderstand, for example, what it is to be red and what it is mantic. This brings us to Brentano's theory of categories. · to be colored. Thus we learn that knowledge is good, joy Theory of categories. The basic theses of Brentano's enrichment every bad), is what in is good (unless it is joy theory of categories may be stated as (I) there is nothing within the realm of ideas is good, love of the ood is ood, IJJI other than concrete particular things, and (2) every judglove of the a is bad and the ri ht end in life is to choose prr I ..1 l __,,,..._...._4 ..-........ _...._.... .•.Jl &.t. ! .._... t...l ...... ---- _____ .i~ :hP f'C lliO.t..!l.nCP n. thP u>iP •tinn of. c;_on1P The following has been redacted from access file (PDF) due to copyright restrictions. Photocopy of title page and two pages from McAlister L L (ed) (1976) The philosophy of Brentano, Duckwort, 36-37. (2 leaves) .P .f'? t__ ·-1c /'~'i.- -- 1 Z, /-,,v / Ca-e... t it(_,; ; ~ • // ce~ ,-.- fc/YYC. /; ~~ /«., /~ ~- / ~ / d ,of ✓ ~ 1 J {,:, ~ -:: ;}7 ~ - ~ 7?"/ c //p / ,,,--,-- c £.;,7 .,, u;,-< ✓c. ~ "&~ / r /2 ~ ~ / l 7~ t"~~ ,' •• •• ;Jo ;ft<J1 o -;::: 1/4 ~/~ _:; ~.✓- ~ ~2:. __., -, ft ~~; ~ ~ ~ ~ "',,,: :~ / C ~ .-/ ~ ,G;_:__ ~ ~ ~ ?~--..__ ~4/ I ?~/ -~_ _'_~  Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Box 59, Item 682: Notes and cuttings on Franz Brentano Subject The topic of the resource Handwritten and typescript notes. Includes copies of published works by other authors Description An account of the resource Published works redacted from access file (PDF) due to copyright restrictions. Title in collection finding aid: Manilla Folder - Brentano - Better, = Correct Pref. RS: many v. misc ms notes on Brentano (but also other topics: including Broad on Sidgwick). Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org/items/browse?search=Richard+Sylvan&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bjoiner%5D=and&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=&amp;range=&amp;collection=&amp;type=&amp;user=&amp;tags=&amp;public=&amp;featured=&amp;exhibit=&amp;geolocation-mapped=&amp;geolocation-address=&amp;geolocation-latitude=&amp;geolocation-longitude=&amp;geolocation-radius=10&amp;submit_search=Search+for+items">Richard Sylvan</a> Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <span class="MuiTypography-root-125 MuiTypography-body2-126">The University of Queensland's <a data-testid="rek-series" href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/records/search?page=1&amp;pageSize=20&amp;sortBy=score&amp;sortDirection=Desc&amp;searchQueryParams%5Brek_series%5D%5Bvalue%5D=Richard+Sylvan+Papers%2C+UQFL291&amp;searchMode=advanced">Richard Sylvan Papers UQFL291</a></span>, Box 59, Item 682 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org">Antipodean Antinuclearism: (Re)constructing Richard Routley/Sylvan's Nuclear Philosophy</a> Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource This item was identified for digitisation at the request of The University of Queensland's 2020 Fryer Library Fellow, <a href="https://najtaylor.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr. N.A.J. 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TYPES OF ADMISSIBLE AND INADMISSIBLE CANNIBALISM Richard Routley Philosophy Department Research School of Social Sciences Australian National University and Environmental Studies University of Victoria Canada �IN DEFENCE OF CANNIBALISM~ It is a commonplace of mainstream Western thought that cannibalism - the eating of human flesh by humans, and, more generally, the feeding of animals on members of their own species is, at least in the human case, morally outrageous. © Ri chard Routley, 1982 This repugnan cy thesis appears to be a legacy especially (but not only) of Christianity, probably derived from Jewish teaching, which went much further and excluded the eating of pig, for instance, as well as "long pig". Also in this series: It is a thesis reinforced by the substitution of Man for God of the World rainforest destruction - the social factors "Enlightenment" and consequent elevation and separation of humans Semantical foundations for value theory from other creatures. Unravelling the meanings of life substantially undermined, have for the most part been observed to Nihilisms and nihilist logics rest on a tangle of false views and prejudices about the world, its Nuclear power - ethical, social and political dimensions origin, evolution and purposes , and about the creatures that inl~bit Now that all these positions have been it, their separateness, and their order (in an a lleged chain of be in g ) Disappearing species and vanishing rainforests: wrong directions and the philosophical roots of the problem with humans at the apex, it is past time that major moral theses that these positions have sustained are re-examined and reassessed. The irrefutability of anarchism, enlarged Up for re-examination are, in particular, all theses that Roles and limits of paradigms in environmental thought and action depend essentially on the common but mistaken assumption that there is something morally very special or distinctive about simply being a human, that Homo sapiens as a species deserves special treatment. On the contrary, there is no morally relevant distinction between humans and all other creatures. Of course there are various morally relevant distinctions between things, but none concerns the biological species Homo sapiens. What holds rather is an annular 1 model which can be depicted schematically as follows:- �3 instance in removing the idea that the wrongness of such practices 2 as cannibalism is not even open to question 3 . Diagram 1: High in a list of inherited moral assumptions that are ripe ANNULAR PICTURE OF MORAL RINGS IN OBJECT SPACE (and the position of humans). of sapiens for reassessment are those concerning the almost universal ~oral prohibition of and repugnance to cannibalism, a practice that used to be extremely widespread, but that has now been almost e;.tirely extirpated 4 with the very successful cultural conquest of the world by Western thought. But instead of the re-examination that should follow the intellectual erosion of mainstream Western social thought, the growing recognition of its theoretical inadequacy, not to say ~:Notional labels for the interiors of such morally relevant rings (or ellipses), from outer to inner: Objects of value, objects of moral concern Objects having well-being Preference havers, choice makers Rights holders Obligation holders, responsibility bearers Contractual obligation makers poverty, what has followed is the often shoddy defence of many of its leading moral theses, mostly on anthropocentric grounds, but sometimes on other grounds, some of them drawn from contemporary philosophy (e.g. the conventionalistic rejection of cannibalism of Diamond, considered below). Many of the defences preferred of total prohibition of There are also more comprehensive philosophical reasons cannibalism are ludicrously weak, and withstand little examination. for the periodic intellectual review of deeper assumptions (and Consider, to illustrate, the main argument in (what was until very prejudices), reasons furnished by dialectics in combination with recently one of the few books in English on cannibalism) Hogg, the theory of objects. namely 'the innate repugnance of contemporary man to touch human According to the theory of objects there is no assumption that has to be held,that cannot be disbelieved, flesh' (p . 188, also earlier) . while according to dialectics proper every assumption is open to represented as a matter of fact, it does not appear to hold generally, questioning and reconsideration by its methods , and assumptions in and may be largely a matter of background and conditioning. order to be rationally maintained should withstand such critical scrutiny. imply 2 Naturally these (methodological) considerations do not that assumptions under examination do not (frequently) withstand critical discussion, or that there are not (or never could be) good reasons for adhering to them. But the considerations are important in opening larger moral assumptions to due reconsideration, for Insofar as the repugnance is There is no evidence that - what seems unlikely given the former prevalence of cannibalism - it is innate; and insofar as it is a matter of fact it does not support moral prohibition of eating human flesh, any more than the apparently very widespread repugnance of urban Americans �5 4 as observed, it has recently been argued, successfully, that this to eating raw snake underwrites a moral prohibition on consumption of raw snake meat. distinction will not carry very much of the moral weight that has been imposed upon it. 7 On the other hand, if the repugnance in With the breakdown of this sharp moral distinction question is (intended to be) warranted moral repugnance, then the argument is trivially circular, the premiss assuming the point at between humans and other species.orthod ox anthropocentr ic options, which sanction human consumption of animals other than humans but issue. never humans, collapse. One reason why the proferred defences look weak is that it has not been thought necessary to provide any defence; for 'Directly daylight falls on the habit it withers away' 5 - the "daylight" is that of contemporary Western civilization. appears in Langton (initial page): A similar theme cannibalism is 'a custom that of civilization' - or, one might say, before the triumph of human (pure) vegeta!ian options and on the other, cannibal(istic ) options (mixes of these options which allow some human flesh eating will it will be seen that by no means all forms of cannibalism are morally inadmissable. present exercise. Showing as much is the main object of the Though the results arrived at are part of the process of elaborating a non-chauvinis tic ethics, and accordingly have implications for policy, no policy conclusions are drawn in what no recommendatio ns for the implementation , or institution- The vegetarian options face, it certainly seems, insuperable difficulties, especially concerning such issues as animal predation (which is an important, immensely frequent, and often _<!~~rab.!!'_, What will be argued is that, on the contrary, when some daylight does penetrate to the issues concerning cannibalism, follows: (at least as regards "higher" creatures) are, on the one side fall under the latter head). must soon become extinct all over the world before the great march chauvinism. Among the important options left open ecological fact), and concerning the reduction in numbers of animals, especially introduced animals, which build up to "pest proportions" (some reduction is often required for vegetable growing to operate successfully) . But it is unnecessary to elaborate these and connected points here because there are cases where consumption of human flesh is perfectly admissible. The main argument advanced is modelled upon simple inductive arguments: a base case is argued, and this base is expanded step by step to cover other cases. alisation, of cannibalistic practices are made 6. Hardly necessary to say, better defences of the mainstream anti-cannibal istic tradition can be devised or pieced together from the literature than those so far alluded to. for example, on the assumption of sanctity Such defences - based, of all human life, on the theme that cannibalism is a brutalising experience, which puts humans in the same category as the brutes - characteristic ally rely on a sharp distinction between humans and other creatures. But, §1. The Base Cases: Eating the Dead. In setting out the first of these cases it is taken for granted that the practice in some American states and Canadian provinces of allowing accident victims (e.g. those of automobile casualties) to consent to the use of parts of their bodies for organ transplants and also for other medical purposes is admissible, and that the use itself in such cases is �Restricted forms of cannibalism in the interests of 6 survival are now quite widely accepted as admissible. admissible 8. Then, is there any good reason why persons should So there is really nothing extravagant at all in contending that sometimes not similarly consent to the use of their bodies for food upon cannibalism is perfectly alright: their death? fact that the admissible cases lead, naturally and coherently, once For food transfusions, instead of blood or transfuslons · or transplants. plasma And if they do, or so bequeath their bodies, why should their bodies not be eaten? What differences human chauvinism is properly cases. any extravagance is due to the left behind, to much more controversial There are several examples of human cannibalism undertaken there are in the types of cases can be minimized, and those that for survival, which have won establishment approval, from remain seem not to make much - or any relevant - moral difference. or church hierarchies. For example, in order for human parts to be intially taken and used, of members of a Uruguayan rugby party who survived an airplane crash the bodies have to be more or less butchered; in the high Andes (dramatised by Read). but then they may be in much less pretty shape after a serious accident. Again, in each typ e of case, the parts may - or may not - be supplied to people who are in genuine need; etc. Nor does internal ingestion appear to differ, in any way that matters morally, from internal connection, from organ transplantation. It could be objected that with an organ transplant a specific organ is required, whereas with a starving or undernourished person alternative sources of food are - or ought legal A striking recent example is the cannibalism Their eating of dead companions, evidently necessary for survival, was condoned by the Catholic Church of Uruguay and by other prominent Catholic thinkers. Interestingly, Rubio, Auxiliary Bishop of Montevideo, justified such cannibalism, necessary for survival, through a medical transplant comparison 10 .•• Eating someone who has died in order to survive is incorporating their substance, and it is quite possible to compare this with a graft. Flesh survives when assimilated by someone in extreme need, to be - available. But where the parts are used for nonspecific just as it does when an eye or heart of a dead man is grafted onto a living man ••. (as quoted in Read, p. 308). medical testing, e.g. cell culture, or just disposed of (e.g. by But the Bishop tactfully rejected, except 'as a source of inspiration', incineration) without any other use, the specific need consideration the equivalence, appealed to by some members of the team, between does not work. Anyway what would it show? eating the flesh of their friends and participating in communion, as The claim staked is accordingly this:_ where the human initiated by Christ at the Last Supper, where he (figuratively) shared eaten is dead, and certain other conditions are satisfied, cannibalism his flesh and blood with his apostles (Read, p.309; is admissr e. also p. 299). The other conditions~ comprise such things as Exactly why this correlation, which undoubtedly helped the survivors, the following: that the whole thing is done decently (in ways, gets discounted, remains tantalisingly obscure. that is . LO be spelled out specifically); that the person eaten consented (or, differently, would consent) to being eaten, perhaps by the parties concerned, or more strongly that the person directed tha t he or .;he be eaten (or otherwise used); or differently again, tha t the ~onsumption was necessary for survival or well-being. etc. seems worth pursuing further. The correlation For though survival was not a problem �9 Suc h d es pi cable motives as those of the ge t-even s yndrome ("we'll 8 fix the ba s t a rd, we'll eat him") are pointl ess (as well as stup id l y for the apostles at the Last Supper (so destroying a strict correlation), survival is not the only basis justifying the eating of human flesh. As with blood, the gift relation is another v i ndi c tiv e ) wh e re the part y is already dead. It can be argued that eating certain pieces of human flesh out of respect is an exceptional case (like eating a fellow creature to avoid starvation), and that a general principle of respect for important basis. A consent or bequeathal clause 11 is important in under- the dead overrides any consent that may be given. The short cutting various objections to the consumption of dead humans, for answe r to this is, firstly, that grantin g of exceptional cases alr eady in s tance, that it is an affront to human dignity, that it is a mark allows that some cases of cannibalism are admissible, and secondly , of total d isr espec t, that the 'sanctity of the human being' is that no general principle applies in a decisive way to exclude the compl e tely disregarded (Hp. 186), that it is impious (Dp. 467). exampl es alr ea dy considered. Fo r if the person consents it can hardly be an affront to that general principles can always be thwarted, it is instructive to consider per s on's dignity, or violate that person's sanctity (as seen from one po int of view). Nor is it an affront to the dignity of creatures of an irreligious cast, for whom a dead body whether of a human or an animal is a d ead body - though perhaps a dead body of a fellow creature o r of a friend. So it is an affront only to those of particular ( religious) groups, perhaps the same groups for whom dead human bodies are sacred and their disfigurement by humans (whether for medical or 5 other purposes) impious . Just as it is legitimate for one to discount the often illfounded views of such groups - insofar as the views are int ended to have universal applicability - as regards medical use of (forme rly ) consenting humans, as regards sexual relations, abortion, e uthanasia, and so forth, so it is legitimate to discount them in the case at hand. Dev ine ' s argument against cannibalism, namely as a paradigmatic applica tion of his overflow principle. On the contrary, the eating of certain parts of the bodies of dead humans was, amon g certain tribes who used to practice cannibalism, for it was thought that in that way the eaters could acquire or participate in some of the (former) virtues o f the dead , e. g . wisdom, strength, hunting skills, etc. still be, that eating is not disrespectful: So it can what is sometimes dis- respectful is raising for food nnd killing, e.g. in order to ent. The overflow principle~ formed -chiefly to cope with the treatment of animals, is this: Act towaPds that which, while not itself a pePson, is clos ely associated with pePsonhood in a way cohePent with an attitude of Pespect fop pePsons (Vp . 503) . Instead of arguing directly for the principle, Devine suggests firstl y that it may be argued for in rule-cons equ e ntial fashion, secondly tha t it may be made plausible as part of a way of life having respect for persons at its centre, and thirdly that th e prin ciple is well ensconced in the moral consciousness of the plain man. Each of these suggestions can be faulted both in general and as regards the relevant application. For instance, plain men mostly do not object to the bulldozing of old cemeteries to make way for a development. Nor need the eating of a dead human be a mark of disrespect. an act of consider a ble res pect; To illustrate how application of suc h On the other hand, the principle can be rendered analytic by taking up the slack in "associated with" and "coherent with" appropriately - only then it won't yield the relevant substantive application. In application of the principle Devine makes two alternative moves. First, �11 It is by no means obvious, however, that a cons~n 10 is required. similarly if it is going to be incinerated and the ashes s pread, it might better be carefully composted. The point ma de does not exclude organ transplants, eating, and so ecological alternatives to burial or cremation. The most the overflow principle The suggestion that the already dead can, at least in s e ems to show, under this move, is - what does not exclude consumption, certain circumstances, be eaten without moral qualm, innocuous though and what one may well concur with - that the dead (and not merely the human dead) ought to be eaten respectfully; it is, is liable to spark off a series of protests. and even this much some ugly scenes could result i f "long pig" caught on; is not shown if the tense change, the transformation from alive to dead, destroys the requisite closeness of association. outback Australia) competing to pick up "accident" victims. ambulances or tow trucks, are readily enough avoided (by suitable body, which forms the visible aspect of the bulk of persons with whom we are acquainted, and which persists when the person ceases to exist in death. (Vp. 593) organization), and more respectful practices adopted. would, if the objection is to have force - lead to what is normally a~sumcs, overflow to the subsequently dead body (which is no longer inadmissible, for example, to a perverse lust for human flesh, and And again respectful eating be marketable commodities, if there was commerce not just in human flesh. but in bags, shoes, and belts made from human hides, decorations from human bones and teeth, glue and fertilizer from other parts and so on 12 in the way that there is commerce in animal parts? Perhaps, disre sp ec t wo uld be an outcome, but perhaps for the wrong re aso ns. What s ee ms clear is that giving human flesh to the ne edful, s ~y , i s one thing, a llowing commerce in human parts is another. More serious is the objection that such "admissible cannibalism" could - or rather ov e rflow to thl' llvlng body docs not however guarantee, what Devine Wouldn't disrespect be inevitable if human parts become But these types of scenes, which can already occur with competing ... respect for persons overflows to the human to dead bodies. e.g. the the way that refrigerated trucks follow the kangaroo shooters in some heavy assumptions as to features of persons, reveals: could, it appears, be coherent with the alleged overflow of respect It is true that spectacle of the refrigerated vans patrolling the highways (in much Devine assumes it does not, as his second move which begins to buy into the "visible aspect" of a person). so in nci cher case is value diminished, it seems, by (respectful) cannibalism or ordinary garbage (in the literal sense) is not eaten (except in desperation, etc.). A dead body does nee have the value of the person whose body it is in life; Garbage is commonly thrown away, things in these end uses are mostly not; For i f a body is going to be buried and "eat,~" by bacteria, or various carnivores, it might as well be eaten; although a dead body is not a person, still the fact that it (so to speak) was a person means that it ought not to be treated like ordinary garbage (Vp. 503). forth. clause perhaps, thereby to the deliberate killing of humans for food. Hogg makes much of the first of these points, the (unintended) impression he gives being that human flesh is so delicious that it is highly addictive. Whether this is so or not (it would seem unlikely with a preponderance of older stringier humans, though the number of "battery humans" is increasing).it appears not to matter, unless it does lead to what would be more disconcerting, e.g. the establishment of a black market or the like in human flesh, with inputs from killer or Mafia syndicates. But the problem is not substantially different �13 12 of our unwillingness to kill people for food or other purposes, from problems that already arise with the treatment of animals (e.g. traffic in rare species), and over the distribution of dangerous drugs to humans, and can be met in similar ways, i.e. through a similar range of political or organizationa l options. The usual utilitarian defence of vegetarianism based on suffering, pain, and the like caused in raising and killing creatures for food, co llapses. 13 For no direct suff~ring, pain or the like occurs, with the creatures eaten already dead; and any sorts of suffering that might be marshalled among some of the still living who are pained by the consumption can be more than compensated for by th e alleviation of suffering of the meat consumers, for a suitable and secondly not a (direct) consequence of our unwillingness to cause distress to people - not that it always would (contrary to Diamond's assumption) - but rather 'what conditions our attitude to not dining on ourselves is the view that a person is not something The argument turns however on a slide on the mi.ddl.e term 'something to eat' which is ambiguous between (i) something that may be eaten and (ii) something that is eaten; In the second sense the justification given of the fact dead people are not eaten, namely people are not eaten, while in a sense "logically adequate" is trivial, and proves no requisite grounding, and the "justification " does not imply that dead people may not be eaten. In the first sense, a nontrivial justification is offered, that it is impermissible choice of consumers. to eat people,but in this case we cend to repeat the initial question; Some vegetarians however (rightly) reject utilitarian defenses; Diamond, in particular, tries to argue that they involve 'fundamental confusions about the moral relations between people and people and between people and animals ' (Dp. 465), and introduces instead convent ionalist arguments - unfortunately of wide philosophical appea l - against eating people. Some of the reasons for not eating people, she subsequently argues, extend to grounds for not eating animals either. Diamond's argument begins from certain quite central facts ... We do not eat our dead, even when they have died in auto- mobile accidents or been struck by lightning • .. (Dp. 467) An immediate objection is that this is little more than a local fact, Why is it? Diamond has a surprising answer: in effect that it is analytic on, or at least a consequence of, our notion of what a person or human being is. ••• it is not respect for our interests which is involved in our not eating each other . These are all things which go to determine what sort of concept 'human being' is it is one of those things which go to build our notion of human beings (Opp. 469-70). But such a thing as not eating other people is certainly not part of the concept 'human being', indeed it is not merely ~ot analytic or normic (near-analytic ) of human beings,it is not even true of them - good for certain ' we ' but by no means generally, as the history of given that, on well-authentic ated evidence, cannibalism was formerly canniba lism shows. widespread, and that it still persists in isolated place s today. It is equally a fact in the context of quite extensive groups, that .EE~L2o not eat l'i~.· So either the central fact has to be morally grounded or has to have moral consequences. The second option would involve a prescriptive fallacy (deduction of an ought from an is); followin g fashion:- in any case, Diamond tries the first, in the The fact is, firstly, not a (direct) consequence The answer is, in short, radically unsatisfactory . That this is �15 Tt may s eem ... I should find myself havin g t o jus tify slav e ry. For do we not learn - if 14 we liv e in a slav e soci e ty - what slaves ar e the answer Diamond is offering is however at once confirmed by how she goes on (writing in speciesist assumptions 15 in the same revolting fashion): and what masters are through the structure of a life in which we are here and do this, and they are there and do that? Do we not learn the difference between a master and a slave that way? (Dp. 470) Diamond does not manage to escape these difficulties, though sh e And so too - very much so - [built into the notion] the idea of the difference between human beings and animals. We learn what a human being is in - among other things sitting at a table where WE eat THEM. We 16 are around the table and they are on it (Dp. 470) . While we may learn something about what some human beings - not makes various attempts (p. 470 and especially pp. 476-7): the notion of a slave or an enemy or an outlaw assumes a background of response to persons, and recognition that what happens in these cases is that we have something which ;;;;-;;,::-e not treating as what it - in a way - is ( Dp. 476). vegetarians - are like in this way, in the way we can learn what But this is to assume a background of norms, of how things morally some other human beings are like from cannibal feasts where 11 we" are, that a person is not something to enslave, etc. (and to attempt are on the table as well as around it, we learn little of the once more to build a presupposed morality into conv entional facts). notion of human being in this way. Nor does what correct information Furthermore, as this reveals, the same ploy could be worked in the we acquire in this way provide a firm basis for moral judgements case of animals, namely that in hunting them, killing them, serving about the possibility of eating humans, though Diamond appears to them up for dinner, we are ~ treating them as what - in a way think that it does; for she later says that the source of moral they are (or, more accurately, as they mora lly deserve treating). life derives from ways in which we mark what human life is (Dp. 418), Such comparisons make it evident then what Diamond is about, and that another move which involves a prescriptive fallacy, as well as he r conventionalistic approach fails. obvious anthropoce ntri cit y . However, to remove objections to eating the already dead, Indeed many of the sorts of conventional patterns of response under specified conditions, is simply to avoid, rather than face up a nd conventional facts that Diamond alludes to are a fairly direct to, the real opposition to even qualified cannibalism. For an o utcome of human chauvinism, e.g. that drivers mostly stop for important part of the real opposition to qualified canniba lism relies injured humans, not for injured animals, that humans are commonly upon illicit assimilation of cases of eating already dead people given funerals, animals mostly not. Diamond needs to say, and with killing humans for food, and, differently again, rearing some proceeds to say, that these sorts of differences are appropriate, but that is to slide to a value judgement which concedes to he rself part of what is at issue. Diamond's approach encounters serious difficulties when applied to such matters as slavery, the treatment of outlaws and enemies of them, e.g. certain infants, for food . and in an obvious sense ! .!1.~~~., Thus Devine's ambiguous, �17 what is entire l y different, permitting the killin g of humans for 16 food, or to, what is different again, the deliberate raisin g of human s for food. claim that 'a meat diet requires that animals be killed' (Vp. 483). And thus Diamond again, the cases are entirely different. involved both rearing and slaughtering Swift's "proposal" of children for food. Nor is the base position so far reached a new one, but an ancient proposition. it i s one thin g morally to eat an already dead deer, another to let a deer die and then eat it, another again to shoo t What we should be going against in adopting Swift 's "Modest proposal" is something one should be going against in salvaging the dead, more generally useful organs for transplantation, and the rest for supper or the compost heap. (Dp. 469) 17 Not a t all: animals: The differences are already clea r as rega rds For instance, Chrysippus, the Stoic, in his or otherwise kill it and then (perhaps) eat it, and yet another to eat a deer raised (in one or another of very different ways) for food. Within each of these different categories, it is important to distinguish cases. For while eating a dead human, even after it has been allowed to die (by omission), may be admissible, killing humans for food is often not, and raising a human for food (and other goods) is, it is now generally assumed by humans, certainly not. treatise On Justice, 'permitt ed eating of the corpses of the dead• 18 There are several separate issues here, in particular the So also apparently did Diogenes in his Republic, Zeno in his Republic, ~~ban~ or raising for food issue, on which much literature on and Cleanthes, all of whom may have authorised cannibalism on a the moral basis of vegetarianism has in fact focussed, and the broader scale. general l?I~'!_ati~ issue, which includes matters of killing and letting die. Limited extensions of cannibalism beyond the base cases, where humans are allowed to die or are killed . eat ing of (certain of) their parts . Eating dead humans involves But if eating such parts is (often) The issues are separate because creatures may be killed for food, e.g . in hunting, though they are not raised for food, and conversely creatures may be raised for food (or treated as slaves) without, for one reason or another, being killed. Cases of humans admiss ibl e , then so also presumably is consumption of such parts when raising humans for food have apparently never occurred, though humans they are (irrevocably or freely) severed from a living human, e.g. have sometimes been fed up for the pot (e.g. in the Aztec empire and in Fiji). ea ting the amputated limb of a friend or enemy or drinking the blood Humans are the only creatures we in fact know who might (having l ost consider- donated by another, able touch with the natural world) just adopt such a practice: These rather special cases, involving (what is no other ca lled, for s h o r t ) ~ human parts, provide a first set of extensions animals ever raise creatures for food, not did cannibalistic cu ltures of the base cases. ever apparently raise humans for food. These extensions include some bizarre cases, in particular where the part concerned is one's own. However, allowing the eating of dead humans and nonlive hum~ n parts under certai n conditions offers no slippery slide to, It is a serious and difficult question (to which moral philosophers have not sufficiently addressed themselves) why it is that if humans are not under !!.!!i'. conditions entitled to raise other humans for food, they are entitled under many �19 18 th e gene ral i ss ue as to wh e n, or wh e n prec i se l y , killin g f o r food i s jus tifiable can be largely skirt ed. For it is justifiable , it is conditions - indeed, it is often assumed, under a sweeping ra~ th e n claimed, whe n and only when killing itself i s justified, whe ne ve r of factory conditions - to raise other animals for food? that is. They can only be justified in so doing if there are significant and While one half of the italicised equivalence is uncontrover s ial - relevant differences between humans and other creatures raised, if killing for food (or for purpose P) is permissible, so is what it or that might be raised, for human or animal food. involves, killing - the converse is not. Yet there are, For consider some circum- it has already been pointed out, no such appropriate species-wide stances (assuming you can find them) where killing of person x is differences. justifie d, e.g. in war, in retribution, in self-defence, in r e ducin g g reat A fresh start can be made on the issue from a cannibalistic perspective. evil. Since it is not eating human f l e s h ~ that is Th e n killing x for these reasons is not killing for food, even if x is in fact subsequently eaten. There is an important intensional wrong, what is it that is wrong, if anything, with raising humans difference, so that being justified in killing x for some crime say , or other creatures for food? does not justify killing him for food, much as thinking of killing him or is it both? both. Is it the raising, or is it the killing, The answer is, of course, that trouble lies with for the one reason is very different from thinking of killing him for Raising of creatures frequently has one or both of two dama ging features accompanying it: first, the other purpose. deprivation of the What can be argued given the permissibility of- eating dead rai s ed creatures, and secondly, treatment of the raised animal humans, is that where killing of z is permissible, cannibalism of z merely as a means (not as an end). is also IN FACT permissible. The second, attitudinal, difference may have little or no impact beyond the first. For example, if infanticide i s alri ght under certain conditions (as Tooley contends, and others have hinted), And the first may be avoided, e.g. whe re the creatures stay by choice but then in fact cannibalism of infants is alright also under the given could depart if they wished. conditions (but the issues as regards the raising of infants for fo od Kept geese, for instance, may be in that position; they are seemingly not deprived, but may live in rather are, of course, not thereby resolved). natural conditions (except that migration and much that goes with it is permissible can, to this limited extent, be bypassed. II has been lost). Thus the issue of when killing It is worth elaborating these points, since important Killing involves something different again: extensions - not the only extensions - of cannibalism beyond the base all that goes with removing of a life, the termination of projects, purposes, cases depend upon them, and since - very differently - they furnish associations of value, etc. (and also the definitive end of con- clear cases of inadmissible cannibalism. sciousness, etc.). of situations to distinguish:- With the predation issue also, a central issue ls as to when killing an animal for food is permissible. It may be thought indeed that the killing for food issue just is, or is t a ntamount to, the general issue of killing, and that accordingly • There are several clas se s �21 survive themselves, the survivors of an aircrash in a remote area, 20 people on a life raft, etc. Such examples, where defensible, as they sometimes are, provide a further class of examples of admissible la. Killing , causing to die, is impermissible. cannibalism - what might be called exceptional cannibalism, since the lb. Letting die (passive killing, as it is sometimes misleadingly , but conveniently , called) is circumstances are, at present anyway, among higher mammals, rather impermissible . exceptional . Then, in either case , killing or letting die for eating or followed by An important and often times questionable practice, which eating is also impermissible, by preceding principles (essentially can in principle at any rate, deliver exceptional examples 20 , is ~Pp ➔ ~P (p & q)), hunting (in the intransitive form, which involves capture or killing So in particular it is where the creature is of the same species. That is, cannibalism is in these cases inadmissible . But some of these cases are clear; for instance, where creature (or if the object sought is duly located). Men continue to hunt in the French fields, and sometimes still their own species 21 , not at present human) x is leading a worthwhile nonaggressive independent and pro- in the shape of enemy soldiers , but those cast as outlaws (manhunts) . ductive life in a peaceful countryside. (Intransitive) Hunting divides into several types, according to its 2a. Killing is permissible. 2b. Letting die is permissible. end purpose, for sport , for food, for extermination, for capture. Hunting humans for sport (hunting for "sport " , so called, typically In common reckoning there are many examples of both second classes, involves killing) is a practice that has persisted well into this "passive" infanticide, suicide and gambling with life, euthanasia, century, in Australia for example . killing or allowing to die to maximise community values where there though it can be given philosophical support by chauvinistic theories are large numbers of people or choices between them, execution and such as a limited and racially prejudiced group-utilitarianism or by assassination, self-defence , killing in war (the list follows roughly appeal to the "ideal" of pure subspecies (the stud ideal). t he later chapter headings in Glover, where these well-known types such hunting is impermissible, so, for the same sorts of reasons, is of examp les are set out in some detail). the hunting of many animals for sport . In all these types of cases, It has nothing to recommend it, But if Hunting otherwise, except for death can be followed by eating, provided the base class conditions capture, is a restricted form of killing, and to what extent it is are satisfied . permissible turns on when that sort of killing is permissible . In such cases, henceforth called de facto extensions, cannibalism is also in fact admissible . The position arrived at thus far is pulled together in rhe Almost always the killing or letting die in 2a and 2b is not spec ifically for eating. conjoined: Eating the resulting dead is simply th e source of food is adventitious. Sometimes, however, in unusual circumstances some members of a party of the one species kill certain members of the party or allow them to die in order to fo ll owing diagram, which subsequent sections (and parts) endeavol1r to fil l out and render more precise:- �23 §3. 22 Unavoidable detours: when is killing a creature wrong, and when is letting a creature die wrong? It is not necessary, nor is it easy or desirable, to avoid entirely the issues of when killing Diagram 2: TYPES OF ADMISSIBLE AND INADMISSIBLE CANNIBALISM is wrong and when killing for food is wrong, and when such kinds of l( ,- killing are not wrong . Type 1 cases (exemplified e.g. in hunting for sport) - - -- ___ _] Base case I ,< conditions fail I X other than rather weak or circular principles. had seemed to be clear turn out on further reflection to be much l ess ,< obvious. \ ESSENTIAL / ,-...__ _ _ _ _ _'-! \ PREDATION..,, For example, it had seemed evident that the onus of jus tification (where this makes sense) characteristically lay with the WATERSHED J(. XCEPTIONAL EXTENSIONS Worse, things chat INADMISSIBLE ADMISSIBLE BASE CASES But it is not so easy to elicit or to defend action-taking party; \t 'I,( that it is the killing or removal of life that muse be justified, not the letting live. Some things, however, are clearer . 'J{ NONLIVE EXTENSIONS First and foremost, a satisfacto ry (nonchauvinistic) a c count K -J KILLING BOUNDARY of when and why killing a creature is wrong won't make exceptions for REARING FOR SLAUGHTER BOUNDARY humans and, more generally, won't contain the term 'human' or logical So far, in considering examples of killing, issue has not equivalents. This important requirement disposes of much of the been taken with enlightened conventional wisdom, with the result chat philosophical literature. a serious , and perhaps unwarranted, discrepancy between the treatment (9p. 135-9), which refer to the (contractual) conditions for human dished out to animals and that accorded humans is beginning to emerge. social life (the mixed account given should be faulted on several other So the judgements made tend to follow conventional practice: grounds as well). killing It wipes out, for example, Ewin's attempts Similarly it removes the main condition eventually humans for food is admitted but happens only in exceptional circumstances, achieved in Glover (a whole text devoted to moral issues concerning killing killing, which fails to present, or seriously address, the matter of animals for food is a pervasive practice. More generally, killing animals for food is considered permissible in a wide range of circumstances where killing humans is not , yet on what solid grounds? . As regards killing, even enlightened conventional moral wisdom returns us to the heartlands of human chauvinism. necessary and sufficient conditions for when killing is wrong) . The first main condition Glover arrives at is that ' taking human life is normally directly wrong: that most acts of killing people would be J/ To avoid it, the matter of wrong in the absence of harmful side-effects' (Gp . 42), i.e . so long killing and letting die will have (like most moral issues) to be as 'the best total outcome' does not involve killing (cf. p . 286), to reconsidered, nonchauvinistically. set down the underlying utilitarian recipe . Other conditions Glover outlines - similarly unacceptable even to their author when 'animal' replaces 'human' - are likewise faulted as damagingly cha,·vinistic, �25 24 for instance that it is wrong to kill a human whose life is worth l iv i ng (Gp . 53) , whenever that is. e . g. burning a collection of seeds (er seedlings) is one thing, burning Secondly , unremarkably, most of the recipes suggested in the a forest is another, slicing up or eating a raw egg is one thing, slicing literature are defective, first among them utili t arian proposals , which, as is well-known can sanction unjust killing. 22 up or eating an eagle is another, etc. Other (non- utilitarian) potential ys me rit the same consideration as ys, as if th ey we r e ys. recipes are also problematic, as a proposal by Young, wh i ch will he l p Call the r.esult of making the required deletio n, th e us on our way, serves to indicate: modified proposal . . . . what makes killing another person [more genera lly a considered . realisation either of the victim's life purposes or of such life- purposes as the victim may reasonably have been narrower utilitarian frameworks and induces a decided circularity, The proposa l requires some brief explanation. The term ' unjust ' , which takes the proposal outside is qualified in the final proposal (p.519) by 'maximally' , the point expected to resume or to come to have (Yp.518; repeated p.519 with 'maximally ' included). of which (though it is not fully explained) is to permit killing or The qualifying term sacrificing of one person in order to save others . 'irrevocable' is inserted to separate killing from life imprisonment I It is the modified proposal that will be chiefly creature] wrong on occasions is its characte r as an irrevocable, [maximally] unjust preventing of their I It is a popular fallacy that which may, as a matter of fact , defeat the prisoner ' s purposes . The long some members of a group (on a lifeboat or from a remote airplane crash) final disjunction is designed to delegitimize killing of sometime comatose are sacrificed for, or by, others of the group . persons (it also would include people undergoing reform programs) - -,hat is ac counled [maximally] unjust. an additional clause is required - and killing of potential future in way, and almost (but not) captial punishment. debatable judgements , such as that in the common case (on Young ' s ified' (p . 528) , ified. 23 from which it follows that abortion is commonly unjust- The disjunct should, it certainly seems, be deleted - especially since what justifies the main part of Young ' s proposal, considerations of what has value, does not justify the final disjunct, because merely potential persons do not appear to have requisite value, though they might (or might not) come to have such. Generally, potential ys do not have the same range of features (including acquired value, etc.) ll Similarly what one is entitled t o do , or feels like doing with r espect to them may differ; If , however, there are no just wars then most killing in war is wrong; and if punishment by death is sometimes just , capital punishment is sometimes not wr.ong. If, for instance, a person's life purposes are sufficiently evil~ e.g. they include genocide, then their fulfilment is certainly pro1, ~ rJ y , justly, thwarted. 0 1· Thus some proviso as to the chara c t e r or qua lit y of life purposes , such as the term 'unjustly ' obliquely supplies , is essential (but often omitted in ethical discussions) . It is not evident however that killing such a person (as distinct, e.g. from imprisonment , re-education, etc.) is permissible, exc ept perhaps in worst cases. ~ • what they become if their potential is realised . For example, Young claims (Ypp.520-1) that the proposal lets through various types of killing persons such as infants and foetl1ses - thereby writing in some very has only 'morally trivial or no moral support abortion will be unjust- But generally what the proposal permits and what it excludes depends critically upon cases already apparently covered, so that it is not obvious that such construal of 'moral') where the expressed wish of the pregnant woman The qualification makes way for certain cases of cannibalism, for instance those where �I 26 Ther e is no good r eason to restrict the proposal to persons , and Young does not intend to. 27 Many killings of animals constitute , he t ells us (Yp.526), maximally unjust prevention of their realisation of life purposes, and accordingl y are wrong. ' Killing such animals for food is only justifiable when no adequate of other crea tures). acts are avoided. food supply is available and food i s needful' (Yp . 526), in which event, presumably, justice prevails. A characteris tic remnant of Further it is simply assumed - though it could no doubt be argued (rather as below) - that requisite unjust Young's proposal as applied has bite; human chauvinism also intrudes , with Young a ppealing to the ' greater eschewing killing of creatures for food. 25 range of life-purpose s normally human beings have' (Yp.527, italics that the modified proposal has bite: amended) ; 24 and thereby smuggling in a greater value assumptio n as regards humans. Here, as elsewl1ere also , the account of when killin g is wrong is progressive ly l oaded , almost manipulated , to yield the sought r esults : in particular , what is unjust - including which killings are unjust and which class of life-purpos es are more valuable relevant to det e rmining maximal injustice - are bot h open to rigging. These points help to bring out too how back of Young's accoun t and application s of his proposal lie more basic consideratio ns of justice and value (and it is to such considera tions that we should no doubt eventually turn). Consider, for instance, the route to the permissibil ity of systematic cullings of a herd. Wants , now substituting for li fe -purpose s , are simply supposed to be summed up utilitarian- fashion, except th at (somewhat as with Mill ' s utilitariani sm) a weighting is imposed to reflect the respective values of different wants (those of humans, e . g ., as opposed to those It is an illusion however the bite all turns on Young's cunning application , since the modified proposal itself reduces to near tautologous ness. purposes occur? taken. For when does irrevocable prevention of a life's When, and only when (since it is irrevocable) that life is So the modified proposal reduces effectively to AP. Killing x is wrong iff taking x's life is maximally unjust. But killing x is, according to OED, causing the death of x, which is tantamount, in terms of sense, to taking the life of x. And what is wrong is, according to OED again, what is unjust, and would be, if the OED were sharpened 1,1p a little, what is maximally unjust. Whence the adjusted proposal, AP. The proposal does not rule out killings which have the effect overall of fostering th e wants of the largest subset of some group like a wild herd where otherwise the wants of an even larger subset will be thwarted. Systematic cullings in the absence of feasible alternative s, therefore, may be morally pe rmissible. (Yp.527) for example, it would oblige most of us to adopt a largely vegetarian life-style We have come round a circle, but much was glimpsed on the way, so the circuitous route was not without its rewards. By working through other l ess chauvinistic accounts of the wrongness of killing (e.g. the nonchauvin istic base of Ewin's account) we can come a similar circular way and arrive at the same fairly stable result. Moveover, in the adjusted proposal we do have an account, not yet a hi ghly usable account, since circular, but an account nonetheless . In terms of this account clear cases where cannibalism is morally inadmissable can be distinguishe d, for example as follows: Cannibalism of x is wrong wherever it involves maximally unjust taking of x's life. Conversely, there are many cases where �28 the killing of one creature by another creature is, because not maximally unjust, quite permissible; 29 e.g. certain instances of killing in self-defenc e, exceptional cannibalism , abortion, etc . But if the creature is killed, then it is dead, so by the earli er Now let x and y be of the same species, say Homo Sapiens: argument it is permissible to eat it (under certain conditions) . CAP provides exact conditions for when cannibalism is wrong, in So there are many cases where killing a creature and then eating it, cases where cannibalism involves killing. or its then being eaten, are permissible . conditions are satisfied; If some of the many cases of permissible killing are, as they seem to be, cases of killing a then Sometimes these often they are not. Sorting out when they are, and when they are not, will occupy many a controversi al creature of the same species, then active cannibalism involving killing is, in such cases, permissible . The argument needs of course filling out in crucial respects, especially by some enumeration of types of cases where killing is permissible , and a sub-listing of cases where these are intra-specie s killings. Would this suffice? However, it of the) distinction between killing and letting die, by blurring or rejecting the distinction on which it is based~ that betweem omission and One question is whether the account determines (even in its circular way) the precise conditions under which killing for food can permissibly occur. Letting die is not the same as (active) killing . has recently become fashionable to try to remove the (moral significance The question reduces commission (or else it is pretended that it is frightfully difficl1lt to make this distinction s out, etc.). Rejection of the omission/ commission distinction appears to rest on a mix of fallacious moves:- to the logical issue of whether AP as a strong logical equivalence FMl. A some to all argument, warrants intersubsti tutivity in more highly intensional frames such FM2. A confusion of the thesis that the distinction is morally as those declaring purposes. Though I've tended to vacillate on this issue, my feeling increasingly is that substitutiv ity is warranted, important with the quite different thesis that only commi.ssions can be morally blameworthy and that omissions are morally guiltless (the the reason being that the equivalence of AP is of virtually synonymity position reportedly held by some religious groups in the past). strength, which legitimates replacement in all but quotational (type) FM3. An extensional approach to nonextensio nal differences . sentence contexts. But purpose sentence contexts, such as' ... for eating' are not quotational . FAP. Hence it follows using AP that Killing x for food purposes is wrong iff taking x's life for food is maximally unjust, heavily upon the fact that there are some cases where it is morally difficult to distinguish between certain commissions and certain and that CAP. These points are considered briefly in turn:- ad FMl. Those attempting to discredit the distinction usually rely y's killing x for (and followed by) eating is wrong iff y's taking x's life for eating is maximally unjust. omissions, e.g. that in appropriate circumstanc es exposing the baby may be little different morally from directly smothering it. (The Greeks believed it wasn't but that was because exposure gave the gods a chance to intervene and save from death those who were fated to perform especially important tasks). �r JO But the fact that there a r c ~ cases where the JI distinctio n is not of great moral significan ce does not show that it is dispensabl e. In order to show that lt is dispensabl e it is extension ality assumption which removes scope. The principle necessa ry to show that there are no cases where it is needed, that appears to be that failing to provide a condition which would have for all cases failing to provide a condition which would prevent been causally responsibl e for preventing x is morally equivalent to ~x is (morally) equivalent to providing a condition for x. providing a condition which is causally responsibl e for x . But Moral it is easy to produce some cases where the distinctio n seems to be equivalenc e requires interchang eability witin deonitic contexts, essential if we are to account for what we wish intuitivel y to say. indeed it could be characteri sed in terms of such substituti bility . For example, to take a case those who wish to abolish the distinctio n The equivalenc e yielded is of the form -F-x are fnnd nf appealing to, we may wish to say that the people who did commonly falls, especially where Fis not extensiona l. not attempt to help in the Kitty Genovese case were morally culpable, moveover that the causal responsib ility functor is not extension al, perhaps to a high degree, but few of us would wish to say that their and that such a principle fails for it. moral culpabilit y was exactly the same or of exactly the same kind as that of the murderer, and that they should equally be brought to trial on murder ch~rges. Or, to take another case, placing poison in your husband ' s tea is not the moral equivalent of failing to give him the antidote when he has placed it in himself. In order to say +-> Fx. But such a principle It is clear Though letting die differs significan tly, then, from killing, conditions upon when it is wrong may be reached in similar ways. How the condition for letting die correspond ing to AP should go becomes rather more obvious if the righthand side of AP is expanded to: taking (the) action which terminates x's life is maximally unjust. what is evident in such cases, some equivalent of the omission/c ommission The parallel passive condition can th en presumably be formulated distinctio n is needed . thus:- ad FM2. But the thesis that the distinctio n is needed and is morally DP. significan t in many, or at l e a s t ~ , cases must be clearly dis- which continues x ' s life is maximally unjust. 26 tinguished from the very much stronger thesis that all omissions are blameless, and that any commission s are morally open ~o blame - or praisewort hy. This thesis is, rather plainly, indefensib le, yet has been responsibl e for much of the bad light in which appeal to distinctio n appears . ad FMJ. Then in turn, substituti on principles again yield clauses EDP and CDP, correspond ing to EAP and CAP, special cases of which yield conditions under which cannibalism is wrong where it involves letting die. Principle CDP which supplies this condition, where x and y are of the same species, runs as follows:- The principle of moral symmetry between omissions and commission s is in fact refutable. Letting x die is wrong iff refraining from taking (the) action It appears to be based on an CDP. y ' s letting x die for eating purposes is wrong iff y's refraining from taking (the) action which continues x's life, for purposes of eating x, is maximally unjust. Since letting die is, for the most �32 part, less heinous than killing, cannibalism involving letting die 33 i s more widely permissible than cannibalism involving killing . 27 §4 . The matter of predation, and important cases of l egit imat e killing and letting die for food. One tempting model that underlies the conflict picture of Paradigmatic examples of legitimate predation, of predation as basically undesirable but an unavoidable killing are provided by predation, where bis prey of a and a depen ds fact, a model that leads to human vegetarianism, is the following (essentially) for its livelihood, indeed for its survival, on eating kind of atomistic axiological theory (or utilitarianism):- bs.28 Such predat ion i s a n essential part of any su ffici e ntl y rich ecosystem . Essential pr eda tio n i s pre dation which is essent i a l to according to the initial positive value thesis, every living creature (every sentient creature , every higher animal , etc .) has an initial positive the nor,~11 livelihood of tl1e predat or , and where the prcd alor takes non-instrumental value which it retains unless it does something to for itself no more than it requires for it s livelihood. forf eit that value. carn.ivores , such as the big cats , but some humans, such traditional Eskimos, are essential predators. Not only ilS some (On the even simpler position of biospheric egalitarianism, discussed below, all living things have equal worth, The fact that humans ar e part of the natural predatory food chains should not be lost s i g ht o[ . Observe that the argument to permissibility of essential pre- in some nontrivial sense.) These positive values just sum ; and maximisation of value (or suitably averaged value) is, of course , the (or an) ethical objective . Then killing is generally undesirable , dation does ~ take the invalid form: such predation is a fact (a fact because it results in a reduction in net value, and survival is generally of life), therefore it is permissible. That arguments of this type , desirable. 29 The exceptions occur when a creature has forfeited its selectively relied upon by Diamond and (earlier) Hegel, are inval id is value, e . g . it per sists in value-reducing behaviour, so that killing well-enough known (they commit a prescriptive fallacy), and is evident it would prevent a further decline in net value or lead to increase in from such fallacious arguments as the diplomacists' argument, e.g. it is total value . a fact of life that Indonesia has occupied (absorbed) East Timar; when it leads to an overall reduction in value . the re- The underlying theme is that killing is unjustifiable The onus of proof, fore it is pe rfectly alright that Indonesia occupied (absorbed) East Timar. when it can be assigned, lies with those who make the exceptions, who Naturally it would be decidedly awkward if the fact of essential predation do or license the killing . turned out to be impermissible: since, with one item of value consuming another item of value, it trouble. the whole natural order would be in moral This brings us to another defect of the argument from· "facts", Predation now appears as an awkward fact , leads to an overall reduction in value. Since inessential preda tion that it suggests that essential predation is really, at base, something is inessential, it is ruled out as inadmissible. pretty undesirable, but nonetheless something we have to live with - in (nonindigenous) humans for whom predation is, it is plausibl~ argu ed , Thus in particular, contrast with predation, in its associated meaning, as plunder, which we iness en tial, are not entitled to kill for f ood : do n't, or rather oughtn 't to, have to live with morally, and which is usual rai si ng of animals for food, etc . are all excluded in one st r oke , commonly reprehensible. and a l eading feature of vegetarianism imposed . therewith hunting, �34 35 Essential predation is not so satisfactorily dispos ed o f, but introduces conflict. For either one creature, the prey, is sacrificed or another creature, the predator, is: value de c lines . Similar objections apply against biological egalitarianism, either way tot 8 1 In the interim, while vegetarian scientists work even when it is qualified as in Drengson and Naess by an in principle 30 on new diets and new lifestyles for predators, there is an obvious clause. recipe to be applied, which while not eliminating conflict, minimises that predation is rather suboptimal: its effe c t: is strictly ruled out as a general practice. just as steam gives way to sail, so the less valuable gives way to t h e ~ valuable. Thus if humans are reckoned to be It is not (or not only) that it is taken for granted the trouble is that predation Since each lion and each antelope is assigned one unit of whatever is assigned equally, mo re valuable than polar bears - the usual human evaluation - then there is no way of justifying the lifestyle of a lion that consumes polar bea rs are not going to be entitled to prey on humans, in the sens e several antelopes. at least that their predation is not justified. Any equalitarian approach that is E££ atomistic is liable Application of the recip e 31 presupposes a value ranking on creatures under which some are more valuabl e to further incoherence, as Drengson's holism reveals. than others: some living system of living things, e.g . the Earth as on the Gaia otherwise if all are equal, predation is never admissible, and Lets be essential predators just die out - at least that is the simple ethical pic t - hypothesis (p. 233). ure. least of the living things that comprise it, has the same value as This points up one of the many problems for biological egaltarianism. But the picture presented so far is too simple, and tl1e recipes suggested dubious. Then s, which should(?) have the value at each of them (in effect 1 = n, for n>l). Some of t~e ecological consequences of implementing the For if the matter is properly considered not at a given time, but over a time interval, dynamically and not suggested recipes, and reform of essential predators, can now be just statically, it is not so simple, and a rather different result gauged. emerges . the chains of predation are long and complex; One predator takes, over a typical lifetime, rather a lot of prey . Unless the predator ranks very much more highly than Massive environmental interference would be required, since distortions especially in lower-level prey would occur, with resulting the prey, the value of the sum of the prey will exceed that of the ecological instability and often catastrophe. predator. that is, are ecologically highly undesirable. These considerations, in combination with a positive and gross population The consequences, What this and the value thesis, suggest a very different result, that predators should summation problems begin to reveal is that the initial atomistic be allowed to, or encouraged to, die out - unless they are somehow, value distribution picture is inadequate because it leaves out systems what seems improbable for predators that remain wild, converted to and systemic connections such as a more ecological approach would vegetarianism, include, The dynamic picture resorted to is still too simple in one important respect, that over a time interval, prey, which would often exceed natural (and sometimes reasonable) population levels without predation, are replaced. Where population of a preyed-upon species of creature is at an ecological limit, and minor culling of the sort �36 natural predation induces does not, owing to replacement, reduce 37 population levels significantly below that limit, predation has no significant effect on total value, So results yet another, different, recipe, one which is a little nearer the ecologica l mark. 32 farm animals (all of them) can be appropriately filled out, to Some utilitarians, Singer in particular, have recognised exclude replacement of animals with unusual or special properties, the role of replacement a·,1d made some allowance for it (at a serious cost to Singer ' s vegetarianism , it should be added), e.g. those carrying valuable genes, and to allow slaughter, without Singer now allows for killing and replacement of nonselfconscious life, but advances a nonreplaceabllity thesis for self-conscious life. Furthermore, even if a replacement thesis for free-range shorter-term replacement, of those carrying damaging diseases or genes - as it no doubt can, in a modified replacement thesis - still For the basic division Singer appeals to 'Tooley 's distinction' between a nonreplacement thesis fails to allow even for essential predation of selfconscious creatures, and accordingly should be scrapped, beings that are merely conscious and ••• those that Since this pronouncement is likely to be disputed, at least are also self -conscious, in the sense of being able to conceive of themselves as distinct entities, existing by some vegetarians, it is worth trying to indicate why essential over time with a past and a future (Sp.151), At the same time it can be In fact most of the sorts of free-range farmyard animals that Singer predation is perfectly admissible, seems to be envisaging as nonselfconscious, and accordingly replaceable, explained what is still wrong with the tempting dynamic picture and creatures, for instance geese and hens, appear to satisfy Tooley's the initial positive value thesis. tests for selfconsciousness. what is put in as what is left out, Geese are certainly aware of themselves they value members of their own community ; trees, and inanimate such as rocks and buildings,~ have initial and they remember value, but that complexes and wholes, in particular ecosystems, may elements of their past and, in things like nest building (practice), anticipate the future. More important, what has selfconsciousness (reflex- ive consciousness), or consciousness to do with the moral dimension? Until well have initial value, The reduction assumptions underlying value decomposition thereof, itself, because by no means all consciousness of conscious life is _ 32 a to atoms fail , Singer's theses lack foundation and look, while perhaps convenient for that it cannot be duly explained; There are grounds for anticipating for instance, being too valuable to be Such wholes may have value furthermore which is not dissolvable into values of component parts, or atoms this is duly explained - it is not satisfactorily explained as valuable in some traditional farmers, rather ad hoe, What is left out is not just that objects other than living creatures, both animate such as plants and as distinct entities, and of geese as distinct from (and superior to) hens; What is wrong is not So much In terms of the value of wholes such as ecosystems, one of the arguments for essential predation is disarmingly elementary . It takes the form: (sufficiently) rich (natural) ecosystems are Predation is an essential part of these systems . simply replaced, in the sense of having irreplaceable experiences, worth- very valuable, while projects, etc., does not have the requisite linkage with self- What is an essential part of what is very valuable is admissible. consc iousness. Therefore, predation is admissible. Such predation, which may be argued for in other ways , admits of extension by the following principle : �38 EP. If something is entitled to kill for food under certain 39 conditions, e.g. respectfully and when in need, then so are others under the same conditions. §5. The argument for EP is of the same type as that for other Postscript . The paper is very incomplete . It fails to address several issues intimately connected with cannibalism, such as hunting similar indifference, or interchangeability, principles in ethics. of humans and other animals, in particular for food, and as raising It follows from EP and essential predation that, since a tiger may humans and other animals, especially defective infants, for food. when in need kill a cow to eat, then so may humans in need. If Worse, it is evasive on some fundamental issues, and it fails to penetrate very taking the cow's life is not maximally unjust in the one case, nor deeply into some of the issues it does begin to consider, such as is it in the other, since the circumstances are similar. predation, or as the necessary and/or sufficient conditions for admiss- The results reached may be alternatively argued for using principle CP. 33 Perhaps Singer is also on the right track, though he has latched onto the wrong distinction. Perhaps there is a (descriptive) condition q (or a condition qs for each sorts of agent), appropriately ible killing. position. It is little consolation that others are in the same Hopefully some of these deficiencies will be compensated for in subsequent parts. At the same time several themes will be developed that may tied with causing to die, such that while killing creatures without q not have been evident so far, e.g. that in under suitable conditions is permissible, killing creatures with q is far too much killing taken much too lightly, but far too little is not, except under special conditions . 34 general experience of killing and death when it does occur, that is Given that q is 11 modern 11 societies there appropriately morally connected such a procedure would fit into the except usually among small groups mostly of inured professionals, annular picture (given earlier: q would mark out the interior of the which "shield" most humans from the phenomena involved. dotted elipse). Nor need the distinction be chauvinistic, because it cuts across species in a morally defensible way. anything, is q? located? made good? But, what, if Can a suitable morally-unloaded category-based distinction And how disconcerting would it be if some such distinction could no Wait for the next exciting episode . 35 �' 40 FOOTNOTES 41 It was singularly appropriate that this paper should have otained its first (and only) public presentation at the Alfred E. Packer Memorial Center, University of Colorado. I am indepted to several members of the audience for comments and references, and in particular for the first extension of the base case . It is noticeable how people who have never been cannibals despise the horrible thing; and how quickly it disappears when a cannibal tribe comes into contact with a wider world than that Directly merely of their own bush village. daylight falls on the habit, it Withers away . This is remarkable when we remember the sanctity The cannibal of it in primitive man's eyes . is not necessarily a hopelessly degraded brute, but-;-man who has not yet lived out of the dark obscurity of bush tribalism, and so had bli~dly_ followed a practice deep-rooted in the sacrificial These themes are defended, and the annular model explained, in The themes are also defended in HC, p. 103ff., and in AHC. other recent work, e.g. by Tooley and Singer. As the schematic diagram shows, humans do not occupy a central ring. Thus adoption of the model does not imply, what Pickering assumes (p. 374), that 'humans are more~ntral ' or, for that matter, that 'humans are owed more extensive moral consideration Nothing in the model itself depends on humans . than plants'. The model is not species based, or biologically based, but category basect";-and designed to reflect the different sorts of things there are, e . g. things capable of entering into contracts conferring obligations, and things not so capable, things that can have preferences and make choices as opposed to things that cannot (truly, or significantly), things, including systems and Nor, therefore, organisations, with a telos and things without. does the model write in a new type of chauvinism, or confer privilege or moral advantage on things in more central rings. Indeed, things in central rings will have obligations and commitments, and be subject to limitations on what they do, in ways that things further out cannot be; so there will be some As this moral disadvantages in occupying a more central place. indicates, the categories selected are intended to have moral And different sorts of behaviour are morally linkages . appropriate with respect to the different categories of objects. 2. 3. 4. The popular view that dialectics and adoption fraction of assumption themes are dangerous is partly based on a modal fallacy, For the fallacy e.g. that what can be believed is believed . in operation in more intellectually respectable quarters see WW. the Epilogue of Harris Some dialectics are accordingly recommended for anyone convinced that cannibalism must be wrong. The investigations undertaken in this paper alwshare other features with (classic) dialectics: there are many loose ends, and in several crucial areas firm conclusions are not reached. Later parts of the paper will take care of some of these things. Thus Hogg (p. 188), Cannibalism . .. can hardly be said to exist in There may be isolated the world of today. pockets of survival in the heart of New Guinea and among some of the tribes in the remotest corner of South America or African jungles; but they will be no more than the rarest of phenomena. 5. Hopkins, given the last word by Hogg, p. 192. quote from Hopkins is of passing interest: The whole ideas common to man the world over from his earliest days. 6. Some of the advantages of institutionalisation of certain cannibalistic practices are evident, e.g. a_much enh~nced Various disadvantages if not evident should supply of protein. become so in the course of the text. 7. See again in HC and similar. Although the human/nonhuman distinction is not, so it is argued, one of moral significance, not all Other distinctions of moral importance distinctions vanish. - those of the annular model - naturally remain. 8. Of coures, this practice is (still) controversial, and But a offensive to various religious and other groups. great advantage of a pluralistic society is t~at it can acconnnodate (better than alternatives) such differences Issues such as human_ . over the morality of practices . burial and restricted cannibalism, however, make the limits of present pluralism evident . 9. Or else did not incur official establishment disapproval, though the acts strictly appeared to infringe the Every s~~ond_ra~onteur has prevailing law of the land. examples of cannibals not brought to Justice . 10. . This clearly anticipates an initial argument of this My thanks to W. Berryman for drawing my attention paper. to the attitude of the Catholic Church, as presented in Read. 11. Consent in principle will carry the requisited load, and for this it is normally enough that the person would consent. This indicates one logical route to the liberalisation, and removal, of the consent clause. 12. There would (so far) be no trophies, e.g. Z's head ~n the hall, Y's skull on a stand, because trophies involve hunting and killing (for which see below). 13. As some vegetarians would freely admit; other 11 vegetar i ans II f rther and regard the killing of certain (nonself) an1•mals for food as admissible provided no suffering u, go i conscious is incurred and that the animals are replaced. . But it s true that usually 'vegeta;ians do not touch the issue of our attitudes to the dead (D., p.9) . �42 14. 15. In a like vein it is suggested that Singer and Regan do not see that 'a cow is not something to eat; (for them) it is only that one must not help the process along' (D., p. 468). The latter incidentally would not exclude the use of dead creatures for food, leather goods, etc.; things that animal liberationists like Singer definitely exclude. 43 21. Diamond recognizes this objection, p. 471, but does not meet Pace K. Bell, according to whom, Men have always hunted in the fields around Potigny and Falaise . They still do, but no longer their it. own species. 16. 17. 18. In similar ways we are said to gain the concept of an animal; s~~ p. 476. -Diamond introduces this piece of serious confusion in the course of emphasizing why the 'assumption that we all agree that it is morally wrong to raise people for meat ... is not, or not merely, ... too weak' (D.• p . 469). Diogenes Laertius, vol. 11, p. 297. Some of the complex issues concerning hunting will be considered in subsequent parts, others elsewhere. 22. See, e.g., Henson, and also Ewin and RKU . 23. A notable piece of male chauvinism also slides through, in the suggestion that, in Lhe absence of more weighty moral backing, the expressed wish of a pregnant woman is morally trivial. And Sayre reports (p. 25), Cannibalism (uv0pwno~ayCa) is alleged to have been a practice of the Cynics by Philodemus and by Theophilus Antiochenus; but, if so, it must have been confined to their early history, for they had a number of critics during the Christian era who would have mentioned it if they had known of it. Both Philodemus and Theophilus were biassed and we must remember that similar stories were told of the early Christians. However, cannibalism is said to have been authorized by the Republic and Thyestes (or Atreus) attributed to Diogenes and also by the Republic of Zeno and by Cleanthes and Chrysippus (Philodemus, On the Stoics; Theophilus Antiochenus, Ad. Autolycum 3, 5; D.L. 6, 73; Ibid. 7, 188; cf. 28th Letter of Diogenes; Dio Chrysostom 8, 14). As Diogenes Laertius goes on to explain, that 'Chrysippus did countenance the eating of dead humans was one of the points brought against him by those who 'ran him down as having written much in a tone that was gross and indecent'. As regards such attitudes to the dead, times have not changed that much. The (idea of) eating "the dead" (dead humans, of course), under ~ circumstances, is still widely regarded as scandalous, and highly newsworthy (see Read, p . 296 ff). 19. Cannibalism which involves explicit killing for food is a kind of reflexive predation, but generally (cases of) cannibalism and predation only properly overlap. 20. An example would be where some of the survivors of a crash or wreck hunt other "survivors" in order to survive; cf. W. Golding, Lord of the Flies. 24. But one's life-purposes are diminished lhow can this be on Young's picture?) if they jeopDrdise those of others. Hence Young's preparedness to let Amin be killed by the stampeding horses, Yp. 527. 25 . Indeed it leads, as Young interprets it, to a more sensible vegetarianism than Singer's initial position (in Animal Liberation, not as significantly modified in Sp.153). neither culling nor predation are simply ruled out. 26. For Action and taking action should be construed in a wide, but common enough fashion, e.g. the action taken may amount to doing nothing or getting-the-hell-out-of-it. 27. It is tempting to try to prove this on the basis of a proper inclusion assumption, that where letting die is wrong so is killing, but not conversely. The assumption may, however, need qualification; e . g. killing may sometimes be preferable to letting died in a lingering way . 28. 'Predation" is a singularly unfortunate word to be stuck with to describe this universal phenomenon. It is unfortunate both because of its etymology, and because of its other meaning . At to the first, ' predation' derives from praedari, 'to plunder', which derives in turn from praedo, 'booty', As to the second, 'predation' also means a 'practice or addiction to plunder or robbery'. Both carry strong negative connotations. There is a similar damaging duality in the expressions 'prey' and 'prey upon'. 29. These defective considerations also lead to a maximisati~n of population of creatures of the base class assigned values, up to the limit - if any (on frontier philosophers there are none) where declining returns set in . Where, further, humans are typically, but erroneously, assigned greater value than other creatures, the considerations support the rapid biassing of terrestial fauna! population in favour of humans that we are witnessing. The second point does not apply, in that form, . against biol0gical egalitarianism, and the first objection fails where total value is replaced, as under some utilitarianisms (with what justification is less clear, since surely we want to maximise value so far as constraints permit: see RKU), by average value, average value per (base class) life lived, etc. �44 The argument in the text is not affected materially by switching from value analogues of total utilitarianism to analogues of some form of average utilitarianism. On some of the serious problems with these utilitarianisms, see Jamieson. 30. Drengson, following Naess and others, espouses 'biospheric egalitarianism and the intrinsic value of all life' (p. 222). According to the theory, each (living) being has intrinsic value (pp.233-4), and hence each presumably has equal worth (and is entitled, in Singer's terms, to equal consideration , if not equal treatment). In Naess and Drengson this biospheric egalitarianism is qualified by an in principle clause. According to Naess, 'The 'in principle' clause is inserted because any realistic praxis necessitates some killing, exploitation and suppression' (p.95), and according to Drengson, 'This qualification is made with the simple recognition that we cannot live without affecting the world to some degree' (the latter claim is inadequate, because it is not just 'we' who are involved). 31. Axiological approaches that are atomistic have other problems, some reminiscent of those Wittgenstein discusses for logical atomism. In particular, how do we locate the atoms to which value is supposed to adhere fundamentally. A first bad feature of this approach is invariance failure: it matters for final summations how the atoms are chosen, for different choices will assign complexes quite different values. Secondly (Wittgenstein's question), why are some things said to be atoms not complexes, and vice versa. A third group of problems, brought out in HC, concerns the choice of a base class. 32. An environmental ethic s:1oul.:l. also be an ccologic:1 I et!dc, sense of an ecologically realistic ethic. facts are certainly relevant. 32a. A detailed case for this claim 33. j:1 t lH· In this resepct too the appears in Routley and Griffin. Thus rp can be made to yield a good deal more than Young's application of his proposal (for which he offers no proper justification): A creature is entitled to kill another creature of lesser value when its life (and so all its functions, prospects, etc.) depends on it and when it does not kill more creatures than it needs for these purposes. And the dubious business of imposing such order rankings on creatures can be bypassed. 34. The qualifications are necessary. If the latter exceptional conditions clause were not adjoined, the prospe ct of finding a condition q would be wiped out by such cases of essential predation as exceptional human cannibalism. The qualifications, although they enhance the prospects of locating such a q, do not appear to make it analytic or near analytic that such a descriptive q can be found. 45 35. Not only are there many proposals for q to sift through - most of which however seem to fail for reasons already indicated in the text - but also there are apparent options to finding such a distinction, such as resetting the problem, in a less individualistic way, in the framework of (ecological) communities. �REFERENCES K. Bell, Not in Vain, University of Toronto Press, 1973, REFERENCES CONTINUED P.E, Devine, 'The moral basis of vegetarianism ', Philosophy 53 (1978) · 481-505 . (all references prefixed with 'V' are to this article) , C. Diamond, ' Eating meat and eating people', Philosophy (references hereto are prefixed by 'D'). 53 (1978) 465-77, Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers (edited, with English translation, by R. D. Hicks), Heinemann , London, 1925, A.R . Drengson, ' Shifting paradigms: from the Technocratic to the PersonPlanetary', Environmental Ethics 2 (1980) 221-40, R. E. Ewin, ' What is wrong with killing people? ' Philosophical Quarterly tl..<. (197;t) 126-39. M, Harris, Cows, Pigs, Wars and Witches, Fontana, London , 1977 (hereafter prefixed by 'W.W.'). M, Harris, Cannibals and Kings , Collins , London, 1978 (hereafter prefixed by ' CK '), R. Henson, ' Utilitarianism and the wrongness of killing', Philosophical Review 80 (1971) :1.u,- n7. D. Jamieson,'Utilitarianis m and the value of life', typescript, University of Colorado, 1981. J, Glover, Causing Death and Saving Lives, Penguin, Middlesex, England, 1977 . L.P. Pickering, Review of ' Ethics and Problems of the 21st Century ', Environmental£.£,.~-~ 2 (1980) 373-78 . G. Hogg , Cannibalism and Human Sacrifice, Robert Hale, London, 1958. (references hereto are prefixed by 'H'), R. and V. Routley, 'Against the inevitability of human chauvinism ' in Ethics and Problems of the 21st Century, eds , K, E. Goodpaster and K. M. Sayre, University of Notre Dame Press, 1979, (Hereafter prefixed by ' AHC') . J. Langton, Cannibal Feast, Herbert Joseph, London, 1937. L, Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations, Blackwell, Oxford, 1953. A. Naess, 'Self-realisation in a mixed community of humans ·, bears, sheep and wolves', Inquiry 22 (1971) 231-41 , A. Naess, ' The shallow and the deep . long-range ecology movement. Inquiry A s11mmr1ry'~ 16 (1':173) 95-100. P.P, Read, Alive, Avon, New York, 1974. R. and V. Routley, 'An expensive repair kit for utilitarianism', typescript 1976 (hereafter referred to as ' RKU ' ). R. and V, Routley, ' Human chauvinism and environmental ethics' in Environmental Philos~ (ed. D. Mannison, M. McRobbie and R. Routley), RSSS , Australian National University , 1980 (the article is referred to as ' HC' , the book as ' EP ' ), F. Sayre, Diogenes of Sinope , A study of Greek Cynicism, Johns Hopkins University , Baltimore, 1938. P. Singer, 'Killing humans and killing animals', Inquiry 22 (1979) 146- 56, (references hereto are prefixed by ' S '). R. Tannahill, Flesh and Blood. A History of the Cannibal Complex , Hamilton , London, 1975 . Hamish M. Tooley , Abortion and Infanticide, typescript, Australian National University, 1980, R. Young, ' What is so wrong with killing people?' Philosophy 5¥ (1979) (all references prefixed with ' Y' are to this article) , 515-528 R. Routley and N. Griffin, 'Unravelling the meanings of life', available in this series , 1982. �) /.o,..,.,,,, l. ~ / , . ~ tA-- ~ <'"'1 ---- 3/ }o/t/v/~}~4--( ~~ ·~~O·\o ~ --..., \0~'203.l\. <;c..c.tt.,. ~ ~ a.I) . ~~ ~✓:. ,;,,tf �~ .r. ..... ---,(7> o-,.J /' ,,,((; 11 / c, ~ I ( _ ///,;.,/ /c/ (',.,./// 1' ,. ~ L: 1 -=y' 1/ ,/L ~ -=~ t<..,(' •.r<-- <-r-? ,r"'t, 7 ; /4... 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(1 leaf) �- / / / . -7 / <et ? -·- -·-- C:; /~ ~, u / f l ~ Jc,._ '? ~ (,, ?0_/~ c c:i--l 7 ,5'<.. / 17 -~ ,..-tt'!' . : . - - - ---- ·-- - · · - - - - - - - - - - - - - -- ~oc-. r-c- a., r..,_,/- t .)I~ , ) / ~ ?! / . / c..rc.v ~~ //._ J �OAJ 77/c /~/?t:J/f??pvc~ c:>~ 77rr" , I /}(,ifth('i/l'J7lt>p)( ;T//VC/73 ,v - cJ,,,C ~E ./,PH/6:-J ,,f/t;I~ I �The following have been redacted from access file (PDF) due to copyright restrictions. • • Typescript, with handwritten emendations and annotation. Two reference reports on Cannibalism I. (2 leaves) Cutting (photocopy) of 'Necessity as a common law doctrine? [6.40] R v Dudley and Systems', The system of criminal law: cases and materials, 544-551. (4 leaves) ��The following have been redacted from access file (PDF) due to copyright restrictions. • • • Cutting (photocopy) of 20 pages from unidentified publication on Pioneers-Donner Party-The Mormons, 526-545. (10 leaves) Letter, Bill to Richard, 7 Oct 1981 re feedback on Richard Sylvan's paper on cannibalism. (2 leaves) Letter, Robert to Richard, 7 Oct 1981 re feedback on Richard Sylvan’s paper on cannibalism. (2 leaves) �I I - I :/.,, f. - - - -- ----------------- - - - - - ----- ---- ----- ___________, --------- ----------·------------- - - ----- - - -- - - -- - - - - - - - -- ------ - - - - - - - - --- $ ~ /~ .2Z- - - - --- - _ _L __ /4 r<./ ...---a~ l 2, ck?- _.:., t';_.~ ~ o_ _s_ ,,. .,/:,_ ~ , {- ~ M7-e;:__ /4?-l, _:., /.: ~ / ; ~ / /--/ ,a-~~ ,4d - - ~ c 1 /dLC4'--=·- - C4--~ _,t:?~7 ,-4,-,/4._ / - /2.; ~<"F' �§5 . Raising humans and other animals for food. Humans have lit tle compuncti on, for the most part, in rearing other animals for food . Since healthy animals that are raised for food often excell humans, especially humans that are "defective " in one way or another , little , except considera tions of species , seems to stand in the way of raising such humans for food . We are in the region of Swift ' s modest proposal again . What distinguis hes creatures humans (and other creatures capable of animal husbandry) are entitled to raise for food from creatures that they are not? It is not difficult to state some constrain ts on t he solution of this problem, which also rule out usual solutions . First , the distinctio n should be independe nt of reference to particula r species , especially of reference to the human species , and also indirect reference thereto, by way of phrases such as ' standard ... ' , ' normal ... . ' 'potential ... ' . Secondly - and this furnishes the ground of the first requireme nt the basis of the distinctio n should be morally relevant i n the way that mere zoologica l distinctio ns are not: otherwise chauvinism is not avoided . ' The replaceme nt principle Singer adopts for benign farmyard husbandry fails on this score , among others (the others being that many farmyard animals seem to satisfy the requireme nts for being selfconsci ous beings) . Not being selfconsc ious , which is supposed to justify replaceme nt, under ideal farming condition s , lacks requisite moral linkage . Singer ' s move does however emphasi ze �' 31. two important things . First , the familiar objections to animal husbandry, e.g. on grounds of cruelty or deprivation to animals, are remove.e\ by considering only (ideal) free-range individualised farmyard husbandry . Secondly, some distinction (fit to take its place in the annular picture) with requisite moral linkage is what is sought . Any distinction that is going to work will have to involve the capacities of the creatures concerned , in such a way that the capacities tie with moral features . The capacities concerned are, obviously, capacities connected with being aware of being raised for food . But this is not sufficiently general, being raised for killing or for cartage or for skin or fur or feathers would be similar, and similarly bad or whatever; lacks moral connection . and it still What all the cases have in common which is general, one which has (as already noted) moral connections , is being used as a means . The sought distinction is accordingly made in terms of creatures that are capable of being aware of their case primarily as means for other, for their food , etc. U-creatures, say, as opposed to A-creatures . 21 no means all, are A-creatures: infants are not . Many humans, but Why this distinction? 21 There are probably other requir e ments as we ll: e . g. that not in midst of present worthwhile projects; e.g. Mrs. Goose is not raising young, etc. �The following have been redacted from access file (PDF) due to copyright restrictions. • • • • • Photocopy of Young R (1979) 'What is so wrong with killing people?', Philosophy, 54(21):515-528, https://doi.org/10.1017/S0031819100063531. (8 leaves) Cutting, Ewin R (1972) 'What is so wrong with killing people?', The Philosophical Quarterly, 22(87): 126-139, https://doi.org/10.2307/2217540. (14 leaves) Typescript (carbon copy) of untitled paper attached to Ewin cutting. (18 leaves) Photocopy of Singer P (1979) 'Killing humans and killing animals', Inquiry, 22:1-4, 145156, https://doi.org/10.1080/00201747908601869. (6 leaves) Photocopy of one page (157) from Lockwood M (1979) 'Singer on killing and the preference for Life', Inquiry, 22:1-4, 157-170, https://doi.org/10.1080/00201747908601870. 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' To -J~ > /~&:, -6-,e> ~ ~ ~7f 7~ ~ /~~ ~,,,_7 ,;,_~ 4/ ~/ C ~~ o/· //4- ~ / ~ /~ 7~ �~ ?¼_ 11 ~ M,- '--+-€- /~1) / ~ ,~ --/?~/ 4:- ..,,.,,,, ,,./" &-"'7/<" c, /4 Ye-/ U.:.... ~ ;/ / 7'~L. . ~ ~,, i 7,2 ~ ~ .,/4 /< ; e-.,, ' ~ ;,I'£ .Y CJ/-?!' , ,_, ·/,,.r.,.-........-,. , ,,__ s « ~ ?< 0~ /~L,, ,4_._ / Cb- i,_,.__1 c-.r r~ /2 re:_ ~ h'L 7 '---71J r-"-"- 3-.. d..-. ~~:; d:....-../ ~ ~_/~ �The following have been redacted from access file (PDF) due to copyright restrictions. • • • • • • Photocopy of Diamond C (1978). 'Eating meat and eating people', Philosophy, 53(206): 465-479, http://www.jstor.org/stable/3749876. (8 leaves) Photocopy from The Encyclopedia Americana (1978) 'Cannibalism', The Encyclopedia Americana, 2: 543-544. (2 leaves) Photocopy from Britannica Encyclopedia (1969) 'Cannibalism', Britannica Encyclopedia, 4: 785. (1 leaf) Photocopy from Chambers's Encyclopaedia (1966) 'Cannibalism', Chambers's Encyclopaedia, 3: 50. (1 leaf) Photocopy of Naess A (1979) 'Self‐realization in mixed communities of humans, bears, Sheep, and Wolves', Inquiry, 22:1-4, 231-241, https://doi.org/10.1080/00201747908601874. (6 leaves). Photocopy of one page (2273) from unidentified dictionary, Pre-collection to Predecree. (1 leaf) �r)I':, t; 1 ·-et I r o-f 6 ?\/ih'i I Jet ~t·.?t'cc If33 •• 11t1;,.,_4,, ;; w ; ~ ) ~,,c._! / //,,,,.---: J:~w ~ J/4 ~"~t New- f'-w1r- > ~:/~4-;-, L 1/75 /I ~-~erY �/, • ,I J �Lcz ~ ' d cc c e::es ,f c::::e.. ~ �.. . -1~ ~~ ;/w,;.,L;:;,',,,._ ,;/ a,~}:z;:__ dL-0~ " 7 1 f,t} 0 ~ ~ A. ~~ - 7'~ - . ' -f ~i,t;i,:___ ~✓~ ~~ . - - /z;j/M?!, ,<4 n/41"? r - / ·~ ·7 - Jo - ~ C:~~ - ~..,;t,J;j,,. - ... c.-C~1/~ - 7"1(~ /'<d~ ..£.... ,;:_~ 74::,,,'~ /k,,. ~~ ~ -4- . ~/17 '_ ~ �1IIE !1i l/lL/7? . ··• .,. Men have always hunted in the fields around They still do, but no • longer their own species. (K. Bell, Not in Vain, University of ~oronto Press, 1973) .,, Petigny and Falaise . � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Draft Papers Description An account of the resource Sylvan's literary executor encountered an archive in which “all his projects were current", since manuscripts were undated and unattributed. Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Text Any textual data included in the document - • 00681 ' ' {; /) f¼i:<:LL I f ~sif0l J IN DEFENCE OF CANNIBALISM I. TYPES OF ADMISSIBLE AND INADMISSIBLE CANNIBALISM Richard Routley Philosophy Department Research School of Social Sciences Australian National University and Environmental Studies University of Victoria Canada IN DEFENCE OF CANNIBALISM~ It is a commonplace of mainstream Western thought that cannibalism - the eating of human flesh by humans, and, more generally, the feeding of animals on members of their own species is, at least in the human case, morally outrageous. © Ri chard Routley, 1982 This repugnan cy thesis appears to be a legacy especially (but not only) of Christianity, probably derived from Jewish teaching, which went much further and excluded the eating of pig, for instance, as well as "long pig". Also in this series: It is a thesis reinforced by the substitution of Man for God of the World rainforest destruction - the social factors "Enlightenment" and consequent elevation and separation of humans Semantical foundations for value theory from other creatures. Unravelling the meanings of life substantially undermined, have for the most part been observed to Nihilisms and nihilist logics rest on a tangle of false views and prejudices about the world, its Nuclear power - ethical, social and political dimensions origin, evolution and purposes , and about the creatures that inl~bit Now that all these positions have been it, their separateness, and their order (in an a lleged chain of be in g ) Disappearing species and vanishing rainforests: wrong directions and the philosophical roots of the problem with humans at the apex, it is past time that major moral theses that these positions have sustained are re-examined and reassessed. The irrefutability of anarchism, enlarged Up for re-examination are, in particular, all theses that Roles and limits of paradigms in environmental thought and action depend essentially on the common but mistaken assumption that there is something morally very special or distinctive about simply being a human, that Homo sapiens as a species deserves special treatment. On the contrary, there is no morally relevant distinction between humans and all other creatures. Of course there are various morally relevant distinctions between things, but none concerns the biological species Homo sapiens. What holds rather is an annular 1 model which can be depicted schematically as follows:- 3 instance in removing the idea that the wrongness of such practices 2 as cannibalism is not even open to question 3 . Diagram 1: High in a list of inherited moral assumptions that are ripe ANNULAR PICTURE OF MORAL RINGS IN OBJECT SPACE (and the position of humans). of sapiens for reassessment are those concerning the almost universal ~oral prohibition of and repugnance to cannibalism, a practice that used to be extremely widespread, but that has now been almost e;.tirely extirpated 4 with the very successful cultural conquest of the world by Western thought. But instead of the re-examination that should follow the intellectual erosion of mainstream Western social thought, the growing recognition of its theoretical inadequacy, not to say ~:Notional labels for the interiors of such morally relevant rings (or ellipses), from outer to inner: Objects of value, objects of moral concern Objects having well-being Preference havers, choice makers Rights holders Obligation holders, responsibility bearers Contractual obligation makers poverty, what has followed is the often shoddy defence of many of its leading moral theses, mostly on anthropocentric grounds, but sometimes on other grounds, some of them drawn from contemporary philosophy (e.g. the conventionalistic rejection of cannibalism of Diamond, considered below). Many of the defences preferred of total prohibition of There are also more comprehensive philosophical reasons cannibalism are ludicrously weak, and withstand little examination. for the periodic intellectual review of deeper assumptions (and Consider, to illustrate, the main argument in (what was until very prejudices), reasons furnished by dialectics in combination with recently one of the few books in English on cannibalism) Hogg, the theory of objects. namely 'the innate repugnance of contemporary man to touch human According to the theory of objects there is no assumption that has to be held,that cannot be disbelieved, flesh' (p . 188, also earlier) . while according to dialectics proper every assumption is open to represented as a matter of fact, it does not appear to hold generally, questioning and reconsideration by its methods , and assumptions in and may be largely a matter of background and conditioning. order to be rationally maintained should withstand such critical scrutiny. imply 2 Naturally these (methodological) considerations do not that assumptions under examination do not (frequently) withstand critical discussion, or that there are not (or never could be) good reasons for adhering to them. But the considerations are important in opening larger moral assumptions to due reconsideration, for Insofar as the repugnance is There is no evidence that - what seems unlikely given the former prevalence of cannibalism - it is innate; and insofar as it is a matter of fact it does not support moral prohibition of eating human flesh, any more than the apparently very widespread repugnance of urban Americans 5 4 as observed, it has recently been argued, successfully, that this to eating raw snake underwrites a moral prohibition on consumption of raw snake meat. distinction will not carry very much of the moral weight that has been imposed upon it. 7 On the other hand, if the repugnance in With the breakdown of this sharp moral distinction question is (intended to be) warranted moral repugnance, then the argument is trivially circular, the premiss assuming the point at between humans and other species.orthod ox anthropocentr ic options, which sanction human consumption of animals other than humans but issue. never humans, collapse. One reason why the proferred defences look weak is that it has not been thought necessary to provide any defence; for 'Directly daylight falls on the habit it withers away' 5 - the "daylight" is that of contemporary Western civilization. appears in Langton (initial page): A similar theme cannibalism is 'a custom that of civilization' - or, one might say, before the triumph of human (pure) vegeta!ian options and on the other, cannibal(istic ) options (mixes of these options which allow some human flesh eating will it will be seen that by no means all forms of cannibalism are morally inadmissable. present exercise. Showing as much is the main object of the Though the results arrived at are part of the process of elaborating a non-chauvinis tic ethics, and accordingly have implications for policy, no policy conclusions are drawn in what no recommendatio ns for the implementation , or institution- The vegetarian options face, it certainly seems, insuperable difficulties, especially concerning such issues as animal predation (which is an important, immensely frequent, and often _<!~~rab.!!'_, What will be argued is that, on the contrary, when some daylight does penetrate to the issues concerning cannibalism, follows: (at least as regards "higher" creatures) are, on the one side fall under the latter head). must soon become extinct all over the world before the great march chauvinism. Among the important options left open ecological fact), and concerning the reduction in numbers of animals, especially introduced animals, which build up to "pest proportions" (some reduction is often required for vegetable growing to operate successfully) . But it is unnecessary to elaborate these and connected points here because there are cases where consumption of human flesh is perfectly admissible. The main argument advanced is modelled upon simple inductive arguments: a base case is argued, and this base is expanded step by step to cover other cases. alisation, of cannibalistic practices are made 6. Hardly necessary to say, better defences of the mainstream anti-cannibal istic tradition can be devised or pieced together from the literature than those so far alluded to. for example, on the assumption of sanctity Such defences - based, of all human life, on the theme that cannibalism is a brutalising experience, which puts humans in the same category as the brutes - characteristic ally rely on a sharp distinction between humans and other creatures. But, §1. The Base Cases: Eating the Dead. In setting out the first of these cases it is taken for granted that the practice in some American states and Canadian provinces of allowing accident victims (e.g. those of automobile casualties) to consent to the use of parts of their bodies for organ transplants and also for other medical purposes is admissible, and that the use itself in such cases is Restricted forms of cannibalism in the interests of 6 survival are now quite widely accepted as admissible. admissible 8. Then, is there any good reason why persons should So there is really nothing extravagant at all in contending that sometimes not similarly consent to the use of their bodies for food upon cannibalism is perfectly alright: their death? fact that the admissible cases lead, naturally and coherently, once For food transfusions, instead of blood or transfuslons · or transplants. plasma And if they do, or so bequeath their bodies, why should their bodies not be eaten? What differences human chauvinism is properly cases. any extravagance is due to the left behind, to much more controversial There are several examples of human cannibalism undertaken there are in the types of cases can be minimized, and those that for survival, which have won establishment approval, from remain seem not to make much - or any relevant - moral difference. or church hierarchies. For example, in order for human parts to be intially taken and used, of members of a Uruguayan rugby party who survived an airplane crash the bodies have to be more or less butchered; in the high Andes (dramatised by Read). but then they may be in much less pretty shape after a serious accident. Again, in each typ e of case, the parts may - or may not - be supplied to people who are in genuine need; etc. Nor does internal ingestion appear to differ, in any way that matters morally, from internal connection, from organ transplantation. It could be objected that with an organ transplant a specific organ is required, whereas with a starving or undernourished person alternative sources of food are - or ought legal A striking recent example is the cannibalism Their eating of dead companions, evidently necessary for survival, was condoned by the Catholic Church of Uruguay and by other prominent Catholic thinkers. Interestingly, Rubio, Auxiliary Bishop of Montevideo, justified such cannibalism, necessary for survival, through a medical transplant comparison 10 .•• Eating someone who has died in order to survive is incorporating their substance, and it is quite possible to compare this with a graft. Flesh survives when assimilated by someone in extreme need, to be - available. But where the parts are used for nonspecific just as it does when an eye or heart of a dead man is grafted onto a living man ••. (as quoted in Read, p. 308). medical testing, e.g. cell culture, or just disposed of (e.g. by But the Bishop tactfully rejected, except 'as a source of inspiration', incineration) without any other use, the specific need consideration the equivalence, appealed to by some members of the team, between does not work. Anyway what would it show? eating the flesh of their friends and participating in communion, as The claim staked is accordingly this:_ where the human initiated by Christ at the Last Supper, where he (figuratively) shared eaten is dead, and certain other conditions are satisfied, cannibalism his flesh and blood with his apostles (Read, p.309; is admissr e. also p. 299). The other conditions~ comprise such things as Exactly why this correlation, which undoubtedly helped the survivors, the following: that the whole thing is done decently (in ways, gets discounted, remains tantalisingly obscure. that is . LO be spelled out specifically); that the person eaten consented (or, differently, would consent) to being eaten, perhaps by the parties concerned, or more strongly that the person directed tha t he or .;he be eaten (or otherwise used); or differently again, tha t the ~onsumption was necessary for survival or well-being. etc. seems worth pursuing further. The correlation For though survival was not a problem 9 Suc h d es pi cable motives as those of the ge t-even s yndrome ("we'll 8 fix the ba s t a rd, we'll eat him") are pointl ess (as well as stup id l y for the apostles at the Last Supper (so destroying a strict correlation), survival is not the only basis justifying the eating of human flesh. As with blood, the gift relation is another v i ndi c tiv e ) wh e re the part y is already dead. It can be argued that eating certain pieces of human flesh out of respect is an exceptional case (like eating a fellow creature to avoid starvation), and that a general principle of respect for important basis. A consent or bequeathal clause 11 is important in under- the dead overrides any consent that may be given. The short cutting various objections to the consumption of dead humans, for answe r to this is, firstly, that grantin g of exceptional cases alr eady in s tance, that it is an affront to human dignity, that it is a mark allows that some cases of cannibalism are admissible, and secondly , of total d isr espec t, that the 'sanctity of the human being' is that no general principle applies in a decisive way to exclude the compl e tely disregarded (Hp. 186), that it is impious (Dp. 467). exampl es alr ea dy considered. Fo r if the person consents it can hardly be an affront to that general principles can always be thwarted, it is instructive to consider per s on's dignity, or violate that person's sanctity (as seen from one po int of view). Nor is it an affront to the dignity of creatures of an irreligious cast, for whom a dead body whether of a human or an animal is a d ead body - though perhaps a dead body of a fellow creature o r of a friend. So it is an affront only to those of particular ( religious) groups, perhaps the same groups for whom dead human bodies are sacred and their disfigurement by humans (whether for medical or 5 other purposes) impious . Just as it is legitimate for one to discount the often illfounded views of such groups - insofar as the views are int ended to have universal applicability - as regards medical use of (forme rly ) consenting humans, as regards sexual relations, abortion, e uthanasia, and so forth, so it is legitimate to discount them in the case at hand. Dev ine ' s argument against cannibalism, namely as a paradigmatic applica tion of his overflow principle. On the contrary, the eating of certain parts of the bodies of dead humans was, amon g certain tribes who used to practice cannibalism, for it was thought that in that way the eaters could acquire or participate in some of the (former) virtues o f the dead , e. g . wisdom, strength, hunting skills, etc. still be, that eating is not disrespectful: So it can what is sometimes dis- respectful is raising for food nnd killing, e.g. in order to ent. The overflow principle~ formed -chiefly to cope with the treatment of animals, is this: Act towaPds that which, while not itself a pePson, is clos ely associated with pePsonhood in a way cohePent with an attitude of Pespect fop pePsons (Vp . 503) . Instead of arguing directly for the principle, Devine suggests firstl y that it may be argued for in rule-cons equ e ntial fashion, secondly tha t it may be made plausible as part of a way of life having respect for persons at its centre, and thirdly that th e prin ciple is well ensconced in the moral consciousness of the plain man. Each of these suggestions can be faulted both in general and as regards the relevant application. For instance, plain men mostly do not object to the bulldozing of old cemeteries to make way for a development. Nor need the eating of a dead human be a mark of disrespect. an act of consider a ble res pect; To illustrate how application of suc h On the other hand, the principle can be rendered analytic by taking up the slack in "associated with" and "coherent with" appropriately - only then it won't yield the relevant substantive application. In application of the principle Devine makes two alternative moves. First, 11 It is by no means obvious, however, that a cons~n 10 is required. similarly if it is going to be incinerated and the ashes s pread, it might better be carefully composted. The point ma de does not exclude organ transplants, eating, and so ecological alternatives to burial or cremation. The most the overflow principle The suggestion that the already dead can, at least in s e ems to show, under this move, is - what does not exclude consumption, certain circumstances, be eaten without moral qualm, innocuous though and what one may well concur with - that the dead (and not merely the human dead) ought to be eaten respectfully; it is, is liable to spark off a series of protests. and even this much some ugly scenes could result i f "long pig" caught on; is not shown if the tense change, the transformation from alive to dead, destroys the requisite closeness of association. outback Australia) competing to pick up "accident" victims. ambulances or tow trucks, are readily enough avoided (by suitable body, which forms the visible aspect of the bulk of persons with whom we are acquainted, and which persists when the person ceases to exist in death. (Vp. 593) organization), and more respectful practices adopted. would, if the objection is to have force - lead to what is normally a~sumcs, overflow to the subsequently dead body (which is no longer inadmissible, for example, to a perverse lust for human flesh, and And again respectful eating be marketable commodities, if there was commerce not just in human flesh. but in bags, shoes, and belts made from human hides, decorations from human bones and teeth, glue and fertilizer from other parts and so on 12 in the way that there is commerce in animal parts? Perhaps, disre sp ec t wo uld be an outcome, but perhaps for the wrong re aso ns. What s ee ms clear is that giving human flesh to the ne edful, s ~y , i s one thing, a llowing commerce in human parts is another. More serious is the objection that such "admissible cannibalism" could - or rather ov e rflow to thl' llvlng body docs not however guarantee, what Devine Wouldn't disrespect be inevitable if human parts become But these types of scenes, which can already occur with competing ... respect for persons overflows to the human to dead bodies. e.g. the the way that refrigerated trucks follow the kangaroo shooters in some heavy assumptions as to features of persons, reveals: could, it appears, be coherent with the alleged overflow of respect It is true that spectacle of the refrigerated vans patrolling the highways (in much Devine assumes it does not, as his second move which begins to buy into the "visible aspect" of a person). so in nci cher case is value diminished, it seems, by (respectful) cannibalism or ordinary garbage (in the literal sense) is not eaten (except in desperation, etc.). A dead body does nee have the value of the person whose body it is in life; Garbage is commonly thrown away, things in these end uses are mostly not; For i f a body is going to be buried and "eat,~" by bacteria, or various carnivores, it might as well be eaten; although a dead body is not a person, still the fact that it (so to speak) was a person means that it ought not to be treated like ordinary garbage (Vp. 503). forth. clause perhaps, thereby to the deliberate killing of humans for food. Hogg makes much of the first of these points, the (unintended) impression he gives being that human flesh is so delicious that it is highly addictive. Whether this is so or not (it would seem unlikely with a preponderance of older stringier humans, though the number of "battery humans" is increasing).it appears not to matter, unless it does lead to what would be more disconcerting, e.g. the establishment of a black market or the like in human flesh, with inputs from killer or Mafia syndicates. But the problem is not substantially different 13 12 of our unwillingness to kill people for food or other purposes, from problems that already arise with the treatment of animals (e.g. traffic in rare species), and over the distribution of dangerous drugs to humans, and can be met in similar ways, i.e. through a similar range of political or organizationa l options. The usual utilitarian defence of vegetarianism based on suffering, pain, and the like caused in raising and killing creatures for food, co llapses. 13 For no direct suff~ring, pain or the like occurs, with the creatures eaten already dead; and any sorts of suffering that might be marshalled among some of the still living who are pained by the consumption can be more than compensated for by th e alleviation of suffering of the meat consumers, for a suitable and secondly not a (direct) consequence of our unwillingness to cause distress to people - not that it always would (contrary to Diamond's assumption) - but rather 'what conditions our attitude to not dining on ourselves is the view that a person is not something The argument turns however on a slide on the mi.ddl.e term 'something to eat' which is ambiguous between (i) something that may be eaten and (ii) something that is eaten; In the second sense the justification given of the fact dead people are not eaten, namely people are not eaten, while in a sense "logically adequate" is trivial, and proves no requisite grounding, and the "justification " does not imply that dead people may not be eaten. In the first sense, a nontrivial justification is offered, that it is impermissible choice of consumers. to eat people,but in this case we cend to repeat the initial question; Some vegetarians however (rightly) reject utilitarian defenses; Diamond, in particular, tries to argue that they involve 'fundamental confusions about the moral relations between people and people and between people and animals ' (Dp. 465), and introduces instead convent ionalist arguments - unfortunately of wide philosophical appea l - against eating people. Some of the reasons for not eating people, she subsequently argues, extend to grounds for not eating animals either. Diamond's argument begins from certain quite central facts ... We do not eat our dead, even when they have died in auto- mobile accidents or been struck by lightning • .. (Dp. 467) An immediate objection is that this is little more than a local fact, Why is it? Diamond has a surprising answer: in effect that it is analytic on, or at least a consequence of, our notion of what a person or human being is. ••• it is not respect for our interests which is involved in our not eating each other . These are all things which go to determine what sort of concept 'human being' is it is one of those things which go to build our notion of human beings (Opp. 469-70). But such a thing as not eating other people is certainly not part of the concept 'human being', indeed it is not merely ~ot analytic or normic (near-analytic ) of human beings,it is not even true of them - good for certain ' we ' but by no means generally, as the history of given that, on well-authentic ated evidence, cannibalism was formerly canniba lism shows. widespread, and that it still persists in isolated place s today. It is equally a fact in the context of quite extensive groups, that .EE~L2o not eat l'i~.· So either the central fact has to be morally grounded or has to have moral consequences. The second option would involve a prescriptive fallacy (deduction of an ought from an is); followin g fashion:- in any case, Diamond tries the first, in the The fact is, firstly, not a (direct) consequence The answer is, in short, radically unsatisfactory . That this is 15 Tt may s eem ... I should find myself havin g t o jus tify slav e ry. For do we not learn - if 14 we liv e in a slav e soci e ty - what slaves ar e the answer Diamond is offering is however at once confirmed by how she goes on (writing in speciesist assumptions 15 in the same revolting fashion): and what masters are through the structure of a life in which we are here and do this, and they are there and do that? Do we not learn the difference between a master and a slave that way? (Dp. 470) Diamond does not manage to escape these difficulties, though sh e And so too - very much so - [built into the notion] the idea of the difference between human beings and animals. We learn what a human being is in - among other things sitting at a table where WE eat THEM. We 16 are around the table and they are on it (Dp. 470) . While we may learn something about what some human beings - not makes various attempts (p. 470 and especially pp. 476-7): the notion of a slave or an enemy or an outlaw assumes a background of response to persons, and recognition that what happens in these cases is that we have something which ;;;;-;;,::-e not treating as what it - in a way - is ( Dp. 476). vegetarians - are like in this way, in the way we can learn what But this is to assume a background of norms, of how things morally some other human beings are like from cannibal feasts where 11 we" are, that a person is not something to enslave, etc. (and to attempt are on the table as well as around it, we learn little of the once more to build a presupposed morality into conv entional facts). notion of human being in this way. Nor does what correct information Furthermore, as this reveals, the same ploy could be worked in the we acquire in this way provide a firm basis for moral judgements case of animals, namely that in hunting them, killing them, serving about the possibility of eating humans, though Diamond appears to them up for dinner, we are ~ treating them as what - in a way think that it does; for she later says that the source of moral they are (or, more accurately, as they mora lly deserve treating). life derives from ways in which we mark what human life is (Dp. 418), Such comparisons make it evident then what Diamond is about, and that another move which involves a prescriptive fallacy, as well as he r conventionalistic approach fails. obvious anthropoce ntri cit y . However, to remove objections to eating the already dead, Indeed many of the sorts of conventional patterns of response under specified conditions, is simply to avoid, rather than face up a nd conventional facts that Diamond alludes to are a fairly direct to, the real opposition to even qualified cannibalism. For an o utcome of human chauvinism, e.g. that drivers mostly stop for important part of the real opposition to qualified canniba lism relies injured humans, not for injured animals, that humans are commonly upon illicit assimilation of cases of eating already dead people given funerals, animals mostly not. Diamond needs to say, and with killing humans for food, and, differently again, rearing some proceeds to say, that these sorts of differences are appropriate, but that is to slide to a value judgement which concedes to he rself part of what is at issue. Diamond's approach encounters serious difficulties when applied to such matters as slavery, the treatment of outlaws and enemies of them, e.g. certain infants, for food . and in an obvious sense ! .!1.~~~., Thus Devine's ambiguous, 17 what is entire l y different, permitting the killin g of humans for 16 food, or to, what is different again, the deliberate raisin g of human s for food. claim that 'a meat diet requires that animals be killed' (Vp. 483). And thus Diamond again, the cases are entirely different. involved both rearing and slaughtering Swift's "proposal" of children for food. Nor is the base position so far reached a new one, but an ancient proposition. it i s one thin g morally to eat an already dead deer, another to let a deer die and then eat it, another again to shoo t What we should be going against in adopting Swift 's "Modest proposal" is something one should be going against in salvaging the dead, more generally useful organs for transplantation, and the rest for supper or the compost heap. (Dp. 469) 17 Not a t all: animals: The differences are already clea r as rega rds For instance, Chrysippus, the Stoic, in his or otherwise kill it and then (perhaps) eat it, and yet another to eat a deer raised (in one or another of very different ways) for food. Within each of these different categories, it is important to distinguish cases. For while eating a dead human, even after it has been allowed to die (by omission), may be admissible, killing humans for food is often not, and raising a human for food (and other goods) is, it is now generally assumed by humans, certainly not. treatise On Justice, 'permitt ed eating of the corpses of the dead• 18 There are several separate issues here, in particular the So also apparently did Diogenes in his Republic, Zeno in his Republic, ~~ban~ or raising for food issue, on which much literature on and Cleanthes, all of whom may have authorised cannibalism on a the moral basis of vegetarianism has in fact focussed, and the broader scale. general l?I~'!_ati~ issue, which includes matters of killing and letting die. Limited extensions of cannibalism beyond the base cases, where humans are allowed to die or are killed . eat ing of (certain of) their parts . Eating dead humans involves But if eating such parts is (often) The issues are separate because creatures may be killed for food, e.g . in hunting, though they are not raised for food, and conversely creatures may be raised for food (or treated as slaves) without, for one reason or another, being killed. Cases of humans admiss ibl e , then so also presumably is consumption of such parts when raising humans for food have apparently never occurred, though humans they are (irrevocably or freely) severed from a living human, e.g. have sometimes been fed up for the pot (e.g. in the Aztec empire and in Fiji). ea ting the amputated limb of a friend or enemy or drinking the blood Humans are the only creatures we in fact know who might (having l ost consider- donated by another, able touch with the natural world) just adopt such a practice: These rather special cases, involving (what is no other ca lled, for s h o r t ) ~ human parts, provide a first set of extensions animals ever raise creatures for food, not did cannibalistic cu ltures of the base cases. ever apparently raise humans for food. These extensions include some bizarre cases, in particular where the part concerned is one's own. However, allowing the eating of dead humans and nonlive hum~ n parts under certai n conditions offers no slippery slide to, It is a serious and difficult question (to which moral philosophers have not sufficiently addressed themselves) why it is that if humans are not under !!.!!i'. conditions entitled to raise other humans for food, they are entitled under many 19 18 th e gene ral i ss ue as to wh e n, or wh e n prec i se l y , killin g f o r food i s jus tifiable can be largely skirt ed. For it is justifiable , it is conditions - indeed, it is often assumed, under a sweeping ra~ th e n claimed, whe n and only when killing itself i s justified, whe ne ve r of factory conditions - to raise other animals for food? that is. They can only be justified in so doing if there are significant and While one half of the italicised equivalence is uncontrover s ial - relevant differences between humans and other creatures raised, if killing for food (or for purpose P) is permissible, so is what it or that might be raised, for human or animal food. involves, killing - the converse is not. Yet there are, For consider some circum- it has already been pointed out, no such appropriate species-wide stances (assuming you can find them) where killing of person x is differences. justifie d, e.g. in war, in retribution, in self-defence, in r e ducin g g reat A fresh start can be made on the issue from a cannibalistic perspective. evil. Since it is not eating human f l e s h ~ that is Th e n killing x for these reasons is not killing for food, even if x is in fact subsequently eaten. There is an important intensional wrong, what is it that is wrong, if anything, with raising humans difference, so that being justified in killing x for some crime say , or other creatures for food? does not justify killing him for food, much as thinking of killing him or is it both? both. Is it the raising, or is it the killing, The answer is, of course, that trouble lies with for the one reason is very different from thinking of killing him for Raising of creatures frequently has one or both of two dama ging features accompanying it: first, the other purpose. deprivation of the What can be argued given the permissibility of- eating dead rai s ed creatures, and secondly, treatment of the raised animal humans, is that where killing of z is permissible, cannibalism of z merely as a means (not as an end). is also IN FACT permissible. The second, attitudinal, difference may have little or no impact beyond the first. For example, if infanticide i s alri ght under certain conditions (as Tooley contends, and others have hinted), And the first may be avoided, e.g. whe re the creatures stay by choice but then in fact cannibalism of infants is alright also under the given could depart if they wished. conditions (but the issues as regards the raising of infants for fo od Kept geese, for instance, may be in that position; they are seemingly not deprived, but may live in rather are, of course, not thereby resolved). natural conditions (except that migration and much that goes with it is permissible can, to this limited extent, be bypassed. II has been lost). Thus the issue of when killing It is worth elaborating these points, since important Killing involves something different again: extensions - not the only extensions - of cannibalism beyond the base all that goes with removing of a life, the termination of projects, purposes, cases depend upon them, and since - very differently - they furnish associations of value, etc. (and also the definitive end of con- clear cases of inadmissible cannibalism. sciousness, etc.). of situations to distinguish:- With the predation issue also, a central issue ls as to when killing an animal for food is permissible. It may be thought indeed that the killing for food issue just is, or is t a ntamount to, the general issue of killing, and that accordingly • There are several clas se s 21 survive themselves, the survivors of an aircrash in a remote area, 20 people on a life raft, etc. Such examples, where defensible, as they sometimes are, provide a further class of examples of admissible la. Killing , causing to die, is impermissible. cannibalism - what might be called exceptional cannibalism, since the lb. Letting die (passive killing, as it is sometimes misleadingly , but conveniently , called) is circumstances are, at present anyway, among higher mammals, rather impermissible . exceptional . Then, in either case , killing or letting die for eating or followed by An important and often times questionable practice, which eating is also impermissible, by preceding principles (essentially can in principle at any rate, deliver exceptional examples 20 , is ~Pp ➔ ~P (p & q)), hunting (in the intransitive form, which involves capture or killing So in particular it is where the creature is of the same species. That is, cannibalism is in these cases inadmissible . But some of these cases are clear; for instance, where creature (or if the object sought is duly located). Men continue to hunt in the French fields, and sometimes still their own species 21 , not at present human) x is leading a worthwhile nonaggressive independent and pro- in the shape of enemy soldiers , but those cast as outlaws (manhunts) . ductive life in a peaceful countryside. (Intransitive) Hunting divides into several types, according to its 2a. Killing is permissible. 2b. Letting die is permissible. end purpose, for sport , for food, for extermination, for capture. Hunting humans for sport (hunting for "sport " , so called, typically In common reckoning there are many examples of both second classes, involves killing) is a practice that has persisted well into this "passive" infanticide, suicide and gambling with life, euthanasia, century, in Australia for example . killing or allowing to die to maximise community values where there though it can be given philosophical support by chauvinistic theories are large numbers of people or choices between them, execution and such as a limited and racially prejudiced group-utilitarianism or by assassination, self-defence , killing in war (the list follows roughly appeal to the "ideal" of pure subspecies (the stud ideal). t he later chapter headings in Glover, where these well-known types such hunting is impermissible, so, for the same sorts of reasons, is of examp les are set out in some detail). the hunting of many animals for sport . In all these types of cases, It has nothing to recommend it, But if Hunting otherwise, except for death can be followed by eating, provided the base class conditions capture, is a restricted form of killing, and to what extent it is are satisfied . permissible turns on when that sort of killing is permissible . In such cases, henceforth called de facto extensions, cannibalism is also in fact admissible . The position arrived at thus far is pulled together in rhe Almost always the killing or letting die in 2a and 2b is not spec ifically for eating. conjoined: Eating the resulting dead is simply th e source of food is adventitious. Sometimes, however, in unusual circumstances some members of a party of the one species kill certain members of the party or allow them to die in order to fo ll owing diagram, which subsequent sections (and parts) endeavol1r to fil l out and render more precise:- 23 §3. 22 Unavoidable detours: when is killing a creature wrong, and when is letting a creature die wrong? It is not necessary, nor is it easy or desirable, to avoid entirely the issues of when killing Diagram 2: TYPES OF ADMISSIBLE AND INADMISSIBLE CANNIBALISM is wrong and when killing for food is wrong, and when such kinds of l( ,- killing are not wrong . Type 1 cases (exemplified e.g. in hunting for sport) - - -- ___ _] Base case I ,< conditions fail I X other than rather weak or circular principles. had seemed to be clear turn out on further reflection to be much l ess ,< obvious. \ ESSENTIAL / ,-...__ _ _ _ _ _'-! \ PREDATION..,, For example, it had seemed evident that the onus of jus tification (where this makes sense) characteristically lay with the WATERSHED J(. XCEPTIONAL EXTENSIONS Worse, things chat INADMISSIBLE ADMISSIBLE BASE CASES But it is not so easy to elicit or to defend action-taking party; \t 'I,( that it is the killing or removal of life that muse be justified, not the letting live. Some things, however, are clearer . 'J{ NONLIVE EXTENSIONS First and foremost, a satisfacto ry (nonchauvinistic) a c count K -J KILLING BOUNDARY of when and why killing a creature is wrong won't make exceptions for REARING FOR SLAUGHTER BOUNDARY humans and, more generally, won't contain the term 'human' or logical So far, in considering examples of killing, issue has not equivalents. This important requirement disposes of much of the been taken with enlightened conventional wisdom, with the result chat philosophical literature. a serious , and perhaps unwarranted, discrepancy between the treatment (9p. 135-9), which refer to the (contractual) conditions for human dished out to animals and that accorded humans is beginning to emerge. social life (the mixed account given should be faulted on several other So the judgements made tend to follow conventional practice: grounds as well). killing It wipes out, for example, Ewin's attempts Similarly it removes the main condition eventually humans for food is admitted but happens only in exceptional circumstances, achieved in Glover (a whole text devoted to moral issues concerning killing killing, which fails to present, or seriously address, the matter of animals for food is a pervasive practice. More generally, killing animals for food is considered permissible in a wide range of circumstances where killing humans is not , yet on what solid grounds? . As regards killing, even enlightened conventional moral wisdom returns us to the heartlands of human chauvinism. necessary and sufficient conditions for when killing is wrong) . The first main condition Glover arrives at is that ' taking human life is normally directly wrong: that most acts of killing people would be J/ To avoid it, the matter of wrong in the absence of harmful side-effects' (Gp . 42), i.e . so long killing and letting die will have (like most moral issues) to be as 'the best total outcome' does not involve killing (cf. p . 286), to reconsidered, nonchauvinistically. set down the underlying utilitarian recipe . Other conditions Glover outlines - similarly unacceptable even to their author when 'animal' replaces 'human' - are likewise faulted as damagingly cha,·vinistic, 25 24 for instance that it is wrong to kill a human whose life is worth l iv i ng (Gp . 53) , whenever that is. e . g. burning a collection of seeds (er seedlings) is one thing, burning Secondly , unremarkably, most of the recipes suggested in the a forest is another, slicing up or eating a raw egg is one thing, slicing literature are defective, first among them utili t arian proposals , which, as is well-known can sanction unjust killing. 22 up or eating an eagle is another, etc. Other (non- utilitarian) potential ys me rit the same consideration as ys, as if th ey we r e ys. recipes are also problematic, as a proposal by Young, wh i ch will he l p Call the r.esult of making the required deletio n, th e us on our way, serves to indicate: modified proposal . . . . what makes killing another person [more genera lly a considered . realisation either of the victim's life purposes or of such life- purposes as the victim may reasonably have been narrower utilitarian frameworks and induces a decided circularity, The proposa l requires some brief explanation. The term ' unjust ' , which takes the proposal outside is qualified in the final proposal (p.519) by 'maximally' , the point expected to resume or to come to have (Yp.518; repeated p.519 with 'maximally ' included). of which (though it is not fully explained) is to permit killing or The qualifying term sacrificing of one person in order to save others . 'irrevocable' is inserted to separate killing from life imprisonment I It is the modified proposal that will be chiefly creature] wrong on occasions is its characte r as an irrevocable, [maximally] unjust preventing of their I It is a popular fallacy that which may, as a matter of fact , defeat the prisoner ' s purposes . The long some members of a group (on a lifeboat or from a remote airplane crash) final disjunction is designed to delegitimize killing of sometime comatose are sacrificed for, or by, others of the group . persons (it also would include people undergoing reform programs) - -,hat is ac counled [maximally] unjust. an additional clause is required - and killing of potential future in way, and almost (but not) captial punishment. debatable judgements , such as that in the common case (on Young ' s ified' (p . 528) , ified. 23 from which it follows that abortion is commonly unjust- The disjunct should, it certainly seems, be deleted - especially since what justifies the main part of Young ' s proposal, considerations of what has value, does not justify the final disjunct, because merely potential persons do not appear to have requisite value, though they might (or might not) come to have such. Generally, potential ys do not have the same range of features (including acquired value, etc.) ll Similarly what one is entitled t o do , or feels like doing with r espect to them may differ; If , however, there are no just wars then most killing in war is wrong; and if punishment by death is sometimes just , capital punishment is sometimes not wr.ong. If, for instance, a person's life purposes are sufficiently evil~ e.g. they include genocide, then their fulfilment is certainly pro1, ~ rJ y , justly, thwarted. 0 1· Thus some proviso as to the chara c t e r or qua lit y of life purposes , such as the term 'unjustly ' obliquely supplies , is essential (but often omitted in ethical discussions) . It is not evident however that killing such a person (as distinct, e.g. from imprisonment , re-education, etc.) is permissible, exc ept perhaps in worst cases. ~ • what they become if their potential is realised . For example, Young claims (Ypp.520-1) that the proposal lets through various types of killing persons such as infants and foetl1ses - thereby writing in some very has only 'morally trivial or no moral support abortion will be unjust- But generally what the proposal permits and what it excludes depends critically upon cases already apparently covered, so that it is not obvious that such construal of 'moral') where the expressed wish of the pregnant woman The qualification makes way for certain cases of cannibalism, for instance those where I 26 Ther e is no good r eason to restrict the proposal to persons , and Young does not intend to. 27 Many killings of animals constitute , he t ells us (Yp.526), maximally unjust prevention of their realisation of life purposes, and accordingl y are wrong. ' Killing such animals for food is only justifiable when no adequate of other crea tures). acts are avoided. food supply is available and food i s needful' (Yp . 526), in which event, presumably, justice prevails. A characteris tic remnant of Further it is simply assumed - though it could no doubt be argued (rather as below) - that requisite unjust Young's proposal as applied has bite; human chauvinism also intrudes , with Young a ppealing to the ' greater eschewing killing of creatures for food. 25 range of life-purpose s normally human beings have' (Yp.527, italics that the modified proposal has bite: amended) ; 24 and thereby smuggling in a greater value assumptio n as regards humans. Here, as elsewl1ere also , the account of when killin g is wrong is progressive ly l oaded , almost manipulated , to yield the sought r esults : in particular , what is unjust - including which killings are unjust and which class of life-purpos es are more valuable relevant to det e rmining maximal injustice - are bot h open to rigging. These points help to bring out too how back of Young's accoun t and application s of his proposal lie more basic consideratio ns of justice and value (and it is to such considera tions that we should no doubt eventually turn). Consider, for instance, the route to the permissibil ity of systematic cullings of a herd. Wants , now substituting for li fe -purpose s , are simply supposed to be summed up utilitarian- fashion, except th at (somewhat as with Mill ' s utilitariani sm) a weighting is imposed to reflect the respective values of different wants (those of humans, e . g ., as opposed to those It is an illusion however the bite all turns on Young's cunning application , since the modified proposal itself reduces to near tautologous ness. purposes occur? taken. For when does irrevocable prevention of a life's When, and only when (since it is irrevocable) that life is So the modified proposal reduces effectively to AP. Killing x is wrong iff taking x's life is maximally unjust. But killing x is, according to OED, causing the death of x, which is tantamount, in terms of sense, to taking the life of x. And what is wrong is, according to OED again, what is unjust, and would be, if the OED were sharpened 1,1p a little, what is maximally unjust. Whence the adjusted proposal, AP. The proposal does not rule out killings which have the effect overall of fostering th e wants of the largest subset of some group like a wild herd where otherwise the wants of an even larger subset will be thwarted. Systematic cullings in the absence of feasible alternative s, therefore, may be morally pe rmissible. (Yp.527) for example, it would oblige most of us to adopt a largely vegetarian life-style We have come round a circle, but much was glimpsed on the way, so the circuitous route was not without its rewards. By working through other l ess chauvinistic accounts of the wrongness of killing (e.g. the nonchauvin istic base of Ewin's account) we can come a similar circular way and arrive at the same fairly stable result. Moveover, in the adjusted proposal we do have an account, not yet a hi ghly usable account, since circular, but an account nonetheless . In terms of this account clear cases where cannibalism is morally inadmissable can be distinguishe d, for example as follows: Cannibalism of x is wrong wherever it involves maximally unjust taking of x's life. Conversely, there are many cases where 28 the killing of one creature by another creature is, because not maximally unjust, quite permissible; 29 e.g. certain instances of killing in self-defenc e, exceptional cannibalism , abortion, etc . But if the creature is killed, then it is dead, so by the earli er Now let x and y be of the same species, say Homo Sapiens: argument it is permissible to eat it (under certain conditions) . CAP provides exact conditions for when cannibalism is wrong, in So there are many cases where killing a creature and then eating it, cases where cannibalism involves killing. or its then being eaten, are permissible . conditions are satisfied; If some of the many cases of permissible killing are, as they seem to be, cases of killing a then Sometimes these often they are not. Sorting out when they are, and when they are not, will occupy many a controversi al creature of the same species, then active cannibalism involving killing is, in such cases, permissible . The argument needs of course filling out in crucial respects, especially by some enumeration of types of cases where killing is permissible , and a sub-listing of cases where these are intra-specie s killings. Would this suffice? However, it of the) distinction between killing and letting die, by blurring or rejecting the distinction on which it is based~ that betweem omission and One question is whether the account determines (even in its circular way) the precise conditions under which killing for food can permissibly occur. Letting die is not the same as (active) killing . has recently become fashionable to try to remove the (moral significance The question reduces commission (or else it is pretended that it is frightfully difficl1lt to make this distinction s out, etc.). Rejection of the omission/ commission distinction appears to rest on a mix of fallacious moves:- to the logical issue of whether AP as a strong logical equivalence FMl. A some to all argument, warrants intersubsti tutivity in more highly intensional frames such FM2. A confusion of the thesis that the distinction is morally as those declaring purposes. Though I've tended to vacillate on this issue, my feeling increasingly is that substitutiv ity is warranted, important with the quite different thesis that only commi.ssions can be morally blameworthy and that omissions are morally guiltless (the the reason being that the equivalence of AP is of virtually synonymity position reportedly held by some religious groups in the past). strength, which legitimates replacement in all but quotational (type) FM3. An extensional approach to nonextensio nal differences . sentence contexts. But purpose sentence contexts, such as' ... for eating' are not quotational . FAP. Hence it follows using AP that Killing x for food purposes is wrong iff taking x's life for food is maximally unjust, heavily upon the fact that there are some cases where it is morally difficult to distinguish between certain commissions and certain and that CAP. These points are considered briefly in turn:- ad FMl. Those attempting to discredit the distinction usually rely y's killing x for (and followed by) eating is wrong iff y's taking x's life for eating is maximally unjust. omissions, e.g. that in appropriate circumstanc es exposing the baby may be little different morally from directly smothering it. (The Greeks believed it wasn't but that was because exposure gave the gods a chance to intervene and save from death those who were fated to perform especially important tasks). r JO But the fact that there a r c ~ cases where the JI distinctio n is not of great moral significan ce does not show that it is dispensabl e. In order to show that lt is dispensabl e it is extension ality assumption which removes scope. The principle necessa ry to show that there are no cases where it is needed, that appears to be that failing to provide a condition which would have for all cases failing to provide a condition which would prevent been causally responsibl e for preventing x is morally equivalent to ~x is (morally) equivalent to providing a condition for x. providing a condition which is causally responsibl e for x . But Moral it is easy to produce some cases where the distinctio n seems to be equivalenc e requires interchang eability witin deonitic contexts, essential if we are to account for what we wish intuitivel y to say. indeed it could be characteri sed in terms of such substituti bility . For example, to take a case those who wish to abolish the distinctio n The equivalenc e yielded is of the form -F-x are fnnd nf appealing to, we may wish to say that the people who did commonly falls, especially where Fis not extensiona l. not attempt to help in the Kitty Genovese case were morally culpable, moveover that the causal responsib ility functor is not extension al, perhaps to a high degree, but few of us would wish to say that their and that such a principle fails for it. moral culpabilit y was exactly the same or of exactly the same kind as that of the murderer, and that they should equally be brought to trial on murder ch~rges. Or, to take another case, placing poison in your husband ' s tea is not the moral equivalent of failing to give him the antidote when he has placed it in himself. In order to say +-> Fx. But such a principle It is clear Though letting die differs significan tly, then, from killing, conditions upon when it is wrong may be reached in similar ways. How the condition for letting die correspond ing to AP should go becomes rather more obvious if the righthand side of AP is expanded to: taking (the) action which terminates x's life is maximally unjust. what is evident in such cases, some equivalent of the omission/c ommission The parallel passive condition can th en presumably be formulated distinctio n is needed . thus:- ad FM2. But the thesis that the distinctio n is needed and is morally DP. significan t in many, or at l e a s t ~ , cases must be clearly dis- which continues x ' s life is maximally unjust. 26 tinguished from the very much stronger thesis that all omissions are blameless, and that any commission s are morally open ~o blame - or praisewort hy. This thesis is, rather plainly, indefensib le, yet has been responsibl e for much of the bad light in which appeal to distinctio n appears . ad FMJ. Then in turn, substituti on principles again yield clauses EDP and CDP, correspond ing to EAP and CAP, special cases of which yield conditions under which cannibalism is wrong where it involves letting die. Principle CDP which supplies this condition, where x and y are of the same species, runs as follows:- The principle of moral symmetry between omissions and commission s is in fact refutable. Letting x die is wrong iff refraining from taking (the) action It appears to be based on an CDP. y ' s letting x die for eating purposes is wrong iff y's refraining from taking (the) action which continues x's life, for purposes of eating x, is maximally unjust. Since letting die is, for the most 32 part, less heinous than killing, cannibalism involving letting die 33 i s more widely permissible than cannibalism involving killing . 27 §4 . The matter of predation, and important cases of l egit imat e killing and letting die for food. One tempting model that underlies the conflict picture of Paradigmatic examples of legitimate predation, of predation as basically undesirable but an unavoidable killing are provided by predation, where bis prey of a and a depen ds fact, a model that leads to human vegetarianism, is the following (essentially) for its livelihood, indeed for its survival, on eating kind of atomistic axiological theory (or utilitarianism):- bs.28 Such predat ion i s a n essential part of any su ffici e ntl y rich ecosystem . Essential pr eda tio n i s pre dation which is essent i a l to according to the initial positive value thesis, every living creature (every sentient creature , every higher animal , etc .) has an initial positive the nor,~11 livelihood of tl1e predat or , and where the prcd alor takes non-instrumental value which it retains unless it does something to for itself no more than it requires for it s livelihood. forf eit that value. carn.ivores , such as the big cats , but some humans, such traditional Eskimos, are essential predators. Not only ilS some (On the even simpler position of biospheric egalitarianism, discussed below, all living things have equal worth, The fact that humans ar e part of the natural predatory food chains should not be lost s i g ht o[ . Observe that the argument to permissibility of essential pre- in some nontrivial sense.) These positive values just sum ; and maximisation of value (or suitably averaged value) is, of course , the (or an) ethical objective . Then killing is generally undesirable , dation does ~ take the invalid form: such predation is a fact (a fact because it results in a reduction in net value, and survival is generally of life), therefore it is permissible. That arguments of this type , desirable. 29 The exceptions occur when a creature has forfeited its selectively relied upon by Diamond and (earlier) Hegel, are inval id is value, e . g . it per sists in value-reducing behaviour, so that killing well-enough known (they commit a prescriptive fallacy), and is evident it would prevent a further decline in net value or lead to increase in from such fallacious arguments as the diplomacists' argument, e.g. it is total value . a fact of life that Indonesia has occupied (absorbed) East Timar; when it leads to an overall reduction in value . the re- The underlying theme is that killing is unjustifiable The onus of proof, fore it is pe rfectly alright that Indonesia occupied (absorbed) East Timar. when it can be assigned, lies with those who make the exceptions, who Naturally it would be decidedly awkward if the fact of essential predation do or license the killing . turned out to be impermissible: since, with one item of value consuming another item of value, it trouble. the whole natural order would be in moral This brings us to another defect of the argument from· "facts", Predation now appears as an awkward fact , leads to an overall reduction in value. Since inessential preda tion that it suggests that essential predation is really, at base, something is inessential, it is ruled out as inadmissible. pretty undesirable, but nonetheless something we have to live with - in (nonindigenous) humans for whom predation is, it is plausibl~ argu ed , Thus in particular, contrast with predation, in its associated meaning, as plunder, which we iness en tial, are not entitled to kill for f ood : do n't, or rather oughtn 't to, have to live with morally, and which is usual rai si ng of animals for food, etc . are all excluded in one st r oke , commonly reprehensible. and a l eading feature of vegetarianism imposed . therewith hunting, 34 35 Essential predation is not so satisfactorily dispos ed o f, but introduces conflict. For either one creature, the prey, is sacrificed or another creature, the predator, is: value de c lines . Similar objections apply against biological egalitarianism, either way tot 8 1 In the interim, while vegetarian scientists work even when it is qualified as in Drengson and Naess by an in principle 30 on new diets and new lifestyles for predators, there is an obvious clause. recipe to be applied, which while not eliminating conflict, minimises that predation is rather suboptimal: its effe c t: is strictly ruled out as a general practice. just as steam gives way to sail, so the less valuable gives way to t h e ~ valuable. Thus if humans are reckoned to be It is not (or not only) that it is taken for granted the trouble is that predation Since each lion and each antelope is assigned one unit of whatever is assigned equally, mo re valuable than polar bears - the usual human evaluation - then there is no way of justifying the lifestyle of a lion that consumes polar bea rs are not going to be entitled to prey on humans, in the sens e several antelopes. at least that their predation is not justified. Any equalitarian approach that is E££ atomistic is liable Application of the recip e 31 presupposes a value ranking on creatures under which some are more valuabl e to further incoherence, as Drengson's holism reveals. than others: some living system of living things, e.g . the Earth as on the Gaia otherwise if all are equal, predation is never admissible, and Lets be essential predators just die out - at least that is the simple ethical pic t - hypothesis (p. 233). ure. least of the living things that comprise it, has the same value as This points up one of the many problems for biological egaltarianism. But the picture presented so far is too simple, and tl1e recipes suggested dubious. Then s, which should(?) have the value at each of them (in effect 1 = n, for n>l). Some of t~e ecological consequences of implementing the For if the matter is properly considered not at a given time, but over a time interval, dynamically and not suggested recipes, and reform of essential predators, can now be just statically, it is not so simple, and a rather different result gauged. emerges . the chains of predation are long and complex; One predator takes, over a typical lifetime, rather a lot of prey . Unless the predator ranks very much more highly than Massive environmental interference would be required, since distortions especially in lower-level prey would occur, with resulting the prey, the value of the sum of the prey will exceed that of the ecological instability and often catastrophe. predator. that is, are ecologically highly undesirable. These considerations, in combination with a positive and gross population The consequences, What this and the value thesis, suggest a very different result, that predators should summation problems begin to reveal is that the initial atomistic be allowed to, or encouraged to, die out - unless they are somehow, value distribution picture is inadequate because it leaves out systems what seems improbable for predators that remain wild, converted to and systemic connections such as a more ecological approach would vegetarianism, include, The dynamic picture resorted to is still too simple in one important respect, that over a time interval, prey, which would often exceed natural (and sometimes reasonable) population levels without predation, are replaced. Where population of a preyed-upon species of creature is at an ecological limit, and minor culling of the sort 36 natural predation induces does not, owing to replacement, reduce 37 population levels significantly below that limit, predation has no significant effect on total value, So results yet another, different, recipe, one which is a little nearer the ecologica l mark. 32 farm animals (all of them) can be appropriately filled out, to Some utilitarians, Singer in particular, have recognised exclude replacement of animals with unusual or special properties, the role of replacement a·,1d made some allowance for it (at a serious cost to Singer ' s vegetarianism , it should be added), e.g. those carrying valuable genes, and to allow slaughter, without Singer now allows for killing and replacement of nonselfconscious life, but advances a nonreplaceabllity thesis for self-conscious life. Furthermore, even if a replacement thesis for free-range shorter-term replacement, of those carrying damaging diseases or genes - as it no doubt can, in a modified replacement thesis - still For the basic division Singer appeals to 'Tooley 's distinction' between a nonreplacement thesis fails to allow even for essential predation of selfconscious creatures, and accordingly should be scrapped, beings that are merely conscious and ••• those that Since this pronouncement is likely to be disputed, at least are also self -conscious, in the sense of being able to conceive of themselves as distinct entities, existing by some vegetarians, it is worth trying to indicate why essential over time with a past and a future (Sp.151), At the same time it can be In fact most of the sorts of free-range farmyard animals that Singer predation is perfectly admissible, seems to be envisaging as nonselfconscious, and accordingly replaceable, explained what is still wrong with the tempting dynamic picture and creatures, for instance geese and hens, appear to satisfy Tooley's the initial positive value thesis. tests for selfconsciousness. what is put in as what is left out, Geese are certainly aware of themselves they value members of their own community ; trees, and inanimate such as rocks and buildings,~ have initial and they remember value, but that complexes and wholes, in particular ecosystems, may elements of their past and, in things like nest building (practice), anticipate the future. More important, what has selfconsciousness (reflex- ive consciousness), or consciousness to do with the moral dimension? Until well have initial value, The reduction assumptions underlying value decomposition thereof, itself, because by no means all consciousness of conscious life is _ 32 a to atoms fail , Singer's theses lack foundation and look, while perhaps convenient for that it cannot be duly explained; There are grounds for anticipating for instance, being too valuable to be Such wholes may have value furthermore which is not dissolvable into values of component parts, or atoms this is duly explained - it is not satisfactorily explained as valuable in some traditional farmers, rather ad hoe, What is left out is not just that objects other than living creatures, both animate such as plants and as distinct entities, and of geese as distinct from (and superior to) hens; What is wrong is not So much In terms of the value of wholes such as ecosystems, one of the arguments for essential predation is disarmingly elementary . It takes the form: (sufficiently) rich (natural) ecosystems are Predation is an essential part of these systems . simply replaced, in the sense of having irreplaceable experiences, worth- very valuable, while projects, etc., does not have the requisite linkage with self- What is an essential part of what is very valuable is admissible. consc iousness. Therefore, predation is admissible. Such predation, which may be argued for in other ways , admits of extension by the following principle : 38 EP. If something is entitled to kill for food under certain 39 conditions, e.g. respectfully and when in need, then so are others under the same conditions. §5. The argument for EP is of the same type as that for other Postscript . The paper is very incomplete . It fails to address several issues intimately connected with cannibalism, such as hunting similar indifference, or interchangeability, principles in ethics. of humans and other animals, in particular for food, and as raising It follows from EP and essential predation that, since a tiger may humans and other animals, especially defective infants, for food. when in need kill a cow to eat, then so may humans in need. If Worse, it is evasive on some fundamental issues, and it fails to penetrate very taking the cow's life is not maximally unjust in the one case, nor deeply into some of the issues it does begin to consider, such as is it in the other, since the circumstances are similar. predation, or as the necessary and/or sufficient conditions for admiss- The results reached may be alternatively argued for using principle CP. 33 Perhaps Singer is also on the right track, though he has latched onto the wrong distinction. Perhaps there is a (descriptive) condition q (or a condition qs for each sorts of agent), appropriately ible killing. position. It is little consolation that others are in the same Hopefully some of these deficiencies will be compensated for in subsequent parts. At the same time several themes will be developed that may tied with causing to die, such that while killing creatures without q not have been evident so far, e.g. that in under suitable conditions is permissible, killing creatures with q is far too much killing taken much too lightly, but far too little is not, except under special conditions . 