Abstract

Historically there are many conceptualizations of «war» and «peace». Taking a closer look, we can nevertheless specify these concepts rather clearly: war is defined as violent conflict resolution between states or as a condition of violence or continuing uncertainty. Peace requires at least the absence of war. As long as we do not consider it the contradictory antonym to war, it seems plausible to specify it by the feature of the absence of enmity or – even better – as an order of non-violent conflict resolution. To speak of a “war on terrorism“ negates the modern restriction of possible agents in war, i. e. that only states can be war parties, and it bears the risk of an erosion of humanity in war as well as of the distinction between martial and criminal law. It seems better justified to deal with transnational terrorism within terms of peace, in which violent acts are legally prosecuted in an order of alternative conflict resolution. Keywords: war, peace, terrorism, transnationality, public international law, law in armed conflicts, sovereignty, Grotius, Hobbes, Rousseau.