Citizenship, Epistemology, and the Just War Theory

In this paper, I will argue that ordinary citizens of democracies should be strongly committed to pacifism in practice. The argument is based on the principles of the just war tradition and a political analysis of the division of labor in society. The idea that pacifist conclusions can be drawn from just war thinking has come under fire lately from just war theorists who reject the idea that the very principles of the just war tradition could lead to pacifism. The just war tradition is committed to the idea of producing justice through a moral use of appropriately limited violent means. I have no doubt that occasionally some violence is necessary in the real world. The problem I focus on here is whether ordinary citizens are able to judge whether military force is justifiable. I argue that most of us are not in a position to make this judgment. From this I conclude that we should err on the side of peace.

This conclusion may sound like the naïve view of a cloistered college professor, who does not understand the complexities of military power. Such an ad hominem objection to the idea of "just war pacifism" has been made recently by Keith Pavlischek—a Gulf War veteran and a colonel in the Marine Reserves. Pavlischek argues that the just war tradition focuses on providing a normative ground for statecraft, providing guidance for military leaders, and offering guidance for individuals as they decide whether to support the use of force. He concludes that judgment about the justice of war "rests with those who have the competence to render such judgments. Put bluntly, the judgment resides with those who know what they are talking about. In almost every instance, that does not include bishops, theologians, and professors."¹ Pavlischek is undoubtedly right about the fact that it is ultimately up to our military and civilian leaders to decide whether a given war is just because they have access to the necessary information and expertise to make the judgment. However, this still leaves the rest of us with the problem of deciding whether to support the judgments made by our leaders. Pavlischek recognizes this: "For most Americans . . . the just war tradition illuminates the responsibilities of citizens in a self-governing democracy under God."² However, he does not recognize the complexity of this claim. The division of labor in society includes a division of responsibility for judgment. Moreover, democratic institutions allow—indeed, demand—debate and disagreement among and between the parts of society. The responsibility of a citizen in a self-governing democracy is not simply to acquiesce in light of the expertise of our leaders. Rather, our duty is to question and demand proof, especially in light of actions that have momentous moral implications, such as the question of whether to support the use of military force.

The pacifistic interpretation of just war theory has been the subject of an ongoing dispute among thinkers—both Catholic and secular—who question whether modern warfare can be just.³ The pacifist conclusion is that according to the principles of just war theory, modern warfare is immoral because the means employed inevitably involve indiscriminate killing of innocents. Although this view began to develop as a reaction to the mechanized killing of World War I, it has gained adherents in the last few decades amid concern for nuclear war, the means of which include deliberate targeting of population centers. While the debate about nuclear war is not entirely irrelevant today, recent uses of military force by the United States—in Kuwait, Kosovo, Afghanistan, and Iraq—occur in a different context. These conflicts used conventional means in the name of humanitarian intervention as a response to aggression or as part of preventive or preemptive war. Despite the use of conventional means in these conflicts, they have been criticized both in terms of...