34 general experience of killing and death when it does occur, that is Given that q is 11 modern 11 societies there appropriately morally connected such a procedure would fit into the except usually among small groups mostly of inured professionals, annular picture (given earlier: q would mark out the interior of the which "shield" most humans from the phenomena involved. dotted elipse). Nor need the distinction be chauvinistic, because it cuts across species in a morally defensible way. anything, is q? located? made good? But, what, if Can a suitable morally-unloaded category-based distinction And how disconcerting would it be if some such distinction could no Wait for the next exciting episode . 35 ' 40 FOOTNOTES 41 It was singularly appropriate that this paper should have otained its first (and only) public presentation at the Alfred E. Packer Memorial Center, University of Colorado. I am indepted to several members of the audience for comments and references, and in particular for the first extension of the base case . It is noticeable how people who have never been cannibals despise the horrible thing; and how quickly it disappears when a cannibal tribe comes into contact with a wider world than that Directly merely of their own bush village. daylight falls on the habit, it Withers away . This is remarkable when we remember the sanctity The cannibal of it in primitive man's eyes . is not necessarily a hopelessly degraded brute, but-;-man who has not yet lived out of the dark obscurity of bush tribalism, and so had bli~dly_ followed a practice deep-rooted in the sacrificial These themes are defended, and the annular model explained, in The themes are also defended in HC, p. 103ff., and in AHC. other recent work, e.g. by Tooley and Singer. As the schematic diagram shows, humans do not occupy a central ring. Thus adoption of the model does not imply, what Pickering assumes (p. 374), that 'humans are more~ntral ' or, for that matter, that 'humans are owed more extensive moral consideration Nothing in the model itself depends on humans . than plants'. The model is not species based, or biologically based, but category basect";-and designed to reflect the different sorts of things there are, e . g. things capable of entering into contracts conferring obligations, and things not so capable, things that can have preferences and make choices as opposed to things that cannot (truly, or significantly), things, including systems and Nor, therefore, organisations, with a telos and things without. does the model write in a new type of chauvinism, or confer privilege or moral advantage on things in more central rings. Indeed, things in central rings will have obligations and commitments, and be subject to limitations on what they do, in ways that things further out cannot be; so there will be some As this moral disadvantages in occupying a more central place. indicates, the categories selected are intended to have moral And different sorts of behaviour are morally linkages . appropriate with respect to the different categories of objects. 2. 3. 4. The popular view that dialectics and adoption fraction of assumption themes are dangerous is partly based on a modal fallacy, For the fallacy e.g. that what can be believed is believed . in operation in more intellectually respectable quarters see WW. the Epilogue of Harris Some dialectics are accordingly recommended for anyone convinced that cannibalism must be wrong. The investigations undertaken in this paper alwshare other features with (classic) dialectics: there are many loose ends, and in several crucial areas firm conclusions are not reached. Later parts of the paper will take care of some of these things. Thus Hogg (p. 188), Cannibalism . .. can hardly be said to exist in There may be isolated the world of today. pockets of survival in the heart of New Guinea and among some of the tribes in the remotest corner of South America or African jungles; but they will be no more than the rarest of phenomena. 5. Hopkins, given the last word by Hogg, p. 192. quote from Hopkins is of passing interest: The whole ideas common to man the world over from his earliest days. 6. Some of the advantages of institutionalisation of certain cannibalistic practices are evident, e.g. a_much enh~nced Various disadvantages if not evident should supply of protein. become so in the course of the text. 7. See again in HC and similar. Although the human/nonhuman distinction is not, so it is argued, one of moral significance, not all Other distinctions of moral importance distinctions vanish. - those of the annular model - naturally remain. 8. Of coures, this practice is (still) controversial, and But a offensive to various religious and other groups. great advantage of a pluralistic society is t~at it can acconnnodate (better than alternatives) such differences Issues such as human_ . over the morality of practices . burial and restricted cannibalism, however, make the limits of present pluralism evident . 9. Or else did not incur official establishment disapproval, though the acts strictly appeared to infringe the Every s~~ond_ra~onteur has prevailing law of the land. examples of cannibals not brought to Justice . 10. . This clearly anticipates an initial argument of this My thanks to W. Berryman for drawing my attention paper. to the attitude of the Catholic Church, as presented in Read. 11. Consent in principle will carry the requisited load, and for this it is normally enough that the person would consent. This indicates one logical route to the liberalisation, and removal, of the consent clause. 12. There would (so far) be no trophies, e.g. Z's head ~n the hall, Y's skull on a stand, because trophies involve hunting and killing (for which see below). 13. As some vegetarians would freely admit; other 11 vegetar i ans II f rther and regard the killing of certain (nonself) an1•mals for food as admissible provided no suffering u, go i conscious is incurred and that the animals are replaced. . But it s true that usually 'vegeta;ians do not touch the issue of our attitudes to the dead (D., p.9) . 42 14. 15. In a like vein it is suggested that Singer and Regan do not see that 'a cow is not something to eat; (for them) it is only that one must not help the process along' (D., p. 468). The latter incidentally would not exclude the use of dead creatures for food, leather goods, etc.; things that animal liberationists like Singer definitely exclude. 43 21. Diamond recognizes this objection, p. 471, but does not meet Pace K. Bell, according to whom, Men have always hunted in the fields around Potigny and Falaise . They still do, but no longer their it. own species. 16. 17. 18. In similar ways we are said to gain the concept of an animal; s~~ p. 476. -Diamond introduces this piece of serious confusion in the course of emphasizing why the 'assumption that we all agree that it is morally wrong to raise people for meat ... is not, or not merely, ... too weak' (D.• p . 469). Diogenes Laertius, vol. 11, p. 297. Some of the complex issues concerning hunting will be considered in subsequent parts, others elsewhere. 22. See, e.g., Henson, and also Ewin and RKU . 23. A notable piece of male chauvinism also slides through, in the suggestion that, in Lhe absence of more weighty moral backing, the expressed wish of a pregnant woman is morally trivial. And Sayre reports (p. 25), Cannibalism (uv0pwno~ayCa) is alleged to have been a practice of the Cynics by Philodemus and by Theophilus Antiochenus; but, if so, it must have been confined to their early history, for they had a number of critics during the Christian era who would have mentioned it if they had known of it. Both Philodemus and Theophilus were biassed and we must remember that similar stories were told of the early Christians. However, cannibalism is said to have been authorized by the Republic and Thyestes (or Atreus) attributed to Diogenes and also by the Republic of Zeno and by Cleanthes and Chrysippus (Philodemus, On the Stoics; Theophilus Antiochenus, Ad. Autolycum 3, 5; D.L. 6, 73; Ibid. 7, 188; cf. 28th Letter of Diogenes; Dio Chrysostom 8, 14). As Diogenes Laertius goes on to explain, that 'Chrysippus did countenance the eating of dead humans was one of the points brought against him by those who 'ran him down as having written much in a tone that was gross and indecent'. As regards such attitudes to the dead, times have not changed that much. The (idea of) eating "the dead" (dead humans, of course), under ~ circumstances, is still widely regarded as scandalous, and highly newsworthy (see Read, p . 296 ff). 19. Cannibalism which involves explicit killing for food is a kind of reflexive predation, but generally (cases of) cannibalism and predation only properly overlap. 20. An example would be where some of the survivors of a crash or wreck hunt other "survivors" in order to survive; cf. W. Golding, Lord of the Flies. 24. But one's life-purposes are diminished lhow can this be on Young's picture?) if they jeopDrdise those of others. Hence Young's preparedness to let Amin be killed by the stampeding horses, Yp. 527. 25 . Indeed it leads, as Young interprets it, to a more sensible vegetarianism than Singer's initial position (in Animal Liberation, not as significantly modified in Sp.153). neither culling nor predation are simply ruled out. 26. For Action and taking action should be construed in a wide, but common enough fashion, e.g. the action taken may amount to doing nothing or getting-the-hell-out-of-it. 27. It is tempting to try to prove this on the basis of a proper inclusion assumption, that where letting die is wrong so is killing, but not conversely. The assumption may, however, need qualification; e . g. killing may sometimes be preferable to letting died in a lingering way . 28. 'Predation" is a singularly unfortunate word to be stuck with to describe this universal phenomenon. It is unfortunate both because of its etymology, and because of its other meaning . At to the first, ' predation' derives from praedari, 'to plunder', which derives in turn from praedo, 'booty', As to the second, 'predation' also means a 'practice or addiction to plunder or robbery'. Both carry strong negative connotations. There is a similar damaging duality in the expressions 'prey' and 'prey upon'. 29. These defective considerations also lead to a maximisati~n of population of creatures of the base class assigned values, up to the limit - if any (on frontier philosophers there are none) where declining returns set in . Where, further, humans are typically, but erroneously, assigned greater value than other creatures, the considerations support the rapid biassing of terrestial fauna! population in favour of humans that we are witnessing. The second point does not apply, in that form, . against biol0gical egalitarianism, and the first objection fails where total value is replaced, as under some utilitarianisms (with what justification is less clear, since surely we want to maximise value so far as constraints permit: see RKU), by average value, average value per (base class) life lived, etc. 44 The argument in the text is not affected materially by switching from value analogues of total utilitarianism to analogues of some form of average utilitarianism. On some of the serious problems with these utilitarianisms, see Jamieson. 30. Drengson, following Naess and others, espouses 'biospheric egalitarianism and the intrinsic value of all life' (p. 222). According to the theory, each (living) being has intrinsic value (pp.233-4), and hence each presumably has equal worth (and is entitled, in Singer's terms, to equal consideration , if not equal treatment). In Naess and Drengson this biospheric egalitarianism is qualified by an in principle clause. According to Naess, 'The 'in principle' clause is inserted because any realistic praxis necessitates some killing, exploitation and suppression' (p.95), and according to Drengson, 'This qualification is made with the simple recognition that we cannot live without affecting the world to some degree' (the latter claim is inadequate, because it is not just 'we' who are involved). 31. Axiological approaches that are atomistic have other problems, some reminiscent of those Wittgenstein discusses for logical atomism. In particular, how do we locate the atoms to which value is supposed to adhere fundamentally. A first bad feature of this approach is invariance failure: it matters for final summations how the atoms are chosen, for different choices will assign complexes quite different values. Secondly (Wittgenstein's question), why are some things said to be atoms not complexes, and vice versa. A third group of problems, brought out in HC, concerns the choice of a base class. 32. An environmental ethic s:1oul.:l. also be an ccologic:1 I et!dc, sense of an ecologically realistic ethic. facts are certainly relevant. 32a. A detailed case for this claim 33. j:1 t lH· In this resepct too the appears in Routley and Griffin. Thus rp can be made to yield a good deal more than Young's application of his proposal (for which he offers no proper justification): A creature is entitled to kill another creature of lesser value when its life (and so all its functions, prospects, etc.) depends on it and when it does not kill more creatures than it needs for these purposes. And the dubious business of imposing such order rankings on creatures can be bypassed. 34. The qualifications are necessary. If the latter exceptional conditions clause were not adjoined, the prospe ct of finding a condition q would be wiped out by such cases of essential predation as exceptional human cannibalism. The qualifications, although they enhance the prospects of locating such a q, do not appear to make it analytic or near analytic that such a descriptive q can be found. 45 35. Not only are there many proposals for q to sift through - most of which however seem to fail for reasons already indicated in the text - but also there are apparent options to finding such a distinction, such as resetting the problem, in a less individualistic way, in the framework of (ecological) communities. REFERENCES K. Bell, Not in Vain, University of Toronto Press, 1973, REFERENCES CONTINUED P.E, Devine, 'The moral basis of vegetarianism ', Philosophy 53 (1978) · 481-505 . (all references prefixed with 'V' are to this article) , C. Diamond, ' Eating meat and eating people', Philosophy (references hereto are prefixed by 'D'). 53 (1978) 465-77, Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers (edited, with English translation, by R. D. Hicks), Heinemann , London, 1925, A.R . Drengson, ' Shifting paradigms: from the Technocratic to the PersonPlanetary', Environmental Ethics 2 (1980) 221-40, R. E. Ewin, ' What is wrong with killing people? ' Philosophical Quarterly tl..<. (197;t) 126-39. M, Harris, Cows, Pigs, Wars and Witches, Fontana, London , 1977 (hereafter prefixed by 'W.W.'). M, Harris, Cannibals and Kings , Collins , London, 1978 (hereafter prefixed by ' CK '), R. Henson, ' Utilitarianism and the wrongness of killing', Philosophical Review 80 (1971) :1.u,- n7. D. Jamieson,'Utilitarianis m and the value of life', typescript, University of Colorado, 1981. J, Glover, Causing Death and Saving Lives, Penguin, Middlesex, England, 1977 . L.P. Pickering, Review of ' Ethics and Problems of the 21st Century ', Environmental£.£,.~-~ 2 (1980) 373-78 . G. Hogg , Cannibalism and Human Sacrifice, Robert Hale, London, 1958. (references hereto are prefixed by 'H'), R. and V. Routley, 'Against the inevitability of human chauvinism ' in Ethics and Problems of the 21st Century, eds , K, E. Goodpaster and K. M. Sayre, University of Notre Dame Press, 1979, (Hereafter prefixed by ' AHC') . J. Langton, Cannibal Feast, Herbert Joseph, London, 1937. L, Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations, Blackwell, Oxford, 1953. A. Naess, 'Self-realisation in a mixed community of humans ·, bears, sheep and wolves', Inquiry 22 (1971) 231-41 , A. Naess, ' The shallow and the deep . long-range ecology movement. Inquiry A s11mmr1ry'~ 16 (1':173) 95-100. P.P, Read, Alive, Avon, New York, 1974. R. and V. Routley, 'An expensive repair kit for utilitarianism', typescript 1976 (hereafter referred to as ' RKU ' ). R. and V, Routley, ' Human chauvinism and environmental ethics' in Environmental Philos~ (ed. D. Mannison, M. McRobbie and R. Routley), RSSS , Australian National University , 1980 (the article is referred to as ' HC' , the book as ' EP ' ), F. Sayre, Diogenes of Sinope , A study of Greek Cynicism, Johns Hopkins University , Baltimore, 1938. P. Singer, 'Killing humans and killing animals', Inquiry 22 (1979) 146- 56, (references hereto are prefixed by ' S '). R. Tannahill, Flesh and Blood. A History of the Cannibal Complex , Hamilton , London, 1975 . Hamish M. Tooley , Abortion and Infanticide, typescript, Australian National University, 1980, R. Young, ' What is so wrong with killing people?' Philosophy 5¥ (1979) (all references prefixed with ' Y' are to this article) , 515-528 R. Routley and N. Griffin, 'Unravelling the meanings of life', available in this series , 1982. ) /.o,..,.,,,, l. ~ / , . ~ tA-- ~ <'"'1 ---- 3/ }o/t/v/~}~4--( ~~ ·~~O·\o ~ --..., \0~'203.l\. <;c..c.tt.,. ~ ~ a.I) . ~~ ~✓:. ,;,,tf ~ .r. ..... ---,(7> o-,.J /' ,,,((; 11 / c, ~ I ( _ ///,;.,/ /c/ (',.,./// 1' ,. ~ L: 1 -=y' 1/ ,/L ~ -=~ t<..,(' •.r<-- <-r-? ,r"'t, 7 ; /4... 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(1 leaf) - / / / . -7 / <et ? -·- -·-- C:; /~ ~, u / f l ~ Jc,._ '? ~ (,, ?0_/~ c c:i--l 7 ,5'<.. / 17 -~ ,..-tt'!' . : . - - - ---- ·-- - · · - - - - - - - - - - - - - -- ~oc-. r-c- a., r..,_,/- t .)I~ , ) / ~ ?! / . / c..rc.v ~~ //._ J OAJ 77/c /~/?t:J/f??pvc~ c:>~ 77rr" , I /}(,ifth('i/l'J7lt>p)( ;T//VC/73 ,v - cJ,,,C ~E ./,PH/6:-J ,,f/t;I~ I The following have been redacted from access file (PDF) due to copyright restrictions. • • Typescript, with handwritten emendations and annotation. Two reference reports on Cannibalism I. (2 leaves) Cutting (photocopy) of 'Necessity as a common law doctrine? [6.40] R v Dudley and Systems', The system of criminal law: cases and materials, 544-551. (4 leaves) The following have been redacted from access file (PDF) due to copyright restrictions. • • • Cutting (photocopy) of 20 pages from unidentified publication on Pioneers-Donner Party-The Mormons, 526-545. (10 leaves) Letter, Bill to Richard, 7 Oct 1981 re feedback on Richard Sylvan's paper on cannibalism. (2 leaves) Letter, Robert to Richard, 7 Oct 1981 re feedback on Richard Sylvan’s paper on cannibalism. (2 leaves) I I - I :/.,, f. - - - -- ----------------- - - - - - ----- ---- ----- ___________, --------- ----------·------------- - - ----- - - -- - - -- - - - - - - - -- ------ - - - - - - - - --- $ ~ /~ .2Z- - - - --- - _ _L __ /4 r<./ ...---a~ l 2, ck?- _.:., t';_.~ ~ o_ _s_ ,,. .,/:,_ ~ , {- ~ M7-e;:__ /4?-l, _:., /.: ~ / ; ~ / /--/ ,a-~~ ,4d - - ~ c 1 /dLC4'--=·- - C4--~ _,t:?~7 ,-4,-,/4._ / - /2.; ~<"F' §5 . Raising humans and other animals for food. Humans have lit tle compuncti on, for the most part, in rearing other animals for food . Since healthy animals that are raised for food often excell humans, especially humans that are "defective " in one way or another , little , except considera tions of species , seems to stand in the way of raising such humans for food . We are in the region of Swift ' s modest proposal again . What distinguis hes creatures humans (and other creatures capable of animal husbandry) are entitled to raise for food from creatures that they are not? It is not difficult to state some constrain ts on t he solution of this problem, which also rule out usual solutions . First , the distinctio n should be independe nt of reference to particula r species , especially of reference to the human species , and also indirect reference thereto, by way of phrases such as ' standard ... ' , ' normal ... . ' 'potential ... ' . Secondly - and this furnishes the ground of the first requireme nt the basis of the distinctio n should be morally relevant i n the way that mere zoologica l distinctio ns are not: otherwise chauvinism is not avoided . ' The replaceme nt principle Singer adopts for benign farmyard husbandry fails on this score , among others (the others being that many farmyard animals seem to satisfy the requireme nts for being selfconsci ous beings) . Not being selfconsc ious , which is supposed to justify replaceme nt, under ideal farming condition s , lacks requisite moral linkage . Singer ' s move does however emphasi ze ' 31. two important things . First , the familiar objections to animal husbandry, e.g. on grounds of cruelty or deprivation to animals, are remove.e\ by considering only (ideal) free-range individualised farmyard husbandry . Secondly, some distinction (fit to take its place in the annular picture) with requisite moral linkage is what is sought . Any distinction that is going to work will have to involve the capacities of the creatures concerned , in such a way that the capacities tie with moral features . The capacities concerned are, obviously, capacities connected with being aware of being raised for food . But this is not sufficiently general, being raised for killing or for cartage or for skin or fur or feathers would be similar, and similarly bad or whatever; lacks moral connection . and it still What all the cases have in common which is general, one which has (as already noted) moral connections , is being used as a means . The sought distinction is accordingly made in terms of creatures that are capable of being aware of their case primarily as means for other, for their food , etc. U-creatures, say, as opposed to A-creatures . 21 no means all, are A-creatures: infants are not . Many humans, but Why this distinction? 21 There are probably other requir e ments as we ll: e . g. that not in midst of present worthwhile projects; e.g. Mrs. Goose is not raising young, etc. The following have been redacted from access file (PDF) due to copyright restrictions. • • • • • Photocopy of Young R (1979) 'What is so wrong with killing people?', Philosophy, 54(21):515-528, https://doi.org/10.1017/S0031819100063531. (8 leaves) Cutting, Ewin R (1972) 'What is so wrong with killing people?', The Philosophical Quarterly, 22(87): 126-139, https://doi.org/10.2307/2217540. (14 leaves) Typescript (carbon copy) of untitled paper attached to Ewin cutting. (18 leaves) Photocopy of Singer P (1979) 'Killing humans and killing animals', Inquiry, 22:1-4, 145156, https://doi.org/10.1080/00201747908601869. (6 leaves) Photocopy of one page (157) from Lockwood M (1979) 'Singer on killing and the preference for Life', Inquiry, 22:1-4, 157-170, https://doi.org/10.1080/00201747908601870. (1 leaf) t . • ~ /,o.R-,4-.. ~t ~,, ,,_,;L ~ C~"'1 /C'.tt---? ,.... ,._._ ~ e.-;- __ jf1~ ~ rur 6 ""efc7'/ ~ ,,,<e,,,.,;z,r4? ~ c,,__,,,- .1 ------~ ,,-v-9"' ~ "'-<- r = c:e/4 /4--,- ~/~~-~ P.f.?4 ,..,.,,PE' r e ~ 7~~ y?f /2 ~c;k__/"7'/~ 7 ~ / 7~ / /,..,;,, ~ ,?£ / ~J" r-tr= / t:t_ ~7, /9-7 r~ o-/4-~ ,.ve- / _,/~,/ ;:7'/ /re-v -~ (~ ,,{~9 C'l<-,r /4 ~vr,, 1~ /c{. rL r ,' ~ ,~ 7-£ ~ - - ~ ~ . , , ~; / " ' - - /c~V-- ~ ~ -~ ~ L <r7J\ _0 / ~ ~~ 0 - ~ 7L 7 C-£-..,/,4c,.~~ ~~ ~ ~ ~ ~ /.? ~ ~ =,/---6-- ~ . ~(' ~ ~ cv;·n! ' To -J~ > /~&:, -6-,e> ~ ~ ~7f 7~ ~ /~~ ~,,,_7 ,;,_~ 4/ ~/ C ~~ o/· //4- ~ / ~ /~ 7~ ~ ?¼_ 11 ~ M,- '--+-€- /~1) / ~ ,~ --/?~/ 4:- ..,,.,,,, ,,./" &-"'7/<" c, /4 Ye-/ U.:.... ~ ;/ / 7'~L. . ~ ~,, i 7,2 ~ ~ .,/4 /< ; e-.,, ' ~ ;,I'£ .Y CJ/-?!' , ,_, ·/,,.r.,.-........-,. , ,,__ s « ~ ?< 0~ /~L,, ,4_._ / Cb- i,_,.__1 c-.r r~ /2 re:_ ~ h'L 7 '---71J r-"-"- 3-.. d..-. ~~:; d:....-../ ~ ~_/~ The following have been redacted from access file (PDF) due to copyright restrictions. • • • • • • Photocopy of Diamond C (1978). 'Eating meat and eating people', Philosophy, 53(206): 465-479, http://www.jstor.org/stable/3749876. (8 leaves) Photocopy from The Encyclopedia Americana (1978) 'Cannibalism', The Encyclopedia Americana, 2: 543-544. (2 leaves) Photocopy from Britannica Encyclopedia (1969) 'Cannibalism', Britannica Encyclopedia, 4: 785. (1 leaf) Photocopy from Chambers's Encyclopaedia (1966) 'Cannibalism', Chambers's Encyclopaedia, 3: 50. (1 leaf) Photocopy of Naess A (1979) 'Self‐realization in mixed communities of humans, bears, Sheep, and Wolves', Inquiry, 22:1-4, 231-241, https://doi.org/10.1080/00201747908601874. (6 leaves). Photocopy of one page (2273) from unidentified dictionary, Pre-collection to Predecree. (1 leaf) r)I':, t; 1 ·-et I r o-f 6 ?\/ih'i I Jet ~t·.?t'cc If33 •• 11t1;,.,_4,, ;; w ; ~ ) ~,,c._! / //,,,,.---: J:~w ~ J/4 ~"~t New- f'-w1r- > ~:/~4-;-, L 1/75 /I ~-~erY /, • ,I J Lcz ~ ' d cc c e::es ,f c::::e.. ~ .. . -1~ ~~ ;/w,;.,L;:;,',,,._ ,;/ a,~}:z;:__ dL-0~ " 7 1 f,t} 0 ~ ~ A. ~~ - 7'~ - . ' -f ~i,t;i,:___ ~✓~ ~~ . - - /z;j/M?!, ,<4 n/41"? r - / ·~ ·7 - Jo - ~ C:~~ - ~..,;t,J;j,,. - ... c.-C~1/~ - 7"1(~ /'<d~ ..£.... ,;:_~ 74::,,,'~ /k,,. ~~ ~ -4- . ~/17 '_ ~ 1IIE !1i l/lL/7? . ··• .,. Men have always hunted in the fields around They still do, but no • longer their own species. (K. Bell, Not in Vain, University of ~oronto Press, 1973) .,, Petigny and Falaise .  Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Box 59, Item 681: Notes and cuttings on predation (for Cannibalism II) Subject The topic of the resource Typescripts and handwritten notes. Includes copies of published works by other authors and letters. Description An account of the resource Published works and letters redacted from access file (PDF) due to copyright restrictions. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org/items/browse?search=Richard+Routley&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bjoiner%5D=and&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=&amp;range=&amp;collection=&amp;type=&amp;user=&amp;tags=&amp;public=&amp;featured=&amp;exhibit=&amp;geolocation-mapped=&amp;geolocation-address=&amp;geolocation-latitude=&amp;geolocation-longitude=&amp;geolocation-radius=10&amp;submit_search=Search+for+items">Richard Routley</a> Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <span class="MuiTypography-root-125 MuiTypography-body2-126">The University of Queensland's <a data-testid="rek-series" href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/records/search?page=1&amp;pageSize=20&amp;sortBy=score&amp;sortDirection=Desc&amp;searchQueryParams%5Brek_series%5D%5Bvalue%5D=Richard+Sylvan+Papers%2C+UQFL291&amp;searchMode=advanced">Richard Sylvan Papers UQFL291</a></span>, Box 59, Item 681 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org">Antipodean Antinuclearism: (Re)constructing Richard Routley/Sylvan's Nuclear Philosophy</a> Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource This item was identified for digitisation at the request of The University of Queensland's 2020 Fryer Library Fellow, <a href="https://najtaylor.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr. N.A.J. Taylor</a>. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource For all enquiries about this work, please contact the Fryer Library, The University of Queensland Library. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource [119] leaves. 30.57 MB. Type The nature or genre of the resource Notes and cuttings Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context <a href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:de64185">https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:de64185</a> Box 59: Nuclear Como House Como House > Cupboard > Pile 3 https://www.antipodean-antinuclearism.org/files/original/581b87e4d67a33473f084886196c0964.pdf 9c80f2dae98c9b0e7076149ee0387602 PDF Text Text ON THE ALLEGED INCONSISTENCY AND MORAL INSENSITIVITY OF PACIFISM Pacifism , despite its.revival lit the nonviolent action movement A respectable philooophieg-1 press. another, the within tradition Catholic church , It is commonly portrayed characteristically as as inconsistent. as a continues to have a bad incoherent in one way or Even philosophical defences of pacifism are liable to be extremely defensive, conceding only that consistent, and pacifism is but insisting otherwise that^is as false as a moral position can be 2 and morally insensitive . What follows challenges the prevailing wisdom put out in the philosophical press, but using its approved analytic methods. §1. Slide arguments to inconsistency;and arguments from irresponsibili ty and from rights. In an influential and widely disseminated series of articles attacking . pacficism3 , Narveson says that the pacifist's position is not only that [Tl] violence is evil but also that [T2] it is morally wrong to use force [violence] to resist, punish, or prevent violence. This further step makes pacifism a radical moral doctrine. What I shall try to establish below is that it is in fact, more than merely radical - it is actually incoherent because self-contradictory (p.408, italics added). Subsequently (p.414) he characterises pacifism by way of T2, though it would better characterised by P2. be A It is morally wrong to use violence. However T2 captures the cases that orthodox opposition. The separate comprehensive pacifism from the main form of pacifism under investigation is called 'comprehensive' to distinguish it from standard pacifism, in the usual 1 narrower �sense which is restricted to certain theses concerning (state) order, notably opposition to (violence in) war, and does not rule necessarily out violence elsewhere. Narveson's location of incoherence in pacifism depends on several connected slides, all of which the pacifist should resist - without force. The initial slide is from the theme T2 italicised above to what results by deletion the of crucial phase 'to use force', or as it should be 'to use violence', namely R2. It is morally wrong to resist, punish, or prevent violence - and similarly from special and related cases of T2 to special and related of R2 (e.g. from T2S, It is forbidden to use force to resist violence, to R2S, forbidden It is cases to violence). resist The slide is illegitimate because commitment to T2 does not entail commitment to the rejected proposition R2; for one thing there are many ways of confronting, reducing and controlling violence, worked out by pacifists and others, which do not involve use of violence (or perhaps force). The initial slide is however that assault on pacifism (after clearing Narveson several exploits confusions, explain the popularity of pacifism, out of the way). irresponsibility of pacifism, in This his first main which he takes to argument, from the does not actually lead to contradiction, but it does suggest that there is a serious tension between pacifism and any method maintaining social order, so serious that pacifism is socially irresponsible: ... to hold the pacifist position as a genuine full-blooded moral principle is to hold nobody has a right to fight back when attacked ... It means that we are all mistaken in supposing that we have the right of self-protection ... It appears to mean, for instance, that we have no right to punish criminals, that all our machinery of criminal justice is, in fact, unjust. Robbers, murderers, rapists, and miscellaneous delinquents ought, on 2 of �this [irresponsible] theory, to be let loose (pp.415-6). Since one can protect oneself and avoid and resist aggression back violence), (with pacifism unless a slide is made. (tentatively) by Nor does T1 and theses does without fighting not mean what Narveson claims it means, comprehensive .pacifism, T2 , imply that we as characterised have no right to punish criminals, but simply that such punishment will not apply violent methods. Nor does it imply that all the conventional machinery of criminal justice therefore is unjust, but only that some - perhaps a good deal - of that machinery is. One hardly needs to be a comprehensive pacifist to coherently think the latter. All this provides some confirmation for the key point, which is that far at there is, so least, no inconsistency evident in maintaining that those who hold that violent methods are morally legitimate are mistaken. The next slide is closely connected with, and really generalises upon, initial slide. The stunt is to imbue a range of more neutral terms with the connotation of -------------------------------------violence, or at least of -----------------------force which Narveson proceeds to with violence. Thus from among admissible pacifist methods. of force is taken to by implied in R2. resist cannot excluded be Hence the conflation of T2 and R2; Hence too Narveson’s assumption Hence (p.415). also Narveson’s that against attack' (pp.417-8). use a unwarranted "recharacterisation" of pacifism as the position that 'no one ought ever defended equate such activities as resisting, punishing, preventing, and defending are taken to imply (use of) force or violence, and so to pacifist the to be If the stunt were got away with, it would deprive pacifism of, for instance, the general methods of nonviolent action and defensible position. But resistance, and so render pacifism a much less positions can be defended, as in this paper or on the field, 3 without violence. �Things be can resisted, even things like arrest, without violence (e.g. sliding out of handcuffs and running away). by Force can be applied, as in opening Violence implies force, but not vice versa; and it is violence, not all applications of force, that.comprehensive pacifists are a jam jar, without violence. bound to exclude. The attempt nonviolent castrate to depriving It enjoys some popularity even any case indefensible. and by it of among those of advocating expansion of nonviolent methods, who no doubt want: to distance themselves from older standard pacifism, whose methods they see as confined to mediation, negotiation, and including the granting of concessions . compromise, But nothing in standard, range the is not confined to those who (want to) think pacifism in practices, development pacifism, so the characterisation its limits of pacifism, admissible methods: whether comprehensive or nothing exclude^ uncompromising methods and imposition of sanctions which offer no concessions. ? It is simply that standard pacifism has not yet developed its fuller potential, especially in conflict resolution. Subsequent slides in the elaboration of the argument against just variations qualifier. in those pacifism are given, writing violence-involving in as an internal Thus the measure of a person’s opposition to something in terms of ’the amount of effort he is willing to put forth against it’ is taken - somewhat perversely - to be violence-involving effort or opposition in the pacifist’s ’opposition to violence'. If this slide were pacifist would be caught in an elementary inconsistency since in case of the permissible any being opposed to violence, by definition, he is prepared to use violence and so is not opposed �Even Narveson ’cannot make too much* of this inconsistency, though to violence. it not so far removed from the alleged inconsistencies he does want to make is much of in his main inconsistency argument. A similar slide, together with a further slide, Is made in the argument based inconsistency the on to notion of rights, especially as it figures in the pacifist’s thesis as transformed to the claim that no one has a right to indulge in violence (p.418). Narveson violence in the notion of right. tries to incorporate the right to indulge in The initial move is to work in assumptions of defence from breaches of a right and of preventative action against infringement Because ’a right just is a status of it. preventative action ... does follow logically is that one has a right to whatever may be necessary what to justifying prevent necessary’ infringements of right' his (p.419). That 'whatever may be out to include force, now very generously construed - here is turns the further slide - to incorporate such things as social pressure. Moreover ’it is a logical truth, not merely a contingent one, that what might be necessary is force’ (p.421). of preventative For the presupposed logical transformations to work, the notion action must have the notion of violence built into it. argument accordingly begs the question against pacifism. it enough is for preventative To block the The argument action associated with rights to be, or to be limited to, nonviolent action. How the argument from rights leads to inconsistency is summed up thus (p.421): SAI. ’If we have any rights at all then we have a right to use force to prevent the deprivation of the thing to which we are said to have a right’. �SA2. We have, according to the pacifist ’the right not to have violence done to us’, as have the a consequence of the obligation to avoid violence. right self-contradictory, to use both violence, granting so the pacifist’s position Narveson is that 'our standard concept of rights' yields SAI (cf. right can be sustained by right-supporting or right-defending require that that action is violent. is and not granting the right to use violence. The argument fails because SAI is readily rejected. claiming But, therefore, we mistaken p.423). action in That a does not Pacifists can provide an adequate analysis of rights - essentially the usual one - without letting themselves in for SAI by 6 simply rejecting the Narveson slide . What appears in place of SAI is something like SAI#. If we have any rights at all then we have a right to uphold them. But the right to uphold them, defend them, protect them, etc., give facto, an entitlement to the use of violence. no dilemma for the pacifist. does not, ipso Without the slide there is The "pacifist's dilemma" and Narveson’s slide are two aspects of the one thing. The arguments from lesser §2. argument violence and evil. lesser In outline the - which is independent of the notion of rights - is that the pacifists must admit, in terms of their own principles, that there are cases where the use of violence those where Inconsistency would be morally permissible and morally justified. some is use of immediate violence by T2. would prevent evil, some greater violence. More explicitly, and in Narveson’s terms which also import the notion of evil, pacifists have lesser much The cases are to admit both that the use of evil, is admissible, in preventing greater evil, and that it is not admissible, because it involves violence. 6 Narveson summarizes an �argument like this as follows It seems to me logically true, in any moral theory whatever, that [LI] the lesser evil must be preferred to the greater. If the use of force by me, now, is necessary to avoid the use of more physical force (by others, perhaps) later, then to say that physical force is the supreme (kind of) evil is precisely to say that under these circumstances I am committed to the use of physical force'7. Now there are several somewhat different arguments snarled up in these sketches, p It is important to get them unsnagged , especially if a clearer view of the ethical role pacifism can assume is to result. lesser The basic argument, from violence, goes as follows Cl. There are cases where use of violence would prevent greater violence. C2. One ought to minimize violence. Therefore C3. There are cases where one ought to use violence, since in this way, in any arbitrary one of the cases indicated, violence is minimized. Therefore ~P2. It is not (always) morally wrong to use violence, contradicting the pacifist principle, P2, according which to it is morally wrong, always, to resort to violence. All the ingredients premisses, can be of argument, this together with pulled together from Narveson’s work. support for He not only expouses C2, but suggests two distinct arguments for it, the first of which connects argument with the lesser evil argument El. (Use of) violence is an evil. E2. Evil should be minimized. 9 The second argument to C2 is simply from the pacifist premiss, varying P2, 7 the the �E3. One ought not to undertake violence - period; that the is, level of violence ought to be zero. Neither argument is decisive; of that reference both in fact begin easing.pacifists into a should they resist, where moral absolutes are warped into moral relatives, where obligations give, way to obligations all, and says nothing about minimizing it when one compatible being does it. into got has E3 is directives quite different from minimization where violence is with involved, e.g. E3 things other In any event E3 only directs one not to get involved in violence at equal, etc. Thus frame rooting it out which may involve strategies. non-minimization not entail E2, and commitment to E3 does not commit pacifists to C2. Nor do El and E2 entail C2; so neither does commitment, by to El and E2 oblige them to accept C2. instance, 10 , e.g. evil-perpetrating but argument Narveson's well-known Such nonviolent fails for similar some as cases hypothetical dictators. for For in particular violence is not the only evil and (so) evil may sometimes be reduced by violence pacifists Regan’s increases in slaying of the reconstruction of Regan argues from premisses reasons. concerning the ranking of evil and a premiss like E2, specifically 3. 4. The use of force is a substantive evil. Therefore, a lesser quuantity of force must great quantity of force (Rp.79). The argument is invalid: ordering of an ordering of evils force, even though force is an evil. increasing force may still reduce evil, and so, on be preferrable \ 8 does be preferred not induce to a a similar It is enough to observe that Regan-Narveson assumptions, �Resort to the theme that Elt, Violence is an irredeemable evil in (proposed by Regan by investigated his Narveson, Np.118) irredeemable evil is figuratively (lesser or evils) whites pacifism, of "defence" promises so black Rp.80, and subsequently a way around the difficulty. that no combination (goods) will lighten its hue; with An grays it always dominates. Elt together with E2 will yield C2, but now the problem with Che argument shifts to What are the grounds for that? Elt. not widely acceptable, most people being amount of As Narveson points out (Np.119), it is prepared to countenance violence in exchange for considerable goods. some (But then, not so long ago, most people were tolerant of cruelty to animals so long as it was gross.) small /not too Moreover, so Narveson implies, appeal to Elt does not get. pacifists out of the argument from lesser violence; underwriting C2. indeed it seems to get them in deeper, by for it removes Cl and, more importantly, It does not however; the corresponding premiss of the more difficult argument from lesser evil, which starts from DI. There are cases where the use of violence would avoid greater evil. For given, by Elt, that use of greater evil than that cases such as DI requires. Rp.80ff.), which however violence is irredeemably with violence; tainted evil, there is no and there are accordingly no This is the core of Regan's defence in pacifism (see he sees as converting pacifism into a 'bizarre and vaguely ludicrous’ position (Rp.86), extreme pacifism, some of the 12 which he outlines 9 features of �The approach through violence as an irredeemable evil is mistaken a (utilitarian inspired) attempt to get at moral absolutes, which is what pacifism is, like other deontological positions, grounded upon. But such absolutes expressed in such commandments as, One ought not to commit violence, adequately meaning thereby, as it says, ought not, not just for the time being, or so as reasons prima are facie, otherwise don’t arise, or other things being equal, or acting for ought but long come not what may, period. old-fashioned Such deontological, moral absolutist positions such as pacifism is at bottom, collide head-on with utilitarianism both that pacifism'. For the moral ’utilitarianism 'that utility will be ... who is incompatible brought out by doing some violence may be greater than that produced by any alternative' he like positions and Regan (at the time) were working from. Narveson The reason for collision is simply that with malleable highly fashionable, more (Np.121) 13 . So acccording to the utilitarian-commandment to maximize utility may acts sometimes commit violence, contravening pacifist principles. On its own inconsistency with a false doctrine such as utilitarianism shows little: position every suffers inconsistency with very many false doctrines. Narveson does have another (small) argument to the effect that pacifism is at odds with contractarianism. correct, if other the the ethical positions he presents, libertarianism and But this argument would only carry weight, were it. positions were suitably exhaustive; including no deeper ecological position for instance. is more also otherwise however they are not, What has happened which insidious, however, is that utilitarian thinking has permeated much of the rest of ethical thought, thus helping to establish a climate unfavourable to incompatible ethical positions such as pacifism. 10 There are two more specific �features. damaging consequentalist Firstly, as more approaches have we of consequentialist Secondly, facie prima principles positions out utilitarianism, of This is entirely mistaken. The is a theory-saving device, designed to get difficulties such dilemmas. moral as consequentialist positions tend to suggest that only consequentialist reasons carry argumentative weight, and so try to ease rival positions, such pacifism, and generally, have made it seem as if no deontic principle were firm, but all are provisional. theory seen, into as sometimes incongruous consequential support for their offering themes. Narveson takes such procedures a assumptions upon violence is that it These (p.425). thus pacifists: produces stage further, and foists utilitarian says that the pacifist's 'objection to he suffering, unwanted pain, in the recipients' incongrous utilitarian grounds are something of a travesty of pacifists' reasons for objecting to violence, which concern rather the action involved and what it does, not astonishing such of only or always at all in the way of suffering, to the perpetrators as well as those in whom it is more type inflicted. Even utilitarian-style considerations are supposed to commit the pacifist to the follow three statements, one of which however he must deny (!): [N]l. To will the end (as mostly good) is to will the means to it (at least pjotTce prima facie). [N]2. Other things being equal, the lesser evil is to be preferred to the greater. [N]3. There are no "privileged" moral persons ... (p.425^ ' . 'These three principles' which appear in Narveson's 'sum up [of] the problem', 11 pacifist's �among them imply, as far as I can see, both the commitment to force when it is necessary to prevent more violence and also the conception of a right as an entitlement to defense. And they therefore leave pacifism, as a moral doctrine, in a logically untenable position (p.425). consequences out of the substantive terms such as implicans; otherwise but logic, It would take not merely statements ’violence’ the deal good a of magic, coax to given. For implications to hold the , /''I <</<<-</ ,■/" < F^ and ’right’ must also figure , in the just fail implications on formal grounds. intended argument to the "commitment to force” conclusion appears however to some for e.g. The be of variant, on the lesser violence argument, with N2 replacing, as it sort may C2. such (N3 and N1 then have oblique roles, N3 to stop exceptions being made oneself, N1 to ensure that violence adopted as a means has its full import, in as reflected in Cl, construction work the ethical an end). But, without need not worry pacifists; arguments much further they hardly leave pacifism as untenable. Much more threatening is the argument from lesser evil, which has yet to be This countered. is argument from DI (cases of violence to avoid greater the evil) and N2 or E2 (minimization of evil) to C3 (admissibility of violence) inconsistency in comprehensive stock examples concern murder, What are these cases^? pacifism. one of them being the Narveson’s situation where (Narveson in fact) must kill the (potential) mass-murderer B (Np.119). is the moral situation here? Narveson ought to prevent but mass-murder, that of a paradigmatic moral In fact the example is dilemma, that of very similar also The to Pedro and Jim, where Pedro volunteers to call off his firing squad about to shoot several captives 12 one But what Narveson ought not to kill B, because that is murder and involves violence. situation is that of a moral dilemma. and if Jim �one shoots Now almost everything turns on what account is given of What a comprehensive pacifist does moral dilemmas. trouble, coherence . of them is to take do, not inadequate utilitarian line of trying to the explain moral dilemmas away, as if they didn’t ever, occur an than initial intuitive negotiable, etc., etc. is as level), wants he unless if (at at least other all obligations were prime facie, The conflicting obligations stand. What is to done be however a very consequentialist thing, to try to determine the best thing to do in the circumstances. action In trying to determine what circumstances is a satisfied. violent sense this the best e.g. Narveson had better a fix. Narveson dilemma, but no B. shoot (not a deontic one) evil should be minimized; not ought circumstances, he had better do so moral of 17 . to the in course Granted, it is preferable to minimize follow that Narveson ought to resort to violence. remains course best that Suppose one, inconsistency in pacifism follows. in the principles like N2 and its mate, N2M, that it is preferrable to minimize evil, will presumably be and is evil, it does not On the contrary the situation shoot B, but in the appalling There is the real-life complication of inconsistency No a through arguments like that from lesser evil. Narveson’s jackpot question, entangled in his discussion from rights, can now be met. of the argument The question presents a dilemma: If force is the only way to prevent violence in a given case, use justified in that case? (p.420) is its Narveson is thinking of cases where one is about to be murdered, Regan where one is to be raped. qualified No: Given that force again entails violence, the pacifist answer is No, it is not deontically 13 justified 18 . It is certainly not �morally it is not justified in the sense of ’justified* which and obligatory, reflects its deontic origin in ’making right*. may and because just some might force in solution, a making to amount dilemma be out But justification is The response is qualified then a case. consequentially situation. ambiguous, as justified, a second-best Narveson, proposes on the contrary, that enough violence for the given occasion is morally justified - it can go at least as as killing another person - but he presents no back-up argument, taking far his proposal as evident. jackpot the question As it is not - the pacifist can simply does not dispute it to a decisive a^rument against pacifism lead (though Narveson gives the impression that it does, e.g. , p.423). What it can lead to is the argument from lesser evil over again. The charge of moral insensitivity. §3. This is less argument an than a damaging charge: A person committed to an extreme pacifism, though he need make no logical mistake, yet lacks a fully developed moral sensitivity to the vagaries and complexities of human existence (Rp.86). The smear is not without basis. is applied avert to greater Regan is envisaging situations evil; where violence and he points to what he takes to be the evident moral permissibility of a woman's using ’what physical power she has free herself from an Interestingly, Regan has not aspiring rapist* (Rp.86). described the situation in a way which is incompatible with there is violence, which implies What is at issue the intentional, non-negligible damage, including pain, injury or (cf. a pacifist stand: nothing in that to prevent a woman wriggling free (even in a way that involves some force) and fleeing. using to is (or death, the permissibility of infliction of wilful) by forceful means / Np.110), that is, which involves much more than mere use of physical force �And it is by no means so or power. violence inflict upon evident A rapist. aspiring the the that woman is entitled to can hardly now be pacifist accused, in a way that can be made to stick, of crass moral insensitivity. More generally, arguments pacifism, the on like Regan’s the to insensitivity moral of basis of pacifists' not taking obvious steps to prevent evil I occurrences, depend upon a confusion of passivity and pacifity. Narveson p.425) (e.g. Both Regan and assume that pacifism is a passive do-nothing position. 20 This is far from true, as the variety of nonviolent action methods groups has made plain. comprehend the real possibilities of considered or adopted by Neither Regan nor Narveson correctly nonviolent action. Otherwise, Narveson would hardly be able to assert, in the automatic (but carping) way he does, that the pacifist is Narveson's standing negative later 'not by doing assessment does not change the situation: anything about’ violence (p.425). of what he calls 'poslLlve nonviolence' for this positive approach is simply nonviolence practised in an exemplary way, as by Christ, in the hope that others will follow suit, and fails to recognise the potential of nonviolent training and the and effectiveness when assembled 21 , of nonviolent practices. much reduce the impact scope Fuller details of these practices, of the argument from social irresponsiblity, which is part of what lies behind the change of insensitivity. Pacifism, however, like most positions, has them 22 its weaknesses, one of undoubtedly derives from the fact that violence is a quantitative matter and there is no sharp cut-off point at the bottom end of the amounts and of violence greater than zero. Yet scale with minute (non-foot-in-the-door ) amounts do not seem to matter all that much morally, at least compared with 15 small the �that evils gross us confront on most sides when we look. Morally sensitive pacifists will not focus or fixate on small quantities of violence to the of exclusion larger moral They problems. give certainly will understood that by ’violence' in principles such as. P2 mean they it undue to be 'non-trivial violence'. §4. and The argument from radical political corollaries The corollaries. out war by definition. so clear. Although War situations? normally would Standard war always would be what excluded, be morally counted brought progressively then second dilemma the impermissible, best but in thing to closer to Comprehensive pacifism can of course extreme principles emphasizing the evil of violence. weighing of Comprehensive pacifism thus does not include standard A strange pacifism! pacifism, in contrast to extreme pacifism. be pacifism But the position of comprehensive pacifism is not exceptional extenuating circumstances it might be the (second-) do. awkward of extreme pacifism would certainly eliminate war. practice For war involves violence, typically on an extensive scale. takes other from best choices will pacifism, in practice, through If evil is given a suitably yield the large same results as extreme A pacifism does (deontically), and entirely exclude war. Now it can hardly be cogently argued that it tells against pacifism that it would eliminate wars, since wars are exchanges that should certainly be avoided at all reasonable costs; nor therefore can an argument Wz/Acuf desirability fHur/l of war as an institution against pacifism,! mounted from the or Cldc. However wars are by no be means the only social arrangements or institutions which dispense^ or rely u violence extensively. The state and many of its institutions, most obviously �police inadmissibility of characteriscally are contraposition do. also forces, coercive 23 institutions and hence ; pacifism Comprehensive it as such implies police anarchism provides no refutation of pacifism.. the implies 24 moral forces and states But once again For anarchism itself is (to 25 stick with a bold claim) irrefutable Pacifism as an ideal brought not is .down by its political corollaries. Pacifism yields not only a qualified anarchism but qualified vegetarianism. While does it not eating of meat, it does morally forbid violence to forbid animals. At least it does this so long as what normally counts as violence, animals, continues to rank as valence, and is not removed from the category by restriction of the application of violence to humans little good for however basis corollaries naturally spread suicide, capt^al euthenasia, (or such a chauvinistic restriction. several into punishment, controversial indeed There persons). is The radical moral, wherever to e.g. areas, violence plays a significant role in many cases'1. The sheer moral power of pacifism is one reason /7j Qc4> for giving it some pause. And there are others. / One is that, like vegetarianism, it runs counter to "natural" behaviour of creatures to which the principles are supposed to apply. Aggression is a fairly S' X common feature of animal and human behavioZur, and it sometimes (though by no means so often is as made out) involves violence. /Ze /cVXC o/1 //>£ Ao'jje.tjw enable ct/ony Ac /Aggression is assumed to be an evolutionary adaption /ZeSG- creatures offspring) in their artificial h to be better natural environments fitted environment. substantially 17 developed to for survival (of themselves and their most humans removed from now live situations in for rather which �there is no way they are evolution gradually adapted their features: adapt in time to absorb massive doses of radiation for instance. have substantially living their adjusted adjust environment, along so with ^oing to Much as humans should they it their social practices - including aggressive and violent practices, now ill-adapted to their situation and mostly counter productive. There is a residual problem, practices of living creatures like in that confronting natural (relatively) vegetarianism. conditions, such as predators and tribal people, to be condemned as morally wrong when they Sometimes, violence? involve when the violence grossly exceeds what is required yes, Though a way can be beaten around the given the end to be attained; but always? edge of this problem Are 26 it is an unsatisfactory way. What this suggests is that <u t be^t nonviolence is not an absolute but^an ideal. The arguments for nonviolence which are mostly violence and do not strictly suggest a to apply since it in creatures natural surroundings opens door the a approaches would categorically exclude. chink to other options The further suggestion that emerges is that moral thinking and associated principles in this area are pretty primitive aimed, among principles state; other than P2. and what - But the suggestion is a dangerous one, sort of conclusion. similar practically at least, nonviolent arguments which do not exclude occasional uses of practical is things, at sharper, This is to in a called for is much more investigation more concede an sensitive, attentuated and less charge insensitivity against comprehensive pacifism so long as P2 remains blanket of moral unqualified. There is no reason however why a genuine pacifism (making for real peace) should not be built on a modified version of P2 which permits such natural phenomena as predation. Nothing logically rules 18 out such a genuine and more sensitive �pacifism 27 There are other requiriments the position to be worked out should meet. in should, particular, be integrated into a Larger framework of nondestructive practices, which are involve violence, e.g. a of a practices metaphorically, damaging wild nonviolent* practices. are practices But, except destructive to the environment, for instance, do not such river, with piece things dumping vandalism. wastes toxic But mining strip as extended sense, which gets beyond the confines these It of in a valley, fertile in streams and oceans. the property In an picture, all even metaphorically, vandalism does not such cover violence against persons (and certainly not nonphysical violence as I "psychological violence"). What is sought /is an appropriate synthesis of these notions covering destructive practices - and better than 'vandolence'. an Then P2 is superseded accompanying synthetic term, 4/Z2°. It is morally wrong to use vandolence./ It remains to characterise the cluster of destructive practices (/V that count as vandolence and to try to justify the principle - no easy tasks. FOOTNOTES 1. ’a valid Christian According to the US Catholic Bishops, pacifism is to Christ and the early long tradition going back position’, with a lifestyle: see Origins Christians who were committed to a nonviolent pp.310-311. 2. Thus, in particular, T. Regan ’A defence of pacifism', Canadian Journal of Philosophy 11 (1972) 73-86. Page references to this article are prefixed by _ 3. J. Narveson 'Pacifism: a philosophical analysis’, Ethics 75 (1968) and ’Is pacifism consistent’, Ethics 78 (1868). The first article is reprinted in War and Morality (ed. R. Wasserstrom) Wadsworth, Belmont, California, T97O7 pp.63-77. The first article is also rewritten and combined with part of the second in 'Pacifism: a philosophical analysis’, Moral Problems (ed. 19 77ju / /A ZAC A IZ(M2 �J. Rachels), Third Edition, Harper .Row, New York, 1979, pp.408-425. Page references without further citation are to this latter article. Narveson's theme that pacifism is incoherent is headlined and further elaborated in his ’Violence and war’, Matters of Life and Death (ed. T. Regan), Temple University Press, Philadelphia, 1980, pp.109-147. Page references prefixed by 'N' are to this article. 4. Pacifism, as involving the active use of defensive methods, can be traced back as far as the Mohist philosophers of ancient China. On modern methods see especially G. Sharp, Exploring Nonviolent Alternatives, Boston, 1971. As will emerge, it is important to distinguish fas Narveson does not in his earlier work) force from violence; they not equivalent. /\ 5. Thus, e.g., G. Sharp in several works: see for instance the unduly narrow definition of pacifism given in Social Power and Political Freedom, Porter Sargent Publishers, Boston, 1980, p.198. 6. Narveson, in responding to a suggestion of Armour (pp.423-4) sees nothing between (0) defence of rights, with the slide to violence in, and (1) nothing really answering to rights at all, where words like 'rights’ occur without stuffing. This shows a serious blindspot. What lies in between are a range of notions which do not guarantee the slide to violence. An account of rights which will serve is that given in R. and V. Routley ’Human chauvinism and environment ethics' in Environmental Philosophy (ed. D. Mannison and others) Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University, 1980; see especially p. Narveson 'Is pacifism inconsistent' Ethics 78 (1968) p.148. 7. J. 8. Without getting into the level of complication, not to say epicycling, that Regan lands himself in: he is obliged to distinguish three mirage-like senses of 'lesser evil': quantitative, qualitative, and resultant (Rp.78). 9. See Np.127 where it is asserted that violence as a source of evil should be minimized, and Np.119> where the point is put in terms of absolute evil. That way of putting it already starts to give the game away, since Narveson is all too evidently interested in negotiable evil which can be traded off against other evils. 10. An argument like the argument from lesser violence itself would appear to undercut the argument for El and E2 to premiss 02 for the argument for lesser violence. 11. That is by no means the onlyelement in Regan's torturous reformulation of Narveson's argument that can be faulted. Consider, for example, premiss '5. If any given action, A, is necessary to bring about a lesser rather than a greater quantity of qualitatively equivalent evil, then one's obligation is to do A.' While the premiss has considerable appeal as a principle of supererogation, there is little reason to accept it as one supplying obligations. 20 �12. Extreme pacifism can be seen as taking the rule that one ought never to use violence as having priority over all other moral rules - which Is indeed an extreme position even if a consistent one. Such a priority rule is an unsatisfactory way to deal with moral dilemmas. 13. To show what Narveson goes on to claim that people are sometimes justified in using force rather more is required, as Regan points out, Rp 85, n.18. It has also to be shown that there are cases of these types (as in Cl) and that agents can know that use of force will increase utility, reduce evil, etc. A pacifist, rightly sceptical of utilitarian tracing of consequences, and fond of noting that violence begets violence, could, with a small dose of scepticism also, dig in at this point and claim that because no one can be sure that use of force will reduce evil, so no one is justified in using force. This is sceptically-based pacifism. 14. Narveson also wants to contend that ’all of these may be defended on purely logical or "meta-ethical" grounds’. This is likely false, especially the claim as to logical status, since some of the principles are rejected in substantive ethical theories. 15. A surprising feature of Narveson’s argument, also Regan’s "reconstruction", is that these cases are nowhere in sight, as if again one got to conclusions logically out of the air, without any of the hard work the cases involve. 16. The example was first discussed in B. 17. This terminology matches the account of moral dilemma, given in much more technical detail in R. Routley and V. Plumwood ’Moral dilemmas and the logic of deontic notions’ in Paraconsistent Logic (ed. G. Priest and others) 1983, to appear. 18. An extreme pacifist would answer with an unqualified No. 19. Directed against other creatures and more generally against ecological systems such as ecosystems which can be hurt. There is a difference here between live(go al-direct ed")~systerns and property, and comprehensive pacifism does not necessarily exclude wilful damage to property. Thus eco-pacifists may destroy, or at least disable, bulldozers but not harm those who use bulldozers to destroy habitat. However sensitive eco-pacifists will not condone "violent" destruction of property either: disab^ling of equipment is different. 20. The methods also include anticipatory action, e.g., the policemen going off to enact violence find their vehicles won’t start, e.g. because components have been removed 21 the peace movement should be preparing for B. Martin ’How See e.g of Peace Proposals 13 (1982) 149-159, and references Bulletin war ’ nuclear cited therein pp.152-3. Williams, //.( Zc (V, /, ( 1 J n l »' /? o C-, / / /' /\ <. ? / < / / i ’'i *7 z* //4 ’Conflict: of values’. �22. Another comes from the necessary circumscription of permissible nonviolent action, to ensure that it does not include actions worse than nontrivial violent action. 23. These organisations may be ruled out directly as violence-dispensing or else because they have individuals, delegates, who effect violence on their behalf. 24. In the sufficiently comprehensive form that the coercive state is without moral basis or legitimacy. Of course the "state" may have nonviolent methods available to it; it may not be a purely voluntary arrangement. 25. See R. Routley and V. Alternatives, (1982). 26. As Singer has in the analogous case of vegetarianism. 27. The position has been called 'pacificism*. Plumwood 'The irrefutability of 22 anarchism’, Social �On the alleged impracticality of pacifism in the real world. Appendix §5. Even if it is conceded that pacifism is a viable moral ideal, that it does not fall down as incoherent or ludicrous, still the feasibility of pacifism as a sensible practice to live by will bo contested - despite, or perhaps because of, major examples such as Christ and Gandhi. And it has to be admitted that the real world, with all its horror and squalor, does put pacifism to severe tests. Nowhere is the practice of nonviolence than in replacing war \ succeed usually been given a dress rehearsal. defence of a region can vary convention observed is or less likely to Yet nonviolent defence methods, to replace the 2 detail , usual violent methods, have been described in some never thought though they have The prospects for success of nonviolent significantly, depending upon whether the war If the convention Is observed then pacifism not. stands reasonable prospects of success. The difficult cases are where the war convention unleashed, perhaps broken, is in massive ways, on noncombatants. his superficially sympathetic sketch and assessment of resistance, 'success ... may all sorts of this: According to Walzer, in nonviolent defence and This is presumably false. that The invaders may give up and depart reasons, some of them irrelevant, e.g., they needed a quick decisive victory, they got homesick. like is attained - there is never any guarantee of it, without or with be war - even if some conventions are flouted. for violence is possible only if the invaders are committed to the 3 war convention - and they won’t always be’ (Wp.331~). Success and sufficiently What Walzer no doubt ruthless invaders sufficient time and sufficient support lines, etc. 23 means is something in sufficient numbers with can eventually succeed. But �sort of thing is also true even if the defending side resorts to violence. that The difference lies in the pattern of events; is more difficult and costly for if the defence is invaders the to well-armed it with and easier start afterwards than with well-prepared civil resistance-. Walzer is thinking, however, like many who jump to the that conclusion nonviolent defence cannot succeed when the war convention is abandoned, in terms of inappropriate examples. command, total in the He is thinking of an extreme totalitarian state, way the Nazis were in Germany, the Jews of Germany The providing the model of the enslaved population, the ’‘resistance". is highly misleading. picture The Nazis, who never invaded Germany, were in control of all the infrastructure and had the cooperation (at least) of the bulk of the For Walzer‘s comparison to work, there would have to be an enormous population. occupying army which took over and managed all key infrastructure. island With such as Australia it is not even so clear that this is logistically territories feasible against a largely united and actively resisting of impression in the acquiscence (e.g. resistance Walzer's population. fragmenting and the populace moving into dulled Wp.332) might have got things the wrong way around, the test with 4 disbelieving and frustrated soldiers ready to leave . Nonviolent resistance is however unlikely to be put adequate way in present state-determined prepared to risk training its populace (civil defence the police: is different). in to any No state would be circumstances. full in action nonviolent techniques It would then be. all to easy for them to "rout" civil obedience, for example, could no longer customary violent means. 24 be ensured by the �FOOTNOTES The replacement of the state is considered op.cit. For example, in Sharp, op.cit. given there. See also in Routley Martin, All page references prefixed by ’W’ are to M. Allen Lane, London, 1977. and op.cit., Plumwood, and 82, references Walzer, Just and Unjust: Wars, The argument suggested in Walzer (e.g. p.333) that nonviolent methods would increase evil, or at least its distribution, is weak. It is countered by Sharp’s observation that the suffering likely to be induced is less than in comparable wars. �§6. On the positive case for pacifism. defensive, meeting itself is revealing. deviations enough: a The argument thus far has been largely That in of objections to comprehensive pacifism. range Pacifism is the rest position from it are what require explanation. and state) (inertial -The reason for this is simple violence is, on most ethical systems, at least a prima facie evil, so use of it has to be justified. Positive arguments for pacifdism position and merely try supposed to be justified. violent opponent: to can advantage take of privileged dispose of "exceptional cases" where violence is The favourite exception is self-defence against a the case is curious in that the defender (person or nation) is already in a morally-excluded situation, since the attacker moral bounds. its has overstepped Still the defender is not normally committed to violence whatever he does - as in a dilemma situation. And since it is at least facie prima wrong, and he does not have to use it, he should not resort to it. An elementary syllogistic argument, given by Narveson (Np.117), can be adapted to give a similar result:Violence is (intrinsically) wrong Violence in any excepted cases (e.g. self-defence) is still violence Violence in any excepted cases is still (intrinsically) wrong. Naturally those opposed to pacifism will challenge the first premiss, and a dialectic already glimpsed will begin. None of the arguments are arguments for pacifism are conclusive, since even where deductively tight assumptions can be challenged (as above). are all the arguments for pacificism particularly good ones. 26 One of the Nor poorer �positive arguments for pacifism, for example, makes similar assumptions to those of the classic theory of war, namely that once war is embarked upon it cannot be limited, the e.g. that hope or nuclear selectively and restrictively is an illusion, (moral) limits in Although the chances overstated. war - of whatever they eXcalation are exchanges Limited escalation are be used inevitable. The weapons chemical is will - are bound to be overstepped. often real enough, and confrontation are possible. more social arrangements and much more conventional than the the case is Wars are much theory classical Wars can, for example, be started and stopped in midstream should more allows. important things intervene (e.g. pollution a crisis affecting other neighbouring states). The main reasons for pacifism are, inevitably, those for nonviolence. They include (as support for the first premiss above) a range of consequentialist and practical reasons, e.g. suffering of modern industrial societies, the broader popular avoidance and anguish of support base obtained None of these well-known types are separately decisive, but their cumulative effect is considerable. ' Cz/ // Z'1 1 Is Ct' i L> ) s' *4 / / 27 — > A by of violence, the desirable social consequences of nonviolence such as a more open, less furtive, society. ) violent futility and counterproductiveness of violence within the setting the methods, the cost in pain, ? . z.. z . of reason � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Draft Papers Description An account of the resource Sylvan's literary executor encountered an archive in which “all his projects were current", since manuscripts were undated and unattributed. Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Text Any textual data included in the document ON THE ALLEGED INCONSISTENCY AND MORAL INSENSITIVITY OF PACIFISM Pacifism , despite its.revival lit the nonviolent action movement A respectable philooophieg-1 press. another, the within tradition Catholic church , It is commonly portrayed characteristically as as inconsistent. as a continues to have a bad incoherent in one way or Even philosophical defences of pacifism are liable to be extremely defensive, conceding only that consistent, and pacifism is but insisting otherwise that^is as false as a moral position can be 2 and morally insensitive . What follows challenges the prevailing wisdom put out in the philosophical press, but using its approved analytic methods. §1. Slide arguments to inconsistency;and arguments from irresponsibili ty and from rights. In an influential and widely disseminated series of articles attacking . pacficism3 , Narveson says that the pacifist's position is not only that [Tl] violence is evil but also that [T2] it is morally wrong to use force [violence] to resist, punish, or prevent violence. This further step makes pacifism a radical moral doctrine. What I shall try to establish below is that it is in fact, more than merely radical - it is actually incoherent because self-contradictory (p.408, italics added). Subsequently (p.414) he characterises pacifism by way of T2, though it would better characterised by P2. be A It is morally wrong to use violence. However T2 captures the cases that orthodox opposition. The separate comprehensive pacifism from the main form of pacifism under investigation is called 'comprehensive' to distinguish it from standard pacifism, in the usual 1 narrower sense which is restricted to certain theses concerning (state) order, notably opposition to (violence in) war, and does not rule necessarily out violence elsewhere. Narveson's location of incoherence in pacifism depends on several connected slides, all of which the pacifist should resist - without force. The initial slide is from the theme T2 italicised above to what results by deletion the of crucial phase 'to use force', or as it should be 'to use violence', namely R2. It is morally wrong to resist, punish, or prevent violence - and similarly from special and related cases of T2 to special and related of R2 (e.g. from T2S, It is forbidden to use force to resist violence, to R2S, forbidden It is cases to violence). resist The slide is illegitimate because commitment to T2 does not entail commitment to the rejected proposition R2; for one thing there are many ways of confronting, reducing and controlling violence, worked out by pacifists and others, which do not involve use of violence (or perhaps force). The initial slide is however that assault on pacifism (after clearing Narveson several exploits confusions, explain the popularity of pacifism, out of the way). irresponsibility of pacifism, in This his first main which he takes to argument, from the does not actually lead to contradiction, but it does suggest that there is a serious tension between pacifism and any method maintaining social order, so serious that pacifism is socially irresponsible: ... to hold the pacifist position as a genuine full-blooded moral principle is to hold nobody has a right to fight back when attacked ... It means that we are all mistaken in supposing that we have the right of self-protection ... It appears to mean, for instance, that we have no right to punish criminals, that all our machinery of criminal justice is, in fact, unjust. Robbers, murderers, rapists, and miscellaneous delinquents ought, on 2 of this [irresponsible] theory, to be let loose (pp.415-6). Since one can protect oneself and avoid and resist aggression back violence), (with pacifism unless a slide is made. (tentatively) by Nor does T1 and theses does without fighting not mean what Narveson claims it means, comprehensive .pacifism, T2 , imply that we as characterised have no right to punish criminals, but simply that such punishment will not apply violent methods. Nor does it imply that all the conventional machinery of criminal justice therefore is unjust, but only that some - perhaps a good deal - of that machinery is. One hardly needs to be a comprehensive pacifist to coherently think the latter. All this provides some confirmation for the key point, which is that far at there is, so least, no inconsistency evident in maintaining that those who hold that violent methods are morally legitimate are mistaken. The next slide is closely connected with, and really generalises upon, initial slide. The stunt is to imbue a range of more neutral terms with the connotation of -------------------------------------violence, or at least of -----------------------force which Narveson proceeds to with violence. Thus from among admissible pacifist methods. of force is taken to by implied in R2. resist cannot excluded be Hence the conflation of T2 and R2; Hence too Narveson’s assumption Hence (p.415). also Narveson’s that against attack' (pp.417-8). use a unwarranted "recharacterisation" of pacifism as the position that 'no one ought ever defended equate such activities as resisting, punishing, preventing, and defending are taken to imply (use of) force or violence, and so to pacifist the to be If the stunt were got away with, it would deprive pacifism of, for instance, the general methods of nonviolent action and defensible position. But resistance, and so render pacifism a much less positions can be defended, as in this paper or on the field, 3 without violence. Things be can resisted, even things like arrest, without violence (e.g. sliding out of handcuffs and running away). by Force can be applied, as in opening Violence implies force, but not vice versa; and it is violence, not all applications of force, that.comprehensive pacifists are a jam jar, without violence. bound to exclude. The attempt nonviolent castrate to depriving It enjoys some popularity even any case indefensible. and by it of among those of advocating expansion of nonviolent methods, who no doubt want: to distance themselves from older standard pacifism, whose methods they see as confined to mediation, negotiation, and including the granting of concessions . compromise, But nothing in standard, range the is not confined to those who (want to) think pacifism in practices, development pacifism, so the characterisation its limits of pacifism, admissible methods: whether comprehensive or nothing exclude^ uncompromising methods and imposition of sanctions which offer no concessions. ? It is simply that standard pacifism has not yet developed its fuller potential, especially in conflict resolution. Subsequent slides in the elaboration of the argument against just variations qualifier. in those pacifism are given, writing violence-involving in as an internal Thus the measure of a person’s opposition to something in terms of ’the amount of effort he is willing to put forth against it’ is taken - somewhat perversely - to be violence-involving effort or opposition in the pacifist’s ’opposition to violence'. If this slide were pacifist would be caught in an elementary inconsistency since in case of the permissible any being opposed to violence, by definition, he is prepared to use violence and so is not opposed Even Narveson ’cannot make too much* of this inconsistency, though to violence. it not so far removed from the alleged inconsistencies he does want to make is much of in his main inconsistency argument. A similar slide, together with a further slide, Is made in the argument based inconsistency the on to notion of rights, especially as it figures in the pacifist’s thesis as transformed to the claim that no one has a right to indulge in violence (p.418). Narveson violence in the notion of right. tries to incorporate the right to indulge in The initial move is to work in assumptions of defence from breaches of a right and of preventative action against infringement Because ’a right just is a status of it. preventative action ... does follow logically is that one has a right to whatever may be necessary what to justifying prevent necessary’ infringements of right' his (p.419). That 'whatever may be out to include force, now very generously construed - here is turns the further slide - to incorporate such things as social pressure. Moreover ’it is a logical truth, not merely a contingent one, that what might be necessary is force’ (p.421). of preventative For the presupposed logical transformations to work, the notion action must have the notion of violence built into it. argument accordingly begs the question against pacifism. it enough is for preventative To block the The argument action associated with rights to be, or to be limited to, nonviolent action. How the argument from rights leads to inconsistency is summed up thus (p.421): SAI. ’If we have any rights at all then we have a right to use force to prevent the deprivation of the thing to which we are said to have a right’. SA2. We have, according to the pacifist ’the right not to have violence done to us’, as have the a consequence of the obligation to avoid violence. right self-contradictory, to use both violence, granting so the pacifist’s position Narveson is that 'our standard concept of rights' yields SAI (cf. right can be sustained by right-supporting or right-defending require that that action is violent. is and not granting the right to use violence. The argument fails because SAI is readily rejected. claiming But, therefore, we mistaken p.423). action in That a does not Pacifists can provide an adequate analysis of rights - essentially the usual one - without letting themselves in for SAI by 6 simply rejecting the Narveson slide . What appears in place of SAI is something like SAI#. If we have any rights at all then we have a right to uphold them. But the right to uphold them, defend them, protect them, etc., give facto, an entitlement to the use of violence. no dilemma for the pacifist. does not, ipso Without the slide there is The "pacifist's dilemma" and Narveson’s slide are two aspects of the one thing. The arguments from lesser §2. argument violence and evil. lesser In outline the - which is independent of the notion of rights - is that the pacifists must admit, in terms of their own principles, that there are cases where the use of violence those where Inconsistency would be morally permissible and morally justified. some is use of immediate violence by T2. would prevent evil, some greater violence. More explicitly, and in Narveson’s terms which also import the notion of evil, pacifists have lesser much The cases are to admit both that the use of evil, is admissible, in preventing greater evil, and that it is not admissible, because it involves violence. 6 Narveson summarizes an argument like this as follows It seems to me logically true, in any moral theory whatever, that [LI] the lesser evil must be preferred to the greater. If the use of force by me, now, is necessary to avoid the use of more physical force (by others, perhaps) later, then to say that physical force is the supreme (kind of) evil is precisely to say that under these circumstances I am committed to the use of physical force'7. Now there are several somewhat different arguments snarled up in these sketches, p It is important to get them unsnagged , especially if a clearer view of the ethical role pacifism can assume is to result. lesser The basic argument, from violence, goes as follows Cl. There are cases where use of violence would prevent greater violence. C2. One ought to minimize violence. Therefore C3. There are cases where one ought to use violence, since in this way, in any arbitrary one of the cases indicated, violence is minimized. Therefore ~P2. It is not (always) morally wrong to use violence, contradicting the pacifist principle, P2, according which to it is morally wrong, always, to resort to violence. All the ingredients premisses, can be of argument, this together with pulled together from Narveson’s work. support for He not only expouses C2, but suggests two distinct arguments for it, the first of which connects argument with the lesser evil argument El. (Use of) violence is an evil. E2. Evil should be minimized. 9 The second argument to C2 is simply from the pacifist premiss, varying P2, 7 the the E3. One ought not to undertake violence - period; that the is, level of violence ought to be zero. Neither argument is decisive; of that reference both in fact begin easing.pacifists into a should they resist, where moral absolutes are warped into moral relatives, where obligations give, way to obligations all, and says nothing about minimizing it when one compatible being does it. into got has E3 is directives quite different from minimization where violence is with involved, e.g. E3 things other In any event E3 only directs one not to get involved in violence at equal, etc. Thus frame rooting it out which may involve strategies. non-minimization not entail E2, and commitment to E3 does not commit pacifists to C2. Nor do El and E2 entail C2; so neither does commitment, by to El and E2 oblige them to accept C2. instance, 10 , e.g. evil-perpetrating but argument Narveson's well-known Such nonviolent fails for similar some as cases hypothetical dictators. for For in particular violence is not the only evil and (so) evil may sometimes be reduced by violence pacifists Regan’s increases in slaying of the reconstruction of Regan argues from premisses reasons. concerning the ranking of evil and a premiss like E2, specifically 3. 4. The use of force is a substantive evil. Therefore, a lesser quuantity of force must great quantity of force (Rp.79). The argument is invalid: ordering of an ordering of evils force, even though force is an evil. increasing force may still reduce evil, and so, on be preferrable \ 8 does be preferred not induce to a a similar It is enough to observe that Regan-Narveson assumptions, Resort to the theme that Elt, Violence is an irredeemable evil in (proposed by Regan by investigated his Narveson, Np.118) irredeemable evil is figuratively (lesser or evils) whites pacifism, of "defence" promises so black Rp.80, and subsequently a way around the difficulty. that no combination (goods) will lighten its hue; with An grays it always dominates. Elt together with E2 will yield C2, but now the problem with Che argument shifts to What are the grounds for that? Elt. not widely acceptable, most people being amount of As Narveson points out (Np.119), it is prepared to countenance violence in exchange for considerable goods. some (But then, not so long ago, most people were tolerant of cruelty to animals so long as it was gross.) small /not too Moreover, so Narveson implies, appeal to Elt does not get. pacifists out of the argument from lesser violence; underwriting C2. indeed it seems to get them in deeper, by for it removes Cl and, more importantly, It does not however; the corresponding premiss of the more difficult argument from lesser evil, which starts from DI. There are cases where the use of violence would avoid greater evil. For given, by Elt, that use of greater evil than that cases such as DI requires. Rp.80ff.), which however violence is irredeemably with violence; tainted evil, there is no and there are accordingly no This is the core of Regan's defence in pacifism (see he sees as converting pacifism into a 'bizarre and vaguely ludicrous’ position (Rp.86), extreme pacifism, some of the 12 which he outlines 9 features of The approach through violence as an irredeemable evil is mistaken a (utilitarian inspired) attempt to get at moral absolutes, which is what pacifism is, like other deontological positions, grounded upon. But such absolutes expressed in such commandments as, One ought not to commit violence, adequately meaning thereby, as it says, ought not, not just for the time being, or so as reasons prima are facie, otherwise don’t arise, or other things being equal, or acting for ought but long come not what may, period. old-fashioned Such deontological, moral absolutist positions such as pacifism is at bottom, collide head-on with utilitarianism both that pacifism'. For the moral ’utilitarianism 'that utility will be ... who is incompatible brought out by doing some violence may be greater than that produced by any alternative' he like positions and Regan (at the time) were working from. Narveson The reason for collision is simply that with malleable highly fashionable, more (Np.121) 13 . So acccording to the utilitarian-commandment to maximize utility may acts sometimes commit violence, contravening pacifist principles. On its own inconsistency with a false doctrine such as utilitarianism shows little: position every suffers inconsistency with very many false doctrines. Narveson does have another (small) argument to the effect that pacifism is at odds with contractarianism. correct, if other the the ethical positions he presents, libertarianism and But this argument would only carry weight, were it. positions were suitably exhaustive; including no deeper ecological position for instance. is more also otherwise however they are not, What has happened which insidious, however, is that utilitarian thinking has permeated much of the rest of ethical thought, thus helping to establish a climate unfavourable to incompatible ethical positions such as pacifism. 10 There are two more specific features. damaging consequentalist Firstly, as more approaches have we of consequentialist Secondly, facie prima principles positions out utilitarianism, of This is entirely mistaken. The is a theory-saving device, designed to get difficulties such dilemmas. moral as consequentialist positions tend to suggest that only consequentialist reasons carry argumentative weight, and so try to ease rival positions, such pacifism, and generally, have made it seem as if no deontic principle were firm, but all are provisional. theory seen, into as sometimes incongruous consequential support for their offering themes. Narveson takes such procedures a assumptions upon violence is that it These (p.425). thus pacifists: produces stage further, and foists utilitarian says that the pacifist's 'objection to he suffering, unwanted pain, in the recipients' incongrous utilitarian grounds are something of a travesty of pacifists' reasons for objecting to violence, which concern rather the action involved and what it does, not astonishing such of only or always at all in the way of suffering, to the perpetrators as well as those in whom it is more type inflicted. Even utilitarian-style considerations are supposed to commit the pacifist to the follow three statements, one of which however he must deny (!): [N]l. To will the end (as mostly good) is to will the means to it (at least pjotTce prima facie). [N]2. Other things being equal, the lesser evil is to be preferred to the greater. [N]3. There are no "privileged" moral persons ... (p.425^ ' . 'These three principles' which appear in Narveson's 'sum up [of] the problem', 11 pacifist's among them imply, as far as I can see, both the commitment to force when it is necessary to prevent more violence and also the conception of a right as an entitlement to defense. And they therefore leave pacifism, as a moral doctrine, in a logically untenable position (p.425). consequences out of the substantive terms such as implicans; otherwise but logic, It would take not merely statements ’violence’ the deal good a of magic, coax to given. For implications to hold the , /''I <</<<-</ ,■/" < F^ and ’right’ must also figure , in the just fail implications on formal grounds. intended argument to the "commitment to force” conclusion appears however to some for e.g. The be of variant, on the lesser violence argument, with N2 replacing, as it sort may C2. such (N3 and N1 then have oblique roles, N3 to stop exceptions being made oneself, N1 to ensure that violence adopted as a means has its full import, in as reflected in Cl, construction work the ethical an end). But, without need not worry pacifists; arguments much further they hardly leave pacifism as untenable. Much more threatening is the argument from lesser evil, which has yet to be This countered. is argument from DI (cases of violence to avoid greater the evil) and N2 or E2 (minimization of evil) to C3 (admissibility of violence) inconsistency in comprehensive stock examples concern murder, What are these cases^? pacifism. one of them being the Narveson’s situation where (Narveson in fact) must kill the (potential) mass-murderer B (Np.119). is the moral situation here? Narveson ought to prevent but mass-murder, that of a paradigmatic moral In fact the example is dilemma, that of very similar also The to Pedro and Jim, where Pedro volunteers to call off his firing squad about to shoot several captives 12 one But what Narveson ought not to kill B, because that is murder and involves violence. situation is that of a moral dilemma. and if Jim one shoots Now almost everything turns on what account is given of What a comprehensive pacifist does moral dilemmas. trouble, coherence . of them is to take do, not inadequate utilitarian line of trying to the explain moral dilemmas away, as if they didn’t ever, occur an than initial intuitive negotiable, etc., etc. is as level), wants he unless if (at at least other all obligations were prime facie, The conflicting obligations stand. What is to done be however a very consequentialist thing, to try to determine the best thing to do in the circumstances. action In trying to determine what circumstances is a satisfied. violent sense this the best e.g. Narveson had better a fix. Narveson dilemma, but no B. shoot (not a deontic one) evil should be minimized; not ought circumstances, he had better do so moral of 17 . to the in course Granted, it is preferable to minimize follow that Narveson ought to resort to violence. remains course best that Suppose one, inconsistency in pacifism follows. in the principles like N2 and its mate, N2M, that it is preferrable to minimize evil, will presumably be and is evil, it does not On the contrary the situation shoot B, but in the appalling There is the real-life complication of inconsistency No a through arguments like that from lesser evil. Narveson’s jackpot question, entangled in his discussion from rights, can now be met. of the argument The question presents a dilemma: If force is the only way to prevent violence in a given case, use justified in that case? (p.420) is its Narveson is thinking of cases where one is about to be murdered, Regan where one is to be raped. qualified No: Given that force again entails violence, the pacifist answer is No, it is not deontically 13 justified 18 . It is certainly not morally it is not justified in the sense of ’justified* which and obligatory, reflects its deontic origin in ’making right*. may and because just some might force in solution, a making to amount dilemma be out But justification is The response is qualified then a case. consequentially situation. ambiguous, as justified, a second-best Narveson, proposes on the contrary, that enough violence for the given occasion is morally justified - it can go at least as as killing another person - but he presents no back-up argument, taking far his proposal as evident. jackpot the question As it is not - the pacifist can simply does not dispute it to a decisive a^rument against pacifism lead (though Narveson gives the impression that it does, e.g. , p.423). What it can lead to is the argument from lesser evil over again. The charge of moral insensitivity. §3. This is less argument an than a damaging charge: A person committed to an extreme pacifism, though he need make no logical mistake, yet lacks a fully developed moral sensitivity to the vagaries and complexities of human existence (Rp.86). The smear is not without basis. is applied avert to greater Regan is envisaging situations evil; where violence and he points to what he takes to be the evident moral permissibility of a woman's using ’what physical power she has free herself from an Interestingly, Regan has not aspiring rapist* (Rp.86). described the situation in a way which is incompatible with there is violence, which implies What is at issue the intentional, non-negligible damage, including pain, injury or (cf. a pacifist stand: nothing in that to prevent a woman wriggling free (even in a way that involves some force) and fleeing. using to is (or death, the permissibility of infliction of wilful) by forceful means / Np.110), that is, which involves much more than mere use of physical force And it is by no means so or power. violence inflict upon evident A rapist. aspiring the the that woman is entitled to can hardly now be pacifist accused, in a way that can be made to stick, of crass moral insensitivity. More generally, arguments pacifism, the on like Regan’s the to insensitivity moral of basis of pacifists' not taking obvious steps to prevent evil I occurrences, depend upon a confusion of passivity and pacifity. Narveson p.425) (e.g. Both Regan and assume that pacifism is a passive do-nothing position. 20 This is far from true, as the variety of nonviolent action methods groups has made plain. comprehend the real possibilities of considered or adopted by Neither Regan nor Narveson correctly nonviolent action. Otherwise, Narveson would hardly be able to assert, in the automatic (but carping) way he does, that the pacifist is Narveson's standing negative later 'not by doing assessment does not change the situation: anything about’ violence (p.425). of what he calls 'poslLlve nonviolence' for this positive approach is simply nonviolence practised in an exemplary way, as by Christ, in the hope that others will follow suit, and fails to recognise the potential of nonviolent training and the and effectiveness when assembled 21 , of nonviolent practices. much reduce the impact scope Fuller details of these practices, of the argument from social irresponsiblity, which is part of what lies behind the change of insensitivity. Pacifism, however, like most positions, has them 22 its weaknesses, one of undoubtedly derives from the fact that violence is a quantitative matter and there is no sharp cut-off point at the bottom end of the amounts and of violence greater than zero. Yet scale with minute (non-foot-in-the-door ) amounts do not seem to matter all that much morally, at least compared with 15 small the that evils gross us confront on most sides when we look. Morally sensitive pacifists will not focus or fixate on small quantities of violence to the of exclusion larger moral They problems. give certainly will understood that by ’violence' in principles such as. P2 mean they it undue to be 'non-trivial violence'. §4. and The argument from radical political corollaries The corollaries. out war by definition. so clear. Although War situations? normally would Standard war always would be what excluded, be morally counted brought progressively then second dilemma the impermissible, best but in thing to closer to Comprehensive pacifism can of course extreme principles emphasizing the evil of violence. weighing of Comprehensive pacifism thus does not include standard A strange pacifism! pacifism, in contrast to extreme pacifism. be pacifism But the position of comprehensive pacifism is not exceptional extenuating circumstances it might be the (second-) do. awkward of extreme pacifism would certainly eliminate war. practice For war involves violence, typically on an extensive scale. takes other from best choices will pacifism, in practice, through If evil is given a suitably yield the large same results as extreme A pacifism does (deontically), and entirely exclude war. Now it can hardly be cogently argued that it tells against pacifism that it would eliminate wars, since wars are exchanges that should certainly be avoided at all reasonable costs; nor therefore can an argument Wz/Acuf desirability fHur/l of war as an institution against pacifism,! mounted from the or Cldc. However wars are by no be means the only social arrangements or institutions which dispense^ or rely u violence extensively. The state and many of its institutions, most obviously police inadmissibility of characteriscally are contraposition do. also forces, coercive 23 institutions and hence ; pacifism Comprehensive it as such implies police anarchism provides no refutation of pacifism.. the implies 24 moral forces and states But once again For anarchism itself is (to 25 stick with a bold claim) irrefutable Pacifism as an ideal brought not is .down by its political corollaries. Pacifism yields not only a qualified anarchism but qualified vegetarianism. While does it not eating of meat, it does morally forbid violence to forbid animals. At least it does this so long as what normally counts as violence, animals, continues to rank as valence, and is not removed from the category by restriction of the application of violence to humans little good for however basis corollaries naturally spread suicide, capt^al euthenasia, (or such a chauvinistic restriction. several into punishment, controversial indeed There persons). is The radical moral, wherever to e.g. areas, violence plays a significant role in many cases'1. The sheer moral power of pacifism is one reason /7j Qc4> for giving it some pause. And there are others. / One is that, like vegetarianism, it runs counter to "natural" behaviour of creatures to which the principles are supposed to apply. Aggression is a fairly S' X common feature of animal and human behavioZur, and it sometimes (though by no means so often is as made out) involves violence. /Ze /cVXC o/1 //>£ Ao'jje.tjw enable ct/ony Ac /Aggression is assumed to be an evolutionary adaption /ZeSG- creatures offspring) in their artificial h to be better natural environments fitted environment. substantially 17 developed to for survival (of themselves and their most humans removed from now live situations in for rather which there is no way they are evolution gradually adapted their features: adapt in time to absorb massive doses of radiation for instance. have substantially living their adjusted adjust environment, along so with ^oing to Much as humans should they it their social practices - including aggressive and violent practices, now ill-adapted to their situation and mostly counter productive. There is a residual problem, practices of living creatures like in that confronting natural (relatively) vegetarianism. conditions, such as predators and tribal people, to be condemned as morally wrong when they Sometimes, violence? involve when the violence grossly exceeds what is required yes, Though a way can be beaten around the given the end to be attained; but always? edge of this problem Are 26 it is an unsatisfactory way. What this suggests is that <u t be^t nonviolence is not an absolute but^an ideal. The arguments for nonviolence which are mostly violence and do not strictly suggest a to apply since it in creatures natural surroundings opens door the a approaches would categorically exclude. chink to other options The further suggestion that emerges is that moral thinking and associated principles in this area are pretty primitive aimed, among principles state; other than P2. and what - But the suggestion is a dangerous one, sort of conclusion. similar practically at least, nonviolent arguments which do not exclude occasional uses of practical is things, at sharper, This is to in a called for is much more investigation more concede an sensitive, attentuated and less charge insensitivity against comprehensive pacifism so long as P2 remains blanket of moral unqualified. There is no reason however why a genuine pacifism (making for real peace) should not be built on a modified version of P2 which permits such natural phenomena as predation. Nothing logically rules 18 out such a genuine and more sensitive pacifism 27 There are other requiriments the position to be worked out should meet. in should, particular, be integrated into a Larger framework of nondestructive practices, which are involve violence, e.g. a of a practices metaphorically, damaging wild nonviolent* practices. are practices But, except destructive to the environment, for instance, do not such river, with piece things dumping vandalism. wastes toxic But mining strip as extended sense, which gets beyond the confines these It of in a valley, fertile in streams and oceans. the property In an picture, all even metaphorically, vandalism does not such cover violence against persons (and certainly not nonphysical violence as I "psychological violence"). What is sought /is an appropriate synthesis of these notions covering destructive practices - and better than 'vandolence'. an Then P2 is superseded accompanying synthetic term, 4/Z2°. It is morally wrong to use vandolence./ It remains to characterise the cluster of destructive practices (/V that count as vandolence and to try to justify the principle - no easy tasks. FOOTNOTES 1. ’a valid Christian According to the US Catholic Bishops, pacifism is to Christ and the early long tradition going back position’, with a lifestyle: see Origins Christians who were committed to a nonviolent pp.310-311. 2. Thus, in particular, T. Regan ’A defence of pacifism', Canadian Journal of Philosophy 11 (1972) 73-86. Page references to this article are prefixed by _ 3. J. Narveson 'Pacifism: a philosophical analysis’, Ethics 75 (1968) and ’Is pacifism consistent’, Ethics 78 (1868). The first article is reprinted in War and Morality (ed. R. Wasserstrom) Wadsworth, Belmont, California, T97O7 pp.63-77. The first article is also rewritten and combined with part of the second in 'Pacifism: a philosophical analysis’, Moral Problems (ed. 19 77ju / /A ZAC A IZ(M2 J. Rachels), Third Edition, Harper .Row, New York, 1979, pp.408-425. Page references without further citation are to this latter article. Narveson's theme that pacifism is incoherent is headlined and further elaborated in his ’Violence and war’, Matters of Life and Death (ed. T. Regan), Temple University Press, Philadelphia, 1980, pp.109-147. Page references prefixed by 'N' are to this article. 4. Pacifism, as involving the active use of defensive methods, can be traced back as far as the Mohist philosophers of ancient China. On modern methods see especially G. Sharp, Exploring Nonviolent Alternatives, Boston, 1971. As will emerge, it is important to distinguish fas Narveson does not in his earlier work) force from violence; they not equivalent. /\ 5. Thus, e.g., G. Sharp in several works: see for instance the unduly narrow definition of pacifism given in Social Power and Political Freedom, Porter Sargent Publishers, Boston, 1980, p.198. 6. Narveson, in responding to a suggestion of Armour (pp.423-4) sees nothing between (0) defence of rights, with the slide to violence in, and (1) nothing really answering to rights at all, where words like 'rights’ occur without stuffing. This shows a serious blindspot. What lies in between are a range of notions which do not guarantee the slide to violence. An account of rights which will serve is that given in R. and V. Routley ’Human chauvinism and environment ethics' in Environmental Philosophy (ed. D. Mannison and others) Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University, 1980; see especially p. Narveson 'Is pacifism inconsistent' Ethics 78 (1968) p.148. 7. J. 8. Without getting into the level of complication, not to say epicycling, that Regan lands himself in: he is obliged to distinguish three mirage-like senses of 'lesser evil': quantitative, qualitative, and resultant (Rp.78). 9. See Np.127 where it is asserted that violence as a source of evil should be minimized, and Np.119> where the point is put in terms of absolute evil. That way of putting it already starts to give the game away, since Narveson is all too evidently interested in negotiable evil which can be traded off against other evils. 10. An argument like the argument from lesser violence itself would appear to undercut the argument for El and E2 to premiss 02 for the argument for lesser violence. 11. That is by no means the onlyelement in Regan's torturous reformulation of Narveson's argument that can be faulted. Consider, for example, premiss '5. If any given action, A, is necessary to bring about a lesser rather than a greater quantity of qualitatively equivalent evil, then one's obligation is to do A.' While the premiss has considerable appeal as a principle of supererogation, there is little reason to accept it as one supplying obligations. 20 12. Extreme pacifism can be seen as taking the rule that one ought never to use violence as having priority over all other moral rules - which Is indeed an extreme position even if a consistent one. Such a priority rule is an unsatisfactory way to deal with moral dilemmas. 13. To show what Narveson goes on to claim that people are sometimes justified in using force rather more is required, as Regan points out, Rp 85, n.18. It has also to be shown that there are cases of these types (as in Cl) and that agents can know that use of force will increase utility, reduce evil, etc. A pacifist, rightly sceptical of utilitarian tracing of consequences, and fond of noting that violence begets violence, could, with a small dose of scepticism also, dig in at this point and claim that because no one can be sure that use of force will reduce evil, so no one is justified in using force. This is sceptically-based pacifism. 14. Narveson also wants to contend that ’all of these may be defended on purely logical or "meta-ethical" grounds’. This is likely false, especially the claim as to logical status, since some of the principles are rejected in substantive ethical theories. 15. A surprising feature of Narveson’s argument, also Regan’s "reconstruction", is that these cases are nowhere in sight, as if again one got to conclusions logically out of the air, without any of the hard work the cases involve. 16. The example was first discussed in B. 17. This terminology matches the account of moral dilemma, given in much more technical detail in R. Routley and V. Plumwood ’Moral dilemmas and the logic of deontic notions’ in Paraconsistent Logic (ed. G. Priest and others) 1983, to appear. 18. An extreme pacifist would answer with an unqualified No. 19. Directed against other creatures and more generally against ecological systems such as ecosystems which can be hurt. There is a difference here between live(go al-direct ed")~systerns and property, and comprehensive pacifism does not necessarily exclude wilful damage to property. Thus eco-pacifists may destroy, or at least disable, bulldozers but not harm those who use bulldozers to destroy habitat. However sensitive eco-pacifists will not condone "violent" destruction of property either: disab^ling of equipment is different. 20. The methods also include anticipatory action, e.g., the policemen going off to enact violence find their vehicles won’t start, e.g. because components have been removed 21 the peace movement should be preparing for B. Martin ’How See e.g of Peace Proposals 13 (1982) 149-159, and references Bulletin war ’ nuclear cited therein pp.152-3. Williams, //.( Zc (V, /, ( 1 J n l »' /? o C-, / / /' /\ <. ? / < / / i ’'i *7 z* //4 ’Conflict: of values’. 22. Another comes from the necessary circumscription of permissible nonviolent action, to ensure that it does not include actions worse than nontrivial violent action. 23. These organisations may be ruled out directly as violence-dispensing or else because they have individuals, delegates, who effect violence on their behalf. 24. In the sufficiently comprehensive form that the coercive state is without moral basis or legitimacy. Of course the "state" may have nonviolent methods available to it; it may not be a purely voluntary arrangement. 25. See R. Routley and V. Alternatives, (1982). 26. As Singer has in the analogous case of vegetarianism. 27. The position has been called 'pacificism*. Plumwood 'The irrefutability of 22 anarchism’, Social On the alleged impracticality of pacifism in the real world. Appendix §5. Even if it is conceded that pacifism is a viable moral ideal, that it does not fall down as incoherent or ludicrous, still the feasibility of pacifism as a sensible practice to live by will bo contested - despite, or perhaps because of, major examples such as Christ and Gandhi. And it has to be admitted that the real world, with all its horror and squalor, does put pacifism to severe tests. Nowhere is the practice of nonviolence than in replacing war \ succeed usually been given a dress rehearsal. defence of a region can vary convention observed is or less likely to Yet nonviolent defence methods, to replace the 2 detail , usual violent methods, have been described in some never thought though they have The prospects for success of nonviolent significantly, depending upon whether the war If the convention Is observed then pacifism not. stands reasonable prospects of success. The difficult cases are where the war convention unleashed, perhaps broken, is in massive ways, on noncombatants. his superficially sympathetic sketch and assessment of resistance, 'success ... may all sorts of this: According to Walzer, in nonviolent defence and This is presumably false. that The invaders may give up and depart reasons, some of them irrelevant, e.g., they needed a quick decisive victory, they got homesick. like is attained - there is never any guarantee of it, without or with be war - even if some conventions are flouted. for violence is possible only if the invaders are committed to the 3 war convention - and they won’t always be’ (Wp.331~). Success and sufficiently What Walzer no doubt ruthless invaders sufficient time and sufficient support lines, etc. 23 means is something in sufficient numbers with can eventually succeed. But sort of thing is also true even if the defending side resorts to violence. that The difference lies in the pattern of events; is more difficult and costly for if the defence is invaders the to well-armed it with and easier start afterwards than with well-prepared civil resistance-. Walzer is thinking, however, like many who jump to the that conclusion nonviolent defence cannot succeed when the war convention is abandoned, in terms of inappropriate examples. command, total in the He is thinking of an extreme totalitarian state, way the Nazis were in Germany, the Jews of Germany The providing the model of the enslaved population, the ’‘resistance". is highly misleading. picture The Nazis, who never invaded Germany, were in control of all the infrastructure and had the cooperation (at least) of the bulk of the For Walzer‘s comparison to work, there would have to be an enormous population. occupying army which took over and managed all key infrastructure. island With such as Australia it is not even so clear that this is logistically territories feasible against a largely united and actively resisting of impression in the acquiscence (e.g. resistance Walzer's population. fragmenting and the populace moving into dulled Wp.332) might have got things the wrong way around, the test with 4 disbelieving and frustrated soldiers ready to leave . Nonviolent resistance is however unlikely to be put adequate way in present state-determined prepared to risk training its populace (civil defence the police: is different). in to any No state would be circumstances. full in action nonviolent techniques It would then be. all to easy for them to "rout" civil obedience, for example, could no longer customary violent means. 24 be ensured by the FOOTNOTES The replacement of the state is considered op.cit. For example, in Sharp, op.cit. given there. See also in Routley Martin, All page references prefixed by ’W’ are to M. Allen Lane, London, 1977. and op.cit., Plumwood, and 82, references Walzer, Just and Unjust: Wars, The argument suggested in Walzer (e.g. p.333) that nonviolent methods would increase evil, or at least its distribution, is weak. It is countered by Sharp’s observation that the suffering likely to be induced is less than in comparable wars. §6. On the positive case for pacifism. defensive, meeting itself is revealing. deviations enough: a The argument thus far has been largely That in of objections to comprehensive pacifism. range Pacifism is the rest position from it are what require explanation. and state) (inertial -The reason for this is simple violence is, on most ethical systems, at least a prima facie evil, so use of it has to be justified. Positive arguments for pacifdism position and merely try supposed to be justified. violent opponent: to can advantage take of privileged dispose of "exceptional cases" where violence is The favourite exception is self-defence against a the case is curious in that the defender (person or nation) is already in a morally-excluded situation, since the attacker moral bounds. its has overstepped Still the defender is not normally committed to violence whatever he does - as in a dilemma situation. And since it is at least facie prima wrong, and he does not have to use it, he should not resort to it. An elementary syllogistic argument, given by Narveson (Np.117), can be adapted to give a similar result:Violence is (intrinsically) wrong Violence in any excepted cases (e.g. self-defence) is still violence Violence in any excepted cases is still (intrinsically) wrong. Naturally those opposed to pacifism will challenge the first premiss, and a dialectic already glimpsed will begin. None of the arguments are arguments for pacifism are conclusive, since even where deductively tight assumptions can be challenged (as above). are all the arguments for pacificism particularly good ones. 26 One of the Nor poorer positive arguments for pacifism, for example, makes similar assumptions to those of the classic theory of war, namely that once war is embarked upon it cannot be limited, the e.g. that hope or nuclear selectively and restrictively is an illusion, (moral) limits in Although the chances overstated. war - of whatever they eXcalation are exchanges Limited escalation are be used inevitable. The weapons chemical is will - are bound to be overstepped. often real enough, and confrontation are possible. more social arrangements and much more conventional than the the case is Wars are much theory classical Wars can, for example, be started and stopped in midstream should more allows. important things intervene (e.g. pollution a crisis affecting other neighbouring states). The main reasons for pacifism are, inevitably, those for nonviolence. They include (as support for the first premiss above) a range of consequentialist and practical reasons, e.g. suffering of modern industrial societies, the broader popular avoidance and anguish of support base obtained None of these well-known types are separately decisive, but their cumulative effect is considerable. ' Cz/ // Z'1 1 Is Ct' i L> ) s' *4 / / 27 — > A by of violence, the desirable social consequences of nonviolence such as a more open, less furtive, society. ) violent futility and counterproductiveness of violence within the setting the methods, the cost in pain, ? . z.. z . of reason  Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Box 59, Item 680: Draft of On the alleged inconsistency and moral insensitivity of pacifism Subject The topic of the resource Computer printout (photocopy), with emendations and annotations. Paper published, Routley R (1984) 'On the alleged inconsistency, moral insensitivity and fanaticism of pacifism', Inquiry (Oslo), 27(1): 117-136. https://doi.org/10.1080/00201748408602030. Description An account of the resource Note, one of four papers digitised from item 680. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org/items/browse?search=Richard+Routley&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bjoiner%5D=and&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=&amp;range=&amp;collection=&amp;type=&amp;user=&amp;tags=&amp;public=&amp;featured=&amp;exhibit=&amp;geolocation-mapped=&amp;geolocation-address=&amp;geolocation-latitude=&amp;geolocation-longitude=&amp;geolocation-radius=10&amp;submit_search=Search+for+items">Richard Routley</a> Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <span class="MuiTypography-root-125 MuiTypography-body2-126">The University of Queensland's <a data-testid="rek-series" href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/records/search?page=1&amp;pageSize=20&amp;sortBy=score&amp;sortDirection=Desc&amp;searchQueryParams%5Brek_series%5D%5Bvalue%5D=Richard+Sylvan+Papers%2C+UQFL291&amp;searchMode=advanced">Richard Sylvan Papers UQFL291</a></span>, Box 59, Item 680 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org">Antipodean Antinuclearism: (Re)constructing Richard Routley/Sylvan's Nuclear Philosophy</a> Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource This item was identified for digitisation at the request of The University of Queensland's 2020 Fryer Library Fellow, <a href="https://najtaylor.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr. N.A.J. 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Type The nature or genre of the resource Manuscript Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context <a href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:6b11360">https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:6b11360</a> Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Como - Cupboard - Pile 3 Box 59: Nuclear Como House Como House > Cupboard > Pile 3 https://www.antipodean-antinuclearism.org/files/original/ccd54bbcfae9fe07cf40299850560203.pdf fe931fcce3b13680c46d5ca17790a70d PDF Text Text AUSTRALIA’S DEFENCE PHILOSOPHY: Further investigations of the nonexistent. ‘The opinions of philosophers, with regard to the conditions of the possibility of a public peace, shall be taken into consideration by states armed for war’ (Kant, ‘A [the only!] secret article for perpetual peace’, p.158 - a surprising article, flattering no doubt to philosophers, but neglecting their dominant bellicose tradition). A defence philosophy is much more than a defence policy, just as a philosophy of technology comprises much more than a technology policy. A policy can be given merely by a list of directives as to what do in various circumstances; even at its best it need only involve practical wisdom. By contrast, a philosophy goes deeper and requires theoretical wisdom, integration of the policy into a theoretical setting, which looks, among other things, at the central arguments and key concepts involved: here, security, stability, control, protection, defence, interests, national interests, intelligence, war, etc. Defence philosophy is thus a branch of political and social philosophy, and has long been treated as such, though under such more familiar and honest headings as “of war” and “of peace”. Like most parts of philosophy, it can be applied, for instance in shaping policies, in regional ways among others. A defence philosophy should integrate appropriate defence arrangements and approaches to war and peace, not merely or superficially into “foreign policy” or assumed “international relations”, but into the way and intended way of life of a country, both into on-going culture and into the intended or planned cultural arrangements. A defence policy typically takes prevailing socio-political arrangements and power structures for granted; a defence philosophy again penetrates deeper, questioning or rejecting features of these structures, enquiring as to the merits of things and institutions of which defence is planned, asking what sort of society should be defended by what sort of appropriate methods and at what lengths. What, for instance, is Australia, what are Australians, defending, concerned to defend, aiming to defend? Here in Australia? In the region? Abroad? How much of what others have, or what we have, is worth defending, preserving? Does Randwick Racecourse, or Pine Gap, merit defending? Would anyone stage a last stand for Oaks Estate, one of Canberra’s dreariest suburbs? If the Indonesians made a lightning strike in Australia just to remove Bjelke-Petersen,1 should we resist? Few of the necessary prerequisites have been adequately thought about in Australia, where unplanned muddling through from immediate problem to immediate problem - reactive contingency “planning”, if you want to be generous - is the main style of political life , and, along with the traditional political game of “follow the leader”, of defence planning. Australia �2 does not yet have a defence philosophy. Some of its critical philosophers could help to supply it with the rudiments of one or more, and to inject some depth into broader defence theorizing. What follows is intended as a modest beginning: much of what is attempted, unearthing arguments and assumptions, followed by analysis and criticism, and some elaboration of alternative principles, falls squarely within the domains both of applied philosophy and traditional philosophical practice. 1. Australia’s inappropriate. defence “policy”: incoherent, obsolescent Australia seems to lack even a clear and coherent defence policy. American, This is a commonplace charge (made even by friends of Defence, interested in obtaining extra public funding for defence and elements of C3I).^ The reasons concern not merely the major unsolved issues of exactly what is being defended, what things and objects and what interests, and whose, what freedoms and values, and what role American defence facilities in Australia are supposed to have in this. They concern the status of present treaty arrangements, such as the “cornerstone”/“millstone” ANZUS treaty, signed between Australia, New Zealand and the US, now in disarray (still ’‘maintained” by New Zealand, whom the US has unilaterally announced expelled), and of subsequent associated memoranda of understanding (some secret, involving the local storage of US nuclear weapons, entry of American personnel, etc.). They also concern a range of more detailed lucunae such as: lack of clearly-defined priorities on what needs defending and how it is to be accomplished; doubtful capacity of present defence forces to handle low-level contingencies in and to the north of Australia and in maritime zones; and unsatisfactory (or no) arrangements and planning for “defence-in-depth”, for civil defence and use of civil infrastructure, mobilisation, wartime administration, protection of key facilities and areas, and post-nuclear organization. And, equally damaging, if its policy makers do have a coherent policy it is nowhere satisfactorily revealed to the peoples of Australia.It is left to journalists and newspaper­ watching academics to winkle out what local defence installations may be for and to make various conjectures as to what the policy may be. Of course there are many administrators and policy makers who think that is the way it should be; the public should not be informed, but kept satisfied with some “generalised” statements.As to coherence, Australian policy makers have only recently found out that Australia has a (purely) regional defence role, not a global one. This they were told by the Americans in Washington in talks allegedly designed to clarify commitments under treaty arrangements with the USA. It thus begins to look as if Australia’s defence policy, such as it is, is still as much determined abroad, by US policy makers, as it is locally in Australia. �3 Much circumstantial evidence can be assembled to confirm the claim that Australia’s vague defence policy can now be stamped Made in USA, as it used, before the last World War (and British abandonment), to be stamped Made in UK. For one thing, Australia has had a bipartisan defence policy, so it is claimed. That “policy” has however been essentially shaped by the Liberal party, which has governed most of the time (as senior partner in a coalition). But the Liberal party simply took over US arrangements for Australia (as planned in Washington for ANZUS) and still does. For instance, the latest package® from the Liberal Party “Defence and Foreign Policy Unit” consists largely of US Defence Department material packaged under a local cover. The Strategic Basis Papers, endorsed by the Labor Government, give virtually unqualified support to US military practices and to the American view of the global strategic situation, and commit Australia to supporting, without any due reservation, American positions in world forums.' The same dependent-policy conclusion can be reached by more devious arguments. regional defence role? When, for example, did Australia find out it had a After the Americans had found that they could no longer afford to police the world on their own and would have to delegate some of that role and offload some of the heavy associated costs, on reliable dogs-bodies; and also after Labor took some faltering steps towards developing a broader foreign more independent policy with some indigenous elements (Australian Minister Hayden was promptly flattened by US heavies such as Schultz). Australian defence and foreign policy copies American policy in main respects, but lags it. The Australian defence policy presented by the Labor government, to the extend that it is visible, is conservative; it coincides with older American defence policy, and diverges from the new (post-Reagan) American war policy. For Australian Labor defence policy supports what the American administration supposedly used to support, namely DI. Multilateral nuclear disarmament (within the framework of series of treaties and agreements), and D2. Deterrence in the interim, deterrence through mutual assured destruction (i.e. MAD). The presence of American military facilities in Australia is supposed to be justified in the framework of these assumptions. For they are to assist in making deterrence under D2 effective, and to provide verification for the arms reduction arrangements under DI (both stabilizing functions). There is much evidence indicating however that American policy makers have now abandoned both Dl and D2 and any serious attempts at nuclear arms control8. Certainly they have moved on to the following highly destabilizing doctrines: Nuclear war-fighting, Limited nuclear wars, and Star-Wars (i.e. Strategic Defense Initiative). While this American war policy may well be accepted by the next Liberal coalition government, all of these military doctrines are explicitly rejected by the 1985 Labor government. Since the American “joint” facilities in Australia also facilitate the rejected �4 objectives, the problems concerning these dubious facilities are much aggravated. The Government’s approach concerning them - withholding information concerning the full range of their functions, and particularly their war-fighting roles from parliament and the public - is certainly unsatisfactory, as several of its members realise; and as a result the Government appear in not atypical disarray, further grist for the incoherence theme. If there is perhaps a coherent Australian global defence approach somewhere away from public exposure, it is most likely then an old abandoned American policy.9 But in that case it certainly lacks - what it in any case appears to lack - justification. For Australia, in supporting US defence policy and activity, for instance in world forums, is supporting present offensive American policy, not what it reputedly adheres to, deterrence (through MAD). The point holds good whether or not American global policy still includes such deterrence as a proper part10; for it certainly involves other very different and dubious strategies. The commonplace, but increasingly feeble, justification given for Australian’s tagging along after America is that Australian interests are the same as American11. American interests by no means coincide with Australian . However Consider, for instance, such matters as enriching Americans, making conditions favourable for American business, promoting Americans and things American. Consider, differently, American practices in Latin America, from undercutting Allende’s government in Chile to its practices against Nicaragua, to its extensive export of arms and violent methods, there and elsewhere in the world. Thus America, like Russia, is busy meddling in Africa, but ‘Australian security interests are not directly involved’ (SB, p.24). Consider, differently again, escalation of the nuclear arms race. Or consider American strategic planning, and all the game- and decision- theoretic models which concern just USA and its adversary USSR, perhaps occasionally adding Europe as part of the monolithic West, but rarely or never considering the Southern Hemisphere - so that either Australia is part of America as Poland may be of Russia or it is nothing. Or consider American interests not merely in Soviet and communist containment, but in containing socialism such as might (under more auspicious conditions) flourish in Australia. An American policy answering to American interests is accordingly inappropriate for Australia, inappropriate for Antipodean socialism. Australians should do their own defence thinking and work out a policy appropriate for Australia. (That applies also to Australian political representatives, who should stop parroting implausible American views and begin developing some genuinely local and original ones.) Should Australia be tagging along after the Americans in support of installation of their style of free-enterprise capitalism everywhere feasible (i.e. that the state socialists don’t already heavily control)? What they quite seriously call ‘keeping the free world free’? Of �5 course freedom has, in this sort of context, multiple meanings and associations (as well as multiple inconsistencies, appearing information” and the like). overtly in subsidized “free trade”, selective “free Significant parts of what mainstream American culture admits under the freedom umbrella, mainstream Australian culture would exclude: for instance, active opposition to and undermining of social and socialist programs and governments, bullying of small countries that impose barriers to US business or military practices (all part of “free enterprise”), etc. What of those intangible freedoms the cultures supposedly agree about, civil liberties, freedom to information, to live and work where one chooses, to travel, and so on? These are certainly important freedoms, better upheld in some parts of the unaligned West (e.g. Sweden, Switzerland) than in most parts of the Eastern Block. But such freedoms, which run counter to dependent policies, hardly require defence subservience. influenced state practices are fast reducing freedom. Moreover, military- Many of the older freedoms have vanished this century, such as freedom to travel, to work and live abroad, etc.; now one requires permits, licences, passports, ... . And many more former freedoms are being or have been eroded; soon it will be identity documents, restricted zones, ID cards, as already in parts of the “free West”. Now nuclearism in Europe ‘is devouring the very freedom it is said to protect: [the Greens] point to the new laws proposed in 1983 designed to keep citizens from assembling to protest deployment of the Pershing II and cruise missiles’ (Capra and Spretnak, pp.58-9). Further structural changes required for the security of the state, imcompatible with democratic freedoms, include ‘secrecy, lack of commentability, permanent emergency, concentration of authority, peacetime militarism, extensive apparatus of state intelligence and police’ (Falk, in Feith p.24). Nuclearism is not a smart strategy to preserve remaining freedoms. 2. Inherited other-reliance, and the populist and elitist cases for patronage and subservience. Australia’s defence policy, such as it is, is furthermore inherited rather than regularly (re)thought through. But that procedure - essentially the legal method of precedence, whatever its very limited satisfactoriness in legalistic decision making - is defective when applied in politics or to defence, especially where immediate independent action is required. For precedence methods are extraordinarily slow, as well as characteristically conservative, and as in defence exclude significant and rather urgent alternatives. The unsatisfactory decision-making practices to be revealed in the case of defence are by no means restricted to defence but are typical of the kind of advanced age capitalism Australia operates under, or rather labours under, down under. In setting down those �4. 6 features of aged capitalism (‘of the Corporate State') that the New Left and Alternative Australia movements were reacting against, Cock neatly summed up these practices: Decisions were made from the top and on the basis of vested political interests, rather than by rational goals and means that served public interests. The people were rarely consulted effectively before a decision and often only partially informed afterwards. Planning was based on a mere extension of the present. ... activists felt they were given little opportunity to choose how they lived or worked. The availability of space, time, trees and air was also determined by others ... (p.18 italics added).14 As it was and is with one’s defence, military and civil, so it is with the matter of whether one lives in a nuclear target zone or not, and so on (though immigration policy, uranium and woodchip export policies, etc.) In these areas planning remains top-down, with at best consultative elements. No real choices are offered to people. A major inherited assumption is that of other reliance, that Australia’s defence depends on other more powerful allies. That ally was firstly Britain, and since World War II America; but in any event the assumption is that to be safe Australia needs a powerful patron, a protector. A corollary is that Australia adopts a suitably submissive relation to its patron, making expected concessions. And for the most part it has; however such a defence insurance policy does not come cheap.15 It costs not only money and resources, but quality of life, freedom and independence. The assumption of other-reliance is however unsound, for several reasons. Most important, it characteristically depends upon the following themes, all of which lack solid foundation: 1. Australia is threatened - or at least 1A. Australia is likely to be threatened in the near future. 2. Australia cannot defend itself. 3. Australia can however depend upon its patron (or ally), i.e. upon the USA. These three themes in fact make up what has been called the populist case for the ANZUS alliance.16 It is very different from the elitist case for ANZUS, said to hold sway with the Australian government, which, while insisting upon premiss 3, essentially rejects 1 and 2 and claims instead 4. Australian has a vital interest in global stability. 5. Global stability is under threat (constantly) by an expansionist Soviet Union. 6. Only USA can contain the Soviet threat and hold the global balance. Some of techniques the US deploys for holding global balance operate through dependent states and a network of alliances like ANZUS. But obviously further premisses are required to reach the intended conclusions that Australia should be participating in any such �alliance, and what is more, hosting US defence facilities and exercises. A first such premise is the no-shirking theme, that Australia should be contributing its part to “holding the balance’’ (cf. Bell). Even this first further step is pretty shaky; as we shall see, one shaky step in a rather ramshackle case, since premisses 5 and 6 are decidedly dubious (and 4 may involve equivocation). For it can be plausibly argued that Australia’s vital interests are not guaranteed by US techniques, which threaten to upset the whole applecart, and can be obtained by alternative more satisfactory means outside of such soft alliances as ANZUS. In any case, it is unclear that local contributions enhance global (nuclear) stability (see e.g. Mack and Davidson). But first, there is more pernicious regionalist version of the elitist position to be considered, what might be called the offshore elitist position. This position grants 2A*. Australia can defend itself against regional threats, and can look after itself regionally. But it does not (as indeed other qualified elitist positions may not) grant 1A. What the offshore position insists upon is 1AI*. Australia’s interests could be threatened in the near future. Since these interests - perhaps concerned with trade, Australian companies or Australians abroad, or whatever - may have little or nothing to do with internal Australian security, this premiss represents an extremely important shift (a shift not unrelated to the inverse bureaucratic shift from war to defence). It goes further than what has been called forward defence. In extended form the offshore position does call for some sort of global policeman or police force ready to intervene whenever a “free port” anywhere looks like closing its doors. Part of the difficulty in getting to grips with the elitist position is that it tends to slide through to the offshore position (by way of now evident immediate positions). The arguments against both the populist and elitist cases, and indeed against virtually all of themes 1 through 7 are sufficiently familiar to justify but a fairly brief outline of some of the main points involved. Of course just a couple of defections from themes 1 through 7 would serve logically defeat both cases, but there have been some interesting repair attempts, designed to float the arguments on diminished premisses. 3. The brief against the popular populist case; the need for new directions. Contra 1 and 1A. While Australia is not at present under notice of threat, veiled threat or harassment from abroad, a majority of its population appears to believe that it is. As the popular view is not the informed, administrative, or parliamentary view, it is worth inquiring �8 why the popular view persists, as the opinion polls reveal it has. The populace has been deliberately kept in the dark (or even misinformed), because this suits bipartisan government purposes. Although both main Australian political parties are well enough aware that the main assumptions underlying the populist case are false, the reasons for which they support the American alliance (e.g. those of the elitist case) are much more difficult to sell to the public. Accordingly the parties and Government have no political interest in undermining the unsound populist case. In particular they have gone out of their way not to cast doubt upon the connected assumption that US is a reliable guarantor against all threats. Thus long-standing Australian psychological insecurity about security has been allowed to stand, and has not been assuaged by any requisite informational and educational effort. In particular, older attitudes to Asia persist not far below the surface of popular Australia: fear, mistrust and xenophobia, patched over by a pragmatic attachment to trade and tourism. This misplaced insecurity is fuelled by popular misconceptions of Australia and its place in the world: metaphorically, that Australia is a luscious plum ripe for Eastern picking, instead of the Asians view that Australia, so far as they are aware of it at all, is a remote desiccated uncouth place perhaps good for some trade and investment. Or, to get towards more concrete assumptions, Australians apparently tend to their view country as affluent but underpopulated, resource rich but largely defenceless; yet not far to the north are Asian hordes who are impoverished, resource poor, and so on . Such a view is seriously out of touch with reality. Parts of Asia are now at least as affluent (on conventional economic indicators) as Australia. They do not see themselves as overpopulated, in a way that calls for mass exodus; and in those areas which are as overpopulated as Europe, such as Java, bribes and force are required to move people on transmigration programs to relatively unoccupied parts of the Indonesian empire. So far as they require them, they can purchase Australian resources - which are not unique - much more easily and cheaply (because they even carry significant local subsidies) than they could obtain • them by seizure. 1s For these sorts of reasons, and because Australia itself poses no threat, no other state has a genuine interest in attempting to invade Australia. As it is for interests, so it is for capabilities. No regional power has the capacity to launch a successful invasion of Australia, or is likely to have such a capacity in the near future. As the joint Parliamentary Committee concluded, Currently only the United States would have the physical capacity to launch a full scale invasion of Australia, and it clearly lacks any motive to do so (TAS, p.94). �9 As the report also stated, quoting Synnot (former Chief of Defence Staff), ... to raise the sort of force which would be required for a mass invasion of Australia could not possibly be done in under five years by other than the superpowers (TAS). But neither superpower is at all likely to expend effort or resources to such an end. An obvious naive question which at once arises is: Why bother then with much defence? (A later question to entertain is: why not be a free-rider on collectively provided global security, such as it is?) Why not proceed forthwith to unilateral disarmament? Mack for one, having reassembled the now-standard telling case that Australia is not threatened ‘now or for the foreseeable future’, and so having broken the populist argument, is confronted by the awkward option of unilateral disarmament for Australia. He stages a hasty retreat, points to the dependence of premisses 1 and 1A on premiss 2, and proceeds to claim that ‘the populist case for ANZUS is sustained’ even without premisses 1 and 1A. It is however a decidedly problematic retreat. While it is true that the arguments against 1 and 1A may sometimes take it for granted that Australia can look after itself to some extend, put up some resistance, it is far from clear that they depend essentially on assumptions approximating premiss 2. Consider the no­ interests argument, which appears decisive given the (estimated) very limited invasion capabilities of potential invaders. The main consideration adduced appears to depend in no essential way, indeed in no obvious way at all, on Australia’s dynamic fighting forces. Australian mineral resources, to repeat one of the more sensitive examples involved, can be obtained more readily and cheaply by trade methods than military ones. What all this seems to show is that a rather minimal streamlined force, if any, would presently meet Australia’s military requirements. It is not as if Australia is ‘entirely defenceless’ without a conventional military force, like a babe-in-arms. The whole apparatus of nonmilitary defence is available on a continent well suited to its use, though lacking a population trained in its techniques. But even without requisite popular training in defence methods, Australia would be a difficult place to govern, Australians a difficult lot to subjugate. It was such features of the Australian character that deterred the Japanese on a previous occasion “If the invasion is attempted, the Australians, in view of their national character, would resist to the end. Also, because the geographical conditions of Australia present numerous difficulties in a military sense, it is apparent that a military venture in that country would be a difficult one” (TAS, p.62). The points still hold good, and could be strengthened. There are several parts to any such �10 program of nonmilitary defence: making it happen, and putting it abroad (ideally with dinkum Australian exaggeration) that it has happened. To the issue of alternative defence we are bound to return. For now, when Australia is not threatened, is a good occasion to reconsider, and begin to adapt, defence arrangements. For example, it looks very much as if enormous sums, which could be valuably directed elsewhere, are being spent, largely to make many Australians feel secure.But a much more effective and inexpensive way to such results would be through requisite popular education and psychological therapy - with, if it were well done, much more satisfactory results, a more secure and better informed people. Contra 2. As a result of post-War developments in weapons systems and C3I capabilities, the military defence of Australia has become much easier. It comes down to enhancing, through new robust and reliable systems, the enormous strategic advantages Australia enjoys by virtue of geographical isolation. In principle, any maritime invading force can now be detected well in advance of arrival, through modern radar warning systems, and destroyed by precision guided munitions. And any invaders that did manage to gain a foothold on Australian soil would face severe logistic problems, and be subject to disproportionate responses from local defence. Standard discussions (as in Dibb, Mack) proceed to introduce a great deal of “Boys’ Own War Games” stuff concerning contemporary weapon and C3I systems; the essential point is that these could serve to turn Australia into a pretty unvulnerable armed fortress, and into an extremely difficult territory were the oceanic moat crossed and the fortress entered (see especially D. Martin). Under such armed neutrality and (differently) fortified Australia defence scenarios, even invasion from outside the region by an inimical world power could be resisted with reasonable prospect of success. There is no power at all likely to mount such an invasion; there is apparently (as noted above) only one power that could, that good ally the USA (reckoned however a likely invader by 6-7% of the Australian population!). Nonetheless the threat of a Soviet invasion is taken seriously not only by the larger populace but by committees of their elected representatives. But the Soviet military has never undertaken such a long-range massive force projection, is ill-equipped to do so, and lacks any plausible reason to try such a stunt (for details see, e.g., D. Martin; also SS, ST). The only credible Soviet threat to Australia is in the context of a superpower war, when American facilities in Australia and perhaps Australian cities, would be struck at by intercontinental missiles. While this would be bad enough, it is highly unlikely that it would be followed or accompanied by an invasion. Soviet forces are once again not sufficient, and not thought sufficient by the Soviets for that sort of diversion; they would be required elsewhere in a superpower war; and they would be devastated, unless USA is militarily even more incompetent than sometimes depicted. �i. 11 Contra 3. What will be argued is not the negation of 3, that the Americans cannot be relied upon, but rather that 3 is dubious, and that it would be rash to place excess reliance on American protection. That being so, and other patrons being even less promising, Australia should look more to its own resources, as the American administration is kindly advising. Especially since the American “Vietnam debacle” and the fall of Saigon, things have changed in important ways which cast doubt on the reliability of American patronage. First, the relative economic and military strength of the USA has declined significantly. It no longer has such a large share of world product(ivity); as a connected matter of policy, US world warfighting aspirations have been reduced. Its ability to act as, and afford to be, global policeman has also markedly declined/ Secondly, the willingness of Americans to engage in remote foreign wars has correspondingly tumbled. Although the American administration includes more than enough hawks, to be sure, the people and Congress are not longer in a mood for gratuitous foreign adventures, especially when the fun may not appear to be in American interests. Since Vietnam, US opinion polls regularly show strong popular opposition to overseas military involvement. This “Vietnam syndrome” has served as a major constraint on US military policy and foreign involvement. An important manifestation of these changes is the Guam Doctrine, calling upon US regional allies to take primary responsibility for their own defence in regional conflicts. Another important outcome is Defense statements to the pointed effect that before US troops are committed abroad there must be reasonable assurance of Congressional and popular support (Weinberger, reported in PC p.14). As Mack comments, ‘such assurance is impossible to guarantee - especially for remote countries where no US vital national interests are at stake’. Certainly no more is assured under the ANZUS treaty which provides only that each signatory ‘act to meet the common danger in accordance with its constitutional processes’ (article 4). All the treaty strictly requires is consultation; there is no undertaking or commitment. Isn’t the treaty backed up by informal verbal reassurances? None that are not undermined by others, in American administrative multiple-speak. Even the elite view is that Australia has to ‘work ... to maximize the prospect of US support’ and that the Americans cannot be counted upon. For ‘the threshold of direct US combat involvement could be quite high, and circumstances at the time could significantly limit US willingness or ability to help Australia in other ways?. ‘... we cannot rely upon US support in a defence emergency arising within our own neighbourhood’ (SB, pp.29-30). However a special case has been made for American reliability in Australia’s case - as �12 opposed to examples of American abandonment of earlier military undertakings (in Vietnam, Cambodia, Iran) - on the basis of permanent friendship, common interests, and shared values and democratic traditions. There are two difficulties with this type of special pleading: first, as to the basis, and, second, as to the adequacy of such a basis in by-passing Congress, the American people, and slow constitutional processes. Historical evidence hardly sustains the adequacy of the basis in analogous cases. And here, as already indicated, the basis is shaky. For there is not a common culture shared by Australia and America: rather values diverge significantly on quite crucial issues. Even less are interests always common, as the matter of subsidised agricultural produce reveals, and as missile testing and nuclear ships issues in the South Pacific have recently confirmed. Interests diverged, for instance, when Australia toyed with opposing Indonesia’s claim to West Papua. So it is dubious at least that American interests would coincide with Australian in disputes or confrontation with Asian nations to the North, e.g. with Indonesia or Japan. Of course if the special case argument did hold water, Australia and America really were mates, then the treaty would be otiose. There was in fact no treaty in operation in 1942; but by then American interests in countering the Japanese were independently aroused. 4. Other-reliance and regional self-reliance A major problem with other-reliance for defence is then that it cannot be deemed entirely reliable, yet precisely here unreliability can hardly be tolerated. When the Indonesians are rolling into Brisbane it won’t do for Defense to call up with a message like that from local Services, "We can’t get there till tomorrow’’, or “until after Congress meets”, or “Sorry, Mate!”