Walzer — The Theory of Aggression: Study Notes

Walzer: The Theory of Aggression — Study Notes (Based on provided transcript)

The Theory of Aggression (Law and Order in International Society)

• Aggression defined as the crime of war; the peace it interrupts is peace-with-rights (liberty and security that exist only in the absence of aggression).

  • The wrong of the aggressor is to force people to risk their lives for their rights; it presents them with the choice: your rights or your lives.

  • Groups respond differently (surrender or fight) depending on moral/material state of their state and army.

  • Aggression is morally and practically COERCIVE; it justifies forceful resistance, and force cannot be used between nations without risking life.

• Aggression is a singular crime states can commit against other states; others are misdemeanors in comparison.

  • Domestic analogies are imperfect: in international law, acts like territorial seizure are all treated under one term (aggression) because they all threaten rights worth dying for.

• The rights at stake are territorial integrity and political sovereignty; these derive from the rights of individuals and the social contract; they protect the shared life of a political community.

• The boundary question: ownership rights and territorial integrity may diverge; moral rights to defend territory come from the common life, not simple property titles.

• The Case of Alsace-Lorraine as an example:

  • Competing claims by France and Germany after 1870; the inhabitants’ loyalty and the right of the land to follow the people.

  • Sidgwick’s perspective (1891): temporary suspension of hostilities may, over time, acquire a moral basis as inhabitants’ sentiments change; moral rights can be obliterated by changes in common life.

  • Territorial integrity is not simply derived from property; national life and common life matter. Nationalization (e.g., socialist states) changes the frame, but territorial integrity remains a function of national existence, not mere ownership.

  • The phrase “the land follows the people” underscores that sovereignty rests on the political community and its sense of collective life.

• Boundaries are often arbitrary and historical; borders matter because crossing them destroys safety. Yet adjustments can be made when feasible; but invasion should be resisted to protect the space where people are secure.

• The Legalist Paradigm (Domestic Analogy) – the international society is like a faulty building founded on rights; its superstructure is built through conflict and cooperation but lacks robust police power.

  • There are no police to enforce aggression; citizens (states) must rely on one another to uphold rights and prevent collapse.

  • Two key presumptions arising from this paradigm:

  • A presumption in favor of military resistance once aggression has begun to defend rights and deter future aggressors.

  • When fighting breaks out, there must be some state to enforce the law (no war can be just on both sides).

• There are wars that are just on neither side (e.g., both sides aggressing, or both seeking domination with no legitimate right to the land).

• The domestic analogy leads to the six propositions that form the core of the theory of aggression (the legalist paradigm).

The Six Propositions of the Legalist Paradigm

1) There exists an international society of independent states; states are the members, not private individuals. In absence of a universal state, people rely on their own governments. Non-intervention is a guiding principle. Private rights exist in international life but cannot be enforced without challenging core values of survival and independence.
2) This international society has a law that establishes the rights of its members above all: territorial integrity and political sovereignty. These rights ultimately rest on the right of individuals to build and risk their shared life; sovereignty is a reflection of that collective life.

• Rights of private persons can be recognized (e.g., UN Charter of Human Rights) but enforcement remains within the context of state-to-state relations; the sanctity of the common life within a state is paramount.
  3) Any use of force or imminent threat by one state against another’s political sovereignty or territorial integrity constitutes aggression and is a criminal act. It focuses on actual or imminent boundary-crossing; resistance must be obvious and urgent to justify force.
  4) Aggression justifies two kinds of violent response: (a) a war of self-defense by the victim, and (b) a war of law enforcement by the victim and any other member of international society. Bystanders have obligations to participate; neutrality is undermined; Korea example: UN authorization turned on law-enforcement logic, though decisions are still unilateral in practice.
  5) Nothing but aggression can justify war. The central maxim: there must be an actual wrong received and actual wronging; war cannot be justified by religion, ideology, or other non-retributive reasons. Non-intervention remains a controlling principle.
  6) After the aggressor is militarily repulsed, punishment is possible; purposes include retribution, deterrence, deterrence, and restraint. Punishment can be applied to the aggressor to prevent future aggression and to moralize behavior.

  • The above six propositions shape the judgments we make when wars break out; they are a coherent, economical theory that dominated moral thinking for a long time.

  • The dominance of this paradigm is tied to historical views where wars were considered the prerogative of states; public opinion often linked war to moral significance and to civil-law-like judgments about aggression.

  • Interventions and exceptions emerge as revisions to the legalist paradigm (millian idea of self-determination and the right to nonintervention) which drawn a line between legitimate self-defense and other forms of intervention.

