Arguing About War
and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle .
Learn more
| ||||||||||||||||||||
 Trade In this Item for up to £0.80
Get an extra £5 when you trade in books worth £10 or more until June 30, 2012. Trade in Arguing About War (Yale Nota Bene) for an Amazon.co.uk gift card of up to £0.80, which you can then spend on millions of items across the site. Trade-in values may vary (terms apply). Find more products eligible for trade-in.
|
Frequently Bought Together
Product details
|
More About the Author
Product Description
Review
"This book of essays has an outstanding pedigree. Michael Walzer is one of the US's foremost political theorists and social commentators... penetrating and powerful" Ben Rogers, Financial Times "Walzer has moved the concerns over just war from the periphery of political theory to the very center of our democratic dilemma." Garry Wills, New York Review of Books "Accessible and elegantly written... essential reading for scholars and practitioners." Choice "If there is such a thing as the American conscience, one of its most important custodians is Michael Walzer... A must read." Peter S. Temes, San Francisco Chronicle"
Product Description
Michael Walzer is one of the world's most eminent philosophers on the subject of war and ethics. Now, for the first time since his classic "Just and Unjust Wars" was published almost three decades ago, this volume brings together his most provocative arguments about contemporary military conflicts and the ethical issues they raise.The essays in the book are divided into three sections. The first deals with issues such as humanitarian intervention, emergency ethics, and terrorism. The second consists of Walzer's responses to particular wars, including the first Gulf War, Kosovo, Afghanistan, and Iraq. And the third presents an essay in which Walzer imagines a future in which war might play a less significant part in our lives. In his introduction, Walzer reveals how his thinking has changed over time.Written during a period of intense debate over the proper use of armed force, this book gets to the heart of difficult problems and argues persuasively for a moral perspective on war.
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
Browse and search another edition of this book.
Browse and search another edition of this book.
Suggested Tags from Similar Products(What's this?)Be the first one to add a relevant tag (keyword that's strongly related to this product)
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
There are no customer reviews yet on Amazon.co.uk.
5 star
4 star
3 star
2 star
1 star
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
4 reviews
25 of 26 people found the following review helpful
Thoughtful
17 Dec 2004
Format:Hardcover
This is a collection of essays and articles focused on the theme of when war is acceptable. In several ways, this book is a followup to Walzer's well known book, Just and Unjust Wars, which explored the same theme. As a collection of previously published pieces, this collection lacks the integrity of a monograph but it is better than most such collections because of the strong theme. It also has the advantage of being quite topical with some essays related to the ongoing war in Iraq. Walzer is critical and consistent thinker. He is opposed to pacifism but has clear and well considered standards for when war making is acceptable. He is generally in favor of well considered interventions to prevent genocide and to abolish odious regimes. He also treats some interesting topics and related topics such as the limits of the standards he develops and the concrete responsibilities of military personnel.
Much of this book is reprinted articles on events like the Bosnian war, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and the war in Iraq. Walzer does a good job of applying his theoretical constructs in a rigorous and fair way. He is critical, for example, of the Bush administration's preventive war in Iraq but has no patience with any efforts to justify terrorist activities. He is quite critical as well of European and Russian, as well as the Clinton administration's, policies towards Iraq.
Comparing Walzer's analysis of moral choices in policies towards Iraq with the statements of Bush administration spokesmen and apologists is interesting. Many of the same arguments appear, only Walzer applies them in a rigorous and consistent manner, often leading to very different conclusions. Walzer exhibits the moral clarity that the Bush administration would like to believe it possesses.
Walzer also makes the very good point that in a truly just war, moral intentions and behavior in the aftermath of a war are just as important as the decision to enter war and the conduct of war. Neglect of the aftermath is a weakness of traditional just war theory derived from the Catholic tradition. If you don't do a competent and principled job of occupation and reconstruction, your war is not moral. In contemporary Iraq, we're witnessing a counter-example of competent and principled occupation that serves as a vivid demonstration of Walzer's argument.
Much of this book is reprinted articles on events like the Bosnian war, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and the war in Iraq. Walzer does a good job of applying his theoretical constructs in a rigorous and fair way. He is critical, for example, of the Bush administration's preventive war in Iraq but has no patience with any efforts to justify terrorist activities. He is quite critical as well of European and Russian, as well as the Clinton administration's, policies towards Iraq.