. More seriously, handing defence over to others means handing control of our lives over to others; and given nuclear defence, which too many Antipodean administrations have opted for, it quite likely means literally handing our lives over for many of us. Another problem of other-reliance is thus its adequacy. A further problem is its cost. In principle, if a State hires out its defence it would no doubt look, other things being equal, for the cheaper bidder - if, that is, defence is a commodity of a sort, like national shipping, meterological services, etc. The trouble with global defence is that the market is monopolistic, with currently only one supplier of the right complexion22, who accordingly can exact a very high price, and has - making the whole country a nuclear target and demanding substantial subservience. Similar points make part of the case, well-enough appreciated, for not trying to press defence, plainly a collective good, into a marketable commodity. When a country can supply its own defence, it therefore makes very good sense for it to do so, since it normally has a stronger interest in its own proper defence than most other parties. Should it also be cheaper in costs that matter, then self-reliance not just makes good sense but pays; other-reliance does not. But in that event, it surely does not need nuclear �13 patrons, or to farm out some of its defence. Such self-reliance undermines an important part of the older case based on other-reliance for alliances such as ANZUS. However newer bipartisan approaches to defence try to combine them (thus e.g. Australian minister Beazley as reported by Davidson) - approaches which thus begin to empty ANZUS of what little content it had, and remove much of the apparent point of such older alliances. Since the ANZUS arrangements contain no clear commitments beyond consultation but are merely vague articles of understanding, a simple course is of course to allow them to be emptied of content, so that the alliance, an expensive and outdated “insurance” policy, dies a natural death. It may however be death by seizure or convulsion should American defence facilities be closed or internationalised and passage of American nuclear equipped or powered transport be excluded from Australia. That would no doubt sacrifice the deterrence and other advantages the treaty supposedly affords , while making way for the greater advantages of friendly nonalignment, of no longer being a nuclear target, or so on. But self-reliance pure and simple is insufficient. The world does not consist of separable isolated pieces, as becomes increasingly evident. Most dramatically, Australia will not escape the effects of nuclear winter. The picture is much the same as for other dynamic subjects, such as plants which are not internally self-sufficient but depend crucially on their environment - and indeed as for States themselves. The question then is what form the additional holistic component of policy should take? Put this way, it is almost obvious that the appropriate move is not taking sides (as in a kids’ war game or tug-of-war game that is already set up) and doing one’s bit for confrontation. For that will not contribute to stability, to a proper holistic approach, but rather to sectionalism and fragmentation, and to bringing nuclear winter closer. Other-reliance and self-reliance typically present a false contrast, and certainly do with pure self-reliance - a false contrast like that of holism and partism (EE, p.223), and of dependence versus isolationism. In between lie a range of positions, one of which - favoured by a long line of peacefully-disposed philosophers from Rousseau and Kant onwards - might be called integrated reliance or federated reliance. The elitist case, insofar as it were to call for such reliance (e.g. in assumption 4), could hardly be faulted. But it doesn’t; and is satisfied with much less. Integration may reach only certain inadequate levels, the level of modern alliances and alignment, which are essentially coupled with opposition to an other side, e.g. the monolithic East (or West). It is into just this trap that elitist arguments fall. �14 5. The decline and fall of elitist arguments. Premisses 4 and 5 of the elitist argument turn around the crucial notion of stability, as related arguments revolve around that of security. But stability and security are value-laden terms, which are not cultural invariants. What stability comprehends in American administrative perception is very different from what highland villages take it to include. In each case a system is stable if it returns to a given stationary state under perturbations of sufficiently small magnitude. But both the relevant states and the stationary among them are relative to given frames of reference; for instance, what is stable at a macrolevel may well not be at a microlevel. As Trudeau has said of the superpowers, ‘they share a global perception according to which even remote events can threaten their interests or their associates’ (p.10) and disturb stability. But lesser states or regional people, not counting remote business or military interests as relevant, report no instability. Bureaucrats invariably view bombs as necessary to stability, and the nuclear fix as stability; by contrast, gentle people increasingly see bombs as tools of terrorism and as characteristically antithetical to peace. ad 4: Of course Australia has a vital interest in global stability and security: what sizeable nation does not? But the determinable motherhood interpretation (of italicised terms), while no doubt diplomatically convenient, conceals crucial differences, highly material to the argument. For one global stability means something different in USA from what it means in Costa Rica and likely what it intends in Australia. Certainly vital interests are different. America is interested in containing socialism (in Australia as elsewhere), and it tends, in more popular rhetoric at least, to equate containing socialism with containing communism and both with Soviet containment. A continental swing to socialism (or Non-Soviet communism) in Latin America, or in Africa, would upset global stability, on American perception, and would indeed have significant effects on US business or investment; but it would not on its own upset or affect most Australians or directly threaten Antipodean stability, and it certainly need not affect nuclear stability. Australians generally are not opposed in principle to socialism or notably interested in containing its spread (indeed perhaps the opposite). Australia is not interested in (and oughtn’t to be charmed by the idea of) defence of the (American) “free enterprise” system, or in the defence of uglier forms of capitalism wherever they are presently initiated or opposed (cf. Chomsky and Herman). Contra 5. It can be conceded, without granting the main thrust of the premiss, that the Soviets are expansionistic, at least in that they are interested in extending their influence where they can. So also are most empires, including American and Indonesian (so for that matter are many academics and most sales-people). But the Soviets have an ideological �15 message to spread, Marxism-Leninism, an ideology they used to anticipate being installed everywhere. But the Americans also have a message, a capitalist message, Free Enterprise Inc, which they are working to sell pretty much everywhere accessible to them. And they need to be expansionistic to have it adopted, whereas the Russians and Chinese need simply wait for history to take its allegedly determined course (though a little assistance - reflecting legitimate doubt about this determinism? - would surely spread their disconcertingly different forms of “progress” without interfering). But surely the Russian message is pernicious? All these messages are pernicious (for familiar reasons: see e.g. Erlich). The proper question is whether on its own Soviet international activity threatens, in some damaging way, global stability. Undoubtedly Soviet-American confrontation, as in the Cuban missile affair, does threaten global stability; though not in a way that has any bearing on Australian defence. In fact no Russian expansionary tendency, military or otherwise, has an untoward direct effect on Australia, little of significance reaches into the Antipodes (see Dibb SS). So what is the local excitement about? In large measure the excitement has been drummed up by the political right, East European expatriates, and pork-barrelling politicians. The effect of Soviet expansionism is much exaggerated and overexploited (Mack ST). Viewed from the Antipodes it is hardly a problem, unless the Soviets should get locked into military confrontation with USA - a real problem to be addressed. With that problem however, the Antipodes can better assist as part of a third nonaligned group which helps to referee and to prize apart the heavies, not by seconding and inciting the USA. But confrontation apart, Soviet internationalism, hardly a great success story, does not seriously disturb global stability, as seen from Australia. For a proper assessment of Soviet internationalism, types of expansion should be distinguished - military, potential military, influence with military access, and mere influence. In actual military expansion and involvement since W’orld War II, the Russian record is hardly striking by comparison with the USA or several other states. The one conspicuous case involving control of new territory, that of Afghanistan, has actually had little effect on global stability. The usual Western apprehension concerns not anything the Soviets have accomplished, but what they might attempt militarily, especially in Europe. But the idea of Soviet military adventure in Europe is a Western invention and bogey, lacking in plausibility. The Soviet military lacks the force ratio needed to be assured of military success in Europe, both by their own standards of what is required and by Western strategic standards. And the Soviets have no good reasons or interests in undertaking such an exercise which would draw them into nuclear war. They already face enough economic difficulties and troubles with East European client states which they cannot control satisfactorily. �16 The extension of Soviet influence has largely been in the Third world. But it has hardly been successful, with as many failures and losses to record as Soviet “gains” - gains which add to the imperial burden since they involve countries wracked with problems, such as Vietnam. The Third World exercises are marred by Soviet inaptitude and limited by the state of their own economy. They scarcely displace the global structure enough to test its stability; and they produce no shock waves or even significant ripples in the Antipodes. Contra 6. The main current threat to world stability appears to come not from one of the dancers in the East-West dance of death, but from the escalating confrontation, easily ignited, between the lead dancers. With this US policies and practices have at least as much to do as USSR ones. Recent US practices are more destabilizing than Soviet ones, and indeed highly destabilising, because of new weapons and weapons systems, because of rejection of arms control and Soviet proposals, and because of “star wars” preparation which both accelerates the arms race on earth and begins a new one in space. A vast increase in tension and suspicion accompanies the “arms race” which is in large measure due to US intransigence and US war-fighting doctrines, new weapons systems, with built-in incentives for pre-emption, and deliberate abandonment of arms control (see PR). Such considerations, duly assembled, demolish the received (but nonetheless crazy) theme that an alliance or alignment with USA helps increase stability. American practices are to be resisted as much as Soviet. 6. The East-West balance argument: American alignment versus friendly independence The need for Australian alignment with the USA is supposed to be shown by the East-West This politically-important balance argument, which shares key premisses nr with the related elitist argument, runs as follows : balance argument. 7. Global stability is the key to world peace. 8. Stability of the international order is a matter of maintaining a global balance. But 5. The global balance is constantly threatened by an expansionist USSR. 6A. The threat is [only] checked by the USA, which (6A.1) guarantees an open and pluralistic international order. 9. Australia’s primary security concern, indeed most vital interest, is this stability. Hence 10. Australia’s role is to help America maintain the balance. The rest of Australia’s intervolvement with American military arrangements is then taken to follow. But there are many reasons for halting the argument before it reaches this stage of practical (and allegedly moral) detail. The balance argument assumes much that has already been rebutted, for instance that the Soviet threat thesis is correct (i.e. 5) and that US �17 policy is stabilizing (part of 6A). It also takes for granted, what now is at least in serious doubt, that American policy is directed at balance and deterrence, rather than what the American administration appears to be aiming at, superiority. But in that event, Australia is not really engaged in some longer term balancing feat, so much as in helping USA prevail in nuclear race, contradicting the goal of world peace of premiss 7. Contra 10. and its derivation. The derivation is inadequate: it does not follow that Australia’s role is such a lackey’s one. If the balance of strength is leaning in America’s direction, as most less-biassed evidence indicates, then Australia should surely be throwing its slight weight in with the Eastern team (that is what such images as the balanced tug-of-war would suggest). Presumably premiss 6A.1 is designed to exclude this deplorable thought, of Australia teaming up with totalitarians. Nevertheless Australia should be putting its slight weight where it is effective, given its own broader objectives, interests, principles and supposedly pluralistic ideals. There are several different roles Australia could fulfil which would enable it to make a more satisfactory, less passive, contribution to world peace, among them de-escalation through active nonalignment, appropriate aid, and so forth. Thus 10 is hardly well-supported or evident. A more direct approach would be better than throwing Australian weight unreflectively on one side of the balance. As a little reflection attests, the balance image and argument point not in the direction intended, but towards nonalignment. Contra 6A (and 6). The theme that US maintains the balance, and hence preserves the peace, is of course false. For again, it takes two to tango. While it can be granted that the USA is interlocked with and checks the USSR in this munitions dance, the history of the dance reveals that the pace-escalation has flowed from the interaction of the one partner with the other. That is, but for the USA, the USA would not be required to check the USSR (the interaction is two-way as with Hegel’s famous master-slave relation). In any case, it looks as if, on a different historical trajectory, the main states of Western Europe could match the Soviet Union militarily (for they have comparable combined GNP, technological resources, etc.; cf. note 20) Thus it is doubtful that the current Soviet build-up, produced in interaction with the USA, could only be, or have been, checked by the US. ad 6A.1. As the premiss is only of marginal relevance to the argument, it is enough to observe that the international order the USA helps maintain leaves very much to be desired. In its intervention, militarily, economically and indirectly, USA has assisted substantially in reducing plurality and openness, is well as in establishing or propping up rotten regimes, etc. The negative side of American imperialism as well-enough documented, if not widely enough read or known by Americans themselves (cf. again Chomsky and Herman). Only under scandalously low redefinitions of ‘open’ and ‘pluralistic’ is the present “free” world order �18 either open or pluralistic. ad 8, and the damaging equivocation on ‘the balance’. While balance is one way of maintaining stability in the world arrangements that have presently come to pass, the balance structure can only carry so much loading. Add too much weight (of arms tension, and so forth) to both sides and the precarious structure will fail, probably catastrophically. increasing probability of catastrophic breakdown, for a variety of reasons The (accident, miscalculation, computer error, human interference, etc.), has been argued elsewhere (e.g. WPI). While a certain neither overloaded nor overstressed balance may serve for stability, the present increasingly stressed balance will probably not. The balance argument, however, neglects this dynamical situation, illegitimately switching from a (certain post) balance in premiss 8 to the (on-going) balance in subsequent premisses. The balance argument itself breaks down through equivocation. What the dynamic picture also indicates is the importance of removing some weight from the balance, most obviously by arms limitation and tension reduction. It points too to a different role for Australasia, to a less aligned position genuinely directed at stability. It is to the emerging case for a different role for Australia, and to action for achieving this different role, that the positive argument will now begin to swing. The inadequate East-West balance argument is typically combined with attacks upon proposals for a different role for Australia than American alliance and. service. effect of these additions is to generate extra confusion and dust. The main For the additions are inessential to the argument, and do not serve to repair it or reinforce it. For example, against nonalignment or neutralism is set the alleged pervasiveness of nuclear winter. We might as well be aligned (it’s good for trade and other economic perquisites), so it is sometimes argued from up top, because if the central balance fails we are all dead. This is a conspicuous nonsequitur^, worse than ex nihilo quodlibet (because it also suggests that balance is a prerequisite for stability). But, in the main, the attack is irrelevant, because the point of nonalignment is to help remove overload and to break down confrontation and its escalation to war; it is a thing to do now, be fore winter descends, to delay or halt its descent, and most important, to reduce its extent and severity. Australia’s weight may be slight, another irrelevant addition goes, but psychologically it is important for the West. Any further spread of the “Kiwi disease” (from New Zealand) would show the weakening of Western resolve, and give the green light for Soviet expansionism. Bell, a leading exponent of the balance argument, virtually gives the impression that if Australia dropped out of American alignment, the Russians would be on the �road down through the isles to Australia tomorrow/ Much of this sort of rhetoric is reminiscent of the baseless fear-mongering of an earlier pre-Vietnam time. The Russians have no such military interests, or present capabilities. And if they were to gear up and set out, they would be met by substantial resistance along most of the route, resistance obtaining Western assistance. For America, for one, has major interests, different from Australia’s, in both Indonesia and the Philippines, as well as elsewhere in East Asia. The addition, so far from strengthening the argument, depends, in its “green light for expansion” comparison, on the previously faulted premiss 5 of Soviet expansionism. In fact most of the further case for American alignment of one sort or another - when it is argued-, often nonalignment and neutrality are simply denounced in good old-fashioned authoritarian style - turns upon already-faulted assumptions. Catley, for example, another exponent of “central balance”, presents the following ‘consideration’: ... whatever the Swedes or Swiss may think about the matter, Australia is locked by considerations of culture, economics, and political philosophy into the defence of the Western world. It has both an obligation and a duty to contribute its share to that defence if necessary by hosting facilities which cannot easily be located elsewhere (p.15). The premiss is false for reasons essentially indicated: and the premiss in no way sustains the conclusion, the argument involving among other things, the prescriptive (is-ought) fallacy. Consider the premiss. Australia is not, unless Catley has information withheld from most of the rest of us, locked into Western nuclear defence, but in principle independent and free to reconsider and rethink its options. (American use of the “facilities” is not irrevocable, and shortly comes up, in principle at least, for reconsideration.) How do culture, economics and political philosophy provide locks and chains for Australia but not for nonaligned Western European states? They do not: Australia is not a part of USA or altogether a client state; and the cultures, interests, economic frameworks and political philosophies of the two nations are significantly different (for details, see CPD). But even if the ideological frameworks were much more similar than they are, that would not entail similar defence practices (as, e.g., ANZUS in all its weakness shows), nor any such defence obligations. Most of the arguments against nonalignment are of Catley calibre - or worse. Fortunately, then, such arguments are examined in detail elsewhere, notably by D. Martin in his examination of counter-arguments to Australian armed neutrality, the legally-recognised non-belligerent form of nonalignment he favours. Virtually none of Martin’s counter-case depends for its success on features of neutrality, which is not advocated here. Virtually all of Martin’s argument is moreover couched in negative form; his positive brief is very brief. It �20 reduces to this: alignment or alliance with the USA 'cannot make us secure against such dangers as we may one day have to meet, while it needlessless exposes to other dangers, including nuclear war (p.l, italics added). While the message is correct enough, and in need of wide propagation, it does little on its own to support neutrality, and it by no means exhausts the positive case for weakening alignment. In particular, there are more positive arguments of much theoretical interest, to be drawn from systems theory and from the burgeoning theory of collective goods and action. 7. Contributions towards stability: free-riding, enlarging group size, and increasing variety. The strategic world situation we now confront can be viewed as a game with more than 100 players, counting in nation-states and leaving out (for convenience) major organisations such as the largest 100 transnational companies. These organisational players align themselves around two large poles, East and West, as indicated: NON-ALIGNED N N WEST EAST India NATO States Japan, Israel Sweden* Switzerland* NZUS: Australi I Ireland1* ^Most Latin ' American States I Tanzania Costa Rica** State capitalist Key: N: *: **: State communist Nuclear weapons states Neutral states Nonmilitary states There are various - a great many - games these state players are playing, some of which are practically important for peace and for stability. Some of these games, such as World Empire and Chicken (already played under one representation), are played essentially between the East-West superplayers. There are several problems about East-West games: for instance, what representation they have, the repeatability of the games (clearly some nuclear games �21 may, like Russian roulette, end after one round, as they will with the Big One), and the negative sum characters of some games. And the monolithic East/monolithic West dichotomy is misleading, and, as will appear, discards crucial detail (in the way simplifications may). So game-theoretical modelling will be approached differently and more obliquely. World Security, like regional and local security, is a collective good (technically, an item, quality unspecified, in joint supply and precluding exclusion). That is not of course to say that there are not conditions under which security may leave much to be desired, for instance where security is guaranteed by a narrow and intolerant despotism; but then, so it can be argued, the trouble lies with the provisioning, not the particular product. collective good G for the collection of N nation-states. It is a It is, furthermore, a collective good which permits the possibility of free-riding by nation-states. Looked at from this perspective the recent American complaint about its allies, Japan for example, and their insufficient expenditure on defence, is a complaint about their free-riding. Within the balance of power framework the conditions for free-riding are satisfied, for instance by unaligned and unilaterally disarming states. For 1. G is available to all N members of the collective if it is available to any, and the achievement (or maintenance) of G by any will make every member better off. 2. G is achieved iff some number m (no larger than that of group K) contribute towards its provision, where under the balance of power assumption Il C K C N and II = {USA, USSR}. 3. The expected value of contributing to G or its maintenance is less than the expected value of not doing so, i.e. likely costs of contribution exceed likely benefits - except perhaps for members of II given that G is largely provided by II. There is what can be called a pegged (or asymmetric) free-rider problem, pegged by members of II for whom the free-rider option is not open - within the confines of the balance of power assumption - and for whom condition 3 is only satisfied under certain ways of looking at the matter (e.g. there will be a war 10 years down the road so the expected costs each year exceed the expected benefits). For most members of N, by contrast, the benefits of G are available even should they reduce their contributions. There is a straightforward case (in narrow game-theoretical terms) for recommending Australian, and regional, free-riding on the balance of power provision of G. Some arguments, beyond or adding to those already in effect presented, are these:- Either stability breaks down catastrophically and there is a large-scale war or it does not. If it does then the region is �22 better off than it would be if (strongly) aligned because it is unlikely to be (so heavily) targetted. (Here the dreadful new argument that nuclear winter means that the Antipodes might as well be involved gets challenged and rejected: as to how see e.g. MF and B. Martin). If, alternatively, stability doesn’t break down then the region has the benefits in any case, without the costs. For there is no clear evidence that our alignment and cooperation with the USA enhances global stability, etc.; indeed, as remarked and will be further argued, the evidence points to the contrary. As regards Australasian regional weight in the Western block, do we seriously believe it is significant? That the Australian voice, though useful for propaganda purposes, makes much real difference in the halls of Northern power? We shouldn’t: and if we do we’re living in a delusional framework. Australia has been left out of the picture in virtually all major strategic planning exercises, most difference-making peace initiatives, etc.,etc. Now Eastern block countries would hardly object to Antipodean free-riding, rather than no offering support (however trifling), comfort and incitement to their opposition/ Furthermore free-riding is how the Americans, on their theoretical principles, would expect Australia to act, the rational self-interested procedure (see CPD). It is how lesser nations should act. For it is economically rational; contributing is not. But won’t the US make things economically dear for Australia? In threats and theory, yes; but in practice, no more than it has already done with subsidized wheat deals to the Soviets, no more than it threatened to do already in the case of New Zealand over the nuclear-ships issue. For except for short term aberrations, America will never give up trade or business arrangements: one gets the impressions that America would trade with the Devil Himself, if doing so would open some new markets in Hell. Despite its political stigma, free-riding need be no problem, or in any way immoral or irregular. Perhaps the buses are free; perhaps there is a voluntary payment system, to which only some need contribute, etc. With the nuclear fix, free-riding is indeed the moral course; contributing is not.29 Free-riding, though often protrayed as a problem, is only a problem in certain cases of collective provisioning, where the good involved is sufficiently desirable and will not be provided because of too many free- riders. This is not the situation with global security, which will be provided, in the curious and precarious way that it is, whether or not Australia stays on the escalating treadmill or gets off and rides free. Australia's free-riding may be a problem for America; it is not for Australia. Interests diverge again. What is more, judicious free-riding can increase stability. In pictorial terms, the stability of a structure is typically increased up to a certain point by securing it more �23 adequately; for example, if it is a wind tower or similar building, by increasing its rigid ties or supports to the ground. Then a tripod (or better still a quadrapod) tower is much less likely to topple than a bipedal one, and requires less guying to stay up. Increasing the diversity, or variety, of supports increases stability. The theme that diversity correlates with stability has been sharpened and confirmed in ecology, for instance in the theory of “spreading the risks” (see EW). The related theme, that a certain variety increases stability, has been elaborated in cybernetics. The core eco-systemic idea to be developed is that Australia’s free-riding in defence, and consequent nonalignment, could help to enhance diversity and variety, and accordingly to increase stability (especially if done in concert with other client and suppliant states). Two interlocked supports in tension, East and West, well dug in but hardly well guyed, are inadequate for the long-term stability of the precarious structure of world peace. What makes engineering sense is not however adding weight to the structure, or even strengthening the supports that are there, helping the East when the balance is disturbed by the more powerful West’s surging ahead and likely overburdening the structure. What makes more sense is increasing the variety of supports, enlarging and diversifying group size, as significant independent grouping could do. The monolithic East/monolithic West picture is much more than a convenient simplification, for instance for strategic thinking. It may force damaging mistakes in conceptualisation, mzsconceptualisation perhaps convenient for some larger players. One main reason for mistakes concerns group size. Whereas 11+ = {West, East} is a small group, the number N of nation-states is not, but is considerably larger. But the collective behaviour of large groups differs in theory from that of small groups; group size is a highly significant factor (though its precise import remains contentious). The group N of nation-states is a large group, of essentially self-interested parties, indeed of substantially economic actors. collective action applies: So we may expect that the American theory of that the groups will behave in a counterintuitive way. Though expected to act in the common interest, to obtain security in particular, the collection will not. On this account (that elaborated by Olson), the common interest can only be guaranteed by outside influence or imposition (coercion in Olson’s rapid thinking). But with the collective of nations, there is, as experience has shown, no outside mediator or influence of sufficient authority to ensure attainment of the collective good. The prognosis looks very gloomy: this most important (though far from unique) collective good will not be provided. Fortunately the reasoning, like much of the “logic” of collective action, has been too �21 swift. The group, though large, is highly privileged, in containing several actors for whom costs of war exceed benefits (note the shift in perspective from the earlier free-riding condition 3). Indeed an important economic effect of the knowledge of an ominous nuclear winter is that virtually all actors involved should now be in that position; for (subjectively) expected costs of nuclear war have become very high. To go back to basics, Olson's grand theory is based on the accountants’ tautology (defining ‘net’) net agent benefit = gross agent benefits - gross agent costs, i.e. in symbols, for each agent or o actor i (in collective N), A- = V-Cj. A group is privileged if Aj is positive for some i in N. It needs little argument to show that for vulnerable European nation-states the net benefits of global security are decidedly positive (e.g. with a nuclear war their respective future GDPs would expectedly fall to near zero). The fact that the group of nation-states is privileged does not however imply that the collective good involved, security, will be supplied, particularly in the longer term. The simple logic is not dynamic; it takes no account of mistake, error, or the like, or of stability achieved through superiority or intermediate instability. An improved modelling - which can take some account of group size and of the dynamics, through iterated games - is gained by returning to game-theoretic grounds. A free rider “problem” is tantamount to a dilemma of some sort; according to the conventional wisdom, it is a prisoners’ dilemma (cf. Pettit, but contrast Taylor and Ward). The argument can go this way:- a free rider problem or issue is defined in terms of the provisioning of a collective good; but the theory of collective goods is equivalent to that of a .QI, generalised prisoners’ dilemma. Certainly the global nuclear situation appears to present a dilemma; as much is a commonplace claim. Elsewhere (e.g. WPI) it is argued in detail that it does indeed present a moral dilemma. Here the argument - which can proceed through the theoretical route just sketched above or in the more piecemeal way to be indicated - is that it is also a prudential dilemma (for many members of N).°2 Consider first, since these have obtained some investigation (e.g. Hardin), the range of apparent two party games being played by the US and Soviet Union administration (labelled US and SU respectively) in 1985 as regards the moves of further nuclear armament, A, or nuclear disarmament, N. (It is supposed, naturally, that the game is set in some background context, e.g. nuclear disarmament is not considered in isolation from on-going French and Chinese nuclear armament). It is important here, as other places, to distinguish the administration - which for the most part calls the shots - from the society and the people. It is administrations or governments that generally take people into war; etc. The American people seem rather more inclined towards nuclear de-escalation than their administration; the German people were clearly opposed to the new nuclear missiles their administration proceeded to install. The strategy games involved are then administration games, which we �25 can suppose to be played over successive time intervals, e.g. years; so there is interaction and feedback as the games go on - until the Big Ones explode. Within this simplistic setting, the apparent games being played by US and SU are those diagrammed next: New Initial game Prisoners’ Dilemma Game SU SU D US A Revised Game D 2,2 A 4,1 1,4 3,3 D US A SU D 3,2 A 4,1 1,4 2,3 D US A D 3,3 A 4,1 1,4 2,2 According to Hardin, ‘giving evidence of [his] deformation professionelle’, the Prisoners’ Dilemma (PD) ‘represents the preference ordering of virtually all the articulate policy analysts in the United States and presumably also in the Soviet Union’ (p.248). While PD may have represented US policy, there is considerable evidence (as already indicated) that it no longer does, that the US administration has shifted to a more aggressive, war-fighting, phase. That is, the US has interchanged its rankings of (D,D) and (A,A), presumably some time between 1978 and 1984 games. The Soviets, who have been much more consistent (and no doubt better censored) in their policy pronouncements, appear not to have changed their game, but have stuck with their form of deterrence and no-first-strike. However they are bound to try to keep up with the Americans, and so are presumably pushed towards the Revised Game shown, which pleasantly restores symmetry. Stable or equilibrium outcomes for each game are circled. An outcome is said to be stable if neither player has incentive to switch strategies unilaterally on the strength of the game, i.e. to alter the outcome except by influencing the other player also to alter strategies. All these games provide dilemmas, in a broad sense, that equilibrium is achieved in an undesirable and dangerous outcome. In all the apparent games, arming is the dominant strategy for each player; yet in the PD game that is even Pareto-suboptimal, whence the economic fascination. But as the other games deliver results which are socially suboptimal (and below a satisfying threshold), all these games are dilemmas. And the same applies to suggested alternative games that might plausibly be taken to represent the superpower situation, and such as Chicken. A recognisably suboptimal outcome is guaranteed by the independent ‘‘stable” strategies. What is worse, iteration of games does not help (as it may in other political circumstances). For there are substantial political and military incentives for the superpower players not to adjust their preferences substantially in socially superior directions after repeated games, but to do what the US at least appears to have done, to make the situation worse. �26 It is important then to attempt to modify or curtail these self-interested superpower games. There are various connected ways of going about this. One is for other parties to combine to limit or discourage these games. Another alternative is for them to try to alter the games. Thus much socially preferable would be a switch to a coordination game of some sort; for instance, to the game which neutrals tend to play (and which Lackey, in contrast to other more bellicose utilitarians, sees utilitarian superpowers playing; hence Hardin’s provocative label for this game, ‘Lackey’s game’). In the coordination game diagrammed, WN represents a western-inclined neutral and EN an Eastern inclined neutral (e.g. Yugoslavia): EN WN D D 1,1 A 3,2 A 2,3 4,4 [Other coordination games, with (D,D) assigned (1,1)] Now the dilemmatic and coordination games are not played in isolation; they come together in international settings such as United Nations’ committees (and elsewhere, since coordination games are frequently peoples’ games as well). Superimposing the games, with coordination games of the first sort applied to previously given US and SU games, leads to the following augmented East (E) and West (W) games: New Game, Augmented Prisoners’ Dilemma Augmented E E A D Revised Game, Augmented A 4,1 2,2 : *4,1' \ : 3^2 ’ D 1 : W ......... 1,4: A 2/3: 2/3; D ; 1 w ........ : 1,4 3,3 ; a 4 ; E D 2/3 • • — •- : 3-3’**: D ; 1 W I 2,3 ; . • 2.3 A D 2/3 2,2 a 4 ■ 4,1* ! . ; : 2/3 J 4 Key: rh represents a sequence of ms, i.e. m, m, m ... for each coordination player; 2/3 a sequence of 2s and 3s in some order. As augmenting games reveals, to play with a superpower is to help reinforce a stable deadlock. But playing an independent coordination game increases variety and can help in breaking the deadlock, in fact in several ways. For one, enough significant players playing a coordination game can alter the overall dominant strategy towards disarmament. For another, much more pressure can be brought to bear on the superpowers. For example, with less support, unilateral action by the US administration on Star-Wars and arms build-up can be exposed. Superpower militarism and power excursions would stand naked and �27 unsupported. Australia’s impact, in particular, would be rather greater as a nonaligned free-rider pressing seriously for disarmament and regional nuclear-freedom (instead of, as at present, white-wash polemics and token ambassadors, undermined by a none-too-tacit policy of US support). The strategy suggested by game-theoretic modelling converges then with that suggested by other approaches, notably regional and ecological approaches. The strategy is that of limitation, of disengagement from escalating US/USSR war games, and progressive alteration of their likely outcomes by defusing coordination moves. In more practical terms, the approaches mean trying to limit and modify superpower games by restricting their games and supporting regional or local coordination of players, in forms of organisations both of nations and of people. Such organisations would work, as many have already been doing, to contract the regions and spheres of influence and access of US and USSR military administrations, and to diminish support for their war-fighting objectives. For example, Antipodean groups could, and should, coordinate to ease the American military out of the South Pacific region, meanwhile resisting any intrusion of Russian military. Then, while the Europeans are doing their coordinated de-escalating, denuclearising things right across Europe, the Russian and American war games are progressively excluded from the entire Southern Hemisphere. An eventual aim geographically is, to send their weapons of war back home, to restrict their (and French and other) global military enterprises to their “own” backyards, where they would not always be so enthusiastically received. Fortunately such an ambitious and optimistic project, so unlikely to come to pass given present nation-state arrangments, can be accomplished piecemeal, from small and significant beginnings, already to be seen. As a result of recent movements in the region, a South Pacific nuclear-free region is now a politically-achievable option. A first token step has already been taken. But next steps, towards genuine nuclear-freedom, require above all cooperation of a less aligned Australia, joining other disengaging “free-riders” in the region. That in turn requires, as a practical component, closure of American bases in Australia as their leases terminate, cessation of American nuclear ship visits and aircraft staging, and an end to uranium mining and sales. As Australia is the only country in the region supplying uranium, and the main location of US bases, such steps would be most significant. Even so, the Pacific regional effect would remain unduly limited, so long as France and the US are based within the region, and transit of nuclear ships is internationally sanctioned everywhere on the shrinking high seas. Plainly there are further more difficult steps on the way to southern Pacific nuclear-freedom and independence, i.e. even for one of the easier oceanic regions. But there is no good reason to �28 expect that removing the nuclear scourge, any more than eliminating other major politico­ social evils, will be easy. Permanent removal and a less dubious “peace” than we presently enjoy is not something that will be achieved by more of what we have witnessed, or even through clever diplomacy and smart technological tricks, such as new defensive weapons; it will take difficult structural and radical design change. 8. On the need for, possibility of, and prospect of appropriate structural change. There is little doubt that certain sorts of structural political change would be highly conducive to peace (e.g. democratic reorganisation of the superpowers), and that certain fundamental changes may even be sufficient for permanent peace. With that in view they have long been advocated - at least from Rousseau and Kant onwards. But it has also been supposed that some such changes are necessary for lasting peace; ‘it is also necessary to transform the structures that lead to war’ (B. Martin, p.12). To render this theme immune to obvious criticisms - for example, that straightforward authoritarian extension of certain established structures could bring an end to war - further desiderata, typically presupposed, are invoked, for instance that certain freedoms, modest material standards of life, and so on, are duly guaranteed, and also the type of necessity involved is wound back to some lower technical level (not excluded however by present practicalities). These adjustments make the necessity theme more difficult to assess, but also more difficult to sustain. There are two parts to its assessment and defence, a negative and critical part, demolishing a range of arguments from determinism, human nature, and the like, to the effect that arrangements have to be more or less the way they are, and a positive part, comprising direct arguments for the theme. The large negative part of this enterprise will simply be illustrated.34 According to deterministic and mechanistic approaches, such as that of (marxist) technological determinism, nuclear weapons, like megamachines generally, are no aberration. They are an integral part of the business of industrial and ecological conquest, a further stage in human intervention which has already involved substantial disruption through pesticides, wastes, etc. The argument tends to the fatalistic. The megamachines of conquest are made, and once made they will be used. No change in political arrangement, which would make any difference, is possible. Sometimes technological enthusiasts push their position and luck, even further, that a weapon or device once invented by humans will be used: there is no stopping progress. But in doing so they overextend themselves. While there is, sadly a fair induction from the manufacture of weapons (of any given type, for many batches are never deployed) to their use, inductions from invention of machines or the like to their manufacture are �c 29 unreliable and subject to many counterexamples (and many machines that do eventually get made have been reinvented or independently rediscovered). But even the good inductions do not show that weapons of various sorts must be used, that a change in background political organisation would not frustrate the inductions. The broader deterministic position is of course that such background changes are not possible either; political arrangements too, like the rest of social life, are technologically or economically determined. But (nonanalytical) determinism, technological and other, is false, so it is argued elsewhere (JB, CPD). Different political arrangements, which alleviate problems, are technically possible, and arrangements would be different in differently evolved worlds. Things did not and do not have to be the way they are, or the social and political sort of way they are. Many routes, none of deductive strength, lead to the conclusion that the dominant political structures of our time, fashioned (with much input from schemes of past philosophers) from feudal institutions, require extensive structural alteration. In particular, they need to be superseded by alternative structures less intricately tied to war, which do not promote or lead so readily to war. Such a theme has been argued directly from the nuclear fix itself (as e.g. WP1, p.47ff.). But suppose, improbable as it may seem, that nuclear weapons all vanished, thereby removing the current nuclear fix; for instance, they turned out to be quietly self-destructing, or a disarmament actually took place. massive thermodynamic miracle occurred, or nuclear The problem of war would not be thereby removed, and even that of nuclear war would only be given some respite. For the structural arrangements for war would remain intact.04 Conventional weapons would remain, along with weapons perhaps as dangerous as nuclear weapons, such as chemical and biological ones. Nuclear weapons, insofar as they were removed (for small caches are easily hidden away), could soon be replaced, especially if nuclear power plants remained intact; and nothing would prevent the development of (Star-Wars) weapons more diabolical than nuclear ones. War cannot be eliminated while leaving the rest of society as it is - by freezing the status quo. ... The structural conditions for war need to be removed - not reinforced as appeals to elites may do - and superseded by alternative structures which do not lead to war (B. Martin, p.12: Martin goes on to indicate the types of structures, and how to reach them). Structural adjustments can provide conditions for lasting satisfactory peace. An initial, somewhat simplistic, Kantian argument for the proposition that peace is possible (presented by Latta, introducing Permanent Peace), runs as follows:- Peace, perpetual peace, is an ideal, not merely of a speculative kind but a practical idea, a moral principle. Hence this ideal ought to be realised, i.e. there ought (morally) to be peace. But ought entails can; therefore peace is possible. �30 From Heracleit.us through Hegel there buzzes an impressive swarm of philosophers"*6 who have rejected the second premiss. Some are even captivated by such extravagant counter-claims as that with peace everything would stop, that competition, with war as one limit, is essential to motion and progress! would now be With the recent shift in philosophical fashions, the second premiss more widely conceded, though often not on Kantian grounds, but consequentialist. Such grounds to support the theme that peace is desirable and ought to be realised, but are more discriminating in that they help indicate what sort of peace. Unfortunately, however it is done, the second premiss does not sustain the conclusion, ought does not entail can, as many moral dilemmas reveal (see MD, WP1). So fortunately, there is a more satisfactory and revealing route to the conclusion that peace is possible, and indeed is feasible. That is the more elaborate method of (semantical) modelling: present in detail scenarios of societies where peace persists (for the sceptical it may be necessary to recall n-human models, with n small). This sort of thing is of course already done, in more pleasing fashion than logicians could hope to emulate, if rather less precisely, by OQ novelists and science-fiction writers, and by activists like the different Martins. What all these scenarios point to, however, are societies considerably different from our own - though not in the people involved, who have their weaknesses, their power drives, and so forth, but because of significant structural alterations in the societies depicted. By way of such modellings we can not merely argue to the feasibility of lasting peace, but push ahead with the argument, that societies of these restructured sorts are desirable alternatives to contemporary military- industrial arrangements. For those of us then who want to move towards such pacific alternatives, the practical inference, from feasibility and desirability is clear: we should begin on the real work of structural change. Peace is possible and desirable, but the prospects are poor (as Heilbroner has said of the human prospect). Present arrangements, though contingent and fashioned in large measure from the schemes of past intellectuals, are thoroughly entrenched, and enforced, both ideologically and by much physical power, often as if along with natural law they were God­ given, though they are no longer appropriate. Even small nonstructural changes look difficult to achieve in present political climates. Through climates have not changed that much, major social improvements have been gained, not instantanously, but in longer-term struggles with government. Such short-term difficulties did not deter social theorists such as Kant, who like Rousseau before him and many after him, were concerned with obtaining lasting peace. The world has changed enormously since the time of Kant’s proposals for peace (of 1795), and even since the time of Veblen’s more cynical additions (in 1917). Hard science and �31 destructive power have grown enormously; and even theoretical knowledge of collective behaviour, especially that admitting of game-theoretic treatment, though still slight, has advanced. But political arrangements and what can be accomplished politically have, in important respects, changed very little, since Rousseau complained (around 1761) that governments were probably too short-sighted to appreciate the merits of his project for perpetual peace. Governments have long been, and been seen as, main obstacles to peace. Thus Veblen rightly maintained that ‘... if the peace is to be kept it will have to come about irrespective of governmental management, - in spite of the State rather than by its good offices’ (p.7).^^ So it has been with most major social changes; for they have involved structural political change disturbing to governmental conservatism. In his search for the indispensible conditions for lasting peace, Kant claimed, as others have claimed since, that peace is not possible under present structural arrangements of an unregulated competing nation-state kind. As times have changed, so, to a limited extent, have state structural arrangements, since Kant compiled his conditions. In particular, there is now, in the shape of the United Nations, a very weak reflection of what Kant looks for, a world (or European!) federation of nations. But crucial ingredients in Kant’s resolution are still lacking:- namely, at the upper level, what is required for a standard resolution of Prisoners Dilemma type situations - some surrender of national sovereignty, especially as regards war, and, at the lower level, “republican” states. Major blockages to adequate arrangements for peace remain at two critical levels of organisation, that concentrated upon of the organisation of collectives of states and, in part by devolution, that of the internal organisation of individual states themselves. Much evidence has now accumulated that more far-reaching changes than Kant, Rousseau and Veblen envisaged are required at both international and nation-state levels if genuine peace is to be secured. Indeed significant changes are wanted even in republician states for peace movements to get their mixed message through already fixed channels to state control systems. For this sort of reason, movements on a single front, such as peace, are unlikely to succeed on their own, but should be linked into a broader plurality of movements, which seek to widen informational and democratic channels, and to alter the character and membership of state systems, and thereby render them much more controllable and accountable.40 Many longer-haul structural changes depend upon diverting nuclear war in the meantime. Thus arguing for more far-reaching changes, for an altered nonaligned Australia, �32 for a nuclear-free South Pacific, for regional structural changes, certainly does not exclude arguing and working for obvious measures for reducing risks of nuclear war. These include: a serious commitment to arms control by the superpowers (whose practices threaten our futures, though most of us lack representation in either); a move away from war-fighting strategies and associated destabilising weapons-systems; moderation of confrontational rhetoric and other tensions-inducing practices by superpower administrations, and improved efforts at mutual understanding (as well some appreciation of the elements of political pluralism); and then, remote though it may appear, significant steps towards nuclear disarmament. Richard Sylvan 41 Bungendore NSW �33 NOTES 1. Queensland premier, with destructive deep-South policies. 2. The point, which has become controversial, is argued in effect in Gilbert. 3. See especially Dibb, as reported in the ANU Reporter, and for a more guarded elaboration, his IAD (e.g. p.163 ‘At present, planning for the defence of Australia lack coherence because there is no clear definition, in priority order, of what needs defending’); see also Sharp, p.l48ff and differently Langtry and Ball, p.575ff., p.6O5ff. The much-heralded Dibb Review of mid-1986 would, if (as already seems unlikely) it were adopted, remove some of the lesser incoherence in Australian policy, that involving details of regional defensive defence (as would also Langtry and Ball, if followed through). While Dibb appears to have demolished what he refers to scathingly as the ‘largely mythical “core force” concept’, a new controversy has sprung up over whether Australia’s more self-reliant defence should be purely defensive defence, Dibb’s ill-named ‘strategy of denial’, or whether it should include an offensive component. Dibb himself has rather rapidly shifted ground on this important issue. In late 1983 he was contending that ‘Australia should have in the force-in-being significant deterrent capabilities, based on present air and naval strike assets, which can mount defensive and offensive operations against attacking forces, their staging bases and lines of resupply’ (IAP, p.166). But in the otherwise conservative Review of 1986 such offensive defence is abandoned; no such forces and equipment for offensive off-shore operations are recommended. Instead ‘the review proposes a layered strategy of defence within our area of direct military interest. Our most important defence planning concern is to ensure that an enemy would have substantial difficulty in crossing the sea and air gap’. The new offensive/defensive defence controversy puts the Review’s adoption in increasing doubt - in which event the local incoherence in strategic planning processes and militational difficulties Dibb alludes to early in his statement will presumably persist. The Review not merely fails to address significant regional issues, as to defence priorities, and as to multiple purpose roles for Australian armed forces given that they will be involved in virtually no military activity other than maintenance and a certain “preparedness” (for on Dibb’s overstatement of the prevailing view of Australia’s very favourable regional security prospects, ‘there is no conceivable prospect of any power contemplating invasion of our continent and subjugation of our population’). But further, the Review is itself vague to incoherent, concerning wider defence issues, vague as to the post-ANZUS situation, and incoherent about Australia’s role in US global “defence” activity. According the Dibb (CT, p.16), ‘there is no requirement for Australia to become involved in United States contingency planning for global war. The presence of the joint facilities, together with the access that we provide to visits by United States warships and the staging through of Australia of B-52 bombers, are a sufficient tangible contribution to the Alliance.’ These contributions are not involvement? That is not how the USSR views the matter: they are the reported sole �34 basis of USSR nuclear targetting of Australia (see Dibb. SS p.13). global stance is left essentially to the USA. And Australia's Amazingly, in the Strategic Basis Papers (SB), Australia criticizes New Zealand because ‘it has still developed no policy for national defence and tends to look to ... the US as its primary source of defence guidance’ (p.29). Note that C3I abbreviates the mouthful, Command, Control, Communications and Intelligence. 4. See Sharp, p.l46ff. An Australian policy should moreover fit with the genuine needs and shared aspirations of local people - to the extent, presumably, that these are commendable; again the presupposed value framework is critical. 5. Thus e.g. Gray (p.17) on the Reagan Administration’s ‘foolhardy brief willingness to talk publicly about nuclear strategy’, and his distain for public involvement or input. There is some concern, especially among neo-conservatives, about US defence strategies being ‘undermined by well-meaning persons who believe they are helping the cause of peace’ (Bell p.10; similarly Gray). Even those not so far right support partial information releases which maintain public confidence; e.g. Dibb on ‘the release of a generalised statement about ;the] functions of the US bases in Australia ... to give Australians more confidence about their crucial contribution to the Allied cause’ (ISA, p.166). ‘Our defence policy-making process is probably more “closed” than that of any other advanced Western democracy’ according to Langtry and Ball (p.608), who contend that ‘the public needs to be involved much more in our defence planning and operations'. For a justified critique of public exclusion and leave-it-to-the-experts approaches, see B. Martin; also Sharp. 6. The paper was drafted in mid-1985. 7. For those amassing evidence that Australia falls into the inexact class of client states, the following Australian contribution is noteworthy: ‘The US prefers to act as a member of a group, and a contribution by Australia can also assist in demonstrating to Congressional and public opinion that the objectives sought are significant enough to attract allied support’ (SB, p.28) 8. As to DI and arms control, see, e.g. Mack PR and Gray. As to D2, ‘USA has now an announced first-strike nuclear targeting policy’ technologically reinforced, Hayes, p.4; and see also Mack AC, p.111. The goal of the Reagan administration is superiority (a conveniently ambiguous term). Thus e.g. Gray (p.32): ‘it is of course essential that the United States modernize its offensive forces so as to render the Soviet Union genuinely offensive-counterforce incompetent.’ 9. On the major changes in American policy, see e.g. Gray p.118 ff. Though America is now said to have a ‘new national security concept of which SDI is the centerpiece’ it may still lack an ‘arms control policy’ (Gray, p.25,pll). Not only arms control, but American commitment to the security of allies, remain at least decidedly cloudy matters. Thus it is of little avail to contend that Australia does have a coherent secondorder global policy, namely the (discreditable) one of following prevailing American policy. For the US lacks a first-order policy which is sufficiently clear in relevant respects. The American direction of Australian policy had better be away from too much public exposure because Australians, no more than New Zealanders, mostly do not like being pushed around, even by Americans. �35 10. Thus we can avoid the important debate as to whether, and to what extent, deterrence remains part of US global “defence” policy (though it certainly remains part of the policy sold to the American public). As to the philosophical significance of the debate, see Gay, p.l29ff. and Benn. 11. The common-interest theme is often traced to (partly self-interested) American action in the Pacific in World War II. Curiously Australia’s interests are are now said also to converge with those of Japan, but to be diametrically opposed to those of the USSR (despite increasing trade). 12. Nor, though this is a longer story, does Australian culture by any means coincide with American: see CPD. Thus a uniform treatment is entirely inappropriate. Similarly, a single overarching treatment for a monolithic West is thoroughly inadequate: see further below in the text. 13. Australian planning should be looking at strategic models (game-theoretic and other) which include Australia. For, as argued below, abandoning the uniformity assumption of the monolithic West, of the West as one parish, makes significant differences to the results yielded. 14. As Cock goes on: ‘These basic issues increasingly become lost in the array of consumer choices’. 15. ‘The serf societies - more or less willingly - accept the status of “allies”, i.e. protection with rights and duties as in feudal societies. They become client countries’ (Galtung, p.169). 16. So-called by Mack PC. But the formulation presented follows G. Davidson’s more satisfactory account in Canberra Times, Wednesday, May 8, 1985, p.2. Mack considers that what amounts to the elitist case is the ‘altogether more sophisticated argument [which] holds sway ... in government’ (p.l, italics added)! 17. The “Asian hordes” derive from one of the less spoken about successors to the Yellow Peril, from the immediate past days of the Asian communist threat, the Domino theory, and White Australia. 18. As Stephenson argued, less fortunately, 20 years ago. Even when around World War II Japan, did have interest in access to strategic raw materials, the Japanese High Command decided against invading Australia because of the difficulty of dealing with the people - a point of much importance. 19. Of course, such military expenditure is also encouraged by economic forces, e.g. like much Third World hard currency expenditure it helps the American economy along a bit. 20. Heilbroner has traced some of the economic components and consequences of what, with excess exaggeration and insufficient irony, he calls ‘the rise and subsequent fall of the American imperium’ (p.52): it hasn’t fallen that far yet. ‘Empires have always been expensive and the American empire was no exception. ... The sheer military cost ... for the United States alone ... is roughly ten percent of ... GNP for the last 25 years ($2 x 10) in 1972 dollars)’. American imperial spending supplemented by other capitalist countries fueled inflation, enhanced poverty, etc., and was complements by, what it was represented as required by, counterexpenditure and efforts by the USSR. �36 ‘The establishment of an American hegemony [consisted and: resulted not just in very large military expenditures, but in the rapid build-up of American capital investments abroad. Between 1950 and 1970, the value of American-owned plant and equipment abroad leaped from $12 billion to $78 billion’ (p.54). A result of the expenditure abroad was a serious balance of payments problem (negative “capital flows” and balances), and a growing accumulation of IOUs. On this sort of basis, Heilbroner speculates that ‘the mere operations of the American imperium by itself - deemed of such critical importance to preserve the peace and security of the capitalist world - was in all likelihood a sufficient condition for the globalisation of the inflationary phenomena’ (p.57 with insert from p.56). According to Heilbroner, ‘Long before the Vietnam debacle, it was clear that American arms could not prevent the rise of revolutionary governments in the under-developed world’ (p.57). But really very little evidence of collapse is presented by Heilbroner; and seemingly there is little. What there is more substantial evidence for is the marked decline of the American imperium in the period (1973-8) concerned. One piece of evidence is the sharp decline in America’s share of World GDP, shown in the following table of select leading national economies: SHARE OF WORLD GDP (%) POPULATION SHARE COUNTRY RANK 1968 1975 1984 (1984 est) USA 1 35.0 24.3 25.0 5.2 USSR 2 11.1 11.0 13.8 6.2 JAPAN 3 5.2 8.0 9.5 2.7 GERMANY FDR 4 5.1 6.7 5.7 1.5 FRANCE 5 4.6 5.4 CHINA 6 2.9 4.8 4.3 22.6 UK 8 2.8 2.8 2.3 1.3 4.4 1.3 INDIA 12 1.3 1.5 1.1 15.1 AUSTRALIA 15 1.1 1.4 1.0 0.3 �37 The table should also make it clear that if the USA cannot sustain a grand empire, nor can the USSR. A totalitarian Pax Sovietica is even less likely than a capitalistic Pax American was. 21. Although, so the documents continue, ‘neighbourhood contingencies .... are at present assessed as impossible’! The theme that the USA affords no sure guarantee of Australian defence is reiterated in Langtry and Bell, e.g. p.608. They go on there to outline the major points that reliance upon the US has distorted Australian arrangements (with forces better equipped to fight alongside the Americans in Asia than on their own in defending Australia) and has led to neglect of the regional priorities, ‘to defence planning which at least would recently paid little attention to the direct defence of our continent and the protection of our remote communities’ (p.608). 22. The French, who operate a global network second only to the Americans and more extensive than the Russians, with many forces in the Pacific region, have never been seriously considered. Yet in certain significant respects French social and cultural arrangements are closer to Antipodean ones than American arrangements are. In these days of technological warfare, the post-Waterloo loss record of the French should not be given too much weight; we don’t after all look very hard at the American record of defeats and incompetence. Etc. 23. If Australia is not likely to be threatened there is no real deterrence advantage because nothing to deter. Other advantages of the ANZUS alliance such as access to high-level intelligence are not only dubious (see PC, D. Martin), but not always guaranteed by the alliance as the blackout of New Zealand shows. 24. Soviet activity is undoubtedly perceived rather differently by American administrations than Antipodean ones. ‘An agressive, treacherous, ruthlessly self-interested, expansionist increasingly powerful, and hence increasingly threatening state - that is the image of the Soviet Union in America. It is the image which has legitimised the strategic modernation and Star Wars programs’ (to adopt Mack ST, pl). To see that this is indeed the intellectually shoddy route by which these grand and dangerous programs are justified, it is enough to work through fundamentalist sources, such as Gray. It is almost as if Americans had projected some of their own occasionally-manifested worst features into the giant enemy. 25. After some considerable reconstruction, that is. For the argument, curiously referred as that of “central balance” in newspaper-level publications of academics (e.g. Catley, Bell), is never presented in requisite detail - which is one reason why it has proved hard to criticise and refute. 26. As well both the premiss and its usual substitutes are false (see MF). The type of argument exhibited is a good example of prevalent Australian consequentialist thinking. A parallel argument, enjoying unwarranted popularity, runs: We might as well sell uranium (e.g. to France), because if we don’t someone else will - as if motives counted morally for nothing. 27. See also the discussion of Bell’s claims in D. Martin and in Mack PC. 28. Since the New Zealand restrictions on nuclear ships, ‘the Soviet media has been full of gloating references to the prospect of the collapse of the ANZUS treaty’ according to Dibb (SS, p.14). Given the unimportance of the Antipodes to Soviet interests (as Dibb �38 himself explains), Dibb is surely exaggerating, at least, when he later claims that ‘the prospect of the breakup of the AN ZUS treaty would be of enormous benefit to the USSR’s world-wide interests’ (SS p.31). Soviet support for Antipodean independence and for ‘a real nuclear weapon-free zones' in the South Pacific has its disconcerting elements (‘with friends like that ...’); but luckily the quality of ideas does not depend essentially on their sources and supporters. 29. As WPI serves to show. In a different context, Bell objects to Australian free-loading ‘on other people’s risks and burdens. That has certainly not been our tradition, and I hope it will not become so, since it is morally quite indefensible’ (p.7). Not so: bludging, for instance, is a well-established, if disapproved of, part of the tradition; and in some cases it is morally in order. However, free-riding is not being proposed merely for self interested reasons, e.g. to remove the present risks of nuclear targetting; it is being proposed with a view to altering the two great alliance structures that at present dominate international politics. Bell’s objection to such a course is that it ‘would on the one hand tend to increase the tendency of the superpowers to unilateralism, and on the other hand tend to induce many of the minor powers in question (including Australia) to consider acquiring nuclear capacity’ (p.7). The second alternative neglects the non­ proliferation treaty, to which Australia is a signatory; the first appears to assume erroneously that friendly relations with America are foregone; both are pretty minor considerations (and both can be dealt with in other negotiated ways) compared with the major problem of nuclear war. 30. The less than perspicuous symbolism is that used in Hardin (CA, p.20, p.39), but with agents’ costs or contributions, C, duly agent relativized. Hardin misleadingly treats C as a fixed parameter, thus strictly falsifying the tautology. 31. Thus Hardin who (in CA) claims to ‘demonstrate the equivalence of the logic of collective action and the Prisoners’ Dilemma’ (p.4) The demonstration is given on p.25ff. 32. But of course the two types of dilemma interconnect. 33. Even so, significant change in USA looks unlikely. Present arrangements suit not only the American corporate-administrative power elite, which can direct public opinion through its control of the main communications media, but many other fat-cat Americans, rather well. The polarisation of the world into two camps increases US control of the larger and far wealthier camp, yet scarcely reduces US trade or markets. While it does limit the global coverage of US business and multinationals, and somewhat restricts the transfer of other regions’ surplus value to the USA, it ensures the much greater advantage of being able to maintain the US domestic political economy on a military basis. The US and the USSR not only dance together; they were made for each other. Abroad US hegemony is maintained through a series of alliances and economic control strategies. Particularly ominous for the South Pacific are the Trilateral and Pacific Rim arrangements (which, with much local assistance, are helping to send Australia on its present economic trajectory). When advice or persuasion directed at allies and client states fail, economic measures can be resorted to (capital outflows, for instance, being a highly effective mechanism, “aid” a lesser device). For the most part, the imperial war machine can remain in the background. At home updated and improved imperial measures also work well. The mass consumerist society affords a rich and diverting selection of bread (much of it again imported) for a majority of Americans; television �39 and its entertainment variants offer a constant diet of circuses. For passive middle mainstream America, the vast police and security network remains a largely background and even unnoticed phenomenon; what is seen is even welcomed as a necessary shield from that other, dangerous, minority America. American social, educational and media management of opinion is obviously successful. Of present relevance, most Americans have been convinced that unilateral disarmament would be unAmerican. Thus the American administration, being hedged in by opinion they have helped to generate, cannot move in any such directions. For, given popular opinion, it would of course be politically disastrous, as well as undemojl’cratic! In the USSR, where political control is exercised to a much greater extent through overt power, present change of substance appears even less likely. 34. More of the negative enterprise is attempted elsewhere, e.g. a critique of the supposed strait-jacket of human nature is begun in CPD. From Plato through Hegel and into contemporary times it has been erroneously supposed that war, like aggression, is part of human nature, that war is a permanent (and perhaps even desirable) condition of human and social existence. For a refutation, see e.g. Trainer and Waite. 35. As observed by B. Martin, who uses this important form of argument for institutional change to get this thick book started (pp.12-13). 36. The swarm includes some anomalies, such as that somewhat tarnished hero of deep ecology, Spinoza: see e.g. Northedge. 37. Perhaps Kant had some such scenario in view in his theme that peace is empirically possible, which he coupled with his striking claim that peace is morally and rationally imperative. The latter claim, running in direct opposition to the long line of bellicose philosophers, really relies on the correct, but controversial, assumption that states are subject to the same moral relations as individual persons. Both then have an obligation to seek peace derived from forms of the categorial morality, notably from rational autonomy, the universality of maxims, and the ultimate value of persons (or, yet more chauvinistically, of humanity). 38. Veblen argued against the State on the basis that ‘governmental establishments and ... powers ... are derived from feudal establishments of the Middle Ages; which in turn, are of a predatory origin and of an irresponsible character’ (p.9), however the Christianfeudal origin of the State provided only one - and a coersive - evolutionary pattern of organisation (pp. 12-13), a pattern much influenced moreover by schemes of intellectuals. Other patterns remain feasible. 39. There are now theoretical arguments for Kant’s claim, as well as practical arguments of an inductive sort. 40. Such is also the new message from America: for the peace movement to get through to the administration, American democracy must be overhauled and revitalised, capitalist democracy superseded by true democracy or “republicanism” (see especially Cohen and Rogers, and earlier Chomsky). But the message, like the US peace movements’ very limited demands for peace, leaves the State, as the bringer of wars, and main source of violence essentially intact; the structural changes suggested, which will be slow to achieve, are much too narrowly conceived. 41. My thanks for information to Andrew Mack and David Bennett, and for comments to �Grover Foley and Russell Hardin. �REFERENCES G. H. Andrewartha and L.C. Birch, The Ecological Web, University of Chicago Press, 1984. W.R. Ashby, Design for a Brain, Second edition, Wiley, New York, 1960. S.Beer, Designing Freedom, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Toronto, 1974. C. Bell, ‘The case against neutrality’, Current Affairs Bulletin 61(4) (1984) 4-10. S.I. Benn, ‘Deterrence or appeasement? or, On trying to be rational about nuclear war’, Journal of Applied Philosophy 1(1984) 5-19. F. Capra and C. Spretnak, Green Politics, Hutchinson, London, 1984. R. Catley, ‘Along with the Bomb ...’ (Review of D. Martin), The Weekend Australian Magazine, 7-8 April, 1984. N. Chomsky and E.S. Herman, The Political Economy of Human Rights, Black Rose Books, Montreal, 1979. P. Cock, Alternative Australia, Quartet Books, Melbourne, 1979. J. Cohen and J. Rogers, On Democracy, Penguin, New York, 1984. P. Dibb (as reported) ‘Defence Planning “lacks coherence” - researcher’, ANU Reporter, 1983. P. Dibb, ‘Issues in Australian defence’, Australian Outlook 37 (1983) 160-166; referred to as IAD. P. Dibb, ‘Soviet strategy towards Australia, New Zealand and Oceania’ paper prepared for Soviet Strategy Against Asia converence, Tokyo, November 1984; referred to as SS. P. Dibb, Review of Australia's Defence Capabilities, Report to the Minister of Defence, Australian Government Publishing Service, Canberra, 1986; edited text also published in The Canberra Times, 4 June 1986, pp.16-18; referred to as the Dibb Review. P. and A. Erlich, Population, Resources, Environment, Second edition, Freeman, San Francisco, 1976. H. Feith,‘Richard Falk, World order radical’, Peace Studies 24 (1985) 24-5. J. Galtung, There are Alternatives, Spokesman, Nottingham, 1984. W.C. Gay, ‘Myths about nuclear war: misconceptions in public beliefs and governmental plans’, Philosophy and Social Criticism, 9(1982) 117-144. A. Gilbert, ‘The state and nature in Australia’, Australian Cultural History 1981 (ed. S. Goldberg and F.B. Smith), Canberra, 1982, pp.9-28. �42 C.S. Gray, ‘The Reagan administration and arms control’, paper presented at The Future of Arms Control Conference, Canberra. August 1985. R. Hardin, Collective Action, Resources for the Future, Washington, 1982; referred to as CA. R. Hardin, ‘Unilateral versus mutual disarmament’, Philosophy and Public Affairs 12(1983) 236-254. M.D. Hayes, ‘Defending the sunburnt country’, Chain Reaction 33(August-September 1983) 11-17. R.L. Heilbroner, Beyond Boom and Bust, Norton, New York, 1978. I. Kant, Perpetual Peace (trans, and introd. M. Campbell Smith), Swan Sonnerschein, London, 1903 (first published 1795). J. O. Langtry and D Ball (eds), A Vunerable Country, Australian National University Press, Canberra, 1986. A. Mack, ‘Farewell to Arms Controls’, Peace Research 9(1984) 9ff.; referred to as PR. A. Mack, ‘The pros and cons of ANZUS’, Fabian ANZUS Conference, Lome, 4-5 May 1985; referred to as PC. A. Mack, ‘Arms control, disarmament and the concept of defensive defence’, Disarmament 8(3)(1984) 109-119; referred to as AC. A. Mack, ‘The Soviet threat thesis: perceptions, capabilities and interests’ typescript, Canberra, May 1985; referred to as ST. B. Martin, Uprooting War, Freedom Press, London, 1984. B. Martin, Armed Neutrality for Australia, Drummond Books, Melbourne, 1984. F.S. Northedge, ‘Peace, war and philosophy’, in Encyclopedia of Philosophy (ed P. Edwards), Volume 6, Macmillan, New York, 1967, 63-67. M. Olson, The Logic of Collective Action, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1965. P. Pettit, ‘Free riding and foul dealing’, Journal of Philosophy, to appear, J.J. Rousseau, A Project for Perpetual Peace (trans. E.M. Nuttal), London, 1927 (first Published 1761). R. Routley, ‘On the ethics of large-scale nuclear war and nuclear deterrence, and the political fall out’, Discussion papers in Environmental philosophy #5, Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University, 1984. R. Routley, ‘Metaphysical fall-out from the nuclear predicament’, Philosophy and Social Criticism 3/4(1984) 19-34; referred to as MF. R. Routley and V. Plumwood, ‘Moral dilemmas and the logic of deontic notions’, Discussion Papers in Environmental Philosophy #6, Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University, 1984; referred to as MD. �43 R. Sharp (ed.), Apocalypse No. Pluto Press, Sydney, 1984. P.R. Stephenson, The Foundations of Culture, W.J. Miles, Sydney, 1936. R. Sylvan, ‘Culture and the roots of political divergence’, typescript, Canberra, 1985; referred to as CPD. M. Taylor and H. Ward, "Chickens, whales, and bumpy goods: alternative models of public­ goods provision’, Political Studies 30(1982) 350-370. T. Trainer and H. Waite, ‘Culture and the production of aggression’, in Sharp, ep.cit, 205-226. The Strategic Basis of Australian Defence Policy, leaked extracts published in the National Times, March 30-April 5, 1984, 23-30; referred to as SB. Threats to Australian Security, Parliamentary Joint Committee for Foreign Affairs and Defence, Australian Government Printer, Canberra; referred to as TAS. T. Veblen, An Inquiry into the Nature of Peace and the Terms of its Perpetuation, Viking Press, New York, 1945 (first published 1917). � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Draft Papers Description An account of the resource Sylvan's literary executor encountered an archive in which “all his projects were current", since manuscripts were undated and unattributed. Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Text Any textual data included in the document AUSTRALIA’S DEFENCE PHILOSOPHY: Further investigations of the nonexistent. ‘The opinions of philosophers, with regard to the conditions of the possibility of a public peace, shall be taken into consideration by states armed for war’ (Kant, ‘A [the only!] secret article for perpetual peace’, p.158 - a surprising article, flattering no doubt to philosophers, but neglecting their dominant bellicose tradition). A defence philosophy is much more than a defence policy, just as a philosophy of technology comprises much more than a technology policy. A policy can be given merely by a list of directives as to what do in various circumstances; even at its best it need only involve practical wisdom. By contrast, a philosophy goes deeper and requires theoretical wisdom, integration of the policy into a theoretical setting, which looks, among other things, at the central arguments and key concepts involved: here, security, stability, control, protection, defence, interests, national interests, intelligence, war, etc. Defence philosophy is thus a branch of political and social philosophy, and has long been treated as such, though under such more familiar and honest headings as “of war” and “of peace”. Like most parts of philosophy, it can be applied, for instance in shaping policies, in regional ways among others. A defence philosophy should integrate appropriate defence arrangements and approaches to war and peace, not merely or superficially into “foreign policy” or assumed “international relations”, but into the way and intended way of life of a country, both into on-going culture and into the intended or planned cultural arrangements. A defence policy typically takes prevailing socio-political arrangements and power structures for granted; a defence philosophy again penetrates deeper, questioning or rejecting features of these structures, enquiring as to the merits of things and institutions of which defence is planned, asking what sort of society should be defended by what sort of appropriate methods and at what lengths. What, for instance, is Australia, what are Australians, defending, concerned to defend, aiming to defend? Here in Australia? In the region? Abroad? How much of what others have, or what we have, is worth defending, preserving? Does Randwick Racecourse, or Pine Gap, merit defending? Would anyone stage a last stand for Oaks Estate, one of Canberra’s dreariest suburbs? If the Indonesians made a lightning strike in Australia just to remove Bjelke-Petersen,1 should we resist? Few of the necessary prerequisites have been adequately thought about in Australia, where unplanned muddling through from immediate problem to immediate problem - reactive contingency “planning”, if you want to be generous - is the main style of political life , and, along with the traditional political game of “follow the leader”, of defence planning. Australia 2 does not yet have a defence philosophy. Some of its critical philosophers could help to supply it with the rudiments of one or more, and to inject some depth into broader defence theorizing. What follows is intended as a modest beginning: much of what is attempted, unearthing arguments and assumptions, followed by analysis and criticism, and some elaboration of alternative principles, falls squarely within the domains both of applied philosophy and traditional philosophical practice. 1. Australia’s inappropriate. defence “policy”: incoherent, obsolescent Australia seems to lack even a clear and coherent defence policy. American, This is a commonplace charge (made even by friends of Defence, interested in obtaining extra public funding for defence and elements of C3I).^ The reasons concern not merely the major unsolved issues of exactly what is being defended, what things and objects and what interests, and whose, what freedoms and values, and what role American defence facilities in Australia are supposed to have in this. They concern the status of present treaty arrangements, such as the “cornerstone”/“millstone” ANZUS treaty, signed between Australia, New Zealand and the US, now in disarray (still ’‘maintained” by New Zealand, whom the US has unilaterally announced expelled), and of subsequent associated memoranda of understanding (some secret, involving the local storage of US nuclear weapons, entry of American personnel, etc.). They also concern a range of more detailed lucunae such as: lack of clearly-defined priorities on what needs defending and how it is to be accomplished; doubtful capacity of present defence forces to handle low-level contingencies in and to the north of Australia and in maritime zones; and unsatisfactory (or no) arrangements and planning for “defence-in-depth”, for civil defence and use of civil infrastructure, mobilisation, wartime administration, protection of key facilities and areas, and post-nuclear organization. And, equally damaging, if its policy makers do have a coherent policy it is nowhere satisfactorily revealed to the peoples of Australia.It is left to journalists and newspaper­ watching academics to winkle out what local defence installations may be for and to make various conjectures as to what the policy may be. Of course there are many administrators and policy makers who think that is the way it should be; the public should not be informed, but kept satisfied with some “generalised” statements.As to coherence, Australian policy makers have only recently found out that Australia has a (purely) regional defence role, not a global one. This they were told by the Americans in Washington in talks allegedly designed to clarify commitments under treaty arrangements with the USA. It thus begins to look as if Australia’s defence policy, such as it is, is still as much determined abroad, by US policy makers, as it is locally in Australia. 3 Much circumstantial evidence can be assembled to confirm the claim that Australia’s vague defence policy can now be stamped Made in USA, as it used, before the last World War (and British abandonment), to be stamped Made in UK. For one thing, Australia has had a bipartisan defence policy, so it is claimed. That “policy” has however been essentially shaped by the Liberal party, which has governed most of the time (as senior partner in a coalition). But the Liberal party simply took over US arrangements for Australia (as planned in Washington for ANZUS) and still does. For instance, the latest package® from the Liberal Party “Defence and Foreign Policy Unit” consists largely of US Defence Department material packaged under a local cover. The Strategic Basis Papers, endorsed by the Labor Government, give virtually unqualified support to US military practices and to the American view of the global strategic situation, and commit Australia to supporting, without any due reservation, American positions in world forums.' The same dependent-policy conclusion can be reached by more devious arguments. regional defence role? When, for example, did Australia find out it had a After the Americans had found that they could no longer afford to police the world on their own and would have to delegate some of that role and offload some of the heavy associated costs, on reliable dogs-bodies; and also after Labor took some faltering steps towards developing a broader foreign more independent policy with some indigenous elements (Australian Minister Hayden was promptly flattened by US heavies such as Schultz). Australian defence and foreign policy copies American policy in main respects, but lags it. The Australian defence policy presented by the Labor government, to the extend that it is visible, is conservative; it coincides with older American defence policy, and diverges from the new (post-Reagan) American war policy. For Australian Labor defence policy supports what the American administration supposedly used to support, namely DI. Multilateral nuclear disarmament (within the framework of series of treaties and agreements), and D2. Deterrence in the interim, deterrence through mutual assured destruction (i.e. MAD). The presence of American military facilities in Australia is supposed to be justified in the framework of these assumptions. For they are to assist in making deterrence under D2 effective, and to provide verification for the arms reduction arrangements under DI (both stabilizing functions). There is much evidence indicating however that American policy makers have now abandoned both Dl and D2 and any serious attempts at nuclear arms control8. Certainly they have moved on to the following highly destabilizing doctrines: Nuclear war-fighting, Limited nuclear wars, and Star-Wars (i.e. Strategic Defense Initiative). While this American war policy may well be accepted by the next Liberal coalition government, all of these military doctrines are explicitly rejected by the 1985 Labor government. Since the American “joint” facilities in Australia also facilitate the rejected 4 objectives, the problems concerning these dubious facilities are much aggravated. The Government’s approach concerning them - withholding information concerning the full range of their functions, and particularly their war-fighting roles from parliament and the public - is certainly unsatisfactory, as several of its members realise; and as a result the Government appear in not atypical disarray, further grist for the incoherence theme. If there is perhaps a coherent Australian global defence approach somewhere away from public exposure, it is most likely then an old abandoned American policy.9 But in that case it certainly lacks - what it in any case appears to lack - justification. For Australia, in supporting US defence policy and activity, for instance in world forums, is supporting present offensive American policy, not what it reputedly adheres to, deterrence (through MAD). The point holds good whether or not American global policy still includes such deterrence as a proper part10; for it certainly involves other very different and dubious strategies. The commonplace, but increasingly feeble, justification given for Australian’s tagging along after America is that Australian interests are the same as American11. American interests by no means coincide with Australian . However Consider, for instance, such matters as enriching Americans, making conditions favourable for American business, promoting Americans and things American. Consider, differently, American practices in Latin America, from undercutting Allende’s government in Chile to its practices against Nicaragua, to its extensive export of arms and violent methods, there and elsewhere in the world. Thus America, like Russia, is busy meddling in Africa, but ‘Australian security interests are not directly involved’ (SB, p.24). Consider, differently again, escalation of the nuclear arms race. Or consider American strategic planning, and all the game- and decision- theoretic models which concern just USA and its adversary USSR, perhaps occasionally adding Europe as part of the monolithic West, but rarely or never considering the Southern Hemisphere - so that either Australia is part of America as Poland may be of Russia or it is nothing. Or consider American interests not merely in Soviet and communist containment, but in containing socialism such as might (under more auspicious conditions) flourish in Australia. An American policy answering to American interests is accordingly inappropriate for Australia, inappropriate for Antipodean socialism. Australians should do their own defence thinking and work out a policy appropriate for Australia. (That applies also to Australian political representatives, who should stop parroting implausible American views and begin developing some genuinely local and original ones.) Should Australia be tagging along after the Americans in support of installation of their style of free-enterprise capitalism everywhere feasible (i.e. that the state socialists don’t already heavily control)? What they quite seriously call ‘keeping the free world free’? Of 5 course freedom has, in this sort of context, multiple meanings and associations (as well as multiple inconsistencies, appearing information” and the like). overtly in subsidized “free trade”, selective “free Significant parts of what mainstream American culture admits under the freedom umbrella, mainstream Australian culture would exclude: for instance, active opposition to and undermining of social and socialist programs and governments, bullying of small countries that impose barriers to US business or military practices (all part of “free enterprise”), etc. What of those intangible freedoms the cultures supposedly agree about, civil liberties, freedom to information, to live and work where one chooses, to travel, and so on? These are certainly important freedoms, better upheld in some parts of the unaligned West (e.g. Sweden, Switzerland) than in most parts of the Eastern Block. But such freedoms, which run counter to dependent policies, hardly require defence subservience. influenced state practices are fast reducing freedom. Moreover, military- Many of the older freedoms have vanished this century, such as freedom to travel, to work and live abroad, etc.; now one requires permits, licences, passports, ... . And many more former freedoms are being or have been eroded; soon it will be identity documents, restricted zones, ID cards, as already in parts of the “free West”. Now nuclearism in Europe ‘is devouring the very freedom it is said to protect: [the Greens] point to the new laws proposed in 1983 designed to keep citizens from assembling to protest deployment of the Pershing II and cruise missiles’ (Capra and Spretnak, pp.58-9). Further structural changes required for the security of the state, imcompatible with democratic freedoms, include ‘secrecy, lack of commentability, permanent emergency, concentration of authority, peacetime militarism, extensive apparatus of state intelligence and police’ (Falk, in Feith p.24). Nuclearism is not a smart strategy to preserve remaining freedoms. 2. Inherited other-reliance, and the populist and elitist cases for patronage and subservience. Australia’s defence policy, such as it is, is furthermore inherited rather than regularly (re)thought through. But that procedure - essentially the legal method of precedence, whatever its very limited satisfactoriness in legalistic decision making - is defective when applied in politics or to defence, especially where immediate independent action is required. For precedence methods are extraordinarily slow, as well as characteristically conservative, and as in defence exclude significant and rather urgent alternatives. The unsatisfactory decision-making practices to be revealed in the case of defence are by no means restricted to defence but are typical of the kind of advanced age capitalism Australia operates under, or rather labours under, down under. In setting down those 4. 6 features of aged capitalism (‘of the Corporate State') that the New Left and Alternative Australia movements were reacting against, Cock neatly summed up these practices: Decisions were made from the top and on the basis of vested political interests, rather than by rational goals and means that served public interests. The people were rarely consulted effectively before a decision and often only partially informed afterwards. Planning was based on a mere extension of the present. ... activists felt they were given little opportunity to choose how they lived or worked. The availability of space, time, trees and air was also determined by others ... (p.18 italics added).14 As it was and is with one’s defence, military and civil, so it is with the matter of whether one lives in a nuclear target zone or not, and so on (though immigration policy, uranium and woodchip export policies, etc.) In these areas planning remains top-down, with at best consultative elements. No real choices are offered to people. A major inherited assumption is that of other reliance, that Australia’s defence depends on other more powerful allies. That ally was firstly Britain, and since World War II America; but in any event the assumption is that to be safe Australia needs a powerful patron, a protector. A corollary is that Australia adopts a suitably submissive relation to its patron, making expected concessions. And for the most part it has; however such a defence insurance policy does not come cheap.15 It costs not only money and resources, but quality of life, freedom and independence. The assumption of other-reliance is however unsound, for several reasons. Most important, it characteristically depends upon the following themes, all of which lack solid foundation: 1. Australia is threatened - or at least 1A. Australia is likely to be threatened in the near future. 2. Australia cannot defend itself. 3. Australia can however depend upon its patron (or ally), i.e. upon the USA. These three themes in fact make up what has been called the populist case for the ANZUS alliance.16 It is very different from the elitist case for ANZUS, said to hold sway with the Australian government, which, while insisting upon premiss 3, essentially rejects 1 and 2 and claims instead 4. Australian has a vital interest in global stability. 5. Global stability is under threat (constantly) by an expansionist Soviet Union. 6. Only USA can contain the Soviet threat and hold the global balance. Some of techniques the US deploys for holding global balance operate through dependent states and a network of alliances like ANZUS. But obviously further premisses are required to reach the intended conclusions that Australia should be participating in any such alliance, and what is more, hosting US defence facilities and exercises. A first such premise is the no-shirking theme, that Australia should be contributing its part to “holding the balance’’ (cf. Bell). Even this first further step is pretty shaky; as we shall see, one shaky step in a rather ramshackle case, since premisses 5 and 6 are decidedly dubious (and 4 may involve equivocation). For it can be plausibly argued that Australia’s vital interests are not guaranteed by US techniques, which threaten to upset the whole applecart, and can be obtained by alternative more satisfactory means outside of such soft alliances as ANZUS. In any case, it is unclear that local contributions enhance global (nuclear) stability (see e.g. Mack and Davidson). But first, there is more pernicious regionalist version of the elitist position to be considered, what might be called the offshore elitist position. This position grants 2A*. Australia can defend itself against regional threats, and can look after itself regionally. But it does not (as indeed other qualified elitist positions may not) grant 1A. What the offshore position insists upon is 1AI*. Australia’s interests could be threatened in the near future. Since these interests - perhaps concerned with trade, Australian companies or Australians abroad, or whatever - may have little or nothing to do with internal Australian security, this premiss represents an extremely important shift (a shift not unrelated to the inverse bureaucratic shift from war to defence). It goes further than what has been called forward defence. In extended form the offshore position does call for some sort of global policeman or police force ready to intervene whenever a “free port” anywhere looks like closing its doors. Part of the difficulty in getting to grips with the elitist position is that it tends to slide through to the offshore position (by way of now evident immediate positions). The arguments against both the populist and elitist cases, and indeed against virtually all of themes 1 through 7 are sufficiently familiar to justify but a fairly brief outline of some of the main points involved. Of course just a couple of defections from themes 1 through 7 would serve logically defeat both cases, but there have been some interesting repair attempts, designed to float the arguments on diminished premisses. 3. The brief against the popular populist case; the need for new directions. Contra 1 and 1A. While Australia is not at present under notice of threat, veiled threat or harassment from abroad, a majority of its population appears to believe that it is. As the popular view is not the informed, administrative, or parliamentary view, it is worth inquiring 8 why the popular view persists, as the opinion polls reveal it has. The populace has been deliberately kept in the dark (or even misinformed), because this suits bipartisan government purposes. Although both main Australian political parties are well enough aware that the main assumptions underlying the populist case are false, the reasons for which they support the American alliance (e.g. those of the elitist case) are much more difficult to sell to the public. Accordingly the parties and Government have no political interest in undermining the unsound populist case. In particular they have gone out of their way not to cast doubt upon the connected assumption that US is a reliable guarantor against all threats. Thus long-standing Australian psychological insecurity about security has been allowed to stand, and has not been assuaged by any requisite informational and educational effort. In particular, older attitudes to Asia persist not far below the surface of popular Australia: fear, mistrust and xenophobia, patched over by a pragmatic attachment to trade and tourism. This misplaced insecurity is fuelled by popular misconceptions of Australia and its place in the world: metaphorically, that Australia is a luscious plum ripe for Eastern picking, instead of the Asians view that Australia, so far as they are aware of it at all, is a remote desiccated uncouth place perhaps good for some trade and investment. Or, to get towards more concrete assumptions, Australians apparently tend to their view country as affluent but underpopulated, resource rich but largely defenceless; yet not far to the north are Asian hordes who are impoverished, resource poor, and so on . Such a view is seriously out of touch with reality. Parts of Asia are now at least as affluent (on conventional economic indicators) as Australia. They do not see themselves as overpopulated, in a way that calls for mass exodus; and in those areas which are as overpopulated as Europe, such as Java, bribes and force are required to move people on transmigration programs to relatively unoccupied parts of the Indonesian empire. So far as they require them, they can purchase Australian resources - which are not unique - much more easily and cheaply (because they even carry significant local subsidies) than they could obtain • them by seizure. 1s For these sorts of reasons, and because Australia itself poses no threat, no other state has a genuine interest in attempting to invade Australia. As it is for interests, so it is for capabilities. No regional power has the capacity to launch a successful invasion of Australia, or is likely to have such a capacity in the near future. As the joint Parliamentary Committee concluded, Currently only the United States would have the physical capacity to launch a full scale invasion of Australia, and it clearly lacks any motive to do so (TAS, p.94). 9 As the report also stated, quoting Synnot (former Chief of Defence Staff), ... to raise the sort of force which would be required for a mass invasion of Australia could not possibly be done in under five years by other than the superpowers (TAS). But neither superpower is at all likely to expend effort or resources to such an end. An obvious naive question which at once arises is: Why bother then with much defence? (A later question to entertain is: why not be a free-rider on collectively provided global security, such as it is?) Why not proceed forthwith to unilateral disarmament? Mack for one, having reassembled the now-standard telling case that Australia is not threatened ‘now or for the foreseeable future’, and so having broken the populist argument, is confronted by the awkward option of unilateral disarmament for Australia. He stages a hasty retreat, points to the dependence of premisses 1 and 1A on premiss 2, and proceeds to claim that ‘the populist case for ANZUS is sustained’ even without premisses 1 and 1A. It is however a decidedly problematic retreat. While it is true that the arguments against 1 and 1A may sometimes take it for granted that Australia can look after itself to some extend, put up some resistance, it is far from clear that they depend essentially on assumptions approximating premiss 2. Consider the no­ interests argument, which appears decisive given the (estimated) very limited invasion capabilities of potential invaders. The main consideration adduced appears to depend in no essential way, indeed in no obvious way at all, on Australia’s dynamic fighting forces. Australian mineral resources, to repeat one of the more sensitive examples involved, can be obtained more readily and cheaply by trade methods than military ones. What all this seems to show is that a rather minimal streamlined force, if any, would presently meet Australia’s military requirements. It is not as if Australia is ‘entirely defenceless’ without a conventional military force, like a babe-in-arms. The whole apparatus of nonmilitary defence is available on a continent well suited to its use, though lacking a population trained in its techniques. But even without requisite popular training in defence methods, Australia would be a difficult place to govern, Australians a difficult lot to subjugate. It was such features of the Australian character that deterred the Japanese on a previous occasion “If the invasion is attempted, the Australians, in view of their national character, would resist to the end. Also, because the geographical conditions of Australia present numerous difficulties in a military sense, it is apparent that a military venture in that country would be a difficult one” (TAS, p.62). The points still hold good, and could be strengthened. There are several parts to any such 10 program of nonmilitary defence: making it happen, and putting it abroad (ideally with dinkum Australian exaggeration) that it has happened. To the issue of alternative defence we are bound to return. For now, when Australia is not threatened, is a good occasion to reconsider, and begin to adapt, defence arrangements. For example, it looks very much as if enormous sums, which could be valuably directed elsewhere, are being spent, largely to make many Australians feel secure.But a much more effective and inexpensive way to such results would be through requisite popular education and psychological therapy - with, if it were well done, much more satisfactory results, a more secure and better informed people. Contra 2. As a result of post-War developments in weapons systems and C3I capabilities, the military defence of Australia has become much easier. It comes down to enhancing, through new robust and reliable systems, the enormous strategic advantages Australia enjoys by virtue of geographical isolation. In principle, any maritime invading force can now be detected well in advance of arrival, through modern radar warning systems, and destroyed by precision guided munitions. And any invaders that did manage to gain a foothold on Australian soil would face severe logistic problems, and be subject to disproportionate responses from local defence. Standard discussions (as in Dibb, Mack) proceed to introduce a great deal of “Boys’ Own War Games” stuff concerning contemporary weapon and C3I systems; the essential point is that these could serve to turn Australia into a pretty unvulnerable armed fortress, and into an extremely difficult territory were the oceanic moat crossed and the fortress entered (see especially D. Martin). Under such armed neutrality and (differently) fortified Australia defence scenarios, even invasion from outside the region by an inimical world power could be resisted with reasonable prospect of success. There is no power at all likely to mount such an invasion; there is apparently (as noted above) only one power that could, that good ally the USA (reckoned however a likely invader by 6-7% of the Australian population!). Nonetheless the threat of a Soviet invasion is taken seriously not only by the larger populace but by committees of their elected representatives. But the Soviet military has never undertaken such a long-range massive force projection, is ill-equipped to do so, and lacks any plausible reason to try such a stunt (for details see, e.g., D. Martin; also SS, ST). The only credible Soviet threat to Australia is in the context of a superpower war, when American facilities in Australia and perhaps Australian cities, would be struck at by intercontinental missiles. While this would be bad enough, it is highly unlikely that it would be followed or accompanied by an invasion. Soviet forces are once again not sufficient, and not thought sufficient by the Soviets for that sort of diversion; they would be required elsewhere in a superpower war; and they would be devastated, unless USA is militarily even more incompetent than sometimes depicted. i. 11 Contra 3. What will be argued is not the negation of 3, that the Americans cannot be relied upon, but rather that 3 is dubious, and that it would be rash to place excess reliance on American protection. That being so, and other patrons being even less promising, Australia should look more to its own resources, as the American administration is kindly advising. Especially since the American “Vietnam debacle” and the fall of Saigon, things have changed in important ways which cast doubt on the reliability of American patronage. First, the relative economic and military strength of the USA has declined significantly. It no longer has such a large share of world product(ivity); as a connected matter of policy, US world warfighting aspirations have been reduced. Its ability to act as, and afford to be, global policeman has also markedly declined/ Secondly, the willingness of Americans to engage in remote foreign wars has correspondingly tumbled. Although the American administration includes more than enough hawks, to be sure, the people and Congress are not longer in a mood for gratuitous foreign adventures, especially when the fun may not appear to be in American interests. Since Vietnam, US opinion polls regularly show strong popular opposition to overseas military involvement. This “Vietnam syndrome” has served as a major constraint on US military policy and foreign involvement. An important manifestation of these changes is the Guam Doctrine, calling upon US regional allies to take primary responsibility for their own defence in regional conflicts. Another important outcome is Defense statements to the pointed effect that before US troops are committed abroad there must be reasonable assurance of Congressional and popular support (Weinberger, reported in PC p.14). As Mack comments, ‘such assurance is impossible to guarantee - especially for remote countries where no US vital national interests are at stake’. Certainly no more is assured under the ANZUS treaty which provides only that each signatory ‘act to meet the common danger in accordance with its constitutional processes’ (article 4). All the treaty strictly requires is consultation; there is no undertaking or commitment. Isn’t the treaty backed up by informal verbal reassurances? None that are not undermined by others, in American administrative multiple-speak. Even the elite view is that Australia has to ‘work ... to maximize the prospect of US support’ and that the Americans cannot be counted upon. For ‘the threshold of direct US combat involvement could be quite high, and circumstances at the time could significantly limit US willingness or ability to help Australia in other ways?. ‘... we cannot rely upon US support in a defence emergency arising within our own neighbourhood’ (SB, pp.29-30). However a special case has been made for American reliability in Australia’s case - as 12 opposed to examples of American abandonment of earlier military undertakings (in Vietnam, Cambodia, Iran) - on the basis of permanent friendship, common interests, and shared values and democratic traditions. There are two difficulties with this type of special pleading: first, as to the basis, and, second, as to the adequacy of such a basis in by-passing Congress, the American people, and slow constitutional processes. Historical evidence hardly sustains the adequacy of the basis in analogous cases. And here, as already indicated, the basis is shaky. For there is not a common culture shared by Australia and America: rather values diverge significantly on quite crucial issues. Even less are interests always common, as the matter of subsidised agricultural produce reveals, and as missile testing and nuclear ships issues in the South Pacific have recently confirmed. Interests diverged, for instance, when Australia toyed with opposing Indonesia’s claim to West Papua. So it is dubious at least that American interests would coincide with Australian in disputes or confrontation with Asian nations to the North, e.g. with Indonesia or Japan. Of course if the special case argument did hold water, Australia and America really were mates, then the treaty would be otiose. There was in fact no treaty in operation in 1942; but by then American interests in countering the Japanese were independently aroused. 4. Other-reliance and regional self-reliance A major problem with other-reliance for defence is then that it cannot be deemed entirely reliable, yet precisely here unreliability can hardly be tolerated. When the Indonesians are rolling into Brisbane it won’t do for Defense to call up with a message like that from local Services, "We can’t get there till tomorrow’’, or “until after Congress meets”, or “Sorry, Mate!”. More seriously, handing defence over to others means handing control of our lives over to others; and given nuclear defence, which too many Antipodean administrations have opted for, it quite likely means literally handing our lives over for many of us. Another problem of other-reliance is thus its adequacy. A further problem is its cost. In principle, if a State hires out its defence it would no doubt look, other things being equal, for the cheaper bidder - if, that is, defence is a commodity of a sort, like national shipping, meterological services, etc. The trouble with global defence is that the market is monopolistic, with currently only one supplier of the right complexion22, who accordingly can exact a very high price, and has - making the whole country a nuclear target and demanding substantial subservience. Similar points make part of the case, well-enough appreciated, for not trying to press defence, plainly a collective good, into a marketable commodity. When a country can supply its own defence, it therefore makes very good sense for it to do so, since it normally has a stronger interest in its own proper defence than most other parties. Should it also be cheaper in costs that matter, then self-reliance not just makes good sense but pays; other-reliance does not. But in that event, it surely does not need nuclear 13 patrons, or to farm out some of its defence. Such self-reliance undermines an important part of the older case based on other-reliance for alliances such as ANZUS. However newer bipartisan approaches to defence try to combine them (thus e.g. Australian minister Beazley as reported by Davidson) - approaches which thus begin to empty ANZUS of what little content it had, and remove much of the apparent point of such older alliances. Since the ANZUS arrangements contain no clear commitments beyond consultation but are merely vague articles of understanding, a simple course is of course to allow them to be emptied of content, so that the alliance, an expensive and outdated “insurance” policy, dies a natural death. It may however be death by seizure or convulsion should American defence facilities be closed or internationalised and passage of American nuclear equipped or powered transport be excluded from Australia. That would no doubt sacrifice the deterrence and other advantages the treaty supposedly affords , while making way for the greater advantages of friendly nonalignment, of no longer being a nuclear target, or so on. But self-reliance pure and simple is insufficient. The world does not consist of separable isolated pieces, as becomes increasingly evident. Most dramatically, Australia will not escape the effects of nuclear winter. The picture is much the same as for other dynamic subjects, such as plants which are not internally self-sufficient but depend crucially on their environment - and indeed as for States themselves. The question then is what form the additional holistic component of policy should take? Put this way, it is almost obvious that the appropriate move is not taking sides (as in a kids’ war game or tug-of-war game that is already set up) and doing one’s bit for confrontation. For that will not contribute to stability, to a proper holistic approach, but rather to sectionalism and fragmentation, and to bringing nuclear winter closer. Other-reliance and self-reliance typically present a false contrast, and certainly do with pure self-reliance - a false contrast like that of holism and partism (EE, p.223), and of dependence versus isolationism. In between lie a range of positions, one of which - favoured by a long line of peacefully-disposed philosophers from Rousseau and Kant onwards - might be called integrated reliance or federated reliance. The elitist case, insofar as it were to call for such reliance (e.g. in assumption 4), could hardly be faulted. But it doesn’t; and is satisfied with much less. Integration may reach only certain inadequate levels, the level of modern alliances and alignment, which are essentially coupled with opposition to an other side, e.g. the monolithic East (or West). It is into just this trap that elitist arguments fall. 14 5. The decline and fall of elitist arguments. Premisses 4 and 5 of the elitist argument turn around the crucial notion of stability, as related arguments revolve around that of security. But stability and security are value-laden terms, which are not cultural invariants. What stability comprehends in American administrative perception is very different from what highland villages take it to include. In each case a system is stable if it returns to a given stationary state under perturbations of sufficiently small magnitude. But both the relevant states and the stationary among them are relative to given frames of reference; for instance, what is stable at a macrolevel may well not be at a microlevel. As Trudeau has said of the superpowers, ‘they share a global perception according to which even remote events can threaten their interests or their associates’ (p.10) and disturb stability. But lesser states or regional people, not counting remote business or military interests as relevant, report no instability. Bureaucrats invariably view bombs as necessary to stability, and the nuclear fix as stability; by contrast, gentle people increasingly see bombs as tools of terrorism and as characteristically antithetical to peace. ad 4: Of course Australia has a vital interest in global stability and security: what sizeable nation does not? But the determinable motherhood interpretation (of italicised terms), while no doubt diplomatically convenient, conceals crucial differences, highly material to the argument. For one global stability means something different in USA from what it means in Costa Rica and likely what it intends in Australia. Certainly vital interests are different. America is interested in containing socialism (in Australia as elsewhere), and it tends, in more popular rhetoric at least, to equate containing socialism with containing communism and both with Soviet containment. A continental swing to socialism (or Non-Soviet communism) in Latin America, or in Africa, would upset global stability, on American perception, and would indeed have significant effects on US business or investment; but it would not on its own upset or affect most Australians or directly threaten Antipodean stability, and it certainly need not affect nuclear stability. Australians generally are not opposed in principle to socialism or notably interested in containing its spread (indeed perhaps the opposite). Australia is not interested in (and oughtn’t to be charmed by the idea of) defence of the (American) “free enterprise” system, or in the defence of uglier forms of capitalism wherever they are presently initiated or opposed (cf. Chomsky and Herman). Contra 5. It can be conceded, without granting the main thrust of the premiss, that the Soviets are expansionistic, at least in that they are interested in extending their influence where they can. So also are most empires, including American and Indonesian (so for that matter are many academics and most sales-people). But the Soviets have an ideological 15 message to spread, Marxism-Leninism, an ideology they used to anticipate being installed everywhere. But the Americans also have a message, a capitalist message, Free Enterprise Inc, which they are working to sell pretty much everywhere accessible to them. And they need to be expansionistic to have it adopted, whereas the Russians and Chinese need simply wait for history to take its allegedly determined course (though a little assistance - reflecting legitimate doubt about this determinism? - would surely spread their disconcertingly different forms of “progress” without interfering). But surely the Russian message is pernicious? All these messages are pernicious (for familiar reasons: see e.g. Erlich). The proper question is whether on its own Soviet international activity threatens, in some damaging way, global stability. Undoubtedly Soviet-American confrontation, as in the Cuban missile affair, does threaten global stability; though not in a way that has any bearing on Australian defence. In fact no Russian expansionary tendency, military or otherwise, has an untoward direct effect on Australia, little of significance reaches into the Antipodes (see Dibb SS). So what is the local excitement about? In large measure the excitement has been drummed up by the political right, East European expatriates, and pork-barrelling politicians. The effect of Soviet expansionism is much exaggerated and overexploited (Mack ST). Viewed from the Antipodes it is hardly a problem, unless the Soviets should get locked into military confrontation with USA - a real problem to be addressed. With that problem however, the Antipodes can better assist as part of a third nonaligned group which helps to referee and to prize apart the heavies, not by seconding and inciting the USA. But confrontation apart, Soviet internationalism, hardly a great success story, does not seriously disturb global stability, as seen from Australia. For a proper assessment of Soviet internationalism, types of expansion should be distinguished - military, potential military, influence with military access, and mere influence. In actual military expansion and involvement since W’orld War II, the Russian record is hardly striking by comparison with the USA or several other states. The one conspicuous case involving control of new territory, that of Afghanistan, has actually had little effect on global stability. The usual Western apprehension concerns not anything the Soviets have accomplished, but what they might attempt militarily, especially in Europe. But the idea of Soviet military adventure in Europe is a Western invention and bogey, lacking in plausibility. The Soviet military lacks the force ratio needed to be assured of military success in Europe, both by their own standards of what is required and by Western strategic standards. And the Soviets have no good reasons or interests in undertaking such an exercise which would draw them into nuclear war. They already face enough economic difficulties and troubles with East European client states which they cannot control satisfactorily. 16 The extension of Soviet influence has largely been in the Third world. But it has hardly been successful, with as many failures and losses to record as Soviet “gains” - gains which add to the imperial burden since they involve countries wracked with problems, such as Vietnam. The Third World exercises are marred by Soviet inaptitude and limited by the state of their own economy. They scarcely displace the global structure enough to test its stability; and they produce no shock waves or even significant ripples in the Antipodes. Contra 6. The main current threat to world stability appears to come not from one of the dancers in the East-West dance of death, but from the escalating confrontation, easily ignited, between the lead dancers. With this US policies and practices have at least as much to do as USSR ones. Recent US practices are more destabilizing than Soviet ones, and indeed highly destabilising, because of new weapons and weapons systems, because of rejection of arms control and Soviet proposals, and because of “star wars” preparation which both accelerates the arms race on earth and begins a new one in space. A vast increase in tension and suspicion accompanies the “arms race” which is in large measure due to US intransigence and US war-fighting doctrines, new weapons systems, with built-in incentives for pre-emption, and deliberate abandonment of arms control (see PR). Such considerations, duly assembled, demolish the received (but nonetheless crazy) theme that an alliance or alignment with USA helps increase stability. American practices are to be resisted as much as Soviet. 6. The East-West balance argument: American alignment versus friendly independence The need for Australian alignment with the USA is supposed to be shown by the East-West This politically-important balance argument, which shares key premisses nr with the related elitist argument, runs as follows : balance argument. 7. Global stability is the key to world peace. 8. Stability of the international order is a matter of maintaining a global balance. But 5. The global balance is constantly threatened by an expansionist USSR. 6A. The threat is [only] checked by the USA, which (6A.1) guarantees an open and pluralistic international order. 9. Australia’s primary security concern, indeed most vital interest, is this stability. Hence 10. Australia’s role is to help America maintain the balance. The rest of Australia’s intervolvement with American military arrangements is then taken to follow. But there are many reasons for halting the argument before it reaches this stage of practical (and allegedly moral) detail. The balance argument assumes much that has already been rebutted, for instance that the Soviet threat thesis is correct (i.e. 5) and that US 17 policy is stabilizing (part of 6A). It also takes for granted, what now is at least in serious doubt, that American policy is directed at balance and deterrence, rather than what the American administration appears to be aiming at, superiority. But in that event, Australia is not really engaged in some longer term balancing feat, so much as in helping USA prevail in nuclear race, contradicting the goal of world peace of premiss 7. Contra 10. and its derivation. The derivation is inadequate: it does not follow that Australia’s role is such a lackey’s one. If the balance of strength is leaning in America’s direction, as most less-biassed evidence indicates, then Australia should surely be throwing its slight weight in with the Eastern team (that is what such images as the balanced tug-of-war would suggest). Presumably premiss 6A.1 is designed to exclude this deplorable thought, of Australia teaming up with totalitarians. Nevertheless Australia should be putting its slight weight where it is effective, given its own broader objectives, interests, principles and supposedly pluralistic ideals. There are several different roles Australia could fulfil which would enable it to make a more satisfactory, less passive, contribution to world peace, among them de-escalation through active nonalignment, appropriate aid, and so forth. Thus 10 is hardly well-supported or evident. A more direct approach would be better than throwing Australian weight unreflectively on one side of the balance. As a little reflection attests, the balance image and argument point not in the direction intended, but towards nonalignment. Contra 6A (and 6). The theme that US maintains the balance, and hence preserves the peace, is of course false. For again, it takes two to tango. While it can be granted that the USA is interlocked with and checks the USSR in this munitions dance, the history of the dance reveals that the pace-escalation has flowed from the interaction of the one partner with the other. That is, but for the USA, the USA would not be required to check the USSR (the interaction is two-way as with Hegel’s famous master-slave relation). In any case, it looks as if, on a different historical trajectory, the main states of Western Europe could match the Soviet Union militarily (for they have comparable combined GNP, technological resources, etc.; cf. note 20) Thus it is doubtful that the current Soviet build-up, produced in interaction with the USA, could only be, or have been, checked by the US. ad 6A.1. As the premiss is only of marginal relevance to the argument, it is enough to observe that the international order the USA helps maintain leaves very much to be desired. In its intervention, militarily, economically and indirectly, USA has assisted substantially in reducing plurality and openness, is well as in establishing or propping up rotten regimes, etc. The negative side of American imperialism as well-enough documented, if not widely enough read or known by Americans themselves (cf. again Chomsky and Herman). Only under scandalously low redefinitions of ‘open’ and ‘pluralistic’ is the present “free” world order 18 either open or pluralistic. ad 8, and the damaging equivocation on ‘the balance’. While balance is one way of maintaining stability in the world arrangements that have presently come to pass, the balance structure can only carry so much loading. Add too much weight (of arms tension, and so forth) to both sides and the precarious structure will fail, probably catastrophically. increasing probability of catastrophic breakdown, for a variety of reasons The (accident, miscalculation, computer error, human interference, etc.), has been argued elsewhere (e.g. WPI). While a certain neither overloaded nor overstressed balance may serve for stability, the present increasingly stressed balance will probably not. The balance argument, however, neglects this dynamical situation, illegitimately switching from a (certain post) balance in premiss 8 to the (on-going) balance in subsequent premisses. The balance argument itself breaks down through equivocation. What the dynamic picture also indicates is the importance of removing some weight from the balance, most obviously by arms limitation and tension reduction. It points too to a different role for Australasia, to a less aligned position genuinely directed at stability. It is to the emerging case for a different role for Australia, and to action for achieving this different role, that the positive argument will now begin to swing. The inadequate East-West balance argument is typically combined with attacks upon proposals for a different role for Australia than American alliance and. service. effect of these additions is to generate extra confusion and dust. The main For the additions are inessential to the argument, and do not serve to repair it or reinforce it. For example, against nonalignment or neutralism is set the alleged pervasiveness of nuclear winter. We might as well be aligned (it’s good for trade and other economic perquisites), so it is sometimes argued from up top, because if the central balance fails we are all dead. This is a conspicuous nonsequitur^, worse than ex nihilo quodlibet (because it also suggests that balance is a prerequisite for stability). But, in the main, the attack is irrelevant, because the point of nonalignment is to help remove overload and to break down confrontation and its escalation to war; it is a thing to do now, be fore winter descends, to delay or halt its descent, and most important, to reduce its extent and severity. Australia’s weight may be slight, another irrelevant addition goes, but psychologically it is important for the West. Any further spread of the “Kiwi disease” (from New Zealand) would show the weakening of Western resolve, and give the green light for Soviet expansionism. Bell, a leading exponent of the balance argument, virtually gives the impression that if Australia dropped out of American alignment, the Russians would be on the road down through the isles to Australia tomorrow/ Much of this sort of rhetoric is reminiscent of the baseless fear-mongering of an earlier pre-Vietnam time. The Russians have no such military interests, or present capabilities. And if they were to gear up and set out, they would be met by substantial resistance along most of the route, resistance obtaining Western assistance. For America, for one, has major interests, different from Australia’s, in both Indonesia and the Philippines, as well as elsewhere in East Asia. The addition, so far from strengthening the argument, depends, in its “green light for expansion” comparison, on the previously faulted premiss 5 of Soviet expansionism. In fact most of the further case for American alignment of one sort or another - when it is argued-, often nonalignment and neutrality are simply denounced in good old-fashioned authoritarian style - turns upon already-faulted assumptions. Catley, for example, another exponent of “central balance”, presents the following ‘consideration’: ... whatever the Swedes or Swiss may think about the matter, Australia is locked by considerations of culture, economics, and political philosophy into the defence of the Western world. It has both an obligation and a duty to contribute its share to that defence if necessary by hosting facilities which cannot easily be located elsewhere (p.15). The premiss is false for reasons essentially indicated: and the premiss in no way sustains the conclusion, the argument involving among other things, the prescriptive (is-ought) fallacy. Consider the premiss. Australia is not, unless Catley has information withheld from most of the rest of us, locked into Western nuclear defence, but in principle independent and free to reconsider and rethink its options. (American use of the “facilities” is not irrevocable, and shortly comes up, in principle at least, for reconsideration.) How do culture, economics and political philosophy provide locks and chains for Australia but not for nonaligned Western European states? They do not: Australia is not a part of USA or altogether a client state; and the cultures, interests, economic frameworks and political philosophies of the two nations are significantly different (for details, see CPD). But even if the ideological frameworks were much more similar than they are, that would not entail similar defence practices (as, e.g., ANZUS in all its weakness shows), nor any such defence obligations. Most of the arguments against nonalignment are of Catley calibre - or worse. Fortunately, then, such arguments are examined in detail elsewhere, notably by D. Martin in his examination of counter-arguments to Australian armed neutrality, the legally-recognised non-belligerent form of nonalignment he favours. Virtually none of Martin’s counter-case depends for its success on features of neutrality, which is not advocated here. Virtually all of Martin’s argument is moreover couched in negative form; his positive brief is very brief. It 20 reduces to this: alignment or alliance with the USA 'cannot make us secure against such dangers as we may one day have to meet, while it needlessless exposes to other dangers, including nuclear war (p.l, italics added). While the message is correct enough, and in need of wide propagation, it does little on its own to support neutrality, and it by no means exhausts the positive case for weakening alignment. In particular, there are more positive arguments of much theoretical interest, to be drawn from systems theory and from the burgeoning theory of collective goods and action. 7. Contributions towards stability: free-riding, enlarging group size, and increasing variety. The strategic world situation we now confront can be viewed as a game with more than 100 players, counting in nation-states and leaving out (for convenience) major organisations such as the largest 100 transnational companies. These organisational players align themselves around two large poles, East and West, as indicated: NON-ALIGNED N N WEST EAST India NATO States Japan, Israel Sweden* Switzerland* NZUS: Australi I Ireland1* ^Most Latin ' American States I Tanzania Costa Rica** State capitalist Key: N: *: **: State communist Nuclear weapons states Neutral states Nonmilitary states There are various - a great many - games these state players are playing, some of which are practically important for peace and for stability. Some of these games, such as World Empire and Chicken (already played under one representation), are played essentially between the East-West superplayers. There are several problems about East-West games: for instance, what representation they have, the repeatability of the games (clearly some nuclear games 21 may, like Russian roulette, end after one round, as they will with the Big One), and the negative sum characters of some games. And the monolithic East/monolithic West dichotomy is misleading, and, as will appear, discards crucial detail (in the way simplifications may). So game-theoretical modelling will be approached differently and more obliquely. World Security, like regional and local security, is a collective good (technically, an item, quality unspecified, in joint supply and precluding exclusion). That is not of course to say that there are not conditions under which security may leave much to be desired, for instance where security is guaranteed by a narrow and intolerant despotism; but then, so it can be argued, the trouble lies with the provisioning, not the particular product. collective good G for the collection of N nation-states. It is a It is, furthermore, a collective good which permits the possibility of free-riding by nation-states. Looked at from this perspective the recent American complaint about its allies, Japan for example, and their insufficient expenditure on defence, is a complaint about their free-riding. Within the balance of power framework the conditions for free-riding are satisfied, for instance by unaligned and unilaterally disarming states. For 1. G is available to all N members of the collective if it is available to any, and the achievement (or maintenance) of G by any will make every member better off. 2. G is achieved iff some number m (no larger than that of group K) contribute towards its provision, where under the balance of power assumption Il C K C N and II = {USA, USSR}. 3. The expected value of contributing to G or its maintenance is less than the expected value of not doing so, i.e. likely costs of contribution exceed likely benefits - except perhaps for members of II given that G is largely provided by II. There is what can be called a pegged (or asymmetric) free-rider problem, pegged by members of II for whom the free-rider option is not open - within the confines of the balance of power assumption - and for whom condition 3 is only satisfied under certain ways of looking at the matter (e.g. there will be a war 10 years down the road so the expected costs each year exceed the expected benefits). For most members of N, by contrast, the benefits of G are available even should they reduce their contributions. There is a straightforward case (in narrow game-theoretical terms) for recommending Australian, and regional, free-riding on the balance of power provision of G. Some arguments, beyond or adding to those already in effect presented, are these:- Either stability breaks down catastrophically and there is a large-scale war or it does not. If it does then the region is 22 better off than it would be if (strongly) aligned because it is unlikely to be (so heavily) targetted. (Here the dreadful new argument that nuclear winter means that the Antipodes might as well be involved gets challenged and rejected: as to how see e.g. MF and B. Martin). If, alternatively, stability doesn’t break down then the region has the benefits in any case, without the costs. For there is no clear evidence that our alignment and cooperation with the USA enhances global stability, etc.; indeed, as remarked and will be further argued, the evidence points to the contrary. As regards Australasian regional weight in the Western block, do we seriously believe it is significant? That the Australian voice, though useful for propaganda purposes, makes much real difference in the halls of Northern power? We shouldn’t: and if we do we’re living in a delusional framework. Australia has been left out of the picture in virtually all major strategic planning exercises, most difference-making peace initiatives, etc.,etc. Now Eastern block countries would hardly object to Antipodean free-riding, rather than no offering support (however trifling), comfort and incitement to their opposition/ Furthermore free-riding is how the Americans, on their theoretical principles, would expect Australia to act, the rational self-interested procedure (see CPD). It is how lesser nations should act. For it is economically rational; contributing is not. But won’t the US make things economically dear for Australia? In threats and theory, yes; but in practice, no more than it has already done with subsidized wheat deals to the Soviets, no more than it threatened to do already in the case of New Zealand over the nuclear-ships issue. For except for short term aberrations, America will never give up trade or business arrangements: one gets the impressions that America would trade with the Devil Himself, if doing so would open some new markets in Hell. Despite its political stigma, free-riding need be no problem, or in any way immoral or irregular. Perhaps the buses are free; perhaps there is a voluntary payment system, to which only some need contribute, etc. With the nuclear fix, free-riding is indeed the moral course; contributing is not.29 Free-riding, though often protrayed as a problem, is only a problem in certain cases of collective provisioning, where the good involved is sufficiently desirable and will not be provided because of too many free- riders. This is not the situation with global security, which will be provided, in the curious and precarious way that it is, whether or not Australia stays on the escalating treadmill or gets off and rides free. Australia's free-riding may be a problem for America; it is not for Australia. Interests diverge again. What is more, judicious free-riding can increase stability. In pictorial terms, the stability of a structure is typically increased up to a certain point by securing it more 23 adequately; for example, if it is a wind tower or similar building, by increasing its rigid ties or supports to the ground. Then a tripod (or better still a quadrapod) tower is much less likely to topple than a bipedal one, and requires less guying to stay up. Increasing the diversity, or variety, of supports increases stability. The theme that diversity correlates with stability has been sharpened and confirmed in ecology, for instance in the theory of “spreading the risks” (see EW). The related theme, that a certain variety increases stability, has been elaborated in cybernetics. The core eco-systemic idea to be developed is that Australia’s free-riding in defence, and consequent nonalignment, could help to enhance diversity and variety, and accordingly to increase stability (especially if done in concert with other client and suppliant states). Two interlocked supports in tension, East and West, well dug in but hardly well guyed, are inadequate for the long-term stability of the precarious structure of world peace. What makes engineering sense is not however adding weight to the structure, or even strengthening the supports that are there, helping the East when the balance is disturbed by the more powerful West’s surging ahead and likely overburdening the structure. What makes more sense is increasing the variety of supports, enlarging and diversifying group size, as significant independent grouping could do. The monolithic East/monolithic West picture is much more than a convenient simplification, for instance for strategic thinking. It may force damaging mistakes in conceptualisation, mzsconceptualisation perhaps convenient for some larger players. One main reason for mistakes concerns group size. Whereas 11+ = {West, East} is a small group, the number N of nation-states is not, but is considerably larger. But the collective behaviour of large groups differs in theory from that of small groups; group size is a highly significant factor (though its precise import remains contentious). The group N of nation-states is a large group, of essentially self-interested parties, indeed of substantially economic actors. collective action applies: So we may expect that the American theory of that the groups will behave in a counterintuitive way. Though expected to act in the common interest, to obtain security in particular, the collection will not. On this account (that elaborated by Olson), the common interest can only be guaranteed by outside influence or imposition (coercion in Olson’s rapid thinking). But with the collective of nations, there is, as experience has shown, no outside mediator or influence of sufficient authority to ensure attainment of the collective good. The prognosis looks very gloomy: this most important (though far from unique) collective good will not be provided. Fortunately the reasoning, like much of the “logic” of collective action, has been too 21 swift. The group, though large, is highly privileged, in containing several actors for whom costs of war exceed benefits (note the shift in perspective from the earlier free-riding condition 3). Indeed an important economic effect of the knowledge of an ominous nuclear winter is that virtually all actors involved should now be in that position; for (subjectively) expected costs of nuclear war have become very high. To go back to basics, Olson's grand theory is based on the accountants’ tautology (defining ‘net’) net agent benefit = gross agent benefits - gross agent costs, i.e. in symbols, for each agent or o actor i (in collective N), A- = V-Cj. A group is privileged if Aj is positive for some i in N. It needs little argument to show that for vulnerable European nation-states the net benefits of global security are decidedly positive (e.g. with a nuclear war their respective future GDPs would expectedly fall to near zero). The fact that the group of nation-states is privileged does not however imply that the collective good involved, security, will be supplied, particularly in the longer term. The simple logic is not dynamic; it takes no account of mistake, error, or the like, or of stability achieved through superiority or intermediate instability. An improved modelling - which can take some account of group size and of the dynamics, through iterated games - is gained by returning to game-theoretic grounds. A free rider “problem” is tantamount to a dilemma of some sort; according to the conventional wisdom, it is a prisoners’ dilemma (cf. Pettit, but contrast Taylor and Ward). The argument can go this way:- a free rider problem or issue is defined in terms of the provisioning of a collective good; but the theory of collective goods is equivalent to that of a .QI, generalised prisoners’ dilemma. Certainly the global nuclear situation appears to present a dilemma; as much is a commonplace claim. Elsewhere (e.g. WPI) it is argued in detail that it does indeed present a moral dilemma. Here the argument - which can proceed through the theoretical route just sketched above or in the more piecemeal way to be indicated - is that it is also a prudential dilemma (for many members of N).°2 Consider first, since these have obtained some investigation (e.g. Hardin), the range of apparent two party games being played by the US and Soviet Union administration (labelled US and SU respectively) in 1985 as regards the moves of further nuclear armament, A, or nuclear disarmament, N. (It is supposed, naturally, that the game is set in some background context, e.g. nuclear disarmament is not considered in isolation from on-going French and Chinese nuclear armament). It is important here, as other places, to distinguish the administration - which for the most part calls the shots - from the society and the people. It is administrations or governments that generally take people into war; etc. The American people seem rather more inclined towards nuclear de-escalation than their administration; the German people were clearly opposed to the new nuclear missiles their administration proceeded to install. The strategy games involved are then administration games, which we 25 can suppose to be played over successive time intervals, e.g. years; so there is interaction and feedback as the games go on - until the Big Ones explode. Within this simplistic setting, the apparent games being played by US and SU are those diagrammed next: New Initial game Prisoners’ Dilemma Game SU SU D US A Revised Game D 2,2 A 4,1 1,4 3,3 D US A SU D 3,2 A 4,1 1,4 2,3 D US A D 3,3 A 4,1 1,4 2,2 According to Hardin, ‘giving evidence of [his] deformation professionelle’, the Prisoners’ Dilemma (PD) ‘represents the preference ordering of virtually all the articulate policy analysts in the United States and presumably also in the Soviet Union’ (p.248). While PD may have represented US policy, there is considerable evidence (as already indicated) that it no longer does, that the US administration has shifted to a more aggressive, war-fighting, phase. That is, the US has interchanged its rankings of (D,D) and (A,A), presumably some time between 1978 and 1984 games. The Soviets, who have been much more consistent (and no doubt better censored) in their policy pronouncements, appear not to have changed their game, but have stuck with their form of deterrence and no-first-strike. However they are bound to try to keep up with the Americans, and so are presumably pushed towards the Revised Game shown, which pleasantly restores symmetry. Stable or equilibrium outcomes for each game are circled. An outcome is said to be stable if neither player has incentive to switch strategies unilaterally on the strength of the game, i.e. to alter the outcome except by influencing the other player also to alter strategies. All these games provide dilemmas, in a broad sense, that equilibrium is achieved in an undesirable and dangerous outcome. In all the apparent games, arming is the dominant strategy for each player; yet in the PD game that is even Pareto-suboptimal, whence the economic fascination. But as the other games deliver results which are socially suboptimal (and below a satisfying threshold), all these games are dilemmas. And the same applies to suggested alternative games that might plausibly be taken to represent the superpower situation, and such as Chicken. A recognisably suboptimal outcome is guaranteed by the independent ‘‘stable” strategies. What is worse, iteration of games does not help (as it may in other political circumstances). For there are substantial political and military incentives for the superpower players not to adjust their preferences substantially in socially superior directions after repeated games, but to do what the US at least appears to have done, to make the situation worse. 26 It is important then to attempt to modify or curtail these self-interested superpower games. There are various connected ways of going about this. One is for other parties to combine to limit or discourage these games. Another alternative is for them to try to alter the games. Thus much socially preferable would be a switch to a coordination game of some sort; for instance, to the game which neutrals tend to play (and which Lackey, in contrast to other more bellicose utilitarians, sees utilitarian superpowers playing; hence Hardin’s provocative label for this game, ‘Lackey’s game’). In the coordination game diagrammed, WN represents a western-inclined neutral and EN an Eastern inclined neutral (e.g. Yugoslavia): EN WN D D 1,1 A 3,2 A 2,3 4,4 [Other coordination games, with (D,D) assigned (1,1)] Now the dilemmatic and coordination games are not played in isolation; they come together in international settings such as United Nations’ committees (and elsewhere, since coordination games are frequently peoples’ games as well). Superimposing the games, with coordination games of the first sort applied to previously given US and SU games, leads to the following augmented East (E) and West (W) games: New Game, Augmented Prisoners’ Dilemma Augmented E E A D Revised Game, Augmented A 4,1 2,2 : *4,1' \ : 3^2 ’ D 1 : W ......... 1,4: A 2/3: 2/3; D ; 1 w ........ : 1,4 3,3 ; a 4 ; E D 2/3 • • — •- : 3-3’**: D ; 1 W I 2,3 ; . • 2.3 A D 2/3 2,2 a 4 ■ 4,1* ! . ; : 2/3 J 4 Key: rh represents a sequence of ms, i.e. m, m, m ... for each coordination player; 2/3 a sequence of 2s and 3s in some order. As augmenting games reveals, to play with a superpower is to help reinforce a stable deadlock. But playing an independent coordination game increases variety and can help in breaking the deadlock, in fact in several ways. For one, enough significant players playing a coordination game can alter the overall dominant strategy towards disarmament. For another, much more pressure can be brought to bear on the superpowers. For example, with less support, unilateral action by the US administration on Star-Wars and arms build-up can be exposed. Superpower militarism and power excursions would stand naked and 27 unsupported. Australia’s impact, in particular, would be rather greater as a nonaligned free-rider pressing seriously for disarmament and regional nuclear-freedom (instead of, as at present, white-wash polemics and token ambassadors, undermined by a none-too-tacit policy of US support). The strategy suggested by game-theoretic modelling converges then with that suggested by other approaches, notably regional and ecological approaches. The strategy is that of limitation, of disengagement from escalating US/USSR war games, and progressive alteration of their likely outcomes by defusing coordination moves. In more practical terms, the approaches mean trying to limit and modify superpower games by restricting their games and supporting regional or local coordination of players, in forms of organisations both of nations and of people. Such organisations would work, as many have already been doing, to contract the regions and spheres of influence and access of US and USSR military administrations, and to diminish support for their war-fighting objectives. For example, Antipodean groups could, and should, coordinate to ease the American military out of the South Pacific region, meanwhile resisting any intrusion of Russian military. Then, while the Europeans are doing their coordinated de-escalating, denuclearising things right across Europe, the Russian and American war games are progressively excluded from the entire Southern Hemisphere. An eventual aim geographically is, to send their weapons of war back home, to restrict their (and French and other) global military enterprises to their “own” backyards, where they would not always be so enthusiastically received. Fortunately such an ambitious and optimistic project, so unlikely to come to pass given present nation-state arrangments, can be accomplished piecemeal, from small and significant beginnings, already to be seen. As a result of recent movements in the region, a South Pacific nuclear-free region is now a politically-achievable option. A first token step has already been taken. But next steps, towards genuine nuclear-freedom, require above all cooperation of a less aligned Australia, joining other disengaging “free-riders” in the region. That in turn requires, as a practical component, closure of American bases in Australia as their leases terminate, cessation of American nuclear ship visits and aircraft staging, and an end to uranium mining and sales. As Australia is the only country in the region supplying uranium, and the main location of US bases, such steps would be most significant. Even so, the Pacific regional effect would remain unduly limited, so long as France and the US are based within the region, and transit of nuclear ships is internationally sanctioned everywhere on the shrinking high seas. Plainly there are further more difficult steps on the way to southern Pacific nuclear-freedom and independence, i.e. even for one of the easier oceanic regions. But there is no good reason to 28 expect that removing the nuclear scourge, any more than eliminating other major politico­ social evils, will be easy. Permanent removal and a less dubious “peace” than we presently enjoy is not something that will be achieved by more of what we have witnessed, or even through clever diplomacy and smart technological tricks, such as new defensive weapons; it will take difficult structural and radical design change. 8. On the need for, possibility of, and prospect of appropriate structural change. There is little doubt that certain sorts of structural political change would be highly conducive to peace (e.g. democratic reorganisation of the superpowers), and that certain fundamental changes may even be sufficient for permanent peace. With that in view they have long been advocated - at least from Rousseau and Kant onwards. But it has also been supposed that some such changes are necessary for lasting peace; ‘it is also necessary to transform the structures that lead to war’ (B. Martin, p.12). To render this theme immune to obvious criticisms - for example, that straightforward authoritarian extension of certain established structures could bring an end to war - further desiderata, typically presupposed, are invoked, for instance that certain freedoms, modest material standards of life, and so on, are duly guaranteed, and also the type of necessity involved is wound back to some lower technical level (not excluded however by present practicalities). These adjustments make the necessity theme more difficult to assess, but also more difficult to sustain. There are two parts to its assessment and defence, a negative and critical part, demolishing a range of arguments from determinism, human nature, and the like, to the effect that arrangements have to be more or less the way they are, and a positive part, comprising direct arguments for the theme. The large negative part of this enterprise will simply be illustrated.34 According to deterministic and mechanistic approaches, such as that of (marxist) technological determinism, nuclear weapons, like megamachines generally, are no aberration. They are an integral part of the business of industrial and ecological conquest, a further stage in human intervention which has already involved substantial disruption through pesticides, wastes, etc. The argument tends to the fatalistic. The megamachines of conquest are made, and once made they will be used. No change in political arrangement, which would make any difference, is possible. Sometimes technological enthusiasts push their position and luck, even further, that a weapon or device once invented by humans will be used: there is no stopping progress. But in doing so they overextend themselves. While there is, sadly a fair induction from the manufacture of weapons (of any given type, for many batches are never deployed) to their use, inductions from invention of machines or the like to their manufacture are c 29 unreliable and subject to many counterexamples (and many machines that do eventually get made have been reinvented or independently rediscovered). But even the good inductions do not show that weapons of various sorts must be used, that a change in background political organisation would not frustrate the inductions. The broader deterministic position is of course that such background changes are not possible either; political arrangements too, like the rest of social life, are technologically or economically determined. But (nonanalytical) determinism, technological and other, is false, so it is argued elsewhere (JB, CPD). Different political arrangements, which alleviate problems, are technically possible, and arrangements would be different in differently evolved worlds. Things did not and do not have to be the way they are, or the social and political sort of way they are. Many routes, none of deductive strength, lead to the conclusion that the dominant political structures of our time, fashioned (with much input from schemes of past philosophers) from feudal institutions, require extensive structural alteration. In particular, they need to be superseded by alternative structures less intricately tied to war, which do not promote or lead so readily to war. Such a theme has been argued directly from the nuclear fix itself (as e.g. WP1, p.47ff.). But suppose, improbable as it may seem, that nuclear weapons all vanished, thereby removing the current nuclear fix; for instance, they turned out to be quietly self-destructing, or a disarmament actually took place. massive thermodynamic miracle occurred, or nuclear The problem of war would not be thereby removed, and even that of nuclear war would only be given some respite. For the structural arrangements for war would remain intact.04 Conventional weapons would remain, along with weapons perhaps as dangerous as nuclear weapons, such as chemical and biological ones. Nuclear weapons, insofar as they were removed (for small caches are easily hidden away), could soon be replaced, especially if nuclear power plants remained intact; and nothing would prevent the development of (Star-Wars) weapons more diabolical than nuclear ones. War cannot be eliminated while leaving the rest of society as it is - by freezing the status quo. ... The structural conditions for war need to be removed - not reinforced as appeals to elites may do - and superseded by alternative structures which do not lead to war (B. Martin, p.12: Martin goes on to indicate the types of structures, and how to reach them). Structural adjustments can provide conditions for lasting satisfactory peace. An initial, somewhat simplistic, Kantian argument for the proposition that peace is possible (presented by Latta, introducing Permanent Peace), runs as follows:- Peace, perpetual peace, is an ideal, not merely of a speculative kind but a practical idea, a moral principle. Hence this ideal ought to be realised, i.e. there ought (morally) to be peace. But ought entails can; therefore peace is possible. 