Interventions: Revisions to the Legalist Paradigm

• The nonintervention principle is strong but not absolute; there are three revisions where intervention can be morally justified:

  • (1) Secession/national liberation cases: when boundaries enclose more than one community engaged in a large-scale independence struggle.

  • (2) Counter-intervention in civil wars: when a foreign power has crossed borders to support one side; the intervening side must consider if they are preventing a larger collapse or merely propping up a faction.

  • (3) Humanitarian interventions (massacres and enslavement): when human rights violations are grave enough that it justifies external action, potentially crossing borders, though the moral calculus is sensitive to risks to third parties and to the local autonomy of the community under threat.

• Mill’s Argument on Self-Determination and Self-Help

  • John Stuart Mill (On Liberty, 1859) framed states as self-determining communities; internal political arrangements may be free or not, but self-determination remains the guiding standard.

  • A state is self-determining even if its citizens struggle and fail to establish free institutions; however, it loses self-determination if an intrusive neighbor imposes institutions.

  • Virtue and liberty are developed within the community; external intervention cannot replace internal struggle. The idea mirrors the Marxist maxim: “The liberation of the working class can come only through the workers themselves.”

  • The possibility of intervention is legitimate only if it serves communal autonomy; a prolonged or covert foreign intervention that serves external power risks undermining independence.

• The problem with Mill’s view: prudence vs justice. While Mill wanted to maximize liberty, he did not claim there is a simple, universally calculable path to safety; world order concerns and risks to third parties complicate the pure self-determination logic.

• The three revisions in practice require a high burden of justification for intervention; interveners must demonstrate that their case is radically different from the usual, where interference is used for purposes other than upholding autonomy.

• The general position: nonintervention remains the baseline, but a nonabsolute boundary exists where intervention might be morally warranted to protect communal autonomy or to rescue those facing massacre.

Secession: The Hungarian Case and Beyond

• Hungary’s 1848-1849 revolution (against Austrian rule) illustrates secession and the creation of belligerent rights for a community fighting for independence.

• Mill’s view: Britain “should have” intervened to defend Hungarian independence at a time when it seemed feasible to assist self-determination (though political calculations about Europe’s balance of power mattered).

• Palmerston held a cautious stance; a direct intervention risked broader European destabilization. Schwarzenberg’s warning about Ireland emphasizes reciprocity among great powers and prudence.

• The central point: secession is more justifiable when there is a genuine political community seeking independence and when external intervention would not destabilize the broader order. The test is whether a community actually exists and can sustain itself on the battlefield and in diplomacy.

• Subcases to consider: secession severs from a larger empire; counter-intervention if a foreign power intervenes to block independence; and the status of minorities within disputed territories. The logic is that the land follows the people; the legitimacy depends on the community’s capacity to self-govern.

• The text notes a caution: some secessionist movements lack a clear, representative base or a continuous, arduous struggle; intervention in such cases must be carefully justified to avoid justifying external meddling for ulterior motives (e.g., imperial power dynamics, resource control).

• The Katangan scenario (1960s) is cited as a cautionary example of movings that require careful judgment about the motives and the realistic capacity of a secessionist movement to sustain independence.

Civil War and Intervention Dilemmas

• Civil wars complicate the nonintervention principle: when insurgents gain substantial territory and belligerent rights, neutrality becomes problematic for outsiders.

• Montague Bernard’s view (Oxford lecture) emphasizes that intervention in civil strife should not simply tilt the balance but preserve the autonomy of the people and the unity of the state’s community.

• The question of whether to intervene in civil wars is a delicate balance between supporting self-determination and preventing external powers from subverting internal processes.

The American War in Vietnam — A Case Study in Counter-Intervention

• The standard, legally conservative view portrayed by some as a North Vietnamese invasion was not convincing; Walzer argues for a more nuanced reading of Vietnam, recognizing a civil war with external influences.

  • The Geneva Accords (1954) created a temporary frontier and governments on both sides pending elections in 1956; South Vietnam’s refusal to allow these elections questioned its legitimacy.

  • Legitimacy is tied to the standing of a government with its own people; elections in a one-party or non-democratic setting may not reflect popular will.

  • The U.S. involvement is criticized as an intervention that propped up a government dependent on foreign support and lacking internal legitimacy; the claim that the U.S. acted to fulfill commitments to another state is seen as overstated or misguided.

  • The insurgent strength in the countryside and the North’s support meant that the U.S. intervention was not a straightforward counter-intervention balancing a prior intervention, but a drawing-out of a civil war for strategic interests.

