Department/School
Philosophy
Date
2005
Document Type
Article
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.0031-8094.2005.00415.x
Abstract
Recently a number of liberal political theorists, including Rawls and Walzer, have argued for a ‘supreme emergency exemption’ from the traditional just war principle of discrimination which absolutely prohibits direct attacks against innocent civilians, claiming that a political community threatened with destruction may deliberately target innocents in order to save itself. I argue that this ‘supreme emergency exemption’ implies that individuals too may kill innocents in supreme emergencies. This is a significant theoretical cost. While it will not constitute a decisive refutation of all arguments for a supreme emergency exemption, my hope is that many will see this cost of endorsing the exemption as unacceptable.
Volume
55
Issue
221
Published in
The Philosophical Quarterly
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Citation/Other Information
Toner, Christopher H. "Just War and the Supreme Emergency Exemption." The Philosophical Quarterly 55, no. 221 (2005): 545-61. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.0031-8094.2005.00415.x