30 From Heracleit.us through Hegel there buzzes an impressive swarm of philosophers"*6 who have rejected the second premiss. Some are even captivated by such extravagant counter-claims as that with peace everything would stop, that competition, with war as one limit, is essential to motion and progress! would now be With the recent shift in philosophical fashions, the second premiss more widely conceded, though often not on Kantian grounds, but consequentialist. Such grounds to support the theme that peace is desirable and ought to be realised, but are more discriminating in that they help indicate what sort of peace. Unfortunately, however it is done, the second premiss does not sustain the conclusion, ought does not entail can, as many moral dilemmas reveal (see MD, WP1). So fortunately, there is a more satisfactory and revealing route to the conclusion that peace is possible, and indeed is feasible. That is the more elaborate method of (semantical) modelling: present in detail scenarios of societies where peace persists (for the sceptical it may be necessary to recall n-human models, with n small). This sort of thing is of course already done, in more pleasing fashion than logicians could hope to emulate, if rather less precisely, by OQ novelists and science-fiction writers, and by activists like the different Martins. What all these scenarios point to, however, are societies considerably different from our own - though not in the people involved, who have their weaknesses, their power drives, and so forth, but because of significant structural alterations in the societies depicted. By way of such modellings we can not merely argue to the feasibility of lasting peace, but push ahead with the argument, that societies of these restructured sorts are desirable alternatives to contemporary military- industrial arrangements. For those of us then who want to move towards such pacific alternatives, the practical inference, from feasibility and desirability is clear: we should begin on the real work of structural change. Peace is possible and desirable, but the prospects are poor (as Heilbroner has said of the human prospect). Present arrangements, though contingent and fashioned in large measure from the schemes of past intellectuals, are thoroughly entrenched, and enforced, both ideologically and by much physical power, often as if along with natural law they were God­ given, though they are no longer appropriate. Even small nonstructural changes look difficult to achieve in present political climates. Through climates have not changed that much, major social improvements have been gained, not instantanously, but in longer-term struggles with government. Such short-term difficulties did not deter social theorists such as Kant, who like Rousseau before him and many after him, were concerned with obtaining lasting peace. The world has changed enormously since the time of Kant’s proposals for peace (of 1795), and even since the time of Veblen’s more cynical additions (in 1917). Hard science and 31 destructive power have grown enormously; and even theoretical knowledge of collective behaviour, especially that admitting of game-theoretic treatment, though still slight, has advanced. But political arrangements and what can be accomplished politically have, in important respects, changed very little, since Rousseau complained (around 1761) that governments were probably too short-sighted to appreciate the merits of his project for perpetual peace. Governments have long been, and been seen as, main obstacles to peace. Thus Veblen rightly maintained that ‘... if the peace is to be kept it will have to come about irrespective of governmental management, - in spite of the State rather than by its good offices’ (p.7).^^ So it has been with most major social changes; for they have involved structural political change disturbing to governmental conservatism. In his search for the indispensible conditions for lasting peace, Kant claimed, as others have claimed since, that peace is not possible under present structural arrangements of an unregulated competing nation-state kind. As times have changed, so, to a limited extent, have state structural arrangements, since Kant compiled his conditions. In particular, there is now, in the shape of the United Nations, a very weak reflection of what Kant looks for, a world (or European!) federation of nations. But crucial ingredients in Kant’s resolution are still lacking:- namely, at the upper level, what is required for a standard resolution of Prisoners Dilemma type situations - some surrender of national sovereignty, especially as regards war, and, at the lower level, “republican” states. Major blockages to adequate arrangements for peace remain at two critical levels of organisation, that concentrated upon of the organisation of collectives of states and, in part by devolution, that of the internal organisation of individual states themselves. Much evidence has now accumulated that more far-reaching changes than Kant, Rousseau and Veblen envisaged are required at both international and nation-state levels if genuine peace is to be secured. Indeed significant changes are wanted even in republician states for peace movements to get their mixed message through already fixed channels to state control systems. For this sort of reason, movements on a single front, such as peace, are unlikely to succeed on their own, but should be linked into a broader plurality of movements, which seek to widen informational and democratic channels, and to alter the character and membership of state systems, and thereby render them much more controllable and accountable.40 Many longer-haul structural changes depend upon diverting nuclear war in the meantime. Thus arguing for more far-reaching changes, for an altered nonaligned Australia, 32 for a nuclear-free South Pacific, for regional structural changes, certainly does not exclude arguing and working for obvious measures for reducing risks of nuclear war. These include: a serious commitment to arms control by the superpowers (whose practices threaten our futures, though most of us lack representation in either); a move away from war-fighting strategies and associated destabilising weapons-systems; moderation of confrontational rhetoric and other tensions-inducing practices by superpower administrations, and improved efforts at mutual understanding (as well some appreciation of the elements of political pluralism); and then, remote though it may appear, significant steps towards nuclear disarmament. Richard Sylvan 41 Bungendore NSW 33 NOTES 1. Queensland premier, with destructive deep-South policies. 2. The point, which has become controversial, is argued in effect in Gilbert. 3. See especially Dibb, as reported in the ANU Reporter, and for a more guarded elaboration, his IAD (e.g. p.163 ‘At present, planning for the defence of Australia lack coherence because there is no clear definition, in priority order, of what needs defending’); see also Sharp, p.l48ff and differently Langtry and Ball, p.575ff., p.6O5ff. The much-heralded Dibb Review of mid-1986 would, if (as already seems unlikely) it were adopted, remove some of the lesser incoherence in Australian policy, that involving details of regional defensive defence (as would also Langtry and Ball, if followed through). While Dibb appears to have demolished what he refers to scathingly as the ‘largely mythical “core force” concept’, a new controversy has sprung up over whether Australia’s more self-reliant defence should be purely defensive defence, Dibb’s ill-named ‘strategy of denial’, or whether it should include an offensive component. Dibb himself has rather rapidly shifted ground on this important issue. In late 1983 he was contending that ‘Australia should have in the force-in-being significant deterrent capabilities, based on present air and naval strike assets, which can mount defensive and offensive operations against attacking forces, their staging bases and lines of resupply’ (IAP, p.166). But in the otherwise conservative Review of 1986 such offensive defence is abandoned; no such forces and equipment for offensive off-shore operations are recommended. Instead ‘the review proposes a layered strategy of defence within our area of direct military interest. Our most important defence planning concern is to ensure that an enemy would have substantial difficulty in crossing the sea and air gap’. The new offensive/defensive defence controversy puts the Review’s adoption in increasing doubt - in which event the local incoherence in strategic planning processes and militational difficulties Dibb alludes to early in his statement will presumably persist. The Review not merely fails to address significant regional issues, as to defence priorities, and as to multiple purpose roles for Australian armed forces given that they will be involved in virtually no military activity other than maintenance and a certain “preparedness” (for on Dibb’s overstatement of the prevailing view of Australia’s very favourable regional security prospects, ‘there is no conceivable prospect of any power contemplating invasion of our continent and subjugation of our population’). But further, the Review is itself vague to incoherent, concerning wider defence issues, vague as to the post-ANZUS situation, and incoherent about Australia’s role in US global “defence” activity. According the Dibb (CT, p.16), ‘there is no requirement for Australia to become involved in United States contingency planning for global war. The presence of the joint facilities, together with the access that we provide to visits by United States warships and the staging through of Australia of B-52 bombers, are a sufficient tangible contribution to the Alliance.’ These contributions are not involvement? That is not how the USSR views the matter: they are the reported sole 34 basis of USSR nuclear targetting of Australia (see Dibb. SS p.13). global stance is left essentially to the USA. And Australia's Amazingly, in the Strategic Basis Papers (SB), Australia criticizes New Zealand because ‘it has still developed no policy for national defence and tends to look to ... the US as its primary source of defence guidance’ (p.29). Note that C3I abbreviates the mouthful, Command, Control, Communications and Intelligence. 4. See Sharp, p.l46ff. An Australian policy should moreover fit with the genuine needs and shared aspirations of local people - to the extent, presumably, that these are commendable; again the presupposed value framework is critical. 5. Thus e.g. Gray (p.17) on the Reagan Administration’s ‘foolhardy brief willingness to talk publicly about nuclear strategy’, and his distain for public involvement or input. There is some concern, especially among neo-conservatives, about US defence strategies being ‘undermined by well-meaning persons who believe they are helping the cause of peace’ (Bell p.10; similarly Gray). Even those not so far right support partial information releases which maintain public confidence; e.g. Dibb on ‘the release of a generalised statement about ;the] functions of the US bases in Australia ... to give Australians more confidence about their crucial contribution to the Allied cause’ (ISA, p.166). ‘Our defence policy-making process is probably more “closed” than that of any other advanced Western democracy’ according to Langtry and Ball (p.608), who contend that ‘the public needs to be involved much more in our defence planning and operations'. For a justified critique of public exclusion and leave-it-to-the-experts approaches, see B. Martin; also Sharp. 6. The paper was drafted in mid-1985. 7. For those amassing evidence that Australia falls into the inexact class of client states, the following Australian contribution is noteworthy: ‘The US prefers to act as a member of a group, and a contribution by Australia can also assist in demonstrating to Congressional and public opinion that the objectives sought are significant enough to attract allied support’ (SB, p.28) 8. As to DI and arms control, see, e.g. Mack PR and Gray. As to D2, ‘USA has now an announced first-strike nuclear targeting policy’ technologically reinforced, Hayes, p.4; and see also Mack AC, p.111. The goal of the Reagan administration is superiority (a conveniently ambiguous term). Thus e.g. Gray (p.32): ‘it is of course essential that the United States modernize its offensive forces so as to render the Soviet Union genuinely offensive-counterforce incompetent.’ 9. On the major changes in American policy, see e.g. Gray p.118 ff. Though America is now said to have a ‘new national security concept of which SDI is the centerpiece’ it may still lack an ‘arms control policy’ (Gray, p.25,pll). Not only arms control, but American commitment to the security of allies, remain at least decidedly cloudy matters. Thus it is of little avail to contend that Australia does have a coherent secondorder global policy, namely the (discreditable) one of following prevailing American policy. For the US lacks a first-order policy which is sufficiently clear in relevant respects. The American direction of Australian policy had better be away from too much public exposure because Australians, no more than New Zealanders, mostly do not like being pushed around, even by Americans. 35 10. Thus we can avoid the important debate as to whether, and to what extent, deterrence remains part of US global “defence” policy (though it certainly remains part of the policy sold to the American public). As to the philosophical significance of the debate, see Gay, p.l29ff. and Benn. 11. The common-interest theme is often traced to (partly self-interested) American action in the Pacific in World War II. Curiously Australia’s interests are are now said also to converge with those of Japan, but to be diametrically opposed to those of the USSR (despite increasing trade). 12. Nor, though this is a longer story, does Australian culture by any means coincide with American: see CPD. Thus a uniform treatment is entirely inappropriate. Similarly, a single overarching treatment for a monolithic West is thoroughly inadequate: see further below in the text. 13. Australian planning should be looking at strategic models (game-theoretic and other) which include Australia. For, as argued below, abandoning the uniformity assumption of the monolithic West, of the West as one parish, makes significant differences to the results yielded. 14. As Cock goes on: ‘These basic issues increasingly become lost in the array of consumer choices’. 15. ‘The serf societies - more or less willingly - accept the status of “allies”, i.e. protection with rights and duties as in feudal societies. They become client countries’ (Galtung, p.169). 16. So-called by Mack PC. But the formulation presented follows G. Davidson’s more satisfactory account in Canberra Times, Wednesday, May 8, 1985, p.2. Mack considers that what amounts to the elitist case is the ‘altogether more sophisticated argument [which] holds sway ... in government’ (p.l, italics added)! 17. The “Asian hordes” derive from one of the less spoken about successors to the Yellow Peril, from the immediate past days of the Asian communist threat, the Domino theory, and White Australia. 18. As Stephenson argued, less fortunately, 20 years ago. Even when around World War II Japan, did have interest in access to strategic raw materials, the Japanese High Command decided against invading Australia because of the difficulty of dealing with the people - a point of much importance. 19. Of course, such military expenditure is also encouraged by economic forces, e.g. like much Third World hard currency expenditure it helps the American economy along a bit. 20. Heilbroner has traced some of the economic components and consequences of what, with excess exaggeration and insufficient irony, he calls ‘the rise and subsequent fall of the American imperium’ (p.52): it hasn’t fallen that far yet. ‘Empires have always been expensive and the American empire was no exception. ... The sheer military cost ... for the United States alone ... is roughly ten percent of ... GNP for the last 25 years ($2 x 10) in 1972 dollars)’. American imperial spending supplemented by other capitalist countries fueled inflation, enhanced poverty, etc., and was complements by, what it was represented as required by, counterexpenditure and efforts by the USSR. 36 ‘The establishment of an American hegemony [consisted and: resulted not just in very large military expenditures, but in the rapid build-up of American capital investments abroad. Between 1950 and 1970, the value of American-owned plant and equipment abroad leaped from $12 billion to $78 billion’ (p.54). A result of the expenditure abroad was a serious balance of payments problem (negative “capital flows” and balances), and a growing accumulation of IOUs. On this sort of basis, Heilbroner speculates that ‘the mere operations of the American imperium by itself - deemed of such critical importance to preserve the peace and security of the capitalist world - was in all likelihood a sufficient condition for the globalisation of the inflationary phenomena’ (p.57 with insert from p.56). According to Heilbroner, ‘Long before the Vietnam debacle, it was clear that American arms could not prevent the rise of revolutionary governments in the under-developed world’ (p.57). But really very little evidence of collapse is presented by Heilbroner; and seemingly there is little. What there is more substantial evidence for is the marked decline of the American imperium in the period (1973-8) concerned. One piece of evidence is the sharp decline in America’s share of World GDP, shown in the following table of select leading national economies: SHARE OF WORLD GDP (%) POPULATION SHARE COUNTRY RANK 1968 1975 1984 (1984 est) USA 1 35.0 24.3 25.0 5.2 USSR 2 11.1 11.0 13.8 6.2 JAPAN 3 5.2 8.0 9.5 2.7 GERMANY FDR 4 5.1 6.7 5.7 1.5 FRANCE 5 4.6 5.4 CHINA 6 2.9 4.8 4.3 22.6 UK 8 2.8 2.8 2.3 1.3 4.4 1.3 INDIA 12 1.3 1.5 1.1 15.1 AUSTRALIA 15 1.1 1.4 1.0 0.3 37 The table should also make it clear that if the USA cannot sustain a grand empire, nor can the USSR. A totalitarian Pax Sovietica is even less likely than a capitalistic Pax American was. 21. Although, so the documents continue, ‘neighbourhood contingencies .... are at present assessed as impossible’! The theme that the USA affords no sure guarantee of Australian defence is reiterated in Langtry and Bell, e.g. p.608. They go on there to outline the major points that reliance upon the US has distorted Australian arrangements (with forces better equipped to fight alongside the Americans in Asia than on their own in defending Australia) and has led to neglect of the regional priorities, ‘to defence planning which at least would recently paid little attention to the direct defence of our continent and the protection of our remote communities’ (p.608). 22. The French, who operate a global network second only to the Americans and more extensive than the Russians, with many forces in the Pacific region, have never been seriously considered. Yet in certain significant respects French social and cultural arrangements are closer to Antipodean ones than American arrangements are. In these days of technological warfare, the post-Waterloo loss record of the French should not be given too much weight; we don’t after all look very hard at the American record of defeats and incompetence. Etc. 23. If Australia is not likely to be threatened there is no real deterrence advantage because nothing to deter. Other advantages of the ANZUS alliance such as access to high-level intelligence are not only dubious (see PC, D. Martin), but not always guaranteed by the alliance as the blackout of New Zealand shows. 24. Soviet activity is undoubtedly perceived rather differently by American administrations than Antipodean ones. ‘An agressive, treacherous, ruthlessly self-interested, expansionist increasingly powerful, and hence increasingly threatening state - that is the image of the Soviet Union in America. It is the image which has legitimised the strategic modernation and Star Wars programs’ (to adopt Mack ST, pl). To see that this is indeed the intellectually shoddy route by which these grand and dangerous programs are justified, it is enough to work through fundamentalist sources, such as Gray. It is almost as if Americans had projected some of their own occasionally-manifested worst features into the giant enemy. 25. After some considerable reconstruction, that is. For the argument, curiously referred as that of “central balance” in newspaper-level publications of academics (e.g. Catley, Bell), is never presented in requisite detail - which is one reason why it has proved hard to criticise and refute. 26. As well both the premiss and its usual substitutes are false (see MF). The type of argument exhibited is a good example of prevalent Australian consequentialist thinking. A parallel argument, enjoying unwarranted popularity, runs: We might as well sell uranium (e.g. to France), because if we don’t someone else will - as if motives counted morally for nothing. 27. See also the discussion of Bell’s claims in D. Martin and in Mack PC. 28. Since the New Zealand restrictions on nuclear ships, ‘the Soviet media has been full of gloating references to the prospect of the collapse of the ANZUS treaty’ according to Dibb (SS, p.14). Given the unimportance of the Antipodes to Soviet interests (as Dibb 38 himself explains), Dibb is surely exaggerating, at least, when he later claims that ‘the prospect of the breakup of the AN ZUS treaty would be of enormous benefit to the USSR’s world-wide interests’ (SS p.31). Soviet support for Antipodean independence and for ‘a real nuclear weapon-free zones' in the South Pacific has its disconcerting elements (‘with friends like that ...’); but luckily the quality of ideas does not depend essentially on their sources and supporters. 29. As WPI serves to show. In a different context, Bell objects to Australian free-loading ‘on other people’s risks and burdens. That has certainly not been our tradition, and I hope it will not become so, since it is morally quite indefensible’ (p.7). Not so: bludging, for instance, is a well-established, if disapproved of, part of the tradition; and in some cases it is morally in order. However, free-riding is not being proposed merely for self interested reasons, e.g. to remove the present risks of nuclear targetting; it is being proposed with a view to altering the two great alliance structures that at present dominate international politics. Bell’s objection to such a course is that it ‘would on the one hand tend to increase the tendency of the superpowers to unilateralism, and on the other hand tend to induce many of the minor powers in question (including Australia) to consider acquiring nuclear capacity’ (p.7). The second alternative neglects the non­ proliferation treaty, to which Australia is a signatory; the first appears to assume erroneously that friendly relations with America are foregone; both are pretty minor considerations (and both can be dealt with in other negotiated ways) compared with the major problem of nuclear war. 30. The less than perspicuous symbolism is that used in Hardin (CA, p.20, p.39), but with agents’ costs or contributions, C, duly agent relativized. Hardin misleadingly treats C as a fixed parameter, thus strictly falsifying the tautology. 31. Thus Hardin who (in CA) claims to ‘demonstrate the equivalence of the logic of collective action and the Prisoners’ Dilemma’ (p.4) The demonstration is given on p.25ff. 32. But of course the two types of dilemma interconnect. 33. Even so, significant change in USA looks unlikely. Present arrangements suit not only the American corporate-administrative power elite, which can direct public opinion through its control of the main communications media, but many other fat-cat Americans, rather well. The polarisation of the world into two camps increases US control of the larger and far wealthier camp, yet scarcely reduces US trade or markets. While it does limit the global coverage of US business and multinationals, and somewhat restricts the transfer of other regions’ surplus value to the USA, it ensures the much greater advantage of being able to maintain the US domestic political economy on a military basis. The US and the USSR not only dance together; they were made for each other. Abroad US hegemony is maintained through a series of alliances and economic control strategies. Particularly ominous for the South Pacific are the Trilateral and Pacific Rim arrangements (which, with much local assistance, are helping to send Australia on its present economic trajectory). When advice or persuasion directed at allies and client states fail, economic measures can be resorted to (capital outflows, for instance, being a highly effective mechanism, “aid” a lesser device). For the most part, the imperial war machine can remain in the background. At home updated and improved imperial measures also work well. The mass consumerist society affords a rich and diverting selection of bread (much of it again imported) for a majority of Americans; television 39 and its entertainment variants offer a constant diet of circuses. For passive middle mainstream America, the vast police and security network remains a largely background and even unnoticed phenomenon; what is seen is even welcomed as a necessary shield from that other, dangerous, minority America. American social, educational and media management of opinion is obviously successful. Of present relevance, most Americans have been convinced that unilateral disarmament would be unAmerican. Thus the American administration, being hedged in by opinion they have helped to generate, cannot move in any such directions. For, given popular opinion, it would of course be politically disastrous, as well as undemojl’cratic! In the USSR, where political control is exercised to a much greater extent through overt power, present change of substance appears even less likely. 34. More of the negative enterprise is attempted elsewhere, e.g. a critique of the supposed strait-jacket of human nature is begun in CPD. From Plato through Hegel and into contemporary times it has been erroneously supposed that war, like aggression, is part of human nature, that war is a permanent (and perhaps even desirable) condition of human and social existence. For a refutation, see e.g. Trainer and Waite. 35. As observed by B. Martin, who uses this important form of argument for institutional change to get this thick book started (pp.12-13). 36. The swarm includes some anomalies, such as that somewhat tarnished hero of deep ecology, Spinoza: see e.g. Northedge. 37. Perhaps Kant had some such scenario in view in his theme that peace is empirically possible, which he coupled with his striking claim that peace is morally and rationally imperative. The latter claim, running in direct opposition to the long line of bellicose philosophers, really relies on the correct, but controversial, assumption that states are subject to the same moral relations as individual persons. Both then have an obligation to seek peace derived from forms of the categorial morality, notably from rational autonomy, the universality of maxims, and the ultimate value of persons (or, yet more chauvinistically, of humanity). 38. Veblen argued against the State on the basis that ‘governmental establishments and ... powers ... are derived from feudal establishments of the Middle Ages; which in turn, are of a predatory origin and of an irresponsible character’ (p.9), however the Christianfeudal origin of the State provided only one - and a coersive - evolutionary pattern of organisation (pp. 12-13), a pattern much influenced moreover by schemes of intellectuals. Other patterns remain feasible. 39. There are now theoretical arguments for Kant’s claim, as well as practical arguments of an inductive sort. 40. Such is also the new message from America: for the peace movement to get through to the administration, American democracy must be overhauled and revitalised, capitalist democracy superseded by true democracy or “republicanism” (see especially Cohen and Rogers, and earlier Chomsky). But the message, like the US peace movements’ very limited demands for peace, leaves the State, as the bringer of wars, and main source of violence essentially intact; the structural changes suggested, which will be slow to achieve, are much too narrowly conceived. 41. My thanks for information to Andrew Mack and David Bennett, and for comments to Grover Foley and Russell Hardin. REFERENCES G. H. Andrewartha and L.C. Birch, The Ecological Web, University of Chicago Press, 1984. W.R. Ashby, Design for a Brain, Second edition, Wiley, New York, 1960. S.Beer, Designing Freedom, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Toronto, 1974. C. Bell, ‘The case against neutrality’, Current Affairs Bulletin 61(4) (1984) 4-10. S.I. Benn, ‘Deterrence or appeasement? or, On trying to be rational about nuclear war’, Journal of Applied Philosophy 1(1984) 5-19. F. Capra and C. Spretnak, Green Politics, Hutchinson, London, 1984. R. Catley, ‘Along with the Bomb ...’ (Review of D. Martin), The Weekend Australian Magazine, 7-8 April, 1984. N. Chomsky and E.S. Herman, The Political Economy of Human Rights, Black Rose Books, Montreal, 1979. P. Cock, Alternative Australia, Quartet Books, Melbourne, 1979. J. Cohen and J. Rogers, On Democracy, Penguin, New York, 1984. P. Dibb (as reported) ‘Defence Planning “lacks coherence” - researcher’, ANU Reporter, 1983. P. Dibb, ‘Issues in Australian defence’, Australian Outlook 37 (1983) 160-166; referred to as IAD. P. Dibb, ‘Soviet strategy towards Australia, New Zealand and Oceania’ paper prepared for Soviet Strategy Against Asia converence, Tokyo, November 1984; referred to as SS. P. Dibb, Review of Australia's Defence Capabilities, Report to the Minister of Defence, Australian Government Publishing Service, Canberra, 1986; edited text also published in The Canberra Times, 4 June 1986, pp.16-18; referred to as the Dibb Review. P. and A. Erlich, Population, Resources, Environment, Second edition, Freeman, San Francisco, 1976. H. Feith,‘Richard Falk, World order radical’, Peace Studies 24 (1985) 24-5. J. Galtung, There are Alternatives, Spokesman, Nottingham, 1984. W.C. Gay, ‘Myths about nuclear war: misconceptions in public beliefs and governmental plans’, Philosophy and Social Criticism, 9(1982) 117-144. A. Gilbert, ‘The state and nature in Australia’, Australian Cultural History 1981 (ed. S. Goldberg and F.B. Smith), Canberra, 1982, pp.9-28. 42 C.S. Gray, ‘The Reagan administration and arms control’, paper presented at The Future of Arms Control Conference, Canberra. August 1985. R. Hardin, Collective Action, Resources for the Future, Washington, 1982; referred to as CA. R. Hardin, ‘Unilateral versus mutual disarmament’, Philosophy and Public Affairs 12(1983) 236-254. M.D. Hayes, ‘Defending the sunburnt country’, Chain Reaction 33(August-September 1983) 11-17. R.L. Heilbroner, Beyond Boom and Bust, Norton, New York, 1978. I. Kant, Perpetual Peace (trans, and introd. M. Campbell Smith), Swan Sonnerschein, London, 1903 (first published 1795). J. O. Langtry and D Ball (eds), A Vunerable Country, Australian National University Press, Canberra, 1986. A. Mack, ‘Farewell to Arms Controls’, Peace Research 9(1984) 9ff.; referred to as PR. A. Mack, ‘The pros and cons of ANZUS’, Fabian ANZUS Conference, Lome, 4-5 May 1985; referred to as PC. A. Mack, ‘Arms control, disarmament and the concept of defensive defence’, Disarmament 8(3)(1984) 109-119; referred to as AC. A. Mack, ‘The Soviet threat thesis: perceptions, capabilities and interests’ typescript, Canberra, May 1985; referred to as ST. B. Martin, Uprooting War, Freedom Press, London, 1984. B. Martin, Armed Neutrality for Australia, Drummond Books, Melbourne, 1984. F.S. Northedge, ‘Peace, war and philosophy’, in Encyclopedia of Philosophy (ed P. Edwards), Volume 6, Macmillan, New York, 1967, 63-67. M. Olson, The Logic of Collective Action, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1965. P. Pettit, ‘Free riding and foul dealing’, Journal of Philosophy, to appear, J.J. Rousseau, A Project for Perpetual Peace (trans. E.M. Nuttal), London, 1927 (first Published 1761). R. Routley, ‘On the ethics of large-scale nuclear war and nuclear deterrence, and the political fall out’, Discussion papers in Environmental philosophy #5, Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University, 1984. R. Routley, ‘Metaphysical fall-out from the nuclear predicament’, Philosophy and Social Criticism 3/4(1984) 19-34; referred to as MF. R. Routley and V. Plumwood, ‘Moral dilemmas and the logic of deontic notions’, Discussion Papers in Environmental Philosophy #6, Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University, 1984; referred to as MD. 43 R. Sharp (ed.), Apocalypse No. Pluto Press, Sydney, 1984. P.R. Stephenson, The Foundations of Culture, W.J. Miles, Sydney, 1936. R. Sylvan, ‘Culture and the roots of political divergence’, typescript, Canberra, 1985; referred to as CPD. M. Taylor and H. Ward, "Chickens, whales, and bumpy goods: alternative models of public­ goods provision’, Political Studies 30(1982) 350-370. T. Trainer and H. Waite, ‘Culture and the production of aggression’, in Sharp, ep.cit, 205-226. The Strategic Basis of Australian Defence Policy, leaked extracts published in the National Times, March 30-April 5, 1984, 23-30; referred to as SB. Threats to Australian Security, Parliamentary Joint Committee for Foreign Affairs and Defence, Australian Government Printer, Canberra; referred to as TAS. T. Veblen, An Inquiry into the Nature of Peace and the Terms of its Perpetuation, Viking Press, New York, 1945 (first published 1917).  Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Box 59, Item 680: Draft of Australia's defence philosophy: further investigation of the nonexistent Subject The topic of the resource Computer printout. Handwritten annotation on page 1: War & Peace III. Description An account of the resource Note, one of four papers digitised from item 680. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org/items/browse?search=Richard+Sylvan&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bjoiner%5D=and&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=&amp;range=&amp;collection=&amp;type=&amp;user=&amp;tags=&amp;public=&amp;featured=&amp;exhibit=&amp;geolocation-mapped=&amp;geolocation-address=&amp;geolocation-latitude=&amp;geolocation-longitude=&amp;geolocation-radius=10&amp;submit_search=Search+for+items">Richard Sylvan</a> Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <span class="MuiTypography-root-125 MuiTypography-body2-126">The University of Queensland's <a data-testid="rek-series" href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/records/search?page=1&amp;pageSize=20&amp;sortBy=score&amp;sortDirection=Desc&amp;searchQueryParams%5Brek_series%5D%5Bvalue%5D=Richard+Sylvan+Papers%2C+UQFL291&amp;searchMode=advanced">Richard Sylvan Papers UQFL291</a></span>, Box 59, Item 680 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org">Antipodean Antinuclearism: (Re)constructing Richard Routley/Sylvan's Nuclear Philosophy</a> Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource This item was identified for digitisation at the request of The University of Queensland's 2020 Fryer Library Fellow, <a href="https://najtaylor.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr. N.A.J. 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Type The nature or genre of the resource Manuscript Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context <a href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:23d96cf">https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:23d96cf</a> Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Como - Cupboard - Pile 3 Box 59: Nuclear Como House Como House > Cupboard > Pile 3 https://www.antipodean-antinuclearism.org/files/original/df8ea475ec2b745964d399c943fb6566.pdf e7cd3be667c873fe9f41ed27b4a5ce46 PDF Text Text WAR AND PEACE IV: TAO AND DEEP-GREEN Taoism and deep-green environmental theory, although closely aligned on very many issues, diverge over war. For Taoism, by contrast for instance with Buddhism, is not a pacific doctrine, but is committed to skilful defensive militarism. While it does not espouse a fortress mentality, Taoism certainly condones limited defensive military operations for specific purposes, a sort of guerilla warfare. By contrast, deep-green theory, while acknowledging the role of organised social defence, stands opposed to professional militarism, and thereby to military defence, and is committed to a principled pacifism. Conveniently a route through Taoism, philosophically fascinating in its own right, will lead us to problems of pacifism and towards deep-green theory. 1. Features of a Taoist critique of war and militarism. War did not receive a favourable press in ancient Chinese philosophy. Generally aggression and war were to be avoided. Even Confucius imposed very demanding conditions: for example, ‘when good men have instructed the people [in morals, agriculture, military tactics] for seven years, they may be allowed to bear arms,’ ‘If a ruler ... does not set himself right, even his commands will not be obeyed’ (SB p.41, italics added). Mo Tzu went much further than Confucius, roundly condemning war - on utilitarian grounds, that war yields no net benefit at any level (SB p.227). What is more, he backed his heavy condemnation practically (unlike some conspicuous contemporary theoretical utilitarians); ‘he did not hesitate to walk for ten days and ten nights in an effort to dissuade a ruler from making war’ (SB P-212). But none, it is said, went as far, in a detailed and sophisticated criticism of war, as Lao Tzu; ‘none has condemned war more strongly than Lao Tzu’. ‘[T]he opposition of Taoism to the use of force is well-known, and the most bitter attack on militarism if found in the Lao Tzu' (Chan, p.154, p.17.) But, after that splendid build-up, the text is slightly disappointing. Lao Tzu does not assert outright that war is an abomination, or even roundly condemn it. His critique of war, militarism, and military technology, is subtle and oblique, and, on the surface, far distanced from pacifism. For he does not recommend an end to war - in that genuine Taoists, those who possess Tao, will never participate in them - but expects wars to continue as unavoidable evils. Worse, he even goes so far as to outline proper attitudes to war and conduct in war, and indeed to suggest military techniques and strategies, some of which look decidedly devious. Among the classical works of Taoism, we focus on the Lao Tzu because, by contrast with other works, a remarkable component of that book is devoted to war and militarism. The apparent deviousness of the tactics Lao Tzu allocates serves to highlight what has been seen as ‘the most troublesome element’ in his philosophy (Chan p.17) - not so much however because they concern military operations, but because they are taken to apply much �2 more widely, ‘to life in general’ (p. 17). But why should military activity obtain some special dispensation? Why should what is not tolerated more generally be exonerated there? But given that Taoism has here the virtue of consistency (i.e. uniformity on principles) and of universalizability, that simply leaves more explaining to be done. • Puzzles for Taoism, and wars as unavoidable evils There are two puzzles here in Taoism rather than one. There is the military-practices paradox, and, varying and generalising on that, there are life-practices paradoxes. The special paradox is generated by the following incompatible elements: on the one side, ‘the most bitter attack on militarism’, the well-known opposition of Taoism to the use of force (p. 17) and to the possession and use of smart military weapons and technology - implying that war is far from all right - and on the other, advocacy of certain (devious) military tactics, outlines of (deceitful) conduct in war, and so on - implying that war is all right after all. A straightforward generalisation of this paradox would look at other morally-sensitive parts of life, where some practice was strongly condemned yet engaged in (for many examples, see the dilemmas assembled in MD). But the variation of concern to Chan and the neo-Confucians concerns the conjunction of upright with devious practices in life, in particular in the life of the sage. For a Taoist sage is presumed to lead an upright straightforward life, yet appears to engage in devious and even deceitful practices incompatible with such a life-style. Call this the Taoist-lifestyle paradox. Evidently a good deal of explaining is required, as to how Taoism can coherently take the positions it appears to presume, both on war and peace, and on life more generally. A desirable preliminary would seem to be a little investigation of what position is taken, especially on war and militarism. One key pasage runs: Fine weapons are instruments of evil They are hated by creatures Therefore those who possess the Tao turn away from them. ... Weapons are instruments of evil, not the instruments of a good ruler. When he uses them unavoidably, he regards calm restraint as the best principle Even when he is victorious, he does not regard it as praiseworthy, For to praise victory is to delight in the slaughter of men. He who delights in the slaughter of men will not succeed in the empire. ... For a victory, let us observe the occasion with funeral-ceremonies (LT p.154). Wars, which involve the use of weapons, instruments of evil, are accordingly themselves evil. They are also evil because they involve the slaughter of men. But they are also sometimes unavoidable (also p.152). Therefore such wars are unavoidable evils. Such discourse, obtained by almost immediate inference from the passage, is within the standard orbit of dilemma talk. But Taoism lacks, through deliberately eschewing deontic talk, the discourse which enables direct expression of such dilemmas, or even direct condemnation of wars or of clever weapons. Instead the points are made by circumlocution, what the possesser of Tao �3 does, how the good ruler conducts himself, or by analogy, of victory in war with death. Unavoidable evils are the very stuff of deontic dilemmas (though many theories, underpinned by shonky logic, lack the resources for representing this stuff properly). Where something is unavoidably evil, it is both bad, because evil, and also not bad, doing it is excusable, because it is unavoidable. So, given such an argument (which has its weaknesses), an unavoidable evil is a genuinely dilemmatic object with inconsistent features. Certain wars have looked, since ancient times, like such dilemmatic objects. Revealingly, Chan tries to explain that ‘most troublesome element’ in Taoism, the military-practice paradox, through the following exercise in lateral thinking: It can ... be argued that Lao Tzu uses warfare to illustrate his principles of taking no action and weakness because warfare is among the most dynamic and critical of human experiences, just as the Indian classic, the Bhagavadgita chooses fighting as the theme on which to discuss the terrible dilemma whether one should fulfil his duty, as in the case of a soldier, and kill, or should fail in his duty and refrain from killing (p.17). ‘Just as’? The Indian classic prevents a classic moral dilemma, a dilemma represented in contemporary philosophy (following its rediscovery by Sartre), where there are incompatible duties: the duty to kill, because of one's role as a soldier, and the duty not to kill, because of one's human condition, and the supervenient dilemma of failing in and fulfilling one's duties. These dilemmas for an individual (male, as it then was) are replicated in dilemmas regarding war for group institutions: at bottom, the obligation to engage in war (for one set of compelling reasons) as contraposed with the obligation not to engage in war (for another, perhaps overlapping, set of reasons). A theory of moral dilemmas (as worked out for example in MD) is crucial for an adequate treatment of major issues in war and peace, especially (as will become evident) for a viable strong pacifism. But Taoism, eschewing deontic discourse, lacks the apparatus to state or develop moral dilemmas. Hence it is logically excluded from giving a full or adequate account of what is going on conceptually. One of the philosophically fascinating feature of Taoism is the fashion in which ij manages to avoid deontic discourse, and to substitute for direct deontic discourse or improvise circumlocutions when deontic discourse would otherwise appear inevitable (cf. UT for examples). But there are costs. One is inability to display the mechanism of deontic dilemmas, or to show what reasons and argument lie behind Taoist prounouncements and conclusions (the shortage of Taoism on argument is another philosophically conspicious feature, also observed in UT). As conceptual apparatus for analysizing moral dilemmas is missing, most of the machinery involved has to be passed over. Only the outcomes, as Taoism sees them, are presented, as if from a black box. Taoism blacks out the story on deontic dilemmas that deep-green theory can tell, as the following diagram tries to show: �4 Diagrams . Charting the processing of deontic dilemmas that are “resolved,”. Deep-green chart: Arguments to Processing of dilemma, directive dilemma incompatible situational procedures output input prescriptions Corresponding Taoist chart: Black directive Box output It is evident that Taoism can be extended; information can be put into the Black Box rendering it less opaque. That extension can be made so as to conform to deep-green theory, e. so that the extended Taoist chart, a neo-Daoist chart, looks like the deep-green one. That is i. indeed essentially how neo-Daoism get characterised, in terms of conformity of the extension to deep ecological theory (see UT). We are now placed to explain how to dissolve, or at least neutralize, the paradoxes deriving from repudiation of militarism, an awkwardly qualified repudiation in the case of Taoism. In a significant sense there is no resolving of genuine deontic dilemmas. The principles delineating the fix may stand, incompatible, signalling the persisting suboptimality (or better, sublimenality) of the dilemmatic situation. Where there is a dilemma, involved parties should try to do well enough in the sublimenal circumstances (for a much fuller account, see MD). Thus where there is a war, itself a non-Taoist process, engaged or caught up Taoists will not abandon Taoism. Taoist methods will be applied, Taoist strategies pursued. So much for theoretical representation and (non-)resolution of life-practices and other dilemmas, details of which are readily elaborated in deep-green extensions of Taoism. A prior substantive issue is whether dilemmas always are generated: not whether wars are evil (typically they are, an issue we shall come to), but whether wars are unavoidable. Analysis of wars does not bear that familiar claim out decisively. Many wars could have been avoided, through conciliation, negotiation, restraint, etc., and no worse results apparently obtained, through sanctions, exchange, trade, etc. Through a typology of wars (coming up) that conjecture can be given some substance. Consider, for instance, what would be walk-overs. Then there is little point in making a military response. So war can be avoided. Certainly an occupation, to be met in a different way, may still occur. And so on, perhaps, for various other types of war. But, more generally, try this:- �5 Every war involves an aggressor, who makes an aggressive move. Such an aggressor could always avoid that move, taking a different (or a do-nothing) course of action. Therefore, every war can be avoided. No war is entirely unavoidable. Setting aside determinism (which renders all actual wars along with all other events unavoidable), it could be argued that a war sometimes simply boils up, without an aggressor, an intensification of a conflagatory situation. There are grounds for scepticism regarding such examples; for such intensification can only occur if provocative military moves are made, for instance troops are stationed in provocative or risky positions. The presumption that certain wars are unavoidable typically derives from a one-sided perspective on war, a defender's perspective. A defender has no option, so it is routinely averred, but to respond to a determined aggressor. Even if that should be so sometimes, when there is no running away or going underground, it does not establish that such a war is unavoidable; for it neglects the role of the aggressor. By a smarter formulation, relevant features of unavoidability can be captured. Although wars may not be unavoidable, defensive action in wars that have been initiated may be unavoidable. At least such action may be unavoidable if unacceptably high costs (death, enslavement, etc.) are not to be avoided. Thereupon another highly relevant feature emerges: the linkage of avoidability to costs. For whether an action is unavoidable then depends upon what costs a party is prepared to incur before and when insisting on action: but this appears entirely unacceptable. How can what is “unavoidable” cease to be so when some further costs are absorbed? However with basics like survival, a certain liberty, and so on, we do reach such bounds. An important type of unavoidability. We also reach scenarios, unavailable to Lao Tzu but kindly brought within range by modem technology, which may appear to justify aggressive strikes. State Z, while not an aggressor, is carrying out practices which will impose unacceptably high costs upon peoples of other states and implacably refuses to desist. It could, for example, be poisoning air or water flowing to other states. But ,to make the case vivid, let us suppose that state Z is constructing, for reasons Zeders find convincing (they are committed to a faith which depicts all hunqpns as incorrigible sinners and unworthy of life), an effective doomsday machine. Would an (aggressive) preemptory strike designed to disable or destroy the machine be unavoidable?1 In a sense, No; in another Yes. For different modalities can operate. Physically outsiders need to do nothing, but watch Zeders go about their zealous work. But deontically they are under heavy moral pressure, because of the costs of standing by idly: if the human race is worth anything very substantial, then they are obliged to act, action is deontically* 1 Whether it would be justifiable, or just, are separate issues. But it is evident enought that such scenarios further damage the obsolescent idea of just war. For, according to received doctrine, a just war is defensive. (How such a war can be fought at all is another matter; coherence requires relativization to ‘just wax for party d’.) �6 unavoidable. Here is a situation where a proposed reduction of deontic logic proves illuminating. Obligation is explicated through not implying, or necessitating, the sanction, i.e. excessive ethical costs such as extermination. Let us explain deontic unavoidability analogously: an action is so unavoidable if not undertaking it would result in excessive ethical costs. Then z/it can be established that there is no other way than a military strike, an act of war, to ensure that the Zeders desist (and certainly we can envisage scenarios like that), then that is deontically unavoidable. It is also dilemmatic for those committed to, or inclined towards pacifism; and it is, for them at least, but paradoxically justifiable, as the negation is also justifiable, on pacific grounds. Scenarios like that sketched, that appear to render certain wars deontically unavoidable require but little or no elaboration to render them evil. Evil indeed is such a standard feature of standard wars that at least its great presence call for little supporting evidence. But it has taken to vast stretch of human history to reach this general point of recognition. The manifold evils of war Lao Tzu very early recognised and emphasized: Wherever armies are stationed, briars and thorns grow. Great wars are always followed by famines (p. 152). And nowadays followed by great tides of refugees. This passage includes not only recognition of the widely-observed socio-environmental consequences of war, but, more striking, very early recognition of the severe environmental impact of military forces. That critique is not however developed in Taoism.2 Only recently has it been pushed substantially further. And only recently could a new, most significant twist occur, the merging of resource security, long a military objective, with environmental security. The appalling idea has recently been floated that the military, in need of new work and roles with the apparent warming of West-East relations and cooling of the Cold War, should exchange usual military idleness for meddling in environmental matters: regulation and policing of environmental resources, ensurance of environmental security of powerful states, and similar. This is a bit like reassigning those imprisoned for child abuse to managing kindergartens; for consider the impressive military record of environmental vandalism. What the military is alleged to offer is a structure appropriate and available for handling such matters. But, to the contrary, it is precisely the sort of hierarchical, authoritarian expensive structure that should be wound down and up as soon as the opportunity appears, as (briefly) now, rather than being retained and shockingly reoriented (as a state-serving “Greenwar”). 2 But a bridge to deep-green theory can be made through neo-Daoism, an updating of Taoism in confirmity with deep ecology (which however is somewhat thin and threadbare on war; for what there is so far, see Naess p.160). On neo-Daoism, see UT. �7 2. On the divergence of deep-green from Taoism. Having arrived, by better or worse arguments, at the conclusion that wars, though generally evil, may be sometimes unavoidable, it is evidently important to say something about how they - those of the theoretical residue - are to be conducted. By appropriate conduct the damage they do may be reduced; also the conduct should be appropriate to the funereal nature of wars (to exceed Taoist resources for stating this sort of point). It is at this stage that deep­ green theory begins to diverge from Taoism. In further explaining the Taoist and deep-green critiques of war, and diverting objections to them, a rough and preliminary typology of wars is important. It is also of passing interest in its own philosophical right. War, according to English Dictionaries, is a ‘contest carried on by force of arms, typically between nations or states’. More exactly, war is a game — in the generous technical sense of game-theory, with players, rules, goals, strategies, and so on carried on in significant part by military means, normally between states or substates. Call the contestants, (warnng) parties. They typically represent of course larger populations. The set­ up between parties resembles the arrangements of players in game theory. There are several analogical extensions of the term war to cover games where one of the parties is an object, construed as hostile (an enemy of the state), such as Crime, Drugs, Poverty or Nature. These we can set aside as analogical wars. Of course wars form only a part of military activities. Military interests and objectives have always stretched significantly further than war, to include surveillence and security, easily extended to resource security, environmental security and life­ style security, and beyond that to political stability and other political matters. Evidently military ambitions have far over-extended themselves in bagging such democratic concerns. An anarchist solution to the whole problem of war, which some have seen Taoism as reaching towards, is immediate: eliminate the source of war, states. Unfortunately it is not quite that simple (and that's not simple). For wars can also occur between nations, cultures, races or tribes (which are not such artifices as states, and not always so readily or desirably abolished), between inhabited regions, and between factions within states (thus civil wars) or, perhaps by extension,.between factions within other social structures (thus, for instance, gang wars). But undoubtedly eliminating states and aspiring states would abolish most wars and virtually all the worst wars. While “nonviolent wars” are excluded by definition, by virtue of ‘force of arms’, token wars, limited wars, and so on, are not: for instance, wars fought by small armed teams representing competing sides (cf. medieval and science fiction war games). As wars are hemmed in by conventions and agreed rules, there is no reason in principle why they should not be reduced to two person contests, fought under strict rules like boxing or gladiatorial contests. But in modem times wars have never taken such sensible forms, but have been much larger affairs, making heavy (though fortunately restricted) use of latest technology. Let us distinguish such wars as techno-powered wars. They have, directly or indirectly (for the �8 technology may be bought or bartered), a heavy research and development support structure (indeed the bulk of contemporary science is devoted - misdirected - in one way or another to this effort). Among wars, an important distinction is that between offensive and defensive wars. An offensive war is one which ventures off a given party’s territory or recognised pad, “invading” that of another party or parties; correlatively defensive parties, if they have not also invaded. Force projection typifies offensive practice. Plainly, offensiveness and defensiveness are not strictly features of a war, but of parties to a war. In a two-party war, while both parties can easily act offensively, the possibility of both parties proceeding defensively is excluded, unless they share territory. (Even then issues may arise as to which party, if any, was the aggressor, which started it, was responsible for starting it, and so on.) Thus mutually defensive wars between contemporary states are impossible (but would be possible if states shared territory, e.g. if Eire and Britain shared the territory of Northern Ireland). Tao-accredited wars were defensive wars, never wars aiming at domination: last-resort wars, in which no pride was taken (LT p.152).3 The pretence that offensive wars are defensive is widespread, and reflected in the subterfuge that departments or ministries of war are those of defence, security or whatever. (If they really were what they purport to be, we should be well on the way to an end to war.) Offensive practices are rendered defensive ones by shabby redefinitional strategems, such as redefining ‘defensive’ to include defence of ideals like democracy or liberty, infringed (or allegedly infringed) on territories abroad, or to include “defence” of a third party or place (whence every offensive war is “defensive”). In the present war in which part of Arabia is engulfed (February 1991), one party claims to be defending what really was (or should be) part of its territory, namely Kuwait, another party to be defending (what Kuwait did not enjoy) democracy. It is a doubly offensive war presented in this guise as jointly defensive. Aggressive wars are waged for a variety of reasons, but usually for resources or access to resources or markets, a matter often disguised by appeal to ideology (thus a war for oil is represented as a war qf liberation). But there are other reasons than narrowly economic ones, such as religion (as with crusades), power and aggrandisement (as in building an empire), and so on. Nor are those reasons necessarily far separated; ideologies like Marxism and market 3 There is one line in LT that may suggest that attack was sometimes justifiable, namely ‘For deep love helps one to win in the case of attack’ (p.219). But how can compassion be appropriate unless this attack is within a defensive setting, a larger context of unavoidability or such like. A passage shortly below confirms this interpretation: I dare not take the offensive but I take the defensive: I dare not advance an inch but I retreat a foot (p.222). These are advances and attacks within a defensive setting. �9 capitalism, for example, exhibit many of the features of religion. The economic reasons for war appear to have become much more complex with the advent of an integrated world economy. At the same time many of the independent reasons for economic wars are now obsolete. For to powerful states accrue the advantages of war without war. At least most of the former economic advantages of war can be obtained without expensive wars, through trade, institution of economic dependence, etc. Small medieval wars were sometimes instituted for the collection of neighbouring riches and booty, a kind of piracy meeting conditions of war. “Small” contemporary wars can be waged for a remarkable mix of political-economy ends: to establish a regime favourable to economic penetration and profit repatriation, to subjugate markets and to remove competition, to boost a sagging weapons economy by using up old stocks and also testing new equipment, to restart a depressed economy, and so on. Such wars, along with the economic aims which motivate them, are in effect heavily castigated by Lao Tzu: When Tao prevails in the world, galloping horses are turned back to fertilize (the fields ...). When Tao does not prevail in the world, war horses thrive in the suburbs. There is no calamity greater than lavish desires. (LT p.181). But it does exceed evidential warrant to claim that Tao is not only sufficient, but necessary, for cessation of such practices. The practice of regularly stimulating complex military-saturated economies through war is reminiscent of older, much ridiculed practices in simpler societies. They now ridicule the Tsembaga, who proceeded to destroy much of their surplus product by going to war every 5-15 years (cf Rapaport). But they do not similarly ridicule the most powerful nation on the Earth, the USA, which proceeds to write off a colossal amount of surplus in war every 10-20 years (the Gulf war liquidated some $1.7 billion per day). Taoists would. For ridicule was a favoured method, an important rhetorical strategem, and war and its idiocy were favourite targets. Some classification of defensive wars is also important, for various reasons: reducing and abolishing wars, their costs and damage, restructuring societies away from war and military practices, and, not least, for appreciating Taoism. A main distinction is between • conventional defence, maintained by armies of armed soldiers, many of them professionals, and • social defence, where there are no such armies or but fragments of them, and defence is carried out through social networks of a significant part of society.4 4 Details of social defence are presented in Sharp and in Martin. �10 It is here that Taoism and deep-green theory part company. Under Taoism, the state will have a standing army, but a defensive army operating by strange, surprise tactics (p.201). No doubt defensive wars are to remain last resort action. Nonetheless the state will operate in secrecy, in a way incompatible with decentralised social defence; people will be kept in the dark about smart weapons of the state; and they too will be surprised, along with presumed enemies of the state. By contrast, under deep-green theory, there should be no hidden smart weapons of state; information would flow more freely and not be hidden from the people (who should retain influence in informed decision making). Under deep-green, standing armies, and more generally military organisation, will be wound down altogether. Taoism should have pushed its searching criticism further. For military objectives, easily acquired by standing armies with time on their hands, are frequently incompatible with Taoism. For example, Taoism is opposed to domination (LT p.152), whereas military operations frequently seek or involve domination; and military structure is invariably hierarchical and authoritarian. Taoism aims for self-regulation, wherever feasible (cf. p.201); so does deep­ green theory, which is one reasons why it aims to dispose of standing armies, as an important preliminary to the withering away of states themselves (military forces being major props of state control and power, and often maintained primarily for internal state security). Taoism has no project for ending the era of wars; deep-green theory does. That project involves an elimination of standing armies, too often poised for fighting or political interference. A recommended route to end war consists in progressive scaling down: reduction of the means and manpower. The initial stages are well-known, and include • elimination of nuclear, biological and chemical weaponry, and • force reduction. It can hardly be pretended that the Earth's states have managed to proceed very far on even this complex of stages. The next stage consists in • contraction to defensive capacities only, and the final stage consists in • elimination of remaining military defensive forces, and adoption, so far as required, of social defence practices. The complete route thus involves complete demilitarisation. Reasons why deep-green aims to proceed the full distance are readily grasped by considering the environmental shallowness of an otherwise cogent traditional case for the sharp curtailment of wars and militarism. The traditional Western case against wars has been primarily along two dimensions: social and moral. Wars are highly disruptive of the social fabric; wars may be unjust. From these joint features, it was argued that wars should be a matter of last resort, to be fought to ensure peace. It was argued further that only just wars should be fought. Just wars were rare objects. But as there was little evidence of the decline and fall of wars, much effort was expended, more practically and unsuccessfully, upon endeavouring to improve the calibre of wars, and more theoretically, upon trying to characterize just war satisfactorily, or rather to bend the notion in an effort to approximate the gory unjust facts. �11 Progress was long hindered, furthermore, because there was always a rival positive perspective on wars, which encouraged the exaltation of wars and military feats. It also facilitated the transfer of the favourable image of war to other problem areas, whence the long and apparently successful war against Nature (but the short-term successes are turning into long-term problems), the short and unsuccessful war against Poverty, and so on. Behind all this is the complex idea of war as rejuvenating, even cleansing, like fire; of war as heroic, and glorious, of war as the supreme testing ground of men. These pictures of war - finally shattered by the first World War (where even the poets began to tell of horrors and atrocities) and subsequent technological wars - though no longer in ascendency, have by no means vanished. The notion of war as rejuvenating a flagging economy persists, along with the practice of keeping capitalism running smoothly by integrating substantial military components into the industrial engine. With the development of highly technological wars - the celebrated development of the dirty industrial age is substantially military - the traditional negative case has grown in strength. Wars have become much more damaging, with the potential for much more that is significantly worse, and the possibility of a just war has correspondingly contracted, virtually to zero. The opposition to war has likewise grown, but more than correspondingly with the rise of women in social and political influence. Wars have almost always and everywhere been Men's affairs; likewise conquest. Deep-green theory accepts much of the traditional negative case, but would further strengthen it. For example, the stricture against unjust wars, as out and out immoral, can be strengthened, through the following syllogism: All wars should be fully just wars. Modem wars cannot be fully just wars. Therefore, there should be no modern wars. A fully just war is not merely a just war, but a war those just character can be reliably forecast in advance. A modern war is of course a war that deploys modern technology, at least that available this century. The evidential basis for the second premiss derives from much information that collateral damage, damage to innocent bystanders and involved citizens is always likely and cannot be excluded. Such wars are always liable to violate uncontroversial requirements for a just war, even if they are purely “conventional” wars, not throwing radiation or chemical or biological weapons around. From a contemporary viewpoint the traditional doctrine of a just war, really of a just defensive war, is seriously out of date. The reasons for this reach wider than the new features introduced by modem technological wars and the character of modem civilization, with its giant cities littered with dangerous and vulnerable military targets. They have also to do with the chauvinism of the justice proposed, which is shallow human justice, not natural or environmental justice. There is no consideration of justice to other creatures or to the Earth (cf �12 Naess p.160). Two troubles are really intertwined here: conceptual difficulties with too narrow a notion of justice, and ideological difficulties with too narrow a vision of what is an object of value, of what counts. The deep-green case against war adds to the traditional case a further dimension, neglected until very recently: the environmental dimension. It has suddenly been seen that wars are typically environmental atrocities. Earlier, of course, “environments” were simply backgrounds, backdrops in paintings and plays, to the real drama. Contemporary technological wars tend to be not merely social tragedies but environmental ones as well. There is a doctrine of just war, but it is a human chauvinistic affair. There is no similarly developed doctrine of an ecologically sound war, a deep ecological war. Unless any such war were literally different from modern wars, that is from contemporary technological wars, it would overstep permitted bounds. For such wars are characteristically ecological disasters. Hardened military people, desensitized by a rigorous unethical training, feel even less compunction about degrading or destroying environments or members of other species than they do of maiming or killing civilians through “collateral” activity. Matching the no-just-war syllogism is a no-sound-war syllogism: All wars should be environmentally sound wars. Modem wars cannot be environmentally sound. Therefore, there should be no modern wars. The argument for the second premiss has of course to be different. It looks to the information accumulating on what wars do to natural and built environments. The Vietnam and Gulf wars both inflicted immense damage on natural environments or what was left of them. The environmental effects of war are not confined to direct and collateral damage. There are indirect effects also. Thus, for instance, war also supplied the mechanism of, and the technology for, modem environmental destruction: explosives, bulldozers from tanks, etc. As well, training for war and engagement in war have much fostered, along with attitudes that make for social callousness or ruthlessness, those that contribute to environmental insensitivity and cruelty. 3. Puzzles about Taoist strategy and its critiques of technology and violence ‘It is surprising how much of the Lao Tzu is devoted to military strategy’. Which strategies? Surprise, above all. But why such strategies? ‘Do they not contradict the Taoists’ strong opposition to the use of force’ (Chan p.222), the implied commitment to quietism? Briefly, Taoism is not committed to quietism, and while certainly antagonistic to violence, does not oppose certain uses of force (only really ///-forcing, as will be explained). Even so, the emphasis on military strategy remains puzzling. The strategies, many of them relevant to social defence, include • seriousness, not ‘making light of the enemy’ (p.222) �13 • surprise, and nonvisibility (p.201). The defensive strategy involves guerilla tactics: marching without formation, holding weapons without seeming to have them, confronting enemies without seeming to meet them (p.222). But even in times of peace, ‘smart weapons of the state should not be displayed to the people’ (p.164). Such recommendations helped to fuel the charge of deviousness lodged against Lao Tzu. But look at part of the reason for concealing smart weapons: ‘The more smart weapons the people have, the more troubled the state will be’ (p.201). Smart weapons are carried in corrupt states, where the rich engage in conspicuous consumption and the people are suppressed, not where Tao is practiced (LT p. 194). • advance from weakness, flexibility but firmness. Weakness is the principle of life and will overcome strength (LT p.164, p.233). • coolness and non-competition (LT p.233, p.164). Like these, most of the general strategies are standard Taoist practices simply applied to military conduct. For these standard practices the charge of deviousness looks feeble. The response applies more generally to other allegedly devious political strategies. For the strategies are but application of Taoist principles and techniques to warfare, politics and elsewhere. Nothing excludes application of these techniques to what are accounted, in general, unnecessary evils (which must sometimes, on other Taoist grounds, be countered). Nor, to meet the main criticism, need any deceit or deviousness be involved; nor is it. In particular, the legalist tactic, Tn order to grasp, it is necessary first to give’ (LT p.164), is cited as involving ‘an element of deceit’ ‘undeniably’, and ‘worse’ it is ‘morally questionable’ (Chan p.17). But in order for me to grasp your hand in a normal handshake, it is necessary first for me to give my hand. There is no deceit here, nothing morally questionable. All the tactics permit of benign construals, of a Taoist kind. Consider, for instance, Tn order to contract, it is necessary first to expand’ (LT p.164). In order to bend a copper pipe to the intended angle, it is better to bend it first a little further than required. The transformation of water to ice (both favoured natural items for symbolic purposes: natural processes which may look devious!) neatly illustrates the Taoist principle (which is however hardly necessary), and shows softness and weakness turned hardness and strength. The Taoist critique of militarism is as much a critique of technology as of war. Sharp weapons, ‘smart weapons’ as we might now say, come in for much critical attention, as we have already noticed. Only in corrupt and degenerate states are they displayed or flaunted (p.194, p.164); in deep-green regions smart weapons of state’ would not be retained unexhibited. The people will not have them for they mean trouble (p.201); for similar reasons deep-green regions will be free of them. So, it seems, will ideal Taoist regions: ‘Even if there are arrows and weapons, none will display them’ (LT p.238). Much technology, military and other, is excluded under the Taoist edict against violence (a further facet of the military-practices �14 paradox).5 The powerful critique of militarism in the Tao-te Ching is coupled with strong opposition to violence. Some of the linkage is evident enough. Militarism as practised represents an ultimate form of state (or party) violence. A basic theme is that violent practices will come to an unnatural end, and accordingly to a non-Taoist end (generalising LT p.176). While force may occur in spectacular, but satisfactory, natural forms, force is duly distinguished from violence. To force the growth of life means ill omen. For the mind to employ the vital force without restraint means violence (LT p. 197). One who follows Tao does not apply dominating force, which usually has had results bringing requital (p.152). Dominating force, like power, is in general castigated, under doctrine of wwwei, no forced actions, no violence. To force natural growth is deviant, destroying harmony. To stop natural growth is deviant. But there is a significant difference between force and violence. To intentionally employ destructive force is to do violence. To so force things is condemned. To remain in harmony with things one does not so force things or practice violence. There is a non-interference principle at work, which also indicates types of non­ interference that are excluded. However Taoism does not always get the distinction between force and violence quite 5 Under contemporary technology and technological arrangements, such as the storage of quantities of oil and nuclear and chemical materials in great cities, wars have assumed new and very destructive dimensions, to the point of being utterly irresponsible. A different approach to technology, as to war, is now mandatory. These are no longer things that can in principle be nicely confined and need not touch parties outside the fray. An important part of ending wars, “winning the war against wars”, is removing the technology of war, above all from irresponsible state power. As for which technology to try to jettison and which to try to retain or improve, it is not so difficult to indicate, provided evaluative terminology is not outlawed. What is wanted is technology that is good in its place, what should be excluded is technology that is indifferent or bad or potentially so. Technology to be justified has to do something worthwhile, it has to address identifiable respectable needs. That is why merely indifferent technology is out; there is no virtue in technology for technology's sake, as it is a mere means technique. It is because of the crucial evaluative component in choice of technology that appropriateness, itself evaluative, comes closer to encapsulating the criterion than other recent efforts. Size, such as smallness, or intermediateness, are not what matter, though modest and not excessive technologies are likely to fare better in satisfying appropriateness. In simpler societies, small technology is of course more appropriate; for that is what is good there. From known criteria for what is good these other features for locally appropriate technology can be read off: reliability, esp. in maintenance, functioning well and safely under the expected range of operating conditions (which may be difficult), ease of repair, capital cheapness and repair inexpensiveness, environmental benignness, and meeting sound social needs. �15 right. ‘Vital force without restraint’, intentionally excessive force, is only part of what counts as violence, which is more generally force which violates, i.e. transgresses, descrecrates, profanes, injures, outrages, etc. It is thus a negatively connoted force, an evil force in some specified intentional respect. There is a tendency for Taoist commentators, not Taoists, to regard Taoism as condemning all uses, or even occurrences, of force, but this is not so. Rather intentional ill-forcing is what is castigated, what is deviant. Thus Taoism does not exclude a range of defensive practices, which make satisfactory use of natural forces, like letting the machines of war industry stop. Those who would abolish war and its machinery, substituting for it nonwarlike and ideally nonviolent methods, technology, and strategies, have been confronted not merely with much sub-rational abuse but with plenty of criticism and even some paradoxes. Here is a recent paradox concerning war and nonviolence: • War must be abolished. One reason is simply economic. We can no longer afford it, and the opportunity costs are enormous. Along with other extraordinarily wasteful activities, it is an anachronism. • Doing so cannot be accomplished without violence, i.e. in effect, given the types of violence involved, without what amounts to war. According to a fuller version of this premiss, the process of abolishing a war would only be achieved through a revolution so profound that it could not succeed without extensive and extreme violence, amounting to (civil) war. 0 But then war cannot be abolished without war. Therefore, war which must be abolished cannot be abolished.6 This “paradox” has been compared with the Liar paradox, but the parallel does not persist far. For this paradox does not involve self-referential features, and is easily broken, as follows. Let the “last war” be not the last standard war but the revolution abolishing war. Then, given that the revolution is successful, war will be abolished therewith, i.e. with that last war. There need be no regress, given again a successful outcome. All the premisses stand intact, but the conclusion, following the ‘therefore’ is a nonsequitur. However, while the dissolution of the argument is accordingly logically fine, the route is repugnant. Standard pacifism challenges the 6 Brian Medlin, who forcefully propounded this puzzle, set other analogous puzzles alongside it - designed to reveal deep difficulties in contemporary political, and especially alternative, thought. Another puzzle, concerning liberty and repression in the context of capitalism, revolved around the following inconsistent triad: • capitalism must be removed, but liberty retained. • capitalism cannot be removed without repression. • repression is antithetical to liberty. The puzzle is resolved as with the analogous puzzle of abolishing. Let the “last capitalist” action before the days of liberty be the repressive but liberating revolution overthrowing capitalism. �i 16 second premiss. 4. Standard and moral pacifism. Although Taoism is strongly opposed to war, and much in favour of peace - and accordingly by prevailing standards a substantially pacific position - it is not (nowhere in the central texts) committed to pacifism in usual senses, for two different reasons:• It is not, by contrast with pacifism, opposed to all types of warfare, for example smart defensive wars. • It eschews deontology in terms of which moral pacifism is commonly stated, for instance through the watershed thesis P2. It is morally wrong to use violence. By contrast with Taoism, deep environmentalism does not avoid deontic claims, and is committed in principle to nonviolent technologies and ways and to pacifistic principles. Moreover, certain forms of deep environmentalism are completely committed to pacifism, notably European forms. Is deep green? There is heavy contemporary opposition to pacifism, as there also was to Taoism in the warring times when Taoism was first being promulgated. Many of the central institutions of contemporary life are intricated in coercion, violence and war. The most prominent contemporary institutions, states, are premissed on these elements of damaging force; they claim entitlement to use them widely, and even claim a certain territorial monopoly on their use. As a result they are having constantly to engage in them in attempt to maintain that monopoly. They are certainly the main perpetrators of wars, and of violence. They are indeed inured to wars, are in constant preparation for wars, yet propound dialectial (and normally dishonest and cynical) doctrines of peace through war (for a recent example see the appendix). Unremarkably then, the extensive propagandistic machinery of state has invested heavily in “justificatory” exercises in favour of controlled use, its own use, of destructive force, and continues to inveigh against pacifism. Because a routine trick in this sophistical repetoire consists in conflating pacifism with extreme, naive and inplausible, forms, an inevitable and important early task commits in unscrambling senses of ‘pacifism’. Semantical skulduggery can be thwarted in this way. Pacifism, as explained by English dictionaries, invariably concerns wars and warfare, and contains two components, negative and, elaborating on that, positive:- The negative component is, in Amauld's word, anti-War-ism, opposition (in ways to be further specified) to all forms of warfare (see OED). The positive component supplies alternative ways of settling disputes (what it is supposed that wars with some semblance of justification involve), such as negotiation, arbitration, ... - and, adding to too narrow dictionary accounts - sanctions, substitutions (e.g. of sporting events, operatic contests, cooperative ventures),.... In brief standard pacifism is opposition to all warfare and resolution of potential wars by other nonmilitary means. �17 Plainly the opposition to warfare, like the sanctions and so on, cannot itself be military (using soldiers and other devices of war), on pain of some incoherence. But otherwise the ways of opposition can be many and various: they can certainly be active, as with nonviolent demonstrations, resistance movements, and so forth, and they may also be devious (e.g. turning the forces of war upon themselves so they are neutralised). It quickly becomes evident, then, that some of the dictionaries offer but loaded definitions which, by restricting the negative components, reduce the initial appeal and plausibility of pacifism. Consider the Concise English definition of the negative component: ‘the doctrine of non-resistance to hostilities and of total non-co-operation with any form of warfare’. Thereby excluded are forms of pacifism which offer active and plausible alternatives to warfare such as social defence. The Concise English tends to force pacifism into what the Oxford English Dictionary lists as its final item: ‘often, with depreciatory implication, the advocacy of peace at any price’, ‘in any circumstance’. Pacifism can easily resist being forced into these sorts of circumstances: it has many resources, as an extensive series of texts on alternatives to war, such as negotiation, non­ violent action and social defence, from Taoism to contemporary environmentalism attest. Academic philosophers have much advanced the semantical strategy of some dictionaries, of rendering pacifism more difficult from the very outset by narrow and biassed definitions. They have stretched the term from its restricted setting of warfare, confined to state and organised gang violence, to cover all forms of violence, from state and interstate to, what is very different, personal and interpersonal violence. Call the resulting considerably stretched notion of pacifism, according to which it is morally wrong to use violence, according to which P2 holds, stretched pacifism? While stretched pacifism certainly includes standard pacifism (unless the notions of war and warfare are tampered with), the converse is very far from being the case. A pacifist is in no way committed to stretched pacifism, which is a much more problematic and difficult position than standard pacifism. There are several, substantially different reasons for this, which will be picked up seriatim. Stretched pacifism, also misleadingly called moral pacifism, has looked a very easy critical target to moral philosophers. Many the effusive philosopher who, upon sighting such a target, has charged, whooping such rhetoric as “incoherent”, “inconsistent”, “insensitive”, “fanatical”. However, with improved logical technology now available for accommodating and treating moral dilemmas, it is no great feat to resist such attacks, in the fashion of previous investigations (see esp. Al, also MD). A main aim was to demonstrate that stretched pacifism was not so stupid as it was made out to be or appeared to be to these inured to present dominant violent ways. So far from being stupid, it is viable. In future gentler times stretched pacifism 7 In Al this notion was contrasted with standard pacifism as comprehensive pacifism: overcomprehensive might have been better. �18 could even be realised for whole communities of creatures (as some genuinely Christian sects envisaged); whence it will finally be seen to be feasible not merely for sages and supermen, and many ordinary women, but much more extensively. The method of philosophical accommodation was through moral dilemmas. The sort of moral dilemma that stretched pacifism can induce derives as follows. On the one side stands the theme P2, Wv, in convenient symbols, for Wrong V-ing, violencing. Now this implies to WB, where B presents a case of of violence. On the other side, particular circumstances develop which lead to W ~B, because ~B would produce in the circumstances considerable wrong, for instance extensive violence, mass murder, etc. One stock example from the literature concerns calling off the firing squad about to shoot several captives if the pacifist shoots one of them (it is elaborated in Al p.13). Interestingly, another stock example from the literature concerns standard pacifism (it can also be presented in terms of patriotism; for details of both see MD p. 10). Resolution of intractable moral dilemmas is, where it is required, situational. The agent decides in the situation, within the fix, what to do. There are many ways in which such decision making can proceed, less rational, such as those applying chance or involving bad faith, or more rational, such as those applying consequentialist decision theory (for details see MD, pp.32-9). A decision theory taking account of all that should be included will not however be purely consequential. It would also take account of relevant motivation. This defence and rehabilitation of moral pacifism has been challenged, in particular by Smith (hereafter JWS). JWS claims the defence offered is a ‘failure because it trivializes pacifism’ (p. 153 twice). The rehabilitation trivializes pacifism because it entails that pacifism doesn't substantially differ from a form of activism which holds that while violence is always wrong one is sometimes justified on consequentialist grounds for preferring violent acts, if these acts are lesser evils than any other real alternatives. This is the commonsense position which most people hold - yet - pacifism after all was supposed to be radical moral doctrine - (p.153 rearranged).8 Part of the criticism is, then, not so much that pacifism is trivialized - JWS “activism” is hardly trivial - as that pacifism is popularised, deflated from a radical position to the commonsense position most people hold (p.154 also). Yet not a shred of evidence is adduced that JWS activism is such a populist position. Available evidence, for example from peace movements and oppositional opinion polls, suggests the very opposite: that, for instance, most people support state-justified conventional wars with the military violence they incur, and 8 JWS now informs me that he has changed his position. Whether the move effects his criticism, I don't know. �19 accordingly do not hold that violence is always wrong. From such a commonsense angle, pacifism with its condemnation of conventional wars and the violence they involve remains a radical doctrine. As regards wars and other violence-incurring social authorities, contemporary pacificism is, as previous explained (e.g. Al p.3), a form of activism. Pacifism does not imply utter pacifity, but may actively involve social defence, resistance and so on. However a certain level of misrepresentation enters into the JWS challenge in the details of what forms of activism pacifism may include. That misrepresentation begins in the second clause concerning what is said to be sometimes justified. For the situational procedure where dilemmas arise will not generally be consequential applying a principle of lesser evil. In dilemmatic situations such principles are suspended, and such a principle is in any case unacceptable to moral pacifists. A small amount of violence may be less bad in its consequences than verbal offence, but a principled pacifist will choose the slightly greater evil where other obligations do not exclude it. A more serious distortion occurs in JWS's effort to force procedures in dilemma situations into purely consequentialist form. In fact consequential decision theory was deployed as a model only for how to proceed rationally in a situational setting where deontic procedures were suspended (see MD p.38). What was said, still misleadingly retrospective vision reveals, was this: ‘what is done is a very consequentialist thing’ (Al p.13), not ‘one acts in a consequentialist fashion to do the sufficiently good thing in the circumstances’ (JWS p.152). Situationally other procedures than those resembling orthodox rational decision making (modified from maximizing to satisizing objectives) may be adopted (MD p.38). Further the orthodox consequentialist theory is inadequate because it leaves out, or tries to reduce to consequences, nonconsequential elements, notably motives. It is not difficult, in principle (in advance of attempted consequentialization of motives), to design situations where motives, such as integrity or maintaining faith, enter to yield outcomes upsetting consequential calculations. More elaborate decision making procedures than those of consequentialism, sometimes at variance with consequentialism, are thus presupposed. A further part of JWS's criticism accordingly goes by the board, the alleged appeal ‘to “second best” consequentialist considerations,... already explicitly condemned’ (p. 154). What was condemned was stock universal consequentialism, ‘that only consequentialist considerations carry argumentative weight’ (quoted on p. 152), so undercutting other deontic principles, such as those of pacifism. It was not claimed, what is utterly different, that consequentialist considerations can nowhere enter into deliberation and decision making. The conclusion JWS arrives at is therefore substantially astray. After criticising modern moral philosophy for its reliance upon consequentialist modes of thought, it is surprising, and inconsistent, to find ... [reliance] upon such modes of thought to escape logical difficulties raised by moral dilemmas facing ... pacifis[m] (p.152) �There is no inconsistency. JWS has confused universal with particular. As well he has wrongly contracted all situational decision making to consequentialist modes. There is a third part to the criticism, that the defence is too easy; the ‘strategy will allow too much violence to be (perpetrated and) justified to suit the tastes of any real pacifist’ (p. 153). This another part of the so-called trivialization, this time however dilution rather than populatization, weakening the moral stand against violence. This third contention is premissed on a mistake: that one can ‘justify on consequentialist grounds any number of violent acts, providing that such acts are lesser evils than other real alternatives facing social agents’ (p. 153). Moral pacifism offers no such licence; allowing such consequentialism to take over was never part of the position. The slide to such consequentialism is made on the strength of a similarly erroneous example. The potential victim of an aspiring rapist ‘is supposed to flee or wriggle free if possible. But it is easy to consequentially justify the use of violence by the woman to prevent herself from being raped’ (p. 153 italics added). In the example so far described there is no dilemma, and no such easy resort to consequentially ‘justified’ violence. What allows too much violence is the lesser evil JWS assumes is easily consequentially justified; for example that the woman is entitled to inflict, and escalate, violence so long as it remains ‘a lesser evil than the violence of attempted rape’ (p. 153). Since she may thereby inflict quite unreasonable damage (esp. if she is a Kung Fu expert), the result is inconsistent with ‘the basic principle of self-defence’ which JWS earlier adduced according to which what is ‘appropriate, in response is only that level of force necessary to defend oneself against the threat’ (p. 150). There is evidence in JWS's work of some enthusiasm for levels of violence which exceed his ‘basic principle’, his appeal to ‘lesser evil’ generates some instances. The ‘basic principle’, itself fraught with difficulties (cf. the contorted discussion of what weapons are appropriate in response to what attacks, p. 150), still exceeds what stretched pacifism would enjoin; for instance, it may not be appropriate to respond with force. But in a technical sense stretched pacifism is compatible with the ‘basic principle’, since it only imposes the upper bound on level of force. As for easiness, moral pacifism is not an easy position to live by, or to justify. Removing objections to pacifism is one thing; solidifying a positive case for it is quite another, and so far hardly conclusive (as Al tried to explain, pp 29-31). Stretched pacifism was advanced, hypothesized to put it more precisely, as a still viable option. It was not presented as a morally compulsory position, or, for that matter, as one that this defender adhered to or affirmed. To reiterate, while a cumulative case can be made for stetched pacifism as principled non­ violence, that case was not conclusive, and is hard to improve. For, further, some serious difficulties standing in the way of stretched pacifism were assembled, the most important of which derives from the extent of violence apparent in transactions within the natural world. Simply consider the practices of carnivores, essential to their natural way of life. In order to meet their life needs for sustenance, these creatures do, and are often obliged to, engage �21 routinely in violent activity. While it can no doubt be argued, as some vegetarians may do, that the natural order is an immoral order, and that remaining carnivores should be converted to vegetarianism as rapidly as proves possible (in the way domestic dogs are converted to dog biscuits), the difficulties with such proposals are immense. The task envisaged is gigantic, and beyond human capacities - even if it were desirable. For there are millions of species to be somehow converted to proper vegetarianism. Then there are millions of other species to be converted to proper and well regulated contraceptive practices, else their numbers will get out of hand (uncontrollably) with predation removed. Given humans lack of success in limiting their own excessive numbers, such regulation appears entirely remote. Aside however from the practical difficulties, is such a fully vegetarian order, with evolution further derailed, a desirable improvement on the natural order? Is it morally obligatory? It is certainly not obligatory, as alternative systems of morality in harmony with the prevailing natural order are feasible. Nor is it desirable, for (to appeal to such alternative value systems) the natural order is more or less in order as it is. Full vegetarianization would only reduce its value, vastly. More generally, a defensible ethical framework should not, it would be rightly contended, be right out of step with the natural order of other creatures, decently depicted. Decent depiction is important, for some features of the natural order, such as competition, combat and predation, so far from escaping attention, have been grossly exaggerated and exploited. Thus, for instance, the ludicrous picture of nature red in truth and claw, so beloved of descendents of orthodox Victorians and of orthodox economists. However, even under decent depiction, the “natural order” is often not benign. That appears to be enough to induce a supervenient moral dilemma for any stretched pacifism which is coupled to a deep ethic (e.g. which does not separate humans out from the natural order) and which eschews the desperate vegetarian route: The natural order is not an immoral order The natural order contains (regular) instances of violence. Therefore, instances of violence are not immoral in apparent defiance of P2 Moreover, there are too many instances of violence, too regularly occurring, for them all to be plausibly shunted into the moral dilemma category (and predatory carnivores face no dilemmas). Raptors that practice violence every week are not immoral (neither are they clearly moral; the category of morality only significantly extends so far). The main trouble lies however with P2 (which needs some finer adjustment, as was alrady indicated in Al). While P2 is alright in context, within a particular, perfectly viable, ethical framework, designed for the usual human round, the conventional setting for ethical theories, it stands in need of modification outside that setting. It is time to suggest the sort of modification envisaged. Evidently P2 was addressed to moral agents. Which agents? Not to carnivores that supply their own livelihood, nor really to morally degenerate humans, but to �i 22 peace-sensitive agents. With that semi-technical form, yet to be characterised, a suitably modified P2 results: MP2. It is morally wrong, for a peace-sensitive agent, to use violence.9 To recover what amounts, in the previous discussive context, to P2, it suffices to add the proposition that every human agent ought to be peace-sensitive. Much as that proposition has to recommend it, it appears too ethically advanced for many modem humans; it sets too high a moral standard to be taken as a serious guide to practice. It seems wise to settle presently for something less demanding, such as that every advanced moral agent ought to be peace sensitive. To put essentially the same proposition alternatively: Stretched pacifism (as modified) is supererogatory. While it is perhaps too late to hope for much moral progress in humans, it is pleasant to contemplate alternative futures where what is supererogatory became obligatory, and widely practiced. Richard Sylvan* Appendix I began drafting this essay at the time (January 17, midday Australian time) of the American attacks upon Iraq. The optly named Prime Minister Hawke of Australia had just made a statement to the nation-state, announcing (the) war. In this statement there was much talk of peace. There was even - in what was effectively a declaration of war - reiteration of the modem quest for ‘a new world order of peace’. Peace through war; so it rings out again and again, through the centuries. ‘War must be for the sake of peace’ (Aristotle p.220). More than two thousand years later, we have fought those wars to end all wars. But it is no use, Hawke solemely pronounced, just talking about peace, and thinking about peace; we must work for peace, fight for it - through war. Impeccable logic? President Bush, supreme commander, convinced us with similar logic, speaking too with many tongues. Of how he ‘preferred to think of peace, not war’. But now ‘only force will prevail’, as ‘all reasonable efforts to reach a peaceful solution are exhausted’. ‘What must be done’ must be done, or will be anyway. With God on side with the US offensive (as well as on the other side), it will go well. As it was said to have, though it achieved comparatively little that other efforts may not have yielded more satisfactorily, and thought it may now have to 9 The generalization of P2, suggested in Al, to cover also the parallel situation of environmental vandalism, can be similarly modified. The anti-vandolence principle becomes MP2°. It is morally wrong, for a peace- and environmentally-sensitive agent, to use vandolence. Thank to David Bennett for joint contributions (from UT) and to JWS for opposition (in JWS) � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Draft Papers Description An account of the resource Sylvan's literary executor encountered an archive in which “all his projects were current", since manuscripts were undated and unattributed. Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Text Any textual data included in the document WAR AND PEACE IV: TAO AND DEEP-GREEN Taoism and deep-green environmental theory, although closely aligned on very many issues, diverge over war. For Taoism, by contrast for instance with Buddhism, is not a pacific doctrine, but is committed to skilful defensive militarism. While it does not espouse a fortress mentality, Taoism certainly condones limited defensive military operations for specific purposes, a sort of guerilla warfare. By contrast, deep-green theory, while acknowledging the role of organised social defence, stands opposed to professional militarism, and thereby to military defence, and is committed to a principled pacifism. Conveniently a route through Taoism, philosophically fascinating in its own right, will lead us to problems of pacifism and towards deep-green theory. 1. Features of a Taoist critique of war and militarism. War did not receive a favourable press in ancient Chinese philosophy. Generally aggression and war were to be avoided. Even Confucius imposed very demanding conditions: for example, ‘when good men have instructed the people [in morals, agriculture, military tactics] for seven years, they may be allowed to bear arms,’ ‘If a ruler ... does not set himself right, even his commands will not be obeyed’ (SB p.41, italics added). Mo Tzu went much further than Confucius, roundly condemning war - on utilitarian grounds, that war yields no net benefit at any level (SB p.227). What is more, he backed his heavy condemnation practically (unlike some conspicuous contemporary theoretical utilitarians); ‘he did not hesitate to walk for ten days and ten nights in an effort to dissuade a ruler from making war’ (SB P-212). But none, it is said, went as far, in a detailed and sophisticated criticism of war, as Lao Tzu; ‘none has condemned war more strongly than Lao Tzu’. ‘[T]he opposition of Taoism to the use of force is well-known, and the most bitter attack on militarism if found in the Lao Tzu' (Chan, p.154, p.17.) But, after that splendid build-up, the text is slightly disappointing. Lao Tzu does not assert outright that war is an abomination, or even roundly condemn it. His critique of war, militarism, and military technology, is subtle and oblique, and, on the surface, far distanced from pacifism. For he does not recommend an end to war - in that genuine Taoists, those who possess Tao, will never participate in them - but expects wars to continue as unavoidable evils. Worse, he even goes so far as to outline proper attitudes to war and conduct in war, and indeed to suggest military techniques and strategies, some of which look decidedly devious. Among the classical works of Taoism, we focus on the Lao Tzu because, by contrast with other works, a remarkable component of that book is devoted to war and militarism. The apparent deviousness of the tactics Lao Tzu allocates serves to highlight what has been seen as ‘the most troublesome element’ in his philosophy (Chan p.17) - not so much however because they concern military operations, but because they are taken to apply much 2 more widely, ‘to life in general’ (p. 17). But why should military activity obtain some special dispensation? Why should what is not tolerated more generally be exonerated there? But given that Taoism has here the virtue of consistency (i.e. uniformity on principles) and of universalizability, that simply leaves more explaining to be done. • Puzzles for Taoism, and wars as unavoidable evils There are two puzzles here in Taoism rather than one. There is the military-practices paradox, and, varying and generalising on that, there are life-practices paradoxes. The special paradox is generated by the following incompatible elements: on the one side, ‘the most bitter attack on militarism’, the well-known opposition of Taoism to the use of force (p. 17) and to the possession and use of smart military weapons and technology - implying that war is far from all right - and on the other, advocacy of certain (devious) military tactics, outlines of (deceitful) conduct in war, and so on - implying that war is all right after all. A straightforward generalisation of this paradox would look at other morally-sensitive parts of life, where some practice was strongly condemned yet engaged in (for many examples, see the dilemmas assembled in MD). But the variation of concern to Chan and the neo-Confucians concerns the conjunction of upright with devious practices in life, in particular in the life of the sage. For a Taoist sage is presumed to lead an upright straightforward life, yet appears to engage in devious and even deceitful practices incompatible with such a life-style. Call this the Taoist-lifestyle paradox. Evidently a good deal of explaining is required, as to how Taoism can coherently take the positions it appears to presume, both on war and peace, and on life more generally. A desirable preliminary would seem to be a little investigation of what position is taken, especially on war and militarism. One key pasage runs: Fine weapons are instruments of evil They are hated by creatures Therefore those who possess the Tao turn away from them. ... Weapons are instruments of evil, not the instruments of a good ruler. When he uses them unavoidably, he regards calm restraint as the best principle Even when he is victorious, he does not regard it as praiseworthy, For to praise victory is to delight in the slaughter of men. He who delights in the slaughter of men will not succeed in the empire. ... For a victory, let us observe the occasion with funeral-ceremonies (LT p.154). Wars, which involve the use of weapons, instruments of evil, are accordingly themselves evil. They are also evil because they involve the slaughter of men. But they are also sometimes unavoidable (also p.152). Therefore such wars are unavoidable evils. Such discourse, obtained by almost immediate inference from the passage, is within the standard orbit of dilemma talk. But Taoism lacks, through deliberately eschewing deontic talk, the discourse which enables direct expression of such dilemmas, or even direct condemnation of wars or of clever weapons. Instead the points are made by circumlocution, what the possesser of Tao 3 does, how the good ruler conducts himself, or by analogy, of victory in war with death. Unavoidable evils are the very stuff of deontic dilemmas (though many theories, underpinned by shonky logic, lack the resources for representing this stuff properly). Where something is unavoidably evil, it is both bad, because evil, and also not bad, doing it is excusable, because it is unavoidable. So, given such an argument (which has its weaknesses), an unavoidable evil is a genuinely dilemmatic object with inconsistent features. Certain wars have looked, since ancient times, like such dilemmatic objects. Revealingly, Chan tries to explain that ‘most troublesome element’ in Taoism, the military-practice paradox, through the following exercise in lateral thinking: It can ... be argued that Lao Tzu uses warfare to illustrate his principles of taking no action and weakness because warfare is among the most dynamic and critical of human experiences, just as the Indian classic, the Bhagavadgita chooses fighting as the theme on which to discuss the terrible dilemma whether one should fulfil his duty, as in the case of a soldier, and kill, or should fail in his duty and refrain from killing (p.17). ‘Just as’? The Indian classic prevents a classic moral dilemma, a dilemma represented in contemporary philosophy (following its rediscovery by Sartre), where there are incompatible duties: the duty to kill, because of one's role as a soldier, and the duty not to kill, because of one's human condition, and the supervenient dilemma of failing in and fulfilling one's duties. These dilemmas for an individual (male, as it then was) are replicated in dilemmas regarding war for group institutions: at bottom, the obligation to engage in war (for one set of compelling reasons) as contraposed with the obligation not to engage in war (for another, perhaps overlapping, set of reasons). A theory of moral dilemmas (as worked out for example in MD) is crucial for an adequate treatment of major issues in war and peace, especially (as will become evident) for a viable strong pacifism. But Taoism, eschewing deontic discourse, lacks the apparatus to state or develop moral dilemmas. Hence it is logically excluded from giving a full or adequate account of what is going on conceptually. One of the philosophically fascinating feature of Taoism is the fashion in which ij manages to avoid deontic discourse, and to substitute for direct deontic discourse or improvise circumlocutions when deontic discourse would otherwise appear inevitable (cf. UT for examples). But there are costs. One is inability to display the mechanism of deontic dilemmas, or to show what reasons and argument lie behind Taoist prounouncements and conclusions (the shortage of Taoism on argument is another philosophically conspicious feature, also observed in UT). As conceptual apparatus for analysizing moral dilemmas is missing, most of the machinery involved has to be passed over. Only the outcomes, as Taoism sees them, are presented, as if from a black box. Taoism blacks out the story on deontic dilemmas that deep-green theory can tell, as the following diagram tries to show: 4 Diagrams . Charting the processing of deontic dilemmas that are “resolved,”. Deep-green chart: Arguments to Processing of dilemma, directive dilemma incompatible situational procedures output input prescriptions Corresponding Taoist chart: Black directive Box output It is evident that Taoism can be extended; information can be put into the Black Box rendering it less opaque. That extension can be made so as to conform to deep-green theory, e. so that the extended Taoist chart, a neo-Daoist chart, looks like the deep-green one. That is i. indeed essentially how neo-Daoism get characterised, in terms of conformity of the extension to deep ecological theory (see UT). We are now placed to explain how to dissolve, or at least neutralize, the paradoxes deriving from repudiation of militarism, an awkwardly qualified repudiation in the case of Taoism. In a significant sense there is no resolving of genuine deontic dilemmas. The principles delineating the fix may stand, incompatible, signalling the persisting suboptimality (or better, sublimenality) of the dilemmatic situation. Where there is a dilemma, involved parties should try to do well enough in the sublimenal circumstances (for a much fuller account, see MD). Thus where there is a war, itself a non-Taoist process, engaged or caught up Taoists will not abandon Taoism. Taoist methods will be applied, Taoist strategies pursued. So much for theoretical representation and (non-)resolution of life-practices and other dilemmas, details of which are readily elaborated in deep-green extensions of Taoism. A prior substantive issue is whether dilemmas always are generated: not whether wars are evil (typically they are, an issue we shall come to), but whether wars are unavoidable. Analysis of wars does not bear that familiar claim out decisively. Many wars could have been avoided, through conciliation, negotiation, restraint, etc., and no worse results apparently obtained, through sanctions, exchange, trade, etc. Through a typology of wars (coming up) that conjecture can be given some substance. Consider, for instance, what would be walk-overs. Then there is little point in making a military response. So war can be avoided. Certainly an occupation, to be met in a different way, may still occur. And so on, perhaps, for various other types of war. But, more generally, try this:- 5 Every war involves an aggressor, who makes an aggressive move. Such an aggressor could always avoid that move, taking a different (or a do-nothing) course of action. Therefore, every war can be avoided. No war is entirely unavoidable. Setting aside determinism (which renders all actual wars along with all other events unavoidable), it could be argued that a war sometimes simply boils up, without an aggressor, an intensification of a conflagatory situation. There are grounds for scepticism regarding such examples; for such intensification can only occur if provocative military moves are made, for instance troops are stationed in provocative or risky positions. The presumption that certain wars are unavoidable typically derives from a one-sided perspective on war, a defender's perspective. A defender has no option, so it is routinely averred, but to respond to a determined aggressor. Even if that should be so sometimes, when there is no running away or going underground, it does not establish that such a war is unavoidable; for it neglects the role of the aggressor. By a smarter formulation, relevant features of unavoidability can be captured. Although wars may not be unavoidable, defensive action in wars that have been initiated may be unavoidable. At least such action may be unavoidable if unacceptably high costs (death, enslavement, etc.) are not to be avoided. Thereupon another highly relevant feature emerges: the linkage of avoidability to costs. For whether an action is unavoidable then depends upon what costs a party is prepared to incur before and when insisting on action: but this appears entirely unacceptable. How can what is “unavoidable” cease to be so when some further costs are absorbed? However with basics like survival, a certain liberty, and so on, we do reach such bounds. An important type of unavoidability. We also reach scenarios, unavailable to Lao Tzu but kindly brought within range by modem technology, which may appear to justify aggressive strikes. State Z, while not an aggressor, is carrying out practices which will impose unacceptably high costs upon peoples of other states and implacably refuses to desist. It could, for example, be poisoning air or water flowing to other states. But ,to make the case vivid, let us suppose that state Z is constructing, for reasons Zeders find convincing (they are committed to a faith which depicts all hunqpns as incorrigible sinners and unworthy of life), an effective doomsday machine. Would an (aggressive) preemptory strike designed to disable or destroy the machine be unavoidable?1 In a sense, No; in another Yes. For different modalities can operate. Physically outsiders need to do nothing, but watch Zeders go about their zealous work. But deontically they are under heavy moral pressure, because of the costs of standing by idly: if the human race is worth anything very substantial, then they are obliged to act, action is deontically* 1 Whether it would be justifiable, or just, are separate issues. But it is evident enought that such scenarios further damage the obsolescent idea of just war. For, according to received doctrine, a just war is defensive. (How such a war can be fought at all is another matter; coherence requires relativization to ‘just wax for party d’.) 6 unavoidable. Here is a situation where a proposed reduction of deontic logic proves illuminating. Obligation is explicated through not implying, or necessitating, the sanction, i.e. excessive ethical costs such as extermination. Let us explain deontic unavoidability analogously: an action is so unavoidable if not undertaking it would result in excessive ethical costs. Then z/it can be established that there is no other way than a military strike, an act of war, to ensure that the Zeders desist (and certainly we can envisage scenarios like that), then that is deontically unavoidable. It is also dilemmatic for those committed to, or inclined towards pacifism; and it is, for them at least, but paradoxically justifiable, as the negation is also justifiable, on pacific grounds. Scenarios like that sketched, that appear to render certain wars deontically unavoidable require but little or no elaboration to render them evil. Evil indeed is such a standard feature of standard wars that at least its great presence call for little supporting evidence. But it has taken to vast stretch of human history to reach this general point of recognition. The manifold evils of war Lao Tzu very early recognised and emphasized: Wherever armies are stationed, briars and thorns grow. Great wars are always followed by famines (p. 152). And nowadays followed by great tides of refugees. This passage includes not only recognition of the widely-observed socio-environmental consequences of war, but, more striking, very early recognition of the severe environmental impact of military forces. That critique is not however developed in Taoism.2 Only recently has it been pushed substantially further. And only recently could a new, most significant twist occur, the merging of resource security, long a military objective, with environmental security. The appalling idea has recently been floated that the military, in need of new work and roles with the apparent warming of West-East relations and cooling of the Cold War, should exchange usual military idleness for meddling in environmental matters: regulation and policing of environmental resources, ensurance of environmental security of powerful states, and similar. This is a bit like reassigning those imprisoned for child abuse to managing kindergartens; for consider the impressive military record of environmental vandalism. What the military is alleged to offer is a structure appropriate and available for handling such matters. But, to the contrary, it is precisely the sort of hierarchical, authoritarian expensive structure that should be wound down and up as soon as the opportunity appears, as (briefly) now, rather than being retained and shockingly reoriented (as a state-serving “Greenwar”). 2 But a bridge to deep-green theory can be made through neo-Daoism, an updating of Taoism in confirmity with deep ecology (which however is somewhat thin and threadbare on war; for what there is so far, see Naess p.160). On neo-Daoism, see UT. 7 2. On the divergence of deep-green from Taoism. Having arrived, by better or worse arguments, at the conclusion that wars, though generally evil, may be sometimes unavoidable, it is evidently important to say something about how they - those of the theoretical residue - are to be conducted. By appropriate conduct the damage they do may be reduced; also the conduct should be appropriate to the funereal nature of wars (to exceed Taoist resources for stating this sort of point). It is at this stage that deep­ green theory begins to diverge from Taoism. In further explaining the Taoist and deep-green critiques of war, and diverting objections to them, a rough and preliminary typology of wars is important. It is also of passing interest in its own philosophical right. War, according to English Dictionaries, is a ‘contest carried on by force of arms, typically between nations or states’. More exactly, war is a game — in the generous technical sense of game-theory, with players, rules, goals, strategies, and so on carried on in significant part by military means, normally between states or substates. Call the contestants, (warnng) parties. They typically represent of course larger populations. The set­ up between parties resembles the arrangements of players in game theory. There are several analogical extensions of the term war to cover games where one of the parties is an object, construed as hostile (an enemy of the state), such as Crime, Drugs, Poverty or Nature. These we can set aside as analogical wars. Of course wars form only a part of military activities. Military interests and objectives have always stretched significantly further than war, to include surveillence and security, easily extended to resource security, environmental security and life­ style security, and beyond that to political stability and other political matters. Evidently military ambitions have far over-extended themselves in bagging such democratic concerns. An anarchist solution to the whole problem of war, which some have seen Taoism as reaching towards, is immediate: eliminate the source of war, states. Unfortunately it is not quite that simple (and that's not simple). For wars can also occur between nations, cultures, races or tribes (which are not such artifices as states, and not always so readily or desirably abolished), between inhabited regions, and between factions within states (thus civil wars) or, perhaps by extension,.between factions within other social structures (thus, for instance, gang wars). But undoubtedly eliminating states and aspiring states would abolish most wars and virtually all the worst wars. While “nonviolent wars” are excluded by definition, by virtue of ‘force of arms’, token wars, limited wars, and so on, are not: for instance, wars fought by small armed teams representing competing sides (cf. medieval and science fiction war games). As wars are hemmed in by conventions and agreed rules, there is no reason in principle why they should not be reduced to two person contests, fought under strict rules like boxing or gladiatorial contests. But in modem times wars have never taken such sensible forms, but have been much larger affairs, making heavy (though fortunately restricted) use of latest technology. Let us distinguish such wars as techno-powered wars. They have, directly or indirectly (for the 8 technology may be bought or bartered), a heavy research and development support structure (indeed the bulk of contemporary science is devoted - misdirected - in one way or another to this effort). Among wars, an important distinction is that between offensive and defensive wars. An offensive war is one which ventures off a given party’s territory or recognised pad, “invading” that of another party or parties; correlatively defensive parties, if they have not also invaded. Force projection typifies offensive practice. Plainly, offensiveness and defensiveness are not strictly features of a war, but of parties to a war. In a two-party war, while both parties can easily act offensively, the possibility of both parties proceeding defensively is excluded, unless they share territory. (Even then issues may arise as to which party, if any, was the aggressor, which started it, was responsible for starting it, and so on.) Thus mutually defensive wars between contemporary states are impossible (but would be possible if states shared territory, e.g. if Eire and Britain shared the territory of Northern Ireland). Tao-accredited wars were defensive wars, never wars aiming at domination: last-resort wars, in which no pride was taken (LT p.152).3 The pretence that offensive wars are defensive is widespread, and reflected in the subterfuge that departments or ministries of war are those of defence, security or whatever. (If they really were what they purport to be, we should be well on the way to an end to war.) Offensive practices are rendered defensive ones by shabby redefinitional strategems, such as redefining ‘defensive’ to include defence of ideals like democracy or liberty, infringed (or allegedly infringed) on territories abroad, or to include “defence” of a third party or place (whence every offensive war is “defensive”). In the present war in which part of Arabia is engulfed (February 1991), one party claims to be defending what really was (or should be) part of its territory, namely Kuwait, another party to be defending (what Kuwait did not enjoy) democracy. It is a doubly offensive war presented in this guise as jointly defensive. Aggressive wars are waged for a variety of reasons, but usually for resources or access to resources or markets, a matter often disguised by appeal to ideology (thus a war for oil is represented as a war qf liberation). But there are other reasons than narrowly economic ones, such as religion (as with crusades), power and aggrandisement (as in building an empire), and so on. Nor are those reasons necessarily far separated; ideologies like Marxism and market 3 There is one line in LT that may suggest that attack was sometimes justifiable, namely ‘For deep love helps one to win in the case of attack’ (p.219). But how can compassion be appropriate unless this attack is within a defensive setting, a larger context of unavoidability or such like. A passage shortly below confirms this interpretation: I dare not take the offensive but I take the defensive: I dare not advance an inch but I retreat a foot (p.222). These are advances and attacks within a defensive setting. 9 capitalism, for example, exhibit many of the features of religion. The economic reasons for war appear to have become much more complex with the advent of an integrated world economy. At the same time many of the independent reasons for economic wars are now obsolete. For to powerful states accrue the advantages of war without war. At least most of the former economic advantages of war can be obtained without expensive wars, through trade, institution of economic dependence, etc. Small medieval wars were sometimes instituted for the collection of neighbouring riches and booty, a kind of piracy meeting conditions of war. “Small” contemporary wars can be waged for a remarkable mix of political-economy ends: to establish a regime favourable to economic penetration and profit repatriation, to subjugate markets and to remove competition, to boost a sagging weapons economy by using up old stocks and also testing new equipment, to restart a depressed economy, and so on. Such wars, along with the economic aims which motivate them, are in effect heavily castigated by Lao Tzu: When Tao prevails in the world, galloping horses are turned back to fertilize (the fields ...). When Tao does not prevail in the world, war horses thrive in the suburbs. There is no calamity greater than lavish desires. (LT p.181). But it does exceed evidential warrant to claim that Tao is not only sufficient, but necessary, for cessation of such practices. The practice of regularly stimulating complex military-saturated economies through war is reminiscent of older, much ridiculed practices in simpler societies. They now ridicule the Tsembaga, who proceeded to destroy much of their surplus product by going to war every 5-15 years (cf Rapaport). But they do not similarly ridicule the most powerful nation on the Earth, the USA, which proceeds to write off a colossal amount of surplus in war every 10-20 years (the Gulf war liquidated some $1.7 billion per day). Taoists would. For ridicule was a favoured method, an important rhetorical strategem, and war and its idiocy were favourite targets. Some classification of defensive wars is also important, for various reasons: reducing and abolishing wars, their costs and damage, restructuring societies away from war and military practices, and, not least, for appreciating Taoism. A main distinction is between • conventional defence, maintained by armies of armed soldiers, many of them professionals, and • social defence, where there are no such armies or but fragments of them, and defence is carried out through social networks of a significant part of society.4 4 Details of social defence are presented in Sharp and in Martin. 10 It is here that Taoism and deep-green theory part company. Under Taoism, the state will have a standing army, but a defensive army operating by strange, surprise tactics (p.201). No doubt defensive wars are to remain last resort action. Nonetheless the state will operate in secrecy, in a way incompatible with decentralised social defence; people will be kept in the dark about smart weapons of the state; and they too will be surprised, along with presumed enemies of the state. By contrast, under deep-green theory, there should be no hidden smart weapons of state; information would flow more freely and not be hidden from the people (who should retain influence in informed decision making). Under deep-green, standing armies, and more generally military organisation, will be wound down altogether. Taoism should have pushed its searching criticism further. For military objectives, easily acquired by standing armies with time on their hands, are frequently incompatible with Taoism. For example, Taoism is opposed to domination (LT p.152), whereas military operations frequently seek or involve domination; and military structure is invariably hierarchical and authoritarian. Taoism aims for self-regulation, wherever feasible (cf. p.201); so does deep­ green theory, which is one reasons why it aims to dispose of standing armies, as an important preliminary to the withering away of states themselves (military forces being major props of state control and power, and often maintained primarily for internal state security). Taoism has no project for ending the era of wars; deep-green theory does. That project involves an elimination of standing armies, too often poised for fighting or political interference. A recommended route to end war consists in progressive scaling down: reduction of the means and manpower. The initial stages are well-known, and include • elimination of nuclear, biological and chemical weaponry, and • force reduction. It can hardly be pretended that the Earth's states have managed to proceed very far on even this complex of stages. The next stage consists in • contraction to defensive capacities only, and the final stage consists in • elimination of remaining military defensive forces, and adoption, so far as required, of social defence practices. The complete route thus involves complete demilitarisation. Reasons why deep-green aims to proceed the full distance are readily grasped by considering the environmental shallowness of an otherwise cogent traditional case for the sharp curtailment of wars and militarism. The traditional Western case against wars has been primarily along two dimensions: social and moral. Wars are highly disruptive of the social fabric; wars may be unjust. From these joint features, it was argued that wars should be a matter of last resort, to be fought to ensure peace. It was argued further that only just wars should be fought. Just wars were rare objects. But as there was little evidence of the decline and fall of wars, much effort was expended, more practically and unsuccessfully, upon endeavouring to improve the calibre of wars, and more theoretically, upon trying to characterize just war satisfactorily, or rather to bend the notion in an effort to approximate the gory unjust facts. 11 Progress was long hindered, furthermore, because there was always a rival positive perspective on wars, which encouraged the exaltation of wars and military feats. It also facilitated the transfer of the favourable image of war to other problem areas, whence the long and apparently successful war against Nature (but the short-term successes are turning into long-term problems), the short and unsuccessful war against Poverty, and so on. Behind all this is the complex idea of war as rejuvenating, even cleansing, like fire; of war as heroic, and glorious, of war as the supreme testing ground of men. These pictures of war - finally shattered by the first World War (where even the poets began to tell of horrors and atrocities) and subsequent technological wars - though no longer in ascendency, have by no means vanished. The notion of war as rejuvenating a flagging economy persists, along with the practice of keeping capitalism running smoothly by integrating substantial military components into the industrial engine. With the development of highly technological wars - the celebrated development of the dirty industrial age is substantially military - the traditional negative case has grown in strength. Wars have become much more damaging, with the potential for much more that is significantly worse, and the possibility of a just war has correspondingly contracted, virtually to zero. The opposition to war has likewise grown, but more than correspondingly with the rise of women in social and political influence. Wars have almost always and everywhere been Men's affairs; likewise conquest. Deep-green theory accepts much of the traditional negative case, but would further strengthen it. For example, the stricture against unjust wars, as out and out immoral, can be strengthened, through the following syllogism: All wars should be fully just wars. Modem wars cannot be fully just wars. Therefore, there should be no modern wars. A fully just war is not merely a just war, but a war those just character can be reliably forecast in advance. A modern war is of course a war that deploys modern technology, at least that available this century. The evidential basis for the second premiss derives from much information that collateral damage, damage to innocent bystanders and involved citizens is always likely and cannot be excluded. Such wars are always liable to violate uncontroversial requirements for a just war, even if they are purely “conventional” wars, not throwing radiation or chemical or biological weapons around. From a contemporary viewpoint the traditional doctrine of a just war, really of a just defensive war, is seriously out of date. The reasons for this reach wider than the new features introduced by modem technological wars and the character of modem civilization, with its giant cities littered with dangerous and vulnerable military targets. They have also to do with the chauvinism of the justice proposed, which is shallow human justice, not natural or environmental justice. There is no consideration of justice to other creatures or to the Earth (cf 12 Naess p.160). Two troubles are really intertwined here: conceptual difficulties with too narrow a notion of justice, and ideological difficulties with too narrow a vision of what is an object of value, of what counts. The deep-green case against war adds to the traditional case a further dimension, neglected until very recently: the environmental dimension. It has suddenly been seen that wars are typically environmental atrocities. Earlier, of course, “environments” were simply backgrounds, backdrops in paintings and plays, to the real drama. Contemporary technological wars tend to be not merely social tragedies but environmental ones as well. There is a doctrine of just war, but it is a human chauvinistic affair. There is no similarly developed doctrine of an ecologically sound war, a deep ecological war. Unless any such war were literally different from modern wars, that is from contemporary technological wars, it would overstep permitted bounds. For such wars are characteristically ecological disasters. Hardened military people, desensitized by a rigorous unethical training, feel even less compunction about degrading or destroying environments or members of other species than they do of maiming or killing civilians through “collateral” activity. Matching the no-just-war syllogism is a no-sound-war syllogism: All wars should be environmentally sound wars. Modem wars cannot be environmentally sound. Therefore, there should be no modern wars. The argument for the second premiss has of course to be different. It looks to the information accumulating on what wars do to natural and built environments. The Vietnam and Gulf wars both inflicted immense damage on natural environments or what was left of them. The environmental effects of war are not confined to direct and collateral damage. There are indirect effects also. Thus, for instance, war also supplied the mechanism of, and the technology for, modem environmental destruction: explosives, bulldozers from tanks, etc. As well, training for war and engagement in war have much fostered, along with attitudes that make for social callousness or ruthlessness, those that contribute to environmental insensitivity and cruelty. 3. Puzzles about Taoist strategy and its critiques of technology and violence ‘It is surprising how much of the Lao Tzu is devoted to military strategy’. Which strategies? Surprise, above all. But why such strategies? ‘Do they not contradict the Taoists’ strong opposition to the use of force’ (Chan p.222), the implied commitment to quietism? Briefly, Taoism is not committed to quietism, and while certainly antagonistic to violence, does not oppose certain uses of force (only really ///-forcing, as will be explained). Even so, the emphasis on military strategy remains puzzling. The strategies, many of them relevant to social defence, include • seriousness, not ‘making light of the enemy’ (p.222) 13 • surprise, and nonvisibility (p.201). The defensive strategy involves guerilla tactics: marching without formation, holding weapons without seeming to have them, confronting enemies without seeming to meet them (p.222). But even in times of peace, ‘smart weapons of the state should not be displayed to the people’ (p.164). Such recommendations helped to fuel the charge of deviousness lodged against Lao Tzu. But look at part of the reason for concealing smart weapons: ‘The more smart weapons the people have, the more troubled the state will be’ (p.201). Smart weapons are carried in corrupt states, where the rich engage in conspicuous consumption and the people are suppressed, not where Tao is practiced (LT p. 194). • advance from weakness, flexibility but firmness. Weakness is the principle of life and will overcome strength (LT p.164, p.233). • coolness and non-competition (LT p.233, p.164). Like these, most of the general strategies are standard Taoist practices simply applied to military conduct. For these standard practices the charge of deviousness looks feeble. The response applies more generally to other allegedly devious political strategies. For the strategies are but application of Taoist principles and techniques to warfare, politics and elsewhere. Nothing excludes application of these techniques to what are accounted, in general, unnecessary evils (which must sometimes, on other Taoist grounds, be countered). Nor, to meet the main criticism, need any deceit or deviousness be involved; nor is it. In particular, the legalist tactic, Tn order to grasp, it is necessary first to give’ (LT p.164), is cited as involving ‘an element of deceit’ ‘undeniably’, and ‘worse’ it is ‘morally questionable’ (Chan p.17). But in order for me to grasp your hand in a normal handshake, it is necessary first for me to give my hand. There is no deceit here, nothing morally questionable. All the tactics permit of benign construals, of a Taoist kind. Consider, for instance, Tn order to contract, it is necessary first to expand’ (LT p.164). In order to bend a copper pipe to the intended angle, it is better to bend it first a little further than required. The transformation of water to ice (both favoured natural items for symbolic purposes: natural processes which may look devious!) neatly illustrates the Taoist principle (which is however hardly necessary), and shows softness and weakness turned hardness and strength. The Taoist critique of militarism is as much a critique of technology as of war. Sharp weapons, ‘smart weapons’ as we might now say, come in for much critical attention, as we have already noticed. Only in corrupt and degenerate states are they displayed or flaunted (p.194, p.164); in deep-green regions smart weapons of state’ would not be retained unexhibited. The people will not have them for they mean trouble (p.201); for similar reasons deep-green regions will be free of them. So, it seems, will ideal Taoist regions: ‘Even if there are arrows and weapons, none will display them’ (LT p.238). Much technology, military and other, is excluded under the Taoist edict against violence (a further facet of the military-practices 14 paradox).5 The powerful critique of militarism in the Tao-te Ching is coupled with strong opposition to violence. Some of the linkage is evident enough. Militarism as practised represents an ultimate form of state (or party) violence. A basic theme is that violent practices will come to an unnatural end, and accordingly to a non-Taoist end (generalising LT p.176). While force may occur in spectacular, but satisfactory, natural forms, force is duly distinguished from violence. To force the growth of life means ill omen. For the mind to employ the vital force without restraint means violence (LT p. 197). One who follows Tao does not apply dominating force, which usually has had results bringing requital (p.152). Dominating force, like power, is in general castigated, under doctrine of wwwei, no forced actions, no violence. To force natural growth is deviant, destroying harmony. To stop natural growth is deviant. But there is a significant difference between force and violence. To intentionally employ destructive force is to do violence. To so force things is condemned. To remain in harmony with things one does not so force things or practice violence. There is a non-interference principle at work, which also indicates types of non­ interference that are excluded. However Taoism does not always get the distinction between force and violence quite 5 Under contemporary technology and technological arrangements, such as the storage of quantities of oil and nuclear and chemical materials in great cities, wars have assumed new and very destructive dimensions, to the point of being utterly irresponsible. A different approach to technology, as to war, is now mandatory. These are no longer things that can in principle be nicely confined and need not touch parties outside the fray. An important part of ending wars, “winning the war against wars”, is removing the technology of war, above all from irresponsible state power. As for which technology to try to jettison and which to try to retain or improve, it is not so difficult to indicate, provided evaluative terminology is not outlawed. What is wanted is technology that is good in its place, what should be excluded is technology that is indifferent or bad or potentially so. Technology to be justified has to do something worthwhile, it has to address identifiable respectable needs. That is why merely indifferent technology is out; there is no virtue in technology for technology's sake, as it is a mere means technique. It is because of the crucial evaluative component in choice of technology that appropriateness, itself evaluative, comes closer to encapsulating the criterion than other recent efforts. Size, such as smallness, or intermediateness, are not what matter, though modest and not excessive technologies are likely to fare better in satisfying appropriateness. In simpler societies, small technology is of course more appropriate; for that is what is good there. From known criteria for what is good these other features for locally appropriate technology can be read off: reliability, esp. in maintenance, functioning well and safely under the expected range of operating conditions (which may be difficult), ease of repair, capital cheapness and repair inexpensiveness, environmental benignness, and meeting sound social needs. 15 right. ‘Vital force without restraint’, intentionally excessive force, is only part of what counts as violence, which is more generally force which violates, i.e. transgresses, descrecrates, profanes, injures, outrages, etc. It is thus a negatively connoted force, an evil force in some specified intentional respect. There is a tendency for Taoist commentators, not Taoists, to regard Taoism as condemning all uses, or even occurrences, of force, but this is not so. Rather intentional ill-forcing is what is castigated, what is deviant. Thus Taoism does not exclude a range of defensive practices, which make satisfactory use of natural forces, like letting the machines of war industry stop. Those who would abolish war and its machinery, substituting for it nonwarlike and ideally nonviolent methods, technology, and strategies, have been confronted not merely with much sub-rational abuse but with plenty of criticism and even some paradoxes. Here is a recent paradox concerning war and nonviolence: • War must be abolished. One reason is simply economic. We can no longer afford it, and the opportunity costs are enormous. Along with other extraordinarily wasteful activities, it is an anachronism. • Doing so cannot be accomplished without violence, i.e. in effect, given the types of violence involved, without what amounts to war. According to a fuller version of this premiss, the process of abolishing a war would only be achieved through a revolution so profound that it could not succeed without extensive and extreme violence, amounting to (civil) war. 0 But then war cannot be abolished without war. Therefore, war which must be abolished cannot be abolished.6 This “paradox” has been compared with the Liar paradox, but the parallel does not persist far. For this paradox does not involve self-referential features, and is easily broken, as follows. Let the “last war” be not the last standard war but the revolution abolishing war. Then, given that the revolution is successful, war will be abolished therewith, i.e. with that last war. There need be no regress, given again a successful outcome. All the premisses stand intact, but the conclusion, following the ‘therefore’ is a nonsequitur. However, while the dissolution of the argument is accordingly logically fine, the route is repugnant. Standard pacifism challenges the 6 Brian Medlin, who forcefully propounded this puzzle, set other analogous puzzles alongside it - designed to reveal deep difficulties in contemporary political, and especially alternative, thought. Another puzzle, concerning liberty and repression in the context of capitalism, revolved around the following inconsistent triad: • capitalism must be removed, but liberty retained. • capitalism cannot be removed without repression. • repression is antithetical to liberty. The puzzle is resolved as with the analogous puzzle of abolishing. Let the “last capitalist” action before the days of liberty be the repressive but liberating revolution overthrowing capitalism. i 16 second premiss. 4. Standard and moral pacifism. Although Taoism is strongly opposed to war, and much in favour of peace - and accordingly by prevailing standards a substantially pacific position - it is not (nowhere in the central texts) committed to pacifism in usual senses, for two different reasons:• It is not, by contrast with pacifism, opposed to all types of warfare, for example smart defensive wars. • It eschews deontology in terms of which moral pacifism is commonly stated, for instance through the watershed thesis P2. It is morally wrong to use violence. By contrast with Taoism, deep environmentalism does not avoid deontic claims, and is committed in principle to nonviolent technologies and ways and to pacifistic principles. Moreover, certain forms of deep environmentalism are completely committed to pacifism, notably European forms. Is deep green? There is heavy contemporary opposition to pacifism, as there also was to Taoism in the warring times when Taoism was first being promulgated. Many of the central institutions of contemporary life are intricated in coercion, violence and war. The most prominent contemporary institutions, states, are premissed on these elements of damaging force; they claim entitlement to use them widely, and even claim a certain territorial monopoly on their use. As a result they are having constantly to engage in them in attempt to maintain that monopoly. They are certainly the main perpetrators of wars, and of violence. They are indeed inured to wars, are in constant preparation for wars, yet propound dialectial (and normally dishonest and cynical) doctrines of peace through war (for a recent example see the appendix). Unremarkably then, the extensive propagandistic machinery of state has invested heavily in “justificatory” exercises in favour of controlled use, its own use, of destructive force, and continues to inveigh against pacifism. Because a routine trick in this sophistical repetoire consists in conflating pacifism with extreme, naive and inplausible, forms, an inevitable and important early task commits in unscrambling senses of ‘pacifism’. Semantical skulduggery can be thwarted in this way. Pacifism, as explained by English dictionaries, invariably concerns wars and warfare, and contains two components, negative and, elaborating on that, positive:- The negative component is, in Amauld's word, anti-War-ism, opposition (in ways to be further specified) to all forms of warfare (see OED). The positive component supplies alternative ways of settling disputes (what it is supposed that wars with some semblance of justification involve), such as negotiation, arbitration, ... - and, adding to too narrow dictionary accounts - sanctions, substitutions (e.g. of sporting events, operatic contests, cooperative ventures),.... In brief standard pacifism is opposition to all warfare and resolution of potential wars by other nonmilitary means. 17 Plainly the opposition to warfare, like the sanctions and so on, cannot itself be military (using soldiers and other devices of war), on pain of some incoherence. But otherwise the ways of opposition can be many and various: they can certainly be active, as with nonviolent demonstrations, resistance movements, and so forth, and they may also be devious (e.g. turning the forces of war upon themselves so they are neutralised). It quickly becomes evident, then, that some of the dictionaries offer but loaded definitions which, by restricting the negative components, reduce the initial appeal and plausibility of pacifism. Consider the Concise English definition of the negative component: ‘the doctrine of non-resistance to hostilities and of total non-co-operation with any form of warfare’. Thereby excluded are forms of pacifism which offer active and plausible alternatives to warfare such as social defence. The Concise English tends to force pacifism into what the Oxford English Dictionary lists as its final item: ‘often, with depreciatory implication, the advocacy of peace at any price’, ‘in any circumstance’. Pacifism can easily resist being forced into these sorts of circumstances: it has many resources, as an extensive series of texts on alternatives to war, such as negotiation, non­ violent action and social defence, from Taoism to contemporary environmentalism attest. Academic philosophers have much advanced the semantical strategy of some dictionaries, of rendering pacifism more difficult from the very outset by narrow and biassed definitions. They have stretched the term from its restricted setting of warfare, confined to state and organised gang violence, to cover all forms of violence, from state and interstate to, what is very different, personal and interpersonal violence. Call the resulting considerably stretched notion of pacifism, according to which it is morally wrong to use violence, according to which P2 holds, stretched pacifism? While stretched pacifism certainly includes standard pacifism (unless the notions of war and warfare are tampered with), the converse is very far from being the case. A pacifist is in no way committed to stretched pacifism, which is a much more problematic and difficult position than standard pacifism. There are several, substantially different reasons for this, which will be picked up seriatim. Stretched pacifism, also misleadingly called moral pacifism, has looked a very easy critical target to moral philosophers. Many the effusive philosopher who, upon sighting such a target, has charged, whooping such rhetoric as “incoherent”, “inconsistent”, “insensitive”, “fanatical”. However, with improved logical technology now available for accommodating and treating moral dilemmas, it is no great feat to resist such attacks, in the fashion of previous investigations (see esp. Al, also MD). A main aim was to demonstrate that stretched pacifism was not so stupid as it was made out to be or appeared to be to these inured to present dominant violent ways. So far from being stupid, it is viable. In future gentler times stretched pacifism 7 In Al this notion was contrasted with standard pacifism as comprehensive pacifism: overcomprehensive might have been better. 