  • The key moral issue: counter-intervention is morally possible only when a government or movement has passed the self-help test; otherwise, external forces cannot legitimize internal struggles by foreign support.

  • The Vietnam case also questions the narrow legalist reading of intervention and stresses the need to weigh the human consequences of third-party involvement and the risk to local autonomy.

• The Vietnam narrative shows that external support should balance rather than overwhelm local forces; Kennedy’s famous line – “it is their war; they have to win it” – is cited to show a belief in local ownership of the conflict, though the subsequent escalation undercut that ideal.

Humanitarian Intervention (Moral Rescue vs. Political Pragmatism)

• Humanitarian intervention is framed as a response to acts that shock the moral conscience of mankind (massacres, enslavement, genocide).

  • Walzer argues humanitarian intervention is morally justifiable when it seeks to rescue people from mass slaughter or enslavement, but it involves hard moral calculations about mixed motives and the potential to override local autonomy.

  • The intervention should balance the prior intervention and avoid turning humanitarian aims into a pretext for coercive domination; unilateral intervention has risks of coercion and domination under the banner of humanitarianism.

• The Cuba example (1898) and the Bangladesh example (1971) are discussed to illustrate differences between humanitarian intervention and benevolent imperialism, and to show how mixed motives and strategic interests shape outcomes.

  • Cuba (1898-1902): U.S. intervention supported Cuban insurgents but also served interests in sugar, the canal, and strategic presence; reconcentrados were able to return home; the policy was not purely humanitarian, nor was it strictly benevolent.

  • The main point: humanitarian intervention is rarely a pure act of altruism; mixed motives and strategic calculations are common, raising questions about its legitimacy and ultimate goals.

  • In the Indian intervention in East Pakistan (Bangladesh) in 1971, Walzer treats it as humanitarian because it saved lives by stopping a massacre; it was also a rescue operation with strategic consequences for India and the region.

• The Bangladesh example illustrates how humanitarian intervention can be narrowly defined (rescue operations) and still be legitimate if it has a clear, limited purpose, respects local aims of the community, and does not attempt to impose a foreign political order.

• The Cuban example highlights how humanitarianism can coexist with expansionist aims; the moral verdict hinges on whether intervention serves the oppressed community’s purposes and whether it respects their autonomy.

• Walzer concludes that humanitarian intervention belongs in the realm of moral choice rather than strict international law; it should be judged by its alignment with the rights and autonomy of the local population, the likelihood of success, and the minimization of coercive power over others.

Concrete Historical Examples Discussed

• The Case of Alsace-Lorraine (1870s-1910s): illustrates how the “land follows the people” and how moral rights of self-determination can override simple ownership claims.

• The Hungarian Revolution (1848-1849): Mill’s stance on intervention to support secessionist movements; debates about British action versus balance of power; the potential for a genuine, self-determining community to resist outside domination.

• The Cuban War (1898-1902): reconcentración policy by Spain and U.S. intervention; humanitarian rhetoric vs. imperial motives; the Platt Amendment and limited independence.

• Bangladesh Liberation War (1971): Indian intervention against Pakistan; framed as humanitarian rescue; the intervention was brief and positioned as assisting a population in distress rather than reordering sovereignty.

War’s Ends and the Importance of Winning

• Walzer closes the excerpt with a reflection on Randall Jarrell’s poem about the grim moral texture of war: war brings losses, costs, and the sense of “wasted” lives; yet Allied victory and the defeat of Nazism are still perceived as morally meaningful by many survivors.

• The final point is to acknowledge that war’s outcomes depend on human perception, moral judgments, and the capacity to translate wartime acts into lasting moral and political order.

• Key takeaways to remember for exam:

  • Aggression is the crime that interrupts peace with rights; it justifies resistance and law enforcement by the international community.

  • Territorial integrity and political sovereignty are the core rights of states, rooted in individual rights and the social contract.

  • The domestic analogy (legalist paradigm) is a baseline model but has revisionary potential when considering self-determination, counter-intervention, and humanitarian intervention.

  • Mill’s self-determination framework emphasizes nonintervention, the need for self-help, and caution about foreign interference; prudence vs. justice can pull in opposite directions.

  • Secession, counter-intervention, and humanitarian intervention illustrate the spectrum of legitimate or permissible interventions, each with stringent criteria and moral caveats.

  • Real-world cases (Hungary, Vietnam, Cuba, Bangladesh) demonstrate the complexity of applying the theory to historical events and highlight the tension between moral aims and geopolitical interests.

*(If you’d like, I can reorganize these notes into a printable outline or create a condensed Red-Flag/Green-Flag quick-study sheet for exam prep.)