As part of the recent special report on the Festival – featured in 30 July 2010 edition of “The Scotsman”, the Festival’s Media Partner – Andrew Collier considered the ethics surrounding peace and armed conflict, which will also be considered in the Festival’s “Is Peace Worth Fighting For?” event, on Wednesday 19 August. In setting the scene for the event, we provide a further opportunity to view Andrew Collier’s insightful article.
It was the war to end all wars. Only, of course, it wasn’t. Little more that 20 years after millions perished in the mud of Flanders and the Somme, Europe was torn apart again. Most of us believe that, in the wake of two worldwide conflicts within a generation, the first real efforts to promote and develop a powerful global peace movement came in the post-war years.
In fact, it gained ground long before this, in the latter years of the 19th century. By the time the guns opened up at Verdun and Passchendaele, the concept of global peace being regulated by supra-national institutions was a relatively well developed one. Thinkers and philanthropists were already supporting a pacifist approach to international affairs, and the concept of “just” war goes back to at least St Thomas Aquinas in the 13th century. To this day, politicians struggle with both pragmatism and ethics in international affairs, and they are forced to do so in a stark way when it comes to armed conflicts.
The principles of war, peace and security will be debated in a Festival of Politics event on 18 August, which will feature former Scottish Secretary and UK Defence Secretary, Sir Malcolm Rifkind, and Joel Rosenthal, president of the New York-based Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs.
Rosenthal says we have to face the uncomfortable truth that civilised nations went into the 20th century with their eyes wide open about the horrors of armed conflict and with some pragmatic ideas about how to address it, but still managed to invoke greater slaughter than at any other time in history. What went wrong?
“I think that there was a fundamental misunderstanding of power, and the thought that, by setting up international institutions you could escape the results of power, was misconceived.” says Rosenthal.
The League of Nations is remembered today chiefly for its failure in the face of the Nazis. The United Nations has fared rather better though it, too, has its flaws. In the 20th century, “just” war, rather like beauty, was in the eye of the beholder – both the First World War and the atomic bombs at Hiroshima and Nagasaki broke its rules.
Rosenthal suggests that the ethics of war are now based on a more general principle. “Force is perhaps not something to be totally avoided, but it should be thought of as a lesser evil, with the emphasis on rules and restraint, and with its use being judicious.”
He says that it troubles him when people who want to avoid conflict put their faith in distant, unaccountable international institutions. “I think one of the big challenges we have is in trying to identify genuinely common interests, though we are starting to do so.
“Addressing climate change, for instance, is an area where we can co-operate globally – it also has the advantage of being relatively uncontroversial. Dealing with terrorism and handling the flow of people, goods and information are others. We need to seek out win-win propositions leading to interest-driven solutions.”
“Is Peace Worth Fighting For?” will take place in at 16:00 on Wednesday 19 August, in the Parliament’s Main Chamber. The even is produced in association with the Carnegie UK Trust.