18 could even be realised for whole communities of creatures (as some genuinely Christian sects envisaged); whence it will finally be seen to be feasible not merely for sages and supermen, and many ordinary women, but much more extensively. The method of philosophical accommodation was through moral dilemmas. The sort of moral dilemma that stretched pacifism can induce derives as follows. On the one side stands the theme P2, Wv, in convenient symbols, for Wrong V-ing, violencing. Now this implies to WB, where B presents a case of of violence. On the other side, particular circumstances develop which lead to W ~B, because ~B would produce in the circumstances considerable wrong, for instance extensive violence, mass murder, etc. One stock example from the literature concerns calling off the firing squad about to shoot several captives if the pacifist shoots one of them (it is elaborated in Al p.13). Interestingly, another stock example from the literature concerns standard pacifism (it can also be presented in terms of patriotism; for details of both see MD p. 10). Resolution of intractable moral dilemmas is, where it is required, situational. The agent decides in the situation, within the fix, what to do. There are many ways in which such decision making can proceed, less rational, such as those applying chance or involving bad faith, or more rational, such as those applying consequentialist decision theory (for details see MD, pp.32-9). A decision theory taking account of all that should be included will not however be purely consequential. It would also take account of relevant motivation. This defence and rehabilitation of moral pacifism has been challenged, in particular by Smith (hereafter JWS). JWS claims the defence offered is a ‘failure because it trivializes pacifism’ (p. 153 twice). The rehabilitation trivializes pacifism because it entails that pacifism doesn't substantially differ from a form of activism which holds that while violence is always wrong one is sometimes justified on consequentialist grounds for preferring violent acts, if these acts are lesser evils than any other real alternatives. This is the commonsense position which most people hold - yet - pacifism after all was supposed to be radical moral doctrine - (p.153 rearranged).8 Part of the criticism is, then, not so much that pacifism is trivialized - JWS “activism” is hardly trivial - as that pacifism is popularised, deflated from a radical position to the commonsense position most people hold (p.154 also). Yet not a shred of evidence is adduced that JWS activism is such a populist position. Available evidence, for example from peace movements and oppositional opinion polls, suggests the very opposite: that, for instance, most people support state-justified conventional wars with the military violence they incur, and 8 JWS now informs me that he has changed his position. Whether the move effects his criticism, I don't know. 19 accordingly do not hold that violence is always wrong. From such a commonsense angle, pacifism with its condemnation of conventional wars and the violence they involve remains a radical doctrine. As regards wars and other violence-incurring social authorities, contemporary pacificism is, as previous explained (e.g. Al p.3), a form of activism. Pacifism does not imply utter pacifity, but may actively involve social defence, resistance and so on. However a certain level of misrepresentation enters into the JWS challenge in the details of what forms of activism pacifism may include. That misrepresentation begins in the second clause concerning what is said to be sometimes justified. For the situational procedure where dilemmas arise will not generally be consequential applying a principle of lesser evil. In dilemmatic situations such principles are suspended, and such a principle is in any case unacceptable to moral pacifists. A small amount of violence may be less bad in its consequences than verbal offence, but a principled pacifist will choose the slightly greater evil where other obligations do not exclude it. A more serious distortion occurs in JWS's effort to force procedures in dilemma situations into purely consequentialist form. In fact consequential decision theory was deployed as a model only for how to proceed rationally in a situational setting where deontic procedures were suspended (see MD p.38). What was said, still misleadingly retrospective vision reveals, was this: ‘what is done is a very consequentialist thing’ (Al p.13), not ‘one acts in a consequentialist fashion to do the sufficiently good thing in the circumstances’ (JWS p.152). Situationally other procedures than those resembling orthodox rational decision making (modified from maximizing to satisizing objectives) may be adopted (MD p.38). Further the orthodox consequentialist theory is inadequate because it leaves out, or tries to reduce to consequences, nonconsequential elements, notably motives. It is not difficult, in principle (in advance of attempted consequentialization of motives), to design situations where motives, such as integrity or maintaining faith, enter to yield outcomes upsetting consequential calculations. More elaborate decision making procedures than those of consequentialism, sometimes at variance with consequentialism, are thus presupposed. A further part of JWS's criticism accordingly goes by the board, the alleged appeal ‘to “second best” consequentialist considerations,... already explicitly condemned’ (p. 154). What was condemned was stock universal consequentialism, ‘that only consequentialist considerations carry argumentative weight’ (quoted on p. 152), so undercutting other deontic principles, such as those of pacifism. It was not claimed, what is utterly different, that consequentialist considerations can nowhere enter into deliberation and decision making. The conclusion JWS arrives at is therefore substantially astray. After criticising modern moral philosophy for its reliance upon consequentialist modes of thought, it is surprising, and inconsistent, to find ... [reliance] upon such modes of thought to escape logical difficulties raised by moral dilemmas facing ... pacifis[m] (p.152) There is no inconsistency. JWS has confused universal with particular. As well he has wrongly contracted all situational decision making to consequentialist modes. There is a third part to the criticism, that the defence is too easy; the ‘strategy will allow too much violence to be (perpetrated and) justified to suit the tastes of any real pacifist’ (p. 153). This another part of the so-called trivialization, this time however dilution rather than populatization, weakening the moral stand against violence. This third contention is premissed on a mistake: that one can ‘justify on consequentialist grounds any number of violent acts, providing that such acts are lesser evils than other real alternatives facing social agents’ (p. 153). Moral pacifism offers no such licence; allowing such consequentialism to take over was never part of the position. The slide to such consequentialism is made on the strength of a similarly erroneous example. The potential victim of an aspiring rapist ‘is supposed to flee or wriggle free if possible. But it is easy to consequentially justify the use of violence by the woman to prevent herself from being raped’ (p. 153 italics added). In the example so far described there is no dilemma, and no such easy resort to consequentially ‘justified’ violence. What allows too much violence is the lesser evil JWS assumes is easily consequentially justified; for example that the woman is entitled to inflict, and escalate, violence so long as it remains ‘a lesser evil than the violence of attempted rape’ (p. 153). Since she may thereby inflict quite unreasonable damage (esp. if she is a Kung Fu expert), the result is inconsistent with ‘the basic principle of self-defence’ which JWS earlier adduced according to which what is ‘appropriate, in response is only that level of force necessary to defend oneself against the threat’ (p. 150). There is evidence in JWS's work of some enthusiasm for levels of violence which exceed his ‘basic principle’, his appeal to ‘lesser evil’ generates some instances. The ‘basic principle’, itself fraught with difficulties (cf. the contorted discussion of what weapons are appropriate in response to what attacks, p. 150), still exceeds what stretched pacifism would enjoin; for instance, it may not be appropriate to respond with force. But in a technical sense stretched pacifism is compatible with the ‘basic principle’, since it only imposes the upper bound on level of force. As for easiness, moral pacifism is not an easy position to live by, or to justify. Removing objections to pacifism is one thing; solidifying a positive case for it is quite another, and so far hardly conclusive (as Al tried to explain, pp 29-31). Stretched pacifism was advanced, hypothesized to put it more precisely, as a still viable option. It was not presented as a morally compulsory position, or, for that matter, as one that this defender adhered to or affirmed. To reiterate, while a cumulative case can be made for stetched pacifism as principled non­ violence, that case was not conclusive, and is hard to improve. For, further, some serious difficulties standing in the way of stretched pacifism were assembled, the most important of which derives from the extent of violence apparent in transactions within the natural world. Simply consider the practices of carnivores, essential to their natural way of life. In order to meet their life needs for sustenance, these creatures do, and are often obliged to, engage 21 routinely in violent activity. While it can no doubt be argued, as some vegetarians may do, that the natural order is an immoral order, and that remaining carnivores should be converted to vegetarianism as rapidly as proves possible (in the way domestic dogs are converted to dog biscuits), the difficulties with such proposals are immense. The task envisaged is gigantic, and beyond human capacities - even if it were desirable. For there are millions of species to be somehow converted to proper vegetarianism. Then there are millions of other species to be converted to proper and well regulated contraceptive practices, else their numbers will get out of hand (uncontrollably) with predation removed. Given humans lack of success in limiting their own excessive numbers, such regulation appears entirely remote. Aside however from the practical difficulties, is such a fully vegetarian order, with evolution further derailed, a desirable improvement on the natural order? Is it morally obligatory? It is certainly not obligatory, as alternative systems of morality in harmony with the prevailing natural order are feasible. Nor is it desirable, for (to appeal to such alternative value systems) the natural order is more or less in order as it is. Full vegetarianization would only reduce its value, vastly. More generally, a defensible ethical framework should not, it would be rightly contended, be right out of step with the natural order of other creatures, decently depicted. Decent depiction is important, for some features of the natural order, such as competition, combat and predation, so far from escaping attention, have been grossly exaggerated and exploited. Thus, for instance, the ludicrous picture of nature red in truth and claw, so beloved of descendents of orthodox Victorians and of orthodox economists. However, even under decent depiction, the “natural order” is often not benign. That appears to be enough to induce a supervenient moral dilemma for any stretched pacifism which is coupled to a deep ethic (e.g. which does not separate humans out from the natural order) and which eschews the desperate vegetarian route: The natural order is not an immoral order The natural order contains (regular) instances of violence. Therefore, instances of violence are not immoral in apparent defiance of P2 Moreover, there are too many instances of violence, too regularly occurring, for them all to be plausibly shunted into the moral dilemma category (and predatory carnivores face no dilemmas). Raptors that practice violence every week are not immoral (neither are they clearly moral; the category of morality only significantly extends so far). The main trouble lies however with P2 (which needs some finer adjustment, as was alrady indicated in Al). While P2 is alright in context, within a particular, perfectly viable, ethical framework, designed for the usual human round, the conventional setting for ethical theories, it stands in need of modification outside that setting. It is time to suggest the sort of modification envisaged. Evidently P2 was addressed to moral agents. Which agents? Not to carnivores that supply their own livelihood, nor really to morally degenerate humans, but to i 22 peace-sensitive agents. With that semi-technical form, yet to be characterised, a suitably modified P2 results: MP2. It is morally wrong, for a peace-sensitive agent, to use violence.9 To recover what amounts, in the previous discussive context, to P2, it suffices to add the proposition that every human agent ought to be peace-sensitive. Much as that proposition has to recommend it, it appears too ethically advanced for many modem humans; it sets too high a moral standard to be taken as a serious guide to practice. It seems wise to settle presently for something less demanding, such as that every advanced moral agent ought to be peace sensitive. To put essentially the same proposition alternatively: Stretched pacifism (as modified) is supererogatory. While it is perhaps too late to hope for much moral progress in humans, it is pleasant to contemplate alternative futures where what is supererogatory became obligatory, and widely practiced. Richard Sylvan* Appendix I began drafting this essay at the time (January 17, midday Australian time) of the American attacks upon Iraq. The optly named Prime Minister Hawke of Australia had just made a statement to the nation-state, announcing (the) war. In this statement there was much talk of peace. There was even - in what was effectively a declaration of war - reiteration of the modem quest for ‘a new world order of peace’. Peace through war; so it rings out again and again, through the centuries. ‘War must be for the sake of peace’ (Aristotle p.220). More than two thousand years later, we have fought those wars to end all wars. But it is no use, Hawke solemely pronounced, just talking about peace, and thinking about peace; we must work for peace, fight for it - through war. Impeccable logic? President Bush, supreme commander, convinced us with similar logic, speaking too with many tongues. Of how he ‘preferred to think of peace, not war’. But now ‘only force will prevail’, as ‘all reasonable efforts to reach a peaceful solution are exhausted’. ‘What must be done’ must be done, or will be anyway. With God on side with the US offensive (as well as on the other side), it will go well. As it was said to have, though it achieved comparatively little that other efforts may not have yielded more satisfactorily, and thought it may now have to 9 The generalization of P2, suggested in Al, to cover also the parallel situation of environmental vandalism, can be similarly modified. The anti-vandolence principle becomes MP2°. It is morally wrong, for a peace- and environmentally-sensitive agent, to use vandolence. Thank to David Bennett for joint contributions (from UT) and to JWS for opposition (in JWS)  Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Box 59, Item 680: Draft of War and peace IV: Tao and deep-green Subject The topic of the resource Computer printout. Later title: On extirpating war: Tao and deep-green pacifism. Description An account of the resource Note, one of four papers digitised from item 680. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org/items/browse?search=Richard+Sylvan&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bjoiner%5D=and&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=&amp;range=&amp;collection=&amp;type=&amp;user=&amp;tags=&amp;public=&amp;featured=&amp;exhibit=&amp;geolocation-mapped=&amp;geolocation-address=&amp;geolocation-latitude=&amp;geolocation-longitude=&amp;geolocation-radius=10&amp;submit_search=Search+for+items">Richard Sylvan</a> Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <span class="MuiTypography-root-125 MuiTypography-body2-126">The University of Queensland's <a data-testid="rek-series" href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/records/search?page=1&amp;pageSize=20&amp;sortBy=score&amp;sortDirection=Desc&amp;searchQueryParams%5Brek_series%5D%5Bvalue%5D=Richard+Sylvan+Papers%2C+UQFL291&amp;searchMode=advanced">Richard Sylvan Papers UQFL291</a></span>, Box 59, Item 680 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org">Antipodean Antinuclearism: (Re)constructing Richard Routley/Sylvan's Nuclear Philosophy</a> Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource This item was identified for digitisation at the request of The University of Queensland's 2020 Fryer Library Fellow, <a href="https://najtaylor.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr. N.A.J. Taylor</a>. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource For all enquiries about this work, please contact the Fryer Library, The University of Queensland Library. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource [22] leaves. 14.62 MB. Type The nature or genre of the resource Manuscript Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context <a href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:16694a5">https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:16694a5</a> Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Como - Cupboard - Pile 3 Box 59: Nuclear Como House Como House > Cupboard > Pile 3 https://www.antipodean-antinuclearism.org/files/original/8d68b6d2b8fc13d2658f8bcec5033f90.pdf 133736fbbf882cc36899905ee9ec3212 PDF Text Text ON EXTIRPATING WAR: TAO AND DEEP-GREEN PACIFISM Taoism and deep-green environmental theory, although closely aligned on very many issues, diverge over war. For Taoism, by contrast for instance with Buddhism, is not a pacific doctrine, but is committed to skilful defensive militarism. While it does not espouse a fortress mentality, Taoism certainly condones limited defensive military operations for specific purposes, a sort of guerilla warfare. By contrast, deep-green theory, while acknowledging the role of organised social defence, stands opposed to professional militarism, and thereby to military defence, and is committed to a principled pacifism. Conveniently a route through Taoism, philosophically fascinating in its own right, will lead us to problems of pacifism and towards deep-green theory. 1. Features of a Taoist critique of war and militarism. War did not receive a favourable press in ancient Chinese philosophy. Generally aggression and war were to be avoided. Even Confucius imposed very demanding conditions: for example, ‘when good men have instructed the people [in morals, agriculture, military tactics] for seven years, they may be allowed to bear arms,’ ‘If a ruler ... does not set himself right, even his commands will not be obeyed’ (SB p.41, italics added). Mo Tzu went much further than Confucius, roundly condemning war - on utilitarian grounds, that war yields no net benefit at any level (SB p.227). What is more, he backed his heavy condemnation practically (unlike some conspicuous contemporary theoretical utilitarians); ‘he did not hesitate to walk for ten days and ten nights in an effort to dissuade a ruler from making war’ (SB p.212). But none, it is said, went as far, in a detailed and sophisticated criticism of war, as Lao Tzu; ‘none has condemned war more strongly than Lao Tzu’. ‘[T]he opposition of Taoism to the use of force is well-known, and the most bitter attack on militarism if found in the Lao Tzu’ (Chan, p.154, p.17.) But, after that splendid build-up, the text is slightly disappointing. Lao Tzu does not assert outright that war is an abomination, or even roundly condemn it. His critique of war, militarism, and military technology, is subtle and oblique, and, on the surface, far distanced from pacifism. For he does not recommend an end to war - in that genuine Taoists, those who possess Tao, will never participate in them - but expects wars to continue as unavoidable evils. Worse, he even goes so far as to outline proper attitudes to war and conduct in war, and indeed to suggest military techniques and strategies, some of which look decidedly devious. Among the classical works of Taoism, we focus on the Lao Tzu because, by contrast with other works, a remarkable component of that book is devoted to war and militarism. The apparent deviousness of the tactics Lao Tzu allocates serves to highlight what has been seen as ‘the most troublesome element’ in his philosophy (Chan p.17) — not so much however because they concern military operations, but because they are taken to apply much more widely, ‘to life in general’ (p.17). But why should military activity obtain some special �2 more widely, ‘to life in general’ (p. 17). But why should military activity obtain some special dispensation? Why should what is not tolerated more generally be exonerated there? But given that Taoism has here the virtue of consistency (i.e. uniformity on principles) and of universalizability, that simply leaves more explaining to be done. • Puzzles for Taoism, and wars as unavoidable evils There are two puzzles here in Taoism rather than one. There is the military-practices paradox, and, varying and generalising on that, there are life-practices paradoxes. The special paradox is generated by the following incompatible elements: on the one side, ‘the most bitter attack on militarism’, the well-known opposition of Taoism to the use of force (p. 17) and to the possession and use of smart military weapons and technology - implying that war is far from all right - and on the other, advocacy of certain (devious) military tactics, outlines of (deceitful) conduct in war, and so on - implying that war is all right after all. A straightforward generalisation of this paradox would look at other morally-sensitive parts of life, where some practice was strongly condemned yet engaged in (for many examples, see the dilemmas assembled in MD). But the variation of concern to Chan and the neo-Confucians concerns thfc conjunction of upright with devious practices in life, in particular in the life of the sage. For a Taoist sage is presumed to lead an upright straightforward life, yet appears to engage in devious and even deceitful practices incompatible with such a life-style. Call this the Taoist-lifestyle paradox. Evidently a good deal of explaining is required, as to how Taoism can coherently take the positions it appears to presume, both on war and peace, and on life more generally. A desirable preliminary would seem to be a little investigation of what position is taken, especially on war and militarism. One key pasage runs: Fine weapons are instruments of evil They are hated by creatures Therefore those who possess the Tao turn away from them. ... Weapons are instruments of evil, not the instruments of a good ruler. When he uses them unavoidably, he regards calm restraint as the best principle Even when he is victorious, he does not regard it as praiseworthy, For to praise victory is to delight in the slaughter of men. He who delights in the slaughter of men will not succeed in the empire. ... For a victory, let us observe the occasion with funeral-ceremonies (LT p.154). Wars, which involve the use of weapons, instruments of evil, are accordingly themselves evil. They are also evil because they involve the slaughter of men. But they are also sometimes unavoidable (also p.152). Therefore such wars are unavoidable evils. Such discourse, obtained by almost immediate inference from the passage, is within the standard orbit of dilemma talk. But Taoism lacks, through deliberately eschewing deontic talk, the discourse which enables direct expression of such dilemmas, or even direct condemnation of wars or of clever weapons. Instead the points are made by circumlocution, what the possesser of Tao �3 does, how the good ruler conducts himself, or by analogy, of victory in war with death. Unavoidable evils are the very stuff of deontic dilemmas (though many theories, underpinned by shonky logic, lack the resources for representing this stuff properly). Where something is unavoidably evil, it is both bad, because evil, and also not bad, doing it is excusable, because it is unavoidable. So, given such an argument (which has its weaknesses), an unavoidable evil is a genuinely dilemmatic object with inconsistent features. Certain wars have looked, since ancient times, like such dilemmatic objects. Revealingly, Chan tries to explain that ‘most troublesome element’ in Taoism, the military-practice paradox, through the following exercise in lateral thinking: It can ... be argued that Lao Tzu uses warfare to illustrate his principles of taking no action and weakness because warfare is among the most dynamic and critical of human experiences, just as the Indian classic, the Bhagavadgita chooses fighting as the theme on which to discuss the terrible dilemma whether one should fulfil his duty, as in the case of a soldier, and kill, or should fail in his duty and refrain from killing (p. 17). ‘Just as’? The Indian classic prevents a classic moral dilemma, a dilemma represented in contemporary philosophy (following its rediscovery by Sartre), where there are incompatible duties: the duty to kill, because of one's role as a soldier, and the duty not to kill, because of one's human condition, and the supervenient dilemma of failing in and fulfilling one's duties. These dilemmas for an individual (male, as it then was) are replicated in dilemmas regarding war for group institutions: at bottom, the obligation to engage in war (for one set of compelling reasons) as contraposed with the obligation not to engage in war (for another, perhaps overlapping, set of reasons). A theory of moral dilemmas (as worked out for example in MD) is crucial for an adequate treatment of major issues in war and peace, especially (as will become evident) for a viable strong pacifism. But Taoism, eschewing deontic discourse, lacks the apparatus to state or develop moral dilemmas. Hence it is logically excluded from giving a full or adequate account of what is going on conceptually. One of the philosophically fascinating feature of Taoism is the fashion in which it manages to avoid deontic discourse, and to substitute for direct deontic discourse or improvise circumlocutions when deontic discourse would otherwise appear inevitable (cf. UT for examples). But there are costs. One is inability to display the mechanism of deontic dilemmas, or to show what reasons and argument lie behind Taoist prounouncements and conclusions (the shortage of Taoism on argument is another philosophically conspicious feature, also observed in UT). As conceptual apparatus for analysizing moral dilemmas is missing, most of the machinery involved has to be passed over. Only the outcomes, as Taoism sees them, are presented, as if from a black box. Taoism blacks out the story on deontic dilemmas that deep-green theory can tell, as the following diagram tries to show: �4 Diagrams . Charting the processing of deontic dilemmas that are “resolved”. Deep-green chart: Processing of dilemma, Arguments to dilemma incompatible input prescriptions situational procedures -» > directive output ■ X. Corresponding Taoist chart: Black directive Box output It is evident that Taoism can be extended', information can be put into the Black Bok rendering it less opaque. That extension can be made so as to conform to deep-green theory, i.e. so that the extended Taoist chart, a neo-Daoist chart, looks like the deep-green one. That is indeed essentially how neo-Daoism get characterised, in terms of conformity of the extension to deep ecological theory (see UT). We are now placed to explain how to dissolve, or at least neutralize, the paradoxes deriving from repudiation of militarism, an awkwardly qualified repudiation in the case of Taoism. In a significant sense there is no resolving of genuine deontic dilemmas. The principles delineating the fix may stand, incompatible, signalling the persisting suboptimality (or better, sublimenality) of the dilemmatic situation. Where there is a dilemma, involved parties should try to do well enough in the sublimenal circumstances (for a much fuller account, see MD). Thus where there is a war, itself a non-Taoist process, engaged or caught up Taoists will not abandon Taoism. Taoist methods will be applied, Taoist strategies pursued. So much for theoretical representation and (non-)resolution of life-practices and other dilemmas, details of which are readily elaborated in deep-green extensions of Taoism. A prior substantive issue is whether dilemmas always are generated: not whether wars are evil (typically they are, an issue we shall come to), but whether wars are unavoidable. Analysis of wars does not bear that familiar claim out decisively. Many wars could have been avoided, through conciliation, negotiation, restraint, etc., and no worse results apparently obtained, through sanctions, exchange, trade, etc. Through a typology of wars (coming up) that conjecture can be given some substance. Consider, for instance, what would be walk-overs. Then there is little point in making a military response. So war can be avoided. Certainly an occupation, to be met in a different way, may still occur. And so on, perhaps, for various other types of war. But, more generally, try this:- �5 Every war involves an aggressor, who makes an aggressive move. Such an aggressor could always avoid that move, taking a different (or a do-nothing) course of action. Therefore, every war can be avoided. No war is entirely unavoidable. Setting aside determinism (which renders all actual wars along with all other events unavoidable), it could be argued that a war sometimes simply boils up, without an aggressor, an intensification of a conflagatory situation. There are grounds for scepticism regarding such examples; for such intensification can only occur if provocative military moves are made, for instance troops are stationed in provocative or risky positions. The presumption that certain wars are unavoidable typically derives from a one-sided perspective on war, a defender's perspective. A defender has no option, so it is routinely averred, but to respond to a determined aggressor. Even if that should be so sometimes, when there is no running away or going underground, it does not establish that such a war is unavoidable; for it neglects the role of the aggressor. By a smarter formulation, relevant features of unavoidability can be captured. Although wars may not be unavoidable, defensive action in wars that have been initiated may be unavoidable. At least such action may b£ unavoidable z/ unacceptably high costs (death, enslavement, etc.) are not to be avoided. Thereupon another highly relevant feature emerges: the linkage of avoidability to costs. For whether an action is unavoidable then depends upon what costs a party is prepared to incur before and when insisting on action: but this appears entirely unacceptable. How can what is “unavoidable” cease to be so when some further costs are absorbed? However with basics like survival, a certain liberty, and so on, we do reach such bounds. An important type of unavoidability. We also reach scenarios, unavailable to Lao Tzu but kindly brought within range by modem technology, which may appear to justify aggressive strikes. State Z, while not an aggressor, is carrying out practices which will impose unacceptably high costs upon peoples of other states and implacably refuses to desist. It could, for example, be poisoning air or water flowing to other states. But ,to make the case vivid, let us suppose that state Z is constructing, for reasons Zeders find convincing (they are committed to a faith which depicts all humans as incorrigible sinners and unworthy of life), an effective doomsday machine. Would an (aggressive) preemptory strike designed to disable or destroy the machine be unavoidable?1 In a sense, No; in another Yes. For different modalities can operate. Physically outsiders need to do nothing, but watch Zeders go about their zealous work. But deontically they are under heavy moral pressure, because of the costs of standing by idly: if the human race is worth anything very substantial, then they are obliged to act, action is deontically 1 Whether it would be justifiable, or just, are separate issues. But it is evident enought that such scenarios further damage the obsolescent idea of just war. For, according to received doctrine, a just war is defensive. (How such a war can be fought at all is another matter; coherence requires relativization to ‘just wxfor party d’.) �6 unavoidable. Here is a situation where a proposed reduction of deontic logic proves illuminating. Obligation is explicated through not implying, or necessitating, the sanction, i.e. excessive ethical costs such as extermination. Let us explain deontic unavoidability analogously: an action is so unavoidable if not undertaking it would result in excessive ethical costs. Then if it can be established that there is no other way than a military strike, an act of war, to ensure that the Zeders desist (and certainly we can envisage scenarios like that), then that is deontically unavoidable. It is also dilemmatic for those committed to, or inclined towards pacifism; and it is, for them at least, but paradoxically justifiable, as the negation is also justifiable, on pacific grounds. Scenarios like that sketched, that appear to render certain wars deontically unavoidable require but little or no elaboration to render them evil. Evil indeed is such a standard feature of standard wars that at least its great presence call for little supporting evidence. But it has taken to vast stretch of human history to reach this general point of recognition. The manifold evils of war Lao Tzu very early recognised and emphasized: Wherever armies are stationed, briars and thorns grow. Great wars are always followed by famines (p. 152). And nowadays followed by great tides of refugees. This passage includes not only recognition of the widely-observed socio-environmental consequences of war, but, more striking, very early recognition of the severe environmental impact of military forces. That critique is not however developed in Taoism.2 Only recently has it been pushed substantially further. And only recently could a new, most significant twist occur, the merging of resource security, long a military objective, with environmental security. The appalling idea has recently been floated that the military, in need of new work and roles with the apparent warming of West-East relations and cooling of the Cold War, should exchange usual military idleness for meddling in environmental matters: regulation and policing of environmental resources, ensurance of environmental security of powerful states, and similar. This is a bit like reassigning those imprisoned for child abuse to managing kindergartens; for consider the impressive military record of environmental vandalism. What the military is alleged to offer is a structure appropriate and available for handling such matters. But, to the contrary, it is precisely the sort of hierarchical, authoritarian expensive structure that should be wound down and up as soon as the opportunity appears, as (briefly) now, rather than being retained and shockingly reoriented (as a state-serving “Greenwar”). But a bridge to deep-green theory can be made through neo-Daoism, an updating of Taoism in confirmity with deep ecology (which however is somewhat thin and threadbare on war; for what there is so far, see Naess p.160). On neo-Daoism, see UT. �7 2. On the divergence of deep-green from Taoism. Having arrived, by better or worse arguments, at the conclusion that wars, though generally evil, may be sometimes unavoidable, it is evidently important to say something about how they - those of the theoretical residue - are to be conducted. By appropriate conduct the damage they do may be reduced; also the conduct should be appropriate to the funereal nature of wars (to exceed Taoist resources for stating this sort of point). It is at this stage that deep­ green theory begins to diverge from Taoism. In further explaining the Taoist and deep-green critiques of war, and diverting objections to them, a rough and preliminary typology of wars is important. It is also of passing interest in its own philosophical right. War, according to English Dictionaries, is a ‘contest carried on by force of arms, typically between nations or states’. More exactly, war is a game - in the generous technical sense of game-theory, with players, rules, goals, strategies, and so on carried on in significant part by military means, normally between states or substates. Call the contestants, (warring) parties. They typically represent of course larger populations. The set­ up between parties resembles the arrangements of players in game theory. There are several analogical extensions of the term war to cover games where one of the parties is an object, construed as hostile (an enemy of the state), such as Crime, Drugs, Poverty or Nature. These we can set aside as analogical wars. Of course wars form only a part of military activities. Military interests and objectives have always stretched significantly further than war, to include surveillence and security, easily extended to resource security, environmental security and life­ style security, and beyond that to political stability and other political matters. Evidently military ambitions have far over-extended themselves in bagging such democratic concerns. An anarchist solution to the whole problem of war, which some have seen Taoism as reaching towards, is immediate: eliminate the source of war, states. Unfortunately it is not quite that simple (and that's not simple). For wars can also occur between nations, cultures, races or tribes (which are not such artifices as states, and not always so readily or desirably abolished), between inhabited regions, and between factions within states (thus civil wars) or, perhaps by extension, between factions within other social structures (thus, for instance, gang wars). But undoubtedly eliminating states and aspiring states would abolish most wars and virtually all the worst wars. While “nonviolent wars” are excluded by definition, by virtue of ‘force of arms’, token wars, limited wars, and so on, are not: for instance, wars fought by small armed teams representing competing sides (cf. medieval and science fiction war games). As wars are hemmed in by conventions and agreed rules, there is no reason in principle why they should not be reduced to two person contests, fought under strict rules like boxing or gladiatorial contests. But in modem times wars have never taken such sensible forms, but have been much larger affairs, making heavy (though fortunately restricted) use of latest technology. Let us distinguish such wars as techno-powered wars. They have, directly or indirectly (for the �8 technology may be bought or bartered), a heavy research and development support structure (indeed the bulk of contemporary science is devoted - misdirected - in one way or another to this effort). Among wars, an important distinction is that between offensive and defensive wars. An offensive war is one which ventures off a given party's territory or recognised pad, “invading" that of another party or parties; correlatively defensive parties, if they have not also invaded. Force projection typifies offensive practice. Plainly, offensiveness and defensiveness are not strictly features of a war, but of parties to a war. In a two-party war, while both parties can easily act offensively, the possibility of both parties proceeding defensively is excluded, unless they share territory. (Even then issues may arise as to which party, if any, was the aggressor, which started it, was responsible for starting it, and so on.) Thus mutually defensive wars between contemporary states are impossible (but would be possible if states shared territory, e.g. if Eire and Britain shared the territory of Northern Ireland). Tao-accredited wars were defensive wars, never wars aiming at domination: last-resort wars, in which no pride was taken (LTp.152).3 The pretence that offensive wars are defensive is widespread, and reflected in the subterfuge that departments or ministries of war are those of defence, security or whatever. (If they really were what they purport to be, we should be well on the way to an end to war.) Offensive practices are rendered defensive ones by shabby redefinitional strategems, such as redefining ‘defensive’ to include defence of ideals like democracy or liberty, infringed (or allegedly infringed) on territories abroad, or to include “defence" of a third party or place (whence every offensive war is “defensive”). In the present war in which part of Arabia is engulfed (February 1991), one party claims to be defending what really was (or should be) part of its territory, namely Kuwait, another party to be defending (what Kuwait did not enjoy) democracy. It is a doubly offensive war presented in this guise as jointly defensive. Aggressive wars are waged for a variety of reasons, but usually for resources or access to resources or markets, a matter often disguised by appeal to ideology (thus a war for oil is represented as a war of liberation). But there are other reasons than narrowly economic ones, such as religion (as with crusades), power and aggrandisement (as in building an empire), and so on. Nor are those reasons necessarily far separated; ideologies like Marxism and market 3 There is one line in LT that may suggest that attack was sometimes justifiable, namely ‘For deep love helps one to win in the case of attack’ (p.219). But how can compassion be appropriate unless this attack is within a defensive setting, a larger context of unavoidability or such like. A passage shortly below confirms this interpretation: I dare not take the offensive but I take the defensive: I dare not advance an inch but I retreat a foot (p.222). These are advances and attacks within a defensive setting. �9 capitalism, for example, exhibit many of the features of religion. The economic reasons for war appear to have become much more complex with the advent of an integrated world economy. At the same time many of the independent reasons for economic wars are now obsolete. For to powerful states accrue the advantages of war without war. At least most of the former economic advantages of war can be obtained without expensive wars, through trade, institution of economic dependence, etc. Small medieval wars were sometimes instituted for the collection of neighbouring riches and booty, a kind of piracy meeting conditions of war. “Small” contemporary wars can be waged for a remarkable mix of political-economy ends: to establish a regime favourable to economic penetration and profit repatriation, to subjugate markets and to remove competition, to boost a sagging weapons economy by using up old stocks and also testing new equipment, to restart a depressed economy, and so on. Such wars, along with the economic aims which motivate them, are in effect heavily castigated by Lao Tzu: When Tao prevails in the world, galloping horses are turned back to fertilize (the fields ...),. When Tao does not prevail in the world, war horses thrive in the suburbs. There is no calamity greater than lavish desires. (LT p.181). But it does exceed evidential warrant to claim that Tao is not only sufficient, but necessary, for cessation of such practices. The practice of regularly stimulating complex military-saturated economies through war is reminiscent of older, much ridiculed practices in simpler societies. They now ridicule the Tsembaga, who proceeded to destroy much of their surplus product by going to war every 5-15 years (cf Rapaport). But they do not similarly ridicule the most powerful nation on the Earth, the USA, which proceeds to write off a colossal amount of surplus in war every 10-20 years (the Gulf war liquidated some $1.7 billion per day). Taoists would. For ridicule was a favoured method, an important rhetorical strategem, and war and its idiocy were favourite targets. Some classification of defensive wars is also important, for various reasons: reducing and abolishing wars, their costs and damage, restructuring societies away from war and military practices, and, not least, for appreciating Taoism. A main distinction is between • conventional defence, maintained by armies of armed soldiers, many of them professionals, and • social defence, where there are no such armies or but fragments of them, and defence is carried out through social networks of a significant part of society.4 4 Details of social defence are presented in Sharp and in Martin. �10 It is here that Taoism and deep-green theory part company. Under Taoism, the state will have a standing army, but a defensive army operating by strange, surprise tactics (p.201). No doubt defensive wars are to remain last resort action. Nonetheless the state will operate in secrecy, in a way incompatible with decentralised social defence; people will be kept in the dark about smart weapons of the state; and they too will be surprised, along with presumed enemies of the state. By contrast, under deep-green theory, there should be no hidden smart weapons of state; information would flow more freely and not be hidden from the people (who should retain influence in informed decision making). Under deep-green, standing armies, and more generally military organisation, will be wound down altogether. Taoism should have pushed its searching criticism further. For military objectives, easily acquired by standing armies with time on their hands, are frequently incompatible with Taoism. For example, Taoism is opposed to domination (LT p.152), whereas military operations frequently seek or involve domination; and military structure is invariably hierarchical and authoritarian. Taoism aims for self-regulation, wherever feasible (cf. p.201); so does deep­ green theory, which is one reasons why it aims to dispose of standing armies, as an important preliminary to the withering away of states themselves (military forces being major props of state control and power, and often maintained primarily for internal state security). Taoism has no project for ending the era of wars; deep-green theory does. That project involves an elimination of standing armies, too often poised for fighting or political interference. A recommended route to end war consists in progressive scaling down: reduction of the means and manpower. The initial stages are well-known, and include • elimination of nuclear, biological and chemical weaponry, and • force reduction. It can hardly be pretended that the Earth's states have managed to proceed very far on even this complex of stages. The next stage consists in • contraction to defensive capacities only, and the final stage consists in • elimination of remaining military defensive forces, and adoption, so far as required, of social defence practices. The complete route thus involves complete demilitarisation. Reasons why deep-green aims to proceed the full distance are readily grasped by considering the environmental shallowness of an otherwise cogent traditional case for the sharp curtailment of wars and militarism. The traditional Western case against wars has been primarily along two dimensions: social and moral. Wars are highly disruptive of the social fabric; wars may be unjust. From these joint features, it was argued that wars should be a matter of last resort, to be fought to ensure peace. It was argued further that only just wars should be fought. Just wars were rare objects. But as there was little evidence of the decline and fall of wars, much effort was expended, more practically and unsuccessfully, upon endeavouring to improve the calibre of wars, and more theoretically, upon trying to characterize just war satisfactorily, or rather to bend the notion in an effort to approximate the gory unjust facts. �11 Progress was long hindered, furthermore, because there was always a rival positive perspective on wars, which encouraged the exaltation of wars and military feats. It also facilitated the transfer of the favourable image of war to other problem areas, whence the long and apparently successful war against Nature (but the short-term successes are turning into long-term problems), the short and unsuccessful war against Poverty, and so on. Behind all this is the complex idea of war as rejuvenating, even cleansing, like fire; of war as heroic, and glorious, of war as the supreme testing ground of men. These pictures of war - finally shattered by the first World War (where even the poets began to tell of horrors and atrocities) and subsequent technological wars - though no longer in ascendency, have by no means vanished. The notion of war as rejuvenating a flagging economy persists, along with the practice of keeping capitalism running smoothly by integrating substantial military components into the industrial engine. With the development of highly technological wars - the celebrated development of the dirty industrial age is substantially military - the traditional negative case has grown in strength. Wars have become much more damaging, with the potential for much more that is significantly worse, and the possibility of a just war has correspondingly contracted, virtually to zero. The opposition to war has likewise grown, but more than correspondingly with the rise of women in social and political influence. Wars have almost always and everywhere been Men's affairs; likewise conquest. Deep-green theory accepts much of the traditional negative case, but would further strengthen it. For example, the stricture against unjust wars, as out and out immoral, can be strengthened, through the following syllogism: All wars should be fully just wars. Modem wars cannot be fully just wars. Therefore, there should be no modern wars. A fully just war is not merely a just war, but a war those just character can be reliably forecast in advance. A modern war is of course a war that deploys modern technology, at least that available this century. The evidential basis for the second premiss derives from much information that collateral damage, damage to innocent bystanders and involved citizens is always likely and cannot be excluded. Such wars are always liable to violate uncontroversial requirements for a just war, even if they are purely “conventional” wars, not throwing radiation or chemical or biological weapons around. From a contemporary viewpoint the traditional doctrine of a just war, really of a just defensive vjsi, is seriously out of date. The reasons for this reach wider than the new features introduced by modem technological wars and the character of modem civilization, with its giant cities littered with dangerous and vulnerable military targets. They have also to do with the chauvinism of the justice proposed, which is shallow human justice, not natural or environmental justice. There is no consideration of justice to other creatures or to the Earth (cf �Naess p.160). Two troubles are really intertwined here: conceptual difficulties with too narrow a notion of justice, and ideological difficulties with too narrow a vision of what is an object of value, of what counts. The deep-green case against war adds to the traditional case a further dimension, neglected until very recently: the environmental dimension. It has suddenly been seen that wars are typically environmental atrocities. Earlier, of course, “environments” were simply backgrounds, backdrops in paintings and plays, to the real drama. Contemporary technological wars tend to be not merely social tragedies but environmental ones as well. There is a doctrine of just war, but it is a human chauvinistic affair. There is no similarly developed doctrine of an ecologically sound war, a deep ecological war. Unless any such war were literally different from modern wars, that is from contemporary technological wars, it would overstep permitted bounds. For such wars are characteristically ecological disasters. Hardened military people, desensitized by a rigorous unethical training, feel even less compunction about degrading or destroying environments or members of other species than they do of maiming or killing civilians through “collateral” activity. Matching the no-just-war syllogism is a no-sound-war syllogism: All wars should be environmentally sound wars. Modern wars cannot be environmentally sound. Therefore, there should be no modern wars. The argument for the second premiss has of course to be different. It looks to the information accumulating on what wars do to natural and built environments. The Vietnam and Gulf wars both inflicted immense damage on natural environments or what was left of them. The environmental effects of war are not confined to direct and collateral damage. There are indirect effects also. Thus, for instance, war also supplied the mechanism of, and the technology for, modern environmental destruction: explosives, bulldozers from tanks, etc. As well, training for war and engagement in war have much fostered, along with attitudes that make for social callousness or ruthlessness, those that contribute to environmental insensitivity and cruelty. 3. Puzzles about Taoist strategy and its critiques of technology and violence ‘It is surprising how much of the Lao Tzu is devoted to military strategy’. Which strategies? Surprise, above all. But why such strategies? ‘Do they not contradict the Taoists’ strong opposition to the use of force’ (Chan p.222), the implied commitment to quietism? Briefly, Taoism is not committed to quietism, and while certainly antagonistic to violence, does not oppose certain uses of force (only really ///-forcing, as will be explained). Even so, the emphasis on military strategy remains puzzling. The strategies, many of them relevant to social defence, include • seriousness, not ‘making light of the enemy’ (p.222) �13 • surprise, and nonvisibility (p.201). The defensive strategy involves guerilla tactics: marching without formation, holding weapons without seeming to have them, confronting enemies without seeming to meet them (p.222). But even in times of peace, ‘smart weapons of the state should not be displayed to the people’ (p.164). Such recommendations helped to fuel the charge of deviousness lodged against Lao Tzu. But look at part of the reason for concealing smart weapons: ‘The more smart weapons the people have, the more troubled the state will be’ (p.201). Smart weapons are carried in corrupt states, where the rich engage in conspicuous consumption and the people are suppressed, not where Tao is practiced (LT p. 194). • advance from weakness, flexibility but firmness. Weakness is the principle of life and will overcome strength (LT p.164, p.233). • coolness and non-competition (LT p.233, p.164). Like these, most of the general strategies are standard Taoist practices simply applied to military conduct. For these standard practices the charge of deviousness looks feeble. The response applies more generally to other allegedly devious political strategies. For the strategies are but application of Taoist principles and techniques to warfare, politics and elsewhere. Nothing excludes application of these techniques to what are accounted, in general, unnecessary evils (which must sometimes, on other Taoist grounds, be countered). Nor, to meet the main criticism, need any deceit or deviousness be involved; nor is it. In particular, the legalist tactic, Tn order to grasp, it is necessary first to give’ (LT p.164), is cited as involving ‘an element of deceit’ ‘undeniably’, and ‘worse’ it is ‘morally questionable’ (Chan p.17). But in order for me to grasp your hand in a normal handshake, it is necessary first for me to give my hand. There is no deceit here, nothing morally questionable. All the tactics permit of benign construals, of a Taoist kind. Consider, for instance, Tn order to contract, it is necessary first to expand’ (LT p.164). In order to bend a copper pipe to the intended angle, it is better to bend it first a little further than required. The transformation of water to ice (both favoured natural items for symbolic purposes: natural processes which may look devious!) neatly illustrates the Taoist principle (which is however hardly necessary), and shows softness and weakness turned hardness and strength. The Taoist critique of militarism is as much a critique of technology as of war. Sharp weapons, ‘smart weapons’ as we might now say, come in for much critical attention, as we have already noticed. Only in corrupt and degenerate states are they displayed or flaunted (p.194, p.164); in deep-green regions smart weapons of state’ would not be retained unexhibited. The people will not have them for they mean trouble (p.201); for similar reasons deep-green regions will be free of them. So, it seems, will ideal Taoist regions: ‘Even if there are arrows and weapons, none will display them’ (LT p.238). Much technology, military and other, is excluded under the Taoist edict against violence (a further facet of the military-practices �14 paradox).5 The powerful critique of militarism in the Tao-te Ching is coupled with strong opposition to violence. Some of the linkage is evident enough. Militarism as practised represents an ultimate form of state (or party) violence. A basic theme is that violent practices will come to an unnatural end, and accordingly to a non-Taoist end (generalising LT p.176). While force may occur in spectacular, but satisfactory, natural forms, force is duly distinguished from violence. To force the growth of life means ill omen. For the mind to employ the vital force without restraint means violence (LT p. 197). One who follows Tao does not apply dominating force, which usually has had results bringing requital (p.152). Dominating force, like power, is in general castigated, under doctrine of wu- wei, no forced actions, no violence. To force natural growth is deviant, destroying harmony. To stop natural growth is deviant. But there is a significant difference between force and violence. To intentionally employ destructive force is to do violence. To so force things is condemned. To remain in harmony with things one does not so force things or practice violence. There is a non-interference principle at work, which also indicates types of non­ interference that are excluded. However Taoism does not always get the distinction between force and violence quite Under contemporary technology and technological arrangements, such as the storage of quantities of oil and nuclear and chemical materials in great cities, wars have assumed new and very destructive dimensions, to the point of being utterly irresponsible. A different approach to technology, as to war, is now mandatory. These are no longer things that can in principle be nicely confined and need not touch parties outside the fray. An important part of ending wars, “winning the war against wars”, is removing the technology of war, above all from irresponsible state power. As for which technology to try to jettison and which to try to retain or improve, it is not so difficult to indicate, provided evaluative terminology is not outlawed. What is wanted is technology that is good in its place, what should be excluded is technology that is indifferent or bad or potentially so. Technology to be justified has to do something worthwhile, it has to address identifiable respectable needs. That is why merely indifferent technology is out; there is no virtue in technology for technology's sake, as it is a mere means technique. It is because of the crucial evaluative component in choice of technology that appropriateness, itself evaluative, comes closer to encapsulating the criterion than other recent efforts. Size, such as smallness, or intermediateness, are not what matter, though modest and not excessive technologies are likely to fare better in satisfying appropriateness. In simpler societies, small technology is of course more appropriate; for that is what is good there. From known criteria for what is good these other features for locally appropriate technology can be read off: reliability, esp. in maintenance, functioning well and safely under the expected range of operating conditions (which may be difficult), ease of repair, capital cheapness and repair inexpensiveness, environmental benignness, and meeting sound social needs. �15 right. ‘Vital force without restraint’, intentionally excessive force, is only part of what counts as violence, which is more generally force which violates, i.e. transgresses, descrecrates, profanes, injures, outrages, etc. It is thus a negatively connoted force, an evil force in some specified intentional respect. There is a tendency for Taoist commentators, not Taoists, to regard Taoism as condemning all uses, or even occurrences, of force, but this is not so. Rather intentional ill-forcing is what is castigated, what is deviant. Thus Taoism does not exclude a range of defensive practices, which make satisfactory use of natural forces, like letting the machines of war industry stop. Those who would abolish war and its machinery, substituting for it nonwarlike and ideally nonviolent methods, technology, and strategies, have been confronted not merely with much sub-rational abuse but with plenty of criticism and even some paradoxes. Here is a recent paradox concerning war and nonviolence: • War must be abolished. One reason is simply economic. We can no longer afford it, and the opportunity costs are enormous. Along with other extraordinarily wasteful activities, it is an anachronism. • Doing so cannot be accomplished without violence, i.e. in effect, given the types of violence involved, without what amounts to war. According to a fuller version of this premiss, the process of abolishing a war would only be achieved through a revolution so profound that it could not succeed without extensive and extreme violence, amounting to (civil) war. ° But then war cannot be abolished without war. Therefore, war which must be abolished cannot be abolished.6 This “paradox” has been compared with the Liar paradox, but the parallel does not persist far. For this paradox does not involve self-referential features, and is easily broken, as follows. Let the “last war” be not the last standard war but the revolution abolishing war. Then, given that the revolution is successful, war will be abolished therewith, i.e. with that last war. There need be no regress, given again a successful outcome. All the premisses stand intact, but the conclusion, following the ‘therefore’ is a nonsequitur. However, while the dissolution of the argument is accordingly logically fine, the route is repugnant. Standard pacifism challenges the 6 Brian Medlin, who forcefully propounded this puzzle, set other analogous puzzles alongside it - designed to reveal deep difficulties in contemporary political, and especially alternative, thought. Another puzzle, concerning liberty and repression in the context of capitalism, revolved around the following inconsistent triad: • capitalism must be removed, but liberty retained. • capitalism cannot be removed without repression. • repression is antithetical to liberty. The puzzle is resolved as with the analogous puzzle of abolishing. Let the “last capitalist” action before the days of liberty be the repressive but liberating revolution overthrowing capitalism. �16 second premiss. 4. Standard and moral pacifism. Although Taoism is strongly opposed to war, and much in favour of peace - and accordingly by prevailing standards a substantially pacific position - it is not (nowhere in the central texts) committed to pacifism in usual senses, for two different reasons: • It is not, by contrast with pacifism, opposed to all types of warfare, for example smart defensive wars. • It eschews deontology in terms of which moral pacifism is commonly stated, for instance through the watershed thesis P2. It is morally wrong to use violence. By contrast with Taoism, deep environmentalism does not avoid deontic claims, and is committed in principle to nonviolent technologies and ways and to pacifistic principles. Moreover, certain forms of deep environmentalism are completely committed to pacifism, notably European forms. Is deep green? There is heavy contemporary opposition to pacifism, as there also was to Taoism in the warring times when Taoism was first being promulgated. Many of the central institutions of contemporary life are intricated in coercion, violence and war. The most prominent contemporary institutions, states, are premissed on these elements of damaging force; they claim entitlement to use them widely, and even claim a certain territorial monopoly on their use. As a result they are having constantly to engage in them in attempt to maintain that monopoly. They are certainly the main perpetrators of wars, and of violence. They are indeed inured to wars, are in constant preparation for wars, yet propound dialectial (and normally dishonest and cynical) doctrines of peace through war (for a recent example see the appendix). Unremarkably then, the extensive propagandistic machinery of state has invested heavily in “justificatory” exercises in favour of controlled use, its own use, of destructive force, and continues to inveigh against pacifism. Because a routine trick in this sophistical repetoire consists in conflating pacifism with extreme, naive and inplausible, forms, an inevitable and important early task commits in unscrambling senses of ‘pacifism’. Semantical skulduggery can be thwarted in this way. Pacifism, as explained by English dictionaries, invariably concerns wars and warfare, and contains two components, negative and, elaborating on that, positive:- The negative component is, in Amauld's word, anti-War-ism, opposition (in ways to be further specified) to all forms of warfare (see OED). The positive component supplies alternative ways of settling disputes (what it is supposed that wars with some semblance of justification involve), such as negotiation, arbitration, ... - and, adding to too narrow dictionary accounts - sanctions, substitutions (e.g. of sporting events, operatic contests, cooperative ventures), ... . In brief standard pacifism is opposition to all warfare and resolution of potential wars by other nonmilitary means. �17 Plainly the opposition to warfare, like the sanctions and so on, cannot itself be military (using soldiers and other devices of war), on pain of some incoherence. But otherwise the ways of opposition can be many and various: they can certainly be active, as with nonviolent demonstrations, resistance movements, and so forth, and they may also be devious (e.g. turning the forces of war upon themselves so they are neutralised). It quickly becomes evident, then, that some of the dictionaries offer but loaded definitions which, by restricting the negative components, reduce the initial appeal and plausibility of pacifism. Consider the Concise English definition of the negative component: ‘the doctrine of non-resistance to hostilities and of total non-co-operation with any form of warfare’. Thereby excluded are forms of pacifism which offer active and plausible alternatives to warfare such as social defence. The Concise English tends to force pacifism into what the Oxford English Dictionary lists as its final item: ‘often, with depreciatory implication, the advocacy of peace at any price’, ‘in any circumstance’. Pacifism can easily resist being forced into these sorts of circumstances: it has many resources, as an extensive series of texts on alternatives to war, such as negotiation, non­ violent action and social defence, from Taoism to contemporary environmentalism attest. Academic philosophers have much advanced the semantical strategy of some dictionaries, of rendering pacifism more difficult from the very outset by narrow and biassed definitions. They have stretched the term from its restricted setting of warfare, confined to state and organised gang violence, to cover all forms of violence, from state and interstate to, what is very different, personal and interpersonal violence. Call the resulting considerably stretched notion of pacifism, according to which it is morally wrong to use violence, according to which P2 holds, stretched pacifism? While stretched pacifism certainly includes standard pacifism (unless the notions of war and warfare are tampered with), the converse is very far from being the case. A pacifist is in no way committed to stretched pacifism, which is a much more problematic and difficult position than standard pacifism. There are several, substantially different reasons for this, which will be picked up seriatim. Stretched pacifism, also misleadingly called moral pacifism, has looked a very easy critical target to moral philosophers. Many the effusive philosopher who, upon sighting such a target, has charged, whooping such rhetoric as “incoherent”, “inconsistent”, “insensitive”, “fanatical”. However, with improved logical technology now available for accommodating and treating moral dilemmas, it is no great feat to resist such attacks, in the fashion of previous investigations (see esp. Al, also MD). A main aim was to demonstrate that stretched pacifism was not so stupid as it was made out to be or appeared to be to these inured to present dominant violent ways. So far from being stupid, it is viable. In future gentler times stretched pacifism 7 In Al this notion was contrasted with standard pacifism as comprehensive pacifism: overcomprehensive might have been better. �18 could even be realised for whole communities of creatures (as some genuinely Christian sects envisaged); whence it will finally be seen to be feasible not merely for sages and supermen, and many ordinary women, but much more extensively. The method of philosophical accommodation was through moral dilemmas. The sort of moral dilemma that stretched pacifism can induce derives as follows. On the one side stands the theme P2, Wv, in convenient symbols, for Wrong V-ing, violencing. Now this implies to WB, where B presents a case of of violence. On the other side, particular circumstances develop which lead to W ~B, because ~B would produce in the circumstances considerable wrong, for instance extensive violence, mass murder, etc. One stock example from the literature concerns calling off the firing squad about to shoot several captives if the pacifist shoots one of them (it is elaborated in Al p. 13). Interestingly, another stock example from the literature concerns standard pacifism (it can also be presented in terms of patriotism; for details of both see MD p. 10). Resolution of intractable moral dilemmas is, where it is required, situational. The agent decides in the situation, within the fix, what to do. There are many ways in which such decision making can proceed, less rational, such as those applying chance or involving bad faith, or more rational, such as those applying consequentialist decision theory (for details see MD, pp.32-9). A decision theory taking account of all that should be included will not however be purely consequential. It would also take account of relevant motivation. This defence and rehabilitation of moral pacifism has been challenged, in particular by Smith (hereafter JWS). JWS claims the defence offered is a ‘failure because it trivializes pacifism’ (p. 153 twice). The rehabilitation trivializes pacifism because it entails that pacifism doesn't substantially differ from a form of activism which holds that while violence is always wrong one is sometimes justified on consequentialist grounds for preferring violent acts, if these acts are lesser evils than any other real alternatives. This is the commonsense position which most people hold - yet - pacifism after all was supposed to be radical moral doctrine - (p.153 rearranged).8 Part of the criticism is, then, not so much that pacifism is trivialized - JWS “activism” is hardly trivial - as that pacifism is popularised, deflated from a radical position to the commonsense position most people hold (p.154 also). Yet not a shred of evidence is adduced that JWS activism is such a populist position. Available evidence, for example from peace movements and oppositional opinion polls, suggests the very opposite: that, for instance, most people support state-justified conventional wars with the military violence they incur, and 8 JWS now informs me that he has changed his position. Whether the move effects his criticism, I don't know. �19 accordingly do not hold that violence is always wrong. From such a commonsense angle, pacifism with its condemnation of conventional wars and the violence they involve remains a radical doctrine. As regards wars and other violence-incurring social authorities, contemporary pacificism is, as previous explained (e.g. Al p.3), a form of activism. Pacifism does not imply utter pacifity, but may actively involve social defence, resistance and so on. However a certain level of misrepresentation enters into the JWS challenge in the details of what forms of activism pacifism may include. That misrepresentation begins in the second clause concerning what is said to be sometimes justified. For the situational procedure where dilemmas arise will not generally be consequential applying a principle of lesser evil. In dilemmatic situations such principles are suspended, and such a principle is in any case unacceptable to moral pacifists. A small amount of violence may be less bad in its consequences than verbal offence, but a principled pacifist will choose the slightly greater evil where other obligations do not exclude it. A more serious distortion occurs in JWS's effort to force procedures in dilemma situations into purely consequentialist form. In fact consequential decision theory was deployed as a model only for how to proceed rationally in a situational setting where deontic procedures were suspended (see MD p.38). What was said, still misleadingly retrospective vision reveals, was this: ‘what is done is a very consequentialist thing’ (Al p.13), not ‘one acts in a consequentialist fashion to do the sufficiently good thing in the circumstances’ (JWS p.152). Situationally other procedures than those resembling orthodox rational decision making (modified from maximizing to satisizing objectives) may be adopted (MD p.38). Further the orthodox consequentialist theory is inadequate because it leaves out, or tries to reduce to consequences, nonconsequential elements, notably motives. It is not difficult, in principle (in advance of attempted consequentialization of motives), to design situations where motives, such as integrity or maintaining faith, enter to yield outcomes upsetting consequential calculations. More elaborate decision making procedures than those of consequentialism, sometimes at variance with consequentialism, are thus presupposed. A further part of JWS's criticism accordingly goes by the board, the alleged appeal ‘to “second best” consequentialist considerations,... already explicitly condemned’ (p. 154). What was condemned was stock universal consequentialism, ‘that only consequentialist considerations carry argumentative weight’ (quoted on p. 152), so undercutting other deontic principles, such as those of pacifism. It was not claimed, what is utterly different, that consequentialist considerations can nowhere enter into deliberation and decision making. The conclusion JWS arrives at is therefore substantially astray. After criticising modern moral philosophy for its reliance upon consequentialist modes of thought, it is surprising, and inconsistent, to find ... [reliance] upon such modes of thought to escape logical difficulties raised by moral dilemmas facing ... pacifis[m] (p. 152) �20 There is no inconsistency. JWS has confused universal with particular. As well he has wrongly contracted all situational decision making to consequentialist modes. There is a third part to the criticism, that the defence is too easy; the ‘strategy will allow too much violence to be (perpetrated and) justified to suit the tastes of any real pacifist’ (p. 153). This another part of the so-called trivialization, this time however dilution rather than populatization, weakening the moral stand against violence. This third contention is premissed on a mistake: that one can ‘justify on consequentialist grounds any number of violent acts, providing that such acts are lesser evils than other real alternatives facing social agents’ (p. 153). Moral pacifism offers no such licence; allowing such consequentialism to take over was never part of the position. The slide to such consequentialism is made on the strength of a similarly erroneous example. The potential victim of an aspiring rapist ‘is supposed to flee or wriggle free if possible. But it is easy to consequentially justify the use of violence by the woman to prevent herself from being raped’ (p. 153 italics added). In the example so far described there is no dilemma, and no such easy resort to consequentially ‘justified’ violence. What allows too much violence is the lesser evil JWS assumes is easily consequentially justified; for example that the woman is entitled to inflict, and escalate, violence so long as it remains ‘a lesser evil than the violence of attempted rape’ (p. 153). Since she may thereby inflict quite unreasonable damage (esp. if she is a Kung Fu expert), the result is inconsistent with ‘the basic principle of self-defence’ which JWS earlier adduced according to which what is ‘appropriate, in response is only that level of force necessary to defend oneself against the threat’ (p. 150). There is evidence in JWS's work of some enthusiasm for levels of violence which exceed his ‘basic principle’, his appeal to ‘lesser evil’ generates some instances. The ‘basic principle’, itself fraught with difficulties (cf. the contorted discussion of what weapons are appropriate in response to what attacks, p. 150), still exceeds what stretched pacifism would enjoin; for instance, it may not be appropriate to respond with force. But in a technical sense stretched pacifism is compatible with the ‘basic principle’, since it only imposes the upper bound on level of force. As for easiness, moral pacifism is not an easy position to live by, or to justify. Removing objections to pacifism is one thing; solidifying a positive case for it is quite another, and so far hardly conclusive (as Al tried to explain, pp 29-31). Stretched pacifism was advanced, hypothesized to put it more precisely, as a still viable option. It was not presented as a morally compulsory position, or, for that matter, as one that this defender adhered to or affirmed. To reiterate, while a cumulative case can be made for stetched pacifism as principled non­ violence, that case was not conclusive, and is hard to improve. For, further, some serious difficulties standing in the way of stretched pacifism were assembled, the most important of which derives from the extent of violence apparent in transactions within the natural world. Simply consider the practices of carnivores, essential to their natural way of life. In order to meet their life needs for sustenance, these creatures do, and are often obliged to, engage �21 routinely in violent activity. While it can no doubt be argued, as some vegetarians may do, that the natural order is an immoral order, and that remaining carnivores should be converted to vegetarianism as rapidly as proves possible (in the way domestic dogs are converted to dog biscuits), the difficulties with such proposals are immense. The task envisaged is gigantic, and beyond human capacities - even if it were desirable. For there are millions of species to be somehow converted to proper vegetarianism. Then there are millions of other species to be converted to proper and well regulated contraceptive practices, else their numbers will get out of hand (uncontrollably) with predation removed. Given humans lack of success in limiting their own excessive numbers, such regulation appears entirely remote. Aside however from the practical difficulties, is such a fully vegetarian order, with evolution further derailed, a desirable improvement on the natural order? Is it morally obligatory? It is certainly not obligatory, as alternative systems of morality in harmony with the prevailing natural order are feasible. Nor is it desirable, for (to appeal to such alternative value systems) the natural order is more or less in order as it is. Full vegetarianization would only reduce its value, vastly. More generally, a defensible ethical framework should not, it would be rightly contended, be right out of step with the natural order of other creatures, decently depicted. Decent depiction is important, for some features of the natural order, such as competition, combat and predation, so far from escaping attention, have been grossly exaggerated and exploited. Thus, for instance, the ludicrous picture of nature red in truth and claw, so beloved of descendents of orthodox Victorians and of orthodox economists. However, even under decent depiction, the natural order is often not benign. That appears to be enough to induce a supervenient moral dilemma for any stretched pacifism which is coupled to a deep ethic (e.g. which does not separate humans out from the natural order) and which eschews the desperate vegetarian route: The natural order is not an immoral order The natural order contains (regular) instances of violence. Therefore, instances of violence are not immoral - in apparent defiance of P2 Moreover, there are too many instances of violence, too regularly occurring, for them all to be plausibly shunted into the moral dilemma category (and predatory carnivores face no dilemmas). Raptors that practice violence every week are not immoral (neither are they clearly moral; the category of morality only significantly extends so far). The main trouble lies however with P2 (which needs some finer adjustment, as was alrady indicated in Al). While P2 is alright in context, within a particular, perfectly viable, ethical framework, designed for the usual human round, the conventional setting for ethical theories, it stands in need of modification outside that setting. It is time to suggest the sort of modification envisaged. Evidently P2 was addressed to moral agents. Which agents? Not to carnivores that supply their own livelihood, nor really to morally degenerate humans, but to �22 peace-sensitive agents. With that semi-technical form, yet to be characterised, a suitably modified P2 results: MP2. It is morally wrong, for a peace-sensitive agent, to use violence.9 To recover what amounts, in the previous discussive context, to P2, it suffices to add the proposition that every human agent ought to be peace-sensitive. Much as that proposition has to recommend it, it appears too ethically advanced for many modern humans; it sets too high a moral standard to be taken as a serious guide to practice. It seems wise to settle presently for something less demanding, such as that every advanced moral agent ought to be peace sensitive. To put essentially the same proposition alternatively: Stretched pacifism (as modified) is supererogatory. While it is perhaps too late to hope for much moral progress in humans, it is pleasant to contemplate alternative futures where what is supererogatory became obligatory, and widely practiced. Richard Sylvan* Appendix I began drafting this essay at the time (January 17, midday Australian time) of the American attacks upon Iraq. The optly named Prime Minister Hawke of Australia had just made a statement to the nation-state, announcing (the) war. In this statement there was much talk of peace. There was even - in what was effectively a declaration of war - reiteration of the modern quest for ‘a new world order of peace’. Peace through war; so it rings out again and again, through the centuries. ‘War must be for the sake of peace’ (Aristotle p.220). More than two thousand years later, we have fought those wars to end all wars. But it is no use, Hawke solemely pronounced, just talking about peace, and thinking about peace; we must work for peace, fight for it - through war. Impeccable logic? President Bush, supreme commander, convinced us with similar logic, speaking too with many tongues. Of how he ‘preferred to think of peace, not war’. But now ‘only force will prevail’, as ‘all reasonable efforts to reach a peaceful solution are exhausted’. ‘What must be done’ must be done, or will be anyway. With God on side with the US offensive (as well as on the other side), it will go well. As it was said to have, though it achieved comparatively little that other efforts may not have yielded more satisfactorily, and thought it may now have to 9 The generalization of P2, suggested in Al, to cover also the parallel situation of environmental vandalism, can be similarly modified. The anti-vandolence principle becomes MP2°. It is morally wrong, for a peace- and environmentally-sensitive agent, to use vandolence. Thank to David Bennett for joint contributions (from UT) and to JWS for opposition (in JWS) �I 23 followed with another invasion. Nor have we ever managed to glimpse much of what is now supposed, when we are no longer engaged, to come ‘out of the horror of war’: a ‘new world order ... which governs the conflict of nations’; a ‘rule of law’, not war. How the one, enforcable law, is achieved, unless backed by the the other, is not explained (Medlin's paradox hits back). Similarly what we now hear from many militarists, as they rush to war, is that ‘peace is a great good, war a great evil’. But, for the most part, only the rhetoric has shifted; practice has scarcely changed at all. REFERENCES W.-T. Chan, A Source Book on Chinese Philosophy, Princeton University Press, 1963; referred to as ST. W.-T. Chan (ed.), The Way of Lao Tzu (Tao-te Ching), Bobbs-Merrill, New York, 1963; referred to as LT. B. Martin, Uprooting War, Freedom Press, London, 1984. A. Naess, Ecology, community and lifestyle, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge UK, 1989. R.A. Rapaport, Pigs for the Ancestors : ritual in the ecology of a New Guinea People, Yale University Press, New Haven, 1967. R. Routley, ‘War and Peace II. On the alleged inconsistency, moral insensitivity and fanaticism of pacifism’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #9, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1983 (also in Inquiry ); referred to as Al. R. Routley and V. Plumwood, ‘Moral dilemmas and the logic of deontic notions’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #6, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1984 (also in Paraconsistent Logic)’, referred to as MD. R. Routley, ‘War and Peace I. On the ethics of large-scale nuclear war and nuclear-deterrence and the political fall-out’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy, #5, Research School Of Social Science, Australian National University, 1984. G. Sharp, Social Power and Political Freedom, Porter Sargent, Boston, 1980. J.W. Smith, The Worms at the Heart of Things , Public Relations Unit, Flinders University, 1989. R. Sylvan, ‘War and Peace III, Australia's defence philosophy’, Social Philosophy, for Nuclear Conference, University of Queensland, 1985. R. Sylvan and D. Bennett, ‘Of Utopias, Tao and Deep Ecology’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #19, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1990; referred to as UT. ��2 more widely, ‘to life in general’ (p. 17). But why should military activity obtain some special dispensation? Why should what is not tolerated more generally be exonerated there? But given that Taoism has here the virtue of consistency (i.e. uniformity on principles) and of universalizability, that simply leaves more explaining to be done. • Puzzles for Taoism, and wars as unavoidable evils There are two puzzles here in Taoism rather than one. There is the military-practices paradox, and, varying and generalising on that, there are life-practices paradoxes. The special paradox is generated by the following incompatible elements: on the one side, ‘the most bitter attack on militarism’, the well-known opposition of Taoism to the use of force (p.17) and to the possession and use of smart military weapons and technology - implying that war is far from all right - and on the other, advocacy of certain (devious) military tactics, outlines of (deceitful) conduct in war, and so on - implying that war is all right after all. A straightforward generalisation of this paradox would look at other morally-sensitive parts of life, where some practice was strongly condemned yet engaged in (for many examples, see the dilemmas assembled in MD). But the variation of concern to Chan and the neo-Confucians concerns the conjunction of upright with devious practices in life, in particular in the life of the sage. For a Taoist sage is presumed to lead an upright straightforward life, yet appears to engage in devious and even deceitful practices incompatible with such a life-style. Call this the Taoist-lifestyle paradox. Evidently a good deal of explaining is required, as to how Taoism can coherently take the positions it appears to presume, both on war and peace, and on life more generally. A desirable preliminary would seem to be a little investigation of what position is taken, especially on war and militarism. One key pasage runs: Fine weapons are instruments of evil They are hated by creatures Therefore those who possess the Tao turn away from them.... Weapons are instruments of evil, not the instruments of a good ruler. When he uses them unavoidably, he regards calm restraint as the best principle Even when he is victorious, he does not regard it as praiseworthy, For to praise victory is to delight in the slaughter of men. He who delights in the slaughter of men will not succeed in the empire. ... For a victory, let us observe the occasion with funeral-ceremonies (LT p.154). Wars, which involve the use of weapons, instruments of evil, are accordingly themselves evil. They are also evil because they involve the slaughter of men. But they are also sometimes unavoidable (also p.152). Therefore such wars are unavoidable evils. Such discourse, obtained by almost immediate inference from the passage, is within the standard orbit of dilemma talk. But Taoism lacks, through deliberately eschewing deontic talk, the discourse which enables direct expression of such dilemmas, or even direct condemnation of wars or of clever weapons. Instead the points are made by circumlocution, what the possesser of Tao �3 does, how the good ruler conducts himself, or by analogy, of victory in war with death. Unavoidable evils are the very stuff of deontic dilemmas (though many theories, underpinned by shonky logic, lack the resources for representing this stuff properly). Where something is unavoidably evil, it is both bad, because evil, and also not bad, doing it is excusable, because it is unavoidable. So, given such an argument (which has its weaknesses), an unavoidable evil is a genuinely dilemmatic object with inconsistent features. Certain wars have looked, since ancient times, like such dilemmatic objects. Revealingly, Chan tries to explain that ‘most troublesome element’ in Taoism, the military-practice paradox, through the following exercise in lateral thinking: It can ... be argued that Lao Tzu uses warfare to illustrate his principles of taking no action and weakness because warfare is among the most dynamic and critical of human experiences, just as the Indian classic, the Bhagavadgita chooses fighting as the theme on which to discuss the terrible dilemma whether one should fulfil his duty, as in the case of a soldier, and kill, or should fail in his duty and refrain from killing (p. 17). ‘Just as’? The Indian classic prevents a classic moral dilemma, a dilemma represented in contemporary philosophy (following its rediscovery by Sartre), where there are incompatible duties: the duty to kill, because of one's role as a soldier, and the duty not to kill, because of one's human condition, and the supervenient dilemma of failing in and fulfilling one's duties. These dilemmas for an individual (male, as it then was) are replicated in dilemmas regarding war for group institutions: at bottom, the obligation to engage in war (for one set of compelling reasons) as contraposed with the obligation not to engage in war (for another, perhaps overlapping, set of reasons). A theory of moral dilemmas (as worked out for example in MD) is crucial for an adequate treatment of major issues in war and peace, especially (as will become evident) for a viable strong pacifism. But Taoism, eschewing deontic discourse, lacks the apparatus to state or develop moral dilemmas. Hence it is logically excluded from giving a full or adequate account of what is going on conceptually. One of the philosophically fascinating feature of Taoism is the fashion in which it manages to avoid deontic discourse, and to substitute for direct deontic discourse or improvise circumlocutions when deontic discourse would otherwise appear inevitable (cf. UT for examples). But there are costs. One is inability to display the mechanism of deontic dilemmas, or to show what reasons and argument lie behind Taoist prounouncements and conclusions (the shortage of Taoism on argument is another philosophically conspicious feature, also observed in UT). As conceptual apparatus for analysizing moral dilemmas is missing, most of the machinery involved has to be passed over. Only the outcomes, as Taoism sees them, are presented, as if from a black box. Taoism blacks out the story on deontic dilemmas that deep-green theory can tell, as the following diagram tries to show: �4 Diagrams . Charting the processing of deontic dilemmas that are “resolved”. Deep-green chart: Arguments to Processing of dilemma, directive dilemma incompatible situational procedures output input prescriptions Corresponding Taoist chart: Black directive Box output It is evident that Taoism can be extended', information can be put into the Black Box rendering it less opaque. That extension can be made so as to conform to deep-green theory, i.e. so that the extended Taoist chart, a neo-Daoist chart, looks like the deep-green one. That is indeed essentially how neo-Daoism get characterised, in terms of conformity of the extension to deep ecological theory (see UT). We are now placed to explain how to dissolve, or at least neutralize, the paradoxes deriving from repudiation of militarism, an awkwardly qualified repudiation in the case of Taoism. In a significant sense there is no resolving of genuine deontic dilemmas. The principles delineating the fix may stand, incompatible, signalling the persisting suboptimality (or better, sublimenality) of the dilemmatic situation. Where there is a dilemma, involved parties should try to do well enough in the sublimenal circumstances (for a much fuller account, see MD). Thus where there is a war, itself a non-Taoist process, engaged or caught up Taoists will not abandon Taoism. Taoist methods will be applied, Taoist strategies pursued. So much for theoretical representation and (non-)resolution of life-practices and other dilemmas, details of which are readily elaborated in deep-green extensions of Taoism. A prior substantive issue is whether dilemmas always are generated: not whether wars are evil (typically they are, an issue we shall come to), but whether wars are unavoidable. Analysis of wars does not bear that familiar claim out decisively. Many wars could have been avoided, through conciliation, negotiation, restraint, etc., and no worse results apparently obtained, through sanctions, exchange, trade, etc. Through a typology of wars (coming up) that conjecture can be given some substance. Consider, for instance, what would be walk-overs. Then there is little point in making a military response. So war can be avoided. Certainly an occupation, to be met in a different way, may still occur. And so on, perhaps, for various other types of war. But, more generally, try this:- �5 Every war involves an aggressor, who makes an aggressive move. Such an aggressor could always avoid that move, taking a different (or a do-nothing) course of action. Therefore, every war can be avoided. No war is entirely unavoidable. Setting aside determinism (which renders all actual wars along with all other events unavoidable), it could be argued that a war sometimes simply boils up, without an aggressor, an intensification of a conflagatory situation. There are grounds for scepticism regarding such examples; for such intensification can only occur if provocative military moves are made, for instance troops are stationed in provocative or risky positions. The presumption that certain wars are unavoidable typically derives from a one-sided perspective on war, a defender's perspective. A defender has no option, so it is routinely averred, but to respond to a determined aggressor. Even z/that should be so sometimes, when there is no running away or going underground, it does not establish that such a war is unavoidable; for it neglects the role of the aggressor. By a smarter formulation, relevant features of unavoidability can be captured. Although wars may not be unavoidable, defensive action in wars that have been initiated may be unavoidable. At least such action may be unavoidable if unacceptably high costs (death, enslavement, etc.) are not to be avoided. Thereupon another highly relevant feature emerges: the linkage of avoidability to costs. For whether an action is unavoidable then depends upon what costs a party is prepared to incur before and when insisting on action: but this appears entirely unacceptable. How can what is “unavoidable” cease to be so when some further costs are absorbed? However with basics like survival, a certain liberty, and so on, we do reach such bounds. An important type of unavoidability. We also reach scenarios, unavailable to Lao Tzu but kindly brought within range by modem technology, which may appear to justify aggressive strikes. State Z, while not an aggressor, is carrying out practices which will impose unacceptably high costs upon peoples of other states and implacably refuses to desist. It could, for example, be poisoning air or water flowing to other states. But ,to make the case vivid, let us suppose that state Z is constructing, for reasons Zeders find convincing (they are committed to a faith which depicts all humans as incorrigible sinners and unworthy of life), an effective doomsday machine. Would an (aggressive) preemptory strike designed to disable or destroy the machine be unavoidable?1 In a sense, No; in another Yes. For different modalities can operate. Physically outsiders need to do nothing, but watch Zeders go about their zealous work. But deontically they are under heavy moral pressure, because of the costs of standing by idly: if the human race is worth anything very substantial, then they are obliged to act, action is deontically 1 Whether it would be justifiable, or just, are separate issues. But it is evident enought that such scenarios further damage the obsolescent idea of just war. For, according to received doctrine, a just war is defensive. (How such a war can be fought at all is another matter; coherence requires relativization to ‘just vwcfor party d’.) �6 unavoidable. Here is a situation where a proposed reduction of deontic logic proves illuminating. Obligation is explicated through not implying, or necessitating, the sanction, i.e. excessive ethical costs such as extermination. Let us explain deontic unavoidability analogously: an action is so unavoidable if not undertaking it would result in excessive ethical costs. Then if it can be established that there is no other way than a military strike, an act of war, to ensure that the Zeders desist (and certainly we can envisage scenarios like that), then that is deontically unavoidable. It is also dilemmatic for those committed to, or inclined towards pacifism; and it is, for them at least, but paradoxically justifiable, as the negation is also justifiable, on pacific grounds. Scenarios like that sketched, that appear to render certain wars deontically unavoidable require but little or no elaboration to render them evil. Evil indeed is such a standard feature of standard wars that at least its great presence call for little supporting evidence. But it has taken to vast stretch of human history to reach this general point of recognition. The manifold evils of war Lao Tzu very early recognised and emphasized: Wherever armies are stationed, briars and thorns grow. Great wars are always followed by famines (p. 152). And nowadays followed by great tides of refugees. This passage includes not only recognition of the widely-observed socio-environmental consequences of war, but, more striking, very early recognition of the severe environmental impact of military forces. That critique is not however developed in Taoism.2 Only recently has it been pushed substantially further. And only recently could a new, most significant twist occur, the merging of resource security, long a military objective, with environmental security. The appalling idea has recently been floated that the military, in need of new work and roles with the apparent warming of West-East relations and cooling of the Cold War, should exchange usual military idleness for meddling in environmental matters: regulation and policing of environmental resources, ensurance of environmental security of powerful states, and similar. This is a bit like reassigning those imprisoned for child abuse to managing kindergartens; for consider the impressive military record of environmental vandalism. What the military is alleged to offer is a structure appropriate and available for handling such matters. But, to the contrary, it is precisely the sort of hierarchical, authoritarian expensive structure that should be wound down and up as soon as the opportunity appears, as (briefly) now, rather than being retained and shockingly reoriented (as a state-serving “Greenwar”). 2 But a bridge to deep-green theory can be made through neo-Daoism, an updating of Taoism in confirmity with deep ecology (which however is somewhat thin and threadbare on war; for what there is so far, see Naess p.160). On neo-Daoism, see UT. �7 2. On the divergence of deep-green from Taoism. Having arrived, by better or worse arguments, at the conclusion that wars, though generally evil, may be sometimes unavoidable, it is evidently important to say something about how they — those of the theoretical residue — are to be conducted. By appropriate conduct the damage they do may be reduced; also the conduct should be appropriate to the funereal nature of wars (to exceed Taoist resources for stating this sort of point). It is at this stage that deep­ green theory begins to diverge from Taoism. In further explaining the Taoist and deep-green critiques of war, and diverting objections to them, a rough and preliminary typology of wars is important. It is also of passing interest in its own philosophical right. War, according to English Dictionaries, is a ‘contest carried on by force of arms, typically between nations or states’. More exactly, war is a game - in the generous technical sense of game-theory, with players, rules, goals, strategies, and so on carried on in significant part by military means, normally between states or substates. Call the contestants, (warring) parties. They typically represent of course larger populations. The set­ up between parties resembles the arrangements of players in game theory. There are several analogical extensions of the term war to cover games where one of the parties is an object, construed as hostile (an enemy of the state), such as Crime, Drugs, Poverty or Nature. These we can set aside as analogical wars. Of course wars form only a part of military activities. Military interests and objectives have always stretched significantly further than war, to include surveillence and security, easily extended to resource security, environmental security and life­ style security, and beyond that to political stability and other political matters. Evidently military ambitions have far over-extended themselves in bagging such democratic concerns. An anarchist solution to the whole problem of war, which some have seen Taoism as reaching towards, is immediate: eliminate the source of war, states. Unfortunately it is not quite that simple (and that's not simple). For wars can also occur between nations, cultures, races or tribes (which are not such artifices as states, and not always so readily or desirably abolished), between inhabited regions, and between factions within states (thus civil wars) or, perhaps by extension, between factions within other social structures (thus, for instance, gang wars). But undoubtedly eliminating states and aspiring states would abolish most wars and virtually all the worst wars. While “nonviolent wars” are excluded by definition, by virtue of ‘force of arms’, token wars, limited wars, and so on, are not: for instance, wars fought by small armed teams representing competing sides (cf. medieval and science fiction war games). As wars are hemmed in by conventions and agreed rules, there is no reason in principle why they should not be reduced to two person contests, fought under strict rules like boxing or gladiatorial contests. But in modem times wars have never taken such sensible forms, but have been much larger affairs, making heavy (though fortunately restricted) use of latest technology. Let us distinguish such wars as techno-powered wars. They have, directly or indirectly (for the �8 technology may be bought or bartered), a heavy research and development support structure (indeed the bulk of contemporary science is devoted - misdirected - in one way or another to this effort). Among wars, an important distinction is that between offensive and defensive wars. An offensive war is one which ventures off a given party's territory or recognised pad, “invading” that of another party or parties; correlatively defensive parties, if they have not also invaded. Force projection typifies offensive practice. Plainly, offensiveness and defensiveness are not strictly features of a war, but of parties to a war. In a two-party war, while both parties can easily act offensively, the possibility of both parties proceeding defensively is excluded, unless they share territory. (Even then issues may arise as to which party, if any, was the aggressor, which started it, was responsible for starting it, and so on.) Thus mutually defensive wars between contemporary states are impossible (but would be possible if states shared territory, e.g. if Eire and Britain shared the territory of Northern Ireland). Tao-accredited wars were defensive wars, never wars aiming at domination: last-resort wars, in which no pride was taken (LT p.152).3 The pretence that offensive wars are defensive is widespread, and reflected in the subterfuge that departments or ministries of war are those of defence, security or whatever. (If they really were what they purport to be, we should be well on the way to an end to war.) Offensive practices are rendered defensive ones by shabby redefinition al strategems, such as redefining ‘defensive’ to include defence of ideals like democracy or liberty, infringed (or allegedly infringed) on territories abroad, or to include “defence” of a third party or place (whence every offensive war is “defensive”). In the present war in which part of Arabia is engulfed (February 1991), one party claims to be defending what really was (or should be) part of its territory, namely Kuwait, another party to be defending (what Kuwait did not enjoy) democracy. It is a doubly offensive war presented in this guise as jointly defensive. Aggressive wars are waged for a variety of reasons, but usually for resources or access to resources or markets, a matter often disguised by appeal to ideology (thus a war for oil is represented as a war of liberation). But there are other reasons than narrowly economic ones, such as religion (as with crusades), power and aggrandisement (as in building an empire), and so on. Nor are those reasons necessarily far separated; ideologies like Marxism and market There is one line in LT that may suggest that attack was sometimes justifiable, namely ‘For deep love helps one to win in the case of attack’ (p.219). But how can compassion be appropriate unless this attack is within a defensive setting, a larger context of unavoidability or such like. A passage shortly below confirms this interpretation: I dare not take the offensive but I take the defensive: I dare not advance an inch but I retreat a foot (p.222). These are advances and attacks within a defensive setting. �9 capitalism, for example, exhibit many of the features of religion. The economic reasons for war appear to have become much more complex with the advent of an integrated world economy. At the same time many of the independent reasons for economic wars are now obsolete. For to powerful states accrue the advantages of war without war. At least most of the former economic advantages of war can be obtained without expensive wars, through trade, institution of economic dependence, etc. Small medieval wars were sometimes instituted for the collection of neighbouring riches and booty, a kind of piracy meeting conditions of war. “Small” contemporary wars can be waged for a remarkable mix of political-economy ends: to establish a regime favourable to economic penetration and profit repatriation, to subjugate markets and to remove competition, to boost a sagging weapons economy by using up old stocks and also testing new equipment, to restart a depressed economy, and so on. Such wars, along with the economic aims which motivate them, are in effect heavily castigated by Lao Tzu: When Tao prevails in the world, galloping horses are turned back to fertilize (the fields ...). When Tao does not prevail in the world, war horses thrive in the suburbs. There is no calamity greater than lavish desires. (LT p. 181). But it does exceed evidential warrant to claim that Tao is not only sufficient, but necessaTy, for cessation of such practices. The practice of regularly stimulating complex military-saturated economies through war is reminiscent of older, much ridiculed practices in simpler societies. They now ridicule the Tsembaga, who proceeded to destroy much of their surplus product by going to war every 5-15 years (cf Rapaport). But they do not similarly ridicule the most powerful nation on the Earth, the USA, which proceeds to write off a colossal amount of surplus in war every 10-20 years (the Gulf war liquidated some $1.7 billion per day). Taoists would. For ridicule was a favoured method, an important rhetorical strategem, and war and its idiocy were favourite targets. Some classification of defensive wars is also important, for various reasons: reducing and abolishing wars, their costs and damage, restructuring societies away from war and military practices, and, not least, for appreciating Taoism. A main distinction is between • conventional defence, maintained by armies of armed soldiers, many of them professionals, and • social defence, where there are no such armies or but fragments of them, and defence is carried out through social networks of a significant part of society.4 4 Details of social defence are presented in Sharp and in Martin. �10 It is here that Taoism and deep-green theory part company. Under Taoism, the state will have a standing army, but a defensive army operating by strange, surprise tactics (p.201). No doubt defensive wars are to remain last resort action. Nonetheless the state will operate in secrecy, in a way incompatible with decentralised social defence; people will be kept in the dark about smart weapons of the state; and they too will be surprised, along with presumed enemies of the state. By contrast, under deep-green theory, there should be no hidden smart weapons of state; information would flow more freely and not be hidden from the people (who should retain influence in informed decision making). Under deep-green, standing armies, and more generally military organisation, will be wound down altogether. Taoism should have pushed its searching criticism further. For military objectives, easily acquired by standing armies with time on their hands, are frequently incompatible with Taoism. For example, Taoism is opposed to domination (LT p.152), whereas military operations frequently seek or involve domination; and military structure is invariably hierarchical and authoritarian. Taoism aims for self-regulation, wherever feasible (cf. p.201); so does deep­ green theory, which is one reasons why it aims to dispose of standing armies, as an important preliminary to the withering away of states themselves (military forces being major props of state control and power, and often maintained primarily for internal state security). Taoism has no project for ending the era of wars; deep-green theory does. That project involves an elimination of standing armies, too often poised for fighting or political interference. A recommended route to end war consists in progressive scaling down: reduction of the means and manpower. The initial stages are well-known, and include • elimination of nuclear, biological and chemical weaponry, and • force reduction. It can hardly be pretended that the Earth's states have managed to proceed very far on even this complex of stages. The next stage consists in • contraction to defensive capacities only, and the final stage consists in • elimination of remaining military defensive forces, and adoption, so far as required, of social defence practices. The complete route thus involves complete demilitarisation. Reasons why deep-green aims to proceed the full distance are readily grasped by considering the environmental shallowness of an otherwise cogent traditional case for the sharp curtailment of wars and militarism. The traditional Western case against wars has been primarily along two dimensions: social and moral. Wars are highly disruptive of the social fabric; wars may be unjust. From these joint features, it was argued that wars should be a matter of last resort, to be fought to ensure peace. It was argued further that only just wars should be fought. Just wars were rare objects. But as there was little evidence of the decline and fall of wars, much effort was expended, more practically and unsuccessfully, upon endeavouring to improve the calibre of wars, and more theoretically, upon trying to characterize just war satisfactorily, or rather to bend the notion in an effort to approximate the gory unjust facts. �11 Progress was long hindered, furthermore, because there was always a rival positive perspective on wars, which encouraged the exaltation of wars and military feats. It also facilitated the transfer of the favourable image of war to other problem areas, whence the long and apparently successful war against Nature (but the short-term successes are turning into long-term problems), the short and unsuccessful war against Poverty, and so on. Behind all this is the complex idea of war as rejuvenating, even cleansing, like fire; of war as heroic, and glorious, of war as the supreme testing ground of men. These pictures of war - finally shattered by the first World War (where even the poets began to tell of horrors and atrocities) and subsequent technological wars — though no longer in ascendency, have by no means vanished. The notion of war as rejuvenating a flagging economy persists, along with the practice of keeping capitalism running smoothly by integrating substantial military components into the industrial engine. With the development of highly technological wars - the celebrated development of the dirty industrial age is substantially military - the traditional negative case has grown in strength. Wars have become much more damaging, with the potential for much more that is significantly worse, and the possibility of a just war has correspondingly contracted, virtually to zero. The opposition to war has likewise grown, but more than correspondingly with the rise of women in social and political influence. Wars have almost always and everywhere been Men's affairs; likewise conquest. Deep-green theory accepts much of the traditional negative case, but would further strengthen it. For example, the stricture against unjust wars, as out and out immoral, can be strengthened, through the following syllogism: All wars should be fully just wars. Modem wars cannot be fully just wars. Therefore, there should be no modern wars. A fully just war is not merely a just war, but a war those just character can be reliably forecast in advance. A modern war is of course a war that deploys modern technology, at least that available this century. The evidential basis for the second premiss derives from much information that collateral damage, damage to innocent bystanders and involved citizens is always likely and cannot be excluded. Such wars are always liable to violate uncontroversial requirements for a just war, even if they are purely “conventional” wars, not throwing radiation or chemical or biological weapons around. From a contemporary viewpoint the traditional doctrine of a just war, really of a just defensive war, is seriously out of date. The reasons for this reach wider than the new features introduced by modem technological wars and the character of modern civilization, with its giant cities littered with dangerous and vulnerable military targets. They have also to do with the chauvinism of the justice proposed, which is shallow human justice, not natural or environmental justice. There is no consideration of justice to other creatures or to the Earth (cf �12 Naess p.160). Two troubles are really intertwined here: conceptual difficulties with too narrow a notion of justice, and ideological difficulties with too narrow a vision of what is an object of value, of what counts. The deep-green case against war adds to the traditional case a further dimension, neglected until very recently: the environmental dimension. It has suddenly been seen that wars are typically environmental atrocities. Earlier, of course, “environments” were simply backgrounds, backdrops in paintings and plays, to the real drama. Contemporary technological wars tend to be not merely social tragedies but environmental ones as well. There is a doctrine of just war, but it is a human chauvinistic affair. There is no similarly developed doctrine of an ecologically sound war, a deep ecological war. Unless any such war were literally different from modern wars, that is from contemporary technological wars, it would overstep permitted bounds. For such wars are characteristically ecological disasters. Hardened military people, desensitized by a rigorous unethical training, feel even less compunction about degrading or destroying environments or members of other species than they do of maiming or killing civilians through “collateral” activity. Matching the no-just-war syllogism is a no-sound-war syllogism: All wars should be environmentally sound wars. Modern wars cannot be environmentally sound. Therefore, there should be no modern wars. The argument for the second premiss has of course to be different. It looks to the information accumulating on what wars do to natural and built environments. The Vietnam and Gulf wars both inflicted immense damage on natural environments or what was left of them. The environmental effects of war are not confined to direct and collateral damage. There are indirect effects also. Thus, for instance, war also supplied the mechanism of, and the technology for, modern environmental destruction: explosives, bulldozers from tanks, etc. As well, training for war and engagement in war have much fostered, along with attitudes that make for social callousness or ruthlessness, those that contribute to environmental insensitivity and cruelty. 3. Puzzles about Taoist strategy and its critiques of technology and violence ‘It is surprising how much of the Lao Tzu is devoted to military strategy’. Which strategies? Surprise, above all. But why such strategies? ‘Do they not contradict the Taoists’ strong opposition to the use of force’ (Chan p.222), the implied commitment to quietism? Briefly, Taoism is not committed to quietism, and while certainly antagonistic to violence, does not oppose certain uses of force (only really ///-forcing, as will be explained). Even so, the emphasis on military strategy remains puzzling. The strategies, many of them relevant to social defence, include • seriousness, not ‘making light of the enemy’ (p.222) �13 • surprise, and nonvisibility (p.201). The defensive strategy involves guerilla tactics: marching without formation, holding weapons without seeming to have them, confronting enemies without seeming to meet them (p.222). But even in times of peace, ‘smart weapons of the state should not be displayed to the people’ (p.164). Such recommendations helped to fuel the charge of deviousness lodged against Lao Tzu. But look at part of the reason for concealing smart weapons: ‘The more smart weapons the people have, the more troubled the state will be’ (p.201). Smart weapons are carried in corrupt states, where the rich engage in conspicuous consumption and the people are suppressed, not where Tao is practiced (LT p.194). • advance from weakness, flexibility but firmness. Weakness is the principle of life and will overcome strength (LT p.164, p.233). • coolness and non-competition (LT p.233, p.164). Like these, most of the general strategies are standard Taoist practices simply applied to military conduct. For these standard practices the charge of deviousness looks feeble. The response applies more generally to other allegedly devious political strategies. For the strategies are but application of Taoist principles and techniques to warfare, politics and elsewhere. Nothing excludes application of these techniques to what are accounted, in general, unnecessary evils (which must sometimes, on other Taoist grounds, be countered). Nor, to meet the main criticism, need any deceit or deviousness be involved; nor is it. In particular, the legalist tactic, Tn order to grasp, it is necessary first to give’ (LT p.164), is cited as involving ‘an element of deceit’ ‘undeniably’, and ‘worse’ it is ‘morally questionable’ (Chan p.17). But in order for me to grasp your hand in a normal handshake, it is necessary first for me to give my hand. There is no deceit here, nothing morally questionable. All the tactics permit of benign construals, of a Taoist kind. Consider, for instance, Tn order to contract, it is necessary first to expand’ (LT p.164). In order to bend a copper pipe to the intended angle, it is better to bend it first a little further than required. The transformation of water to ice (both favoured natural items for symbolic purposes: natural processes which may look devious!) neatly illustrates the Taoist principle (which is however hardly necessary), and shows softness and weakness turned hardness and strength. The Taoist critique of militarism is as much a critique of technology as of war. Sharp weapons, ‘smart weapons’ as we might now say, come in for much critical attention, as we have already noticed. Only in corrupt and degenerate states are they displayed or flaunted (p.194, p.164); in deep-green regions smart weapons of state’ would not be retained unexhibited. The people will not have them for they mean trouble (p.201); for similar reasons deep-green regions will be free of them. So, it seems, will ideal Taoist regions: ‘Even if there are arrows and weapons, none will display them’ (LT p.238). Much technology, military and other, is excluded under the Taoist edict against violence (a further facet of the military-practices �14 paradox).5 The powerful critique of militarism in the Tao-te Ching is coupled with strong opposition to violence. Some of the linkage is evident enough. Militarism as practised represents an ultimate form of state (or party) violence. A basic theme is that violent practices will come to an unnatural end, and accordingly to a non-Taoist end (generalising LT p.176). While force may occur in spectacular, but satisfactory, natural forms, force is duly distinguished from violence. To force the growth of life means ill omen. For the mind to employ the vital force without restraint means violence (LT p. 197). One who follows Tao does not apply dominating force, which usually has had results bringing requital (p.152). Dominating force, like power, is in general castigated, under doctrine of wu- wei, no forced actions, no violence. To force natural growth is deviant, destroying harmony. To stop natural growth is deviant. But there is a significant difference between force and violence. To intentionally employ destructive force is to do violence. To so force things is condemned. To remain in harmony with things one does not so force things or practice violence. There is a non-interference principle at work, which also indicates types of non­ interference that are excluded. However Taoism does not always get the distinction between force and violence quite 5 Under contemporary technology and technological arrangements, such as the storage of quantities of oil and nuclear and chemical materials in great cities, wars have assumed new and very destructive dimensions, to the point of being utterly irresponsible. A different approach to technology, as to war, is now mandatory. These are no longer things that can in principle be nicely confined and need not touch parties outside the fray. An important part of ending wars, “winning the war against wars”, is removing the technology of war, above all from irresponsible state power. As for which technology to try to jettison and which to try to retain or improve, it is not so difficult to indicate, provided evaluative terminology is not outlawed. What is wanted is technology that is good in its place, what should be excluded is technology that is indifferent or bad or potentially so. Technology to be justified has to do something worthwhile, it has to address identifiable respectable needs. That is why merely indifferent technology is out; there is no virtue in technology for technology's sake, as it is a mere means technique. It is because of the crucial evaluative component in choice of technology that appropriateness, itself evaluative, comes closer to encapsulating the criterion than other recent efforts. Size, such as smallness, or intermediateness, are not what matter, though modest and not excessive technologies are likely to fare better in satisfying appropriateness. In simpler societies, small technology is of course more appropriate; for that is what is good there. From known criteria for what is good these other features for locally appropriate technology can be read off: reliability, esp. in maintenance, functioning well and safely under the expected range of operating conditions (which may be difficult), ease of repair, capital cheapness and repair inexpensiveness, environmental benignness, and meeting sound social needs. �15 right. ‘Vital force without restraint’, intentionally excessive force, is only part of what counts as violence, which is more generally force which violates, i.e. transgresses, descrecrates, profanes, injures, outrages, etc. It is thus a negatively connoted force, an evil force in some specified intentional respect. There is a tendency for Taoist commentators, not Taoists, to regard Taoism as condemning all uses, or even occurrences, of force, but this is not so. Rather intentional ill-forcing is what is castigated, what is deviant. Thus Taoism does not exclude a range of defensive practices, which make satisfactory use of natural forces, like letting the machines of war industry stop. Those who would abolish war and its machinery, substituting for it nonwarlike and ideally nonviolent methods, technology, and strategies, have been confronted not merely with much sub-rational abuse but with plenty of criticism and even some paradoxes. Here is a recent paradox concerning war and nonviolence: • War must be abolished. One reason is simply economic. We can no longer afford it, and the opportunity costs are enormous. Along with other extraordinarily wasteful activities, it is an anachronism. • Doing so cannot be accomplished without violence, i.e. in effect, given the types of violence involved, without what amounts to war. According to a fuller version of this premiss, the process of abolishing a war would only be achieved through a revolution so profound that it could not succeed without extensive and extreme violence, amounting to (civil) war. ° But then war cannot be abolished without war. Therefore, war which must be abolished cannot be abolished.6 This “paradox” has been compared with the Liar paradox, but the parallel does not persist far. For this paradox does not involve self-referential features, and is easily broken, as follows. Let the “last war” be not the last standard war but the revolution abolishing war. Then, given that the revolution is successful, war will be abolished therewith, i.e. with that last war. There need be no regress, given again a successful outcome. All the premisses stand intact, but the conclusion, following the ‘therefore’ is a nonsequitur. However, while the dissolution of the argument is accordingly logically fine, the route is repugnant. Standard pacifism challenges the 6 Brian Medlin, who forcefully propounded this puzzle, set other analogous puzzles alongside it - designed to reveal deep difficulties in contemporary political, and especially alternative, thought. Another puzzle, concerning liberty and repression in the context of capitalism, revolved around the following inconsistent triad: • capitalism must be removed, but liberty retained. • capitalism cannot be removed without repression. • repression is antithetical to liberty. The puzzle is resolved as with the analogous puzzle of abolishing. Let the “last capitalist” action before the days of liberty be the repressive but liberating revolution overthrowing capitalism. �16 second premiss. 4. Standard and moral pacifism. Although Taoism is strongly opposed to war, and much in favour of peace - and accordingly by prevailing standards a substantially pacific position - it is not (nowhere in the central texts) committed to pacifism in usual senses, for two different reasons:• It is not, by contrast with pacifism, opposed to all types of warfare, for example smart defensive wars. • It eschews deontology in terms of which moral pacifism is commonly stated, for instance through the watershed thesis P2. It is morally wrong to use violence. By contrast with Taoism, deep environmentalism does not avoid deontic claims, and is committed in principle to nonviolent technologies and ways and to pacifistic principles. Moreover, certain forms of deep environmentalism are completely committed to pacifism, notably European forms. Is deep green? There is heavy contemporary opposition to pacifism, as there also was to Taoism in the warring times when Taoism was first being promulgated. Many of the central institutions of contemporary life are intricated in coercion, violence and war. The most prominent contemporary institutions, states, are premissed on these elements of damaging force; they claim entitlement to use them widely, and even claim a certain territorial monopoly on their use. As a result they are having constantly to engage in them in attempt to maintain that monopoly. They are certainly the main perpetrators of wars, and of violence. They are indeed inured to wars, are in constant preparation for wars, yet propound dialectial (and normally dishonest and cynical) doctrines of peace through war (for a recent example see the appendix). Unremarkably then, the extensive propagandistic machinery of state has invested heavily in “justificatory” exercises in favour of controlled use, its own use, of destructive force, and continues to inveigh against pacifism. Because a routine trick in this sophistical repetoire consists in conflating pacifism with extreme, naive and inplausible, forms, an inevitable and important early task commits in unscrambling senses of ‘pacifism’. Semantical skulduggery can be thwarted in this way. Pacifism, as explained by English dictionaries, invariably concerns wars and warfare, and contains two components, negative and, elaborating on that, positive:- The negative component is, in Amauld's word, anti-War-ism, opposition (in ways to be further specified) to all forms of warfare (see OED). The positive component supplies alternative ways of settling disputes (what it is supposed that wars with some semblance of justification involve), such as negotiation, arbitration,... - and, adding to too narrow dictionary accounts - sanctions, substitutions (e.g. of sporting events, operatic contests, cooperative ventures),... . In brief standard pacifism is opposition to all warfare and resolution of potential wars by other nonmilitary means. �17 Plainly the opposition to warfare, like the sanctions and so on, cannot itself be military (using soldiers and other devices of war), on pain of some incoherence. But otherwise the ways of opposition can be many and various: they can certainly be active, as with nonviolent demonstrations, resistance movements, and so forth, and they may also be devious (e.g. turning the forces of war upon themselves so they are neutralised). It quickly becomes evident, then, that some of the dictionaries offer but loaded definitions which, by restricting the negative components, reduce the initial appeal and plausibility of pacifism. Consider the Concise English definition of the negative component: ‘the doctrine of non-resistance to hostilities and of total non-co-operation with any form of warfare’. Thereby excluded are forms of pacifism which offer active and plausible alternatives to warfare such as social defence. The Concise English tends to force pacifism into what the Oxford English Dictionary lists as its final item: ‘often, with depreciatory implication, the advocacy of peace at any price’, ‘in any circumstance’. Pacifism can easily resist being forced into these sorts of circumstances: it has many resources, as an extensive series of texts on alternatives to war, such as negotiation, non­ violent action and social defence, from Taoism to contemporary environmentalism attest. Academic philosophers have much advanced the semantical strategy of some dictionaries, of rendering pacifism more difficult from the very outset by narrow and biassed definitions. They have stretched the term from its restricted setting of warfare, confined to state and organised gang violence, to cover all forms of violence, from state and interstate to, what is very different, personal and interpersonal violence. Call the resulting considerably stretched notion of pacifism, according to which it is morally wrong to use violence, according to which P2 holds, stretched pacifism.^ While stretched pacifism certainly includes standard pacifism (unless the notions of war and warfare are tampered with), the converse is very far from being the case. A pacifist is in no way committed to stretched pacifism, which is a much more problematic and difficult position than standard pacifism. There are several, substantially different reasons for this, which will be picked up seriatim. Stretched pacifism, also misleadingly called moral pacifism, has looked a very easy critical target to moral philosophers. Many the effusive philosopher who, upon sighting such a target, has charged, whooping such rhetoric as “incoherent”, “inconsistent”, “insensitive”, “fanatical”. However, with improved logical technology now available for accommodating and treating moral dilemmas, it is no great feat to resist such attacks, in the fashion of previous investigations (see esp. Al, also MD). A main aim was to demonstrate that stretched pacifism was not so stupid as it was made out to be or appeared to be to these inured to present dominant violent ways. So far from being stupid, it is viable. In future gentler times stretched pacifism 7 In Al this notion was contrasted with standard pacifism as comprehensive pacifism: overcomprehensive might have been better. �18 could even be realised for whole communities of creatures (as some genuinely Christian sects envisaged); whence it will finally be seen to be feasible not merely for sages and supermen, and many ordinary women, but much more extensively. The method of philosophical accommodation was through moral dilemmas. The sort of moral dilemma that stretched pacifism can induce derives as follows. On the one side stands the theme P2, Wv, in convenient symbols, for Wrong V-ing, violencing. Now this implies to WB, where B presents a case of of violence. On the other side, particular circumstances develop which lead to W ~B, because ~B would produce in the circumstances considerable wrong, for instance extensive violence, mass murder, etc. One stock example from the literature concerns calling off the firing squad about to shoot several captives if the pacifist shoots one of them (it is elaborated in Al p.13). Interestingly, another stock example from the literature concerns standard pacifism (it can also be presented in terms of patriotism; for details of both see MD p.10). Resolution of intractable moral dilemmas is, where it is required, situational. The agent decides in the situation, within the fix, what to do. There are many ways in which such decision making can proceed, less rational, such as those applying chance or involving bad faith, or more rational, such as those applying consequentialist decision theory (for details see MD, pp.32-9). A decision theory taking account of all that should be included will not however be purely consequential. It would also take account of relevant motivation. This defence and rehabilitation of moral pacifism has been challenged, in particular by Smith (hereafter JWS). JWS claims the defence offered is a ‘failure because it trivializes pacifism’ (p. 153 twice). The rehabilitation trivializes pacifism because it entails that pacifism doesn't substantially differ from a form of activism which holds that while violence is always wrong one is sometimes justified on consequentialist grounds for preferring violent acts, if these acts are lesser evils than any other real alternatives. This is the commonsense position which most people hold - yet - pacifism after all was supposed to be radical moral doctrine - (p.153 rearranged).8 Part of the criticism is, then, not so much that pacifism is trivialized - JWS “activism” is hardly trivial - as that pacifism is popularised, deflated from a radical position to the commonsense position most people hold (p.154 also). Yet not a shred of evidence is adduced that JWS activism is such a populist position. Available evidence, for example from peace movements and oppositional opinion polls, suggests the very opposite: that, for instance, most people support state-justified conventional wars with the military violence they incur, and 8 JWS now informs me that he has changed his position. Whether the move effects his criticism, I don't know. �19 accordingly do not hold that violence is always wrong. From such a commonsense angle, pacifism with its condemnation of conventional wars and the violence they involve remains a radical doctrine. As regards wars and other violence-incurring social authorities, contemporary pacificism is, as previous explained (e.g. Al p.3), a form of activism. Pacifism does not imply utter pacifity, but may actively involve social defence, resistance and so on. However a certain level of misrepresentation enters into the JWS challenge in the details of what forms of activism pacifism may include. That misrepresentation begins in the second clause concerning what is said to be sometimes justified. For the situational procedure where dilemmas arise will not generally be consequential applying a principle of lesser evil. In dilemmatic situations such principles are suspended, and such a principle is in any case unacceptable to moral pacifists. A small amount of violence may be less bad in its consequences than verbal offence, but a principled pacifist will choose the slightly greater evil where other obligations do not exclude it. A more serious distortion occurs in JWS's effort to force procedures in dilemma situations into purely consequentialist form. In fact consequential decision theory was deployed as a model only for how to proceed rationally in a situational setting where deontic procedures were suspended (see MD p.38). What was said, still misleadingly retrospective vision reveals, was this: ‘what is done is a very consequentialist thing’ (Al p.13), not ‘one acts in a consequentialist fashion to do the sufficiently good thing in the circumstances’ (JWS P-152). Situationally other procedures than those resembling orthodox rational decision making (modified from maximizing to satisizing objectives) may be adopted (MD p.38). Further the orthodox consequentialist theory is inadequate because it leaves out, or tries to reduce to consequences, nonconsequential elements, notably motives. It is not difficult, in principle (in advance of attempted consequentialization of motives), to design situations where motives, such as integrity or maintaining faith, enter to yield outcomes upsetting consequential calculations. More elaborate decision making procedures than those of consequentialism, sometimes at variance with consequentialism, are thus presupposed. A further part of JWS's criticism accordingly goes by the board, the alleged appeal ‘to “second best” consequentialist considerations,... already explicitly condemned’ (p.154). What was condemned was stock universal consequentialism, ‘that only consequentialist considerations carry argumentative weight’ (quoted on p.152), so undercutting other deontic principles, such as those of pacifism. It was not claimed, what is utterly different, that consequentialist considerations can nowhere enter into deliberation and decision making. The conclusion JWS arrives at is therefore substantially astray. After criticising modern moral philosophy for its reliance upon consequentialist modes of thought, it is surprising, and inconsistent, to find ... [reliance] upon such modes of thought to escape logical difficulties raised by moral dilemmas facing ... pacifis[m] (p.152) �20 There is no inconsistency. JWS has confused universal with particular. As well he has wrongly contracted all situational decision making to consequentialist modes. There is a third part to the criticism, that the defence is too easy; the ‘strategy will allow too much violence to be (perpetrated and) justified to suit the tastes of any real pacifist’ (p. 153). This another part of the so-called trivialization, this time however dilution rather than populatization, weakening the moral stand against violence. This third contention is premissed on a mistake: that one can ‘justify on consequentialist grounds any number of violent acts, providing that such acts are lesser evils than other real alternatives facing social agents’ (p.153). Moral pacifism offers no such licence; allowing such consequentialism to take over was never part of the position. The slide to such consequentialism is made on the strength of a similarly erroneous example. The potential victim of an aspiring rapist ‘is supposed to flee or wriggle free if possible. But it is easy to consequentially justify the use of violence by the woman to prevent herself from being raped’ (p.153 italics added). In the example so far described there is no dilemma, and no such easy resort to consequentially ‘justified’ violence. What allows too much violence is the lesser evil JWS assumes is easily consequentially justified; for example that the woman is entitled to inflict, and escalate, violence so long as it remains ‘a lesser evil than the violence of attempted rape’ (p. 153). Since she may thereby inflict quite unreasonable damage (esp. if she is a Kung Fu expert), the result is inconsistent with ‘the basic principle of self-defence’ which JWS earlier adduced according to which what is ‘appropriate, in response is only that level of force necessary to defend oneself against the threat’ (p.150). There is evidence in JWS's work of some enthusiasm for levels of violence which exceed his ‘basic principle’, his appeal to ‘lesser evil’ generates some instances. The ‘basic principle’, itself fraught with difficulties (cf. the contorted discussion of what weapons are appropriate in response to what attacks, p.150), still exceeds what stretched pacifism would enjoin; for instance, it may not be appropriate to respond with force. But in a technical sense stretched pacifism is compatible with the ‘basic principle’, since it only imposes the upper bound on level of force. As for easiness, moral pacifism is not an easy position to live by, or to justify. Removing objections to pacifism is one thing; solidifying a positive case for it is quite another, and so far hardly conclusive (as Al tried to explain, pp 29-31). Stretched pacifism was advanced, hypothesized to put it more precisely, as a still viable option. It was not presented as a morally compulsory position, or, for that matter, as one that this defender adhered to or affirmed. To reiterate, while a cumulative case can be made for stetched pacifism as principled non­ violence, that case was not conclusive, and is hard to improve. For, further, some serious difficulties standing in the way of stretched pacifism were assembled, the most important of which derives from the extent of violence apparent in transactions within the natural world. Simply consider the practices of carnivores, essential to their natural way of life. In order to meet their life needs for sustenance, these creatures do, and are often obliged to, engage �21 routinely in violent activity. While it can no doubt be argued, as some vegetarians may do, that the natural order is an immoral order, and that remaining carnivores should be converted to vegetarianism as rapidly as proves possible (in the way domestic dogs are converted to dog biscuits), the difficulties with such proposals are immense. The task envisaged is gigantic, and beyond human capacities - even if it were desirable. For there are millions of species to be somehow converted to proper vegetarianism. Then there are millions of other species to be converted to proper and well regulated contraceptive practices, else their numbers will get out of hand (uncontrollably) with predation removed. Given humans lack of success in limiting their own excessive numbers, such regulation appears entirely remote. Aside however from the practical difficulties, is such a fully vegetarian order, with evolution further derailed, a desirable improvement on the natural order? Is it morally obligatory? It is certainly not obligatory, as alternative systems of morality in harmony with the prevailing natural order are feasible. Nor is it desirable, for (to appeal to such alternative value systems) the natural order is more or less in order as it is. Full vegetarianization would only reduce its value, vastly. More generally, a defensible ethical framework should not, it would be rightly contended, be right out of step with the natural order of other creatures, decently depicted. Decent depiction is important, for some features of the natural order, such as competition, combat and predation, so far from escaping attention, have been grossly exaggerated and exploited. Thus, for instance, the ludicrous picture of nature red in truth and claw, so beloved of descendents of orthodox Victorians and of orthodox economists. However, even under decent depiction, the “natural order” is often not benign. That appears to be enough to induce a supervenient moral dilemma for any stretched pacifism which is coupled to a deep ethic (e.g. which does not separate humans out from the natural order) and which eschews the desperate vegetarian route: The natural order is not an immoral order The natural order contains (regular) instances of violence. Therefore, instances of violence are not immoral in apparent defiance of P2 Moreover, there are too many instances of violence, too regularly occurring, for them all to be plausibly shunted into the moral dilemma category (and predatory carnivores face no dilemmas). Raptors that practice violence every week are not immoral (neither are they clearly moral; the category of morality only significantly extends so far). The main trouble lies however with P2 (which needs some finer adjustment, as was alrady indicated in Al). While P2 is alright in context, within a particular, perfectly viable, ethical framework, designed for the usual human round, the conventional setting for ethical theories, it stands in need of modification outside that setting. It is time to suggest the sort of modification envisaged. Evidently P2 was addressed to moral agents. Which agents? Not to carnivores that supply their own livelihood, nor really to morally degenerate humans, but to �22 peace-sensitive agents. With that semi-technical form, yet to be characterised, a suitably modified P2 results: MP2. It is morally wrong, for a peace-sensitive agent, to use violence.9 To recover what amounts, in the previous discussive context, to P2, it suffices to add the proposition that every human agent ought to be peace-sensitive. Much as that proposition has to recommend it, it appears too ethically advanced for many modern humans; it sets too high a moral standard to be taken as a serious guide to practice. It seems wise to settle presently for something less demanding, such as that every advanced moral agent ought to be peace sensitive. To put essentially the same proposition alternatively: Stretched pacifism (as modified) is supererogatory. While it is perhaps too late to hope for much moral progress in humans, it is pleasant to contemplate alternative futures where what is supererogatory became obligatory, and widely practiced. Richard Sylvan* Appendix I began drafting this essay at the time (January 17, midday Australian time) of the American attacks upon Iraq. The optly named Prime Minister Hawke of Australia had just made a statement to the nation-state, announcing (the) war. In this statement there was much talk of peace. There was even - in what was effectively a declaration of war - reiteration of the modern quest for ‘a new world order of peace’. Peace through war; so it rings out again and again, through the centuries. ‘War must be for the sake of peace’ (Aristotle p.220). More than two thousand years later, we have fought those wars to end all wars. But it is no use, Hawke solemely pronounced, just talking about peace, and thinking about peace; we must work for peace, fight for it - through war. Impeccable logic? President Bush, supreme commander, convinced us with similar logic, speaking too with many tongues. Of how he ‘preferred to think of peace, not war’. But now ‘only force will prevail’, as ‘all reasonable efforts to reach a peaceful solution are exhausted’. ‘What must be done’ must be done, or will be anyway. With God on side with the US offensive (as well as on the other side), it will go well. As it was said to have, though it achieved comparatively little that other efforts may not have yielded more satisfactorily, and thought it may now have to The generalization of P2, suggested in Al, to cover also the parallel situation of environmental vandalism, can be similarly modified. The anti-vandolence principle becomes MP2°. It is morally wrong, for a peace- and environmentally-sensitive agent, to use vandolence. Thank to David Bennett for joint contributions (from UT) and to JWS for opposition (in JWS) �23 followed with another invasion. Nor have we ever managed to glimpse much of what is now supposed, when we are no longer engaged, to come ‘out of the horror of war’: a ‘new world order ... which governs the conflict of nations’; a ‘rule of law’, not war. How the one, enforcable law, is achieved, unless backed by the the other, is not explained (Medlin's paradox hits back). Similarly what we now hear from many militarists, as they rush to war, is that ‘peace is a great good, war a great evil’. But, for the most part, only the rhetoric has shifted; practice has scarcely changed at all. REFERENCES W.-T. Chan, A Source Book on Chinese Philosophy, Princeton University Press, 1963; referred to as ST. W.-T. Chan (ed.), The Way of Lao Tzu (Tao-te Ching), Bobbs-Merrill, New York, 1963; referred to as LT. B. Martin, Uprooting War, Freedom Press, London, 1984. A. Naess, Ecology, community and lifestyle, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge UK, 1989. R.A. Rapaport, Pigs for the Ancestors : ritual in the ecology of a New Guinea People, Yale University Press, New Haven, 1967. R. Routley, ‘War and Peace II. On the alleged inconsistency, moral insensitivity and fanaticism of pacifism’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #9, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1983 (also in Inquiry ); referred to as Al. R. Routley and V. Plumwood, ‘Moral dilemmas and the logic of deontic notions’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #6, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1984 (also in Paraconsistent Logic)', referred to as MD. R. Routley, ‘War and Peace I. On the ethics of large-scale nuclear war and nuclear-deterrence and the political fall-out’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy, #5, Research School Of Social Science, Australian National University, 1984. G. Sharp, Social Power and Political Freedom, Porter Sargent, Boston, 1980. J.W. Smith, The Worms at the Heart of Things , Public Relations Unit, Flinders University, 1989. R. Sylvan, ‘War and Peace III, Australia's defence philosophy’, SoczaZ Philosophy, for Nuclear Conference, University of Queensland, 1985. R. Sylvan and D. Bennett, ‘Of Utopias, Tao and Deep Ecology’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #19, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1990; referred to as UT. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Draft Papers Description An account of the resource Sylvan's literary executor encountered an archive in which “all his projects were current", since manuscripts were undated and unattributed. Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Text Any textual data included in the document ON EXTIRPATING WAR: TAO AND DEEP-GREEN PACIFISM Taoism and deep-green environmental theory, although closely aligned on very many issues, diverge over war. For Taoism, by contrast for instance with Buddhism, is not a pacific doctrine, but is committed to skilful defensive militarism. While it does not espouse a fortress mentality, Taoism certainly condones limited defensive military operations for specific purposes, a sort of guerilla warfare. By contrast, deep-green theory, while acknowledging the role of organised social defence, stands opposed to professional militarism, and thereby to military defence, and is committed to a principled pacifism. Conveniently a route through Taoism, philosophically fascinating in its own right, will lead us to problems of pacifism and towards deep-green theory. 1. Features of a Taoist critique of war and militarism. War did not receive a favourable press in ancient Chinese philosophy. Generally aggression and war were to be avoided. Even Confucius imposed very demanding conditions: for example, ‘when good men have instructed the people [in morals, agriculture, military tactics] for seven years, they may be allowed to bear arms,’ ‘If a ruler ... does not set himself right, even his commands will not be obeyed’ (SB p.41, italics added). Mo Tzu went much further than Confucius, roundly condemning war - on utilitarian grounds, that war yields no net benefit at any level (SB p.227). What is more, he backed his heavy condemnation practically (unlike some conspicuous contemporary theoretical utilitarians); ‘he did not hesitate to walk for ten days and ten nights in an effort to dissuade a ruler from making war’ (SB p.212). But none, it is said, went as far, in a detailed and sophisticated criticism of war, as Lao Tzu; ‘none has condemned war more strongly than Lao Tzu’. ‘[T]he opposition of Taoism to the use of force is well-known, and the most bitter attack on militarism if found in the Lao Tzu’ (Chan, p.154, p.17.) But, after that splendid build-up, the text is slightly disappointing. Lao Tzu does not assert outright that war is an abomination, or even roundly condemn it. His critique of war, militarism, and military technology, is subtle and oblique, and, on the surface, far distanced from pacifism. For he does not recommend an end to war - in that genuine Taoists, those who possess Tao, will never participate in them - but expects wars to continue as unavoidable evils. Worse, he even goes so far as to outline proper attitudes to war and conduct in war, and indeed to suggest military techniques and strategies, some of which look decidedly devious. Among the classical works of Taoism, we focus on the Lao Tzu because, by contrast with other works, a remarkable component of that book is devoted to war and militarism. The apparent deviousness of the tactics Lao Tzu allocates serves to highlight what has been seen as ‘the most troublesome element’ in his philosophy (Chan p.17) — not so much however because they concern military operations, but because they are taken to apply much more widely, ‘to life in general’ (p.17). But why should military activity obtain some special 2 more widely, ‘to life in general’ (p. 17). But why should military activity obtain some special dispensation? Why should what is not tolerated more generally be exonerated there? But given that Taoism has here the virtue of consistency (i.e. uniformity on principles) and of universalizability, that simply leaves more explaining to be done. • Puzzles for Taoism, and wars as unavoidable evils There are two puzzles here in Taoism rather than one. There is the military-practices paradox, and, varying and generalising on that, there are life-practices paradoxes. The special paradox is generated by the following incompatible elements: on the one side, ‘the most bitter attack on militarism’, the well-known opposition of Taoism to the use of force (p. 17) and to the possession and use of smart military weapons and technology - implying that war is far from all right - and on the other, advocacy of certain (devious) military tactics, outlines of (deceitful) conduct in war, and so on - implying that war is all right after all. A straightforward generalisation of this paradox would look at other morally-sensitive parts of life, where some practice was strongly condemned yet engaged in (for many examples, see the dilemmas assembled in MD). But the variation of concern to Chan and the neo-Confucians concerns thfc conjunction of upright with devious practices in life, in particular in the life of the sage. For a Taoist sage is presumed to lead an upright straightforward life, yet appears to engage in devious and even deceitful practices incompatible with such a life-style. Call this the Taoist-lifestyle paradox. Evidently a good deal of explaining is required, as to how Taoism can coherently take the positions it appears to presume, both on war and peace, and on life more generally. A desirable preliminary would seem to be a little investigation of what position is taken, especially on war and militarism. One key pasage runs: Fine weapons are instruments of evil They are hated by creatures Therefore those who possess the Tao turn away from them. ... Weapons are instruments of evil, not the instruments of a good ruler. When he uses them unavoidably, he regards calm restraint as the best principle Even when he is victorious, he does not regard it as praiseworthy, For to praise victory is to delight in the slaughter of men. He who delights in the slaughter of men will not succeed in the empire. ... For a victory, let us observe the occasion with funeral-ceremonies (LT p.154). Wars, which involve the use of weapons, instruments of evil, are accordingly themselves evil. They are also evil because they involve the slaughter of men. But they are also sometimes unavoidable (also p.152). Therefore such wars are unavoidable evils. Such discourse, obtained by almost immediate inference from the passage, is within the standard orbit of dilemma talk. But Taoism lacks, through deliberately eschewing deontic talk, the discourse which enables direct expression of such dilemmas, or even direct condemnation of wars or of clever weapons. Instead the points are made by circumlocution, what the possesser of Tao 3 does, how the good ruler conducts himself, or by analogy, of victory in war with death. Unavoidable evils are the very stuff of deontic dilemmas (though many theories, underpinned by shonky logic, lack the resources for representing this stuff properly). Where something is unavoidably evil, it is both bad, because evil, and also not bad, doing it is excusable, because it is unavoidable. So, given such an argument (which has its weaknesses), an unavoidable evil is a genuinely dilemmatic object with inconsistent features. Certain wars have looked, since ancient times, like such dilemmatic objects. Revealingly, Chan tries to explain that ‘most troublesome element’ in Taoism, the military-practice paradox, through the following exercise in lateral thinking: It can ... be argued that Lao Tzu uses warfare to illustrate his principles of taking no action and weakness because warfare is among the most dynamic and critical of human experiences, just as the Indian classic, the Bhagavadgita chooses fighting as the theme on which to discuss the terrible dilemma whether one should fulfil his duty, as in the case of a soldier, and kill, or should fail in his duty and refrain from killing (p. 17). ‘Just as’? The Indian classic prevents a classic moral dilemma, a dilemma represented in contemporary philosophy (following its rediscovery by Sartre), where there are incompatible duties: the duty to kill, because of one's role as a soldier, and the duty not to kill, because of one's human condition, and the supervenient dilemma of failing in and fulfilling one's duties. These dilemmas for an individual (male, as it then was) are replicated in dilemmas regarding war for group institutions: at bottom, the obligation to engage in war (for one set of compelling reasons) as contraposed with the obligation not to engage in war (for another, perhaps overlapping, set of reasons). A theory of moral dilemmas (as worked out for example in MD) is crucial for an adequate treatment of major issues in war and peace, especially (as will become evident) for a viable strong pacifism. But Taoism, eschewing deontic discourse, lacks the apparatus to state or develop moral dilemmas. Hence it is logically excluded from giving a full or adequate account of what is going on conceptually. One of the philosophically fascinating feature of Taoism is the fashion in which it manages to avoid deontic discourse, and to substitute for direct deontic discourse or improvise circumlocutions when deontic discourse would otherwise appear inevitable (cf. UT for examples). But there are costs. One is inability to display the mechanism of deontic dilemmas, or to show what reasons and argument lie behind Taoist prounouncements and conclusions (the shortage of Taoism on argument is another philosophically conspicious feature, also observed in UT). As conceptual apparatus for analysizing moral dilemmas is missing, most of the machinery involved has to be passed over. Only the outcomes, as Taoism sees them, are presented, as if from a black box. Taoism blacks out the story on deontic dilemmas that deep-green theory can tell, as the following diagram tries to show: 4 Diagrams . Charting the processing of deontic dilemmas that are “resolved”. Deep-green chart: Processing of dilemma, Arguments to dilemma incompatible input prescriptions situational procedures -» > directive output ■ X. Corresponding Taoist chart: Black directive Box output It is evident that Taoism can be extended', information can be put into the Black Bok rendering it less opaque. That extension can be made so as to conform to deep-green theory, i.e. so that the extended Taoist chart, a neo-Daoist chart, looks like the deep-green one. That is indeed essentially how neo-Daoism get characterised, in terms of conformity of the extension to deep ecological theory (see UT). We are now placed to explain how to dissolve, or at least neutralize, the paradoxes deriving from repudiation of militarism, an awkwardly qualified repudiation in the case of Taoism. In a significant sense there is no resolving of genuine deontic dilemmas. The principles delineating the fix may stand, incompatible, signalling the persisting suboptimality (or better, sublimenality) of the dilemmatic situation. Where there is a dilemma, involved parties should try to do well enough in the sublimenal circumstances (for a much fuller account, see MD). Thus where there is a war, itself a non-Taoist process, engaged or caught up Taoists will not abandon Taoism. Taoist methods will be applied, Taoist strategies pursued. So much for theoretical representation and (non-)resolution of life-practices and other dilemmas, details of which are readily elaborated in deep-green extensions of Taoism. A prior substantive issue is whether dilemmas always are generated: not whether wars are evil (typically they are, an issue we shall come to), but whether wars are unavoidable. Analysis of wars does not bear that familiar claim out decisively. Many wars could have been avoided, through conciliation, negotiation, restraint, etc., and no worse results apparently obtained, through sanctions, exchange, trade, etc. Through a typology of wars (coming up) that conjecture can be given some substance. Consider, for instance, what would be walk-overs. Then there is little point in making a military response. So war can be avoided. Certainly an occupation, to be met in a different way, may still occur. And so on, perhaps, for various other types of war. But, more generally, try this:- 5 Every war involves an aggressor, who makes an aggressive move. Such an aggressor could always avoid that move, taking a different (or a do-nothing) course of action. Therefore, every war can be avoided. No war is entirely unavoidable. Setting aside determinism (which renders all actual wars along with all other events unavoidable), it could be argued that a war sometimes simply boils up, without an aggressor, an intensification of a conflagatory situation. There are grounds for scepticism regarding such examples; for such intensification can only occur if provocative military moves are made, for instance troops are stationed in provocative or risky positions. The presumption that certain wars are unavoidable typically derives from a one-sided perspective on war, a defender's perspective. A defender has no option, so it is routinely averred, but to respond to a determined aggressor. Even if that should be so sometimes, when there is no running away or going underground, it does not establish that such a war is unavoidable; for it neglects the role of the aggressor. By a smarter formulation, relevant features of unavoidability can be captured. Although wars may not be unavoidable, defensive action in wars that have been initiated may be unavoidable. At least such action may b£ unavoidable z/ unacceptably high costs (death, enslavement, etc.) are not to be avoided. Thereupon another highly relevant feature emerges: the linkage of avoidability to costs. For whether an action is unavoidable then depends upon what costs a party is prepared to incur before and when insisting on action: but this appears entirely unacceptable. How can what is “unavoidable” cease to be so when some further costs are absorbed? However with basics like survival, a certain liberty, and so on, we do reach such bounds. An important type of unavoidability. We also reach scenarios, unavailable to Lao Tzu but kindly brought within range by modem technology, which may appear to justify aggressive strikes. State Z, while not an aggressor, is carrying out practices which will impose unacceptably high costs upon peoples of other states and implacably refuses to desist. It could, for example, be poisoning air or water flowing to other states. But ,to make the case vivid, let us suppose that state Z is constructing, for reasons Zeders find convincing (they are committed to a faith which depicts all humans as incorrigible sinners and unworthy of life), an effective doomsday machine. Would an (aggressive) preemptory strike designed to disable or destroy the machine be unavoidable?1 In a sense, No; in another Yes. For different modalities can operate. Physically outsiders need to do nothing, but watch Zeders go about their zealous work. But deontically they are under heavy moral pressure, because of the costs of standing by idly: if the human race is worth anything very substantial, then they are obliged to act, action is deontically 1 Whether it would be justifiable, or just, are separate issues. But it is evident enought that such scenarios further damage the obsolescent idea of just war. For, according to received doctrine, a just war is defensive. (How such a war can be fought at all is another matter; coherence requires relativization to ‘just wxfor party d’.) 