The just war tradition is an evolving body of tenets for determining when resorting to war is just and how war may be justly executed. Rethinking the Just War Tradition provides a timely exploration in light of new security threats that have emerged since the end of the Cold War, including ongoing conflicts in the Middle East, threats of terror attacks, and genocidal conflicts within states. The contributors are philosophers, political scientists, a U.S. Army officer, and a senior analyst at (...) the Center for Defense Information. They scrutinize some familiar themes in just war theory from fresh and original angles, and also explore altogether new territory. The diverse topics considered include war and the environment, justice in the ending of war, U.S. military hegemony, a general theory of just armed-conflict principles, supreme emergencies, the distinction between combatants and noncombatants, child soldiers, the moral equality of all soldiers, targeted assassination, preventive war, right authority, and armed humanitarian intervention. Clearly written and free of jargon, this book illustrates how the just war tradition can be rethought and applied today. Contributors include Mark Woods, Eric Patterson, Harry van der Linden, John Lango, Frederik Kaufman, Pauline Kaurin, Reuben Brigety II, Rachel Stohl, Michael Brough, Whitley Kaufman, Jordy Rocheleau, Hartley Spatt, and Robert Hoag. (shrink)

In studying the history of the ethics of war, the just war tradition may be interpreted as a historically evolving body of tenets about just war principles. Instead of a single just war theory, there have been many just war theories—for example, those of Augustine, Aquinas, Vitoria, and Grotius—theories that have various commonalities and differences. A comprehensive history of the evolving just war tradition should feature a thorough study of how these just war theories were rethought. For example, in his (...) landmark work Just and Unjust Wars, written during the Cold War, Michael Walzer exclaimed: “Nuclear weapons explode the theory of just war.” 1 In his rethinking of the just war tradition in light of the superpower practice of nuclear deterrence, he contributed his influential conception of supreme emergency exceptions. Now that the Cold War is over, the authors of the articles in this book are primarily concerned with the question of how the just war tradition—which is understood somewhat differently by the different authors—should be rethought today. Echoing Walzer’s exclamation, among the particular post–Cold War questions that can be raised are these: Is just war theory exploded by terrorism? Is it annihilated by genocide? In their various rethinkings of the just war tradition, our authors state their own particular post–Cold War questions, and answer them from their diverse viewpoints... (shrink)