Comparing Walzer's analysis of moral choices in policies towards Iraq with the statements of Bush administration spokesmen and apologists is interesting. Many of the same arguments appear, only Walzer applies them in a rigorous and consistent manner, often leading to very different conclusions. Walzer exhibits the moral clarity that the Bush administration would like to believe it possesses.
Walzer also makes the very good point that in a truly just war, moral intentions and behavior in the aftermath of a war are just as important as the decision to enter war and the conduct of war. Neglect of the aftermath is a weakness of traditional just war theory derived from the Catholic tradition. If you don't do a competent and principled job of occupation and reconstruction, your war is not moral. In contemporary Iraq, we're witnessing a counter-example of competent and principled occupation that serves as a vivid demonstration of Walzer's argument.
14 of 18 people found the following review helpful
THE BEST THE LEFT HAS
19 Nov 2005
Format:Hardcover
A funny thing happened to Michael Walzer on his way to opposing the Vietnam War. Recognizing the hollowness of the arguments being made by the post-modern Left he sought serious moral ground and found it in traditional Just War Theory. But morality is a tricky thing, for just when we think it's conveyed a cloak for the selfish actions we wish to take, or not take as the case may be, we discover that it has simultaneously imposed certain responsibilities upon us, often unwanted ones, always selfless ones. Thus, while Mr. Walzer grabbed onto Just War Theory as a way to oppose a given war, he discovered that: "[J]ust war theory, even when it demands a strong critique of particular acts of war, is the doctrine of people who expect to use power and exercise force." The theory, obviously, assumes that war can be just. Indeed, Mr. Walzer has developed the notion that war is justified in instances of "supreme emergency," occasions where "our deepest values and our collective survival are in imminent danger." Moreover, while recognizes the importance of self-determination as a principle for relations among nations, he adds a liberal democratic component to the standard. Accepting the biblical injunction "Do not stand idly by the blood of they neighbor" he accepts the justness of humanitarian intervention in cases where a nation's people are "victims of tyranny, ideological zeal, [and/or] ethnic hatred" and who "urgently need help from outside."
Though Mr. Walzer remains very much a man of the Left in general, this recognition that humanitarian intervention may be morally justified/obligated against regimes that do not meet standards of liberal democratic legitimacy has put him so much at odds with the rest of the Left that they accuse him of being a crypto-conservative and he has been forced to ask whether there can even be a Decent Left, a question which he largely answers in the negative. The essays in this book are drawn from the past twenty-five years, with an emphasis on our recent interventions in Iraq (twice), Kosovo, Afghanistan, Haiti, etc. and our tragic non-intervention in Rwanda. Because he straddles the line between Left and Right he's unlikely to satisfy anyone completely. But you can't help but admire the utter gravity with which he reckons with every issue and, even where you disagree, the depth of his arguments forces you to reckon with them yourself. The Decent Left may be a deuced small collection of folk, but counting Mr. Walzer among their number is no small boast.
Though Mr. Walzer remains very much a man of the Left in general, this recognition that humanitarian intervention may be morally justified/obligated against regimes that do not meet standards of liberal democratic legitimacy has put him so much at odds with the rest of the Left that they accuse him of being a crypto-conservative and he has been forced to ask whether there can even be a Decent Left, a question which he largely answers in the negative. The essays in this book are drawn from the past twenty-five years, with an emphasis on our recent interventions in Iraq (twice), Kosovo, Afghanistan, Haiti, etc. and our tragic non-intervention in Rwanda. Because he straddles the line between Left and Right he's unlikely to satisfy anyone completely. But you can't help but admire the utter gravity with which he reckons with every issue and, even where you disagree, the depth of his arguments forces you to reckon with them yourself. The Decent Left may be a deuced small collection of folk, but counting Mr. Walzer among their number is no small boast.
1 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Walzer on War
8 Nov 2010
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
An interesting elaboration on the author's original argument in Just and Unjust Wars. The strengths and defects of his argument become more apparent. Can't help but get the sense that it is a peculiarly American view of the world and is rather (unfairly) dismissive of anti-war positions. The focus on WWII as the exemplar of a just war seems to me somewhat out-dated and a too easy position. It would be interesting, given Walzer thinks the American involvment in Vietnam was unjust, to consider the Vietnamese side of that war as an example of a just war.
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
|
|
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