6 unavoidable. Here is a situation where a proposed reduction of deontic logic proves illuminating. Obligation is explicated through not implying, or necessitating, the sanction, i.e. excessive ethical costs such as extermination. Let us explain deontic unavoidability analogously: an action is so unavoidable if not undertaking it would result in excessive ethical costs. Then if it can be established that there is no other way than a military strike, an act of war, to ensure that the Zeders desist (and certainly we can envisage scenarios like that), then that is deontically unavoidable. It is also dilemmatic for those committed to, or inclined towards pacifism; and it is, for them at least, but paradoxically justifiable, as the negation is also justifiable, on pacific grounds. Scenarios like that sketched, that appear to render certain wars deontically unavoidable require but little or no elaboration to render them evil. Evil indeed is such a standard feature of standard wars that at least its great presence call for little supporting evidence. But it has taken to vast stretch of human history to reach this general point of recognition. The manifold evils of war Lao Tzu very early recognised and emphasized: Wherever armies are stationed, briars and thorns grow. Great wars are always followed by famines (p. 152). And nowadays followed by great tides of refugees. This passage includes not only recognition of the widely-observed socio-environmental consequences of war, but, more striking, very early recognition of the severe environmental impact of military forces. That critique is not however developed in Taoism.2 Only recently has it been pushed substantially further. And only recently could a new, most significant twist occur, the merging of resource security, long a military objective, with environmental security. The appalling idea has recently been floated that the military, in need of new work and roles with the apparent warming of West-East relations and cooling of the Cold War, should exchange usual military idleness for meddling in environmental matters: regulation and policing of environmental resources, ensurance of environmental security of powerful states, and similar. This is a bit like reassigning those imprisoned for child abuse to managing kindergartens; for consider the impressive military record of environmental vandalism. What the military is alleged to offer is a structure appropriate and available for handling such matters. But, to the contrary, it is precisely the sort of hierarchical, authoritarian expensive structure that should be wound down and up as soon as the opportunity appears, as (briefly) now, rather than being retained and shockingly reoriented (as a state-serving “Greenwar”). But a bridge to deep-green theory can be made through neo-Daoism, an updating of Taoism in confirmity with deep ecology (which however is somewhat thin and threadbare on war; for what there is so far, see Naess p.160). On neo-Daoism, see UT. 7 2. On the divergence of deep-green from Taoism. Having arrived, by better or worse arguments, at the conclusion that wars, though generally evil, may be sometimes unavoidable, it is evidently important to say something about how they - those of the theoretical residue - are to be conducted. By appropriate conduct the damage they do may be reduced; also the conduct should be appropriate to the funereal nature of wars (to exceed Taoist resources for stating this sort of point). It is at this stage that deep­ green theory begins to diverge from Taoism. In further explaining the Taoist and deep-green critiques of war, and diverting objections to them, a rough and preliminary typology of wars is important. It is also of passing interest in its own philosophical right. War, according to English Dictionaries, is a ‘contest carried on by force of arms, typically between nations or states’. More exactly, war is a game - in the generous technical sense of game-theory, with players, rules, goals, strategies, and so on carried on in significant part by military means, normally between states or substates. Call the contestants, (warring) parties. They typically represent of course larger populations. The set­ up between parties resembles the arrangements of players in game theory. There are several analogical extensions of the term war to cover games where one of the parties is an object, construed as hostile (an enemy of the state), such as Crime, Drugs, Poverty or Nature. These we can set aside as analogical wars. Of course wars form only a part of military activities. Military interests and objectives have always stretched significantly further than war, to include surveillence and security, easily extended to resource security, environmental security and life­ style security, and beyond that to political stability and other political matters. Evidently military ambitions have far over-extended themselves in bagging such democratic concerns. An anarchist solution to the whole problem of war, which some have seen Taoism as reaching towards, is immediate: eliminate the source of war, states. Unfortunately it is not quite that simple (and that's not simple). For wars can also occur between nations, cultures, races or tribes (which are not such artifices as states, and not always so readily or desirably abolished), between inhabited regions, and between factions within states (thus civil wars) or, perhaps by extension, between factions within other social structures (thus, for instance, gang wars). But undoubtedly eliminating states and aspiring states would abolish most wars and virtually all the worst wars. While “nonviolent wars” are excluded by definition, by virtue of ‘force of arms’, token wars, limited wars, and so on, are not: for instance, wars fought by small armed teams representing competing sides (cf. medieval and science fiction war games). As wars are hemmed in by conventions and agreed rules, there is no reason in principle why they should not be reduced to two person contests, fought under strict rules like boxing or gladiatorial contests. But in modem times wars have never taken such sensible forms, but have been much larger affairs, making heavy (though fortunately restricted) use of latest technology. Let us distinguish such wars as techno-powered wars. They have, directly or indirectly (for the 8 technology may be bought or bartered), a heavy research and development support structure (indeed the bulk of contemporary science is devoted - misdirected - in one way or another to this effort). Among wars, an important distinction is that between offensive and defensive wars. An offensive war is one which ventures off a given party's territory or recognised pad, “invading" that of another party or parties; correlatively defensive parties, if they have not also invaded. Force projection typifies offensive practice. Plainly, offensiveness and defensiveness are not strictly features of a war, but of parties to a war. In a two-party war, while both parties can easily act offensively, the possibility of both parties proceeding defensively is excluded, unless they share territory. (Even then issues may arise as to which party, if any, was the aggressor, which started it, was responsible for starting it, and so on.) Thus mutually defensive wars between contemporary states are impossible (but would be possible if states shared territory, e.g. if Eire and Britain shared the territory of Northern Ireland). Tao-accredited wars were defensive wars, never wars aiming at domination: last-resort wars, in which no pride was taken (LTp.152).3 The pretence that offensive wars are defensive is widespread, and reflected in the subterfuge that departments or ministries of war are those of defence, security or whatever. (If they really were what they purport to be, we should be well on the way to an end to war.) Offensive practices are rendered defensive ones by shabby redefinitional strategems, such as redefining ‘defensive’ to include defence of ideals like democracy or liberty, infringed (or allegedly infringed) on territories abroad, or to include “defence" of a third party or place (whence every offensive war is “defensive”). In the present war in which part of Arabia is engulfed (February 1991), one party claims to be defending what really was (or should be) part of its territory, namely Kuwait, another party to be defending (what Kuwait did not enjoy) democracy. It is a doubly offensive war presented in this guise as jointly defensive. Aggressive wars are waged for a variety of reasons, but usually for resources or access to resources or markets, a matter often disguised by appeal to ideology (thus a war for oil is represented as a war of liberation). But there are other reasons than narrowly economic ones, such as religion (as with crusades), power and aggrandisement (as in building an empire), and so on. Nor are those reasons necessarily far separated; ideologies like Marxism and market 3 There is one line in LT that may suggest that attack was sometimes justifiable, namely ‘For deep love helps one to win in the case of attack’ (p.219). But how can compassion be appropriate unless this attack is within a defensive setting, a larger context of unavoidability or such like. A passage shortly below confirms this interpretation: I dare not take the offensive but I take the defensive: I dare not advance an inch but I retreat a foot (p.222). These are advances and attacks within a defensive setting. 9 capitalism, for example, exhibit many of the features of religion. The economic reasons for war appear to have become much more complex with the advent of an integrated world economy. At the same time many of the independent reasons for economic wars are now obsolete. For to powerful states accrue the advantages of war without war. At least most of the former economic advantages of war can be obtained without expensive wars, through trade, institution of economic dependence, etc. Small medieval wars were sometimes instituted for the collection of neighbouring riches and booty, a kind of piracy meeting conditions of war. “Small” contemporary wars can be waged for a remarkable mix of political-economy ends: to establish a regime favourable to economic penetration and profit repatriation, to subjugate markets and to remove competition, to boost a sagging weapons economy by using up old stocks and also testing new equipment, to restart a depressed economy, and so on. Such wars, along with the economic aims which motivate them, are in effect heavily castigated by Lao Tzu: When Tao prevails in the world, galloping horses are turned back to fertilize (the fields ...),. When Tao does not prevail in the world, war horses thrive in the suburbs. There is no calamity greater than lavish desires. (LT p.181). But it does exceed evidential warrant to claim that Tao is not only sufficient, but necessary, for cessation of such practices. The practice of regularly stimulating complex military-saturated economies through war is reminiscent of older, much ridiculed practices in simpler societies. They now ridicule the Tsembaga, who proceeded to destroy much of their surplus product by going to war every 5-15 years (cf Rapaport). But they do not similarly ridicule the most powerful nation on the Earth, the USA, which proceeds to write off a colossal amount of surplus in war every 10-20 years (the Gulf war liquidated some $1.7 billion per day). Taoists would. For ridicule was a favoured method, an important rhetorical strategem, and war and its idiocy were favourite targets. Some classification of defensive wars is also important, for various reasons: reducing and abolishing wars, their costs and damage, restructuring societies away from war and military practices, and, not least, for appreciating Taoism. A main distinction is between • conventional defence, maintained by armies of armed soldiers, many of them professionals, and • social defence, where there are no such armies or but fragments of them, and defence is carried out through social networks of a significant part of society.4 4 Details of social defence are presented in Sharp and in Martin. 10 It is here that Taoism and deep-green theory part company. Under Taoism, the state will have a standing army, but a defensive army operating by strange, surprise tactics (p.201). No doubt defensive wars are to remain last resort action. Nonetheless the state will operate in secrecy, in a way incompatible with decentralised social defence; people will be kept in the dark about smart weapons of the state; and they too will be surprised, along with presumed enemies of the state. By contrast, under deep-green theory, there should be no hidden smart weapons of state; information would flow more freely and not be hidden from the people (who should retain influence in informed decision making). Under deep-green, standing armies, and more generally military organisation, will be wound down altogether. Taoism should have pushed its searching criticism further. For military objectives, easily acquired by standing armies with time on their hands, are frequently incompatible with Taoism. For example, Taoism is opposed to domination (LT p.152), whereas military operations frequently seek or involve domination; and military structure is invariably hierarchical and authoritarian. Taoism aims for self-regulation, wherever feasible (cf. p.201); so does deep­ green theory, which is one reasons why it aims to dispose of standing armies, as an important preliminary to the withering away of states themselves (military forces being major props of state control and power, and often maintained primarily for internal state security). Taoism has no project for ending the era of wars; deep-green theory does. That project involves an elimination of standing armies, too often poised for fighting or political interference. A recommended route to end war consists in progressive scaling down: reduction of the means and manpower. The initial stages are well-known, and include • elimination of nuclear, biological and chemical weaponry, and • force reduction. It can hardly be pretended that the Earth's states have managed to proceed very far on even this complex of stages. The next stage consists in • contraction to defensive capacities only, and the final stage consists in • elimination of remaining military defensive forces, and adoption, so far as required, of social defence practices. The complete route thus involves complete demilitarisation. Reasons why deep-green aims to proceed the full distance are readily grasped by considering the environmental shallowness of an otherwise cogent traditional case for the sharp curtailment of wars and militarism. The traditional Western case against wars has been primarily along two dimensions: social and moral. Wars are highly disruptive of the social fabric; wars may be unjust. From these joint features, it was argued that wars should be a matter of last resort, to be fought to ensure peace. It was argued further that only just wars should be fought. Just wars were rare objects. But as there was little evidence of the decline and fall of wars, much effort was expended, more practically and unsuccessfully, upon endeavouring to improve the calibre of wars, and more theoretically, upon trying to characterize just war satisfactorily, or rather to bend the notion in an effort to approximate the gory unjust facts. 11 Progress was long hindered, furthermore, because there was always a rival positive perspective on wars, which encouraged the exaltation of wars and military feats. It also facilitated the transfer of the favourable image of war to other problem areas, whence the long and apparently successful war against Nature (but the short-term successes are turning into long-term problems), the short and unsuccessful war against Poverty, and so on. Behind all this is the complex idea of war as rejuvenating, even cleansing, like fire; of war as heroic, and glorious, of war as the supreme testing ground of men. These pictures of war - finally shattered by the first World War (where even the poets began to tell of horrors and atrocities) and subsequent technological wars - though no longer in ascendency, have by no means vanished. The notion of war as rejuvenating a flagging economy persists, along with the practice of keeping capitalism running smoothly by integrating substantial military components into the industrial engine. With the development of highly technological wars - the celebrated development of the dirty industrial age is substantially military - the traditional negative case has grown in strength. Wars have become much more damaging, with the potential for much more that is significantly worse, and the possibility of a just war has correspondingly contracted, virtually to zero. The opposition to war has likewise grown, but more than correspondingly with the rise of women in social and political influence. Wars have almost always and everywhere been Men's affairs; likewise conquest. Deep-green theory accepts much of the traditional negative case, but would further strengthen it. For example, the stricture against unjust wars, as out and out immoral, can be strengthened, through the following syllogism: All wars should be fully just wars. Modem wars cannot be fully just wars. Therefore, there should be no modern wars. A fully just war is not merely a just war, but a war those just character can be reliably forecast in advance. A modern war is of course a war that deploys modern technology, at least that available this century. The evidential basis for the second premiss derives from much information that collateral damage, damage to innocent bystanders and involved citizens is always likely and cannot be excluded. Such wars are always liable to violate uncontroversial requirements for a just war, even if they are purely “conventional” wars, not throwing radiation or chemical or biological weapons around. From a contemporary viewpoint the traditional doctrine of a just war, really of a just defensive vjsi, is seriously out of date. The reasons for this reach wider than the new features introduced by modem technological wars and the character of modem civilization, with its giant cities littered with dangerous and vulnerable military targets. They have also to do with the chauvinism of the justice proposed, which is shallow human justice, not natural or environmental justice. There is no consideration of justice to other creatures or to the Earth (cf Naess p.160). Two troubles are really intertwined here: conceptual difficulties with too narrow a notion of justice, and ideological difficulties with too narrow a vision of what is an object of value, of what counts. The deep-green case against war adds to the traditional case a further dimension, neglected until very recently: the environmental dimension. It has suddenly been seen that wars are typically environmental atrocities. Earlier, of course, “environments” were simply backgrounds, backdrops in paintings and plays, to the real drama. Contemporary technological wars tend to be not merely social tragedies but environmental ones as well. There is a doctrine of just war, but it is a human chauvinistic affair. There is no similarly developed doctrine of an ecologically sound war, a deep ecological war. Unless any such war were literally different from modern wars, that is from contemporary technological wars, it would overstep permitted bounds. For such wars are characteristically ecological disasters. Hardened military people, desensitized by a rigorous unethical training, feel even less compunction about degrading or destroying environments or members of other species than they do of maiming or killing civilians through “collateral” activity. Matching the no-just-war syllogism is a no-sound-war syllogism: All wars should be environmentally sound wars. Modern wars cannot be environmentally sound. Therefore, there should be no modern wars. The argument for the second premiss has of course to be different. It looks to the information accumulating on what wars do to natural and built environments. The Vietnam and Gulf wars both inflicted immense damage on natural environments or what was left of them. The environmental effects of war are not confined to direct and collateral damage. There are indirect effects also. Thus, for instance, war also supplied the mechanism of, and the technology for, modern environmental destruction: explosives, bulldozers from tanks, etc. As well, training for war and engagement in war have much fostered, along with attitudes that make for social callousness or ruthlessness, those that contribute to environmental insensitivity and cruelty. 3. Puzzles about Taoist strategy and its critiques of technology and violence ‘It is surprising how much of the Lao Tzu is devoted to military strategy’. Which strategies? Surprise, above all. But why such strategies? ‘Do they not contradict the Taoists’ strong opposition to the use of force’ (Chan p.222), the implied commitment to quietism? Briefly, Taoism is not committed to quietism, and while certainly antagonistic to violence, does not oppose certain uses of force (only really ///-forcing, as will be explained). Even so, the emphasis on military strategy remains puzzling. The strategies, many of them relevant to social defence, include • seriousness, not ‘making light of the enemy’ (p.222) 13 • surprise, and nonvisibility (p.201). The defensive strategy involves guerilla tactics: marching without formation, holding weapons without seeming to have them, confronting enemies without seeming to meet them (p.222). But even in times of peace, ‘smart weapons of the state should not be displayed to the people’ (p.164). Such recommendations helped to fuel the charge of deviousness lodged against Lao Tzu. But look at part of the reason for concealing smart weapons: ‘The more smart weapons the people have, the more troubled the state will be’ (p.201). Smart weapons are carried in corrupt states, where the rich engage in conspicuous consumption and the people are suppressed, not where Tao is practiced (LT p. 194). • advance from weakness, flexibility but firmness. Weakness is the principle of life and will overcome strength (LT p.164, p.233). • coolness and non-competition (LT p.233, p.164). Like these, most of the general strategies are standard Taoist practices simply applied to military conduct. For these standard practices the charge of deviousness looks feeble. The response applies more generally to other allegedly devious political strategies. For the strategies are but application of Taoist principles and techniques to warfare, politics and elsewhere. Nothing excludes application of these techniques to what are accounted, in general, unnecessary evils (which must sometimes, on other Taoist grounds, be countered). Nor, to meet the main criticism, need any deceit or deviousness be involved; nor is it. In particular, the legalist tactic, Tn order to grasp, it is necessary first to give’ (LT p.164), is cited as involving ‘an element of deceit’ ‘undeniably’, and ‘worse’ it is ‘morally questionable’ (Chan p.17). But in order for me to grasp your hand in a normal handshake, it is necessary first for me to give my hand. There is no deceit here, nothing morally questionable. All the tactics permit of benign construals, of a Taoist kind. Consider, for instance, Tn order to contract, it is necessary first to expand’ (LT p.164). In order to bend a copper pipe to the intended angle, it is better to bend it first a little further than required. The transformation of water to ice (both favoured natural items for symbolic purposes: natural processes which may look devious!) neatly illustrates the Taoist principle (which is however hardly necessary), and shows softness and weakness turned hardness and strength. The Taoist critique of militarism is as much a critique of technology as of war. Sharp weapons, ‘smart weapons’ as we might now say, come in for much critical attention, as we have already noticed. Only in corrupt and degenerate states are they displayed or flaunted (p.194, p.164); in deep-green regions smart weapons of state’ would not be retained unexhibited. The people will not have them for they mean trouble (p.201); for similar reasons deep-green regions will be free of them. So, it seems, will ideal Taoist regions: ‘Even if there are arrows and weapons, none will display them’ (LT p.238). Much technology, military and other, is excluded under the Taoist edict against violence (a further facet of the military-practices 14 paradox).5 The powerful critique of militarism in the Tao-te Ching is coupled with strong opposition to violence. Some of the linkage is evident enough. Militarism as practised represents an ultimate form of state (or party) violence. A basic theme is that violent practices will come to an unnatural end, and accordingly to a non-Taoist end (generalising LT p.176). While force may occur in spectacular, but satisfactory, natural forms, force is duly distinguished from violence. To force the growth of life means ill omen. For the mind to employ the vital force without restraint means violence (LT p. 197). One who follows Tao does not apply dominating force, which usually has had results bringing requital (p.152). Dominating force, like power, is in general castigated, under doctrine of wu- wei, no forced actions, no violence. To force natural growth is deviant, destroying harmony. To stop natural growth is deviant. But there is a significant difference between force and violence. To intentionally employ destructive force is to do violence. To so force things is condemned. To remain in harmony with things one does not so force things or practice violence. There is a non-interference principle at work, which also indicates types of non­ interference that are excluded. However Taoism does not always get the distinction between force and violence quite Under contemporary technology and technological arrangements, such as the storage of quantities of oil and nuclear and chemical materials in great cities, wars have assumed new and very destructive dimensions, to the point of being utterly irresponsible. A different approach to technology, as to war, is now mandatory. These are no longer things that can in principle be nicely confined and need not touch parties outside the fray. An important part of ending wars, “winning the war against wars”, is removing the technology of war, above all from irresponsible state power. As for which technology to try to jettison and which to try to retain or improve, it is not so difficult to indicate, provided evaluative terminology is not outlawed. What is wanted is technology that is good in its place, what should be excluded is technology that is indifferent or bad or potentially so. Technology to be justified has to do something worthwhile, it has to address identifiable respectable needs. That is why merely indifferent technology is out; there is no virtue in technology for technology's sake, as it is a mere means technique. It is because of the crucial evaluative component in choice of technology that appropriateness, itself evaluative, comes closer to encapsulating the criterion than other recent efforts. Size, such as smallness, or intermediateness, are not what matter, though modest and not excessive technologies are likely to fare better in satisfying appropriateness. In simpler societies, small technology is of course more appropriate; for that is what is good there. From known criteria for what is good these other features for locally appropriate technology can be read off: reliability, esp. in maintenance, functioning well and safely under the expected range of operating conditions (which may be difficult), ease of repair, capital cheapness and repair inexpensiveness, environmental benignness, and meeting sound social needs. 15 right. ‘Vital force without restraint’, intentionally excessive force, is only part of what counts as violence, which is more generally force which violates, i.e. transgresses, descrecrates, profanes, injures, outrages, etc. It is thus a negatively connoted force, an evil force in some specified intentional respect. There is a tendency for Taoist commentators, not Taoists, to regard Taoism as condemning all uses, or even occurrences, of force, but this is not so. Rather intentional ill-forcing is what is castigated, what is deviant. Thus Taoism does not exclude a range of defensive practices, which make satisfactory use of natural forces, like letting the machines of war industry stop. Those who would abolish war and its machinery, substituting for it nonwarlike and ideally nonviolent methods, technology, and strategies, have been confronted not merely with much sub-rational abuse but with plenty of criticism and even some paradoxes. Here is a recent paradox concerning war and nonviolence: • War must be abolished. One reason is simply economic. We can no longer afford it, and the opportunity costs are enormous. Along with other extraordinarily wasteful activities, it is an anachronism. • Doing so cannot be accomplished without violence, i.e. in effect, given the types of violence involved, without what amounts to war. According to a fuller version of this premiss, the process of abolishing a war would only be achieved through a revolution so profound that it could not succeed without extensive and extreme violence, amounting to (civil) war. ° But then war cannot be abolished without war. Therefore, war which must be abolished cannot be abolished.6 This “paradox” has been compared with the Liar paradox, but the parallel does not persist far. For this paradox does not involve self-referential features, and is easily broken, as follows. Let the “last war” be not the last standard war but the revolution abolishing war. Then, given that the revolution is successful, war will be abolished therewith, i.e. with that last war. There need be no regress, given again a successful outcome. All the premisses stand intact, but the conclusion, following the ‘therefore’ is a nonsequitur. However, while the dissolution of the argument is accordingly logically fine, the route is repugnant. Standard pacifism challenges the 6 Brian Medlin, who forcefully propounded this puzzle, set other analogous puzzles alongside it - designed to reveal deep difficulties in contemporary political, and especially alternative, thought. Another puzzle, concerning liberty and repression in the context of capitalism, revolved around the following inconsistent triad: • capitalism must be removed, but liberty retained. • capitalism cannot be removed without repression. • repression is antithetical to liberty. The puzzle is resolved as with the analogous puzzle of abolishing. Let the “last capitalist” action before the days of liberty be the repressive but liberating revolution overthrowing capitalism. 16 second premiss. 4. Standard and moral pacifism. Although Taoism is strongly opposed to war, and much in favour of peace - and accordingly by prevailing standards a substantially pacific position - it is not (nowhere in the central texts) committed to pacifism in usual senses, for two different reasons: • It is not, by contrast with pacifism, opposed to all types of warfare, for example smart defensive wars. • It eschews deontology in terms of which moral pacifism is commonly stated, for instance through the watershed thesis P2. It is morally wrong to use violence. By contrast with Taoism, deep environmentalism does not avoid deontic claims, and is committed in principle to nonviolent technologies and ways and to pacifistic principles. Moreover, certain forms of deep environmentalism are completely committed to pacifism, notably European forms. Is deep green? There is heavy contemporary opposition to pacifism, as there also was to Taoism in the warring times when Taoism was first being promulgated. Many of the central institutions of contemporary life are intricated in coercion, violence and war. The most prominent contemporary institutions, states, are premissed on these elements of damaging force; they claim entitlement to use them widely, and even claim a certain territorial monopoly on their use. As a result they are having constantly to engage in them in attempt to maintain that monopoly. They are certainly the main perpetrators of wars, and of violence. They are indeed inured to wars, are in constant preparation for wars, yet propound dialectial (and normally dishonest and cynical) doctrines of peace through war (for a recent example see the appendix). Unremarkably then, the extensive propagandistic machinery of state has invested heavily in “justificatory” exercises in favour of controlled use, its own use, of destructive force, and continues to inveigh against pacifism. Because a routine trick in this sophistical repetoire consists in conflating pacifism with extreme, naive and inplausible, forms, an inevitable and important early task commits in unscrambling senses of ‘pacifism’. Semantical skulduggery can be thwarted in this way. Pacifism, as explained by English dictionaries, invariably concerns wars and warfare, and contains two components, negative and, elaborating on that, positive:- The negative component is, in Amauld's word, anti-War-ism, opposition (in ways to be further specified) to all forms of warfare (see OED). The positive component supplies alternative ways of settling disputes (what it is supposed that wars with some semblance of justification involve), such as negotiation, arbitration, ... - and, adding to too narrow dictionary accounts - sanctions, substitutions (e.g. of sporting events, operatic contests, cooperative ventures), ... . In brief standard pacifism is opposition to all warfare and resolution of potential wars by other nonmilitary means. 17 Plainly the opposition to warfare, like the sanctions and so on, cannot itself be military (using soldiers and other devices of war), on pain of some incoherence. But otherwise the ways of opposition can be many and various: they can certainly be active, as with nonviolent demonstrations, resistance movements, and so forth, and they may also be devious (e.g. turning the forces of war upon themselves so they are neutralised). It quickly becomes evident, then, that some of the dictionaries offer but loaded definitions which, by restricting the negative components, reduce the initial appeal and plausibility of pacifism. Consider the Concise English definition of the negative component: ‘the doctrine of non-resistance to hostilities and of total non-co-operation with any form of warfare’. Thereby excluded are forms of pacifism which offer active and plausible alternatives to warfare such as social defence. The Concise English tends to force pacifism into what the Oxford English Dictionary lists as its final item: ‘often, with depreciatory implication, the advocacy of peace at any price’, ‘in any circumstance’. Pacifism can easily resist being forced into these sorts of circumstances: it has many resources, as an extensive series of texts on alternatives to war, such as negotiation, non­ violent action and social defence, from Taoism to contemporary environmentalism attest. Academic philosophers have much advanced the semantical strategy of some dictionaries, of rendering pacifism more difficult from the very outset by narrow and biassed definitions. They have stretched the term from its restricted setting of warfare, confined to state and organised gang violence, to cover all forms of violence, from state and interstate to, what is very different, personal and interpersonal violence. Call the resulting considerably stretched notion of pacifism, according to which it is morally wrong to use violence, according to which P2 holds, stretched pacifism? While stretched pacifism certainly includes standard pacifism (unless the notions of war and warfare are tampered with), the converse is very far from being the case. A pacifist is in no way committed to stretched pacifism, which is a much more problematic and difficult position than standard pacifism. There are several, substantially different reasons for this, which will be picked up seriatim. Stretched pacifism, also misleadingly called moral pacifism, has looked a very easy critical target to moral philosophers. Many the effusive philosopher who, upon sighting such a target, has charged, whooping such rhetoric as “incoherent”, “inconsistent”, “insensitive”, “fanatical”. However, with improved logical technology now available for accommodating and treating moral dilemmas, it is no great feat to resist such attacks, in the fashion of previous investigations (see esp. Al, also MD). A main aim was to demonstrate that stretched pacifism was not so stupid as it was made out to be or appeared to be to these inured to present dominant violent ways. So far from being stupid, it is viable. In future gentler times stretched pacifism 7 In Al this notion was contrasted with standard pacifism as comprehensive pacifism: overcomprehensive might have been better. 18 could even be realised for whole communities of creatures (as some genuinely Christian sects envisaged); whence it will finally be seen to be feasible not merely for sages and supermen, and many ordinary women, but much more extensively. The method of philosophical accommodation was through moral dilemmas. The sort of moral dilemma that stretched pacifism can induce derives as follows. On the one side stands the theme P2, Wv, in convenient symbols, for Wrong V-ing, violencing. Now this implies to WB, where B presents a case of of violence. On the other side, particular circumstances develop which lead to W ~B, because ~B would produce in the circumstances considerable wrong, for instance extensive violence, mass murder, etc. One stock example from the literature concerns calling off the firing squad about to shoot several captives if the pacifist shoots one of them (it is elaborated in Al p. 13). Interestingly, another stock example from the literature concerns standard pacifism (it can also be presented in terms of patriotism; for details of both see MD p. 10). Resolution of intractable moral dilemmas is, where it is required, situational. The agent decides in the situation, within the fix, what to do. There are many ways in which such decision making can proceed, less rational, such as those applying chance or involving bad faith, or more rational, such as those applying consequentialist decision theory (for details see MD, pp.32-9). A decision theory taking account of all that should be included will not however be purely consequential. It would also take account of relevant motivation. This defence and rehabilitation of moral pacifism has been challenged, in particular by Smith (hereafter JWS). JWS claims the defence offered is a ‘failure because it trivializes pacifism’ (p. 153 twice). The rehabilitation trivializes pacifism because it entails that pacifism doesn't substantially differ from a form of activism which holds that while violence is always wrong one is sometimes justified on consequentialist grounds for preferring violent acts, if these acts are lesser evils than any other real alternatives. This is the commonsense position which most people hold - yet - pacifism after all was supposed to be radical moral doctrine - (p.153 rearranged).8 Part of the criticism is, then, not so much that pacifism is trivialized - JWS “activism” is hardly trivial - as that pacifism is popularised, deflated from a radical position to the commonsense position most people hold (p.154 also). Yet not a shred of evidence is adduced that JWS activism is such a populist position. Available evidence, for example from peace movements and oppositional opinion polls, suggests the very opposite: that, for instance, most people support state-justified conventional wars with the military violence they incur, and 8 JWS now informs me that he has changed his position. Whether the move effects his criticism, I don't know. 19 accordingly do not hold that violence is always wrong. From such a commonsense angle, pacifism with its condemnation of conventional wars and the violence they involve remains a radical doctrine. As regards wars and other violence-incurring social authorities, contemporary pacificism is, as previous explained (e.g. Al p.3), a form of activism. Pacifism does not imply utter pacifity, but may actively involve social defence, resistance and so on. However a certain level of misrepresentation enters into the JWS challenge in the details of what forms of activism pacifism may include. That misrepresentation begins in the second clause concerning what is said to be sometimes justified. For the situational procedure where dilemmas arise will not generally be consequential applying a principle of lesser evil. In dilemmatic situations such principles are suspended, and such a principle is in any case unacceptable to moral pacifists. A small amount of violence may be less bad in its consequences than verbal offence, but a principled pacifist will choose the slightly greater evil where other obligations do not exclude it. A more serious distortion occurs in JWS's effort to force procedures in dilemma situations into purely consequentialist form. In fact consequential decision theory was deployed as a model only for how to proceed rationally in a situational setting where deontic procedures were suspended (see MD p.38). What was said, still misleadingly retrospective vision reveals, was this: ‘what is done is a very consequentialist thing’ (Al p.13), not ‘one acts in a consequentialist fashion to do the sufficiently good thing in the circumstances’ (JWS p.152). Situationally other procedures than those resembling orthodox rational decision making (modified from maximizing to satisizing objectives) may be adopted (MD p.38). Further the orthodox consequentialist theory is inadequate because it leaves out, or tries to reduce to consequences, nonconsequential elements, notably motives. It is not difficult, in principle (in advance of attempted consequentialization of motives), to design situations where motives, such as integrity or maintaining faith, enter to yield outcomes upsetting consequential calculations. More elaborate decision making procedures than those of consequentialism, sometimes at variance with consequentialism, are thus presupposed. A further part of JWS's criticism accordingly goes by the board, the alleged appeal ‘to “second best” consequentialist considerations,... already explicitly condemned’ (p. 154). What was condemned was stock universal consequentialism, ‘that only consequentialist considerations carry argumentative weight’ (quoted on p. 152), so undercutting other deontic principles, such as those of pacifism. It was not claimed, what is utterly different, that consequentialist considerations can nowhere enter into deliberation and decision making. The conclusion JWS arrives at is therefore substantially astray. After criticising modern moral philosophy for its reliance upon consequentialist modes of thought, it is surprising, and inconsistent, to find ... [reliance] upon such modes of thought to escape logical difficulties raised by moral dilemmas facing ... pacifis[m] (p. 152) 20 There is no inconsistency. JWS has confused universal with particular. As well he has wrongly contracted all situational decision making to consequentialist modes. There is a third part to the criticism, that the defence is too easy; the ‘strategy will allow too much violence to be (perpetrated and) justified to suit the tastes of any real pacifist’ (p. 153). This another part of the so-called trivialization, this time however dilution rather than populatization, weakening the moral stand against violence. This third contention is premissed on a mistake: that one can ‘justify on consequentialist grounds any number of violent acts, providing that such acts are lesser evils than other real alternatives facing social agents’ (p. 153). Moral pacifism offers no such licence; allowing such consequentialism to take over was never part of the position. The slide to such consequentialism is made on the strength of a similarly erroneous example. The potential victim of an aspiring rapist ‘is supposed to flee or wriggle free if possible. But it is easy to consequentially justify the use of violence by the woman to prevent herself from being raped’ (p. 153 italics added). In the example so far described there is no dilemma, and no such easy resort to consequentially ‘justified’ violence. What allows too much violence is the lesser evil JWS assumes is easily consequentially justified; for example that the woman is entitled to inflict, and escalate, violence so long as it remains ‘a lesser evil than the violence of attempted rape’ (p. 153). Since she may thereby inflict quite unreasonable damage (esp. if she is a Kung Fu expert), the result is inconsistent with ‘the basic principle of self-defence’ which JWS earlier adduced according to which what is ‘appropriate, in response is only that level of force necessary to defend oneself against the threat’ (p. 150). There is evidence in JWS's work of some enthusiasm for levels of violence which exceed his ‘basic principle’, his appeal to ‘lesser evil’ generates some instances. The ‘basic principle’, itself fraught with difficulties (cf. the contorted discussion of what weapons are appropriate in response to what attacks, p. 150), still exceeds what stretched pacifism would enjoin; for instance, it may not be appropriate to respond with force. But in a technical sense stretched pacifism is compatible with the ‘basic principle’, since it only imposes the upper bound on level of force. As for easiness, moral pacifism is not an easy position to live by, or to justify. Removing objections to pacifism is one thing; solidifying a positive case for it is quite another, and so far hardly conclusive (as Al tried to explain, pp 29-31). Stretched pacifism was advanced, hypothesized to put it more precisely, as a still viable option. It was not presented as a morally compulsory position, or, for that matter, as one that this defender adhered to or affirmed. To reiterate, while a cumulative case can be made for stetched pacifism as principled non­ violence, that case was not conclusive, and is hard to improve. For, further, some serious difficulties standing in the way of stretched pacifism were assembled, the most important of which derives from the extent of violence apparent in transactions within the natural world. Simply consider the practices of carnivores, essential to their natural way of life. In order to meet their life needs for sustenance, these creatures do, and are often obliged to, engage 21 routinely in violent activity. While it can no doubt be argued, as some vegetarians may do, that the natural order is an immoral order, and that remaining carnivores should be converted to vegetarianism as rapidly as proves possible (in the way domestic dogs are converted to dog biscuits), the difficulties with such proposals are immense. The task envisaged is gigantic, and beyond human capacities - even if it were desirable. For there are millions of species to be somehow converted to proper vegetarianism. Then there are millions of other species to be converted to proper and well regulated contraceptive practices, else their numbers will get out of hand (uncontrollably) with predation removed. Given humans lack of success in limiting their own excessive numbers, such regulation appears entirely remote. Aside however from the practical difficulties, is such a fully vegetarian order, with evolution further derailed, a desirable improvement on the natural order? Is it morally obligatory? It is certainly not obligatory, as alternative systems of morality in harmony with the prevailing natural order are feasible. Nor is it desirable, for (to appeal to such alternative value systems) the natural order is more or less in order as it is. Full vegetarianization would only reduce its value, vastly. More generally, a defensible ethical framework should not, it would be rightly contended, be right out of step with the natural order of other creatures, decently depicted. Decent depiction is important, for some features of the natural order, such as competition, combat and predation, so far from escaping attention, have been grossly exaggerated and exploited. Thus, for instance, the ludicrous picture of nature red in truth and claw, so beloved of descendents of orthodox Victorians and of orthodox economists. However, even under decent depiction, the natural order is often not benign. That appears to be enough to induce a supervenient moral dilemma for any stretched pacifism which is coupled to a deep ethic (e.g. which does not separate humans out from the natural order) and which eschews the desperate vegetarian route: The natural order is not an immoral order The natural order contains (regular) instances of violence. Therefore, instances of violence are not immoral - in apparent defiance of P2 Moreover, there are too many instances of violence, too regularly occurring, for them all to be plausibly shunted into the moral dilemma category (and predatory carnivores face no dilemmas). Raptors that practice violence every week are not immoral (neither are they clearly moral; the category of morality only significantly extends so far). The main trouble lies however with P2 (which needs some finer adjustment, as was alrady indicated in Al). While P2 is alright in context, within a particular, perfectly viable, ethical framework, designed for the usual human round, the conventional setting for ethical theories, it stands in need of modification outside that setting. It is time to suggest the sort of modification envisaged. Evidently P2 was addressed to moral agents. Which agents? Not to carnivores that supply their own livelihood, nor really to morally degenerate humans, but to 22 peace-sensitive agents. With that semi-technical form, yet to be characterised, a suitably modified P2 results: MP2. It is morally wrong, for a peace-sensitive agent, to use violence.9 To recover what amounts, in the previous discussive context, to P2, it suffices to add the proposition that every human agent ought to be peace-sensitive. Much as that proposition has to recommend it, it appears too ethically advanced for many modern humans; it sets too high a moral standard to be taken as a serious guide to practice. It seems wise to settle presently for something less demanding, such as that every advanced moral agent ought to be peace sensitive. To put essentially the same proposition alternatively: Stretched pacifism (as modified) is supererogatory. While it is perhaps too late to hope for much moral progress in humans, it is pleasant to contemplate alternative futures where what is supererogatory became obligatory, and widely practiced. Richard Sylvan* Appendix I began drafting this essay at the time (January 17, midday Australian time) of the American attacks upon Iraq. The optly named Prime Minister Hawke of Australia had just made a statement to the nation-state, announcing (the) war. In this statement there was much talk of peace. There was even - in what was effectively a declaration of war - reiteration of the modern quest for ‘a new world order of peace’. Peace through war; so it rings out again and again, through the centuries. ‘War must be for the sake of peace’ (Aristotle p.220). More than two thousand years later, we have fought those wars to end all wars. But it is no use, Hawke solemely pronounced, just talking about peace, and thinking about peace; we must work for peace, fight for it - through war. Impeccable logic? President Bush, supreme commander, convinced us with similar logic, speaking too with many tongues. Of how he ‘preferred to think of peace, not war’. But now ‘only force will prevail’, as ‘all reasonable efforts to reach a peaceful solution are exhausted’. ‘What must be done’ must be done, or will be anyway. With God on side with the US offensive (as well as on the other side), it will go well. As it was said to have, though it achieved comparatively little that other efforts may not have yielded more satisfactorily, and thought it may now have to 9 The generalization of P2, suggested in Al, to cover also the parallel situation of environmental vandalism, can be similarly modified. The anti-vandolence principle becomes MP2°. It is morally wrong, for a peace- and environmentally-sensitive agent, to use vandolence. Thank to David Bennett for joint contributions (from UT) and to JWS for opposition (in JWS) I 23 followed with another invasion. Nor have we ever managed to glimpse much of what is now supposed, when we are no longer engaged, to come ‘out of the horror of war’: a ‘new world order ... which governs the conflict of nations’; a ‘rule of law’, not war. How the one, enforcable law, is achieved, unless backed by the the other, is not explained (Medlin's paradox hits back). Similarly what we now hear from many militarists, as they rush to war, is that ‘peace is a great good, war a great evil’. But, for the most part, only the rhetoric has shifted; practice has scarcely changed at all. REFERENCES W.-T. Chan, A Source Book on Chinese Philosophy, Princeton University Press, 1963; referred to as ST. W.-T. Chan (ed.), The Way of Lao Tzu (Tao-te Ching), Bobbs-Merrill, New York, 1963; referred to as LT. B. Martin, Uprooting War, Freedom Press, London, 1984. A. Naess, Ecology, community and lifestyle, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge UK, 1989. R.A. Rapaport, Pigs for the Ancestors : ritual in the ecology of a New Guinea People, Yale University Press, New Haven, 1967. R. Routley, ‘War and Peace II. On the alleged inconsistency, moral insensitivity and fanaticism of pacifism’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #9, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1983 (also in Inquiry ); referred to as Al. R. Routley and V. Plumwood, ‘Moral dilemmas and the logic of deontic notions’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #6, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1984 (also in Paraconsistent Logic)’, referred to as MD. R. Routley, ‘War and Peace I. On the ethics of large-scale nuclear war and nuclear-deterrence and the political fall-out’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy, #5, Research School Of Social Science, Australian National University, 1984. G. Sharp, Social Power and Political Freedom, Porter Sargent, Boston, 1980. J.W. Smith, The Worms at the Heart of Things , Public Relations Unit, Flinders University, 1989. R. Sylvan, ‘War and Peace III, Australia's defence philosophy’, Social Philosophy, for Nuclear Conference, University of Queensland, 1985. R. Sylvan and D. Bennett, ‘Of Utopias, Tao and Deep Ecology’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #19, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1990; referred to as UT. 2 more widely, ‘to life in general’ (p. 17). But why should military activity obtain some special dispensation? Why should what is not tolerated more generally be exonerated there? But given that Taoism has here the virtue of consistency (i.e. uniformity on principles) and of universalizability, that simply leaves more explaining to be done. • Puzzles for Taoism, and wars as unavoidable evils There are two puzzles here in Taoism rather than one. There is the military-practices paradox, and, varying and generalising on that, there are life-practices paradoxes. The special paradox is generated by the following incompatible elements: on the one side, ‘the most bitter attack on militarism’, the well-known opposition of Taoism to the use of force (p.17) and to the possession and use of smart military weapons and technology - implying that war is far from all right - and on the other, advocacy of certain (devious) military tactics, outlines of (deceitful) conduct in war, and so on - implying that war is all right after all. A straightforward generalisation of this paradox would look at other morally-sensitive parts of life, where some practice was strongly condemned yet engaged in (for many examples, see the dilemmas assembled in MD). But the variation of concern to Chan and the neo-Confucians concerns the conjunction of upright with devious practices in life, in particular in the life of the sage. For a Taoist sage is presumed to lead an upright straightforward life, yet appears to engage in devious and even deceitful practices incompatible with such a life-style. Call this the Taoist-lifestyle paradox. Evidently a good deal of explaining is required, as to how Taoism can coherently take the positions it appears to presume, both on war and peace, and on life more generally. A desirable preliminary would seem to be a little investigation of what position is taken, especially on war and militarism. One key pasage runs: Fine weapons are instruments of evil They are hated by creatures Therefore those who possess the Tao turn away from them.... Weapons are instruments of evil, not the instruments of a good ruler. When he uses them unavoidably, he regards calm restraint as the best principle Even when he is victorious, he does not regard it as praiseworthy, For to praise victory is to delight in the slaughter of men. He who delights in the slaughter of men will not succeed in the empire. ... For a victory, let us observe the occasion with funeral-ceremonies (LT p.154). Wars, which involve the use of weapons, instruments of evil, are accordingly themselves evil. They are also evil because they involve the slaughter of men. But they are also sometimes unavoidable (also p.152). Therefore such wars are unavoidable evils. Such discourse, obtained by almost immediate inference from the passage, is within the standard orbit of dilemma talk. But Taoism lacks, through deliberately eschewing deontic talk, the discourse which enables direct expression of such dilemmas, or even direct condemnation of wars or of clever weapons. Instead the points are made by circumlocution, what the possesser of Tao 3 does, how the good ruler conducts himself, or by analogy, of victory in war with death. Unavoidable evils are the very stuff of deontic dilemmas (though many theories, underpinned by shonky logic, lack the resources for representing this stuff properly). Where something is unavoidably evil, it is both bad, because evil, and also not bad, doing it is excusable, because it is unavoidable. So, given such an argument (which has its weaknesses), an unavoidable evil is a genuinely dilemmatic object with inconsistent features. Certain wars have looked, since ancient times, like such dilemmatic objects. Revealingly, Chan tries to explain that ‘most troublesome element’ in Taoism, the military-practice paradox, through the following exercise in lateral thinking: It can ... be argued that Lao Tzu uses warfare to illustrate his principles of taking no action and weakness because warfare is among the most dynamic and critical of human experiences, just as the Indian classic, the Bhagavadgita chooses fighting as the theme on which to discuss the terrible dilemma whether one should fulfil his duty, as in the case of a soldier, and kill, or should fail in his duty and refrain from killing (p. 17). ‘Just as’? The Indian classic prevents a classic moral dilemma, a dilemma represented in contemporary philosophy (following its rediscovery by Sartre), where there are incompatible duties: the duty to kill, because of one's role as a soldier, and the duty not to kill, because of one's human condition, and the supervenient dilemma of failing in and fulfilling one's duties. These dilemmas for an individual (male, as it then was) are replicated in dilemmas regarding war for group institutions: at bottom, the obligation to engage in war (for one set of compelling reasons) as contraposed with the obligation not to engage in war (for another, perhaps overlapping, set of reasons). A theory of moral dilemmas (as worked out for example in MD) is crucial for an adequate treatment of major issues in war and peace, especially (as will become evident) for a viable strong pacifism. But Taoism, eschewing deontic discourse, lacks the apparatus to state or develop moral dilemmas. Hence it is logically excluded from giving a full or adequate account of what is going on conceptually. One of the philosophically fascinating feature of Taoism is the fashion in which it manages to avoid deontic discourse, and to substitute for direct deontic discourse or improvise circumlocutions when deontic discourse would otherwise appear inevitable (cf. UT for examples). But there are costs. One is inability to display the mechanism of deontic dilemmas, or to show what reasons and argument lie behind Taoist prounouncements and conclusions (the shortage of Taoism on argument is another philosophically conspicious feature, also observed in UT). As conceptual apparatus for analysizing moral dilemmas is missing, most of the machinery involved has to be passed over. Only the outcomes, as Taoism sees them, are presented, as if from a black box. Taoism blacks out the story on deontic dilemmas that deep-green theory can tell, as the following diagram tries to show: 4 Diagrams . Charting the processing of deontic dilemmas that are “resolved”. Deep-green chart: Arguments to Processing of dilemma, directive dilemma incompatible situational procedures output input prescriptions Corresponding Taoist chart: Black directive Box output It is evident that Taoism can be extended', information can be put into the Black Box rendering it less opaque. That extension can be made so as to conform to deep-green theory, i.e. so that the extended Taoist chart, a neo-Daoist chart, looks like the deep-green one. That is indeed essentially how neo-Daoism get characterised, in terms of conformity of the extension to deep ecological theory (see UT). We are now placed to explain how to dissolve, or at least neutralize, the paradoxes deriving from repudiation of militarism, an awkwardly qualified repudiation in the case of Taoism. In a significant sense there is no resolving of genuine deontic dilemmas. The principles delineating the fix may stand, incompatible, signalling the persisting suboptimality (or better, sublimenality) of the dilemmatic situation. Where there is a dilemma, involved parties should try to do well enough in the sublimenal circumstances (for a much fuller account, see MD). Thus where there is a war, itself a non-Taoist process, engaged or caught up Taoists will not abandon Taoism. Taoist methods will be applied, Taoist strategies pursued. So much for theoretical representation and (non-)resolution of life-practices and other dilemmas, details of which are readily elaborated in deep-green extensions of Taoism. A prior substantive issue is whether dilemmas always are generated: not whether wars are evil (typically they are, an issue we shall come to), but whether wars are unavoidable. Analysis of wars does not bear that familiar claim out decisively. Many wars could have been avoided, through conciliation, negotiation, restraint, etc., and no worse results apparently obtained, through sanctions, exchange, trade, etc. Through a typology of wars (coming up) that conjecture can be given some substance. Consider, for instance, what would be walk-overs. Then there is little point in making a military response. So war can be avoided. Certainly an occupation, to be met in a different way, may still occur. And so on, perhaps, for various other types of war. But, more generally, try this:- 5 Every war involves an aggressor, who makes an aggressive move. Such an aggressor could always avoid that move, taking a different (or a do-nothing) course of action. Therefore, every war can be avoided. No war is entirely unavoidable. Setting aside determinism (which renders all actual wars along with all other events unavoidable), it could be argued that a war sometimes simply boils up, without an aggressor, an intensification of a conflagatory situation. There are grounds for scepticism regarding such examples; for such intensification can only occur if provocative military moves are made, for instance troops are stationed in provocative or risky positions. The presumption that certain wars are unavoidable typically derives from a one-sided perspective on war, a defender's perspective. A defender has no option, so it is routinely averred, but to respond to a determined aggressor. Even z/that should be so sometimes, when there is no running away or going underground, it does not establish that such a war is unavoidable; for it neglects the role of the aggressor. By a smarter formulation, relevant features of unavoidability can be captured. Although wars may not be unavoidable, defensive action in wars that have been initiated may be unavoidable. At least such action may be unavoidable if unacceptably high costs (death, enslavement, etc.) are not to be avoided. Thereupon another highly relevant feature emerges: the linkage of avoidability to costs. For whether an action is unavoidable then depends upon what costs a party is prepared to incur before and when insisting on action: but this appears entirely unacceptable. How can what is “unavoidable” cease to be so when some further costs are absorbed? However with basics like survival, a certain liberty, and so on, we do reach such bounds. An important type of unavoidability. We also reach scenarios, unavailable to Lao Tzu but kindly brought within range by modem technology, which may appear to justify aggressive strikes. State Z, while not an aggressor, is carrying out practices which will impose unacceptably high costs upon peoples of other states and implacably refuses to desist. It could, for example, be poisoning air or water flowing to other states. But ,to make the case vivid, let us suppose that state Z is constructing, for reasons Zeders find convincing (they are committed to a faith which depicts all humans as incorrigible sinners and unworthy of life), an effective doomsday machine. Would an (aggressive) preemptory strike designed to disable or destroy the machine be unavoidable?1 In a sense, No; in another Yes. For different modalities can operate. Physically outsiders need to do nothing, but watch Zeders go about their zealous work. But deontically they are under heavy moral pressure, because of the costs of standing by idly: if the human race is worth anything very substantial, then they are obliged to act, action is deontically 1 Whether it would be justifiable, or just, are separate issues. But it is evident enought that such scenarios further damage the obsolescent idea of just war. For, according to received doctrine, a just war is defensive. (How such a war can be fought at all is another matter; coherence requires relativization to ‘just vwcfor party d’.) 6 unavoidable. Here is a situation where a proposed reduction of deontic logic proves illuminating. Obligation is explicated through not implying, or necessitating, the sanction, i.e. excessive ethical costs such as extermination. Let us explain deontic unavoidability analogously: an action is so unavoidable if not undertaking it would result in excessive ethical costs. Then if it can be established that there is no other way than a military strike, an act of war, to ensure that the Zeders desist (and certainly we can envisage scenarios like that), then that is deontically unavoidable. It is also dilemmatic for those committed to, or inclined towards pacifism; and it is, for them at least, but paradoxically justifiable, as the negation is also justifiable, on pacific grounds. Scenarios like that sketched, that appear to render certain wars deontically unavoidable require but little or no elaboration to render them evil. Evil indeed is such a standard feature of standard wars that at least its great presence call for little supporting evidence. But it has taken to vast stretch of human history to reach this general point of recognition. The manifold evils of war Lao Tzu very early recognised and emphasized: Wherever armies are stationed, briars and thorns grow. Great wars are always followed by famines (p. 152). And nowadays followed by great tides of refugees. This passage includes not only recognition of the widely-observed socio-environmental consequences of war, but, more striking, very early recognition of the severe environmental impact of military forces. That critique is not however developed in Taoism.2 Only recently has it been pushed substantially further. And only recently could a new, most significant twist occur, the merging of resource security, long a military objective, with environmental security. The appalling idea has recently been floated that the military, in need of new work and roles with the apparent warming of West-East relations and cooling of the Cold War, should exchange usual military idleness for meddling in environmental matters: regulation and policing of environmental resources, ensurance of environmental security of powerful states, and similar. This is a bit like reassigning those imprisoned for child abuse to managing kindergartens; for consider the impressive military record of environmental vandalism. What the military is alleged to offer is a structure appropriate and available for handling such matters. But, to the contrary, it is precisely the sort of hierarchical, authoritarian expensive structure that should be wound down and up as soon as the opportunity appears, as (briefly) now, rather than being retained and shockingly reoriented (as a state-serving “Greenwar”). 2 But a bridge to deep-green theory can be made through neo-Daoism, an updating of Taoism in confirmity with deep ecology (which however is somewhat thin and threadbare on war; for what there is so far, see Naess p.160). On neo-Daoism, see UT. 7 2. On the divergence of deep-green from Taoism. Having arrived, by better or worse arguments, at the conclusion that wars, though generally evil, may be sometimes unavoidable, it is evidently important to say something about how they — those of the theoretical residue — are to be conducted. By appropriate conduct the damage they do may be reduced; also the conduct should be appropriate to the funereal nature of wars (to exceed Taoist resources for stating this sort of point). It is at this stage that deep­ green theory begins to diverge from Taoism. In further explaining the Taoist and deep-green critiques of war, and diverting objections to them, a rough and preliminary typology of wars is important. It is also of passing interest in its own philosophical right. War, according to English Dictionaries, is a ‘contest carried on by force of arms, typically between nations or states’. More exactly, war is a game - in the generous technical sense of game-theory, with players, rules, goals, strategies, and so on carried on in significant part by military means, normally between states or substates. Call the contestants, (warring) parties. They typically represent of course larger populations. The set­ up between parties resembles the arrangements of players in game theory. There are several analogical extensions of the term war to cover games where one of the parties is an object, construed as hostile (an enemy of the state), such as Crime, Drugs, Poverty or Nature. These we can set aside as analogical wars. Of course wars form only a part of military activities. Military interests and objectives have always stretched significantly further than war, to include surveillence and security, easily extended to resource security, environmental security and life­ style security, and beyond that to political stability and other political matters. Evidently military ambitions have far over-extended themselves in bagging such democratic concerns. An anarchist solution to the whole problem of war, which some have seen Taoism as reaching towards, is immediate: eliminate the source of war, states. Unfortunately it is not quite that simple (and that's not simple). For wars can also occur between nations, cultures, races or tribes (which are not such artifices as states, and not always so readily or desirably abolished), between inhabited regions, and between factions within states (thus civil wars) or, perhaps by extension, between factions within other social structures (thus, for instance, gang wars). But undoubtedly eliminating states and aspiring states would abolish most wars and virtually all the worst wars. While “nonviolent wars” are excluded by definition, by virtue of ‘force of arms’, token wars, limited wars, and so on, are not: for instance, wars fought by small armed teams representing competing sides (cf. medieval and science fiction war games). As wars are hemmed in by conventions and agreed rules, there is no reason in principle why they should not be reduced to two person contests, fought under strict rules like boxing or gladiatorial contests. But in modem times wars have never taken such sensible forms, but have been much larger affairs, making heavy (though fortunately restricted) use of latest technology. Let us distinguish such wars as techno-powered wars. They have, directly or indirectly (for the 8 technology may be bought or bartered), a heavy research and development support structure (indeed the bulk of contemporary science is devoted - misdirected - in one way or another to this effort). Among wars, an important distinction is that between offensive and defensive wars. An offensive war is one which ventures off a given party's territory or recognised pad, “invading” that of another party or parties; correlatively defensive parties, if they have not also invaded. Force projection typifies offensive practice. Plainly, offensiveness and defensiveness are not strictly features of a war, but of parties to a war. In a two-party war, while both parties can easily act offensively, the possibility of both parties proceeding defensively is excluded, unless they share territory. (Even then issues may arise as to which party, if any, was the aggressor, which started it, was responsible for starting it, and so on.) Thus mutually defensive wars between contemporary states are impossible (but would be possible if states shared territory, e.g. if Eire and Britain shared the territory of Northern Ireland). Tao-accredited wars were defensive wars, never wars aiming at domination: last-resort wars, in which no pride was taken (LT p.152).3 The pretence that offensive wars are defensive is widespread, and reflected in the subterfuge that departments or ministries of war are those of defence, security or whatever. (If they really were what they purport to be, we should be well on the way to an end to war.) Offensive practices are rendered defensive ones by shabby redefinition al strategems, such as redefining ‘defensive’ to include defence of ideals like democracy or liberty, infringed (or allegedly infringed) on territories abroad, or to include “defence” of a third party or place (whence every offensive war is “defensive”). In the present war in which part of Arabia is engulfed (February 1991), one party claims to be defending what really was (or should be) part of its territory, namely Kuwait, another party to be defending (what Kuwait did not enjoy) democracy. It is a doubly offensive war presented in this guise as jointly defensive. Aggressive wars are waged for a variety of reasons, but usually for resources or access to resources or markets, a matter often disguised by appeal to ideology (thus a war for oil is represented as a war of liberation). But there are other reasons than narrowly economic ones, such as religion (as with crusades), power and aggrandisement (as in building an empire), and so on. Nor are those reasons necessarily far separated; ideologies like Marxism and market There is one line in LT that may suggest that attack was sometimes justifiable, namely ‘For deep love helps one to win in the case of attack’ (p.219). But how can compassion be appropriate unless this attack is within a defensive setting, a larger context of unavoidability or such like. A passage shortly below confirms this interpretation: I dare not take the offensive but I take the defensive: I dare not advance an inch but I retreat a foot (p.222). These are advances and attacks within a defensive setting. 9 capitalism, for example, exhibit many of the features of religion. The economic reasons for war appear to have become much more complex with the advent of an integrated world economy. At the same time many of the independent reasons for economic wars are now obsolete. For to powerful states accrue the advantages of war without war. At least most of the former economic advantages of war can be obtained without expensive wars, through trade, institution of economic dependence, etc. Small medieval wars were sometimes instituted for the collection of neighbouring riches and booty, a kind of piracy meeting conditions of war. “Small” contemporary wars can be waged for a remarkable mix of political-economy ends: to establish a regime favourable to economic penetration and profit repatriation, to subjugate markets and to remove competition, to boost a sagging weapons economy by using up old stocks and also testing new equipment, to restart a depressed economy, and so on. Such wars, along with the economic aims which motivate them, are in effect heavily castigated by Lao Tzu: When Tao prevails in the world, galloping horses are turned back to fertilize (the fields ...). When Tao does not prevail in the world, war horses thrive in the suburbs. There is no calamity greater than lavish desires. (LT p. 181). But it does exceed evidential warrant to claim that Tao is not only sufficient, but necessaTy, for cessation of such practices. The practice of regularly stimulating complex military-saturated economies through war is reminiscent of older, much ridiculed practices in simpler societies. They now ridicule the Tsembaga, who proceeded to destroy much of their surplus product by going to war every 5-15 years (cf Rapaport). But they do not similarly ridicule the most powerful nation on the Earth, the USA, which proceeds to write off a colossal amount of surplus in war every 10-20 years (the Gulf war liquidated some $1.7 billion per day). Taoists would. For ridicule was a favoured method, an important rhetorical strategem, and war and its idiocy were favourite targets. Some classification of defensive wars is also important, for various reasons: reducing and abolishing wars, their costs and damage, restructuring societies away from war and military practices, and, not least, for appreciating Taoism. A main distinction is between • conventional defence, maintained by armies of armed soldiers, many of them professionals, and • social defence, where there are no such armies or but fragments of them, and defence is carried out through social networks of a significant part of society.4 4 Details of social defence are presented in Sharp and in Martin. 10 It is here that Taoism and deep-green theory part company. Under Taoism, the state will have a standing army, but a defensive army operating by strange, surprise tactics (p.201). No doubt defensive wars are to remain last resort action. Nonetheless the state will operate in secrecy, in a way incompatible with decentralised social defence; people will be kept in the dark about smart weapons of the state; and they too will be surprised, along with presumed enemies of the state. By contrast, under deep-green theory, there should be no hidden smart weapons of state; information would flow more freely and not be hidden from the people (who should retain influence in informed decision making). Under deep-green, standing armies, and more generally military organisation, will be wound down altogether. Taoism should have pushed its searching criticism further. For military objectives, easily acquired by standing armies with time on their hands, are frequently incompatible with Taoism. For example, Taoism is opposed to domination (LT p.152), whereas military operations frequently seek or involve domination; and military structure is invariably hierarchical and authoritarian. Taoism aims for self-regulation, wherever feasible (cf. p.201); so does deep­ green theory, which is one reasons why it aims to dispose of standing armies, as an important preliminary to the withering away of states themselves (military forces being major props of state control and power, and often maintained primarily for internal state security). Taoism has no project for ending the era of wars; deep-green theory does. That project involves an elimination of standing armies, too often poised for fighting or political interference. A recommended route to end war consists in progressive scaling down: reduction of the means and manpower. The initial stages are well-known, and include • elimination of nuclear, biological and chemical weaponry, and • force reduction. It can hardly be pretended that the Earth's states have managed to proceed very far on even this complex of stages. The next stage consists in • contraction to defensive capacities only, and the final stage consists in • elimination of remaining military defensive forces, and adoption, so far as required, of social defence practices. The complete route thus involves complete demilitarisation. Reasons why deep-green aims to proceed the full distance are readily grasped by considering the environmental shallowness of an otherwise cogent traditional case for the sharp curtailment of wars and militarism. The traditional Western case against wars has been primarily along two dimensions: social and moral. Wars are highly disruptive of the social fabric; wars may be unjust. From these joint features, it was argued that wars should be a matter of last resort, to be fought to ensure peace. It was argued further that only just wars should be fought. Just wars were rare objects. But as there was little evidence of the decline and fall of wars, much effort was expended, more practically and unsuccessfully, upon endeavouring to improve the calibre of wars, and more theoretically, upon trying to characterize just war satisfactorily, or rather to bend the notion in an effort to approximate the gory unjust facts. 11 Progress was long hindered, furthermore, because there was always a rival positive perspective on wars, which encouraged the exaltation of wars and military feats. It also facilitated the transfer of the favourable image of war to other problem areas, whence the long and apparently successful war against Nature (but the short-term successes are turning into long-term problems), the short and unsuccessful war against Poverty, and so on. Behind all this is the complex idea of war as rejuvenating, even cleansing, like fire; of war as heroic, and glorious, of war as the supreme testing ground of men. These pictures of war - finally shattered by the first World War (where even the poets began to tell of horrors and atrocities) and subsequent technological wars — though no longer in ascendency, have by no means vanished. The notion of war as rejuvenating a flagging economy persists, along with the practice of keeping capitalism running smoothly by integrating substantial military components into the industrial engine. With the development of highly technological wars - the celebrated development of the dirty industrial age is substantially military - the traditional negative case has grown in strength. Wars have become much more damaging, with the potential for much more that is significantly worse, and the possibility of a just war has correspondingly contracted, virtually to zero. The opposition to war has likewise grown, but more than correspondingly with the rise of women in social and political influence. Wars have almost always and everywhere been Men's affairs; likewise conquest. Deep-green theory accepts much of the traditional negative case, but would further strengthen it. For example, the stricture against unjust wars, as out and out immoral, can be strengthened, through the following syllogism: All wars should be fully just wars. Modem wars cannot be fully just wars. Therefore, there should be no modern wars. A fully just war is not merely a just war, but a war those just character can be reliably forecast in advance. A modern war is of course a war that deploys modern technology, at least that available this century. The evidential basis for the second premiss derives from much information that collateral damage, damage to innocent bystanders and involved citizens is always likely and cannot be excluded. Such wars are always liable to violate uncontroversial requirements for a just war, even if they are purely “conventional” wars, not throwing radiation or chemical or biological weapons around. From a contemporary viewpoint the traditional doctrine of a just war, really of a just defensive war, is seriously out of date. The reasons for this reach wider than the new features introduced by modem technological wars and the character of modern civilization, with its giant cities littered with dangerous and vulnerable military targets. They have also to do with the chauvinism of the justice proposed, which is shallow human justice, not natural or environmental justice. There is no consideration of justice to other creatures or to the Earth (cf 12 Naess p.160). Two troubles are really intertwined here: conceptual difficulties with too narrow a notion of justice, and ideological difficulties with too narrow a vision of what is an object of value, of what counts. The deep-green case against war adds to the traditional case a further dimension, neglected until very recently: the environmental dimension. It has suddenly been seen that wars are typically environmental atrocities. Earlier, of course, “environments” were simply backgrounds, backdrops in paintings and plays, to the real drama. Contemporary technological wars tend to be not merely social tragedies but environmental ones as well. There is a doctrine of just war, but it is a human chauvinistic affair. There is no similarly developed doctrine of an ecologically sound war, a deep ecological war. Unless any such war were literally different from modern wars, that is from contemporary technological wars, it would overstep permitted bounds. For such wars are characteristically ecological disasters. Hardened military people, desensitized by a rigorous unethical training, feel even less compunction about degrading or destroying environments or members of other species than they do of maiming or killing civilians through “collateral” activity. Matching the no-just-war syllogism is a no-sound-war syllogism: All wars should be environmentally sound wars. Modern wars cannot be environmentally sound. Therefore, there should be no modern wars. The argument for the second premiss has of course to be different. It looks to the information accumulating on what wars do to natural and built environments. The Vietnam and Gulf wars both inflicted immense damage on natural environments or what was left of them. The environmental effects of war are not confined to direct and collateral damage. There are indirect effects also. Thus, for instance, war also supplied the mechanism of, and the technology for, modern environmental destruction: explosives, bulldozers from tanks, etc. As well, training for war and engagement in war have much fostered, along with attitudes that make for social callousness or ruthlessness, those that contribute to environmental insensitivity and cruelty. 3. Puzzles about Taoist strategy and its critiques of technology and violence ‘It is surprising how much of the Lao Tzu is devoted to military strategy’. Which strategies? Surprise, above all. But why such strategies? ‘Do they not contradict the Taoists’ strong opposition to the use of force’ (Chan p.222), the implied commitment to quietism? Briefly, Taoism is not committed to quietism, and while certainly antagonistic to violence, does not oppose certain uses of force (only really ///-forcing, as will be explained). Even so, the emphasis on military strategy remains puzzling. The strategies, many of them relevant to social defence, include • seriousness, not ‘making light of the enemy’ (p.222) 13 • surprise, and nonvisibility (p.201). The defensive strategy involves guerilla tactics: marching without formation, holding weapons without seeming to have them, confronting enemies without seeming to meet them (p.222). But even in times of peace, ‘smart weapons of the state should not be displayed to the people’ (p.164). Such recommendations helped to fuel the charge of deviousness lodged against Lao Tzu. But look at part of the reason for concealing smart weapons: ‘The more smart weapons the people have, the more troubled the state will be’ (p.201). Smart weapons are carried in corrupt states, where the rich engage in conspicuous consumption and the people are suppressed, not where Tao is practiced (LT p.194). • advance from weakness, flexibility but firmness. Weakness is the principle of life and will overcome strength (LT p.164, p.233). • coolness and non-competition (LT p.233, p.164). Like these, most of the general strategies are standard Taoist practices simply applied to military conduct. For these standard practices the charge of deviousness looks feeble. The response applies more generally to other allegedly devious political strategies. For the strategies are but application of Taoist principles and techniques to warfare, politics and elsewhere. Nothing excludes application of these techniques to what are accounted, in general, unnecessary evils (which must sometimes, on other Taoist grounds, be countered). Nor, to meet the main criticism, need any deceit or deviousness be involved; nor is it. In particular, the legalist tactic, Tn order to grasp, it is necessary first to give’ (LT p.164), is cited as involving ‘an element of deceit’ ‘undeniably’, and ‘worse’ it is ‘morally questionable’ (Chan p.17). But in order for me to grasp your hand in a normal handshake, it is necessary first for me to give my hand. There is no deceit here, nothing morally questionable. All the tactics permit of benign construals, of a Taoist kind. Consider, for instance, Tn order to contract, it is necessary first to expand’ (LT p.164). In order to bend a copper pipe to the intended angle, it is better to bend it first a little further than required. The transformation of water to ice (both favoured natural items for symbolic purposes: natural processes which may look devious!) neatly illustrates the Taoist principle (which is however hardly necessary), and shows softness and weakness turned hardness and strength. The Taoist critique of militarism is as much a critique of technology as of war. Sharp weapons, ‘smart weapons’ as we might now say, come in for much critical attention, as we have already noticed. Only in corrupt and degenerate states are they displayed or flaunted (p.194, p.164); in deep-green regions smart weapons of state’ would not be retained unexhibited. The people will not have them for they mean trouble (p.201); for similar reasons deep-green regions will be free of them. So, it seems, will ideal Taoist regions: ‘Even if there are arrows and weapons, none will display them’ (LT p.238). Much technology, military and other, is excluded under the Taoist edict against violence (a further facet of the military-practices 14 paradox).5 The powerful critique of militarism in the Tao-te Ching is coupled with strong opposition to violence. Some of the linkage is evident enough. Militarism as practised represents an ultimate form of state (or party) violence. A basic theme is that violent practices will come to an unnatural end, and accordingly to a non-Taoist end (generalising LT p.176). While force may occur in spectacular, but satisfactory, natural forms, force is duly distinguished from violence. To force the growth of life means ill omen. For the mind to employ the vital force without restraint means violence (LT p. 197). One who follows Tao does not apply dominating force, which usually has had results bringing requital (p.152). Dominating force, like power, is in general castigated, under doctrine of wu- wei, no forced actions, no violence. To force natural growth is deviant, destroying harmony. To stop natural growth is deviant. But there is a significant difference between force and violence. To intentionally employ destructive force is to do violence. To so force things is condemned. To remain in harmony with things one does not so force things or practice violence. There is a non-interference principle at work, which also indicates types of non­ interference that are excluded. However Taoism does not always get the distinction between force and violence quite 5 Under contemporary technology and technological arrangements, such as the storage of quantities of oil and nuclear and chemical materials in great cities, wars have assumed new and very destructive dimensions, to the point of being utterly irresponsible. A different approach to technology, as to war, is now mandatory. These are no longer things that can in principle be nicely confined and need not touch parties outside the fray. An important part of ending wars, “winning the war against wars”, is removing the technology of war, above all from irresponsible state power. As for which technology to try to jettison and which to try to retain or improve, it is not so difficult to indicate, provided evaluative terminology is not outlawed. What is wanted is technology that is good in its place, what should be excluded is technology that is indifferent or bad or potentially so. Technology to be justified has to do something worthwhile, it has to address identifiable respectable needs. That is why merely indifferent technology is out; there is no virtue in technology for technology's sake, as it is a mere means technique. It is because of the crucial evaluative component in choice of technology that appropriateness, itself evaluative, comes closer to encapsulating the criterion than other recent efforts. Size, such as smallness, or intermediateness, are not what matter, though modest and not excessive technologies are likely to fare better in satisfying appropriateness. In simpler societies, small technology is of course more appropriate; for that is what is good there. From known criteria for what is good these other features for locally appropriate technology can be read off: reliability, esp. in maintenance, functioning well and safely under the expected range of operating conditions (which may be difficult), ease of repair, capital cheapness and repair inexpensiveness, environmental benignness, and meeting sound social needs. 15 right. ‘Vital force without restraint’, intentionally excessive force, is only part of what counts as violence, which is more generally force which violates, i.e. transgresses, descrecrates, profanes, injures, outrages, etc. It is thus a negatively connoted force, an evil force in some specified intentional respect. There is a tendency for Taoist commentators, not Taoists, to regard Taoism as condemning all uses, or even occurrences, of force, but this is not so. Rather intentional ill-forcing is what is castigated, what is deviant. Thus Taoism does not exclude a range of defensive practices, which make satisfactory use of natural forces, like letting the machines of war industry stop. Those who would abolish war and its machinery, substituting for it nonwarlike and ideally nonviolent methods, technology, and strategies, have been confronted not merely with much sub-rational abuse but with plenty of criticism and even some paradoxes. Here is a recent paradox concerning war and nonviolence: • War must be abolished. One reason is simply economic. We can no longer afford it, and the opportunity costs are enormous. Along with other extraordinarily wasteful activities, it is an anachronism. • Doing so cannot be accomplished without violence, i.e. in effect, given the types of violence involved, without what amounts to war. According to a fuller version of this premiss, the process of abolishing a war would only be achieved through a revolution so profound that it could not succeed without extensive and extreme violence, amounting to (civil) war. ° But then war cannot be abolished without war. Therefore, war which must be abolished cannot be abolished.6 This “paradox” has been compared with the Liar paradox, but the parallel does not persist far. For this paradox does not involve self-referential features, and is easily broken, as follows. Let the “last war” be not the last standard war but the revolution abolishing war. Then, given that the revolution is successful, war will be abolished therewith, i.e. with that last war. There need be no regress, given again a successful outcome. All the premisses stand intact, but the conclusion, following the ‘therefore’ is a nonsequitur. However, while the dissolution of the argument is accordingly logically fine, the route is repugnant. Standard pacifism challenges the 6 Brian Medlin, who forcefully propounded this puzzle, set other analogous puzzles alongside it - designed to reveal deep difficulties in contemporary political, and especially alternative, thought. Another puzzle, concerning liberty and repression in the context of capitalism, revolved around the following inconsistent triad: • capitalism must be removed, but liberty retained. • capitalism cannot be removed without repression. • repression is antithetical to liberty. The puzzle is resolved as with the analogous puzzle of abolishing. Let the “last capitalist” action before the days of liberty be the repressive but liberating revolution overthrowing capitalism. 16 second premiss. 4. Standard and moral pacifism. Although Taoism is strongly opposed to war, and much in favour of peace - and accordingly by prevailing standards a substantially pacific position - it is not (nowhere in the central texts) committed to pacifism in usual senses, for two different reasons:• It is not, by contrast with pacifism, opposed to all types of warfare, for example smart defensive wars. • It eschews deontology in terms of which moral pacifism is commonly stated, for instance through the watershed thesis P2. It is morally wrong to use violence. By contrast with Taoism, deep environmentalism does not avoid deontic claims, and is committed in principle to nonviolent technologies and ways and to pacifistic principles. Moreover, certain forms of deep environmentalism are completely committed to pacifism, notably European forms. Is deep green? There is heavy contemporary opposition to pacifism, as there also was to Taoism in the warring times when Taoism was first being promulgated. Many of the central institutions of contemporary life are intricated in coercion, violence and war. The most prominent contemporary institutions, states, are premissed on these elements of damaging force; they claim entitlement to use them widely, and even claim a certain territorial monopoly on their use. As a result they are having constantly to engage in them in attempt to maintain that monopoly. They are certainly the main perpetrators of wars, and of violence. They are indeed inured to wars, are in constant preparation for wars, yet propound dialectial (and normally dishonest and cynical) doctrines of peace through war (for a recent example see the appendix). Unremarkably then, the extensive propagandistic machinery of state has invested heavily in “justificatory” exercises in favour of controlled use, its own use, of destructive force, and continues to inveigh against pacifism. Because a routine trick in this sophistical repetoire consists in conflating pacifism with extreme, naive and inplausible, forms, an inevitable and important early task commits in unscrambling senses of ‘pacifism’. Semantical skulduggery can be thwarted in this way. Pacifism, as explained by English dictionaries, invariably concerns wars and warfare, and contains two components, negative and, elaborating on that, positive:- The negative component is, in Amauld's word, anti-War-ism, opposition (in ways to be further specified) to all forms of warfare (see OED). The positive component supplies alternative ways of settling disputes (what it is supposed that wars with some semblance of justification involve), such as negotiation, arbitration,... - and, adding to too narrow dictionary accounts - sanctions, substitutions (e.g. of sporting events, operatic contests, cooperative ventures),... . In brief standard pacifism is opposition to all warfare and resolution of potential wars by other nonmilitary means. 17 Plainly the opposition to warfare, like the sanctions and so on, cannot itself be military (using soldiers and other devices of war), on pain of some incoherence. But otherwise the ways of opposition can be many and various: they can certainly be active, as with nonviolent demonstrations, resistance movements, and so forth, and they may also be devious (e.g. turning the forces of war upon themselves so they are neutralised). It quickly becomes evident, then, that some of the dictionaries offer but loaded definitions which, by restricting the negative components, reduce the initial appeal and plausibility of pacifism. Consider the Concise English definition of the negative component: ‘the doctrine of non-resistance to hostilities and of total non-co-operation with any form of warfare’. Thereby excluded are forms of pacifism which offer active and plausible alternatives to warfare such as social defence. The Concise English tends to force pacifism into what the Oxford English Dictionary lists as its final item: ‘often, with depreciatory implication, the advocacy of peace at any price’, ‘in any circumstance’. Pacifism can easily resist being forced into these sorts of circumstances: it has many resources, as an extensive series of texts on alternatives to war, such as negotiation, non­ violent action and social defence, from Taoism to contemporary environmentalism attest. Academic philosophers have much advanced the semantical strategy of some dictionaries, of rendering pacifism more difficult from the very outset by narrow and biassed definitions. They have stretched the term from its restricted setting of warfare, confined to state and organised gang violence, to cover all forms of violence, from state and interstate to, what is very different, personal and interpersonal violence. Call the resulting considerably stretched notion of pacifism, according to which it is morally wrong to use violence, according to which P2 holds, stretched pacifism.^ While stretched pacifism certainly includes standard pacifism (unless the notions of war and warfare are tampered with), the converse is very far from being the case. A pacifist is in no way committed to stretched pacifism, which is a much more problematic and difficult position than standard pacifism. There are several, substantially different reasons for this, which will be picked up seriatim. Stretched pacifism, also misleadingly called moral pacifism, has looked a very easy critical target to moral philosophers. Many the effusive philosopher who, upon sighting such a target, has charged, whooping such rhetoric as “incoherent”, “inconsistent”, “insensitive”, “fanatical”. However, with improved logical technology now available for accommodating and treating moral dilemmas, it is no great feat to resist such attacks, in the fashion of previous investigations (see esp. Al, also MD). A main aim was to demonstrate that stretched pacifism was not so stupid as it was made out to be or appeared to be to these inured to present dominant violent ways. So far from being stupid, it is viable. In future gentler times stretched pacifism 7 In Al this notion was contrasted with standard pacifism as comprehensive pacifism: overcomprehensive might have been better. 18 could even be realised for whole communities of creatures (as some genuinely Christian sects envisaged); whence it will finally be seen to be feasible not merely for sages and supermen, and many ordinary women, but much more extensively. The method of philosophical accommodation was through moral dilemmas. The sort of moral dilemma that stretched pacifism can induce derives as follows. On the one side stands the theme P2, Wv, in convenient symbols, for Wrong V-ing, violencing. Now this implies to WB, where B presents a case of of violence. On the other side, particular circumstances develop which lead to W ~B, because ~B would produce in the circumstances considerable wrong, for instance extensive violence, mass murder, etc. One stock example from the literature concerns calling off the firing squad about to shoot several captives if the pacifist shoots one of them (it is elaborated in Al p.13). Interestingly, another stock example from the literature concerns standard pacifism (it can also be presented in terms of patriotism; for details of both see MD p.10). Resolution of intractable moral dilemmas is, where it is required, situational. The agent decides in the situation, within the fix, what to do. There are many ways in which such decision making can proceed, less rational, such as those applying chance or involving bad faith, or more rational, such as those applying consequentialist decision theory (for details see MD, pp.32-9). A decision theory taking account of all that should be included will not however be purely consequential. It would also take account of relevant motivation. This defence and rehabilitation of moral pacifism has been challenged, in particular by Smith (hereafter JWS). JWS claims the defence offered is a ‘failure because it trivializes pacifism’ (p. 153 twice). The rehabilitation trivializes pacifism because it entails that pacifism doesn't substantially differ from a form of activism which holds that while violence is always wrong one is sometimes justified on consequentialist grounds for preferring violent acts, if these acts are lesser evils than any other real alternatives. This is the commonsense position which most people hold - yet - pacifism after all was supposed to be radical moral doctrine - (p.153 rearranged).8 Part of the criticism is, then, not so much that pacifism is trivialized - JWS “activism” is hardly trivial - as that pacifism is popularised, deflated from a radical position to the commonsense position most people hold (p.154 also). Yet not a shred of evidence is adduced that JWS activism is such a populist position. Available evidence, for example from peace movements and oppositional opinion polls, suggests the very opposite: that, for instance, most people support state-justified conventional wars with the military violence they incur, and 8 JWS now informs me that he has changed his position. Whether the move effects his criticism, I don't know. 19 accordingly do not hold that violence is always wrong. From such a commonsense angle, pacifism with its condemnation of conventional wars and the violence they involve remains a radical doctrine. As regards wars and other violence-incurring social authorities, contemporary pacificism is, as previous explained (e.g. Al p.3), a form of activism. Pacifism does not imply utter pacifity, but may actively involve social defence, resistance and so on. However a certain level of misrepresentation enters into the JWS challenge in the details of what forms of activism pacifism may include. That misrepresentation begins in the second clause concerning what is said to be sometimes justified. For the situational procedure where dilemmas arise will not generally be consequential applying a principle of lesser evil. In dilemmatic situations such principles are suspended, and such a principle is in any case unacceptable to moral pacifists. A small amount of violence may be less bad in its consequences than verbal offence, but a principled pacifist will choose the slightly greater evil where other obligations do not exclude it. A more serious distortion occurs in JWS's effort to force procedures in dilemma situations into purely consequentialist form. In fact consequential decision theory was deployed as a model only for how to proceed rationally in a situational setting where deontic procedures were suspended (see MD p.38). What was said, still misleadingly retrospective vision reveals, was this: ‘what is done is a very consequentialist thing’ (Al p.13), not ‘one acts in a consequentialist fashion to do the sufficiently good thing in the circumstances’ (JWS P-152). Situationally other procedures than those resembling orthodox rational decision making (modified from maximizing to satisizing objectives) may be adopted (MD p.38). Further the orthodox consequentialist theory is inadequate because it leaves out, or tries to reduce to consequences, nonconsequential elements, notably motives. It is not difficult, in principle (in advance of attempted consequentialization of motives), to design situations where motives, such as integrity or maintaining faith, enter to yield outcomes upsetting consequential calculations. More elaborate decision making procedures than those of consequentialism, sometimes at variance with consequentialism, are thus presupposed. A further part of JWS's criticism accordingly goes by the board, the alleged appeal ‘to “second best” consequentialist considerations,... already explicitly condemned’ (p.154). What was condemned was stock universal consequentialism, ‘that only consequentialist considerations carry argumentative weight’ (quoted on p.152), so undercutting other deontic principles, such as those of pacifism. It was not claimed, what is utterly different, that consequentialist considerations can nowhere enter into deliberation and decision making. The conclusion JWS arrives at is therefore substantially astray. After criticising modern moral philosophy for its reliance upon consequentialist modes of thought, it is surprising, and inconsistent, to find ... [reliance] upon such modes of thought to escape logical difficulties raised by moral dilemmas facing ... pacifis[m] (p.152) 20 There is no inconsistency. JWS has confused universal with particular. As well he has wrongly contracted all situational decision making to consequentialist modes. There is a third part to the criticism, that the defence is too easy; the ‘strategy will allow too much violence to be (perpetrated and) justified to suit the tastes of any real pacifist’ (p. 153). This another part of the so-called trivialization, this time however dilution rather than populatization, weakening the moral stand against violence. This third contention is premissed on a mistake: that one can ‘justify on consequentialist grounds any number of violent acts, providing that such acts are lesser evils than other real alternatives facing social agents’ (p.153). Moral pacifism offers no such licence; allowing such consequentialism to take over was never part of the position. The slide to such consequentialism is made on the strength of a similarly erroneous example. The potential victim of an aspiring rapist ‘is supposed to flee or wriggle free if possible. But it is easy to consequentially justify the use of violence by the woman to prevent herself from being raped’ (p.153 italics added). In the example so far described there is no dilemma, and no such easy resort to consequentially ‘justified’ violence. What allows too much violence is the lesser evil JWS assumes is easily consequentially justified; for example that the woman is entitled to inflict, and escalate, violence so long as it remains ‘a lesser evil than the violence of attempted rape’ (p. 153). Since she may thereby inflict quite unreasonable damage (esp. if she is a Kung Fu expert), the result is inconsistent with ‘the basic principle of self-defence’ which JWS earlier adduced according to which what is ‘appropriate, in response is only that level of force necessary to defend oneself against the threat’ (p.150). There is evidence in JWS's work of some enthusiasm for levels of violence which exceed his ‘basic principle’, his appeal to ‘lesser evil’ generates some instances. The ‘basic principle’, itself fraught with difficulties (cf. the contorted discussion of what weapons are appropriate in response to what attacks, p.150), still exceeds what stretched pacifism would enjoin; for instance, it may not be appropriate to respond with force. But in a technical sense stretched pacifism is compatible with the ‘basic principle’, since it only imposes the upper bound on level of force. As for easiness, moral pacifism is not an easy position to live by, or to justify. Removing objections to pacifism is one thing; solidifying a positive case for it is quite another, and so far hardly conclusive (as Al tried to explain, pp 29-31). Stretched pacifism was advanced, hypothesized to put it more precisely, as a still viable option. It was not presented as a morally compulsory position, or, for that matter, as one that this defender adhered to or affirmed. To reiterate, while a cumulative case can be made for stetched pacifism as principled non­ violence, that case was not conclusive, and is hard to improve. For, further, some serious difficulties standing in the way of stretched pacifism were assembled, the most important of which derives from the extent of violence apparent in transactions within the natural world. Simply consider the practices of carnivores, essential to their natural way of life. In order to meet their life needs for sustenance, these creatures do, and are often obliged to, engage 21 routinely in violent activity. While it can no doubt be argued, as some vegetarians may do, that the natural order is an immoral order, and that remaining carnivores should be converted to vegetarianism as rapidly as proves possible (in the way domestic dogs are converted to dog biscuits), the difficulties with such proposals are immense. The task envisaged is gigantic, and beyond human capacities - even if it were desirable. For there are millions of species to be somehow converted to proper vegetarianism. Then there are millions of other species to be converted to proper and well regulated contraceptive practices, else their numbers will get out of hand (uncontrollably) with predation removed. Given humans lack of success in limiting their own excessive numbers, such regulation appears entirely remote. Aside however from the practical difficulties, is such a fully vegetarian order, with evolution further derailed, a desirable improvement on the natural order? Is it morally obligatory? It is certainly not obligatory, as alternative systems of morality in harmony with the prevailing natural order are feasible. Nor is it desirable, for (to appeal to such alternative value systems) the natural order is more or less in order as it is. Full vegetarianization would only reduce its value, vastly. More generally, a defensible ethical framework should not, it would be rightly contended, be right out of step with the natural order of other creatures, decently depicted. Decent depiction is important, for some features of the natural order, such as competition, combat and predation, so far from escaping attention, have been grossly exaggerated and exploited. Thus, for instance, the ludicrous picture of nature red in truth and claw, so beloved of descendents of orthodox Victorians and of orthodox economists. However, even under decent depiction, the “natural order” is often not benign. That appears to be enough to induce a supervenient moral dilemma for any stretched pacifism which is coupled to a deep ethic (e.g. which does not separate humans out from the natural order) and which eschews the desperate vegetarian route: The natural order is not an immoral order The natural order contains (regular) instances of violence. Therefore, instances of violence are not immoral in apparent defiance of P2 Moreover, there are too many instances of violence, too regularly occurring, for them all to be plausibly shunted into the moral dilemma category (and predatory carnivores face no dilemmas). Raptors that practice violence every week are not immoral (neither are they clearly moral; the category of morality only significantly extends so far). The main trouble lies however with P2 (which needs some finer adjustment, as was alrady indicated in Al). While P2 is alright in context, within a particular, perfectly viable, ethical framework, designed for the usual human round, the conventional setting for ethical theories, it stands in need of modification outside that setting. It is time to suggest the sort of modification envisaged. Evidently P2 was addressed to moral agents. Which agents? Not to carnivores that supply their own livelihood, nor really to morally degenerate humans, but to 22 peace-sensitive agents. With that semi-technical form, yet to be characterised, a suitably modified P2 results: MP2. It is morally wrong, for a peace-sensitive agent, to use violence.9 To recover what amounts, in the previous discussive context, to P2, it suffices to add the proposition that every human agent ought to be peace-sensitive. Much as that proposition has to recommend it, it appears too ethically advanced for many modern humans; it sets too high a moral standard to be taken as a serious guide to practice. It seems wise to settle presently for something less demanding, such as that every advanced moral agent ought to be peace sensitive. To put essentially the same proposition alternatively: Stretched pacifism (as modified) is supererogatory. While it is perhaps too late to hope for much moral progress in humans, it is pleasant to contemplate alternative futures where what is supererogatory became obligatory, and widely practiced. Richard Sylvan* Appendix I began drafting this essay at the time (January 17, midday Australian time) of the American attacks upon Iraq. The optly named Prime Minister Hawke of Australia had just made a statement to the nation-state, announcing (the) war. In this statement there was much talk of peace. There was even - in what was effectively a declaration of war - reiteration of the modern quest for ‘a new world order of peace’. Peace through war; so it rings out again and again, through the centuries. ‘War must be for the sake of peace’ (Aristotle p.220). More than two thousand years later, we have fought those wars to end all wars. But it is no use, Hawke solemely pronounced, just talking about peace, and thinking about peace; we must work for peace, fight for it - through war. Impeccable logic? President Bush, supreme commander, convinced us with similar logic, speaking too with many tongues. Of how he ‘preferred to think of peace, not war’. But now ‘only force will prevail’, as ‘all reasonable efforts to reach a peaceful solution are exhausted’. ‘What must be done’ must be done, or will be anyway. With God on side with the US offensive (as well as on the other side), it will go well. As it was said to have, though it achieved comparatively little that other efforts may not have yielded more satisfactorily, and thought it may now have to The generalization of P2, suggested in Al, to cover also the parallel situation of environmental vandalism, can be similarly modified. The anti-vandolence principle becomes MP2°. It is morally wrong, for a peace- and environmentally-sensitive agent, to use vandolence. Thank to David Bennett for joint contributions (from UT) and to JWS for opposition (in JWS) 23 followed with another invasion. Nor have we ever managed to glimpse much of what is now supposed, when we are no longer engaged, to come ‘out of the horror of war’: a ‘new world order ... which governs the conflict of nations’; a ‘rule of law’, not war. How the one, enforcable law, is achieved, unless backed by the the other, is not explained (Medlin's paradox hits back). Similarly what we now hear from many militarists, as they rush to war, is that ‘peace is a great good, war a great evil’. But, for the most part, only the rhetoric has shifted; practice has scarcely changed at all. REFERENCES W.-T. Chan, A Source Book on Chinese Philosophy, Princeton University Press, 1963; referred to as ST. W.-T. Chan (ed.), The Way of Lao Tzu (Tao-te Ching), Bobbs-Merrill, New York, 1963; referred to as LT. B. Martin, Uprooting War, Freedom Press, London, 1984. A. Naess, Ecology, community and lifestyle, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge UK, 1989. R.A. Rapaport, Pigs for the Ancestors : ritual in the ecology of a New Guinea People, Yale University Press, New Haven, 1967. R. Routley, ‘War and Peace II. On the alleged inconsistency, moral insensitivity and fanaticism of pacifism’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #9, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1983 (also in Inquiry ); referred to as Al. R. Routley and V. Plumwood, ‘Moral dilemmas and the logic of deontic notions’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #6, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1984 (also in Paraconsistent Logic)', referred to as MD. R. Routley, ‘War and Peace I. On the ethics of large-scale nuclear war and nuclear-deterrence and the political fall-out’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy, #5, Research School Of Social Science, Australian National University, 1984. G. Sharp, Social Power and Political Freedom, Porter Sargent, Boston, 1980. J.W. Smith, The Worms at the Heart of Things , Public Relations Unit, Flinders University, 1989. R. Sylvan, ‘War and Peace III, Australia's defence philosophy’, SoczaZ Philosophy, for Nuclear Conference, University of Queensland, 1985. R. Sylvan and D. Bennett, ‘Of Utopias, Tao and Deep Ecology’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #19, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1990; referred to as UT.  Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Box 59, Item 680: Two drafts of On extirpating on war: Tao and deep-green pacifism Subject The topic of the resource Two computer printouts of draft paper. Second copy, first page is missing and reference page has handwritten annotation. Previous title: War and peace IV: Tao and deep-green. Description An account of the resource Note, one of four papers digitised from item 680. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org/items/browse?search=Richard+Sylvan&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bjoiner%5D=and&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=&amp;range=&amp;collection=&amp;type=&amp;user=&amp;tags=&amp;public=&amp;featured=&amp;exhibit=&amp;geolocation-mapped=&amp;geolocation-address=&amp;geolocation-latitude=&amp;geolocation-longitude=&amp;geolocation-radius=10&amp;submit_search=Search+for+items">Richard Sylvan</a> Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <span class="MuiTypography-root-125 MuiTypography-body2-126">The University of Queensland's <a data-testid="rek-series" href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/records/search?page=1&amp;pageSize=20&amp;sortBy=score&amp;sortDirection=Desc&amp;searchQueryParams%5Brek_series%5D%5Bvalue%5D=Richard+Sylvan+Papers%2C+UQFL291&amp;searchMode=advanced">Richard Sylvan Papers UQFL291</a></span>, Box 59, Item 680 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org">Antipodean Antinuclearism: (Re)constructing Richard Routley/Sylvan's Nuclear Philosophy</a> Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource This item was identified for digitisation at the request of The University of Queensland's 2020 Fryer Library Fellow, <a href="https://najtaylor.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr. N.A.J. Taylor</a>. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource For all enquiries about this work, please contact the Fryer Library, The University of Queensland Library. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource [35] leaves. 28.66 MB. Type The nature or genre of the resource Manuscript Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context <a href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:c8da24a">https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:c8da24a</a> Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Como - Cupboard - Pile 3 Box 59: Nuclear Como House Como House > Cupboard > Pile 3 https://www.antipodean-antinuclearism.org/files/original/74c5918ce1775b9771b6ab241d1cfda9.pdf d64b9b726171c91b2c89e43f71832e29 PDF Text Text ✓ f / / Z ) The Australian National University ■The Research School of Social Sciences Department of Philosophy reference Post Office Box 4 Canberra ACT 2600 Telegrams & cables natuniv Canberra Telex aa 62694 sopac 'telephone 062-49 $111 22 July 1983 John Martin 10 Alamein Avenue WARRACKNABEAL VIC 3393 Dear John, Thank you for the July 83 copy of The Deep Ecologist. I certainly think that such a network newsletter is a fine idea (and my sub. follows under separate cover). I should confess, however, that I was alarmed by the extent to which shallow ecology - which already has an excellent press had crept into the issue. In particular, the centerpiece article, purportedly on wilderness (signed P. Conroy) contained themes directly antithetical to deeper ecology, some of which I shall note. I really hope the article was intended as some sort of test or as a spoof; but I fear it wasn't. 1. 'The wonders of creation exist in the minds of humans'. The three step argument to this, from the granted 'Nature is wondrous, ...' is quite fallacious. For one thing, it smuggles in the assumption of a creation. Deep ecologists don't have to buy into creation, or (what Conroy goes on to, in a version of the argument from design I suppose) God(s). More important, the wonders of nature are not confined to, and do not require, the minds of humans. A core theme of deep ecology is that some natural things are intrinsically valuable, worthwhile in themselves, independently of any creatures, including humans. An alpine gentian does not owe its value, its importance to humans. For similar reasons the deep ecologist, who may embrace some one of the more orthodox religions but need not, rejects both parts of Conroy's supporting comparison: 'As light needs our eyes to give it reality, so [nature] around us needs our constant assent', human affirmation. There was light, as an element of nature, before humans evolved; there will be light, and still some wonders of nature, when humans are gone, for instance after nuclear annihilation. It is the same on the genesis account as it is on deep ecological assumptions: nature and light were real, and also good, before man appeared on the scene (on the seventh day). 2. Admittedly some deeper ecological themes are picked up by Conroy, for example 'the importance of relationships', especially those of ecosystems. Unfortunately Conroy almost at once tries to 2/... �2. undermine this theme (a theme that runs counter to a main thrust of Western philosophy, concerning the eliminability or secondary character of relations) and in a human chauvinist way: 'Let us not delude ourselves as to the basis for this'. Relations too are alleged to answer back to humans, and owe their importance to them: again shallow, and surely mistaken, anthrocentricism. But Conroy wants us to proceed to a strong form of this‘shallow doctrine: 'To recognise the importance of our environment is to recognise the importance of ourselves'. No; and certainly not on deeper thinking. Environments free of humans, such as pure wilderness, can be important; worlds devoid of humans beautiful, or ugly. 3. 'Humans do hold dominion over the earth'; 'recognise your kingship of the earth'. The dominion position, with which Conroy gets quite carried away, is only one of various positions that the shallow ecologist can adopt; others (delineated by Passmore) are the stewardship and the perfectionist positions. It is however the position most antithetical to the concerns of deep ecology. 4. Conroy repudiates the theme of biological (or biospheric) egalitarianism, often taken to be an ingredient of deep ecology, in a decidedly arrogant way: 'To pretend we can treat ourselves as equals with other organisms in our cohabitation of this planet is to show an ignorance of the inevitable forces that continue to shape human destinies everywhere' (it reminds me of the worst reaches of German Ubermensch philosophy, Nietzsche to Hitler). An egalitarian theme was tendered by Naess in his introduction of deep ecology, and has certainly been built into the West Coast understanding of the notion. And as Singer's work on "equality of consideration", and other nonutilitarian work on respect has made plain, the theme can be given relatively palatable construals. It remains however something of an open question whether the theme is an essential ingredient of deep ecology. My view is also that it is not; but I should not want to have anything much to do with Conroy's human chauvinist (and sometimes human fascist) case for ditching the theme. Regrettably Naess's more recent account of deep ecology, in terms of asking 'deeper and deeper questions', has further muddied what started out by being d valuable and sufficiently clear notion. Now a nuclear engineer who asks deeper questions, or any shallow ecologist who 'probes the deepness of the human psyche', stands a fair chance of passing perself off as a deep ecologist. I hope however that Ths Deep Ecologist can maintain a deep relationship with deep ecology. Best wishes, Richard �The following has been redacted from access file (PDF) due to copyright restrictions. Letter, John Martin to Richard Sylvan, 30 July 1983 re Martin replies to Sylvan's letter and comments on an article published in The Deep Ecologist. (1 leaf) � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Notes, Correspondences and Marginalia Description An account of the resource In one obituary, Sylvan's handwriting was said to have "looked like the oscilloscope for a patient in intensive care", and thus "not for the timid". Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Text Any textual data included in the document ✓ f / / Z ) The Australian National University ■The Research School of Social Sciences Department of Philosophy reference Post Office Box 4 Canberra ACT 2600 Telegrams & cables natuniv Canberra Telex aa 62694 sopac 'telephone 062-49 $111 22 July 1983 John Martin 10 Alamein Avenue WARRACKNABEAL VIC 3393 Dear John, Thank you for the July 83 copy of The Deep Ecologist. I certainly think that such a network newsletter is a fine idea (and my sub. follows under separate cover). I should confess, however, that I was alarmed by the extent to which shallow ecology - which already has an excellent press had crept into the issue. In particular, the centerpiece article, purportedly on wilderness (signed P. Conroy) contained themes directly antithetical to deeper ecology, some of which I shall note. I really hope the article was intended as some sort of test or as a spoof; but I fear it wasn't. 1. 'The wonders of creation exist in the minds of humans'. The three step argument to this, from the granted 'Nature is wondrous, ...' is quite fallacious. For one thing, it smuggles in the assumption of a creation. Deep ecologists don't have to buy into creation, or (what Conroy goes on to, in a version of the argument from design I suppose) God(s). More important, the wonders of nature are not confined to, and do not require, the minds of humans. A core theme of deep ecology is that some natural things are intrinsically valuable, worthwhile in themselves, independently of any creatures, including humans. An alpine gentian does not owe its value, its importance to humans. For similar reasons the deep ecologist, who may embrace some one of the more orthodox religions but need not, rejects both parts of Conroy's supporting comparison: 'As light needs our eyes to give it reality, so [nature] around us needs our constant assent', human affirmation. There was light, as an element of nature, before humans evolved; there will be light, and still some wonders of nature, when humans are gone, for instance after nuclear annihilation. It is the same on the genesis account as it is on deep ecological assumptions: nature and light were real, and also good, before man appeared on the scene (on the seventh day). 2. Admittedly some deeper ecological themes are picked up by Conroy, for example 'the importance of relationships', especially those of ecosystems. Unfortunately Conroy almost at once tries to 2/... 2. undermine this theme (a theme that runs counter to a main thrust of Western philosophy, concerning the eliminability or secondary character of relations) and in a human chauvinist way: 'Let us not delude ourselves as to the basis for this'. Relations too are alleged to answer back to humans, and owe their importance to them: again shallow, and surely mistaken, anthrocentricism. But Conroy wants us to proceed to a strong form of this‘shallow doctrine: 'To recognise the importance of our environment is to recognise the importance of ourselves'. No; and certainly not on deeper thinking. Environments free of humans, such as pure wilderness, can be important; worlds devoid of humans beautiful, or ugly. 3. 'Humans do hold dominion over the earth'; 'recognise your kingship of the earth'. The dominion position, with which Conroy gets quite carried away, is only one of various positions that the shallow ecologist can adopt; others (delineated by Passmore) are the stewardship and the perfectionist positions. It is however the position most antithetical to the concerns of deep ecology. 4. Conroy repudiates the theme of biological (or biospheric) egalitarianism, often taken to be an ingredient of deep ecology, in a decidedly arrogant way: 'To pretend we can treat ourselves as equals with other organisms in our cohabitation of this planet is to show an ignorance of the inevitable forces that continue to shape human destinies everywhere' (it reminds me of the worst reaches of German Ubermensch philosophy, Nietzsche to Hitler). An egalitarian theme was tendered by Naess in his introduction of deep ecology, and has certainly been built into the West Coast understanding of the notion. And as Singer's work on "equality of consideration", and other nonutilitarian work on respect has made plain, the theme can be given relatively palatable construals. It remains however something of an open question whether the theme is an essential ingredient of deep ecology. My view is also that it is not; but I should not want to have anything much to do with Conroy's human chauvinist (and sometimes human fascist) case for ditching the theme. Regrettably Naess's more recent account of deep ecology, in terms of asking 'deeper and deeper questions', has further muddied what started out by being d valuable and sufficiently clear notion. Now a nuclear engineer who asks deeper questions, or any shallow ecologist who 'probes the deepness of the human psyche', stands a fair chance of passing perself off as a deep ecologist. I hope however that Ths Deep Ecologist can maintain a deep relationship with deep ecology. Best wishes, Richard The following has been redacted from access file (PDF) due to copyright restrictions. Letter, John Martin to Richard Sylvan, 30 July 1983 re Martin replies to Sylvan's letter and comments on an article published in The Deep Ecologist. (1 leaf)  Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Box 14, Item 1765: Correspondence between Richard Sylvan and John Martin, 2 letters, Jul 1983 Subject The topic of the resource Letter 1: Typescript on a Australian National University letter head. Letter dated 22 July 1983 to John Martin, Warracknabeal, VIC 3393. From Richard Sylvan, The Research School of Social Sciences, Department of Philosophy, The Australian National University. Sylvan sends feedback to Martin about an article published in The Deep Ecologist (July 183). John Martin was the founding editor of the Australian based newsletter, The Deep Ecologist. One of three copies of letter held in collection, two copies with annotations: Deep ecology notes ; Fred, please return newsletter [?]. Thanks for your comments, [?] things. [Richard?]. Letter 2: Handwritten letter dated 30 Jul 1983 to Richard Sylvan. From John Martin, Warracknabeal, VIC 3393. Martin replies to Sylvan's letter and comments on an article published in The Deep Ecologist. Description An account of the resource Note, one of two papers digitised from item 1765. Letter from John Martin redacted from access file (PDF) due to copyright restrictions. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org/items/browse?search=Richard+Sylvan&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bjoiner%5D=and&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=&amp;range=&amp;collection=&amp;type=&amp;user=&amp;tags=&amp;public=&amp;featured=&amp;exhibit=&amp;geolocation-mapped=&amp;geolocation-address=&amp;geolocation-latitude=&amp;geolocation-longitude=&amp;geolocation-radius=10&amp;submit_search=Search+for+items">Richard Sylvan</a> Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <span class="MuiTypography-root-125 MuiTypography-body2-126">The University of Queensland's <a data-testid="rek-series" href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/records/search?page=1&amp;pageSize=20&amp;sortBy=score&amp;sortDirection=Desc&amp;searchQueryParams%5Brek_series%5D%5Bvalue%5D=Richard+Sylvan+Papers%2C+UQFL291&amp;searchMode=advanced">Richard Sylvan Papers UQFL291</a></span>, Box 14, Item 1765 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org">Antipodean Antinuclearism: (Re)constructing Richard Routley/Sylvan's Nuclear Philosophy</a> Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource July 23, 1983 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource This item was identified for digitisation at the request of The University of Queensland's 2020 Fryer Library Fellow, <a href="https://najtaylor.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr. N.A.J. Taylor</a>. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource For all enquiries about this work, please contact the Fryer Library, The University of Queensland Library. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource [7] leaves. 1.43 MB. Type The nature or genre of the resource Correspondences Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context <a href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:4660a51">https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:4660a51</a> Australian National University Office Australian National University Office > Second Shelf > Bottom Shelf Box 14: Green Projects in Progress https://www.antipodean-antinuclearism.org/files/original/8a962b5798d431ed7a49e3c965d3293d.pdf 3793cc17bc61a17cc2d746104329864a PDF Text Text '"T__ / <'Y J /x X<X X I z / //. / c f-vX' ‘'t Xr" Y ( <lr~ / <■ Ye t e tZ<? Z C z4 /X/ Xi /z- a / r /XX «) - YY/XX e X X'X xC <?— C" Z j>ctYe^_Z^Z l -■ X-^—y X—- I X .X i/x /l t tC c X * /7Z’’' <j Y^X ft J X<>-^ XX Y C'U1 Y c^ 7 XYy / // Y X n ?-/ ^i/'^ /q /’*■ XX 3 2- /< Y'1^ Xr^x 6 ,’ 'A/' C ■"' z// '- 7/XxY . 1 ��:) 2. 2 f.y; �The following has been redacted from access file (PDF) due to copyright restrictions. Computer printout, draft paper with emendations and annotations, Intrinsic value, quantum theory, and environmental ethics by J. Baird Callicott. Includes annotation addressed to Professor Routley from J. Baird Callicott. (37 pages) Paper published, Callicott J B (1985) ‘Intrinsic Value, Quantum Theory, and Environmental Ethics’, Environmental Ethics, 7(3): 257275. https://doi.org/10.5840/enviroethics19857334 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Notes, Correspondences and Marginalia Description An account of the resource In one obituary, Sylvan's handwriting was said to have "looked like the oscilloscope for a patient in intensive care", and thus "not for the timid". Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Text Any textual data included in the document '"T__ / <'Y J /x X<X X I z / //. / c f-vX' ‘'t Xr" Y ( <lr~ / <■ Ye t e tZ<? Z C z4 /X/ Xi /z- a / r /XX «) - YY/XX e X X'X xC <?— C" Z j>ctYe^_Z^Z l -■ X-^—y X—- I X .X i/x /l t tC c X * /7Z’’' <j Y^X ft J X<>-^ XX Y C'U1 Y c^ 7 XYy / // Y X n ?-/ ^i/'^ /q /’*■ XX 3 2- /< Y'1^ Xr^x 6 ,’ 'A/' C ■"' z// '- 7/XxY . 1 :) 2. 2 f.y; The following has been redacted from access file (PDF) due to copyright restrictions. Computer printout, draft paper with emendations and annotations, Intrinsic value, quantum theory, and environmental ethics by J. Baird Callicott. Includes annotation addressed to Professor Routley from J. Baird Callicott. (37 pages) Paper published, Callicott J B (1985) ‘Intrinsic Value, Quantum Theory, and Environmental Ethics’, Environmental Ethics, 7(3): 257275. https://doi.org/10.5840/enviroethics19857334  Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Box 14, Item 1765: Letter, Richard Sylvan to J. Baird Callicott, 25 Oct c1985 ; Draft of Intrinsic value, quantum theory, and environmental ethics by J. Baird Callicott Subject The topic of the resource Computer printout of draft paper with emendations and annotations. Includes annotation on title page, addressed to Professor Routley from J. Baird Callicott. Paper published, Callicott J B (1985) 'Intrinsic Value, Quantum Theory, and Environmental Ethics', Environmental Ethics, 7(3): 257-275, https://doi.org/10.5840/enviroethics19857334. Description An account of the resource Note, one of two papers digitised from item 1765. Paper by J. Baird Callicott redacted from access file (PDF) due to copyright restrictions. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org/items/browse?search=Richard+Sylvan&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bjoiner%5D=and&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=&amp;range=&amp;collection=&amp;type=&amp;user=&amp;tags=&amp;public=&amp;featured=&amp;exhibit=&amp;geolocation-mapped=&amp;geolocation-address=&amp;geolocation-latitude=&amp;geolocation-longitude=&amp;geolocation-radius=10&amp;submit_search=Search+for+items">Richard Sylvan</a> Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <span class="MuiTypography-root-125 MuiTypography-body2-126">The University of Queensland's <a data-testid="rek-series" href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/records/search?page=1&amp;pageSize=20&amp;sortBy=score&amp;sortDirection=Desc&amp;searchQueryParams%5Brek_series%5D%5Bvalue%5D=Richard+Sylvan+Papers%2C+UQFL291&amp;searchMode=advanced">Richard Sylvan Papers UQFL291</a></span>, Box 14, Item 1765 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org">Antipodean Antinuclearism: (Re)constructing Richard Routley/Sylvan's Nuclear Philosophy</a> Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource October 25 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource This item was identified for digitisation at the request of The University of Queensland's 2020 Fryer Library Fellow, <a href="https://najtaylor.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr. N.A.J. Taylor</a>. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource For all enquiries about this work, please contact the Fryer Library, The University of Queensland Library. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource [40] leaves. 1.73 MB. Type The nature or genre of the resource Correspondences Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context <a href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:f77bd00">https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:f77bd00</a> Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Australian National University - Second Shelf - Bottom Shelf Australian National University Office Australian National University Office > Second Shelf > Bottom Shelf Box 14: Green Projects in Progress https://www.antipodean-antinuclearism.org/files/original/a712372fc5eb6f4fbc060ed2fdbafa53.pdf 201a8b138801518733d5f3bcd3bc60e3 PDF Text Text The Research Schoot oi Sociai Sciences Post Office Box 4 Canberra ACT 2600 Telegrams & cables NATUNiv Canberra Telex AA 62694 sopAC Telephone 062-49 5111 Department of Philosophy reference 10 February 1981. The Editor, A.N.U. Reporter Dear Editor, In the eyes of many the A.N.U. had already abandoned any semblance of neutrality on the issue of nuclear power and uranium mining ^me time ago, especially by the use of official university resources for the promotion of Professor Ringwood and his pro-nuclear position. Now we have the news that the A.N.U. has even more thoroughly compromised its neutrality on the issue through the purchase of /2(^0,00^ -weath'TKf shares in uranium mining. In view of the university's use of its funds and other resources to sponsor nuclear development, the initials A.N.U. could perhaps be better taken to stand for Australian Nuclear University. This suggests some possible ways in which the many people within the university who object to uranium mining and nuclear development could protest and express their awareness of and distaste for its pronuclear character, for example: * Sign published work with the home address to avoid the embarrassment of being associated with this thoroughly compromised institution, adding a note to explain why. * Sign published work 'Australian Nuclear University', appending a footnote to explain why this name is more appropriate. * Substitute 'Australian Nuclear University' on letterheads, envelopes, in letters to colleagues, and in other appropriate places, so that the character of the university and its political commitments become more widely known. No doubt others will be able to think of many appropriate variations on the theme, Yours, Richard Routley. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Notes, Correspondences and Marginalia Description An account of the resource In one obituary, Sylvan's handwriting was said to have "looked like the oscilloscope for a patient in intensive care", and thus "not for the timid". Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Text Any textual data included in the document The Research Schoot oi Sociai Sciences Post Office Box 4 Canberra ACT 2600 Telegrams & cables NATUNiv Canberra Telex AA 62694 sopAC Telephone 062-49 5111 Department of Philosophy reference 10 February 1981. The Editor, A.N.U. Reporter Dear Editor, In the eyes of many the A.N.U. had already abandoned any semblance of neutrality on the issue of nuclear power and uranium mining ^me time ago, especially by the use of official university resources for the promotion of Professor Ringwood and his pro-nuclear position. Now we have the news that the A.N.U. has even more thoroughly compromised its neutrality on the issue through the purchase of /2(^0,00^ -weath'TKf shares in uranium mining. In view of the university's use of its funds and other resources to sponsor nuclear development, the initials A.N.U. could perhaps be better taken to stand for Australian Nuclear University. This suggests some possible ways in which the many people within the university who object to uranium mining and nuclear development could protest and express their awareness of and distaste for its pronuclear character, for example: * Sign published work with the home address to avoid the embarrassment of being associated with this thoroughly compromised institution, adding a note to explain why. * Sign published work 'Australian Nuclear University', appending a footnote to explain why this name is more appropriate. * Substitute 'Australian Nuclear University' on letterheads, envelopes, in letters to colleagues, and in other appropriate places, so that the character of the university and its political commitments become more widely known. No doubt others will be able to think of many appropriate variations on the theme, Yours, Richard Routley.  Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Box 98, Item 1865: Richard Routley to The Editor, ANU Reporter, 10 Feb 1981 Subject The topic of the resource Typescript letter, with emendations. Letter on a Australian National University letter head. Richard Routley (later Sylvan) writes about ANU’s "…abandoned any semblance of neutrality on the issue of nuclear and uranium mining…", through the promotion of Professor Ringwood and "his pro-nuclear position", and the purchase of shares in uranium mining. Sylvan suggests some possible ways staff could protest. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org/items/browse?search=Richard+Routley&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bjoiner%5D=and&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=&amp;range=&amp;collection=&amp;type=&amp;user=&amp;tags=&amp;public=&amp;featured=&amp;exhibit=&amp;geolocation-mapped=&amp;geolocation-address=&amp;geolocation-latitude=&amp;geolocation-longitude=&amp;geolocation-radius=10&amp;submit_search=Search+for+items">Richard Routley</a> Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <span class="MuiTypography-root-125 MuiTypography-body2-126">The University of Queensland's <a data-testid="rek-series" href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/records/search?page=1&amp;pageSize=20&amp;sortBy=score&amp;sortDirection=Desc&amp;searchQueryParams%5Brek_series%5D%5Bvalue%5D=Richard+Sylvan+Papers%2C+UQFL291&amp;searchMode=advanced">Richard Sylvan Papers UQFL291</a></span>, Box 98, Item 1865 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org">Antipodean Antinuclearism: (Re)constructing Richard Routley/Sylvan's Nuclear Philosophy</a> Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource February 10, 1981 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource This item was identified for digitisation at the request of The University of Queensland's 2020 Fryer Library Fellow, <a href="https://najtaylor.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr. N.A.J. Taylor</a>. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource For all enquiries about this work, please contact the Fryer Library, The University of Queensland Library. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource Letter, [1] leaf. 2.12 MB. Type The nature or genre of the resource Correspondences Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context <a href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:2e5219e">https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:2e5219e</a> Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Australian National University - Far Bookcase - Second Bay - Second Shelf - Pile 1 Australian National University Office Australian National University Office > Far Bookcase > Second Bay > Second Shelf > Pile 1 Box 98: Richard's Professional Work-refereeing - examining - reports etc and Philosophy of Language https://www.antipodean-antinuclearism.org/files/original/16947195a878ecb196bb09099f17f712.pdf 3db2c0baa2c3c95fd45969180538a40b PDF Text Text ���� Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Notes, Correspondences and Marginalia Description An account of the resource In one obituary, Sylvan's handwriting was said to have "looked like the oscilloscope for a patient in intensive care", and thus "not for the timid". Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Text Any textual data included in the document  Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Box 120, Item 102: Richard Sylvan to John, c1983 to ? Subject The topic of the resource Handwritten letter to John from Richard Sylvan, letter isn't signed. Sylvan writes about a UNESCO Asia-Pacific meeting held in 1983 and discusses John's report on philosophy in New Zealand. The meeting is possibly the UNESCO Asia-Pacific Teaching and research in philosophy in Asia and the Pacific held in Bangkok, 21-25 February 1983. The letter is also possibly addressed to John Patterson who attended the UNESCO Asia-Pacific meeting and presented a paper on philosophy in New Zealand. (Information from UNESCO (1984) Teaching and Research in Philosophy: Asia and the Pacific, UNESCO). Description An account of the resource Note, one of two papers digitised from item 102. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org/items/browse?search=Richard+Sylvan&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bjoiner%5D=and&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=&amp;range=&amp;collection=&amp;type=&amp;user=&amp;tags=&amp;public=&amp;featured=&amp;exhibit=&amp;geolocation-mapped=&amp;geolocation-address=&amp;geolocation-latitude=&amp;geolocation-longitude=&amp;geolocation-radius=10&amp;submit_search=Search+for+items">Richard Sylvan</a> Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <span class="MuiTypography-root-125 MuiTypography-body2-126">The University of Queensland's <a data-testid="rek-series" href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/records/search?page=1&amp;pageSize=20&amp;sortBy=score&amp;sortDirection=Desc&amp;searchQueryParams%5Brek_series%5D%5Bvalue%5D=Richard+Sylvan+Papers%2C+UQFL291&amp;searchMode=advanced">Richard Sylvan Papers UQFL291</a></span>, Box 120, Item 102 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org">Antipodean Antinuclearism: (Re)constructing Richard Routley/Sylvan's Nuclear Philosophy</a> Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource This item was identified for digitisation at the request of The University of Queensland's 2020 Fryer Library Fellow, <a href="https://najtaylor.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr. N.A.J. Taylor</a>. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource For all enquiries about this work, please contact the Fryer Library, The University of Queensland Library. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource Letter, [4] leaves. [12.73 MB] For all enquiries about this work, please contact the Fryer Library, The University of Queensland Library. Type The nature or genre of the resource Correspondences Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context <a href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:d21b575">https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:d21b575</a> Box 120: Philosophy Wisdom to Wowserism Como House Como House > Green Table > Pile 5 https://www.antipodean-antinuclearism.org/files/original/e697a58c0c0eb658f0859e812161a780.pdf 6e6025285db216731a09bd2dbbf3c02f PDF Text Text ���� Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Notes, Correspondences and Marginalia Description An account of the resource In one obituary, Sylvan's handwriting was said to have "looked like the oscilloscope for a patient in intensive care", and thus "not for the timid". Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Text Any textual data included in the document  Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Box 139, Item 1: Richard Sylvan to Tom Cahill, Editor, Anarchist Studies, 5 Jan 1993 and peer review of paper Subject The topic of the resource Handwritten letter with peer view by Sylvan. Paper titled Research on 'creating cooperative autonomy', author not identified. Description An account of the resource Unnumbered paper from collection, item number assigned by library staff Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org/items/browse?search=Richard+Sylvan&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bjoiner%5D=and&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=&amp;range=&amp;collection=&amp;type=&amp;user=&amp;tags=&amp;public=&amp;featured=&amp;exhibit=&amp;geolocation-mapped=&amp;geolocation-address=&amp;geolocation-latitude=&amp;geolocation-longitude=&amp;geolocation-radius=10&amp;submit_search=Search+for+items">Richard Sylvan</a> Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <span class="MuiTypography-root-125 MuiTypography-body2-126">The University of Queensland's <a data-testid="rek-series" href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/records/search?page=1&amp;pageSize=20&amp;sortBy=score&amp;sortDirection=Desc&amp;searchQueryParams%5Brek_series%5D%5Bvalue%5D=Richard+Sylvan+Papers%2C+UQFL291&amp;searchMode=advanced">Richard Sylvan Papers UQFL291</a></span>, Box 139, Item 1 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org">Antipodean Antinuclearism: (Re)constructing Richard Routley/Sylvan's Nuclear Philosophy</a> Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource January 5, 1991 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource This item was identified for digitisation at the request of The University of Queensland's 2020 Fryer Library Fellow, <a href="https://najtaylor.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr. N.A.J. Taylor</a>. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource For all enquiries about this work, please contact the Fryer Library, The University of Queensland Library. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource Letter, [4] leaves. [2.34 MB] Type The nature or genre of the resource Correspondences Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context <a href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:a892974">https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:a892974</a> Box 139: Anarchy https://www.antipodean-antinuclearism.org/files/original/b87130a29f9b52af42c4cef275532629.pdf b0bf742ca1521f0e62f99c840366ccf4 PDF Text Text I I 1 / I PRIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL THE AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL UNIVERSITY CENTRE FOR CONTINUING EDUCATION 23 May 1983 Professor Peter Karmel, Vice-Chancellor. Dear Professor Karmel, Publi .. Affairs Conference: The consequences of nuclear war. I have to advise you that I have serious concerns about several aspects of this conference, which takes place next Monday-Tuesday 30-31 May. Despit the unusual amount of time that it has taken in an attempt to establish and agree upon the programme, and an unprecedented level of involvement_ of the Assistant Vice-Chancellor in an attempt to enlist more senior authority to hold the programme to what is agreed, it has not proved possible for the Centre for Continuing Education effectively to be responsible for the programme, or indeed even to be sure what the programme is. I respect and personally happen to be in agreement with Dr Denborough in his commitment to the cause of peace and prevention of nuclear war. The large enrolment of the conference (well in excess of 300) is due to his very considerable efforts in publicising it as well as to its intrinsic contemporary interest and importance. His commitment however is such as to override all normal conventions of cooperative behaviour, and it leaves me unable to give assurances that the conference will be ah activity proper and appropriate to the University. The programme as it now appears to be is the result of a succession of compromises extracted through pressures of various kinds. Those involved in the Centre are by no means happy with the result, and fear that it has now become over-crowded, as we have been nbliged to honour agreements entered into, as I believe, illegitimately on behalf of the University. The likely high level of interest and energy among those taking part, and the frustration of a crowded programme and little opportunity till late on for floor contribution, may well make for an explosive situation. Much of this I have accepted, as I believe has the Assistant Vice-Chancellor, reluctantly and finding the alternatives still less attractive. As the programme now reads, my most serious concern is that Dr Denborough is to chair the final session. I believe that he is too dedicated to a point of view, and too embedded in the whole emotional side of the subject, the planning and the conference, to be able to take this part satisfactorily. I am also concerned that Dr Millar is apparently being limited in his participation to chairing the session at which Dr Ball is to speak. I consider that a strong chairperson and a well balanced panel are very important for the final session to be satisfactory from a University point of view. The various kinds of moral and other blackmail that have been employed may make this impossible, but in this and some other respects the conference remains, for all the efforts of CCE to retain balance and authoritative presentations, highly volatile. One reason for writing is to alert you to this, as even now it may not be too late to enhance the quality of what at any rate is certain to be a high profile event. The other is to anticipate and if possible avert a consequence of any embarrassment which might be caused by the conference: a natural reaction away from attempting any other important but controversial theme in public affairs and extension conferences. The cornmi ttee which was developing thi_s conference came to be replaced by one man, and the attempt of Mr Plowman and myself, with CCE colleagues, to fill the vacant place naturally proved less than satisfactory. The lesson should be not again to allow any member of the University with a particular personal commitment of this kind to capture � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Notes, Correspondences and Marginalia Description An account of the resource In one obituary, Sylvan's handwriting was said to have "looked like the oscilloscope for a patient in intensive care", and thus "not for the timid". Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Text Any textual data included in the document I I 1 / I PRIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL THE AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL UNIVERSITY CENTRE FOR CONTINUING EDUCATION 23 May 1983 Professor Peter Karmel, Vice-Chancellor. Dear Professor Karmel, Publi .. Affairs Conference: The consequences of nuclear war. I have to advise you that I have serious concerns about several aspects of this conference, which takes place next Monday-Tuesday 30-31 May. Despit the unusual amount of time that it has taken in an attempt to establish and agree upon the programme, and an unprecedented level of involvement_ of the Assistant Vice-Chancellor in an attempt to enlist more senior authority to hold the programme to what is agreed, it has not proved possible for the Centre for Continuing Education effectively to be responsible for the programme, or indeed even to be sure what the programme is. I respect and personally happen to be in agreement with Dr Denborough in his commitment to the cause of peace and prevention of nuclear war. The large enrolment of the conference (well in excess of 300) is due to his very considerable efforts in publicising it as well as to its intrinsic contemporary interest and importance. His commitment however is such as to override all normal conventions of cooperative behaviour, and it leaves me unable to give assurances that the conference will be ah activity proper and appropriate to the University. The programme as it now appears to be is the result of a succession of compromises extracted through pressures of various kinds. Those involved in the Centre are by no means happy with the result, and fear that it has now become over-crowded, as we have been nbliged to honour agreements entered into, as I believe, illegitimately on behalf of the University. The likely high level of interest and energy among those taking part, and the frustration of a crowded programme and little opportunity till late on for floor contribution, may well make for an explosive situation. Much of this I have accepted, as I believe has the Assistant Vice-Chancellor, reluctantly and finding the alternatives still less attractive. As the programme now reads, my most serious concern is that Dr Denborough is to chair the final session. I believe that he is too dedicated to a point of view, and too embedded in the whole emotional side of the subject, the planning and the conference, to be able to take this part satisfactorily. I am also concerned that Dr Millar is apparently being limited in his participation to chairing the session at which Dr Ball is to speak. I consider that a strong chairperson and a well balanced panel are very important for the final session to be satisfactory from a University point of view. The various kinds of moral and other blackmail that have been employed may make this impossible, but in this and some other respects the conference remains, for all the efforts of CCE to retain balance and authoritative presentations, highly volatile. One reason for writing is to alert you to this, as even now it may not be too late to enhance the quality of what at any rate is certain to be a high profile event. The other is to anticipate and if possible avert a consequence of any embarrassment which might be caused by the conference: a natural reaction away from attempting any other important but controversial theme in public affairs and extension conferences. The cornmi ttee which was developing thi_s conference came to be replaced by one man, and the attempt of Mr Plowman and myself, with CCE colleagues, to fill the vacant place naturally proved less than satisfactory. The lesson should be not again to allow any member of the University with a particular personal commitment of this kind to capture  Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Box 17, Item 1: Richard Routley? to Professor Peter Karmel, Vice-Chancellor, Australian National University, 23 May 1983 Subject The topic of the resource Letter missing pages. Possibly written by Richard Routley (later Sylvan). Routley writes to Professor Peter Karmel, Vice-Chancellor of ANU, about his concerns of the university's involvement in the Public Affairs Conference (30-31 May), in relation to the consequences of nuclear war and Dr Denborough, the conference chair. Typescript letter, written on Australian National University (ANU) Centre for Continuing Education letter head. Marked private and confidential. Description An account of the resource Unnumbered manuscript from collection, item number assigned by library staff. The rightsholder for this work cannot be identified, or is identifiable but cannot be found, after a reasonable good faith search. If you believe you have a valid claim to the rights in this work, please contact us by email copyright@library.uq.edu.au Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org/items/browse?search=Richard+Sylvan&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bjoiner%5D=and&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=&amp;range=&amp;collection=&amp;type=&amp;user=&amp;tags=&amp;public=&amp;featured=&amp;exhibit=&amp;geolocation-mapped=&amp;geolocation-address=&amp;geolocation-latitude=&amp;geolocation-longitude=&amp;geolocation-radius=10&amp;submit_search=Search+for+items">Richard Sylvan</a> Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <span class="MuiTypography-root-125 MuiTypography-body2-126">The University of Queensland's <a data-testid="rek-series" href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/records/search?page=1&amp;pageSize=20&amp;sortBy=score&amp;sortDirection=Desc&amp;searchQueryParams%5Brek_series%5D%5Bvalue%5D=Richard+Sylvan+Papers%2C+UQFL291&amp;searchMode=advanced">Richard Sylvan Papers UQFL291</a></span>, Box 17, Item 1 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org">Antipodean Antinuclearism: (Re)constructing Richard Routley/Sylvan's Nuclear Philosophy</a> Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource May 23, 1993 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Richard Sylvan Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource For all enquiries about this work, please contact the Fryer Library, The University of Queensland Library. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource Letter, 1 leaf [962.77 KB] Type The nature or genre of the resource Correspondences Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context <a href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:7af99ef">https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:7af99ef</a> https://www.antipodean-antinuclearism.org/files/original/bc6906f973b58155fcdff1d8fbf5c13e.pdf cdee1d9f8cd9703c694e69ab3507018e PDF Text Text IS The UNIVERSE THE argument design HRTERHUTP existence of a designer, a planner, a God, the for RN (LIKE) regularly deploys the model of the universe as an artefact, A noteworthy part of plants from universe, the planets on through naturally evolved systems, If the whole arrangement Is an artefact, contrasts with artefacts. 'artefact' has been and Its contexts, etc., and to lose both Its normal contrasts, place, much stretched, e.g. of then, firstly tools applied by external living external creatures, and secondly, the relevant features are extremely well hidden. In the face of elaboration of these points the artefact claim Is eroded or weakened to-, the universe like an artefact. Is like In having a maker. Is usually meant, 'like' some are There It s as If It were an artefact, etc. And by features curious about Wilkinson s argument In his universe Is artefact'. The usual moves to the artefact model the Intelligibility universe the of e.g. (thus premissed are Heynell). But concentrates on the limits to human knowledge and the apparent extent the universe product on Wilkinson which to not Intelligible to us and may never be. Wilkinson however Is Is Idealism: not arguing for design In the universe, but for a kind of the The nature as of the human mind! The traditional case for design In the universe Is strangely subverted Into an argument for Idealism. God's. Everything Intended by It Is our not artefact, tells against this: but redefinition Is artefact one order of the day In philosophical argument. Consider first Mrs. four arguments, none decvscve, but all with to limits to knowledge, human limits severe practical limits to etc. equipment, ascertaining larger And that limits 1. Levels of detail. There are Is. very the also, appeal, such Size small. as and spaceship cost earth, of men s lifetimes, etc. (One experiment-careers). 2. forces? Variety The (and number) of forces. How many (1) Ignorance lead us Into l> super-weak , «« super-strong ” Issue of completeness Is serious here (as with Kant s philosophy). As with forces, so with objects, NB. It major laws, etc. of an (undiscovered) moderating or compensating force could about error features world, of e.g. Into postulating granularity of space and time. (2) Classlf Icatlon of forces In sort of periodic table, and then deeper explanation. 3. Limits to human conception? Macro-objects of our dimensions can have no conceptions of very small (micro seconds) Involves a slide from or very no real personal experience large. to No?? The argument no Imagination of to no conception of . Argues for limits to conception In both tIme and space. Goes on to suggest limits to description using everyday -1- household language, but �the argument Is bad: It depends on standard (Copenhagen) quantum theory. Ideas that limits of' conception tied to limits of language. 4-. Human nature and Its essential prejudice-, limits to what we are prepared to accept or understand. Set of prejudices, etc., e.g. prejudices In of favour numbers (In a fuaay world). Our constitution prevents understanding of world. Wilkinson's further argument Is that In view of limits we humans cannot but value to resort 'in reaching his judgements as to how the natural world Is - constructed, man cannot ultimately do more than say this Is how It has to be (p.96). Value ImposItIon, has to be', lie know that whether or [whether 'should be', quarks No, (p.98): Is here like Leslie? not we This Is how It get can good' feel at quarks we shall continue to talk about them and discuss their exist] (p.97). Nature Is going to be what the mind anatomy and domestic economy It me this makes the same makes of [our] theory with the thing confusion theorised that pervades Idealistic approaches. Wilkinson also to wants (as above and especially from orthodox proceed quantum theory) to reject any theme of the closure of nature to mind. He contends (p.80) that objectivity - looking at nature from outside - dissolves to be replaced by something Involving man essentially. The natural world depends on man for Its definition: hence the universe as an artefact. But this Is In no way established. The argument depends on the fallacy of of theory nature again, find nature equating with the It makes the erroneous assumption that the only criteria for theory selection are at bottom those of value or feeling. R question Wilkinson suggests, but sets aside (In the too-hard basket) Is: How It Is that we manage to understand the universe, or It s e.g. the much of It? mostly good luck. Historically rather different answers were favoured, universe Intelligible, Is natural, the world Is Intelligible. It's Since sufficiently Intelligent creatures can come to understand It. The Intelligibility theme Is not lacking for exponents. Here, In summary. Is Heynell argues for and applies It: R. If the It would not be that we can In world were not Intelligible, principle come to know. But the world Is that which we can In principle come to know. Therefore the world Is Intelligible. B. If Very like: We don't; or, So far as we different repsonses quickly suggest themselves, do so there were not something analogous to human Intelligence In the constitution of the world? the world would not be Intelligible. Therefore there Is something analogous to human Intelligence In constitution of the world (68). -2- the how �The preMiss first of B is flat out false, but present concern is with fl. The Minor preMiss of fl is false, by virtue of llMltatlon arguments such as those Wilkinson and elsewhere take an analytical shape is suffIclently (e.g. a of Routley). find the Major preMiss, though it can distortion. For Instance, the world May be intelligible for us to come to understand what we do of It without being completely intelligible. -3- �f~. i— i— i— r—i f— k i r^. ez. r- ez. r*--. ez. i -i H. fl e g n e 11, London, The Intelligible Universe r— «~- ez. - -=• A cosMologlcal arguwent , flacwll I an, 1982. D.H. Ullklnson, The universe as an artefact Models and Han, Clarendon, Oxford, In H. 1976, 88-98. -4- Harris (ed. ) Sc tent itto �Lj / 1 -\ L/ A C'T'Zf^ £ X J -/■■».*> -K f. / (/ W7 e (/ 7^77 sy J e 4^-?'')'? ] '^7' 4~r>l*'< > & '' ( //// O ' a � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Draft Papers Description An account of the resource Sylvan's literary executor encountered an archive in which “all his projects were current", since manuscripts were undated and unattributed. Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Text Any textual data included in the document IS The UNIVERSE THE argument design HRTERHUTP existence of a designer, a planner, a God, the for RN (LIKE) regularly deploys the model of the universe as an artefact, A noteworthy part of plants from universe, the planets on through naturally evolved systems, If the whole arrangement Is an artefact, contrasts with artefacts. 'artefact' has been and Its contexts, etc., and to lose both Its normal contrasts, place, much stretched, e.g. of then, firstly tools applied by external living external creatures, and secondly, the relevant features are extremely well hidden. In the face of elaboration of these points the artefact claim Is eroded or weakened to-, the universe like an artefact. Is like In having a maker. Is usually meant, 'like' some are There It s as If It were an artefact, etc. And by features curious about Wilkinson s argument In his universe Is artefact'. The usual moves to the artefact model the Intelligibility universe the of e.g. (thus premissed are Heynell). But concentrates on the limits to human knowledge and the apparent extent the universe product on Wilkinson which to not Intelligible to us and may never be. Wilkinson however Is Is Idealism: not arguing for design In the universe, but for a kind of the The nature as of the human mind! The traditional case for design In the universe Is strangely subverted Into an argument for Idealism. God's. Everything Intended by It Is our not artefact, tells against this: but redefinition Is artefact one order of the day In philosophical argument. Consider first Mrs. four arguments, none decvscve, but all with to limits to knowledge, human limits severe practical limits to etc. equipment, ascertaining larger And that limits 1. Levels of detail. There are Is. very the also, appeal, such Size small. as and spaceship cost earth, of men s lifetimes, etc. (One experiment-careers). 2. forces? Variety The (and number) of forces. How many (1) Ignorance lead us Into l> super-weak , «« super-strong ” Issue of completeness Is serious here (as with Kant s philosophy). As with forces, so with objects, NB. It major laws, etc. of an (undiscovered) moderating or compensating force could about error features world, of e.g. Into postulating granularity of space and time. (2) Classlf Icatlon of forces In sort of periodic table, and then deeper explanation. 3. Limits to human conception? Macro-objects of our dimensions can have no conceptions of very small (micro seconds) Involves a slide from or very no real personal experience large. to No?? The argument no Imagination of to no conception of . Argues for limits to conception In both tIme and space. Goes on to suggest limits to description using everyday -1- household language, but the argument Is bad: It depends on standard (Copenhagen) quantum theory. Ideas that limits of' conception tied to limits of language. 4-. Human nature and Its essential prejudice-, limits to what we are prepared to accept or understand. Set of prejudices, etc., e.g. prejudices In of favour numbers (In a fuaay world). Our constitution prevents understanding of world. Wilkinson's further argument Is that In view of limits we humans cannot but value to resort 'in reaching his judgements as to how the natural world Is - constructed, man cannot ultimately do more than say this Is how It has to be (p.96). Value ImposItIon, has to be', lie know that whether or [whether 'should be', quarks No, (p.98): Is here like Leslie? not we This Is how It get can good' feel at quarks we shall continue to talk about them and discuss their exist] (p.97). Nature Is going to be what the mind anatomy and domestic economy It me this makes the same makes of [our] theory with the thing confusion theorised that pervades Idealistic approaches. Wilkinson also to wants (as above and especially from orthodox proceed quantum theory) to reject any theme of the closure of nature to mind. He contends (p.80) that objectivity - looking at nature from outside - dissolves to be replaced by something Involving man essentially. The natural world depends on man for Its definition: hence the universe as an artefact. But this Is In no way established. The argument depends on the fallacy of of theory nature again, find nature equating with the It makes the erroneous assumption that the only criteria for theory selection are at bottom those of value or feeling. R question Wilkinson suggests, but sets aside (In the too-hard basket) Is: How It Is that we manage to understand the universe, or It s e.g. the much of It? mostly good luck. Historically rather different answers were favoured, universe Intelligible, Is natural, the world Is Intelligible. It's Since sufficiently Intelligent creatures can come to understand It. The Intelligibility theme Is not lacking for exponents. Here, In summary. Is Heynell argues for and applies It: R. If the It would not be that we can In world were not Intelligible, principle come to know. But the world Is that which we can In principle come to know. Therefore the world Is Intelligible. B. If Very like: We don't; or, So far as we different repsonses quickly suggest themselves, do so there were not something analogous to human Intelligence In the constitution of the world? the world would not be Intelligible. Therefore there Is something analogous to human Intelligence In constitution of the world (68). -2- the how The preMiss first of B is flat out false, but present concern is with fl. The Minor preMiss of fl is false, by virtue of llMltatlon arguments such as those Wilkinson and elsewhere take an analytical shape is suffIclently (e.g. a of Routley). find the Major preMiss, though it can distortion. For Instance, the world May be intelligible for us to come to understand what we do of It without being completely intelligible. -3- f~. i— i— i— r—i f— k i r^. ez. r- ez. r*--. ez. i -i H. fl e g n e 11, London, The Intelligible Universe r— «~- ez. - -=• A cosMologlcal arguwent , flacwll I an, 1982. D.H. Ullklnson, The universe as an artefact Models and Han, Clarendon, Oxford, In H. 1976, 88-98. -4- Harris (ed. ) Sc tent itto Lj / 1 -\ L/ A C'T'Zf^ £ X J -/■■».*> -K f. / (/ W7 e (/ 7^77 sy J e 4^-?'')'? ] '^7' 4~r>l*'< > & '' ( //// O ' a  Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Box 7, Item 792: Is the universe (like) an artefact? Subject The topic of the resource Computer printout with handwritten amendments, and handwritten notes on scrap paper. Description An account of the resource Note, one item digitised from item 792. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org/items/browse?search=Richard+Routley&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bjoiner%5D=and&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=&amp;range=&amp;collection=&amp;type=&amp;user=&amp;tags=&amp;public=&amp;featured=&amp;exhibit=&amp;geolocation-mapped=&amp;geolocation-address=&amp;geolocation-latitude=&amp;geolocation-longitude=&amp;geolocation-radius=10&amp;submit_search=Search+for+items">Richard Routley</a> Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <span class="MuiTypography-root-125 MuiTypography-body2-126">The University of Queensland's <a data-testid="rek-series" href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/records/search?page=1&amp;pageSize=20&amp;sortBy=score&amp;sortDirection=Desc&amp;searchQueryParams%5Brek_series%5D%5Bvalue%5D=Richard+Sylvan+Papers%2C+UQFL291&amp;searchMode=advanced">Richard Sylvan Papers UQFL291</a></span>, Box 7, Item 792 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org">Antipodean Antinuclearism: (Re)constructing Richard Routley/Sylvan's Nuclear Philosophy</a> Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource This item was identified for digitisation at the request of The University of Queensland's 2020 Fryer Library Fellow, <a href="https://najtaylor.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr. N.A.J. Taylor</a>. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource For all enquiries about this work, please contact the Fryer Library, The University of Queensland Library. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource [4] leaves + [1] leaf. 2.68 MB. Type The nature or genre of the resource Manuscript Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context <a href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:acc747a">https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:acc747a</a> Australian National University Office Box 7: Environmental Ethics Como House > Shelves > Bottom > Pile 3 https://www.antipodean-antinuclearism.org/files/original/9d2cb1366bf43e4d6fa3297d8399ddd8.pdf 2826984189904e731ada17347bd52c28 PDF Text Text WAR AND PEACE IV: TAO AND DEEP-GREEN Taoism and deep-green environmental theory, although closely aligned on very many issues, diverge over war. For Taoism, by contrast for instance with Buddhism, is not a pacific doctrine, but is committed to skilful defensive militarism. While it does not espouse a fortress mentality, Taoism certainly condones limited defensive military operations for specific purposes, a sort of guerilla warfare. By contrast, deep-green theory, while acknowledging the role of organised social defence, stands opposed to professional militarism, and thereby to military defence, and is committed to a principled pacifism. Conveniently a route through Taoism, philosophically fascinating in its own right, will lead us to problems of pacifism and towards deep-green theory. 1. Features of a Taoist critique of war and militarism. War did not receive a favourable press in ancient Chinese philosophy. Generally aggression and war were to be avoided. Even Confucius imposed very demanding conditions: for example, ‘when good men have instructed the people [in morals, agriculture, military tactics] for seven years, they may be allowed to bear arms,’ ‘If a ruler ... does not set himself right, even his commands will not be obeyed’ ( SB p.41, italics added). Mo Tzu went much further than Confucius, roundly condemning war – on utilitarian grounds, that war yields no net benefit at any level ( SB p.227). What is more, he backed his heavy condemnation practically (unlike some conspicuous contemporary theoretical utilitarians); ‘he did not hesitate to walk for ten days and ten nights in an effort to dissuade a ruler from making war’ ( SB p.212). But none, it is said, went as far, in a detailed and sophisticated criticism of war, as Lao Tzu; ‘none has condemned war more strongly than Lao Tzu’. ‘[T]he opposition of Taoism to the use of force is well-known, and the most bitter attack on militarism if found in the Lao Tzu’ (Chan, p.154, p.17.) But, after that splendid build-up, the text is slightly disappointing. Lao Tzu does not assert outright that war is an abomination, or even roundly condemn it. His critique of war, militarism, and military technology, is subtle and oblique, and, on the surface, far distanced from pacifism. For he does not recommend an end to war - in that genuine Taoists, those who possess Tao, will never participate in them – but expects wars to continue as unavoidable evils. Worse, he even goes so far as to outline proper attitudes to war and conduct in war, and indeed to suggest military techniques and strategies, some of which look decidedly devious. Among the classical works of Taoism, we focus on the Lao Tzu because, by contrast with other works, a remarkable component of that book is devoted to war and militarism. The apparent deviousness of the tactics Lao Tzu allocates serves to highlight what has been seen as ‘the most troublesome element’ in his philosophy (Chan p.17) – not so much however because they concern military operations, but because they are taken �to apply much more widely, ‘to life in general’ (p.17). But why should military activity obtain some special �dispensation? Why should what is not tolerated more generally be exonerated there? But given that Taoism has here the virtue of consistency (i.e. uniformity on principles) and of universalizability, that simply leaves more explaining to be done. • Puzzles for Taoism, and wars as unavoidable evils There are two puzzles here in Taoism rather than one. There is the militarypractices paradox, and, varying and generalising on that, there are life-practices paradoxes. The special paradox is generated by the following incompatible elements: on the one side, ‘the most bitter attack on militarism’, the well-known opposition of Taoism to the use of force (p.17) and to the possession and use of smart military weapons and technology – implying that war is far from all right – and on the other, advocacy of certain (devious) military tactics, outlines of (deceitful) conduct in war, and so on – implying that war is all right after all. A straightforward generalisation of this paradox would look at other morally-sensitive parts of life, where some practice was strongly condemned yet engaged in (for many examples, see the dilemmas assembled in MD). But the variation of concern to Chan and the neo-Confucians concerns the conjunction of upright with devious practices in life, in particular in the life of the sage. For a Taoist sage is presumed to lead an upright straightforward life, yet appears to engage in devious and even deceitful practices incompatible with such a life-style. Call this the Taoist-lifestyle paradox. Evidently a good deal of explaining is required, as to how Taoism can coherently take the positions it appears to presume, both on war and peace, and on life more generally. A desirable preliminary would seem to be a little investigation of what position is taken, especially on war and militarism. One key pasage runs: Fine weapons are instruments of evil They are hated by creatures Therefore those who possess the Tao turn away from them. ... Weapons are instruments of evil, not the instruments of a good ruler. When he uses them unavoidably, he regards calm restraint as the best principle Even when he is victorious, he does not regard it as praiseworthy, For to praise victory is to delight in the slaughter of men. He who delights in the slaughter of men will not succeed in the empire. ... For a victory, let us observe the occasion with funeral-ceremonies (LT p.154). Wars, which involve the use of weapons, instruments of evil, are accordingly themselves evil. They are also evil because they involve the slaughter of men. But they are also sometimes unavoidable (also p.152). Therefore such wars are unavoidable evils. Such discourse, obtained by almost immediate inference from the passage, is within the standard orbit of dilemma talk. But Taoism lacks, through �deliberately eschewing deontic talk, the discourse which enables direct expression of such dilemmas, or even direct condemnation of wars or of clever weapons. Instead the points are made by circumlocution, what the possesser of Tao does, how the good ruler conducts himself, or by analogy, of victory in war with death. �Unavoidable evils are the very stuff of deontic dilemmas (though many theories, underpinned by shonky logic, lack the resources for representing this stuff properly). Where something is unavoidably evil, it is both bad, because evil, and also not bad, doing it is excusable, because it is unavoidable. So, given such an argument (which has its weaknesses), an unavoidable evil is a genuinely dilemmatic object with inconsistent features. Certain wars have looked, since ancient times, like such dilemmatic objects. Revealingly, Chan tries to explain that ‘most troublesome element’ in Taoism, the military-practice paradox, through the following exercise in lateral thinking: It can ... be argued that Lao Tzu uses warfare to illustrate his principles of taking no action and weakness because warfare is among the most dynamic and critical of human experiences, just as the Indian classic, the Bhagavadgita chooses fighting as the theme on which to discuss the terrible dilemma whether one should fulfil his duty, as in the case of a soldier, and kill, or should fail in his duty and refrain from killing (p.17). ‘Just as’? The Indian classic prevents a classic moral dilemma, a dilemma represented in contemporary philosophy (following its rediscovery by Sartre), where there are incompatible duties: the duty to kill, because of one's role as a soldier, and the duty not to kill, because of one's human condition, and the supervenient dilemma of failing in and fulfilling one's duties. These dilemmas for an individual (male, as it then was) are replicated in dilemmas regarding war for group institutions: at bottom, the obligation to engage in war (for one set of compelling reasons) as contraposed with the obligation not to engage in war (for another, perhaps overlapping, set of reasons). A theory of moral dilemmas (as worked out for example in MD) is crucial for an adequate treatment of major issues in war and peace, especially (as will become evident) for a viable strong pacifism. But Taoism, eschewing deontic discourse, lacks the apparatus to state or develop moral dilemmas. Hence it is logically excluded from giving a full or adequate account of what is going on conceptually. One of the philosophically fascinating feature of Taoism is the fashion in which it manages to avoid deontic discourse, and to substitute for direct deontic discourse or improvise circumlocutions when deontic discourse would otherwise appear inevitable (cf. UT for examples). But there are costs. One is inability to display the mechanism of deontic dilemmas, or to show what reasons and argument lie behind Taoist prounouncements and conclusions (the shortage of Taoism on argument is another philosophically conspicious feature, also observed in UT). As conceptual apparatus for analysizing moral dilemmas is missing, most of the machinery involved has to be passed over. Only the outcomes, as Taoism sees them, are presented, as if from a black box. Taoism blacks out the story on deontic dilemmas that deep-green theory can tell, as the following diagram tries to show: �Diagrams . Charting the processing of deontic dilemmas that are “resolved”. �Deep-green chart: dilemma input Arguments to incompatible prescriptions § Processing of dilemma, directive situational procedures output Corresponding Taoist chart: Black directive Box output input It is evident that Taoism can be extended; information can be put into the Black Box rendering it less opaque. That extension can be made so as to conform to deepgreen theory, i.e. so that the extended Taoist chart, a neo-Daoist chart, looks like the deep-green one. That is indeed essentially how neo-Daoism get characterised, in terms of conformity of the extension to deep ecological theory (see UT). We are now placed to explain how to dissolve, or at least neutralize, the paradoxes deriving from repudiation of militarism, an awkwardly qualified repudiation in the case of Taoism. In a significant sense there is no resolving of genuine deontic dilemmas. The principles delineating the fix may stand, incompatible, signalling the persisting suboptimality (or better, sublimenality) of the dilemmatic situation. Where there is a dilemma, involved parties should try to do well enough in the sublimenal circumstances (for a much fuller account, see MD). Thus where there is a war, itself a non-Taoist process, engaged or caught up Taoists will not abandon Taoism. Taoist methods will be applied, Taoist strategies pursued. So much for theoretical representation and (non-)resolution of life-practices and other dilemmas, details of which are readily elaborated in deep-green extensions of Taoism. A prior substantive issue is whether dilemmas always are generated: not whether wars are evil (typically they are, an issue we shall come to), but whether wars are unavoidable. Analysis of wars does not bear that familiar claim out decisively. Many wars could have been avoided, through conciliation, negotiation, restraint, etc., and no worse results apparently obtained, through sanctions, exchange, trade, etc. Through a typology of wars (coming up) that conjecture can be given some substance. Consider, for instance, what would be walk-overs. Then there is little point in making a military response. So war can be avoided. Certainly an occupation, to be met in a different way, may still occur. And so on, perhaps, for various other types of war. But, more generally, try this:Every war involves an aggressor, who makes an aggressive move. Such an aggressor could always avoid that move, taking a different (or a do-nothing) course of �action. Therefore, �every war can be avoided. No war is entirely unavoidable. Setting aside determinism (which renders all actual wars along with all other events unavoidable), it could be argued that a war sometimes simply boils up, without an aggressor, an intensification of a conflagatory situation. There are grounds for scepticism regarding such examples; for such intensification can only occur if provocative military moves are made, for instance troops are stationed in provocative or risky positions. The presumption that certain wars are unavoidable typically derives from a onesided perspective on war, a defender's perspective. A defender has no option, so it is routinely averred, but to respond to a determined aggressor. Even if that should be so sometimes, when there is no running away or going underground, it does not establish that such a war is unavoidable; for it neglects the role of the aggressor. By a smarter formulation, relevant features of unavoidability can be captured. Although wars may not be unavoidable, defensive action in wars that have been initiated may be unavoidable. At least such action may be unavoidable if unacceptably high costs (death, enslavement, etc.) are not to be avoided. Thereupon another highly relevant feature emerges: the linkage of avoidability to costs. For whether an action is unavoidable then depends upon what costs a party is prepared to incur before and when insisting on action: but this appears entirely unacceptable. How can what is “unavoidable” cease to be so when some further costs are absorbed? However with basics like survival, a certain liberty, and so on, we do reach such bounds. An important type of unavoidability. We also reach scenarios, unavailable to Lao Tzu but kindly brought within range by modern technology, which may appear to justify aggressive strikes. State Z, while not an aggressor, is carrying out practices which will impose unacceptably high costs upon peoples of other states and implacably refuses to desist. It could, for example, be poisoning air or water flowing to other states. But ,to make the case vivid, let us suppose that state Z is constructing, for reasons Zeders find convincing (they are committed to a faith which depicts all humans as incorrigible sinners and unworthy of life), an effective doomsday machine. Would an (aggressive) preemptory strike designed to disable or destroy the machine be unavoidable? 1 In a sense, No; in another Yes. For different modalities can operate. Physically outsiders need to do nothing, but watch Zeders go about their zealous work. But deontically they are under heavy moral pressure, because of the costs of standing by idly: if the human race is worth anything very substantial, then they are obliged to act, action is deontically unavoidable. Here is a situation where a proposed reduction of deontic logic proves illuminating. Obligation is explicated through not implying, or necessitating, the sanction, i.e. 1 Whether it would be justifiable, or just, are separate issues. But it is evident enought that such scenarios further damage the obsolescent idea of just war. For, according to received doctrine, a just war is defensive. (How such a war can be fought at all is another matter; coherence requires relativization to ‘just war for party d’.) �excessive ethical costs such as extermination. Let us explain deontic unavoidability analogously: an action is so unavoidable if not undertaking it would result in excessive ethical costs. Then if it can be established that there is no other way than a military strike, an act of war, to ensure that the Zeders desist (and certainly we can envisage scenarios like that), then that is deontically unavoidable. It is also dilemmatic for those committed to, or inclined towards pacifism; and it is, for them at least, but paradoxically justifiable, as the negation is also justifiable, on pacific grounds. Scenarios like that sketched, that appear to render certain wars deontically unavoidable require but little or no elaboration to render them evil. Evil indeed is such a standard feature of standard wars that at least its great presence call for little supporting evidence. But it has taken to vast stretch of human history to reach this general point of recognition. The manifold evils of war Lao Tzu very early recognised and emphasized: Wherever armies are stationed, briars and thorns grow. Great wars are always followed by famines (p.152). And nowadays followed by great tides of refugees. This passage includes not only recognition of the widely-observed socioenvironmental consequences of war, but, more striking, very early recognition of the severe environmental impact of military forces. That critique is not however developed in Taoism. 2 Only recently has it been pushed substantially further. And only recently could a new, most significant twist occur, the merging of resource security, long a military objective, with environmental security. The appalling idea has recently been floated that the military, in need of new work and roles with the apparent warming of West-East relations and cooling of the Cold War, should exchange usual military idleness for meddling in environmental matters: regulation and policing of environmental resources, ensurance of environmental security of powerful states, and similar. This is a bit like reassigning those imprisoned for child abuse to managing kindergartens; for consider the impressive military record of environmental vandalism. What the military is alleged to offer is a structure appropriate and available for handling such matters. But, to the contrary, it is precisely the sort of hierarchical, authoritarian expensive structure that should be wound down and up as soon as the opportunity appears, as (briefly) now, rather than being retained and shockingly reoriented (as a state-serving “Greenwar”). 2. On the divergence of deep-green from Taoism. Having arrived, by better or worse arguments, at the conclusion that wars, though 2 But a bridge to deep-green theory can be made through neo-Daoism, an updating of Taoism in confirmity with deep ecology (which however is somewhat thin and threadbare on war; for what there is so far, see Naess p.160). On neoDaoism, see UT. �generally evil, may be sometimes unavoidable, it is evidently important to say something about how they – those of the theoretical residue – are to be conducted. By appropriate conduct the damage they do may be reduced; also the conduct should be appropriate to the funereal nature of wars (to exceed Taoist resources for stating this sort of point). It is at this stage that deep-green theory begins to diverge from Taoism. In further explaining the Taoist and deep-green critiques of war, and diverting objections to them, a rough and preliminary typology of wars is important. It is also of passing interest in its own philosophical right. War, according to English Dictionaries, is a ‘contest carried on by force of arms, typically between nations or states’. More exactly, war is a game – in the generous technical sense of game-theory, with players, rules, goals, strategies, and so on – carried on in significant part by military means, normally between states or substates. Call the contestants, (warring) parties. They typically represent of course larger populations. The set-up between parties resembles the arrangements of players in game theory. There are several analogical extensions of the term war to cover games where one of the parties is an object, construed as hostile (an enemy of the state), such as Crime, Drugs, Poverty or Nature. These we can set aside as analogical wars. Of course wars form only a part of military activities. Military interests and objectives have always stretched significantly further than war, to include surveillence and security, easily extended to resource security, environmental security and life-style security, and beyond that to political stability and other political matters. Evidently military ambitions have far over-extended themselves in bagging such democratic concerns. An anarchist solution to the whole problem of war, which some have seen Taoism as reaching towards, is immediate: eliminate the source of war, states. Unfortunately it is not quite that simple (and that's not simple). For wars can also occur between nations, cultures, races or tribes (which are not such artifices as states, and not always so readily or desirably abolished), between inhabited regions, and between factions within states (thus civil wars) or, perhaps by extension, between factions within other social structures (thus, for instance, gang wars). But undoubtedly eliminating states and aspiring states would abolish most wars and virtually all the worst wars. While “nonviolent wars” are excluded by definition, by virtue of ‘force of arms’, token wars, limited wars, and so on, are not: for instance, wars fought by small armed teams representing competing sides (cf. medieval and science fiction war games). As wars are hemmed in by conventions and agreed rules, there is no reason in principle why they should not be reduced to two person contests, fought under strict rules like boxing or gladiatorial contests. But in modern times wars have never taken such sensible forms, but have been much larger affairs, making heavy (though fortunately restricted) use of latest technology. Let us distinguish such wars as techno-powered wars. They have, directly or indirectly (for the technology may be bought or bartered), a heavy research and development support structure (indeed the bulk of contemporary science is devoted – misdirected – in one way or another to �this effort). Among wars, an important distinction is that between offensive and defensive wars. An offensive war is one which ventures off a given party's territory or recognised pad, “invading” that of another party or parties; correlatively defensive parties, if they have not also invaded. Force projection typifies offensive practice. Plainly, offensiveness and defensiveness are not strictly features of a war, but of parties to a war. In a two-party war, while both parties can easily act offensively, the possibility of both parties proceeding defensively is excluded, unless they share territory. (Even then issues may arise as to which party, if any, was the aggressor, which started it, was responsible for starting it, and so on.) Thus mutually defensive wars between contemporary states are impossible (but would be possible if states shared territory, e.g. if Eire and Britain shared the territory of Northern Ireland). Tao-accredited wars were defensive wars, never wars aiming at domination: last-resort wars, in which no pride was taken ( LT p.152).3 The pretence that offensive wars are defensive is widespread, and reflected in the subterfuge that departments or ministries of war are those of defence, security or whatever. (If they really were what they purport to be, we should be well on the way to an end to war.) Offensive practices are rendered defensive ones by shabby redefinitional strategems, such as redefining ‘defensive’ to include defence of ideals like democracy or liberty, infringed (or allegedly infringed) on territories abroad, or to include “defence” of a third party or place (whence every offensive war is “defensive”). In the present war in which part of Arabia is engulfed (February 1991), one party claims to be defending what really was (or should be) part of its territory, namely Kuwait, another party to be defending (what Kuwait did not enjoy) democracy. It is a doubly offensive war presented in this guise as jointly defensive. Aggressive wars are waged for a variety of reasons, but usually for resources or access to resources or markets, a matter often disguised by appeal to ideology (thus a war for oil is represented as a war of liberation). But there are other reasons than narrowly economic ones, such as religion (as with crusades), power and aggrandisement (as in building an empire), and so on. Nor are those reasons necessarily far separated; ideologies like Marxism and market capitalism, for example, exhibit many of the features of religion. The economic reasons for war appear to have become much more complex with the 3 There is one line in LT that may suggest that attack was sometimes justifiable, namely ‘For deep love helps one to win in the case of attack’ (p.219). But how can compassion be appropriate unless this attack is within a defensive setting, a larger context of unavoidability or such like. A passage shortly below confirms this interpretation: I dare not take the offensive but I take the defensive: I dare not advance an inch but I retreat a foot (p.222). These are advances and attacks within a defensive setting. �advent of an integrated world economy. At the same time many of the independent reasons for economic wars are now obsolete. For to powerful states accrue the advantages of war without war. At least most of the former economic advantages of war can be obtained without expensive wars, through trade, institution of economic dependence, etc. Small medieval wars were sometimes instituted for the collection of neighbouring riches and booty, a kind of piracy meeting conditions of war. “Small” contemporary wars can be waged for a remarkable mix of political-economy ends: to establish a regime favourable to economic penetration and profit repatriation, to subjugate markets and to remove competition, to boost a sagging weapons economy by using up old stocks and also testing new equipment, to restart a depressed economy, and so on. Such wars, along with the economic aims which motivate them, are in effect heavily castigated by Lao Tzu: When Tao prevails in the world, galloping horses are turned back to fertilize When Tao does not prevail in the world, war horses (the thrive in fields ...). the suburbs. There is no calamity greater than lavish desires. ( LT p.181). But it does exceed evidential warrant to claim that Tao is not only sufficient, but necessary, for cessation of such practices. The practice of regularly stimulating complex military-saturated economies through war is reminiscent of older, much ridiculed practices in simpler societies. They now ridicule the Tsembaga, who proceeded to destroy much of their surplus product by going to war every 5-15 years (cf Rapaport). But they do not similarly ridicule the most powerful nation on the Earth, the USA, which proceeds to write off a colossal amount of surplus in war every 10-20 years (the Gulf war liquidated some $1.7 billion per day). Taoists would. For ridicule was a favoured method, an important rhetorical strategem, and war and its idiocy were favourite targets. Some classification of defensive wars is also important, for various reasons: reducing and abolishing wars, their costs and damage, restructuring societies away from war and military practices, and, not least, for appreciating Taoism. A main distinction is between • conventional defence, maintained by armies of armed soldiers, many of them professionals, and • social defence, where there are no such armies or but fragments of them, and defence is carried out through social networks of a significant part of society.4 It is here that Taoism and deep-green theory part company. Under Taoism, the state will have a standing army, but a defensive army operating by strange, surprise tactics (p.201). No 4 Details of social defence are presented in Sharp and in Martin. �doubt defensive wars are to remain last resort action. Nonetheless the state will operate in secrecy, in a way incompatible with decentralised social defence; people will be kept in the dark about smart weapons of the state; and they too will be surprised, along with presumed enemies of the state. By contrast, under deep-green theory, there should be no hidden smart weapons of state; information would flow more freely and not be hidden from the people (who should retain influence in informed decision making). Under deep-green, standing armies, and more generally military organisation, will be wound down altogether. Taoism should have pushed its searching criticism further. For military objectives, easily acquired by standing armies with time on their hands, are frequently incompatible with Taoism. For example, Taoism is opposed to domination ( LT p.152), whereas military operations frequently seek or involve domination; and military structure is invariably hierarchical and authoritarian. Taoism aims for self-regulation, wherever feasible (cf. p.201); so does deep-green theory, which is one reasons why it aims to dispose of standing armies, as an important preliminary to the withering away of states themselves (military forces being major props of state control and power, and often maintained primarily for internal state security). Taoism has no project for ending the era of wars; deepgreen theory does. That project involves an elimination of standing armies, too often poised for fighting or political interference. A recommended route to end war consists in progressive scaling down: reduction of the means and manpower. The initial stages are well-known, and include • elimination of nuclear, biological and chemical weaponry, and • force reduction. It can hardly be pretended that the Earth's states have managed to proceed very far on even this complex of stages. The next stage consists in • contraction to defensive capacities only, and the final stage consists in • elimination of remaining military defensive forces, and adoption, so far as required, of social defence practices. The complete route thus involves complete demilitarisation. Reasons why deep-green aims to proceed the full distance are readily grasped by considering the environmental shallowness of an otherwise cogent traditional case for the sharp curtailment of wars and militarism. The traditional Western case against wars has been primarily along two dimensions: social and moral. Wars are highly disruptive of the social fabric; wars may be unjust. From these joint features, it was argued that wars should be a matter of last resort, to be fought to ensure peace. It was argued further that only just wars should be fought. Just wars were rare objects. But as there was little evidence of the decline and fall of wars, much effort was expended, more practically and unsuccessfully, upon endeavouring to improve the calibre of wars, and more theoretically, upon trying to characterize just war satisfactorily, or rather to bend the notion in an effort to approximate the gory unjust facts. Progress was long hindered, furthermore, because there was always a rival positive perspective on wars, which encouraged the exaltation of wars and military feats. It also �facilitated the transfer of the favourable image of war to other problem areas, whence the long and apparently successful war against Nature (but the short-term successes are turning into long-term problems), the short and unsuccessful war against Poverty, and so on. Behind all this is the complex idea of war as rejuvenating, even cleansing, like fire; of war as heroic, and glorious, of war as the supreme testing ground of men. These pictures of war – finally shattered by the first World War (where even the poets began to tell of horrors and atrocities) and subsequent technological wars – though no longer in ascendency, have by no means vanished. The notion of war as rejuvenating a flagging economy persists, along with the practice of keeping capitalism running smoothly by integrating substantial military components into the industrial engine. With the development of highly technological wars – the celebrated development of the dirty industrial age is substantially military – the traditional negative case has grown in strength. Wars have become much more damaging, with the potential for much more that is significantly worse, and the possibility of a just war has correspondingly contracted, virtually to zero. The opposition to war has likewise grown, but more than correspondingly with the rise of women in social and political influence. Wars have almost always and everywhere been Men's affairs; likewise conquest. Deep-green theory accepts much of the traditional negative case, but would further strengthen it. For example, the stricture against unjust wars, as out and out immoral, can be strengthened, through the following syllogism: All wars should be fully just wars. Modern wars cannot be fully just wars. Therefore, there should be no modern wars. A fully just war is not merely a just war, but a war those just character can be reliably forecast in advance. A modern war is of course a war that deploys modern technology, at least that available this century. The evidential basis for the second premiss derives from much information that collateral damage, damage to innocent bystanders and involved citizens is always likely and cannot be excluded. Such wars are always liable to violate uncontroversial requirements for a just war, even if they are purely “conventional” wars, not throwing radiation or chemical or biological weapons around. From a contemporary viewpoint the traditional doctrine of a just war, really of a just defensive war, is seriously out of date. The reasons for this reach wider than the new features introduced by modern technological wars and the character of modern civilization, with its giant cities littered with dangerous and vulnerable military targets. They have also to do with the chauvinism of the justice proposed, which is shallow human justice, not natural or environmental justice. There is no consideration of justice to other creatures or to the Earth (cf Naess p.160). Two troubles are really intertwined here: conceptual difficulties with too narrow a notion of justice, and ideological difficulties with too narrow a vision of what is an object of �value, of what counts. The deep-green case against war adds to the traditional case a further dimension, neglected until very recently: the environmental dimension. It has suddenly been seen that wars are typically environmental atrocities. Earlier, of course, “environments” were simply backgrounds, backdrops in paintings and plays, to the real drama. Contemporary technological wars tend to be not merely social tragedies but environmental ones as well. There is a doctrine of just war, but it is a human chauvinistic affair. There is no similarly developed doctrine of an ecologically sound war, a deep ecological war. Unless any such war were literally different from modern wars, that is from contemporary technological wars, it would overstep permitted bounds. For such wars are characteristically ecological disasters. Hardened military people, desensitized by a rigorous unethical training, feel even less compunction about degrading or destroying environments or members of other species than they do of maiming or killing civilians through “collateral” activity. Matching the no-just-war syllogism is a no-sound-war syllogism: All wars should be environmentally sound wars. Modern wars cannot be environmentally sound. Therefore, there should be no modern wars. The argument for the second premiss has of course to be different. It looks to the information accumulating on what wars do to natural and built environments. The Vietnam and Gulf wars both inflicted immense damage on natural environments or what was left of them. The environmental effects of war are not confined to direct and collateral damage. There are indirect effects also. Thus, for instance, war also supplied the mechanism of, and the technology for, modern environmental destruction: explosives, bulldozers from tanks, etc. As well, training for war and engagement in war have much fostered, along with attitudes that make for social callousness or ruthlessness, those that contribute to environmental insensitivity and cruelty. 3. Puzzles about Taoist strategy and its critiques of technology and violence ‘It is surprising how much of the Lao Tzu is devoted to military strategy’. Which strategies? Surprise, above all. But why such strategies? ‘Do they not contradict the Taoists’ strong opposition to the use of force’ (Chan p.222), the implied commitment to quietism? Briefly, Taoism is not committed to quietism, and while certainly antagonistic to violence, does not oppose certain uses of force (only really ill-forcing, as will be explained). Even so, the emphasis on military strategy remains puzzling. The strategies, many of them relevant to social defence, include • seriousness, not ‘making light of the enemy’ (p.222) • surprise, and nonvisibility (p.201). The defensive strategy involves guerilla tactics: marching without formation, holding weapons without seeming to have them, confronting �enemies without seeming to meet them (p.222). But even in times of peace, ‘smart weapons of the state should not be displayed to the people’ (p.164). Such recommendations helped to fuel the charge of deviousness lodged against Lao Tzu. But look at part of the reason for concealing smart weapons: ‘The more smart weapons the people have, the more troubled the state will be’ (p.201). Smart weapons are carried in corrupt states, where the rich engage in conspicuous consumption and the people are suppressed, not where Tao is practiced (LT p.194). • advance from weakness, flexibility but firmness. Weakness is the principle of life and will overcome strength ( LT p.164, p.233). • coolness and non-competition (LT p.233, p.164). Like these, most of the general strategies are standard Taoist practices simply applied to military conduct. For these standard practices the charge of deviousness looks feeble. The response applies more generally to other allegedly devious political strategies. For the strategies are but application of Taoist principles and techniques to warfare, politics and elsewhere. Nothing excludes application of these techniques to what are accounted, in general, unnecessary evils (which must sometimes, on other Taoist grounds, be countered). Nor, to meet the main criticism, need any deceit or deviousness be involved; nor is it. In particular, the legalist tactic, ‘In order to grasp, it is necessary first to give’ (LT p.164), is cited as involving ‘an element of deceit’ ‘undeniably’, and ‘worse’ it is ‘morally questionable’ (Chan p.17). But in order for me to grasp your hand in a normal handshake, it is necessary first for me to give my hand. There is no deceit here, nothing morally questionable. All the tactics permit of benign construals, of a Taoist kind. Consider, for instance, ‘In order to contract, it is necessary first to expand’ (LT p.164). In order to bend a copper pipe to the intended angle, it is better to bend it first a little further than required. The transformation of water to ice (both favoured natural items for symbolic purposes: natural processes which may look devious!) neatly illustrates the Taoist principle (which is however hardly necessary), and shows softness and weakness turned hardness and strength. The Taoist critique of militarism is as much a critique of technology as of war. Sharp weapons, ‘smart weapons’ as we might now say, come in for much critical attention, as we have already noticed. Only in corrupt and degenerate states are they displayed or flaunted (p.194, p.164); in deep-green regions smart weapons of state’ would not be retained unexhibited. The people will not have them for they mean trouble (p.201); for similar reasons deep-green regions will be free of them. So, it seems, will ideal Taoist regions: ‘Even if there are arrows and weapons, none will display them’ ( LT p.238). Much technology, military and other, is excluded under the Taoist edict against violence (a further facet of the military-practices paradox). 5 5 Under contemporary technology and technological arrangements, such as the storage of quantities of oil and nuclear and chemical materials in great cities, wars have assumed new and very destructive dimensions, to the point of being utterly irresponsible. A different approach to technology, as to war, is now mandatory. These are no longer things that can in principle be nicely confined and need not touch parties outside the fray. An important part of ending wars, “winning the war against wars”, is removing the technology of war, above all from irresponsible state power. As for which technology to try to jettison and which to try to retain or improve, it is not so difficult to indicate, provided evaluative terminology is not outlawed. What is wanted is technology that is good in its place, what should be excluded is technology that is indifferent or bad or potentially so. Technology to be justified has to do something worthwhile, it has to address identifiable respectable needs. That is why �The powerful critique of militarism in the Tao-te Ching is coupled with strong opposition to violence. Some of the linkage is evident enough. Militarism as practised represents an ultimate form of state (or party) violence. A basic theme is that violent practices will come to an unnatural end, and accordingly to a non-Taoist end (generalising LT p.176). While force may occur in spectacular, but satisfactory, natural forms, force is duly distinguished from violence. To force the growth of life means ill omen. For the mind to employ the vital force without restraint means violence (LT p.197). One who follows Tao does not apply dominating force, which usually has had results bringing requital (p.152). Dominating force, like power, is in general castigated, under doctrine of wu-wei, no forced actions, no violence. To force natural growth is deviant, destroying harmony. To stop natural growth is deviant. But there is a significant difference between force and violence. To intentionally employ destructive force is to do violence. To so force things is condemned. To remain in harmony with things one does not so force things or practice violence. There is a non-interference principle at work, which also indicates types of non-interference that are excluded. However Taoism does not always get the distinction between force and violence quite right. ‘Vital force without restraint’, intentionally excessive force, is only part of what counts as violence, which is more generally force which violates, i.e. transgresses, descrecrates, merely indifferent technology is out; there is no virtue in technology for technology's sake, as it is a mere means technique. It is because of the crucial evaluative component in choice of technology that appropriateness, itself evaluative, comes closer to encapsulating the criterion than other recent efforts. Size, such as smallness, or intermediateness, are not what matter, though modest and not excessive technologies are likely to fare better in satisfying appropriateness. In simpler societies, small technology is of course more appropriate; for that is what is good there. From known criteria for what is good these other features for locally appropriate technology can be read off: reliability, esp. in maintenance, functioning well and safely under the expected range of operating conditions (which may be difficult), ease of repair, capital cheapness and repair inexpensiveness, environmental benignness, and meeting sound social needs. �profanes, injures, outrages, etc. It is thus a negatively connoted force, an evil force in some specified intentional respect. There is a tendency for Taoist commentators, not Taoists, to regard Taoism as condemning all uses, or even occurrences, of force, but this is not so. Rather intentional ill-forcing is what is castigated, what is deviant. Thus Taoism does not exclude a range of defensive practices, which make satisfactory use of natural forces, like letting the machines of war industry stop. Those who would abolish war and its machinery, substituting for it nonwarlike and ideally nonviolent methods, technology, and strategies, have been confronted not merely with much sub-rational abuse but with plenty of criticism and even some paradoxes. Here is a recent paradox concerning war and nonviolence: • War must be abolished. One reason is simply economic. We can no longer afford it, and the opportunity costs are enormous. Along with other extraordinarily wasteful activities, it is an anachronism. • Doing so cannot be accomplished without violence, i.e. in effect, given the types of violence involved, without what amounts to war. According to a fuller version of this premiss, the process of abolishing a war would only be achieved through a revolution so profound that it could not succeed without extensive and extreme violence, amounting to (civil) war. ˚ But then war cannot be abolished without war. Therefore, war which must be abolished cannot be abolished. 6 This “paradox” has been compared with the Liar paradox, but the parallel does not persist far. For this paradox does not involve selfreferential features, and is easily broken, as follows. Let the “last war” be not the last standard war but the revolution abolishing war. Then, given that the revolution is successful, war will be abolished therewith, i.e. with that last war. There need be no regress, given again a successful outcome. All the premisses stand intact, but the conclusion, following the ‘therefore’ is a nonsequitur. However, while the dissolution of the argument is accordingly logically fine, the route is repugnant. Standard pacifism challenges the second premiss. 4. Standard and moral pacifism. 6 Brian Medlin, who forcefully propounded this puzzle, set other analogous puzzles alongside it – designed to reveal deep difficulties in contemporary political, and especially alternative, thought. Another puzzle, concerning liberty and repression in the context of capitalism, revolved around the following inconsistent triad: • capitalism must be removed, but liberty retained. • capitalism cannot be removed without repression. • repression is antithetical to liberty. The puzzle is resolved as with the analogous puzzle of abolishing. Let the “last capitalist” action before the days of liberty be the repressive but liberating revolution overthrowing capitalism. �Although Taoism is strongly opposed to war, and much in favour of peace – and accordingly by prevailing standards a substantially pacific position – it is not (nowhere in the central texts) committed to pacifism in usual senses, for two different reasons:- • It is not, by contrast with pacifism, opposed to all types of warfare, for example smart defensive wars. • It eschews deontology in terms of which moral pacifism is commonly stated, for instance through the watershed thesis P2. It is morally wrong to use violence. By contrast with Taoism, deep environmentalism does not avoid deontic claims, and is committed in principle to nonviolent technologies and ways and to pacifistic principles. Moreover, certain forms of deep environmentalism are completely committed to pacifism, notably European forms. Is deep green? There is heavy contemporary opposition to pacifism, as there also was to Taoism in the warring times when Taoism was first being promulgated. Many of the central institutions of contemporary life are intricated in coercion, violence and war. The most prominent contemporary institutions, states, are premissed on these elements of damaging force; they claim entitlement to use them widely, and even claim a certain territorial monopoly on their use. As a result they are having constantly to engage in them in attempt to maintain that monopoly. They are certainly the main perpetrators of wars, and of violence. They are indeed inured to wars, are in constant preparation for wars, yet propound dialectial (and normally dishonest and cynical) doctrines of peace through war (for a recent example see the appendix). Unremarkably then, the extensive propagandistic machinery of state has invested heavily in “justificatory” exercises in favour of controlled use, its own use, of destructive force, and continues to inveigh against pacifism. Because a routine trick in this sophistical repetoire consists in conflating pacifism with extreme, naive and inplausible, forms, an inevitable and important early task commits in unscrambling senses of ‘pacifism’. Semantical skulduggery can be thwarted in this way. Pacifism, as explained by English dictionaries, invariably concerns wars and warfare, and contains two components, negative and, elaborating on that, positive:- The negative component is, in Arnauld's word, anti-War-ism, opposition (in ways to be further specified) to all forms of warfare (see OED). The positive component supplies alternative ways of settling disputes (what it is supposed that wars with some semblance of justification involve), such as negotiation, arbitration, ... – and, adding to too narrow dictionary accounts – sanctions, substitutions (e.g. of sporting events, operatic contests, cooperative ventures), ... . In brief standard pacifism is opposition to all warfare and resolution of potential wars by other nonmilitary means. Plainly the opposition to warfare, like the sanctions and so on, cannot itself be military (using soldiers and other devices of war), on pain of some incoherence. But otherwise the ways of opposition can be many and various: they can certainly be active, as with nonviolent �demonstrations, resistance movements, and so forth, and they may also be devious (e.g. turning the forces of war upon themselves so they are neutralised). It quickly becomes evident, then, that some of the dictionaries offer but loaded definitions which, by restricting the negative components, reduce the initial appeal and plausibility of pacifism. Consider the Concise English definition of the negative component: ‘the doctrine of non-resistance to hostilities and of total non-co-operation with any form of warfare’. Thereby excluded are forms of pacifism which offer active and plausible alternatives to warfare such as social defence. The Concise English tends to force pacifism into what the Oxford English Dictionary lists as its final item: ‘often, with depreciatory implication, the advocacy of peace at any price’, ‘in any circumstance’. Pacifism can easily resist being forced into these sorts of circumstances: it has many resources, as an extensive series of texts on alternatives to war, such as negotiation, non-violent action and social defence, from Taoism to contemporary environmentalism attest. Academic philosophers have much advanced the semantical strategy of some dictionaries, of rendering pacifism more difficult from the very outset by narrow and biassed definitions. They have stretched the term from its restricted setting of warfare, confined to state and organised gang violence, to cover all forms of violence, from state and interstate to, what is very different, personal and interpersonal violence. Call the resulting considerably stretched notion of pacifism, according to which it is morally wrong to use violence, according to which P2 holds, stretched pacifism.7 While stretched pacifism certainly includes standard pacifism (unless the notions of war and warfare are tampered with), the converse is very far from being the case. A pacifist is in no way committed to stretched pacifism, which is a much more problematic and difficult position than standard pacifism. There are several, substantially different reasons for this, which will be picked up seriatim. Stretched pacifism, also misleadingly called moral pacifism, has looked a very easy critical target to moral philosophers. Many the effusive philosopher who, upon sighting such a target, has charged, whooping such rhetoric as “incoherent”, “inconsistent”, “insensitive”, “fanatical”. However, with improved logical technology now available for accommodating and treating moral dilemmas, it is no great feat to resist such attacks, in the fashion of previous investigations (see esp. AI, also MD). A main aim was to demonstrate that stretched pacifism was not so stupid as it was made out to be or appeared to be to these inured to present dominant violent ways. So far from being stupid, it is viable. In future gentler times stretched pacifism could even be realised for whole communities of creatures (as some genuinely Christian sects envisaged); whence it will finally be seen to be feasible not merely for sages and supermen, and many ordinary women, but much more extensively. 7 In AI this notion was contrasted with standard pacifism as comprehensive pacifism: overcomprehensive might have been better. �The method of philosophical accommodation was through moral dilemmas. The sort of moral dilemma that stretched pacifism can induce derives as follows. On the one side stands the theme P2, Wv, in convenient symbols, for Wrong V-ing, violencing. Now this implies to WB, where B presents a case of of violence. On the other side, particular circumstances develop which lead to W ~B, because ~B would produce in the circumstances considerable wrong, for instance extensive violence, mass murder, etc. One stock example from the literature concerns calling off the firing squad about to shoot several captives if the pacifist shoots one of them (it is elaborated in AI p.13). Interestingly, another stock example from the literature concerns standard pacifism (it can also be presented in terms of patriotism; for details of both see MD p.10). Resolution of intractable moral dilemmas is, where it is required, situational. The agent decides in the situation, within the fix, what to do. There are many ways in which such decision making can proceed, less rational, such as those applying chance or involving bad faith, or more rational, such as those applying consequentialist decision theory (for details see MD, pp.32-9). A decision theory taking account of all that should be included will not however be purely consequential. It would also take account of relevant motivation. This defence and rehabilitation of moral pacifism has been challenged, in particular by Smith (hereafter JWS). JWS claims the defence offered is a ‘failure because it trivializes pacifism’ (p.153 twice). The rehabilitation trivializes pacifism because it entails that pacifism doesn't substantially differ from a form of activism which holds that while violence is always wrong one is sometimes justified on consequentialist grounds for preferring violent acts, if these acts are lesser evils than any other real alternatives. This is the commonsense position which most people hold – yet ... pacifism after all was supposed to be radical moral doctrine ... (p.153 rearranged).8 Part of the criticism is, then, not so much that pacifism is trivialized – JWS “activism” is hardly trivial – as that pacifism is popularised, deflated from a radical position to the commonsense position most people hold (p.154 also). Yet not a shred of evidence is adduced that JWS activism is such a populist position. Available evidence, for example from peace movements and oppositional opinion polls, suggests the very opposite: that, for instance, most people support state-justified conventional wars with the military violence they incur, and accordingly do not hold that violence is always wrong. From such a commonsense angle, pacifism with its condemnation of conventional wars and the violence they involve remains a radical doctrine. As regards wars and other violence-incurring social authorities, contemporary pacificism 8 JWS now informs me that he has changed his position. Whether the move effects his criticism, I don't know. �is, as previous explained (e.g. AI p.3), a form of activism. Pacifism does not imply utter pacifity, but may actively involve social defence, resistance and so on. However a certain level of misrepresentation enters into the JWS challenge in the details of what forms of activism pacifism may include. That misrepresentation begins in the second clause concerning what is said to be sometimes justified. For the situational procedure where dilemmas arise will not generally be consequential applying a principle of lesser evil. In dilemmatic situations such principles are suspended, and such a principle is in any case unacceptable to moral pacifists. A small amount of violence may be less bad in its consequences than verbal offence, but a principled pacifist will choose the slightly greater evil where other obligations do not exclude it. A more serious distortion occurs in JWS's effort to force procedures in dilemma situations into purely consequentialist form. In fact consequential decision theory was deployed as a model only for how to proceed rationally in a situational setting where deontic procedures were suspended (see MD p.38). What was said, still misleadingly retrospective vision reveals, was this: ‘what is done is a very consequentialist thing’ (AI p.13), not ‘one acts in a consequentialist fashion to do the sufficiently good thing in the circumstances’ (JWS p.152). Situationally other procedures than those resembling orthodox rational decision making (modified from maximizing to satisizing objectives) may be adopted ( MD p.38). Further the orthodox consequentialist theory is inadequate because it leaves out, or tries to reduce to consequences, nonconsequential elements, notably motives. It is not difficult, in principle (in advance of attempted consequentialization of motives), to design situations where motives, such as integrity or maintaining faith, enter to yield outcomes upsetting consequential calculations. More elaborate decision making procedures than those of consequentialism, sometimes at variance with consequentialism, are thus presupposed. A further part of JWS's criticism accordingly goes by the board, the alleged appeal ‘to “second best” consequentialist considerations, ... already explicitly condemned’ (p.154). What was condemned was stock universal consequentialism, ‘that only consequentialist considerations carry argumentative weight’ (quoted on p.152), so undercutting other deontic principles, such as those of pacifism. It was not claimed, what is utterly different, that consequentialist considerations can nowhere enter into deliberation and decision making. The conclusion JWS arrives at is therefore substantially astray. After criticising modern moral philosophy for its reliance upon consequentialist modes of thought, it is surprising, and inconsistent, to find ... [reliance] upon such modes of thought to escape logical difficulties raised by moral dilemmas facing ... pacifis[m] (p.152) There is no inconsistency. JWS has confused universal with particular. As well he has wrongly contracted all situational decision making to consequentialist modes. There is a third part to the criticism, that the defence is too easy; the ‘strategy will allow too much violence to be (perpetrated and) justified to suit the tastes of any real pacifist’ (p.153). This another part of the so-called trivialization, this time however dilution rather than �populatization, weakening the moral stand against violence. This third contention is premissed on a mistake: that one can ‘justify on consequentialist grounds any number of violent acts, providing that such acts are lesser evils than other real alternatives facing social agents’ (p.153). Moral pacifism offers no such licence; allowing such consequentialism to take over was never part of the position. The slide to such consequentialism is made on the strength of a similarly erroneous example. The potential victim of an aspiring rapist ‘is supposed to flee or wriggle free if possible. But it is easy to consequentially justify the use of violence by the woman to prevent herself from being raped’ (p.153 italics added). In the example so far described there is no dilemma, and no such easy resort to consequentially ‘justified’ violence. What allows too much violence is the lesser evil JWS assumes is easily consequentially justified; for example that the woman is entitled to inflict, and escalate, violence so long as it remains ‘a lesser evil than the violence of attempted rape’ (p.153). Since she may thereby inflict quite unreasonable damage (esp. if she is a Kung Fu expert), the result is inconsistent with ‘the basic principle of self-defence’ which JWS earlier adduced according to which what is ‘appropriate, in response is only that level of force necessary to defend oneself against the threat’ (p.150). There is evidence in JWS's work of some enthusiasm for levels of violence which exceed his ‘basic principle’, his appeal to ‘lesser evil’ generates some instances. The ‘basic principle’, itself fraught with difficulties (cf. the contorted discussion of what weapons are appropriate in response to what attacks, p.150), still exceeds what stretched pacifism would enjoin; for instance, it may not be appropriate to respond with force. But in a technical sense stretched pacifism is compatible with the ‘basic principle’, since it only imposes the upper bound on level of force. As for easiness, moral pacifism is not an easy position to live by, or to justify. Removing objections to pacifism is one thing; solidifying a positive case for it is quite another, and so far hardly conclusive (as AI tried to explain, pp 29-31). Stretched pacifism was advanced, hypothesized to put it more precisely, as a still viable option. It was not presented as a morally compulsory position, or, for that matter, as one that this defender adhered to or affirmed. To reiterate, while a cumulative case can be made for stetched pacifism as principled non-violence, that case was not conclusive, and is hard to improve. For, further, some serious difficulties standing in the way of stretched pacifism were assembled, the most important of which derives from the extent of violence apparent in transactions within the natural world. Simply consider the practices of carnivores, essential to their natural way of life. In order to meet their life needs for sustenance, these creatures do, and are often obliged to, engage routinely in violent activity. While it can no doubt be argued, as some vegetarians may do, that the natural order is an immoral order, and that remaining carnivores should be converted to vegetarianism as rapidly as proves possible (in the way domestic dogs are converted to dog biscuits), the difficulties with such proposals are immense. The task envisaged is gigantic, and beyond human capacities – even if it were desirable. For there are millions of species to be �somehow converted to proper vegetarianism. Then there are millions of other species to be converted to proper and well regulated contraceptive practices, else their numbers will get out of hand (uncontrollably) with predation removed. Given humans lack of success in limiting their own excessive numbers, such regulation appears entirely remote. Aside however from the practical difficulties, is such a fully vegetarian order, with evolution further derailed, a desirable improvement on the natural order? Is it morally obligatory? It is certainly not obligatory, as alternative systems of morality in harmony with the prevailing natural order are feasible. Nor is it desirable, for (to appeal to such alternative value systems) the natural order is more or less in order as it is. Full vegetarianization would only reduce its value, vastly. More generally, a defensible ethical framework should not, it would be rightly contended, be right out of step with the natural order of other creatures, decently depicted. Decent depiction is important, for some features of the natural order, such as competition, combat and predation, so far from escaping attention, have been grossly exaggerated and exploited. Thus, for instance, the ludicrous picture of nature red in truth and claw, so beloved of descendents of orthodox Victorians and of orthodox economists. However, even under decent depiction, the “natural order” is often not benign. That appears to be enough to induce a supervenient moral dilemma for any stretched pacifism which is coupled to a deep ethic (e.g. which does not separate humans out from the natural order ) and which eschews the desperate vegetarian route: The natural order is not an immoral order The natural order contains (regular) instances of violence. Therefore, instances of violence are not immoral – in apparent defiance of P2 Moreover, there are too many instances of violence, too regularly occurring, for them all to be plausibly shunted into the moral dilemma category (and predatory carnivores face no dilemmas). Raptors that practice violence every week are not immoral (neither are they clearly moral; the category of morality only significantly extends so far). The main trouble lies however with P2 (which needs some finer adjustment, as was alrady indicated in AI ). While P2 is alright in context, within a particular, perfectly viable, ethical framework, designed for the usual human round, the conventional setting for ethical theories, it stands in need of modification outside that setting. It is time to suggest the sort of modification envisaged. Evidently P2 was addressed to moral agents. Which agents? Not to carnivores that supply their own livelihood, nor really to morally degenerate humans, but to peace-sensitive agents. With that semi-technical form, yet to be characterised, a suitably modified P2 results: MP2. It is morally wrong, for a peace-sensitive agent, to use violence. 9 9 The generalization of P2, suggested in AI, to cover also the parallel situation of environmental vandalism, can be similarly modified. The anti-vandolence principle becomes MP2°. It is morally wrong, for a peace- and environmentally-sensitive agent, to use vandolence. �To recover what amounts, in the previous discussive context, to P2, it suffices to add the proposition that every human agent ought to be peace-sensitive. Much as that proposition has to recommend it, it appears too ethically advanced for many modern humans; it sets too high a moral standard to be taken as a serious guide to practice. It seems wise to settle presently for something less demanding, such as that every advanced moral agent ought to be peace sensitive. To put essentially the same proposition alternatively: Stretched pacifism (as modified) is supererogatory. While it is perhaps too late to hope for much moral progress in humans, it is pleasant to contemplate alternative futures where what is supererogatory became obligatory, and widely practiced. Richard Sylvan10* Appendix I began drafting this essay at the time (January 17, midday Australian time) of the American attacks upon Iraq. The aptly named Prime Minister Hawke of Australia had just made a statement to the nation-state, announcing (the) war. In this statement there was much talk of peace. There was even – in what was effectively a declaration of war – reiteration of the modern quest for ‘a new world order of peace’. Peace through war; so it rings out again and again, through the centuries. ‘War must be for the sake of peace’ (Aristotle p.220). More than two thousand years later, we have fought those wars to end all wars. But it is no use, Hawke solemely pronounced, just talking about peace, and thinking about peace; we must work for peace, fight for it – through war. Impeccable logic? President Bush, supreme commander, convinced us with similar logic, speaking too with many tongues. Of how he ‘preferred to think of peace, not war’. But now ‘only force will prevail’, as ‘all reasonable efforts to reach a peaceful solution are exhausted’. ‘What must be done’ must be done, or will be anyway. With God on side with the US offensive (as well as on the other side), it will go well. As it was said to have, though it achieved comparatively little that other efforts may not have yielded more satisfactorily, and thought it may now have to followed with another invasion. Nor have we ever managed to glimpse much of what is now supposed, when we are no longer engaged, to come ‘out of the horror of war’: a ‘new world order ... which governs the conflict of nations’; a ‘rule of law’, not war. How the one, enforcable law, is achieved, unless backed by the the other, is not explained (Medlin's paradox hits back). Similarly what we now hear from many militarists, as they rush to war, is that 10 * Thank to David Bennett for joint contributions (from UT) and to JWS for opposition (in JWS) �‘peace is a great good, war a great evil’. But, for the most part, only the rhetoric has shifted; practice has scarcely changed at all. REFERENCES W.-T. Chan, A Source Book on Chinese Philosophy, Princeton University Press, 1963; referred to as ST. W.-T. Chan (ed.), The Way of Lao Tzu (Tao-te Ching), Bobbs-Merrill, New York, 1963; referred to as LT. B. Martin, Uprooting War, Freedom Press, London, 1984. A. Naess, Ecology, community and lifestyle, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge UK, 1989. R.A. Rapaport, Pigs for the Ancestors : ritual in the ecology of a New Guinea People, Yale University Press, New Haven, 1967. R. Routley, ‘War and Peace II. On the alleged inconsistency, moral insensitivity and fanaticism of pacifism’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #9, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1983 (also in Inquiry ); referred to as AI. R. Routley and V. Plumwood, ‘Moral dilemmas and the logic of deontic notions’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #6, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1984 (also in Paraconsistent Logic); referred to as MD. R. Routley, ‘War and Peace I. On the ethics of large-scale nuclear war and nuclear-deterrence and the political fall-out’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy, #5, Research School Of Social Science, Australian National University, 1984. G. Sharp, Social Power and Political Freedom, Porter Sargent, Boston, 1980. J.W. Smith, The Worms at the Heart of Things , Public Relations Unit, Flinders University, 1989. R. Sylvan, ‘War and Peace III, Australia's defence philosophy’, Social Philosophy, for Nuclear Conference, University of Queensland, 1985. R. Sylvan and D. Bennett, ‘Of Utopias, Tao and Deep Ecology’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #19, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1990; referred to as UT. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Draft Papers Description An account of the resource Sylvan's literary executor encountered an archive in which “all his projects were current", since manuscripts were undated and unattributed. Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Text Any textual data included in the document WAR AND PEACE IV: TAO AND DEEP-GREEN Taoism and deep-green environmental theory, although closely aligned on very many issues, diverge over war. For Taoism, by contrast for instance with Buddhism, is not a pacific doctrine, but is committed to skilful defensive militarism. While it does not espouse a fortress mentality, Taoism certainly condones limited defensive military operations for specific purposes, a sort of guerilla warfare. By contrast, deep-green theory, while acknowledging the role of organised social defence, stands opposed to professional militarism, and thereby to military defence, and is committed to a principled pacifism. Conveniently a route through Taoism, philosophically fascinating in its own right, will lead us to problems of pacifism and towards deep-green theory. 1. Features of a Taoist critique of war and militarism. War did not receive a favourable press in ancient Chinese philosophy. Generally aggression and war were to be avoided. Even Confucius imposed very demanding conditions: for example, ‘when good men have instructed the people [in morals, agriculture, military tactics] for seven years, they may be allowed to bear arms,’ ‘If a ruler ... does not set himself right, even his commands will not be obeyed’ ( SB p.41, italics added). Mo Tzu went much further than Confucius, roundly condemning war – on utilitarian grounds, that war yields no net benefit at any level ( SB p.227). What is more, he backed his heavy condemnation practically (unlike some conspicuous contemporary theoretical utilitarians); ‘he did not hesitate to walk for ten days and ten nights in an effort to dissuade a ruler from making war’ ( SB p.212). But none, it is said, went as far, in a detailed and sophisticated criticism of war, as Lao Tzu; ‘none has condemned war more strongly than Lao Tzu’. ‘[T]he opposition of Taoism to the use of force is well-known, and the most bitter attack on militarism if found in the Lao Tzu’ (Chan, p.154, p.17.) But, after that splendid build-up, the text is slightly disappointing. Lao Tzu does not assert outright that war is an abomination, or even roundly condemn it. His critique of war, militarism, and military technology, is subtle and oblique, and, on the surface, far distanced from pacifism. For he does not recommend an end to war - in that genuine Taoists, those who possess Tao, will never participate in them – but expects wars to continue as unavoidable evils. Worse, he even goes so far as to outline proper attitudes to war and conduct in war, and indeed to suggest military techniques and strategies, some of which look decidedly devious. Among the classical works of Taoism, we focus on the Lao Tzu because, by contrast with other works, a remarkable component of that book is devoted to war and militarism. The apparent deviousness of the tactics Lao Tzu allocates serves to highlight what has been seen as ‘the most troublesome element’ in his philosophy (Chan p.17) – not so much however because they concern military operations, but because they are taken to apply much more widely, ‘to life in general’ (p.17). But why should military activity obtain some special dispensation? Why should what is not tolerated more generally be exonerated there? But given that Taoism has here the virtue of consistency (i.e. uniformity on principles) and of universalizability, that simply leaves more explaining to be done. • Puzzles for Taoism, and wars as unavoidable evils There are two puzzles here in Taoism rather than one. There is the militarypractices paradox, and, varying and generalising on that, there are life-practices paradoxes. The special paradox is generated by the following incompatible elements: on the one side, ‘the most bitter attack on militarism’, the well-known opposition of Taoism to the use of force (p.17) and to the possession and use of smart military weapons and technology – implying that war is far from all right – and on the other, advocacy of certain (devious) military tactics, outlines of (deceitful) conduct in war, and so on – implying that war is all right after all. A straightforward generalisation of this paradox would look at other morally-sensitive parts of life, where some practice was strongly condemned yet engaged in (for many examples, see the dilemmas assembled in MD). But the variation of concern to Chan and the neo-Confucians concerns the conjunction of upright with devious practices in life, in particular in the life of the sage. For a Taoist sage is presumed to lead an upright straightforward life, yet appears to engage in devious and even deceitful practices incompatible with such a life-style. Call this the Taoist-lifestyle paradox. Evidently a good deal of explaining is required, as to how Taoism can coherently take the positions it appears to presume, both on war and peace, and on life more generally. A desirable preliminary would seem to be a little investigation of what position is taken, especially on war and militarism. One key pasage runs: Fine weapons are instruments of evil They are hated by creatures Therefore those who possess the Tao turn away from them. ... Weapons are instruments of evil, not the instruments of a good ruler. When he uses them unavoidably, he regards calm restraint as the best principle Even when he is victorious, he does not regard it as praiseworthy, For to praise victory is to delight in the slaughter of men. He who delights in the slaughter of men will not succeed in the empire. ... For a victory, let us observe the occasion with funeral-ceremonies (LT p.154). Wars, which involve the use of weapons, instruments of evil, are accordingly themselves evil. They are also evil because they involve the slaughter of men. But they are also sometimes unavoidable (also p.152). Therefore such wars are unavoidable evils. Such discourse, obtained by almost immediate inference from the passage, is within the standard orbit of dilemma talk. But Taoism lacks, through deliberately eschewing deontic talk, the discourse which enables direct expression of such dilemmas, or even direct condemnation of wars or of clever weapons. Instead the points are made by circumlocution, what the possesser of Tao does, how the good ruler conducts himself, or by analogy, of victory in war with death. Unavoidable evils are the very stuff of deontic dilemmas (though many theories, underpinned by shonky logic, lack the resources for representing this stuff properly). Where something is unavoidably evil, it is both bad, because evil, and also not bad, doing it is excusable, because it is unavoidable. So, given such an argument (which has its weaknesses), an unavoidable evil is a genuinely dilemmatic object with inconsistent features. Certain wars have looked, since ancient times, like such dilemmatic objects. Revealingly, Chan tries to explain that ‘most troublesome element’ in Taoism, the military-practice paradox, through the following exercise in lateral thinking: It can ... be argued that Lao Tzu uses warfare to illustrate his principles of taking no action and weakness because warfare is among the most dynamic and critical of human experiences, just as the Indian classic, the Bhagavadgita chooses fighting as the theme on which to discuss the terrible dilemma whether one should fulfil his duty, as in the case of a soldier, and kill, or should fail in his duty and refrain from killing (p.17). ‘Just as’? The Indian classic prevents a classic moral dilemma, a dilemma represented in contemporary philosophy (following its rediscovery by Sartre), where there are incompatible duties: the duty to kill, because of one's role as a soldier, and the duty not to kill, because of one's human condition, and the supervenient dilemma of failing in and fulfilling one's duties. These dilemmas for an individual (male, as it then was) are replicated in dilemmas regarding war for group institutions: at bottom, the obligation to engage in war (for one set of compelling reasons) as contraposed with the obligation not to engage in war (for another, perhaps overlapping, set of reasons). A theory of moral dilemmas (as worked out for example in MD) is crucial for an adequate treatment of major issues in war and peace, especially (as will become evident) for a viable strong pacifism. But Taoism, eschewing deontic discourse, lacks the apparatus to state or develop moral dilemmas. Hence it is logically excluded from giving a full or adequate account of what is going on conceptually. One of the philosophically fascinating feature of Taoism is the fashion in which it manages to avoid deontic discourse, and to substitute for direct deontic discourse or improvise circumlocutions when deontic discourse would otherwise appear inevitable (cf. UT for examples). But there are costs. One is inability to display the mechanism of deontic dilemmas, or to show what reasons and argument lie behind Taoist prounouncements and conclusions (the shortage of Taoism on argument is another philosophically conspicious feature, also observed in UT). As conceptual apparatus for analysizing moral dilemmas is missing, most of the machinery involved has to be passed over. Only the outcomes, as Taoism sees them, are presented, as if from a black box. Taoism blacks out the story on deontic dilemmas that deep-green theory can tell, as the following diagram tries to show: Diagrams . Charting the processing of deontic dilemmas that are “resolved”. Deep-green chart: dilemma input Arguments to incompatible prescriptions § Processing of dilemma, directive situational procedures output Corresponding Taoist chart: Black directive Box output input It is evident that Taoism can be extended; information can be put into the Black Box rendering it less opaque. That extension can be made so as to conform to deepgreen theory, i.e. so that the extended Taoist chart, a neo-Daoist chart, looks like the deep-green one. That is indeed essentially how neo-Daoism get characterised, in terms of conformity of the extension to deep ecological theory (see UT). We are now placed to explain how to dissolve, or at least neutralize, the paradoxes deriving from repudiation of militarism, an awkwardly qualified repudiation in the case of Taoism. In a significant sense there is no resolving of genuine deontic dilemmas. The principles delineating the fix may stand, incompatible, signalling the persisting suboptimality (or better, sublimenality) of the dilemmatic situation. Where there is a dilemma, involved parties should try to do well enough in the sublimenal circumstances (for a much fuller account, see MD). Thus where there is a war, itself a non-Taoist process, engaged or caught up Taoists will not abandon Taoism. Taoist methods will be applied, Taoist strategies pursued. So much for theoretical representation and (non-)resolution of life-practices and other dilemmas, details of which are readily elaborated in deep-green extensions of Taoism. A prior substantive issue is whether dilemmas always are generated: not whether wars are evil (typically they are, an issue we shall come to), but whether wars are unavoidable. Analysis of wars does not bear that familiar claim out decisively. Many wars could have been avoided, through conciliation, negotiation, restraint, etc., and no worse results apparently obtained, through sanctions, exchange, trade, etc. Through a typology of wars (coming up) that conjecture can be given some substance. Consider, for instance, what would be walk-overs. Then there is little point in making a military response. So war can be avoided. Certainly an occupation, to be met in a different way, may still occur. And so on, perhaps, for various other types of war. But, more generally, try this:Every war involves an aggressor, who makes an aggressive move. Such an aggressor could always avoid that move, taking a different (or a do-nothing) course of action. Therefore, every war can be avoided. No war is entirely unavoidable. Setting aside determinism (which renders all actual wars along with all other events unavoidable), it could be argued that a war sometimes simply boils up, without an aggressor, an intensification of a conflagatory situation. There are grounds for scepticism regarding such examples; for such intensification can only occur if provocative military moves are made, for instance troops are stationed in provocative or risky positions. The presumption that certain wars are unavoidable typically derives from a onesided perspective on war, a defender's perspective. A defender has no option, so it is routinely averred, but to respond to a determined aggressor. Even if that should be so sometimes, when there is no running away or going underground, it does not establish that such a war is unavoidable; for it neglects the role of the aggressor. By a smarter formulation, relevant features of unavoidability can be captured. Although wars may not be unavoidable, defensive action in wars that have been initiated may be unavoidable. At least such action may be unavoidable if unacceptably high costs (death, enslavement, etc.) are not to be avoided. Thereupon another highly relevant feature emerges: the linkage of avoidability to costs. For whether an action is unavoidable then depends upon what costs a party is prepared to incur before and when insisting on action: but this appears entirely unacceptable. How can what is “unavoidable” cease to be so when some further costs are absorbed? However with basics like survival, a certain liberty, and so on, we do reach such bounds. An important type of unavoidability. We also reach scenarios, unavailable to Lao Tzu but kindly brought within range by modern technology, which may appear to justify aggressive strikes. State Z, while not an aggressor, is carrying out practices which will impose unacceptably high costs upon peoples of other states and implacably refuses to desist. It could, for example, be poisoning air or water flowing to other states. But ,to make the case vivid, let us suppose that state Z is constructing, for reasons Zeders find convincing (they are committed to a faith which depicts all humans as incorrigible sinners and unworthy of life), an effective doomsday machine. Would an (aggressive) preemptory strike designed to disable or destroy the machine be unavoidable? 1 In a sense, No; in another Yes. For different modalities can operate. Physically outsiders need to do nothing, but watch Zeders go about their zealous work. But deontically they are under heavy moral pressure, because of the costs of standing by idly: if the human race is worth anything very substantial, then they are obliged to act, action is deontically unavoidable. Here is a situation where a proposed reduction of deontic logic proves illuminating. Obligation is explicated through not implying, or necessitating, the sanction, i.e. 1 Whether it would be justifiable, or just, are separate issues. But it is evident enought that such scenarios further damage the obsolescent idea of just war. For, according to received doctrine, a just war is defensive. (How such a war can be fought at all is another matter; coherence requires relativization to ‘just war for party d’.) excessive ethical costs such as extermination. Let us explain deontic unavoidability analogously: an action is so unavoidable if not undertaking it would result in excessive ethical costs. Then if it can be established that there is no other way than a military strike, an act of war, to ensure that the Zeders desist (and certainly we can envisage scenarios like that), then that is deontically unavoidable. It is also dilemmatic for those committed to, or inclined towards pacifism; and it is, for them at least, but paradoxically justifiable, as the negation is also justifiable, on pacific grounds. Scenarios like that sketched, that appear to render certain wars deontically unavoidable require but little or no elaboration to render them evil. Evil indeed is such a standard feature of standard wars that at least its great presence call for little supporting evidence. But it has taken to vast stretch of human history to reach this general point of recognition. The manifold evils of war Lao Tzu very early recognised and emphasized: Wherever armies are stationed, briars and thorns grow. Great wars are always followed by famines (p.152). And nowadays followed by great tides of refugees. This passage includes not only recognition of the widely-observed socioenvironmental consequences of war, but, more striking, very early recognition of the severe environmental impact of military forces. That critique is not however developed in Taoism. 2 Only recently has it been pushed substantially further. And only recently could a new, most significant twist occur, the merging of resource security, long a military objective, with environmental security. The appalling idea has recently been floated that the military, in need of new work and roles with the apparent warming of West-East relations and cooling of the Cold War, should exchange usual military idleness for meddling in environmental matters: regulation and policing of environmental resources, ensurance of environmental security of powerful states, and similar. This is a bit like reassigning those imprisoned for child abuse to managing kindergartens; for consider the impressive military record of environmental vandalism. What the military is alleged to offer is a structure appropriate and available for handling such matters. But, to the contrary, it is precisely the sort of hierarchical, authoritarian expensive structure that should be wound down and up as soon as the opportunity appears, as (briefly) now, rather than being retained and shockingly reoriented (as a state-serving “Greenwar”). 2. On the divergence of deep-green from Taoism. Having arrived, by better or worse arguments, at the conclusion that wars, though 2 But a bridge to deep-green theory can be made through neo-Daoism, an updating of Taoism in confirmity with deep ecology (which however is somewhat thin and threadbare on war; for what there is so far, see Naess p.160). On neoDaoism, see UT. generally evil, may be sometimes unavoidable, it is evidently important to say something about how they – those of the theoretical residue – are to be conducted. By appropriate conduct the damage they do may be reduced; also the conduct should be appropriate to the funereal nature of wars (to exceed Taoist resources for stating this sort of point). It is at this stage that deep-green theory begins to diverge from Taoism. In further explaining the Taoist and deep-green critiques of war, and diverting objections to them, a rough and preliminary typology of wars is important. It is also of passing interest in its own philosophical right. War, according to English Dictionaries, is a ‘contest carried on by force of arms, typically between nations or states’. More exactly, war is a game – in the generous technical sense of game-theory, with players, rules, goals, strategies, and so on – carried on in significant part by military means, normally between states or substates. Call the contestants, (warring) parties. They typically represent of course larger populations. The set-up between parties resembles the arrangements of players in game theory. There are several analogical extensions of the term war to cover games where one of the parties is an object, construed as hostile (an enemy of the state), such as Crime, Drugs, Poverty or Nature. These we can set aside as analogical wars. Of course wars form only a part of military activities. Military interests and objectives have always stretched significantly further than war, to include surveillence and security, easily extended to resource security, environmental security and life-style security, and beyond that to political stability and other political matters. Evidently military ambitions have far over-extended themselves in bagging such democratic concerns. An anarchist solution to the whole problem of war, which some have seen Taoism as reaching towards, is immediate: eliminate the source of war, states. Unfortunately it is not quite that simple (and that's not simple). For wars can also occur between nations, cultures, races or tribes (which are not such artifices as states, and not always so readily or desirably abolished), between inhabited regions, and between factions within states (thus civil wars) or, perhaps by extension, between factions within other social structures (thus, for instance, gang wars). But undoubtedly eliminating states and aspiring states would abolish most wars and virtually all the worst wars. While “nonviolent wars” are excluded by definition, by virtue of ‘force of arms’, token wars, limited wars, and so on, are not: for instance, wars fought by small armed teams representing competing sides (cf. medieval and science fiction war games). As wars are hemmed in by conventions and agreed rules, there is no reason in principle why they should not be reduced to two person contests, fought under strict rules like boxing or gladiatorial contests. But in modern times wars have never taken such sensible forms, but have been much larger affairs, making heavy (though fortunately restricted) use of latest technology. Let us distinguish such wars as techno-powered wars. They have, directly or indirectly (for the technology may be bought or bartered), a heavy research and development support structure (indeed the bulk of contemporary science is devoted – misdirected – in one way or another to this effort). Among wars, an important distinction is that between offensive and defensive wars. An offensive war is one which ventures off a given party's territory or recognised pad, “invading” that of another party or parties; correlatively defensive parties, if they have not also invaded. Force projection typifies offensive practice. Plainly, offensiveness and defensiveness are not strictly features of a war, but of parties to a war. In a two-party war, while both parties can easily act offensively, the possibility of both parties proceeding defensively is excluded, unless they share territory. (Even then issues may arise as to which party, if any, was the aggressor, which started it, was responsible for starting it, and so on.) Thus mutually defensive wars between contemporary states are impossible (but would be possible if states shared territory, e.g. if Eire and Britain shared the territory of Northern Ireland). Tao-accredited wars were defensive wars, never wars aiming at domination: last-resort wars, in which no pride was taken ( LT p.152).3 The pretence that offensive wars are defensive is widespread, and reflected in the subterfuge that departments or ministries of war are those of defence, security or whatever. (If they really were what they purport to be, we should be well on the way to an end to war.) Offensive practices are rendered defensive ones by shabby redefinitional strategems, such as redefining ‘defensive’ to include defence of ideals like democracy or liberty, infringed (or allegedly infringed) on territories abroad, or to include “defence” of a third party or place (whence every offensive war is “defensive”). In the present war in which part of Arabia is engulfed (February 1991), one party claims to be defending what really was (or should be) part of its territory, namely Kuwait, another party to be defending (what Kuwait did not enjoy) democracy. It is a doubly offensive war presented in this guise as jointly defensive. Aggressive wars are waged for a variety of reasons, but usually for resources or access to resources or markets, a matter often disguised by appeal to ideology (thus a war for oil is represented as a war of liberation). But there are other reasons than narrowly economic ones, such as religion (as with crusades), power and aggrandisement (as in building an empire), and so on. Nor are those reasons necessarily far separated; ideologies like Marxism and market capitalism, for example, exhibit many of the features of religion. The economic reasons for war appear to have become much more complex with the 3 There is one line in LT that may suggest that attack was sometimes justifiable, namely ‘For deep love helps one to win in the case of attack’ (p.219). But how can compassion be appropriate unless this attack is within a defensive setting, a larger context of unavoidability or such like. A passage shortly below confirms this interpretation: I dare not take the offensive but I take the defensive: I dare not advance an inch but I retreat a foot (p.222). These are advances and attacks within a defensive setting. advent of an integrated world economy. At the same time many of the independent reasons for economic wars are now obsolete. For to powerful states accrue the advantages of war without war. At least most of the former economic advantages of war can be obtained without expensive wars, through trade, institution of economic dependence, etc. Small medieval wars were sometimes instituted for the collection of neighbouring riches and booty, a kind of piracy meeting conditions of war. “Small” contemporary wars can be waged for a remarkable mix of political-economy ends: to establish a regime favourable to economic penetration and profit repatriation, to subjugate markets and to remove competition, to boost a sagging weapons economy by using up old stocks and also testing new equipment, to restart a depressed economy, and so on. Such wars, along with the economic aims which motivate them, are in effect heavily castigated by Lao Tzu: When Tao prevails in the world, galloping horses are turned back to fertilize When Tao does not prevail in the world, war horses (the thrive in fields ...). the suburbs. There is no calamity greater than lavish desires. ( LT p.181). But it does exceed evidential warrant to claim that Tao is not only sufficient, but necessary, for cessation of such practices. The practice of regularly stimulating complex military-saturated economies through war is reminiscent of older, much ridiculed practices in simpler societies. They now ridicule the Tsembaga, who proceeded to destroy much of their surplus product by going to war every 5-15 years (cf Rapaport). But they do not similarly ridicule the most powerful nation on the Earth, the USA, which proceeds to write off a colossal amount of surplus in war every 10-20 years (the Gulf war liquidated some $1.7 billion per day). Taoists would. For ridicule was a favoured method, an important rhetorical strategem, and war and its idiocy were favourite targets. Some classification of defensive wars is also important, for various reasons: reducing and abolishing wars, their costs and damage, restructuring societies away from war and military practices, and, not least, for appreciating Taoism. A main distinction is between • conventional defence, maintained by armies of armed soldiers, many of them professionals, and • social defence, where there are no such armies or but fragments of them, and defence is carried out through social networks of a significant part of society.4 It is here that Taoism and deep-green theory part company. Under Taoism, the state will have a standing army, but a defensive army operating by strange, surprise tactics (p.201). No 4 Details of social defence are presented in Sharp and in Martin. doubt defensive wars are to remain last resort action. Nonetheless the state will operate in secrecy, in a way incompatible with decentralised social defence; people will be kept in the dark about smart weapons of the state; and they too will be surprised, along with presumed enemies of the state. By contrast, under deep-green theory, there should be no hidden smart weapons of state; information would flow more freely and not be hidden from the people (who should retain influence in informed decision making). Under deep-green, standing armies, and more generally military organisation, will be wound down altogether. Taoism should have pushed its searching criticism further. For military objectives, easily acquired by standing armies with time on their hands, are frequently incompatible with Taoism. For example, Taoism is opposed to domination ( LT p.152), whereas military operations frequently seek or involve domination; and military structure is invariably hierarchical and authoritarian. Taoism aims for self-regulation, wherever feasible (cf. p.201); so does deep-green theory, which is one reasons why it aims to dispose of standing armies, as an important preliminary to the withering away of states themselves (military forces being major props of state control and power, and often maintained primarily for internal state security). Taoism has no project for ending the era of wars; deepgreen theory does. That project involves an elimination of standing armies, too often poised for fighting or political interference. A recommended route to end war consists in progressive scaling down: reduction of the means and manpower. The initial stages are well-known, and include • elimination of nuclear, biological and chemical weaponry, and • force reduction. It can hardly be pretended that the Earth's states have managed to proceed very far on even this complex of stages. The next stage consists in • contraction to defensive capacities only, and the final stage consists in • elimination of remaining military defensive forces, and adoption, so far as required, of social defence practices. The complete route thus involves complete demilitarisation. Reasons why deep-green aims to proceed the full distance are readily grasped by considering the environmental shallowness of an otherwise cogent traditional case for the sharp curtailment of wars and militarism. The traditional Western case against wars has been primarily along two dimensions: social and moral. Wars are highly disruptive of the social fabric; wars may be unjust. From these joint features, it was argued that wars should be a matter of last resort, to be fought to ensure peace. It was argued further that only just wars should be fought. Just wars were rare objects. But as there was little evidence of the decline and fall of wars, much effort was expended, more practically and unsuccessfully, upon endeavouring to improve the calibre of wars, and more theoretically, upon trying to characterize just war satisfactorily, or rather to bend the notion in an effort to approximate the gory unjust facts. Progress was long hindered, furthermore, because there was always a rival positive perspective on wars, which encouraged the exaltation of wars and military feats. It also facilitated the transfer of the favourable image of war to other problem areas, whence the long and apparently successful war against Nature (but the short-term successes are turning into long-term problems), the short and unsuccessful war against Poverty, and so on. Behind all this is the complex idea of war as rejuvenating, even cleansing, like fire; of war as heroic, and glorious, of war as the supreme testing ground of men. These pictures of war – finally shattered by the first World War (where even the poets began to tell of horrors and atrocities) and subsequent technological wars – though no longer in ascendency, have by no means vanished. The notion of war as rejuvenating a flagging economy persists, along with the practice of keeping capitalism running smoothly by integrating substantial military components into the industrial engine. With the development of highly technological wars – the celebrated development of the dirty industrial age is substantially military – the traditional negative case has grown in strength. Wars have become much more damaging, with the potential for much more that is significantly worse, and the possibility of a just war has correspondingly contracted, virtually to zero. The opposition to war has likewise grown, but more than correspondingly with the rise of women in social and political influence. Wars have almost always and everywhere been Men's affairs; likewise conquest. Deep-green theory accepts much of the traditional negative case, but would further strengthen it. For example, the stricture against unjust wars, as out and out immoral, can be strengthened, through the following syllogism: All wars should be fully just wars. Modern wars cannot be fully just wars. Therefore, there should be no modern wars. A fully just war is not merely a just war, but a war those just character can be reliably forecast in advance. A modern war is of course a war that deploys modern technology, at least that available this century. The evidential basis for the second premiss derives from much information that collateral damage, damage to innocent bystanders and involved citizens is always likely and cannot be excluded. Such wars are always liable to violate uncontroversial requirements for a just war, even if they are purely “conventional” wars, not throwing radiation or chemical or biological weapons around. From a contemporary viewpoint the traditional doctrine of a just war, really of a just defensive war, is seriously out of date. The reasons for this reach wider than the new features introduced by modern technological wars and the character of modern civilization, with its giant cities littered with dangerous and vulnerable military targets. They have also to do with the chauvinism of the justice proposed, which is shallow human justice, not natural or environmental justice. There is no consideration of justice to other creatures or to the Earth (cf Naess p.160). Two troubles are really intertwined here: conceptual difficulties with too narrow a notion of justice, and ideological difficulties with too narrow a vision of what is an object of value, of what counts. The deep-green case against war adds to the traditional case a further dimension, neglected until very recently: the environmental dimension. It has suddenly been seen that wars are typically environmental atrocities. Earlier, of course, “environments” were simply backgrounds, backdrops in paintings and plays, to the real drama. Contemporary technological wars tend to be not merely social tragedies but environmental ones as well. There is a doctrine of just war, but it is a human chauvinistic affair. There is no similarly developed doctrine of an ecologically sound war, a deep ecological war. Unless any such war were literally different from modern wars, that is from contemporary technological wars, it would overstep permitted bounds. For such wars are characteristically ecological disasters. Hardened military people, desensitized by a rigorous unethical training, feel even less compunction about degrading or destroying environments or members of other species than they do of maiming or killing civilians through “collateral” activity. Matching the no-just-war syllogism is a no-sound-war syllogism: All wars should be environmentally sound wars. Modern wars cannot be environmentally sound. Therefore, there should be no modern wars. The argument for the second premiss has of course to be different. It looks to the information accumulating on what wars do to natural and built environments. The Vietnam and Gulf wars both inflicted immense damage on natural environments or what was left of them. The environmental effects of war are not confined to direct and collateral damage. There are indirect effects also. Thus, for instance, war also supplied the mechanism of, and the technology for, modern environmental destruction: explosives, bulldozers from tanks, etc. As well, training for war and engagement in war have much fostered, along with attitudes that make for social callousness or ruthlessness, those that contribute to environmental insensitivity and cruelty. 3. Puzzles about Taoist strategy and its critiques of technology and violence ‘It is surprising how much of the Lao Tzu is devoted to military strategy’. Which strategies? Surprise, above all. But why such strategies? ‘Do they not contradict the Taoists’ strong opposition to the use of force’ (Chan p.222), the implied commitment to quietism? Briefly, Taoism is not committed to quietism, and while certainly antagonistic to violence, does not oppose certain uses of force (only really ill-forcing, as will be explained). Even so, the emphasis on military strategy remains puzzling. The strategies, many of them relevant to social defence, include • seriousness, not ‘making light of the enemy’ (p.222) • surprise, and nonvisibility (p.201). The defensive strategy involves guerilla tactics: marching without formation, holding weapons without seeming to have them, confronting enemies without seeming to meet them (p.222). But even in times of peace, ‘smart weapons of the state should not be displayed to the people’ (p.164). Such recommendations helped to fuel the charge of deviousness lodged against Lao Tzu. But look at part of the reason for concealing smart weapons: ‘The more smart weapons the people have, the more troubled the state will be’ (p.201). Smart weapons are carried in corrupt states, where the rich engage in conspicuous consumption and the people are suppressed, not where Tao is practiced (LT p.194). • advance from weakness, flexibility but firmness. Weakness is the principle of life and will overcome strength ( LT p.164, p.233). • coolness and non-competition (LT p.233, p.164). Like these, most of the general strategies are standard Taoist practices simply applied to military conduct. For these standard practices the charge of deviousness looks feeble. The response applies more generally to other allegedly devious political strategies. For the strategies are but application of Taoist principles and techniques to warfare, politics and elsewhere. Nothing excludes application of these techniques to what are accounted, in general, unnecessary evils (which must sometimes, on other Taoist grounds, be countered). Nor, to meet the main criticism, need any deceit or deviousness be involved; nor is it. In particular, the legalist tactic, ‘In order to grasp, it is necessary first to give’ (LT p.164), is cited as involving ‘an element of deceit’ ‘undeniably’, and ‘worse’ it is ‘morally questionable’ (Chan p.17). But in order for me to grasp your hand in a normal handshake, it is necessary first for me to give my hand. There is no deceit here, nothing morally questionable. All the tactics permit of benign construals, of a Taoist kind. Consider, for instance, ‘In order to contract, it is necessary first to expand’ (LT p.164). In order to bend a copper pipe to the intended angle, it is better to bend it first a little further than required. The transformation of water to ice (both favoured natural items for symbolic purposes: natural processes which may look devious!) neatly illustrates the Taoist principle (which is however hardly necessary), and shows softness and weakness turned hardness and strength. The Taoist critique of militarism is as much a critique of technology as of war. Sharp weapons, ‘smart weapons’ as we might now say, come in for much critical attention, as we have already noticed. Only in corrupt and degenerate states are they displayed or flaunted (p.194, p.164); in deep-green regions smart weapons of state’ would not be retained unexhibited. The people will not have them for they mean trouble (p.201); for similar reasons deep-green regions will be free of them. So, it seems, will ideal Taoist regions: ‘Even if there are arrows and weapons, none will display them’ ( LT p.238). Much technology, military and other, is excluded under the Taoist edict against violence (a further facet of the military-practices paradox). 5 5 Under contemporary technology and technological arrangements, such as the storage of quantities of oil and nuclear and chemical materials in great cities, wars have assumed new and very destructive dimensions, to the point of being utterly irresponsible. A different approach to technology, as to war, is now mandatory. These are no longer things that can in principle be nicely confined and need not touch parties outside the fray. An important part of ending wars, “winning the war against wars”, is removing the technology of war, above all from irresponsible state power. As for which technology to try to jettison and which to try to retain or improve, it is not so difficult to indicate, provided evaluative terminology is not outlawed. What is wanted is technology that is good in its place, what should be excluded is technology that is indifferent or bad or potentially so. Technology to be justified has to do something worthwhile, it has to address identifiable respectable needs. That is why The powerful critique of militarism in the Tao-te Ching is coupled with strong opposition to violence. Some of the linkage is evident enough. Militarism as practised represents an ultimate form of state (or party) violence. A basic theme is that violent practices will come to an unnatural end, and accordingly to a non-Taoist end (generalising LT p.176). While force may occur in spectacular, but satisfactory, natural forms, force is duly distinguished from violence. To force the growth of life means ill omen. For the mind to employ the vital force without restraint means violence (LT p.197). One who follows Tao does not apply dominating force, which usually has had results bringing requital (p.152). Dominating force, like power, is in general castigated, under doctrine of wu-wei, no forced actions, no violence. To force natural growth is deviant, destroying harmony. To stop natural growth is deviant. But there is a significant difference between force and violence. To intentionally employ destructive force is to do violence. To so force things is condemned. To remain in harmony with things one does not so force things or practice violence. There is a non-interference principle at work, which also indicates types of non-interference that are excluded. However Taoism does not always get the distinction between force and violence quite right. ‘Vital force without restraint’, intentionally excessive force, is only part of what counts as violence, which is more generally force which violates, i.e. transgresses, descrecrates, merely indifferent technology is out; there is no virtue in technology for technology's sake, as it is a mere means technique. It is because of the crucial evaluative component in choice of technology that appropriateness, itself evaluative, comes closer to encapsulating the criterion than other recent efforts. Size, such as smallness, or intermediateness, are not what matter, though modest and not excessive technologies are likely to fare better in satisfying appropriateness. In simpler societies, small technology is of course more appropriate; for that is what is good there. From known criteria for what is good these other features for locally appropriate technology can be read off: reliability, esp. in maintenance, functioning well and safely under the expected range of operating conditions (which may be difficult), ease of repair, capital cheapness and repair inexpensiveness, environmental benignness, and meeting sound social needs. profanes, injures, outrages, etc. It is thus a negatively connoted force, an evil force in some specified intentional respect. There is a tendency for Taoist commentators, not Taoists, to regard Taoism as condemning all uses, or even occurrences, of force, but this is not so. Rather intentional ill-forcing is what is castigated, what is deviant. Thus Taoism does not exclude a range of defensive practices, which make satisfactory use of natural forces, like letting the machines of war industry stop. Those who would abolish war and its machinery, substituting for it nonwarlike and ideally nonviolent methods, technology, and strategies, have been confronted not merely with much sub-rational abuse but with plenty of criticism and even some paradoxes. Here is a recent paradox concerning war and nonviolence: • War must be abolished. One reason is simply economic. We can no longer afford it, and the opportunity costs are enormous. Along with other extraordinarily wasteful activities, it is an anachronism. • Doing so cannot be accomplished without violence, i.e. in effect, given the types of violence involved, without what amounts to war. According to a fuller version of this premiss, the process of abolishing a war would only be achieved through a revolution so profound that it could not succeed without extensive and extreme violence, amounting to (civil) war. ˚ But then war cannot be abolished without war. Therefore, war which must be abolished cannot be abolished. 6 This “paradox” has been compared with the Liar paradox, but the parallel does not persist far. For this paradox does not involve selfreferential features, and is easily broken, as follows. Let the “last war” be not the last standard war but the revolution abolishing war. Then, given that the revolution is successful, war will be abolished therewith, i.e. with that last war. There need be no regress, given again a successful outcome. All the premisses stand intact, but the conclusion, following the ‘therefore’ is a nonsequitur. However, while the dissolution of the argument is accordingly logically fine, the route is repugnant. Standard pacifism challenges the second premiss. 4. Standard and moral pacifism. 6 Brian Medlin, who forcefully propounded this puzzle, set other analogous puzzles alongside it – designed to reveal deep difficulties in contemporary political, and especially alternative, thought. Another puzzle, concerning liberty and repression in the context of capitalism, revolved around the following inconsistent triad: • capitalism must be removed, but liberty retained. • capitalism cannot be removed without repression. • repression is antithetical to liberty. The puzzle is resolved as with the analogous puzzle of abolishing. Let the “last capitalist” action before the days of liberty be the repressive but liberating revolution overthrowing capitalism. Although Taoism is strongly opposed to war, and much in favour of peace – and accordingly by prevailing standards a substantially pacific position – it is not (nowhere in the central texts) committed to pacifism in usual senses, for two different reasons:- • It is not, by contrast with pacifism, opposed to all types of warfare, for example smart defensive wars. • It eschews deontology in terms of which moral pacifism is commonly stated, for instance through the watershed thesis P2. It is morally wrong to use violence. By contrast with Taoism, deep environmentalism does not avoid deontic claims, and is committed in principle to nonviolent technologies and ways and to pacifistic principles. Moreover, certain forms of deep environmentalism are completely committed to pacifism, notably European forms. Is deep green? There is heavy contemporary opposition to pacifism, as there also was to Taoism in the warring times when Taoism was first being promulgated. Many of the central institutions of contemporary life are intricated in coercion, violence and war. The most prominent contemporary institutions, states, are premissed on these elements of damaging force; they claim entitlement to use them widely, and even claim a certain territorial monopoly on their use. As a result they are having constantly to engage in them in attempt to maintain that monopoly. They are certainly the main perpetrators of wars, and of violence. They are indeed inured to wars, are in constant preparation for wars, yet propound dialectial (and normally dishonest and cynical) doctrines of peace through war (for a recent example see the appendix). Unremarkably then, the extensive propagandistic machinery of state has invested heavily in “justificatory” exercises in favour of controlled use, its own use, of destructive force, and continues to inveigh against pacifism. Because a routine trick in this sophistical repetoire consists in conflating pacifism with extreme, naive and inplausible, forms, an inevitable and important early task commits in unscrambling senses of ‘pacifism’. Semantical skulduggery can be thwarted in this way. Pacifism, as explained by English dictionaries, invariably concerns wars and warfare, and contains two components, negative and, elaborating on that, positive:- The negative component is, in Arnauld's word, anti-War-ism, opposition (in ways to be further specified) to all forms of warfare (see OED). The positive component supplies alternative ways of settling disputes (what it is supposed that wars with some semblance of justification involve), such as negotiation, arbitration, ... – and, adding to too narrow dictionary accounts – sanctions, substitutions (e.g. of sporting events, operatic contests, cooperative ventures), ... . In brief standard pacifism is opposition to all warfare and resolution of potential wars by other nonmilitary means. Plainly the opposition to warfare, like the sanctions and so on, cannot itself be military (using soldiers and other devices of war), on pain of some incoherence. But otherwise the ways of opposition can be many and various: they can certainly be active, as with nonviolent demonstrations, resistance movements, and so forth, and they may also be devious (e.g. turning the forces of war upon themselves so they are neutralised). It quickly becomes evident, then, that some of the dictionaries offer but loaded definitions which, by restricting the negative components, reduce the initial appeal and plausibility of pacifism. Consider the Concise English definition of the negative component: ‘the doctrine of non-resistance to hostilities and of total non-co-operation with any form of warfare’. Thereby excluded are forms of pacifism which offer active and plausible alternatives to warfare such as social defence. The Concise English tends to force pacifism into what the Oxford English Dictionary lists as its final item: ‘often, with depreciatory implication, the advocacy of peace at any price’, ‘in any circumstance’. Pacifism can easily resist being forced into these sorts of circumstances: it has many resources, as an extensive series of texts on alternatives to war, such as negotiation, non-violent action and social defence, from Taoism to contemporary environmentalism attest. Academic philosophers have much advanced the semantical strategy of some dictionaries, of rendering pacifism more difficult from the very outset by narrow and biassed definitions. They have stretched the term from its restricted setting of warfare, confined to state and organised gang violence, to cover all forms of violence, from state and interstate to, what is very different, personal and interpersonal violence. Call the resulting considerably stretched notion of pacifism, according to which it is morally wrong to use violence, according to which P2 holds, stretched pacifism.7 While stretched pacifism certainly includes standard pacifism (unless the notions of war and warfare are tampered with), the converse is very far from being the case. A pacifist is in no way committed to stretched pacifism, which is a much more problematic and difficult position than standard pacifism. There are several, substantially different reasons for this, which will be picked up seriatim. Stretched pacifism, also misleadingly called moral pacifism, has looked a very easy critical target to moral philosophers. Many the effusive philosopher who, upon sighting such a target, has charged, whooping such rhetoric as “incoherent”, “inconsistent”, “insensitive”, “fanatical”. However, with improved logical technology now available for accommodating and treating moral dilemmas, it is no great feat to resist such attacks, in the fashion of previous investigations (see esp. AI, also MD). A main aim was to demonstrate that stretched pacifism was not so stupid as it was made out to be or appeared to be to these inured to present dominant violent ways. So far from being stupid, it is viable. In future gentler times stretched pacifism could even be realised for whole communities of creatures (as some genuinely Christian sects envisaged); whence it will finally be seen to be feasible not merely for sages and supermen, and many ordinary women, but much more extensively. 7 In AI this notion was contrasted with standard pacifism as comprehensive pacifism: overcomprehensive might have been better. The method of philosophical accommodation was through moral dilemmas. The sort of moral dilemma that stretched pacifism can induce derives as follows. On the one side stands the theme P2, Wv, in convenient symbols, for Wrong V-ing, violencing. Now this implies to WB, where B presents a case of of violence. On the other side, particular circumstances develop which lead to W ~B, because ~B would produce in the circumstances considerable wrong, for instance extensive violence, mass murder, etc. One stock example from the literature concerns calling off the firing squad about to shoot several captives if the pacifist shoots one of them (it is elaborated in AI p.13). Interestingly, another stock example from the literature concerns standard pacifism (it can also be presented in terms of patriotism; for details of both see MD p.10). Resolution of intractable moral dilemmas is, where it is required, situational. The agent decides in the situation, within the fix, what to do. There are many ways in which such decision making can proceed, less rational, such as those applying chance or involving bad faith, or more rational, such as those applying consequentialist decision theory (for details see MD, pp.32-9). A decision theory taking account of all that should be included will not however be purely consequential. It would also take account of relevant motivation. This defence and rehabilitation of moral pacifism has been challenged, in particular by Smith (hereafter JWS). JWS claims the defence offered is a ‘failure because it trivializes pacifism’ (p.153 twice). The rehabilitation trivializes pacifism because it entails that pacifism doesn't substantially differ from a form of activism which holds that while violence is always wrong one is sometimes justified on consequentialist grounds for preferring violent acts, if these acts are lesser evils than any other real alternatives. This is the commonsense position which most people hold – yet ... pacifism after all was supposed to be radical moral doctrine ... (p.153 rearranged).8 Part of the criticism is, then, not so much that pacifism is trivialized – JWS “activism” is hardly trivial – as that pacifism is popularised, deflated from a radical position to the commonsense position most people hold (p.154 also). Yet not a shred of evidence is adduced that JWS activism is such a populist position. Available evidence, for example from peace movements and oppositional opinion polls, suggests the very opposite: that, for instance, most people support state-justified conventional wars with the military violence they incur, and accordingly do not hold that violence is always wrong. From such a commonsense angle, pacifism with its condemnation of conventional wars and the violence they involve remains a radical doctrine. As regards wars and other violence-incurring social authorities, contemporary pacificism 8 JWS now informs me that he has changed his position. Whether the move effects his criticism, I don't know. is, as previous explained (e.g. AI p.3), a form of activism. Pacifism does not imply utter pacifity, but may actively involve social defence, resistance and so on. However a certain level of misrepresentation enters into the JWS challenge in the details of what forms of activism pacifism may include. That misrepresentation begins in the second clause concerning what is said to be sometimes justified. For the situational procedure where dilemmas arise will not generally be consequential applying a principle of lesser evil. In dilemmatic situations such principles are suspended, and such a principle is in any case unacceptable to moral pacifists. A small amount of violence may be less bad in its consequences than verbal offence, but a principled pacifist will choose the slightly greater evil where other obligations do not exclude it. A more serious distortion occurs in JWS's effort to force procedures in dilemma situations into purely consequentialist form. In fact consequential decision theory was deployed as a model only for how to proceed rationally in a situational setting where deontic procedures were suspended (see MD p.38). What was said, still misleadingly retrospective vision reveals, was this: ‘what is done is a very consequentialist thing’ (AI p.13), not ‘one acts in a consequentialist fashion to do the sufficiently good thing in the circumstances’ (JWS p.152). Situationally other procedures than those resembling orthodox rational decision making (modified from maximizing to satisizing objectives) may be adopted ( MD p.38). Further the orthodox consequentialist theory is inadequate because it leaves out, or tries to reduce to consequences, nonconsequential elements, notably motives. It is not difficult, in principle (in advance of attempted consequentialization of motives), to design situations where motives, such as integrity or maintaining faith, enter to yield outcomes upsetting consequential calculations. More elaborate decision making procedures than those of consequentialism, sometimes at variance with consequentialism, are thus presupposed. A further part of JWS's criticism accordingly goes by the board, the alleged appeal ‘to “second best” consequentialist considerations, ... already explicitly condemned’ (p.154). What was condemned was stock universal consequentialism, ‘that only consequentialist considerations carry argumentative weight’ (quoted on p.152), so undercutting other deontic principles, such as those of pacifism. It was not claimed, what is utterly different, that consequentialist considerations can nowhere enter into deliberation and decision making. The conclusion JWS arrives at is therefore substantially astray. After criticising modern moral philosophy for its reliance upon consequentialist modes of thought, it is surprising, and inconsistent, to find ... [reliance] upon such modes of thought to escape logical difficulties raised by moral dilemmas facing ... pacifis[m] (p.152) There is no inconsistency. JWS has confused universal with particular. As well he has wrongly contracted all situational decision making to consequentialist modes. There is a third part to the criticism, that the defence is too easy; the ‘strategy will allow too much violence to be (perpetrated and) justified to suit the tastes of any real pacifist’ (p.153). This another part of the so-called trivialization, this time however dilution rather than populatization, weakening the moral stand against violence. This third contention is premissed on a mistake: that one can ‘justify on consequentialist grounds any number of violent acts, providing that such acts are lesser evils than other real alternatives facing social agents’ (p.153). Moral pacifism offers no such licence; allowing such consequentialism to take over was never part of the position. The slide to such consequentialism is made on the strength of a similarly erroneous example. The potential victim of an aspiring rapist ‘is supposed to flee or wriggle free if possible. But it is easy to consequentially justify the use of violence by the woman to prevent herself from being raped’ (p.153 italics added). In the example so far described there is no dilemma, and no such easy resort to consequentially ‘justified’ violence. What allows too much violence is the lesser evil JWS assumes is easily consequentially justified; for example that the woman is entitled to inflict, and escalate, violence so long as it remains ‘a lesser evil than the violence of attempted rape’ (p.153). Since she may thereby inflict quite unreasonable damage (esp. if she is a Kung Fu expert), the result is inconsistent with ‘the basic principle of self-defence’ which JWS earlier adduced according to which what is ‘appropriate, in response is only that level of force necessary to defend oneself against the threat’ (p.150). There is evidence in JWS's work of some enthusiasm for levels of violence which exceed his ‘basic principle’, his appeal to ‘lesser evil’ generates some instances. The ‘basic principle’, itself fraught with difficulties (cf. the contorted discussion of what weapons are appropriate in response to what attacks, p.150), still exceeds what stretched pacifism would enjoin; for instance, it may not be appropriate to respond with force. But in a technical sense stretched pacifism is compatible with the ‘basic principle’, since it only imposes the upper bound on level of force. As for easiness, moral pacifism is not an easy position to live by, or to justify. Removing objections to pacifism is one thing; solidifying a positive case for it is quite another, and so far hardly conclusive (as AI tried to explain, pp 29-31). Stretched pacifism was advanced, hypothesized to put it more precisely, as a still viable option. It was not presented as a morally compulsory position, or, for that matter, as one that this defender adhered to or affirmed. To reiterate, while a cumulative case can be made for stetched pacifism as principled non-violence, that case was not conclusive, and is hard to improve. For, further, some serious difficulties standing in the way of stretched pacifism were assembled, the most important of which derives from the extent of violence apparent in transactions within the natural world. Simply consider the practices of carnivores, essential to their natural way of life. In order to meet their life needs for sustenance, these creatures do, and are often obliged to, engage routinely in violent activity. While it can no doubt be argued, as some vegetarians may do, that the natural order is an immoral order, and that remaining carnivores should be converted to vegetarianism as rapidly as proves possible (in the way domestic dogs are converted to dog biscuits), the difficulties with such proposals are immense. The task envisaged is gigantic, and beyond human capacities – even if it were desirable. For there are millions of species to be somehow converted to proper vegetarianism. Then there are millions of other species to be converted to proper and well regulated contraceptive practices, else their numbers will get out of hand (uncontrollably) with predation removed. Given humans lack of success in limiting their own excessive numbers, such regulation appears entirely remote. Aside however from the practical difficulties, is such a fully vegetarian order, with evolution further derailed, a desirable improvement on the natural order? Is it morally obligatory? It is certainly not obligatory, as alternative systems of morality in harmony with the prevailing natural order are feasible. Nor is it desirable, for (to appeal to such alternative value systems) the natural order is more or less in order as it is. Full vegetarianization would only reduce its value, vastly. More generally, a defensible ethical framework should not, it would be rightly contended, be right out of step with the natural order of other creatures, decently depicted. Decent depiction is important, for some features of the natural order, such as competition, combat and predation, so far from escaping attention, have been grossly exaggerated and exploited. Thus, for instance, the ludicrous picture of nature red in truth and claw, so beloved of descendents of orthodox Victorians and of orthodox economists. However, even under decent depiction, the “natural order” is often not benign. That appears to be enough to induce a supervenient moral dilemma for any stretched pacifism which is coupled to a deep ethic (e.g. which does not separate humans out from the natural order ) and which eschews the desperate vegetarian route: The natural order is not an immoral order The natural order contains (regular) instances of violence. Therefore, instances of violence are not immoral – in apparent defiance of P2 Moreover, there are too many instances of violence, too regularly occurring, for them all to be plausibly shunted into the moral dilemma category (and predatory carnivores face no dilemmas). Raptors that practice violence every week are not immoral (neither are they clearly moral; the category of morality only significantly extends so far). The main trouble lies however with P2 (which needs some finer adjustment, as was alrady indicated in AI ). While P2 is alright in context, within a particular, perfectly viable, ethical framework, designed for the usual human round, the conventional setting for ethical theories, it stands in need of modification outside that setting. It is time to suggest the sort of modification envisaged. Evidently P2 was addressed to moral agents. Which agents? Not to carnivores that supply their own livelihood, nor really to morally degenerate humans, but to peace-sensitive agents. With that semi-technical form, yet to be characterised, a suitably modified P2 results: MP2. It is morally wrong, for a peace-sensitive agent, to use violence. 9 9 The generalization of P2, suggested in AI, to cover also the parallel situation of environmental vandalism, can be similarly modified. The anti-vandolence principle becomes MP2°. It is morally wrong, for a peace- and environmentally-sensitive agent, to use vandolence. To recover what amounts, in the previous discussive context, to P2, it suffices to add the proposition that every human agent ought to be peace-sensitive. Much as that proposition has to recommend it, it appears too ethically advanced for many modern humans; it sets too high a moral standard to be taken as a serious guide to practice. It seems wise to settle presently for something less demanding, such as that every advanced moral agent ought to be peace sensitive. To put essentially the same proposition alternatively: Stretched pacifism (as modified) is supererogatory. While it is perhaps too late to hope for much moral progress in humans, it is pleasant to contemplate alternative futures where what is supererogatory became obligatory, and widely practiced. Richard Sylvan10* Appendix I began drafting this essay at the time (January 17, midday Australian time) of the American attacks upon Iraq. The aptly named Prime Minister Hawke of Australia had just made a statement to the nation-state, announcing (the) war. In this statement there was much talk of peace. There was even – in what was effectively a declaration of war – reiteration of the modern quest for ‘a new world order of peace’. Peace through war; so it rings out again and again, through the centuries. ‘War must be for the sake of peace’ (Aristotle p.220). More than two thousand years later, we have fought those wars to end all wars. But it is no use, Hawke solemely pronounced, just talking about peace, and thinking about peace; we must work for peace, fight for it – through war. Impeccable logic? President Bush, supreme commander, convinced us with similar logic, speaking too with many tongues. Of how he ‘preferred to think of peace, not war’. But now ‘only force will prevail’, as ‘all reasonable efforts to reach a peaceful solution are exhausted’. ‘What must be done’ must be done, or will be anyway. With God on side with the US offensive (as well as on the other side), it will go well. As it was said to have, though it achieved comparatively little that other efforts may not have yielded more satisfactorily, and thought it may now have to followed with another invasion. Nor have we ever managed to glimpse much of what is now supposed, when we are no longer engaged, to come ‘out of the horror of war’: a ‘new world order ... which governs the conflict of nations’; a ‘rule of law’, not war. How the one, enforcable law, is achieved, unless backed by the the other, is not explained (Medlin's paradox hits back). Similarly what we now hear from many militarists, as they rush to war, is that 10 * Thank to David Bennett for joint contributions (from UT) and to JWS for opposition (in JWS) ‘peace is a great good, war a great evil’. But, for the most part, only the rhetoric has shifted; practice has scarcely changed at all. REFERENCES W.-T. Chan, A Source Book on Chinese Philosophy, Princeton University Press, 1963; referred to as ST. W.-T. Chan (ed.), The Way of Lao Tzu (Tao-te Ching), Bobbs-Merrill, New York, 1963; referred to as LT. B. Martin, Uprooting War, Freedom Press, London, 1984. A. Naess, Ecology, community and lifestyle, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge UK, 1989. R.A. Rapaport, Pigs for the Ancestors : ritual in the ecology of a New Guinea People, Yale University Press, New Haven, 1967. R. Routley, ‘War and Peace II. On the alleged inconsistency, moral insensitivity and fanaticism of pacifism’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #9, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1983 (also in Inquiry ); referred to as AI. R. Routley and V. Plumwood, ‘Moral dilemmas and the logic of deontic notions’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #6, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1984 (also in Paraconsistent Logic); referred to as MD. R. Routley, ‘War and Peace I. On the ethics of large-scale nuclear war and nuclear-deterrence and the political fall-out’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy, #5, Research School Of Social Science, Australian National University, 1984. G. Sharp, Social Power and Political Freedom, Porter Sargent, Boston, 1980. J.W. Smith, The Worms at the Heart of Things , Public Relations Unit, Flinders University, 1989. R. Sylvan, ‘War and Peace III, Australia's defence philosophy’, Social Philosophy, for Nuclear Conference, University of Queensland, 1985. R. Sylvan and D. Bennett, ‘Of Utopias, Tao and Deep Ecology’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #19, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1990; referred to as UT.  Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Box 77, Item 3: Draft of War and peace IV: Tao and deep-green Subject The topic of the resource Later title: On extirpating war: Tao and deep-green pacifism. Description An account of the resource Paper from floppy disk containing 21 files. Directory and file name: war and peace I V\War and Peace IV.pdf Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org/items/browse?search=Richard+Sylvan&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bjoiner%5D=and&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=&amp;range=&amp;collection=&amp;type=&amp;user=&amp;tags=&amp;public=&amp;featured=&amp;exhibit=&amp;geolocation-mapped=&amp;geolocation-address=&amp;geolocation-latitude=&amp;geolocation-longitude=&amp;geolocation-radius=10&amp;submit_search=Search+for+items">Richard Sylvan</a> Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <span class="MuiTypography-root-125 MuiTypography-body2-126">The University of Queensland's <a data-testid="rek-series" href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/records/search?page=1&amp;pageSize=20&amp;sortBy=score&amp;sortDirection=Desc&amp;searchQueryParams%5Brek_series%5D%5Bvalue%5D=Richard+Sylvan+Papers%2C+UQFL291&amp;searchMode=advanced">Richard Sylvan Papers UQFL291</a></span>, Box 77, Item 3 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org">Antipodean Antinuclearism: (Re)constructing Richard Routley/Sylvan's Nuclear Philosophy</a> Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource <span>This item was identified for digitisation at the request of The University of Queensland's 2020 Fryer Library Fellow, </span><a href="https://najtaylor.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr. N.A.J. Taylor</a><span>.</span> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource For all enquiries about this work, please contact the Fryer Library, The University of Queensland Library. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource [27] leaves. 200.82 KB. Type The nature or genre of the resource Manuscript Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context <a href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:e39d951">https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:e39d951</a> Box 77: Untitled and Unlisted Boxes https://www.antipodean-antinuclearism.org/files/original/8b7e8d66d0e9ea5ede0b0b74abc38bfe.pdf 437b0835703278585d832d8eec97184e PDF Text Text PACIFISM P.4 Those who would abolish war, substituting for it nonwarlike and ideally nonviolent methods and strategies, have been confronted not merely with much subrational abuse but with plenty of criticism and some paradoxes. Here is a recent paradox concerning war and nonviolence: • War must be abolished. One reason is simply economic. We can no longer afford it, and the opportunity costs and enormous. Along with other extraordinarily wasteful activities, it is an anachronism. • Do so cannot be uncomplished without violence, i.e. in effect given the types of violence involved without what amounts to war. According to a fuller version of this premiss, the process of abolishing a war would only be achieved through a revolution so profound that it could not succeed without extensive and extreme violence, amounting to (civil) war. ˚ But then war cannot be abolished without war. Therefore, war which must be abolished cannot be abolished.1 This “paradox” has been compared with the Liar paradox, but the parallel does not continue far. This paradox does not involve self-referented features, and is easily broken. For let the “last war” be not the last standard war but the revolution abolishing war. Then, given that the revolution is successful, war will be abolished therewith, i.e. with that last war. There need be no regress, given again a successful outcome. All the premisses stand intact, but the conclusion, following the ‘therefore’ is a nonsequitar. However, while the outcome is accordingly logically fine, the route is repugnant. Standard pacifism challenges the second premiss. Outlining the deep-green case against war. The traditional Western case against wars has been primarily along two dimerous: social and moral. Wars are highly disruptive of the social fabric; wars may be unjust. From these joint features, it was argued that wars should be a matter of last resort, to be fought to ensure peace. It was argued further that only just wars should be fought. As there was little evidence of the decline and fall of wars, much effort was expended upon trying to characterize just war satisfactorily. But there was always a rival positive perspective in wars, which encouraged the exaltation of wars and military feats. It also facilitated the transfer of the favourable image of war to other problem areas, whence the long and apparently successful war against nature (but the short-term accesses are turning into long-term problems), the short and unsucessful war against poverty, and so on. Behind all this is the complex idea of war as rejuvenating, even cleansing, like fire; of war as heroic, and glorious, of war as 1 Brian Mullin who forcefully prpounded this puzzle, set other analogous puzzles alongside it – designed to reveal deep difficulties in contemporary political, and especially atternative, though. An other puzzle, concerning liberty and repression in the context of capitalism, revolved around the following immitent trivial: • capitalism must be removed, but liberty retained. • capitalism cannot be removed without repression. • repression is antithetrial to liberty. The puzzle is resolved as with the analogous puzzle of abolishing. Let the “last capitalist” action before the days of liberty to the repressive but liberating solvation overthrowing capitalism. �the supreme testing ground of men. These picture of war, finally shattered by the first World War (where even the poets began to tell of horrors and atrocities) and subsequent technological wars, though no larger in assendency, have by no means vanished. The notion of war as rejuvenating a flagging economy persists, along with the practice of keeping capitalism running smoothly by integrating substantial military components into the industrial engine. With the development of highly technological wars – the celebrated development of the dirty industrial age is substantially military – the traditional negative case has grown in strength. Wars have become much more damaging, with the potential for much more that is significantly worse, and the possibility of a just war has correspondingly contracted. The opposition to war has likewise grown, but more than correspondingly with the rise of women in social and political influence. Deep-green theory accepts the traditional negative case, but would further strengthen it. For example, the stricture against unjust wars, as out and out inmoral, can be strengthened, through the following syllogism: All wars should be fully just wars. Modern wars cannot be fully just wars. There should be no modern wars. A fully just war is not merely a just war but a war those just character can be reliably forecast in advance. A modern war is of course a war that deploys modern technology, at least that available this century. The evidential basis for the second premiss derives from much information that collateral damage, damage to innocent bystanders and involved citizens is always likely and cannot be excluded. Such wars are always liable to violate uncontroversial requirements for a just war, even if they are purely “conventional” wars, not throwing radiation or chemical or biological weapons around. From a contemperary viewpoint the traditional doctrine of a just war, really of a jsut defensive war, is seriously out of date. The reasons for this stretch wider than the new features introduced by modern technological wars and the character of modern civilization, with its giant cities littered with dangerous vulnerable military targets. They have also to do with the chauvinism of the justice proposed, which is shallow human justice, not natural or environmental justice. There is no consideration of justice to other creatures or to the Earth. Two troubles are really intentioned here: conceptual difficulaties with too narrow a nation of justice, and ideological difficulties with too narrow a vision of what is an object of value, what counts. The deep-green case against war adds to the traditional case a further dimension, neglected until very recently: the environmental dimension. It has suddenly been seen that wars are typically environmental atrocities. Earlier, of course, environments were simply backgrounds, backdrops in paintings and plays, to the real drama. Contemporary technological wars tend to be not merely social tragedies but environmental ones as well. There is a do-trines of just war, but it is a human chauvinistic affair. There is no similarly deeloped doctrine of an ecologically sound war, a deep ecological war. Unless any such war were literaly different from modern wars, that is contemporary technicological wars, it would overstep permitted bounds. For such wars are characteristically ecological disasters. Hardened Military people, desensitized by a rigorous unethical training, feel even less compunction about degrading or destroying environments or members of other species than they do of maiming or killing civilians through “collateral” activity. Matching the no-just-war syllogism is a no-sound-war syllogism: All wars should be environmentally sound wars. Modern wars cannot be environmentally sound. There should be no modern wars. The argument for the second premiss has of course to be different. It looks to the informative accumulating on what ward do to �natural and built environments. The Vietnam and Gulf wars both inflicted immense damage on natural environments on what was left of them. The environmental effects of war are not confined to direct and collateral damage. There are indirect effects also. Thus, for instance, war also supplied to mechanism of a technology for, modern environmental destruction: explosives, bull dozers from tanks, etc. There is little Tao linking war and ecology. (But a bridge to deep-green theory can be made using neo-Duoism, an updating Taoism in conformity with deep ecology, which however also includes but little on war: see UT.) APPENDIX I began drafting this essay at the time (January 17, midday Australian time) of the American attacks upon Iraq. Prime Minister hawke of Australia had just made a statement to the nation-state, announcing (the0 war. In this statement there was much talk of peace. There was even – in what was effectively a declaration of war – riteration of the modern quest for ‘a new world order of peace’. Peace through war; so it rings out again and again, through the centuries. ‘War must be for the sake of peace’ (Aristotle p.220). More than two thousand years later, we have fought those wars to end all wars. But it is no use, Hawke solemely pronounced, just talking about peace, and thinking about peace; we must work for peace, fight for it – through war. Impeccable logic? President Bush, supreme commander, convinced us with similar logic, speaking too with many tongues. Of how he ‘preferred to think of peace, not war’. But now ‘only force will prevail’, as ‘all reasonable efforts to reach a peaceful solution are exhausted’. ‘What must be done’ must be done, or will be anyway. With God on side with the US offensive (as well as on the other side), it will go well. As it was said to have, though it achieved comparatively little that other efforts may have have yielded, and thought it may now have to followed with another invasion. Nor have we ever managed to glimpse much of what is now supposed, when we are no longer engaged, to come ‘out of the horror of war’: a ‘new world order ... which governs the conflict of nations’; a ‘rule of law’, not war. How the one, enforcable law, is achieved unless backed by the the other is not explained. Similarly what we now hear from many militarists, as they rush to war, is that ‘peace is a great good, war a great evil’. But, for the most part, only the rhetoric has changed. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Draft Papers Description An account of the resource Sylvan's literary executor encountered an archive in which “all his projects were current", since manuscripts were undated and unattributed. Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Text Any textual data included in the document PACIFISM P.4 Those who would abolish war, substituting for it nonwarlike and ideally nonviolent methods and strategies, have been confronted not merely with much subrational abuse but with plenty of criticism and some paradoxes. Here is a recent paradox concerning war and nonviolence: • War must be abolished. One reason is simply economic. We can no longer afford it, and the opportunity costs and enormous. Along with other extraordinarily wasteful activities, it is an anachronism. • Do so cannot be uncomplished without violence, i.e. in effect given the types of violence involved without what amounts to war. According to a fuller version of this premiss, the process of abolishing a war would only be achieved through a revolution so profound that it could not succeed without extensive and extreme violence, amounting to (civil) war. ˚ But then war cannot be abolished without war. Therefore, war which must be abolished cannot be abolished.1 This “paradox” has been compared with the Liar paradox, but the parallel does not continue far. This paradox does not involve self-referented features, and is easily broken. For let the “last war” be not the last standard war but the revolution abolishing war. Then, given that the revolution is successful, war will be abolished therewith, i.e. with that last war. There need be no regress, given again a successful outcome. All the premisses stand intact, but the conclusion, following the ‘therefore’ is a nonsequitar. However, while the outcome is accordingly logically fine, the route is repugnant. Standard pacifism challenges the second premiss. Outlining the deep-green case against war. The traditional Western case against wars has been primarily along two dimerous: social and moral. Wars are highly disruptive of the social fabric; wars may be unjust. From these joint features, it was argued that wars should be a matter of last resort, to be fought to ensure peace. It was argued further that only just wars should be fought. As there was little evidence of the decline and fall of wars, much effort was expended upon trying to characterize just war satisfactorily. But there was always a rival positive perspective in wars, which encouraged the exaltation of wars and military feats. It also facilitated the transfer of the favourable image of war to other problem areas, whence the long and apparently successful war against nature (but the short-term accesses are turning into long-term problems), the short and unsucessful war against poverty, and so on. Behind all this is the complex idea of war as rejuvenating, even cleansing, like fire; of war as heroic, and glorious, of war as 1 Brian Mullin who forcefully prpounded this puzzle, set other analogous puzzles alongside it – designed to reveal deep difficulties in contemporary political, and especially atternative, though. An other puzzle, concerning liberty and repression in the context of capitalism, revolved around the following immitent trivial: • capitalism must be removed, but liberty retained. • capitalism cannot be removed without repression. • repression is antithetrial to liberty. The puzzle is resolved as with the analogous puzzle of abolishing. Let the “last capitalist” action before the days of liberty to the repressive but liberating solvation overthrowing capitalism. the supreme testing ground of men. These picture of war, finally shattered by the first World War (where even the poets began to tell of horrors and atrocities) and subsequent technological wars, though no larger in assendency, have by no means vanished. The notion of war as rejuvenating a flagging economy persists, along with the practice of keeping capitalism running smoothly by integrating substantial military components into the industrial engine. With the development of highly technological wars – the celebrated development of the dirty industrial age is substantially military – the traditional negative case has grown in strength. Wars have become much more damaging, with the potential for much more that is significantly worse, and the possibility of a just war has correspondingly contracted. The opposition to war has likewise grown, but more than correspondingly with the rise of women in social and political influence. Deep-green theory accepts the traditional negative case, but would further strengthen it. For example, the stricture against unjust wars, as out and out inmoral, can be strengthened, through the following syllogism: All wars should be fully just wars. Modern wars cannot be fully just wars. There should be no modern wars. A fully just war is not merely a just war but a war those just character can be reliably forecast in advance. A modern war is of course a war that deploys modern technology, at least that available this century. The evidential basis for the second premiss derives from much information that collateral damage, damage to innocent bystanders and involved citizens is always likely and cannot be excluded. Such wars are always liable to violate uncontroversial requirements for a just war, even if they are purely “conventional” wars, not throwing radiation or chemical or biological weapons around. From a contemperary viewpoint the traditional doctrine of a just war, really of a jsut defensive war, is seriously out of date. The reasons for this stretch wider than the new features introduced by modern technological wars and the character of modern civilization, with its giant cities littered with dangerous vulnerable military targets. They have also to do with the chauvinism of the justice proposed, which is shallow human justice, not natural or environmental justice. There is no consideration of justice to other creatures or to the Earth. Two troubles are really intentioned here: conceptual difficulaties with too narrow a nation of justice, and ideological difficulties with too narrow a vision of what is an object of value, what counts. The deep-green case against war adds to the traditional case a further dimension, neglected until very recently: the environmental dimension. It has suddenly been seen that wars are typically environmental atrocities. Earlier, of course, environments were simply backgrounds, backdrops in paintings and plays, to the real drama. Contemporary technological wars tend to be not merely social tragedies but environmental ones as well. There is a do-trines of just war, but it is a human chauvinistic affair. There is no similarly deeloped doctrine of an ecologically sound war, a deep ecological war. Unless any such war were literaly different from modern wars, that is contemporary technicological wars, it would overstep permitted bounds. For such wars are characteristically ecological disasters. Hardened Military people, desensitized by a rigorous unethical training, feel even less compunction about degrading or destroying environments or members of other species than they do of maiming or killing civilians through “collateral” activity. Matching the no-just-war syllogism is a no-sound-war syllogism: All wars should be environmentally sound wars. Modern wars cannot be environmentally sound. There should be no modern wars. The argument for the second premiss has of course to be different. It looks to the informative accumulating on what ward do to natural and built environments. The Vietnam and Gulf wars both inflicted immense damage on natural environments on what was left of them. The environmental effects of war are not confined to direct and collateral damage. There are indirect effects also. Thus, for instance, war also supplied to mechanism of a technology for, modern environmental destruction: explosives, bull dozers from tanks, etc. There is little Tao linking war and ecology. (But a bridge to deep-green theory can be made using neo-Duoism, an updating Taoism in conformity with deep ecology, which however also includes but little on war: see UT.) APPENDIX I began drafting this essay at the time (January 17, midday Australian time) of the American attacks upon Iraq. Prime Minister hawke of Australia had just made a statement to the nation-state, announcing (the0 war. In this statement there was much talk of peace. There was even – in what was effectively a declaration of war – riteration of the modern quest for ‘a new world order of peace’. Peace through war; so it rings out again and again, through the centuries. ‘War must be for the sake of peace’ (Aristotle p.220). More than two thousand years later, we have fought those wars to end all wars. But it is no use, Hawke solemely pronounced, just talking about peace, and thinking about peace; we must work for peace, fight for it – through war. Impeccable logic? President Bush, supreme commander, convinced us with similar logic, speaking too with many tongues. Of how he ‘preferred to think of peace, not war’. But now ‘only force will prevail’, as ‘all reasonable efforts to reach a peaceful solution are exhausted’. ‘What must be done’ must be done, or will be anyway. With God on side with the US offensive (as well as on the other side), it will go well. As it was said to have, though it achieved comparatively little that other efforts may have have yielded, and thought it may now have to followed with another invasion. Nor have we ever managed to glimpse much of what is now supposed, when we are no longer engaged, to come ‘out of the horror of war’: a ‘new world order ... which governs the conflict of nations’; a ‘rule of law’, not war. How the one, enforcable law, is achieved unless backed by the the other is not explained. Similarly what we now hear from many militarists, as they rush to war, is that ‘peace is a great good, war a great evil’. But, for the most part, only the rhetoric has changed.  Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Box 77, Item 2: Pacifism p.4 Description An account of the resource Paper from floppy disk containing 21 files. Directory and file name: war and peace I V\pacifism.pdf Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org/items/browse?search=Richard+Sylvan&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bjoiner%5D=and&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=&amp;range=&amp;collection=&amp;type=&amp;user=&amp;tags=&amp;public=&amp;featured=&amp;exhibit=&amp;geolocation-mapped=&amp;geolocation-address=&amp;geolocation-latitude=&amp;geolocation-longitude=&amp;geolocation-radius=10&amp;submit_search=Search+for+items">Richard Sylvan</a> Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <span class="MuiTypography-root-125 MuiTypography-body2-126">The University of Queensland's <a data-testid="rek-series" href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/records/search?page=1&amp;pageSize=20&amp;sortBy=score&amp;sortDirection=Desc&amp;searchQueryParams%5Brek_series%5D%5Bvalue%5D=Richard+Sylvan+Papers%2C+UQFL291&amp;searchMode=advanced">Richard Sylvan Papers UQFL291</a></span>, Box 77, Item 2 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org">Antipodean Antinuclearism: (Re)constructing Richard Routley/Sylvan's Nuclear Philosophy</a> Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource <span>This item was identified for digitisation at the request of The University of Queensland's 2020 Fryer Library Fellow, </span><a href="https://najtaylor.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr. N.A.J. Taylor</a><span>.</span> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource For all enquiries about this work, please contact the Fryer Library, The University of Queensland Library. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource [3] leaves. 99.11 KB. Type The nature or genre of the resource Manuscript Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context <a href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:68b7b8f">https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:68b7b8f</a> Box 77: Untitled and Unlisted Boxes https://www.antipodean-antinuclearism.org/files/original/5e8415bb76024d67ded6d6e3977f7eb3.pdf 96f3e6a4de450fe22ae29f31689e350e PDF Text Text ON EXTIRPATING WAR: TAO AND DEEP-GREEN PACIFISM Taoism and deep-green environmental theory, although closely aligned on very many issues, diverge over war. For Taoism, by contrast for instance with Buddhism, is not a pacific doctrine, but is committed to skilful defensive militarism. While it does not espouse a fortress mentality, Taoism certainly condones limited defensive military operations for specific purposes, a sort of guerilla warfare. By contrast, deep-green theory, while acknowledging the role of organised social defence, stands opposed to professional militarism, and thereby to military defence, and is committed to a principled pacifism. Conveniently a route through Taoism, philosophically fascinating in its own right, will lead us to problems of pacifism and towards deep-green theory. 1. Features of a Taoist critique of war and militarism. War did not receive a favourable press in ancient Chinese philosophy. Generally aggression and war were to be avoided. Even Confucius imposed very demanding conditions: for example, ‘when good men have instructed the people [in morals, agriculture, military tactics] for seven years, they may be allowed to bear arms,’ ‘If a ruler ... does not set himself right, even his commands will not be obeyed’ ( SB p.41, italics added). Mo Tzu went much further than Confucius, roundly condemning war – on utilitarian grounds, that war yields no net benefit at any level ( SB p.227). What is more, he backed his heavy condemnation practically (unlike some conspicuous contemporary theoretical utilitarians); ‘he did not hesitate to walk for ten days and ten nights in an effort to dissuade a ruler from making war’ ( SB p.212). But none, it is said, went as far, in a detailed and sophisticated criticism of war, as Lao Tzu; ‘none has condemned war more strongly than Lao Tzu’. ‘[T]he opposition of Taoism to the use of force is well-known, and the most bitter attack on militarism if found in the Lao Tzu’ (Chan, p.154, p.17.) But, after that splendid build-up, the text is slightly disappointing. Lao Tzu does not assert outright that war is an abomination, or even roundly condemn it. His critique of war, militarism, and military technology, is subtle and oblique, and, on the surface, far distanced from pacifism. For he does not recommend an end to war - in that genuine Taoists, those who possess Tao, will never participate in them – but expects wars to continue as unavoidable evils. Worse, he even goes so far as to outline proper attitudes to war and conduct in war, and indeed to suggest military techniques and strategies, some of which look decidedly devious. Among the classical works of Taoism, we focus on the Lao Tzu because, by contrast with other works, a remarkable component of that book is devoted to war and militarism. The apparent deviousness of the tactics Lao Tzu allocates serves to highlight what has been seen as ‘the most troublesome element’ in his philosophy (Chan p.17) – not so much however because they concern military operations, but because they are taken �to apply much more widely, ‘to life in general’ (p.17). But why should military activity obtain some special �dispensation? Why should what is not tolerated more generally be exonerated there? But given that Taoism has here the virtue of consistency (i.e. uniformity on principles) and of universalizability, that simply leaves more explaining to be done. • Puzzles for Taoism, and wars as unavoidable evils There are two puzzles here in Taoism rather than one. There is the militarypractices paradox, and, varying and generalising on that, there are life-practices paradoxes. The special paradox is generated by the following incompatible elements: on the one side, ‘the most bitter attack on militarism’, the well-known opposition of Taoism to the use of force (p.17) and to the possession and use of smart military weapons and technology – implying that war is far from all right – and on the other, advocacy of certain (devious) military tactics, outlines of (deceitful) conduct in war, and so on – implying that war is all right after all. A straightforward generalisation of this paradox would look at other morally-sensitive parts of life, where some practice was strongly condemned yet engaged in (for many examples, see the dilemmas assembled in MD). But the variation of concern to Chan and the neo-Confucians concerns the conjunction of upright with devious practices in life, in particular in the life of the sage. For a Taoist sage is presumed to lead an upright straightforward life, yet appears to engage in devious and even deceitful practices incompatible with such a life-style. Call this the Taoist-lifestyle paradox. Evidently a good deal of explaining is required, as to how Taoism can coherently take the positions it appears to presume, both on war and peace, and on life more generally. A desirable preliminary would seem to be a little investigation of what position is taken, especially on war and militarism. One key pasage runs: Fine weapons are instruments of evil They are hated by creatures Therefore those who possess the Tao turn away from them. ... Weapons are instruments of evil, not the instruments of a good ruler. When he uses them unavoidably, he regards calm restraint as the best principle Even when he is victorious, he does not regard it as praiseworthy, For to praise victory is to delight in the slaughter of men. He who delights in the slaughter of men will not succeed in the empire. ... For a victory, let us observe the occasion with funeral-ceremonies (LT p.154). Wars, which involve the use of weapons, instruments of evil, are accordingly themselves evil. They are also evil because they involve the slaughter of men. But they are also sometimes unavoidable (also p.152). Therefore such wars are unavoidable evils. Such discourse, obtained by almost immediate inference from the passage, is within the standard orbit of dilemma talk. But Taoism lacks, through �deliberately eschewing deontic talk, the discourse which enables direct expression of such dilemmas, or even direct condemnation of wars or of clever weapons. Instead the points are made by circumlocution, what the possesser of Tao does, how the good ruler conducts himself, or by analogy, of victory in war with death. �Unavoidable evils are the very stuff of deontic dilemmas (though many theories, underpinned by shonky logic, lack the resources for representing this stuff properly). Where something is unavoidably evil, it is both bad, because evil, and also not bad, doing it is excusable, because it is unavoidable. So, given such an argument (which has its weaknesses), an unavoidable evil is a genuinely dilemmatic object with inconsistent features. Certain wars have looked, since ancient times, like such dilemmatic objects. Revealingly, Chan tries to explain that ‘most troublesome element’ in Taoism, the military-practice paradox, through the following exercise in lateral thinking: It can ... be argued that Lao Tzu uses warfare to illustrate his principles of taking no action and weakness because warfare is among the most dynamic and critical of human experiences, just as the Indian classic, the Bhagavadgita chooses fighting as the theme on which to discuss the terrible dilemma whether one should fulfil his duty, as in the case of a soldier, and kill, or should fail in his duty and refrain from killing (p.17). ‘Just as’? The Indian classic prevents a classic moral dilemma, a dilemma represented in contemporary philosophy (following its rediscovery by Sartre), where there are incompatible duties: the duty to kill, because of one's role as a soldier, and the duty not to kill, because of one's human condition, and the supervenient dilemma of failing in and fulfilling one's duties. These dilemmas for an individual (male, as it then was) are replicated in dilemmas regarding war for group institutions: at bottom, the obligation to engage in war (for one set of compelling reasons) as contraposed with the obligation not to engage in war (for another, perhaps overlapping, set of reasons). A theory of moral dilemmas (as worked out for example in MD) is crucial for an adequate treatment of major issues in war and peace, especially (as will become evident) for a viable strong pacifism. But Taoism, eschewing deontic discourse, lacks the apparatus to state or develop moral dilemmas. Hence it is logically excluded from giving a full or adequate account of what is going on conceptually. One of the philosophically fascinating feature of Taoism is the fashion in which it manages to avoid deontic discourse, and to substitute for direct deontic discourse or improvise circumlocutions when deontic discourse would otherwise appear inevitable (cf. UT for examples). But there are costs. One is inability to display the mechanism of deontic dilemmas, or to show what reasons and argument lie behind Taoist prounouncements and conclusions (the shortage of Taoism on argument is another philosophically conspicious feature, also observed in UT). As conceptual apparatus for analysizing moral dilemmas is missing, most of the machinery involved has to be passed over. Only the outcomes, as Taoism sees them, are presented, as if from a black box. Taoism blacks out the story on deontic dilemmas that deep-green theory can tell, as the following diagram tries to show: �Diagrams . Charting the processing of deontic dilemmas that are “resolved”. �Deep-green chart: dilemma input Arguments to incompatible prescriptions § Processing of dilemma, directive situational procedures output Corresponding Taoist chart: Black directive Box output input It is evident that Taoism can be extended; information can be put into the Black Box rendering it less opaque. That extension can be made so as to conform to deepgreen theory, i.e. so that the extended Taoist chart, a neo-Daoist chart, looks like the deep-green one. That is indeed essentially how neo-Daoism get characterised, in terms of conformity of the extension to deep ecological theory (see UT). We are now placed to explain how to dissolve, or at least neutralize, the paradoxes deriving from repudiation of militarism, an awkwardly qualified repudiation in the case of Taoism. In a significant sense there is no resolving of genuine deontic dilemmas. The principles delineating the fix may stand, incompatible, signalling the persisting suboptimality (or better, sublimenality) of the dilemmatic situation. Where there is a dilemma, involved parties should try to do well enough in the sublimenal circumstances (for a much fuller account, see MD). Thus where there is a war, itself a non-Taoist process, engaged or caught up Taoists will not abandon Taoism. Taoist methods will be applied, Taoist strategies pursued. So much for theoretical representation and (non-)resolution of life-practices and other dilemmas, details of which are readily elaborated in deep-green extensions of Taoism. A prior substantive issue is whether dilemmas always are generated: not whether wars are evil (typically they are, an issue we shall come to), but whether wars are unavoidable. Analysis of wars does not bear that familiar claim out decisively. Many wars could have been avoided, through conciliation, negotiation, restraint, etc., and no worse results apparently obtained, through sanctions, exchange, trade, etc. Through a typology of wars (coming up) that conjecture can be given some substance. Consider, for instance, what would be walk-overs. Then there is little point in making a military response. So war can be avoided. Certainly an occupation, to be met in a different way, may still occur. And so on, perhaps, for various other types of war. But, more generally, try this:Every war involves an aggressor, who makes an aggressive move. Such an aggressor could always avoid that move, taking a different (or a do-nothing) course of �action. Therefore, �every war can be avoided. No war is entirely unavoidable. Setting aside determinism (which renders all actual wars along with all other events unavoidable), it could be argued that a war sometimes simply boils up, without an aggressor, an intensification of a conflagatory situation. There are grounds for scepticism regarding such examples; for such intensification can only occur if provocative military moves are made, for instance troops are stationed in provocative or risky positions. The presumption that certain wars are unavoidable typically derives from a onesided perspective on war, a defender's perspective. A defender has no option, so it is routinely averred, but to respond to a determined aggressor. Even if that should be so sometimes, when there is no running away or going underground, it does not establish that such a war is unavoidable; for it neglects the role of the aggressor. By a smarter formulation, relevant features of unavoidability can be captured. Although wars may not be unavoidable, defensive action in wars that have been initiated may be unavoidable. At least such action may be unavoidable if unacceptably high costs (death, enslavement, etc.) are not to be avoided. Thereupon another highly relevant feature emerges: the linkage of avoidability to costs. For whether an action is unavoidable then depends upon what costs a party is prepared to incur before and when insisting on action: but this appears entirely unacceptable. How can what is “unavoidable” cease to be so when some further costs are absorbed? However with basics like survival, a certain liberty, and so on, we do reach such bounds. An important type of unavoidability. We also reach scenarios, unavailable to Lao Tzu but kindly brought within range by modern technology, which may appear to justify aggressive strikes. State Z, while not an aggressor, is carrying out practices which will impose unacceptably high costs upon peoples of other states and implacably refuses to desist. It could, for example, be poisoning air or water flowing to other states. But ,to make the case vivid, let us suppose that state Z is constructing, for reasons Zeders find convincing (they are committed to a faith which depicts all humans as incorrigible sinners and unworthy of life), an effective doomsday machine. Would an (aggressive) preemptory strike designed to disable or destroy the machine be unavoidable? 1 In a sense, No; in another Yes. For different modalities can operate. Physically outsiders need to do nothing, but watch Zeders go about their zealous work. But deontically they are under heavy moral pressure, because of the costs of standing by idly: if the human race is worth anything very substantial, then they are obliged to act, action is deontically 1 Whether it would be justifiable, or just, are separate issues. But it is evident enought that such scenarios further damage the obsolescent idea of just war. For, according to received doctrine, a just war is defensive. (How such a war can be fought at all is another matter; coherence requires relativization to ‘just war for party d’.) �unavoidable. Here is a situation where a proposed reduction of deontic logic proves illuminating. Obligation is explicated through not implying, or necessitating, the sanction, i.e. excessive ethical costs such as extermination. Let us explain deontic unavoidability analogously: an action is so unavoidable if not undertaking it would result in excessive ethical costs. Then if it can be established that there is no other way than a military strike, an act of war, to ensure that the Zeders desist (and certainly we can envisage scenarios like that), then that is deontically unavoidable. It is also dilemmatic for those committed to, or inclined towards pacifism; and it is, for them at least, but paradoxically justifiable, as the negation is also justifiable, on pacific grounds. Scenarios like that sketched, that appear to render certain wars deontically unavoidable require but little or no elaboration to render them evil. Evil indeed is such a standard feature of standard wars that at least its great presence call for little supporting evidence. But it has taken to vast stretch of human history to reach this general point of recognition. The manifold evils of war Lao Tzu very early recognised and emphasized: Wherever armies are stationed, briars and thorns grow. Great wars are always followed by famines (p.152). And nowadays followed by great tides of refugees. This passage includes not only recognition of the widely-observed socioenvironmental consequences of war, but, more striking, very early recognition of the severe environmental impact of military forces. That critique is not however developed in Taoism. 2 Only recently has it been pushed substantially further. And only recently could a new, most significant twist occur, the merging of resource security, long a military objective, with environmental security. The appalling idea has recently been floated that the military, in need of new work and roles with the apparent warming of West-East relations and cooling of the Cold War, should exchange usual military idleness for meddling in environmental matters: regulation and policing of environmental resources, ensurance of environmental security of powerful states, and similar. This is a bit like reassigning those imprisoned for child abuse to managing kindergartens; for consider the impressive military record of environmental vandalism. What the military is alleged to offer is a structure appropriate and available for handling such matters. But, to the contrary, it is precisely the sort of hierarchical, authoritarian expensive structure that should be wound down and up as soon as the opportunity appears, as (briefly) now, rather than being retained and shockingly reoriented (as a state-serving “Greenwar”). 2 But a bridge to deep-green theory can be made through neo-Daoism, an updating of Taoism in confirmity with deep ecology (which however is somewhat thin and threadbare on war; for what there is so far, see Naess p.160). On neoDaoism, see UT. �2. On the divergence of deep-green from Taoism. Having arrived, by better or worse arguments, at the conclusion that wars, though generally evil, may be sometimes unavoidable, it is evidently important to say something about how they – those of the theoretical residue – are to be conducted. By appropriate conduct the damage they do may be reduced; also the conduct should be appropriate to the funereal nature of wars (to exceed Taoist resources for stating this sort of point). It is at this stage that deep-green theory begins to diverge from Taoism. In further explaining the Taoist and deep-green critiques of war, and diverting objections to them, a rough and preliminary typology of wars is important. It is also of passing interest in its own philosophical right. War, according to English Dictionaries, is a ‘contest carried on by force of arms, typically between nations or states’. More exactly, war is a game – in the generous technical sense of game-theory, with players, rules, goals, strategies, and so on – carried on in significant part by military means, normally between states or substates. Call the contestants, (warring) parties. They typically represent of course larger populations. The set-up between parties resembles the arrangements of players in game theory. There are several analogical extensions of the term war to cover games where one of the parties is an object, construed as hostile (an enemy of the state), such as Crime, Drugs, Poverty or Nature. These we can set aside as analogical wars. Of course wars form only a part of military activities. Military interests and objectives have always stretched significantly further than war, to include surveillence and security, easily extended to resource security, environmental security and life-style security, and beyond that to political stability and other political matters. Evidently military ambitions have far over-extended themselves in bagging such democratic concerns. An anarchist solution to the whole problem of war, which some have seen Taoism as reaching towards, is immediate: eliminate the source of war, states. Unfortunately it is not quite that simple (and that's not simple). For wars can also occur between nations, cultures, races or tribes (which are not such artifices as states, and not always so readily or desirably abolished), between inhabited regions, and between factions within states (thus civil wars) or, perhaps by extension, between factions within other social structures (thus, for instance, gang wars). But undoubtedly eliminating states and aspiring states would abolish most wars and virtually all the worst wars. While “nonviolent wars” are excluded by definition, by virtue of ‘force of arms’, token wars, limited wars, and so on, are not: for instance, wars fought by small armed teams representing competing sides (cf. medieval and science fiction war games). As wars are hemmed in by conventions and agreed rules, there is no reason in principle why they should not be reduced to two person contests, fought under strict rules like boxing or gladiatorial contests. But in modern times wars have never taken such sensible forms, but have been much larger affairs, making heavy (though fortunately restricted) use of latest technology. Let us distinguish such wars as techno-powered wars. They have, directly or indirectly (for the �technology may be bought or bartered), a heavy research and development support structure (indeed the bulk of contemporary science is devoted – misdirected – in one way or another to this effort). Among wars, an important distinction is that between offensive and defensive wars. An offensive war is one which ventures off a given party's territory or recognised pad, “invading” that of another party or parties; correlatively defensive parties, if they have not also invaded. Force projection typifies offensive practice. Plainly, offensiveness and defensiveness are not strictly features of a war, but of parties to a war. In a two-party war, while both parties can easily act offensively, the possibility of both parties proceeding defensively is excluded, unless they share territory. (Even then issues may arise as to which party, if any, was the aggressor, which started it, was responsible for starting it, and so on.) Thus mutually defensive wars between contemporary states are impossible (but would be possible if states shared territory, e.g. if Eire and Britain shared the territory of Northern Ireland). Tao-accredited wars were defensive wars, never wars aiming at domination: last-resort wars, in which no pride was taken ( LT p.152).3 The pretence that offensive wars are defensive is widespread, and reflected in the subterfuge that departments or ministries of war are those of defence, security or whatever. (If they really were what they purport to be, we should be well on the way to an end to war.) Offensive practices are rendered defensive ones by shabby redefinitional strategems, such as redefining ‘defensive’ to include defence of ideals like democracy or liberty, infringed (or allegedly infringed) on territories abroad, or to include “defence” of a third party or place (whence every offensive war is “defensive”). In the present war in which part of Arabia is engulfed (February 1991), one party claims to be defending what really was (or should be) part of its territory, namely Kuwait, another party to be defending (what Kuwait did not enjoy) democracy. It is a doubly offensive war presented in this guise as jointly defensive. Aggressive wars are waged for a variety of reasons, but usually for resources or access to resources or markets, a matter often disguised by appeal to ideology (thus a war for oil is represented as a war of liberation). But there are other reasons than narrowly economic ones, such as religion (as with crusades), power and aggrandisement (as in building an empire), and so on. Nor are those reasons necessarily far separated; ideologies like Marxism and market 3 There is one line in LT that may suggest that attack was sometimes justifiable, namely ‘For deep love helps one to win in the case of attack’ (p.219). But how can compassion be appropriate unless this attack is within a defensive setting, a larger context of unavoidability or such like. A passage shortly below confirms this interpretation: I dare not take the offensive but I take the defensive: I dare not advance an inch but I retreat a foot (p.222). These are advances and attacks within a defensive setting. �capitalism, for example, exhibit many of the features of religion. The economic reasons for war appear to have become much more complex with the advent of an integrated world economy. At the same time many of the independent reasons for economic wars are now obsolete. For to powerful states accrue the advantages of war without war. At least most of the former economic advantages of war can be obtained without expensive wars, through trade, institution of economic dependence, etc. Small medieval wars were sometimes instituted for the collection of neighbouring riches and booty, a kind of piracy meeting conditions of war. “Small” contemporary wars can be waged for a remarkable mix of politicaleconomy ends: to establish a regime favourable to economic penetration and profit repatriation, to subjugate markets and to remove competition, to boost a sagging weapons economy by using up old stocks and also testing new equipment, to restart a depressed economy, and so on. Such wars, along with the economic aims which motivate them, are in effect heavily castigated by Lao Tzu: When Tao prevails in the world, galloping horses are turned back to fertilize When Tao does not prevail in the world, war horses (the thrive in fields ...). the suburbs. There is no calamity greater than lavish desires. ( LT p.181). But it does exceed evidential warrant to claim that Tao is not only sufficient, but necessary, for cessation of such practices. The practice of regularly stimulating complex military-saturated economies through war is reminiscent of older, much ridiculed practices in simpler societies. They now ridicule the Tsembaga, who proceeded to destroy much of their surplus product by going to war every 5-15 years (cf Rapaport). But they do not similarly ridicule the most powerful nation on the Earth, the USA, which proceeds to write off a colossal amount of surplus in war every 10-20 years (the Gulf war liquidated some $1.7 billion per day). Taoists would. For ridicule was a favoured method, an important rhetorical strategem, and war and its idiocy were favourite targets. Some classification of defensive wars is also important, for various reasons: reducing and abolishing wars, their costs and damage, restructuring societies away from war and military practices, and, not least, for appreciating Taoism. A main distinction is between • conventional defence, maintained by armies of armed soldiers, many of them professionals, and • social defence, where there are no such armies or but fragments of them, and defence is carried out through social networks of a significant part of society.4 4 Details of social defence are presented in Sharp and in Martin. �It is here that Taoism and deep-green theory part company. Under Taoism, the state will have a standing army, but a defensive army operating by strange, surprise tactics (p.201). No doubt defensive wars are to remain last resort action. Nonetheless the state will operate in secrecy, in a way incompatible with decentralised social defence; people will be kept in the dark about smart weapons of the state; and they too will be surprised, along with presumed enemies of the state. By contrast, under deep-green theory, there should be no hidden smart weapons of state; information would flow more freely and not be hidden from the people (who should retain influence in informed decision making). Under deep-green, standing armies, and more generally military organisation, will be wound down altogether. Taoism should have pushed its searching criticism further. For military objectives, easily acquired by standing armies with time on their hands, are frequently incompatible with Taoism. For example, Taoism is opposed to domination ( LT p.152), whereas military operations frequently seek or involve domination; and military structure is invariably hierarchical and authoritarian. Taoism aims for self-regulation, wherever feasible (cf. p.201); so does deep-green theory, which is one reasons why it aims to dispose of standing armies, as an important preliminary to the withering away of states themselves (military forces being major props of state control and power, and often maintained primarily for internal state security). Taoism has no project for ending the era of wars; deepgreen theory does. That project involves an elimination of standing armies, too often poised for fighting or political interference. A recommended route to end war consists in progressive scaling down: reduction of the means and manpower. The initial stages are well-known, and include • elimination of nuclear, biological and chemical weaponry, and • force reduction. It can hardly be pretended that the Earth's states have managed to proceed very far on even this complex of stages. The next stage consists in • contraction to defensive capacities only, and the final stage consists in • elimination of remaining military defensive forces, and adoption, so far as required, of social defence practices. The complete route thus involves complete demilitarisation. Reasons why deep-green aims to proceed the full distance are readily grasped by considering the environmental shallowness of an otherwise cogent traditional case for the sharp curtailment of wars and militarism. The traditional Western case against wars has been primarily along two dimensions: social and moral. Wars are highly disruptive of the social fabric; wars may be unjust. From these joint features, it was argued that wars should be a matter of last resort, to be fought to ensure peace. It was argued further that only just wars should be fought. Just wars were rare objects. But as there was little evidence of the decline and fall of wars, much effort was expended, more practically and unsuccessfully, upon endeavouring to improve the calibre of wars, and more theoretically, upon trying to characterize just war satisfactorily, or rather to bend the notion in an effort to approximate the gory unjust facts. �Progress was long hindered, furthermore, because there was always a rival positive perspective on wars, which encouraged the exaltation of wars and military feats. It also facilitated the transfer of the favourable image of war to other problem areas, whence the long and apparently successful war against Nature (but the short-term successes are turning into long-term problems), the short and unsuccessful war against Poverty, and so on. Behind all this is the complex idea of war as rejuvenating, even cleansing, like fire; of war as heroic, and glorious, of war as the supreme testing ground of men. These pictures of war – finally shattered by the first World War (where even the poets began to tell of horrors and atrocities) and subsequent technological wars – though no longer in ascendency, have by no means vanished. The notion of war as rejuvenating a flagging economy persists, along with the practice of keeping capitalism running smoothly by integrating substantial military components into the industrial engine. With the development of highly technological wars – the celebrated development of the dirty industrial age is substantially military – the traditional negative case has grown in strength. Wars have become much more damaging, with the potential for much more that is significantly worse, and the possibility of a just war has correspondingly contracted, virtually to zero. The opposition to war has likewise grown, but more than correspondingly with the rise of women in social and political influence. Wars have almost always and everywhere been Men's affairs; likewise conquest. Deep-green theory accepts much of the traditional negative case, but would further strengthen it. For example, the stricture against unjust wars, as out and out immoral, can be strengthened, through the following syllogism: All wars should be fully just wars. Modern wars cannot be fully just wars. Therefore, there should be no modern wars. A fully just war is not merely a just war, but a war those just character can be reliably forecast in advance. A modern war is of course a war that deploys modern technology, at least that available this century. The evidential basis for the second premiss derives from much information that collateral damage, damage to innocent bystanders and involved citizens is always likely and cannot be excluded. Such wars are always liable to violate uncontroversial requirements for a just war, even if they are purely “conventional” wars, not throwing radiation or chemical or biological weapons around. From a contemporary viewpoint the traditional doctrine of a just war, really of a just defensive war, is seriously out of date. The reasons for this reach wider than the new features introduced by modern technological wars and the character of modern civilization, with its giant cities littered with dangerous and vulnerable military targets. They have also to do with the chauvinism of the justice proposed, which is shallow human justice, not natural or environmental justice. There is no consideration of justice to other creatures or to the Earth (cf �Naess p.160). Two troubles are really intertwined here: conceptual difficulties with too narrow a notion of justice, and ideological difficulties with too narrow a vision of what is an object of value, of what counts. The deep-green case against war adds to the traditional case a further dimension, neglected until very recently: the environmental dimension. It has suddenly been seen that wars are typically environmental atrocities. Earlier, of course, “environments” were simply backgrounds, backdrops in paintings and plays, to the real drama. Contemporary technological wars tend to be not merely social tragedies but environmental ones as well. There is a doctrine of just war, but it is a human chauvinistic affair. There is no similarly developed doctrine of an ecologically sound war, a deep ecological war. Unless any such war were literally different from modern wars, that is from contemporary technological wars, it would overstep permitted bounds. For such wars are characteristically ecological disasters. Hardened military people, desensitized by a rigorous unethical training, feel even less compunction about degrading or destroying environments or members of other species than they do of maiming or killing civilians through “collateral” activity. Matching the no-just-war syllogism is a no-sound-war syllogism: All wars should be environmentally sound wars. Modern wars cannot be environmentally sound. Therefore, there should be no modern wars. The argument for the second premiss has of course to be different. It looks to the information accumulating on what wars do to natural and built environments. The Vietnam and Gulf wars both inflicted immense damage on natural environments or what was left of them. The environmental effects of war are not confined to direct and collateral damage. There are indirect effects also. Thus, for instance, war also supplied the mechanism of, and the technology for, modern environmental destruction: explosives, bulldozers from tanks, etc. As well, training for war and engagement in war have much fostered, along with attitudes that make for social callousness or ruthlessness, those that contribute to environmental insensitivity and cruelty. 3. Puzzles about Taoist strategy and its critiques of technology and violence ‘It is surprising how much of the Lao Tzu is devoted to military strategy’. Which strategies? Surprise, above all. But why such strategies? ‘Do they not contradict the Taoists’ strong opposition to the use of force’ (Chan p.222), the implied commitment to quietism? Briefly, Taoism is not committed to quietism, and while certainly antagonistic to violence, does not oppose certain uses of force (only really ill-forcing, as will be explained). Even so, the emphasis on military strategy remains puzzling. The strategies, many of them relevant to social defence, include • seriousness, not ‘making light of the enemy’ (p.222) �• surprise, and nonvisibility (p.201). The defensive strategy involves guerilla tactics: marching without formation, holding weapons without seeming to have them, confronting enemies without seeming to meet them (p.222). But even in times of peace, ‘smart weapons of the state should not be displayed to the people’ (p.164). Such recommendations helped to fuel the charge of deviousness lodged against Lao Tzu. But look at part of the reason for concealing smart weapons: ‘The more smart weapons the people have, the more troubled the state will be’ (p.201). Smart weapons are carried in corrupt states, where the rich engage in conspicuous consumption and the people are suppressed, not where Tao is practiced ( LT p.194). • advance from weakness, flexibility but firmness. Weakness is the principle of life and will overcome strength ( LT p.164, p.233). • coolness and non-competition (LT p.233, p.164). Like these, most of the general strategies are standard Taoist practices simply applied to military conduct. For these standard practices the charge of deviousness looks feeble. The response applies more generally to other allegedly devious political strategies. For the strategies are but application of Taoist principles and techniques to warfare, politics and elsewhere. Nothing excludes application of these techniques to what are accounted, in general, unnecessary evils (which must sometimes, on other Taoist grounds, be countered). Nor, to meet the main criticism, need any deceit or deviousness be involved; nor is it. In particular, the legalist tactic, ‘In order to grasp, it is necessary first to give’ (LT p.164), is cited as involving ‘an element of deceit’ ‘undeniably’, and ‘worse’ it is ‘morally questionable’ (Chan p.17). But in order for me to grasp your hand in a normal handshake, it is necessary first for me to give my hand. There is no deceit here, nothing morally questionable. All the tactics permit of benign construals, of a Taoist kind. Consider, for instance, ‘In order to contract, it is necessary first to expand’ (LT p.164). In order to bend a copper pipe to the intended angle, it is better to bend it first a little further than required. The transformation of water to ice (both favoured natural items for symbolic purposes: natural processes which may look devious!) neatly illustrates the Taoist principle (which is however hardly necessary), and shows softness and weakness turned hardness and strength. The Taoist critique of militarism is as much a critique of technology as of war. Sharp weapons, ‘smart weapons’ as we might now say, come in for much critical attention, as we have already noticed. Only in corrupt and degenerate states are they displayed or flaunted (p.194, p.164); in deep-green regions smart weapons of state’ would not be retained unexhibited. The people will not have them for they mean trouble (p.201); for similar reasons deep-green regions will be free of them. So, it seems, will ideal Taoist regions: ‘Even if there are arrows and weapons, none will display them’ ( LT p.238). Much technology, military and other, is excluded under the Taoist edict against violence (a further facet of the military-practices �paradox).5 The powerful critique of militarism in the Tao-te Ching is coupled with strong opposition to violence. Some of the linkage is evident enough. Militarism as practised represents an ultimate form of state (or party) violence. A basic theme is that violent practices will come to an unnatural end, and accordingly to a non-Taoist end (generalising LT p.176). While force may occur in spectacular, but satisfactory, natural forms, force is duly distinguished from violence. To force the growth of life means ill omen. For the mind to employ the vital force without restraint means violence (LT p.197). One who follows Tao does not apply dominating force, which usually has had results bringing requital (p.152). Dominating force, like power, is in general castigated, under doctrine of wu-wei, no forced actions, no violence. To force natural growth is deviant, destroying harmony. To stop natural growth is deviant. But there is a significant difference between force and violence. To intentionally employ destructive force is to do violence. To so force things is condemned. To remain in harmony with things one does not so force things or practice violence. There is a non-interference principle at work, which also indicates types of non-interference that are excluded. However Taoism does not always get the distinction between force and violence quite 5 Under contemporary technology and technological arrangements, such as the storage of quantities of oil and nuclear and chemical materials in great cities, wars have assumed new and very destructive dimensions, to the point of being utterly irresponsible. A different approach to technology, as to war, is now mandatory. These are no longer things that can in principle be nicely confined and need not touch parties outside the fray. An important part of ending wars, “winning the war against wars”, is removing the technology of war, above all from irresponsible state power. As for which technology to try to jettison and which to try to retain or improve, it is not so difficult to indicate, provided evaluative terminology is not outlawed. What is wanted is technology that is good in its place, what should be excluded is technology that is indifferent or bad or potentially so. Technology to be justified has to do something worthwhile, it has to address identifiable respectable needs. That is why merely indifferent technology is out; there is no virtue in technology for technology's sake, as it is a mere means technique. It is because of the crucial evaluative component in choice of technology that appropriateness, itself evaluative, comes closer to encapsulating the criterion than other recent efforts. Size, such as smallness, or intermediateness, are not what matter, though modest and not excessive technologies are likely to fare better in satisfying appropriateness. In simpler societies, small technology is of course more appropriate; for that is what is good there. From known criteria for what is good these other features for locally appropriate technology can be read off: reliability, esp. in maintenance, functioning well and safely under the expected range of operating conditions (which may be difficult), ease of repair, capital cheapness and repair inexpensiveness, environmental benignness, and meeting sound social needs. �right. ‘Vital force without restraint’, intentionally excessive force, is only part of what counts as violence, which is more generally force which violates, i.e. transgresses, descrecrates, profanes, injures, outrages, etc. It is thus a negatively connoted force, an evil force in some specified intentional respect. There is a tendency for Taoist commentators, not Taoists, to regard Taoism as condemning all uses, or even occurrences, of force, but this is not so. Rather intentional ill-forcing is what is castigated, what is deviant. Thus Taoism does not exclude a range of defensive practices, which make satisfactory use of natural forces, like letting the machines of war industry stop. Those who would abolish war and its machinery, substituting for it nonwarlike and ideally nonviolent methods, technology, and strategies, have been confronted not merely with much sub-rational abuse but with plenty of criticism and even some paradoxes. Here is a recent paradox concerning war and nonviolence: • War must be abolished. One reason is simply economic. We can no longer afford it, and the opportunity costs are enormous. Along with other extraordinarily wasteful activities, it is an anachronism. • Doing so cannot be accomplished without violence, i.e. in effect, given the types of violence involved, without what amounts to war. According to a fuller version of this premiss, the process of abolishing a war would only be achieved through a revolution so profound that it could not succeed without extensive and extreme violence, amounting to (civil) war. ˚ But then war cannot be abolished without war. Therefore, war which must be abolished cannot be abolished. 6 This “paradox” has been compared with the Liar paradox, but the parallel does not persist far. For this paradox does not involve selfreferential features, and is easily broken, as follows. Let the “last war” be not the last standard war but the revolution abolishing war. Then, given that the revolution is successful, war will be abolished therewith, i.e. with that last war. There need be no regress, given again a successful outcome. All the premisses stand intact, but the conclusion, following the ‘therefore’ is a nonsequitur. However, while the dissolution of the argument is accordingly logically fine, the route is repugnant. Standard pacifism challenges the 6 Brian Medlin, who forcefully propounded this puzzle, set other analogous puzzles alongside it – designed to reveal deep difficulties in contemporary political, and especially alternative, thought. Another puzzle, concerning liberty and repression in the context of capitalism, revolved around the following inconsistent triad: • capitalism must be removed, but liberty retained. • capitalism cannot be removed without repression. • repression is antithetical to liberty. The puzzle is resolved as with the analogous puzzle of abolishing. Let the “last capitalist” action before the days of liberty be the repressive but liberating revolution overthrowing capitalism. �second premiss. 4. Standard and moral pacifism. Although Taoism is strongly opposed to war, and much in favour of peace – and accordingly by prevailing standards a substantially pacific position – it is not (nowhere in the central texts) committed to pacifism in usual senses, for two different reasons:- • It is not, by contrast with pacifism, opposed to all types of warfare, for example smart defensive wars. • It eschews deontology in terms of which moral pacifism is commonly stated, for instance through the watershed thesis P2. It is morally wrong to use violence. By contrast with Taoism, deep environmentalism does not avoid deontic claims, and is committed in principle to nonviolent technologies and ways and to pacifistic principles. Moreover, certain forms of deep environmentalism are completely committed to pacifism, notably European forms. Is deep green? There is heavy contemporary opposition to pacifism, as there also was to Taoism in the warring times when Taoism was first being promulgated. Many of the central institutions of contemporary life are intricated in coercion, violence and war. The most prominent contemporary institutions, states, are premissed on these elements of damaging force; they claim entitlement to use them widely, and even claim a certain territorial monopoly on their use. As a result they are having constantly to engage in them in attempt to maintain that monopoly. They are certainly the main perpetrators of wars, and of violence. They are indeed inured to wars, are in constant preparation for wars, yet propound dialectial (and normally dishonest and cynical) doctrines of peace through war (for a recent example see the appendix). Unremarkably then, the extensive propagandistic machinery of state has invested heavily in “justificatory” exercises in favour of controlled use, its own use, of destructive force, and continues to inveigh against pacifism. Because a routine trick in this sophistical repetoire consists in conflating pacifism with extreme, naive and inplausible, forms, an inevitable and important early task commits in unscrambling senses of ‘pacifism’. Semantical skulduggery can be thwarted in this way. Pacifism, as explained by English dictionaries, invariably concerns wars and warfare, and contains two components, negative and, elaborating on that, positive:- The negative component is, in Arnauld's word, anti-War-ism, opposition (in ways to be further specified) to all forms of warfare (see OED). The positive component supplies alternative ways of settling disputes (what it is supposed that wars with some semblance of justification involve), such as negotiation, arbitration, ... – and, adding to too narrow dictionary accounts – sanctions, substitutions (e.g. of sporting events, operatic contests, cooperative ventures), ... . In brief standard pacifism is opposition to all warfare and resolution of potential wars by other nonmilitary means. �Plainly the opposition to warfare, like the sanctions and so on, cannot itself be military (using soldiers and other devices of war), on pain of some incoherence. But otherwise the ways of opposition can be many and various: they can certainly be active, as with nonviolent demonstrations, resistance movements, and so forth, and they may also be devious (e.g. turning the forces of war upon themselves so they are neutralised). It quickly becomes evident, then, that some of the dictionaries offer but loaded definitions which, by restricting the negative components, reduce the initial appeal and plausibility of pacifism. Consider the Concise English definition of the negative component: ‘the doctrine of non-resistance to hostilities and of total non-co-operation with any form of warfare’. Thereby excluded are forms of pacifism which offer active and plausible alternatives to warfare such as social defence. The Concise English tends to force pacifism into what the Oxford English Dictionary lists as its final item: ‘often, with depreciatory implication, the advocacy of peace at any price’, ‘in any circumstance’. Pacifism can easily resist being forced into these sorts of circumstances: it has many resources, as an extensive series of texts on alternatives to war, such as negotiation, non-violent action and social defence, from Taoism to contemporary environmentalism attest. Academic philosophers have much advanced the semantical strategy of some dictionaries, of rendering pacifism more difficult from the very outset by narrow and biassed definitions. They have stretched the term from its restricted setting of warfare, confined to state and organised gang violence, to cover all forms of violence, from state and interstate to, what is very different, personal and interpersonal violence. Call the resulting considerably stretched notion of pacifism, according to which it is morally wrong to use violence, according to which P2 holds, stretched pacifism.7 While stretched pacifism certainly includes standard pacifism (unless the notions of war and warfare are tampered with), the converse is very far from being the case. A pacifist is in no way committed to stretched pacifism, which is a much more problematic and difficult position than standard pacifism. There are several, substantially different reasons for this, which will be picked up seriatim. Stretched pacifism, also misleadingly called moral pacifism, has looked a very easy critical target to moral philosophers. Many the effusive philosopher who, upon sighting such a target, has charged, whooping such rhetoric as “incoherent”, “inconsistent”, “insensitive”, “fanatical”. However, with improved logical technology now available for accommodating and treating moral dilemmas, it is no great feat to resist such attacks, in the fashion of previous investigations (see esp. AI, also MD). A main aim was to demonstrate that stretched pacifism was not so stupid as it was made out to be or appeared to be to these inured to present dominant violent ways. So far from being stupid, it is viable. In future gentler times stretched pacifism 7 In AI this notion was contrasted with standard pacifism as comprehensive pacifism: overcomprehensive might have been better. �could even be realised for whole communities of creatures (as some genuinely Christian sects envisaged); whence it will finally be seen to be feasible not merely for sages and supermen, and many ordinary women, but much more extensively. The method of philosophical accommodation was through moral dilemmas. The sort of moral dilemma that stretched pacifism can induce derives as follows. On the one side stands the theme P2, Wv, in convenient symbols, for Wrong V-ing, violencing. Now this implies to WB, where B presents a case of of violence. On the other side, particular circumstances develop which lead to W ~B, because ~B would produce in the circumstances considerable wrong, for instance extensive violence, mass murder, etc. One stock example from the literature concerns calling off the firing squad about to shoot several captives if the pacifist shoots one of them (it is elaborated in AI p.13). Interestingly, another stock example from the literature concerns standard pacifism (it can also be presented in terms of patriotism; for details of both see MD p.10). Resolution of intractable moral dilemmas is, where it is required, situational. The agent decides in the situation, within the fix, what to do. There are many ways in which such decision making can proceed, less rational, such as those applying chance or involving bad faith, or more rational, such as those applying consequentialist decision theory (for details see MD, pp.32-9). A decision theory taking account of all that should be included will not however be purely consequential. It would also take account of relevant motivation. This defence and rehabilitation of moral pacifism has been challenged, in particular by Smith (hereafter JWS). JWS claims the defence offered is a ‘failure because it trivializes pacifism’ (p.153 twice). The rehabilitation trivializes pacifism because it entails that pacifism doesn't substantially differ from a form of activism which holds that while violence is always wrong one is sometimes justified on consequentialist grounds for preferring violent acts, if these acts are lesser evils than any other real alternatives. This is the commonsense position which most people hold – yet ... pacifism after all was supposed to be radical moral doctrine ... (p.153 rearranged).8 Part of the criticism is, then, not so much that pacifism is trivialized – JWS “activism” is hardly trivial – as that pacifism is popularised, deflated from a radical position to the commonsense position most people hold (p.154 also). Yet not a shred of evidence is adduced that JWS activism is such a populist position. Available evidence, for example from peace movements and oppositional opinion polls, suggests the very opposite: that, for instance, most people support state-justified conventional wars with the military violence they incur, and 8 JWS now informs me that he has changed his position. Whether the move effects his criticism, I don't know. �accordingly do not hold that violence is always wrong. From such a commonsense angle, pacifism with its condemnation of conventional wars and the violence they involve remains a radical doctrine. As regards wars and other violence-incurring social authorities, contemporary pacificism is, as previous explained (e.g. AI p.3), a form of activism. Pacifism does not imply utter pacifity, but may actively involve social defence, resistance and so on. However a certain level of misrepresentation enters into the JWS challenge in the details of what forms of activism pacifism may include. That misrepresentation begins in the second clause concerning what is said to be sometimes justified. For the situational procedure where dilemmas arise will not generally be consequential applying a principle of lesser evil. In dilemmatic situations such principles are suspended, and such a principle is in any case unacceptable to moral pacifists. A small amount of violence may be less bad in its consequences than verbal offence, but a principled pacifist will choose the slightly greater evil where other obligations do not exclude it. A more serious distortion occurs in JWS's effort to force procedures in dilemma situations into purely consequentialist form. In fact consequential decision theory was deployed as a model only for how to proceed rationally in a situational setting where deontic procedures were suspended (see MD p.38). What was said, still misleadingly retrospective vision reveals, was this: ‘what is done is a very consequentialist thing’ (AI p.13), not ‘one acts in a consequentialist fashion to do the sufficiently good thing in the circumstances’ (JWS p.152). Situationally other procedures than those resembling orthodox rational decision making (modified from maximizing to satisizing objectives) may be adopted ( MD p.38). Further the orthodox consequentialist theory is inadequate because it leaves out, or tries to reduce to consequences, nonconsequential elements, notably motives. It is not difficult, in principle (in advance of attempted consequentialization of motives), to design situations where motives, such as integrity or maintaining faith, enter to yield outcomes upsetting consequential calculations. More elaborate decision making procedures than those of consequentialism, sometimes at variance with consequentialism, are thus presupposed. A further part of JWS's criticism accordingly goes by the board, the alleged appeal ‘to “second best” consequentialist considerations, ... already explicitly condemned’ (p.154). What was condemned was stock universal consequentialism, ‘that only consequentialist considerations carry argumentative weight’ (quoted on p.152), so undercutting other deontic principles, such as those of pacifism. It was not claimed, what is utterly different, that consequentialist considerations can nowhere enter into deliberation and decision making. The conclusion JWS arrives at is therefore substantially astray. After criticising modern moral philosophy for its reliance upon consequentialist modes of thought, it is surprising, and inconsistent, to find ... [reliance] upon such modes of thought to escape logical difficulties raised by moral dilemmas facing ... pacifis[m] (p.152) �There is no inconsistency. JWS has confused universal with particular. As well he has wrongly contracted all situational decision making to consequentialist modes. There is a third part to the criticism, that the defence is too easy; the ‘strategy will allow too much violence to be (perpetrated and) justified to suit the tastes of any real pacifist’ (p.153). This another part of the so-called trivialization, this time however dilution rather than populatization, weakening the moral stand against violence. This third contention is premissed on a mistake: that one can ‘justify on consequentialist grounds any number of violent acts, providing that such acts are lesser evils than other real alternatives facing social agents’ (p.153). Moral pacifism offers no such licence; allowing such consequentialism to take over was never part of the position. The slide to such consequentialism is made on the strength of a similarly erroneous example. The potential victim of an aspiring rapist ‘is supposed to flee or wriggle free if possible. But it is easy to consequentially justify the use of violence by the woman to prevent herself from being raped’ (p.153 italics added). In the example so far described there is no dilemma, and no such easy resort to consequentially ‘justified’ violence. What allows too much violence is the lesser evil JWS assumes is easily consequentially justified; for example that the woman is entitled to inflict, and escalate, violence so long as it remains ‘a lesser evil than the violence of attempted rape’ (p.153). Since she may thereby inflict quite unreasonable damage (esp. if she is a Kung Fu expert), the result is inconsistent with ‘the basic principle of self-defence’ which JWS earlier adduced according to which what is ‘appropriate, in response is only that level of force necessary to defend oneself against the threat’ (p.150). There is evidence in JWS's work of some enthusiasm for levels of violence which exceed his ‘basic principle’, his appeal to ‘lesser evil’ generates some instances. The ‘basic principle’, itself fraught with difficulties (cf. the contorted discussion of what weapons are appropriate in response to what attacks, p.150), still exceeds what stretched pacifism would enjoin; for instance, it may not be appropriate to respond with force. But in a technical sense stretched pacifism is compatible with the ‘basic principle’, since it only imposes the upper bound on level of force. As for easiness, moral pacifism is not an easy position to live by, or to justify. Removing objections to pacifism is one thing; solidifying a positive case for it is quite another, and so far hardly conclusive (as AI tried to explain, pp 29-31). Stretched pacifism was advanced, hypothesized to put it more precisely, as a still viable option. It was not presented as a morally compulsory position, or, for that matter, as one that this defender adhered to or affirmed. To reiterate, while a cumulative case can be made for stetched pacifism as principled non-violence, that case was not conclusive, and is hard to improve. For, further, some serious difficulties standing in the way of stretched pacifism were assembled, the most important of which derives from the extent of violence apparent in transactions within the natural world. Simply consider the practices of carnivores, essential to their natural way of life. In order to meet their life needs for sustenance, these creatures do, and are often obliged to, engage �routinely in violent activity. While it can no doubt be argued, as some vegetarians may do, that the natural order is an immoral order, and that remaining carnivores should be converted to vegetarianism as rapidly as proves possible (in the way domestic dogs are converted to dog biscuits), the difficulties with such proposals are immense. The task envisaged is gigantic, and beyond human capacities – even if it were desirable. For there are millions of species to be somehow converted to proper vegetarianism. Then there are millions of other species to be converted to proper and well regulated contraceptive practices, else their numbers will get out of hand (uncontrollably) with predation removed. Given humans lack of success in limiting their own excessive numbers, such regulation appears entirely remote. Aside however from the practical difficulties, is such a fully vegetarian order, with evolution further derailed, a desirable improvement on the natural order? Is it morally obligatory? It is certainly not obligatory, as alternative systems of morality in harmony with the prevailing natural order are feasible. Nor is it desirable, for (to appeal to such alternative value systems) the natural order is more or less in order as it is. Full vegetarianization would only reduce its value, vastly. More generally, a defensible ethical framework should not, it would be rightly contended, be right out of step with the natural order of other creatures, decently depicted. Decent depiction is important, for some features of the natural order, such as competition, combat and predation, so far from escaping attention, have been grossly exaggerated and exploited. Thus, for instance, the ludicrous picture of nature red in truth and claw, so beloved of descendents of orthodox Victorians and of orthodox economists. However, even under decent depiction, the “natural order” is often not benign. That appears to be enough to induce a supervenient moral dilemma for any stretched pacifism which is coupled to a deep ethic (e.g. which does not separate humans out from the natural order ) and which eschews the desperate vegetarian route: The natural order is not an immoral order The natural order contains (regular) instances of violence. Therefore, instances of violence are not immoral – in apparent defiance of P2 Moreover, there are too many instances of violence, too regularly occurring, for them all to be plausibly shunted into the moral dilemma category (and predatory carnivores face no dilemmas). Raptors that practice violence every week are not immoral (neither are they clearly moral; the category of morality only significantly extends so far). The main trouble lies however with P2 (which needs some finer adjustment, as was alrady indicated in AI ). While P2 is alright in context, within a particular, perfectly viable, ethical framework, designed for the usual human round, the conventional setting for ethical theories, it stands in need of modification outside that setting. It is time to suggest the sort of modification envisaged. Evidently P2 was addressed to moral agents. Which agents? Not to carnivores that supply their own livelihood, nor really to morally degenerate humans, but to �peace-sensitive agents. With that semi-technical form, yet to be characterised, a suitably modified P2 results: MP2. It is morally wrong, for a peace-sensitive agent, to use violence. 9 To recover what amounts, in the previous discussive context, to P2, it suffices to add the proposition that every human agent ought to be peace-sensitive. Much as that proposition has to recommend it, it appears too ethically advanced for many modern humans; it sets too high a moral standard to be taken as a serious guide to practice. It seems wise to settle presently for something less demanding, such as that every advanced moral agent ought to be peace sensitive. To put essentially the same proposition alternatively: Stretched pacifism (as modified) is supererogatory. While it is perhaps too late to hope for much moral progress in humans, it is pleasant to contemplate alternative futures where what is supererogatory became obligatory, and widely practiced. Richard Sylvan10* Appendix I began drafting this essay at the time (January 17, midday Australian time) of the American attacks upon Iraq. The optly named Prime Minister Hawke of Australia had just made a statement to the nation-state, announcing (the) war. In this statement there was much talk of peace. There was even – in what was effectively a declaration of war – reiteration of the modern quest for ‘a new world order of peace’. Peace through war; so it rings out again and again, through the centuries. ‘War must be for the sake of peace’ (Aristotle p.220). More than two thousand years later, we have fought those wars to end all wars. But it is no use, Hawke solemely pronounced, just talking about peace, and thinking about peace; we must work for peace, fight for it – through war. Impeccable logic? President Bush, supreme commander, convinced us with similar logic, speaking too with many tongues. Of how he ‘preferred to think of peace, not war’. But now ‘only force will prevail’, as ‘all reasonable efforts to reach a peaceful solution are exhausted’. ‘What must be done’ must be done, or will be anyway. With God on side with the US offensive (as well as on the other side), it will go well. As it was said to have, though it achieved comparatively little that other efforts may not have yielded more satisfactorily, and thought it may now have to followed with another invasion. Nor have we ever managed to glimpse much of what is now 9 The generalization of P2, suggested in AI, to cover also the parallel situation of environmental vandalism, can be similarly modified. The anti-vandolence principle becomes MP2°. It is morally wrong, for a peace- and environmentally-sensitive agent, to use vandolence. 10 * Thank to David Bennett for joint contributions (from UT) and to JWS for opposition (in JWS) �supposed, when we are no longer engaged, to come ‘out of the horror of war’: a ‘new world order ... which governs the conflict of nations’; a ‘rule of law’, not war. How the one, enforcable law, is achieved, unless backed by the the other, is not explained (Medlin's paradox hits back). Similarly what we now hear from many militarists, as they rush to war, is that ‘peace is a great good, war a great evil’. But, for the most part, only the rhetoric has shifted; practice has scarcely changed at all. REFERENCES W.-T. Chan, A Source Book on Chinese Philosophy, Princeton University Press, 1963; referred to as ST. W.-T. Chan (ed.), The Way of Lao Tzu (Tao-te Ching), Bobbs-Merrill, New York, 1963; referred to as LT. B. Martin, Uprooting War, Freedom Press, London, 1984. A. Naess, Ecology, community and lifestyle, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge UK, 1989. R.A. Rapaport, Pigs for the Ancestors : ritual in the ecology of a New Guinea People, Yale University Press, New Haven, 1967. R. Routley, ‘War and Peace II. On the alleged inconsistency, moral insensitivity and fanaticism of pacifism’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #9, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1983 (also in Inquiry ); referred to as AI. R. Routley and V. Plumwood, ‘Moral dilemmas and the logic of deontic notions’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #6, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1984 (also in Paraconsistent Logic); referred to as MD. R. Routley, ‘War and Peace I. On the ethics of large-scale nuclear war and nuclear-deterrence and the political fall-out’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy, #5, Research School Of Social Science, Australian National University, 1984. G. Sharp, Social Power and Political Freedom, Porter Sargent, Boston, 1980. J.W. Smith, The Worms at the Heart of Things , Public Relations Unit, Flinders University, 1989. R. Sylvan, ‘War and Peace III, Australia's defence philosophy’, Social Philosophy, for Nuclear Conference, University of Queensland, 1985. R. Sylvan and D. Bennett, ‘Of Utopias, Tao and Deep Ecology’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #19, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1990; referred to as UT. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Draft Papers Description An account of the resource Sylvan's literary executor encountered an archive in which “all his projects were current", since manuscripts were undated and unattributed. Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Text Any textual data included in the document ON EXTIRPATING WAR: TAO AND DEEP-GREEN PACIFISM Taoism and deep-green environmental theory, although closely aligned on very many issues, diverge over war. For Taoism, by contrast for instance with Buddhism, is not a pacific doctrine, but is committed to skilful defensive militarism. While it does not espouse a fortress mentality, Taoism certainly condones limited defensive military operations for specific purposes, a sort of guerilla warfare. By contrast, deep-green theory, while acknowledging the role of organised social defence, stands opposed to professional militarism, and thereby to military defence, and is committed to a principled pacifism. Conveniently a route through Taoism, philosophically fascinating in its own right, will lead us to problems of pacifism and towards deep-green theory. 1. Features of a Taoist critique of war and militarism. War did not receive a favourable press in ancient Chinese philosophy. Generally aggression and war were to be avoided. Even Confucius imposed very demanding conditions: for example, ‘when good men have instructed the people [in morals, agriculture, military tactics] for seven years, they may be allowed to bear arms,’ ‘If a ruler ... does not set himself right, even his commands will not be obeyed’ ( SB p.41, italics added). Mo Tzu went much further than Confucius, roundly condemning war – on utilitarian grounds, that war yields no net benefit at any level ( SB p.227). What is more, he backed his heavy condemnation practically (unlike some conspicuous contemporary theoretical utilitarians); ‘he did not hesitate to walk for ten days and ten nights in an effort to dissuade a ruler from making war’ ( SB p.212). But none, it is said, went as far, in a detailed and sophisticated criticism of war, as Lao Tzu; ‘none has condemned war more strongly than Lao Tzu’. ‘[T]he opposition of Taoism to the use of force is well-known, and the most bitter attack on militarism if found in the Lao Tzu’ (Chan, p.154, p.17.) But, after that splendid build-up, the text is slightly disappointing. Lao Tzu does not assert outright that war is an abomination, or even roundly condemn it. His critique of war, militarism, and military technology, is subtle and oblique, and, on the surface, far distanced from pacifism. For he does not recommend an end to war - in that genuine Taoists, those who possess Tao, will never participate in them – but expects wars to continue as unavoidable evils. Worse, he even goes so far as to outline proper attitudes to war and conduct in war, and indeed to suggest military techniques and strategies, some of which look decidedly devious. Among the classical works of Taoism, we focus on the Lao Tzu because, by contrast with other works, a remarkable component of that book is devoted to war and militarism. The apparent deviousness of the tactics Lao Tzu allocates serves to highlight what has been seen as ‘the most troublesome element’ in his philosophy (Chan p.17) – not so much however because they concern military operations, but because they are taken to apply much more widely, ‘to life in general’ (p.17). But why should military activity obtain some special dispensation? Why should what is not tolerated more generally be exonerated there? But given that Taoism has here the virtue of consistency (i.e. uniformity on principles) and of universalizability, that simply leaves more explaining to be done. • Puzzles for Taoism, and wars as unavoidable evils There are two puzzles here in Taoism rather than one. There is the militarypractices paradox, and, varying and generalising on that, there are life-practices paradoxes. The special paradox is generated by the following incompatible elements: on the one side, ‘the most bitter attack on militarism’, the well-known opposition of Taoism to the use of force (p.17) and to the possession and use of smart military weapons and technology – implying that war is far from all right – and on the other, advocacy of certain (devious) military tactics, outlines of (deceitful) conduct in war, and so on – implying that war is all right after all. A straightforward generalisation of this paradox would look at other morally-sensitive parts of life, where some practice was strongly condemned yet engaged in (for many examples, see the dilemmas assembled in MD). But the variation of concern to Chan and the neo-Confucians concerns the conjunction of upright with devious practices in life, in particular in the life of the sage. For a Taoist sage is presumed to lead an upright straightforward life, yet appears to engage in devious and even deceitful practices incompatible with such a life-style. Call this the Taoist-lifestyle paradox. Evidently a good deal of explaining is required, as to how Taoism can coherently take the positions it appears to presume, both on war and peace, and on life more generally. A desirable preliminary would seem to be a little investigation of what position is taken, especially on war and militarism. One key pasage runs: Fine weapons are instruments of evil They are hated by creatures Therefore those who possess the Tao turn away from them. ... Weapons are instruments of evil, not the instruments of a good ruler. When he uses them unavoidably, he regards calm restraint as the best principle Even when he is victorious, he does not regard it as praiseworthy, For to praise victory is to delight in the slaughter of men. He who delights in the slaughter of men will not succeed in the empire. ... For a victory, let us observe the occasion with funeral-ceremonies (LT p.154). Wars, which involve the use of weapons, instruments of evil, are accordingly themselves evil. They are also evil because they involve the slaughter of men. But they are also sometimes unavoidable (also p.152). Therefore such wars are unavoidable evils. Such discourse, obtained by almost immediate inference from the passage, is within the standard orbit of dilemma talk. But Taoism lacks, through deliberately eschewing deontic talk, the discourse which enables direct expression of such dilemmas, or even direct condemnation of wars or of clever weapons. Instead the points are made by circumlocution, what the possesser of Tao does, how the good ruler conducts himself, or by analogy, of victory in war with death. Unavoidable evils are the very stuff of deontic dilemmas (though many theories, underpinned by shonky logic, lack the resources for representing this stuff properly). Where something is unavoidably evil, it is both bad, because evil, and also not bad, doing it is excusable, because it is unavoidable. So, given such an argument (which has its weaknesses), an unavoidable evil is a genuinely dilemmatic object with inconsistent features. Certain wars have looked, since ancient times, like such dilemmatic objects. Revealingly, Chan tries to explain that ‘most troublesome element’ in Taoism, the military-practice paradox, through the following exercise in lateral thinking: It can ... be argued that Lao Tzu uses warfare to illustrate his principles of taking no action and weakness because warfare is among the most dynamic and critical of human experiences, just as the Indian classic, the Bhagavadgita chooses fighting as the theme on which to discuss the terrible dilemma whether one should fulfil his duty, as in the case of a soldier, and kill, or should fail in his duty and refrain from killing (p.17). ‘Just as’? The Indian classic prevents a classic moral dilemma, a dilemma represented in contemporary philosophy (following its rediscovery by Sartre), where there are incompatible duties: the duty to kill, because of one's role as a soldier, and the duty not to kill, because of one's human condition, and the supervenient dilemma of failing in and fulfilling one's duties. These dilemmas for an individual (male, as it then was) are replicated in dilemmas regarding war for group institutions: at bottom, the obligation to engage in war (for one set of compelling reasons) as contraposed with the obligation not to engage in war (for another, perhaps overlapping, set of reasons). A theory of moral dilemmas (as worked out for example in MD) is crucial for an adequate treatment of major issues in war and peace, especially (as will become evident) for a viable strong pacifism. But Taoism, eschewing deontic discourse, lacks the apparatus to state or develop moral dilemmas. Hence it is logically excluded from giving a full or adequate account of what is going on conceptually. One of the philosophically fascinating feature of Taoism is the fashion in which it manages to avoid deontic discourse, and to substitute for direct deontic discourse or improvise circumlocutions when deontic discourse would otherwise appear inevitable (cf. UT for examples). But there are costs. One is inability to display the mechanism of deontic dilemmas, or to show what reasons and argument lie behind Taoist prounouncements and conclusions (the shortage of Taoism on argument is another philosophically conspicious feature, also observed in UT). As conceptual apparatus for analysizing moral dilemmas is missing, most of the machinery involved has to be passed over. Only the outcomes, as Taoism sees them, are presented, as if from a black box. Taoism blacks out the story on deontic dilemmas that deep-green theory can tell, as the following diagram tries to show: Diagrams . Charting the processing of deontic dilemmas that are “resolved”. Deep-green chart: dilemma input Arguments to incompatible prescriptions § Processing of dilemma, directive situational procedures output Corresponding Taoist chart: Black directive Box output input It is evident that Taoism can be extended; information can be put into the Black Box rendering it less opaque. That extension can be made so as to conform to deepgreen theory, i.e. so that the extended Taoist chart, a neo-Daoist chart, looks like the deep-green one. That is indeed essentially how neo-Daoism get characterised, in terms of conformity of the extension to deep ecological theory (see UT). We are now placed to explain how to dissolve, or at least neutralize, the paradoxes deriving from repudiation of militarism, an awkwardly qualified repudiation in the case of Taoism. In a significant sense there is no resolving of genuine deontic dilemmas. The principles delineating the fix may stand, incompatible, signalling the persisting suboptimality (or better, sublimenality) of the dilemmatic situation. Where there is a dilemma, involved parties should try to do well enough in the sublimenal circumstances (for a much fuller account, see MD). Thus where there is a war, itself a non-Taoist process, engaged or caught up Taoists will not abandon Taoism. Taoist methods will be applied, Taoist strategies pursued. So much for theoretical representation and (non-)resolution of life-practices and other dilemmas, details of which are readily elaborated in deep-green extensions of Taoism. A prior substantive issue is whether dilemmas always are generated: not whether wars are evil (typically they are, an issue we shall come to), but whether wars are unavoidable. Analysis of wars does not bear that familiar claim out decisively. Many wars could have been avoided, through conciliation, negotiation, restraint, etc., and no worse results apparently obtained, through sanctions, exchange, trade, etc. Through a typology of wars (coming up) that conjecture can be given some substance. Consider, for instance, what would be walk-overs. Then there is little point in making a military response. So war can be avoided. Certainly an occupation, to be met in a different way, may still occur. And so on, perhaps, for various other types of war. But, more generally, try this:Every war involves an aggressor, who makes an aggressive move. Such an aggressor could always avoid that move, taking a different (or a do-nothing) course of action. Therefore, every war can be avoided. No war is entirely unavoidable. Setting aside determinism (which renders all actual wars along with all other events unavoidable), it could be argued that a war sometimes simply boils up, without an aggressor, an intensification of a conflagatory situation. There are grounds for scepticism regarding such examples; for such intensification can only occur if provocative military moves are made, for instance troops are stationed in provocative or risky positions. The presumption that certain wars are unavoidable typically derives from a onesided perspective on war, a defender's perspective. A defender has no option, so it is routinely averred, but to respond to a determined aggressor. Even if that should be so sometimes, when there is no running away or going underground, it does not establish that such a war is unavoidable; for it neglects the role of the aggressor. By a smarter formulation, relevant features of unavoidability can be captured. Although wars may not be unavoidable, defensive action in wars that have been initiated may be unavoidable. At least such action may be unavoidable if unacceptably high costs (death, enslavement, etc.) are not to be avoided. Thereupon another highly relevant feature emerges: the linkage of avoidability to costs. For whether an action is unavoidable then depends upon what costs a party is prepared to incur before and when insisting on action: but this appears entirely unacceptable. How can what is “unavoidable” cease to be so when some further costs are absorbed? However with basics like survival, a certain liberty, and so on, we do reach such bounds. An important type of unavoidability. We also reach scenarios, unavailable to Lao Tzu but kindly brought within range by modern technology, which may appear to justify aggressive strikes. State Z, while not an aggressor, is carrying out practices which will impose unacceptably high costs upon peoples of other states and implacably refuses to desist. It could, for example, be poisoning air or water flowing to other states. But ,to make the case vivid, let us suppose that state Z is constructing, for reasons Zeders find convincing (they are committed to a faith which depicts all humans as incorrigible sinners and unworthy of life), an effective doomsday machine. Would an (aggressive) preemptory strike designed to disable or destroy the machine be unavoidable? 1 In a sense, No; in another Yes. For different modalities can operate. Physically outsiders need to do nothing, but watch Zeders go about their zealous work. But deontically they are under heavy moral pressure, because of the costs of standing by idly: if the human race is worth anything very substantial, then they are obliged to act, action is deontically 1 Whether it would be justifiable, or just, are separate issues. But it is evident enought that such scenarios further damage the obsolescent idea of just war. For, according to received doctrine, a just war is defensive. (How such a war can be fought at all is another matter; coherence requires relativization to ‘just war for party d’.) unavoidable. Here is a situation where a proposed reduction of deontic logic proves illuminating. Obligation is explicated through not implying, or necessitating, the sanction, i.e. excessive ethical costs such as extermination. Let us explain deontic unavoidability analogously: an action is so unavoidable if not undertaking it would result in excessive ethical costs. Then if it can be established that there is no other way than a military strike, an act of war, to ensure that the Zeders desist (and certainly we can envisage scenarios like that), then that is deontically unavoidable. It is also dilemmatic for those committed to, or inclined towards pacifism; and it is, for them at least, but paradoxically justifiable, as the negation is also justifiable, on pacific grounds. Scenarios like that sketched, that appear to render certain wars deontically unavoidable require but little or no elaboration to render them evil. Evil indeed is such a standard feature of standard wars that at least its great presence call for little supporting evidence. But it has taken to vast stretch of human history to reach this general point of recognition. The manifold evils of war Lao Tzu very early recognised and emphasized: Wherever armies are stationed, briars and thorns grow. Great wars are always followed by famines (p.152). And nowadays followed by great tides of refugees. This passage includes not only recognition of the widely-observed socioenvironmental consequences of war, but, more striking, very early recognition of the severe environmental impact of military forces. That critique is not however developed in Taoism. 2 Only recently has it been pushed substantially further. And only recently could a new, most significant twist occur, the merging of resource security, long a military objective, with environmental security. The appalling idea has recently been floated that the military, in need of new work and roles with the apparent warming of West-East relations and cooling of the Cold War, should exchange usual military idleness for meddling in environmental matters: regulation and policing of environmental resources, ensurance of environmental security of powerful states, and similar. This is a bit like reassigning those imprisoned for child abuse to managing kindergartens; for consider the impressive military record of environmental vandalism. What the military is alleged to offer is a structure appropriate and available for handling such matters. But, to the contrary, it is precisely the sort of hierarchical, authoritarian expensive structure that should be wound down and up as soon as the opportunity appears, as (briefly) now, rather than being retained and shockingly reoriented (as a state-serving “Greenwar”). 2 But a bridge to deep-green theory can be made through neo-Daoism, an updating of Taoism in confirmity with deep ecology (which however is somewhat thin and threadbare on war; for what there is so far, see Naess p.160). On neoDaoism, see UT. 2. On the divergence of deep-green from Taoism. Having arrived, by better or worse arguments, at the conclusion that wars, though generally evil, may be sometimes unavoidable, it is evidently important to say something about how they – those of the theoretical residue – are to be conducted. By appropriate conduct the damage they do may be reduced; also the conduct should be appropriate to the funereal nature of wars (to exceed Taoist resources for stating this sort of point). It is at this stage that deep-green theory begins to diverge from Taoism. In further explaining the Taoist and deep-green critiques of war, and diverting objections to them, a rough and preliminary typology of wars is important. It is also of passing interest in its own philosophical right. War, according to English Dictionaries, is a ‘contest carried on by force of arms, typically between nations or states’. More exactly, war is a game – in the generous technical sense of game-theory, with players, rules, goals, strategies, and so on – carried on in significant part by military means, normally between states or substates. Call the contestants, (warring) parties. They typically represent of course larger populations. The set-up between parties resembles the arrangements of players in game theory. There are several analogical extensions of the term war to cover games where one of the parties is an object, construed as hostile (an enemy of the state), such as Crime, Drugs, Poverty or Nature. These we can set aside as analogical wars. Of course wars form only a part of military activities. Military interests and objectives have always stretched significantly further than war, to include surveillence and security, easily extended to resource security, environmental security and life-style security, and beyond that to political stability and other political matters. Evidently military ambitions have far over-extended themselves in bagging such democratic concerns. An anarchist solution to the whole problem of war, which some have seen Taoism as reaching towards, is immediate: eliminate the source of war, states. Unfortunately it is not quite that simple (and that's not simple). For wars can also occur between nations, cultures, races or tribes (which are not such artifices as states, and not always so readily or desirably abolished), between inhabited regions, and between factions within states (thus civil wars) or, perhaps by extension, between factions within other social structures (thus, for instance, gang wars). But undoubtedly eliminating states and aspiring states would abolish most wars and virtually all the worst wars. While “nonviolent wars” are excluded by definition, by virtue of ‘force of arms’, token wars, limited wars, and so on, are not: for instance, wars fought by small armed teams representing competing sides (cf. medieval and science fiction war games). As wars are hemmed in by conventions and agreed rules, there is no reason in principle why they should not be reduced to two person contests, fought under strict rules like boxing or gladiatorial contests. But in modern times wars have never taken such sensible forms, but have been much larger affairs, making heavy (though fortunately restricted) use of latest technology. Let us distinguish such wars as techno-powered wars. They have, directly or indirectly (for the technology may be bought or bartered), a heavy research and development support structure (indeed the bulk of contemporary science is devoted – misdirected – in one way or another to this effort). Among wars, an important distinction is that between offensive and defensive wars. An offensive war is one which ventures off a given party's territory or recognised pad, “invading” that of another party or parties; correlatively defensive parties, if they have not also invaded. Force projection typifies offensive practice. Plainly, offensiveness and defensiveness are not strictly features of a war, but of parties to a war. In a two-party war, while both parties can easily act offensively, the possibility of both parties proceeding defensively is excluded, unless they share territory. (Even then issues may arise as to which party, if any, was the aggressor, which started it, was responsible for starting it, and so on.) Thus mutually defensive wars between contemporary states are impossible (but would be possible if states shared territory, e.g. if Eire and Britain shared the territory of Northern Ireland). Tao-accredited wars were defensive wars, never wars aiming at domination: last-resort wars, in which no pride was taken ( LT p.152).3 The pretence that offensive wars are defensive is widespread, and reflected in the subterfuge that departments or ministries of war are those of defence, security or whatever. (If they really were what they purport to be, we should be well on the way to an end to war.) Offensive practices are rendered defensive ones by shabby redefinitional strategems, such as redefining ‘defensive’ to include defence of ideals like democracy or liberty, infringed (or allegedly infringed) on territories abroad, or to include “defence” of a third party or place (whence every offensive war is “defensive”). In the present war in which part of Arabia is engulfed (February 1991), one party claims to be defending what really was (or should be) part of its territory, namely Kuwait, another party to be defending (what Kuwait did not enjoy) democracy. It is a doubly offensive war presented in this guise as jointly defensive. Aggressive wars are waged for a variety of reasons, but usually for resources or access to resources or markets, a matter often disguised by appeal to ideology (thus a war for oil is represented as a war of liberation). But there are other reasons than narrowly economic ones, such as religion (as with crusades), power and aggrandisement (as in building an empire), and so on. Nor are those reasons necessarily far separated; ideologies like Marxism and market 3 There is one line in LT that may suggest that attack was sometimes justifiable, namely ‘For deep love helps one to win in the case of attack’ (p.219). But how can compassion be appropriate unless this attack is within a defensive setting, a larger context of unavoidability or such like. A passage shortly below confirms this interpretation: I dare not take the offensive but I take the defensive: I dare not advance an inch but I retreat a foot (p.222). These are advances and attacks within a defensive setting. capitalism, for example, exhibit many of the features of religion. The economic reasons for war appear to have become much more complex with the advent of an integrated world economy. At the same time many of the independent reasons for economic wars are now obsolete. For to powerful states accrue the advantages of war without war. At least most of the former economic advantages of war can be obtained without expensive wars, through trade, institution of economic dependence, etc. Small medieval wars were sometimes instituted for the collection of neighbouring riches and booty, a kind of piracy meeting conditions of war. “Small” contemporary wars can be waged for a remarkable mix of politicaleconomy ends: to establish a regime favourable to economic penetration and profit repatriation, to subjugate markets and to remove competition, to boost a sagging weapons economy by using up old stocks and also testing new equipment, to restart a depressed economy, and so on. Such wars, along with the economic aims which motivate them, are in effect heavily castigated by Lao Tzu: When Tao prevails in the world, galloping horses are turned back to fertilize When Tao does not prevail in the world, war horses (the thrive in fields ...). the suburbs. There is no calamity greater than lavish desires. ( LT p.181). But it does exceed evidential warrant to claim that Tao is not only sufficient, but necessary, for cessation of such practices. The practice of regularly stimulating complex military-saturated economies through war is reminiscent of older, much ridiculed practices in simpler societies. They now ridicule the Tsembaga, who proceeded to destroy much of their surplus product by going to war every 5-15 years (cf Rapaport). But they do not similarly ridicule the most powerful nation on the Earth, the USA, which proceeds to write off a colossal amount of surplus in war every 10-20 years (the Gulf war liquidated some $1.7 billion per day). Taoists would. For ridicule was a favoured method, an important rhetorical strategem, and war and its idiocy were favourite targets. Some classification of defensive wars is also important, for various reasons: reducing and abolishing wars, their costs and damage, restructuring societies away from war and military practices, and, not least, for appreciating Taoism. A main distinction is between • conventional defence, maintained by armies of armed soldiers, many of them professionals, and • social defence, where there are no such armies or but fragments of them, and defence is carried out through social networks of a significant part of society.4 4 Details of social defence are presented in Sharp and in Martin. It is here that Taoism and deep-green theory part company. Under Taoism, the state will have a standing army, but a defensive army operating by strange, surprise tactics (p.201). No doubt defensive wars are to remain last resort action. Nonetheless the state will operate in secrecy, in a way incompatible with decentralised social defence; people will be kept in the dark about smart weapons of the state; and they too will be surprised, along with presumed enemies of the state. By contrast, under deep-green theory, there should be no hidden smart weapons of state; information would flow more freely and not be hidden from the people (who should retain influence in informed decision making). Under deep-green, standing armies, and more generally military organisation, will be wound down altogether. Taoism should have pushed its searching criticism further. For military objectives, easily acquired by standing armies with time on their hands, are frequently incompatible with Taoism. For example, Taoism is opposed to domination ( LT p.152), whereas military operations frequently seek or involve domination; and military structure is invariably hierarchical and authoritarian. Taoism aims for self-regulation, wherever feasible (cf. p.201); so does deep-green theory, which is one reasons why it aims to dispose of standing armies, as an important preliminary to the withering away of states themselves (military forces being major props of state control and power, and often maintained primarily for internal state security). Taoism has no project for ending the era of wars; deepgreen theory does. That project involves an elimination of standing armies, too often poised for fighting or political interference. A recommended route to end war consists in progressive scaling down: reduction of the means and manpower. The initial stages are well-known, and include • elimination of nuclear, biological and chemical weaponry, and • force reduction. It can hardly be pretended that the Earth's states have managed to proceed very far on even this complex of stages. The next stage consists in • contraction to defensive capacities only, and the final stage consists in • elimination of remaining military defensive forces, and adoption, so far as required, of social defence practices. The complete route thus involves complete demilitarisation. Reasons why deep-green aims to proceed the full distance are readily grasped by considering the environmental shallowness of an otherwise cogent traditional case for the sharp curtailment of wars and militarism. The traditional Western case against wars has been primarily along two dimensions: social and moral. Wars are highly disruptive of the social fabric; wars may be unjust. From these joint features, it was argued that wars should be a matter of last resort, to be fought to ensure peace. It was argued further that only just wars should be fought. Just wars were rare objects. But as there was little evidence of the decline and fall of wars, much effort was expended, more practically and unsuccessfully, upon endeavouring to improve the calibre of wars, and more theoretically, upon trying to characterize just war satisfactorily, or rather to bend the notion in an effort to approximate the gory unjust facts. Progress was long hindered, furthermore, because there was always a rival positive perspective on wars, which encouraged the exaltation of wars and military feats. It also facilitated the transfer of the favourable image of war to other problem areas, whence the long and apparently successful war against Nature (but the short-term successes are turning into long-term problems), the short and unsuccessful war against Poverty, and so on. Behind all this is the complex idea of war as rejuvenating, even cleansing, like fire; of war as heroic, and glorious, of war as the supreme testing ground of men. These pictures of war – finally shattered by the first World War (where even the poets began to tell of horrors and atrocities) and subsequent technological wars – though no longer in ascendency, have by no means vanished. The notion of war as rejuvenating a flagging economy persists, along with the practice of keeping capitalism running smoothly by integrating substantial military components into the industrial engine. With the development of highly technological wars – the celebrated development of the dirty industrial age is substantially military – the traditional negative case has grown in strength. Wars have become much more damaging, with the potential for much more that is significantly worse, and the possibility of a just war has correspondingly contracted, virtually to zero. The opposition to war has likewise grown, but more than correspondingly with the rise of women in social and political influence. Wars have almost always and everywhere been Men's affairs; likewise conquest. Deep-green theory accepts much of the traditional negative case, but would further strengthen it. For example, the stricture against unjust wars, as out and out immoral, can be strengthened, through the following syllogism: All wars should be fully just wars. Modern wars cannot be fully just wars. Therefore, there should be no modern wars. A fully just war is not merely a just war, but a war those just character can be reliably forecast in advance. A modern war is of course a war that deploys modern technology, at least that available this century. The evidential basis for the second premiss derives from much information that collateral damage, damage to innocent bystanders and involved citizens is always likely and cannot be excluded. Such wars are always liable to violate uncontroversial requirements for a just war, even if they are purely “conventional” wars, not throwing radiation or chemical or biological weapons around. From a contemporary viewpoint the traditional doctrine of a just war, really of a just defensive war, is seriously out of date. The reasons for this reach wider than the new features introduced by modern technological wars and the character of modern civilization, with its giant cities littered with dangerous and vulnerable military targets. They have also to do with the chauvinism of the justice proposed, which is shallow human justice, not natural or environmental justice. There is no consideration of justice to other creatures or to the Earth (cf Naess p.160). Two troubles are really intertwined here: conceptual difficulties with too narrow a notion of justice, and ideological difficulties with too narrow a vision of what is an object of value, of what counts. The deep-green case against war adds to the traditional case a further dimension, neglected until very recently: the environmental dimension. It has suddenly been seen that wars are typically environmental atrocities. Earlier, of course, “environments” were simply backgrounds, backdrops in paintings and plays, to the real drama. Contemporary technological wars tend to be not merely social tragedies but environmental ones as well. There is a doctrine of just war, but it is a human chauvinistic affair. There is no similarly developed doctrine of an ecologically sound war, a deep ecological war. Unless any such war were literally different from modern wars, that is from contemporary technological wars, it would overstep permitted bounds. For such wars are characteristically ecological disasters. Hardened military people, desensitized by a rigorous unethical training, feel even less compunction about degrading or destroying environments or members of other species than they do of maiming or killing civilians through “collateral” activity. Matching the no-just-war syllogism is a no-sound-war syllogism: All wars should be environmentally sound wars. Modern wars cannot be environmentally sound. Therefore, there should be no modern wars. The argument for the second premiss has of course to be different. It looks to the information accumulating on what wars do to natural and built environments. The Vietnam and Gulf wars both inflicted immense damage on natural environments or what was left of them. The environmental effects of war are not confined to direct and collateral damage. There are indirect effects also. Thus, for instance, war also supplied the mechanism of, and the technology for, modern environmental destruction: explosives, bulldozers from tanks, etc. As well, training for war and engagement in war have much fostered, along with attitudes that make for social callousness or ruthlessness, those that contribute to environmental insensitivity and cruelty. 3. Puzzles about Taoist strategy and its critiques of technology and violence ‘It is surprising how much of the Lao Tzu is devoted to military strategy’. Which strategies? Surprise, above all. But why such strategies? ‘Do they not contradict the Taoists’ strong opposition to the use of force’ (Chan p.222), the implied commitment to quietism? Briefly, Taoism is not committed to quietism, and while certainly antagonistic to violence, does not oppose certain uses of force (only really ill-forcing, as will be explained). Even so, the emphasis on military strategy remains puzzling. The strategies, many of them relevant to social defence, include • seriousness, not ‘making light of the enemy’ (p.222) • surprise, and nonvisibility (p.201). The defensive strategy involves guerilla tactics: marching without formation, holding weapons without seeming to have them, confronting enemies without seeming to meet them (p.222). But even in times of peace, ‘smart weapons of the state should not be displayed to the people’ (p.164). Such recommendations helped to fuel the charge of deviousness lodged against Lao Tzu. But look at part of the reason for concealing smart weapons: ‘The more smart weapons the people have, the more troubled the state will be’ (p.201). Smart weapons are carried in corrupt states, where the rich engage in conspicuous consumption and the people are suppressed, not where Tao is practiced ( LT p.194). • advance from weakness, flexibility but firmness. Weakness is the principle of life and will overcome strength ( LT p.164, p.233). • coolness and non-competition (LT p.233, p.164). Like these, most of the general strategies are standard Taoist practices simply applied to military conduct. For these standard practices the charge of deviousness looks feeble. The response applies more generally to other allegedly devious political strategies. For the strategies are but application of Taoist principles and techniques to warfare, politics and elsewhere. Nothing excludes application of these techniques to what are accounted, in general, unnecessary evils (which must sometimes, on other Taoist grounds, be countered). Nor, to meet the main criticism, need any deceit or deviousness be involved; nor is it. In particular, the legalist tactic, ‘In order to grasp, it is necessary first to give’ (LT p.164), is cited as involving ‘an element of deceit’ ‘undeniably’, and ‘worse’ it is ‘morally questionable’ (Chan p.17). But in order for me to grasp your hand in a normal handshake, it is necessary first for me to give my hand. There is no deceit here, nothing morally questionable. All the tactics permit of benign construals, of a Taoist kind. Consider, for instance, ‘In order to contract, it is necessary first to expand’ (LT p.164). In order to bend a copper pipe to the intended angle, it is better to bend it first a little further than required. The transformation of water to ice (both favoured natural items for symbolic purposes: natural processes which may look devious!) neatly illustrates the Taoist principle (which is however hardly necessary), and shows softness and weakness turned hardness and strength. The Taoist critique of militarism is as much a critique of technology as of war. Sharp weapons, ‘smart weapons’ as we might now say, come in for much critical attention, as we have already noticed. Only in corrupt and degenerate states are they displayed or flaunted (p.194, p.164); in deep-green regions smart weapons of state’ would not be retained unexhibited. The people will not have them for they mean trouble (p.201); for similar reasons deep-green regions will be free of them. So, it seems, will ideal Taoist regions: ‘Even if there are arrows and weapons, none will display them’ ( LT p.238). Much technology, military and other, is excluded under the Taoist edict against violence (a further facet of the military-practices paradox).5 The powerful critique of militarism in the Tao-te Ching is coupled with strong opposition to violence. Some of the linkage is evident enough. Militarism as practised represents an ultimate form of state (or party) violence. A basic theme is that violent practices will come to an unnatural end, and accordingly to a non-Taoist end (generalising LT p.176). While force may occur in spectacular, but satisfactory, natural forms, force is duly distinguished from violence. To force the growth of life means ill omen. For the mind to employ the vital force without restraint means violence (LT p.197). One who follows Tao does not apply dominating force, which usually has had results bringing requital (p.152). Dominating force, like power, is in general castigated, under doctrine of wu-wei, no forced actions, no violence. To force natural growth is deviant, destroying harmony. To stop natural growth is deviant. But there is a significant difference between force and violence. To intentionally employ destructive force is to do violence. To so force things is condemned. To remain in harmony with things one does not so force things or practice violence. There is a non-interference principle at work, which also indicates types of non-interference that are excluded. However Taoism does not always get the distinction between force and violence quite 5 Under contemporary technology and technological arrangements, such as the storage of quantities of oil and nuclear and chemical materials in great cities, wars have assumed new and very destructive dimensions, to the point of being utterly irresponsible. A different approach to technology, as to war, is now mandatory. These are no longer things that can in principle be nicely confined and need not touch parties outside the fray. An important part of ending wars, “winning the war against wars”, is removing the technology of war, above all from irresponsible state power. As for which technology to try to jettison and which to try to retain or improve, it is not so difficult to indicate, provided evaluative terminology is not outlawed. What is wanted is technology that is good in its place, what should be excluded is technology that is indifferent or bad or potentially so. Technology to be justified has to do something worthwhile, it has to address identifiable respectable needs. That is why merely indifferent technology is out; there is no virtue in technology for technology's sake, as it is a mere means technique. It is because of the crucial evaluative component in choice of technology that appropriateness, itself evaluative, comes closer to encapsulating the criterion than other recent efforts. Size, such as smallness, or intermediateness, are not what matter, though modest and not excessive technologies are likely to fare better in satisfying appropriateness. In simpler societies, small technology is of course more appropriate; for that is what is good there. From known criteria for what is good these other features for locally appropriate technology can be read off: reliability, esp. in maintenance, functioning well and safely under the expected range of operating conditions (which may be difficult), ease of repair, capital cheapness and repair inexpensiveness, environmental benignness, and meeting sound social needs. right. ‘Vital force without restraint’, intentionally excessive force, is only part of what counts as violence, which is more generally force which violates, i.e. transgresses, descrecrates, profanes, injures, outrages, etc. It is thus a negatively connoted force, an evil force in some specified intentional respect. There is a tendency for Taoist commentators, not Taoists, to regard Taoism as condemning all uses, or even occurrences, of force, but this is not so. Rather intentional ill-forcing is what is castigated, what is deviant. Thus Taoism does not exclude a range of defensive practices, which make satisfactory use of natural forces, like letting the machines of war industry stop. Those who would abolish war and its machinery, substituting for it nonwarlike and ideally nonviolent methods, technology, and strategies, have been confronted not merely with much sub-rational abuse but with plenty of criticism and even some paradoxes. Here is a recent paradox concerning war and nonviolence: • War must be abolished. One reason is simply economic. We can no longer afford it, and the opportunity costs are enormous. Along with other extraordinarily wasteful activities, it is an anachronism. • Doing so cannot be accomplished without violence, i.e. in effect, given the types of violence involved, without what amounts to war. According to a fuller version of this premiss, the process of abolishing a war would only be achieved through a revolution so profound that it could not succeed without extensive and extreme violence, amounting to (civil) war. ˚ But then war cannot be abolished without war. Therefore, war which must be abolished cannot be abolished. 6 This “paradox” has been compared with the Liar paradox, but the parallel does not persist far. For this paradox does not involve selfreferential features, and is easily broken, as follows. Let the “last war” be not the last standard war but the revolution abolishing war. Then, given that the revolution is successful, war will be abolished therewith, i.e. with that last war. There need be no regress, given again a successful outcome. All the premisses stand intact, but the conclusion, following the ‘therefore’ is a nonsequitur. However, while the dissolution of the argument is accordingly logically fine, the route is repugnant. Standard pacifism challenges the 6 Brian Medlin, who forcefully propounded this puzzle, set other analogous puzzles alongside it – designed to reveal deep difficulties in contemporary political, and especially alternative, thought. Another puzzle, concerning liberty and repression in the context of capitalism, revolved around the following inconsistent triad: • capitalism must be removed, but liberty retained. • capitalism cannot be removed without repression. • repression is antithetical to liberty. The puzzle is resolved as with the analogous puzzle of abolishing. Let the “last capitalist” action before the days of liberty be the repressive but liberating revolution overthrowing capitalism. second premiss. 4. Standard and moral pacifism. Although Taoism is strongly opposed to war, and much in favour of peace – and accordingly by prevailing standards a substantially pacific position – it is not (nowhere in the central texts) committed to pacifism in usual senses, for two different reasons:- • It is not, by contrast with pacifism, opposed to all types of warfare, for example smart defensive wars. • It eschews deontology in terms of which moral pacifism is commonly stated, for instance through the watershed thesis P2. It is morally wrong to use violence. By contrast with Taoism, deep environmentalism does not avoid deontic claims, and is committed in principle to nonviolent technologies and ways and to pacifistic principles. Moreover, certain forms of deep environmentalism are completely committed to pacifism, notably European forms. Is deep green? There is heavy contemporary opposition to pacifism, as there also was to Taoism in the warring times when Taoism was first being promulgated. Many of the central institutions of contemporary life are intricated in coercion, violence and war. The most prominent contemporary institutions, states, are premissed on these elements of damaging force; they claim entitlement to use them widely, and even claim a certain territorial monopoly on their use. As a result they are having constantly to engage in them in attempt to maintain that monopoly. They are certainly the main perpetrators of wars, and of violence. They are indeed inured to wars, are in constant preparation for wars, yet propound dialectial (and normally dishonest and cynical) doctrines of peace through war (for a recent example see the appendix). Unremarkably then, the extensive propagandistic machinery of state has invested heavily in “justificatory” exercises in favour of controlled use, its own use, of destructive force, and continues to inveigh against pacifism. Because a routine trick in this sophistical repetoire consists in conflating pacifism with extreme, naive and inplausible, forms, an inevitable and important early task commits in unscrambling senses of ‘pacifism’. Semantical skulduggery can be thwarted in this way. Pacifism, as explained by English dictionaries, invariably concerns wars and warfare, and contains two components, negative and, elaborating on that, positive:- The negative component is, in Arnauld's word, anti-War-ism, opposition (in ways to be further specified) to all forms of warfare (see OED). The positive component supplies alternative ways of settling disputes (what it is supposed that wars with some semblance of justification involve), such as negotiation, arbitration, ... – and, adding to too narrow dictionary accounts – sanctions, substitutions (e.g. of sporting events, operatic contests, cooperative ventures), ... . In brief standard pacifism is opposition to all warfare and resolution of potential wars by other nonmilitary means. Plainly the opposition to warfare, like the sanctions and so on, cannot itself be military (using soldiers and other devices of war), on pain of some incoherence. But otherwise the ways of opposition can be many and various: they can certainly be active, as with nonviolent demonstrations, resistance movements, and so forth, and they may also be devious (e.g. turning the forces of war upon themselves so they are neutralised). It quickly becomes evident, then, that some of the dictionaries offer but loaded definitions which, by restricting the negative components, reduce the initial appeal and plausibility of pacifism. Consider the Concise English definition of the negative component: ‘the doctrine of non-resistance to hostilities and of total non-co-operation with any form of warfare’. Thereby excluded are forms of pacifism which offer active and plausible alternatives to warfare such as social defence. The Concise English tends to force pacifism into what the Oxford English Dictionary lists as its final item: ‘often, with depreciatory implication, the advocacy of peace at any price’, ‘in any circumstance’. Pacifism can easily resist being forced into these sorts of circumstances: it has many resources, as an extensive series of texts on alternatives to war, such as negotiation, non-violent action and social defence, from Taoism to contemporary environmentalism attest. Academic philosophers have much advanced the semantical strategy of some dictionaries, of rendering pacifism more difficult from the very outset by narrow and biassed definitions. They have stretched the term from its restricted setting of warfare, confined to state and organised gang violence, to cover all forms of violence, from state and interstate to, what is very different, personal and interpersonal violence. Call the resulting considerably stretched notion of pacifism, according to which it is morally wrong to use violence, according to which P2 holds, stretched pacifism.7 While stretched pacifism certainly includes standard pacifism (unless the notions of war and warfare are tampered with), the converse is very far from being the case. A pacifist is in no way committed to stretched pacifism, which is a much more problematic and difficult position than standard pacifism. There are several, substantially different reasons for this, which will be picked up seriatim. Stretched pacifism, also misleadingly called moral pacifism, has looked a very easy critical target to moral philosophers. Many the effusive philosopher who, upon sighting such a target, has charged, whooping such rhetoric as “incoherent”, “inconsistent”, “insensitive”, “fanatical”. However, with improved logical technology now available for accommodating and treating moral dilemmas, it is no great feat to resist such attacks, in the fashion of previous investigations (see esp. AI, also MD). A main aim was to demonstrate that stretched pacifism was not so stupid as it was made out to be or appeared to be to these inured to present dominant violent ways. So far from being stupid, it is viable. In future gentler times stretched pacifism 7 In AI this notion was contrasted with standard pacifism as comprehensive pacifism: overcomprehensive might have been better. could even be realised for whole communities of creatures (as some genuinely Christian sects envisaged); whence it will finally be seen to be feasible not merely for sages and supermen, and many ordinary women, but much more extensively. The method of philosophical accommodation was through moral dilemmas. The sort of moral dilemma that stretched pacifism can induce derives as follows. On the one side stands the theme P2, Wv, in convenient symbols, for Wrong V-ing, violencing. Now this implies to WB, where B presents a case of of violence. On the other side, particular circumstances develop which lead to W ~B, because ~B would produce in the circumstances considerable wrong, for instance extensive violence, mass murder, etc. One stock example from the literature concerns calling off the firing squad about to shoot several captives if the pacifist shoots one of them (it is elaborated in AI p.13). Interestingly, another stock example from the literature concerns standard pacifism (it can also be presented in terms of patriotism; for details of both see MD p.10). Resolution of intractable moral dilemmas is, where it is required, situational. The agent decides in the situation, within the fix, what to do. There are many ways in which such decision making can proceed, less rational, such as those applying chance or involving bad faith, or more rational, such as those applying consequentialist decision theory (for details see MD, pp.32-9). A decision theory taking account of all that should be included will not however be purely consequential. It would also take account of relevant motivation. This defence and rehabilitation of moral pacifism has been challenged, in particular by Smith (hereafter JWS). JWS claims the defence offered is a ‘failure because it trivializes pacifism’ (p.153 twice). The rehabilitation trivializes pacifism because it entails that pacifism doesn't substantially differ from a form of activism which holds that while violence is always wrong one is sometimes justified on consequentialist grounds for preferring violent acts, if these acts are lesser evils than any other real alternatives. This is the commonsense position which most people hold – yet ... pacifism after all was supposed to be radical moral doctrine ... (p.153 rearranged).8 Part of the criticism is, then, not so much that pacifism is trivialized – JWS “activism” is hardly trivial – as that pacifism is popularised, deflated from a radical position to the commonsense position most people hold (p.154 also). Yet not a shred of evidence is adduced that JWS activism is such a populist position. Available evidence, for example from peace movements and oppositional opinion polls, suggests the very opposite: that, for instance, most people support state-justified conventional wars with the military violence they incur, and 8 JWS now informs me that he has changed his position. Whether the move effects his criticism, I don't know. accordingly do not hold that violence is always wrong. From such a commonsense angle, pacifism with its condemnation of conventional wars and the violence they involve remains a radical doctrine. As regards wars and other violence-incurring social authorities, contemporary pacificism is, as previous explained (e.g. AI p.3), a form of activism. Pacifism does not imply utter pacifity, but may actively involve social defence, resistance and so on. However a certain level of misrepresentation enters into the JWS challenge in the details of what forms of activism pacifism may include. That misrepresentation begins in the second clause concerning what is said to be sometimes justified. For the situational procedure where dilemmas arise will not generally be consequential applying a principle of lesser evil. In dilemmatic situations such principles are suspended, and such a principle is in any case unacceptable to moral pacifists. A small amount of violence may be less bad in its consequences than verbal offence, but a principled pacifist will choose the slightly greater evil where other obligations do not exclude it. A more serious distortion occurs in JWS's effort to force procedures in dilemma situations into purely consequentialist form. In fact consequential decision theory was deployed as a model only for how to proceed rationally in a situational setting where deontic procedures were suspended (see MD p.38). What was said, still misleadingly retrospective vision reveals, was this: ‘what is done is a very consequentialist thing’ (AI p.13), not ‘one acts in a consequentialist fashion to do the sufficiently good thing in the circumstances’ (JWS p.152). Situationally other procedures than those resembling orthodox rational decision making (modified from maximizing to satisizing objectives) may be adopted ( MD p.38). Further the orthodox consequentialist theory is inadequate because it leaves out, or tries to reduce to consequences, nonconsequential elements, notably motives. It is not difficult, in principle (in advance of attempted consequentialization of motives), to design situations where motives, such as integrity or maintaining faith, enter to yield outcomes upsetting consequential calculations. More elaborate decision making procedures than those of consequentialism, sometimes at variance with consequentialism, are thus presupposed. A further part of JWS's criticism accordingly goes by the board, the alleged appeal ‘to “second best” consequentialist considerations, ... already explicitly condemned’ (p.154). What was condemned was stock universal consequentialism, ‘that only consequentialist considerations carry argumentative weight’ (quoted on p.152), so undercutting other deontic principles, such as those of pacifism. It was not claimed, what is utterly different, that consequentialist considerations can nowhere enter into deliberation and decision making. The conclusion JWS arrives at is therefore substantially astray. After criticising modern moral philosophy for its reliance upon consequentialist modes of thought, it is surprising, and inconsistent, to find ... [reliance] upon such modes of thought to escape logical difficulties raised by moral dilemmas facing ... pacifis[m] (p.152) There is no inconsistency. JWS has confused universal with particular. As well he has wrongly contracted all situational decision making to consequentialist modes. There is a third part to the criticism, that the defence is too easy; the ‘strategy will allow too much violence to be (perpetrated and) justified to suit the tastes of any real pacifist’ (p.153). This another part of the so-called trivialization, this time however dilution rather than populatization, weakening the moral stand against violence. This third contention is premissed on a mistake: that one can ‘justify on consequentialist grounds any number of violent acts, providing that such acts are lesser evils than other real alternatives facing social agents’ (p.153). Moral pacifism offers no such licence; allowing such consequentialism to take over was never part of the position. The slide to such consequentialism is made on the strength of a similarly erroneous example. The potential victim of an aspiring rapist ‘is supposed to flee or wriggle free if possible. But it is easy to consequentially justify the use of violence by the woman to prevent herself from being raped’ (p.153 italics added). In the example so far described there is no dilemma, and no such easy resort to consequentially ‘justified’ violence. What allows too much violence is the lesser evil JWS assumes is easily consequentially justified; for example that the woman is entitled to inflict, and escalate, violence so long as it remains ‘a lesser evil than the violence of attempted rape’ (p.153). Since she may thereby inflict quite unreasonable damage (esp. if she is a Kung Fu expert), the result is inconsistent with ‘the basic principle of self-defence’ which JWS earlier adduced according to which what is ‘appropriate, in response is only that level of force necessary to defend oneself against the threat’ (p.150). There is evidence in JWS's work of some enthusiasm for levels of violence which exceed his ‘basic principle’, his appeal to ‘lesser evil’ generates some instances. The ‘basic principle’, itself fraught with difficulties (cf. the contorted discussion of what weapons are appropriate in response to what attacks, p.150), still exceeds what stretched pacifism would enjoin; for instance, it may not be appropriate to respond with force. But in a technical sense stretched pacifism is compatible with the ‘basic principle’, since it only imposes the upper bound on level of force. As for easiness, moral pacifism is not an easy position to live by, or to justify. Removing objections to pacifism is one thing; solidifying a positive case for it is quite another, and so far hardly conclusive (as AI tried to explain, pp 29-31). Stretched pacifism was advanced, hypothesized to put it more precisely, as a still viable option. It was not presented as a morally compulsory position, or, for that matter, as one that this defender adhered to or affirmed. To reiterate, while a cumulative case can be made for stetched pacifism as principled non-violence, that case was not conclusive, and is hard to improve. For, further, some serious difficulties standing in the way of stretched pacifism were assembled, the most important of which derives from the extent of violence apparent in transactions within the natural world. Simply consider the practices of carnivores, essential to their natural way of life. In order to meet their life needs for sustenance, these creatures do, and are often obliged to, engage routinely in violent activity. While it can no doubt be argued, as some vegetarians may do, that the natural order is an immoral order, and that remaining carnivores should be converted to vegetarianism as rapidly as proves possible (in the way domestic dogs are converted to dog biscuits), the difficulties with such proposals are immense. The task envisaged is gigantic, and beyond human capacities – even if it were desirable. For there are millions of species to be somehow converted to proper vegetarianism. Then there are millions of other species to be converted to proper and well regulated contraceptive practices, else their numbers will get out of hand (uncontrollably) with predation removed. Given humans lack of success in limiting their own excessive numbers, such regulation appears entirely remote. Aside however from the practical difficulties, is such a fully vegetarian order, with evolution further derailed, a desirable improvement on the natural order? Is it morally obligatory? It is certainly not obligatory, as alternative systems of morality in harmony with the prevailing natural order are feasible. Nor is it desirable, for (to appeal to such alternative value systems) the natural order is more or less in order as it is. Full vegetarianization would only reduce its value, vastly. More generally, a defensible ethical framework should not, it would be rightly contended, be right out of step with the natural order of other creatures, decently depicted. Decent depiction is important, for some features of the natural order, such as competition, combat and predation, so far from escaping attention, have been grossly exaggerated and exploited. Thus, for instance, the ludicrous picture of nature red in truth and claw, so beloved of descendents of orthodox Victorians and of orthodox economists. However, even under decent depiction, the “natural order” is often not benign. That appears to be enough to induce a supervenient moral dilemma for any stretched pacifism which is coupled to a deep ethic (e.g. which does not separate humans out from the natural order ) and which eschews the desperate vegetarian route: The natural order is not an immoral order The natural order contains (regular) instances of violence. Therefore, instances of violence are not immoral – in apparent defiance of P2 Moreover, there are too many instances of violence, too regularly occurring, for them all to be plausibly shunted into the moral dilemma category (and predatory carnivores face no dilemmas). Raptors that practice violence every week are not immoral (neither are they clearly moral; the category of morality only significantly extends so far). The main trouble lies however with P2 (which needs some finer adjustment, as was alrady indicated in AI ). While P2 is alright in context, within a particular, perfectly viable, ethical framework, designed for the usual human round, the conventional setting for ethical theories, it stands in need of modification outside that setting. It is time to suggest the sort of modification envisaged. Evidently P2 was addressed to moral agents. Which agents? Not to carnivores that supply their own livelihood, nor really to morally degenerate humans, but to peace-sensitive agents. With that semi-technical form, yet to be characterised, a suitably modified P2 results: MP2. It is morally wrong, for a peace-sensitive agent, to use violence. 9 To recover what amounts, in the previous discussive context, to P2, it suffices to add the proposition that every human agent ought to be peace-sensitive. Much as that proposition has to recommend it, it appears too ethically advanced for many modern humans; it sets too high a moral standard to be taken as a serious guide to practice. It seems wise to settle presently for something less demanding, such as that every advanced moral agent ought to be peace sensitive. To put essentially the same proposition alternatively: Stretched pacifism (as modified) is supererogatory. While it is perhaps too late to hope for much moral progress in humans, it is pleasant to contemplate alternative futures where what is supererogatory became obligatory, and widely practiced. Richard Sylvan10* Appendix I began drafting this essay at the time (January 17, midday Australian time) of the American attacks upon Iraq. The optly named Prime Minister Hawke of Australia had just made a statement to the nation-state, announcing (the) war. In this statement there was much talk of peace. There was even – in what was effectively a declaration of war – reiteration of the modern quest for ‘a new world order of peace’. Peace through war; so it rings out again and again, through the centuries. ‘War must be for the sake of peace’ (Aristotle p.220). More than two thousand years later, we have fought those wars to end all wars. But it is no use, Hawke solemely pronounced, just talking about peace, and thinking about peace; we must work for peace, fight for it – through war. Impeccable logic? President Bush, supreme commander, convinced us with similar logic, speaking too with many tongues. Of how he ‘preferred to think of peace, not war’. But now ‘only force will prevail’, as ‘all reasonable efforts to reach a peaceful solution are exhausted’. ‘What must be done’ must be done, or will be anyway. With God on side with the US offensive (as well as on the other side), it will go well. As it was said to have, though it achieved comparatively little that other efforts may not have yielded more satisfactorily, and thought it may now have to followed with another invasion. Nor have we ever managed to glimpse much of what is now 9 The generalization of P2, suggested in AI, to cover also the parallel situation of environmental vandalism, can be similarly modified. The anti-vandolence principle becomes MP2°. It is morally wrong, for a peace- and environmentally-sensitive agent, to use vandolence. 10 * Thank to David Bennett for joint contributions (from UT) and to JWS for opposition (in JWS) supposed, when we are no longer engaged, to come ‘out of the horror of war’: a ‘new world order ... which governs the conflict of nations’; a ‘rule of law’, not war. How the one, enforcable law, is achieved, unless backed by the the other, is not explained (Medlin's paradox hits back). Similarly what we now hear from many militarists, as they rush to war, is that ‘peace is a great good, war a great evil’. But, for the most part, only the rhetoric has shifted; practice has scarcely changed at all. REFERENCES W.-T. Chan, A Source Book on Chinese Philosophy, Princeton University Press, 1963; referred to as ST. W.-T. Chan (ed.), The Way of Lao Tzu (Tao-te Ching), Bobbs-Merrill, New York, 1963; referred to as LT. B. Martin, Uprooting War, Freedom Press, London, 1984. A. Naess, Ecology, community and lifestyle, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge UK, 1989. R.A. Rapaport, Pigs for the Ancestors : ritual in the ecology of a New Guinea People, Yale University Press, New Haven, 1967. R. Routley, ‘War and Peace II. On the alleged inconsistency, moral insensitivity and fanaticism of pacifism’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #9, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1983 (also in Inquiry ); referred to as AI. R. Routley and V. Plumwood, ‘Moral dilemmas and the logic of deontic notions’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #6, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1984 (also in Paraconsistent Logic); referred to as MD. R. Routley, ‘War and Peace I. On the ethics of large-scale nuclear war and nuclear-deterrence and the political fall-out’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy, #5, Research School Of Social Science, Australian National University, 1984. G. Sharp, Social Power and Political Freedom, Porter Sargent, Boston, 1980. J.W. Smith, The Worms at the Heart of Things , Public Relations Unit, Flinders University, 1989. R. Sylvan, ‘War and Peace III, Australia's defence philosophy’, Social Philosophy, for Nuclear Conference, University of Queensland, 1985. R. Sylvan and D. Bennett, ‘Of Utopias, Tao and Deep Ecology’, Discussion papers in environmental philosophy #19, Research School of Social Science, Australian National University, 1990; referred to as UT.  Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Box 77, Item 1: Draft of On extirpating war: Tao and deep-green pacifism Subject The topic of the resource Previous title of paper: War and peace IV: Tao and deep-green. Description An account of the resource Paper from floppy disk containing 21 files. Directory and file name: war and peace I V\on extirpating war tao & depgre.pdf. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org/items/browse?search=Richard+Sylvan&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bjoiner%5D=and&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=39&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=&amp;range=&amp;collection=&amp;type=&amp;user=&amp;tags=&amp;public=&amp;featured=&amp;exhibit=&amp;geolocation-mapped=&amp;geolocation-address=&amp;geolocation-latitude=&amp;geolocation-longitude=&amp;geolocation-radius=10&amp;submit_search=Search+for+items">Richard Sylvan</a> Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <span class="MuiTypography-root-125 MuiTypography-body2-126">The University of Queensland's <a data-testid="rek-series" href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/records/search?page=1&amp;pageSize=20&amp;sortBy=score&amp;sortDirection=Desc&amp;searchQueryParams%5Brek_series%5D%5Bvalue%5D=Richard+Sylvan+Papers%2C+UQFL291&amp;searchMode=advanced">Richard Sylvan Papers UQFL291</a></span>, Box 77, Item 1 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <a href="https://antipodean-antinuclearism.org">Antipodean Antinuclearism: (Re)constructing Richard Routley/Sylvan's Nuclear Philosophy</a> Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource <span>This item was identified for digitisation at the request of The University of Queensland's 2020 Fryer Library Fellow, </span><a href="https://najtaylor.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr. N.A.J. Taylor</a><span>.</span> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource For all enquiries about this work, please contact the Fryer Library, The University of Queensland Library. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource [27] leaves. 201.77 KB. Type The nature or genre of the resource Manuscript Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context <a href="https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:3c66dd9">https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:3c66dd9</a> Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant n/a - not listed in manuscript finding aid Box 77: Untitled and Unlisted Boxes