Note: This is a paper I delivered (in abbreviated
form) at the Society for Social Studies of Science conference in Denver on
November 12. I post it today in honor of the international conference on climate change, convening tomorrow in Paris.
Good afternoon. Let me start by making clear that this paper
is a work in progress. It is also a thought experiment. My purpose is to
demonstrate that the classic principles of just war theory may well justify –
possibly sooner rather than later – the use of some form of aggressive action
to combat climate change.
As anyone who pays attention to these matters knows,
world leaders will convene in Paris later this month for the 21st Session of
the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on
Climate Change. The fact that this is the 21st such session tells
you something. The “Conference of the Parties,’ is the “supreme decision-making
body” of UN’s Framework Convention on Climate Change. It has met annually for
20 years; Paris will be year 21. I doubt if you’d find many climate scientists
who would tell you those meetings have produced results that significantly
reduce the damage greenhouse gases have inflicted and continue to inflict on
the environment. It’s true there appears to be an increased sense of urgency
and resolve regarding the threat of climate change, and the build-up to the
Paris convocation suggests that this time will be different. We’ll see. A
realistic appraisal of what we’re up against leaves room for doubt.
In
my book, Not So Fast: Thinking Twice About Technology, forthcoming from
University of Georgia Press, I write about a condition I call “de facto
technological autonomy.” It refers to the totality of our commitments to a
technological way of life. To effectively reverse the damage we’ve inflicted on
the planet would require, in the developed countries especially, a fundamental
re-ordering of that way of life. It’s hard to imagine how that would happen quickly enough to avoid the ecological “tipping point” that scientists tell us
we’re fast approaching, when we move from climate change to climate
collapse.
Climate change has already been linked to various episodes
of social and economic disruption. A recent study published in
Proceedings
of the National Academy of Sciences, for example, argues that drought
provoked the initial unrest that led to the catastrophic civil war in Syria.[1] When
access to food, shelter and security are compromised, people and nations can be
counted on to fight for what they need. As the effects of global warming
continue to multiply the resulting social disruptions can be expected to
multiply as well. As the Obama Administration put it earlier this year,
“Climate change is an urgent and growing threat to our national security,
contributing to increased natural disasters, refugee flows, and conflicts over
basic resources like food and water.”[2]
It’s conceivable, therefore, that at some point in the not-too-distant
future, coercive measures would become feasible as a means of eliminating the
sources of greenhouse gases poisoning the atmosphere. That is the hypothetical
jumping off point for this paper.
One other thing I should make
clear at the outset is that traditional just war theory does not contemplate
the sorts of conditions presented to the international community by global
warming. Traditional just war theory examines conflicts between nation states,
whereas climate change is a truly global phenomenon, affecting an unprecedented
breadth of nations and peoples. Traditional just war theory also focuses almost
exclusively on what we traditionally think of as war – that is, military
actions in which physical weapons are wielded in an intentional effort to take
over the territory and destroy the property and the lives of enemy forces.
Climate change is different. The damage it causes is real, but it is a side
effect of other activities, rather than an intentional act. Climate change crosses
borders not with tanks and troops, but by poisoning the atmosphere, and it
kills not with bombs and bullets but by undermining the natural processes
necessary to sustain life. It is also true that, although national policies permit the activities that lead to global warming, the primary instigators of
climate change are for the most part not nation states, per se, but the businesses that
manufacture and sell products responsible for producing greenhouse gases and
the consumers who use those products. Most if not all us in this room, then,
are implicated in the promulgation of climate change, which points to another reason
why global warming doesn’t fit neatly into the traditional parameters of just
war theory. It’s not easy to define who the enemy is, or where the line should
be drawn between combatants and non-combatants.
Despite these differences, I
think the sorts of practices that contribute most egregiously to global warming
– now that we recognize the threats they pose – can be considered a form of aggression,
and thus I think the principles of just war theory can usefully address them.
Traditional just war theory lists six requirements for the
justified initiation of aggressive action. All six must be met. They
are:
- Just cause
- Competent authority
- Right Intention
- Proportionality
- Last resort
- Probability of success
I am going to focus my remarks today on the requirements of
just cause and competent authority. I will stipulate for the present discussion
the requirement of right intention. By “right intention,” just war theory means
that an attack is launched for a justifiable purpose and not as an excuse to
achieve some other, non-justifiable purpose, such as gaining territorial or
economic advantage. The intention I contemplate here is aimed solely at
reducing the threat of global warming. I will also stipulate that such actions
will be undertaken only when conditions are extreme enough to satisfy the
requirement of last resort. As mentioned, the environmental degradation we're witnessing today suggests we are fast approaching that point, if we haven't already passed it.
So, what are the conditions that fulfill, according to
traditional just war theory, the requirement of just cause for aggressive
action? The most basic of these is self defense. Probably the best known
contemporary just war theorist is Michael Walzer, author of Just and Unjust
Wars, who argues that self defense is “our baseline, our model, the
fundamental structure for the moral comprehension of war.”[3]
The logic of self defense derives from what is known as “the
domestic analogy,” which suggests that nations are entitled to defend
themselves from an act of aggression just as an average citizen is entitled to
defend herself from an intruder who breaks into her home. When a nation is
presented with a situation of “forced choice,” it has the right to aggressively
resist the imposed aggression in order to restore the nation or the home to a
state of security. Immediate action is justified by situations that Walzer calls “supreme emergency,” in which the threat is both imminent and
serious. It’s possible, if a state fails to defend itself promptly in response
to an aggressive attack, that it may become too weakened by that attack to be
able to respond effectively. This is why self defense is the one act of war
that the United Nations Charter specifically says can be undertaken without
Security Council approval.[4]
 |
| Vitoria de Francisco |
One of the earliest just war theorists, Vitoria de
Francisco, said, “There is a single and only just cause for commencing a war,
namely, a wrong received.” International bodies are increasingly
acknowledging that disruption of the climate can be considered a wrong
received. An influential report by the International Commission on
Intervention and State Sovereignty, for example, stated that the debate over
what constitutes a justifiable intervention has shifted “from territorial
security, and security through armaments, to security through human development
with access to food and employment, and to environmental security.”[5]
Another
way of describing the fundamental purpose of a just war is to establish “a
better state of peace.” As noted, climate change is already a source of social
disruption and will increasingly be one in the future. To remove the
causes of climate change therefore will reduce the likelihood of disorder and
conflict. To fail to remove them will eventually lead to a state of extreme, if
not supreme, emergency – again, if we haven’t reached that point already. Thus
aggressive action to address climate change can be construed as a justifiable
act aimed at establishing “a better state of peace.”[6]
I pointed out above that, unlike traditional acts of war,
the damage inflicted by climate change is not necessarily an intentional act,
but a byproduct of non-aggressive activities. However, intention matters less
when it comes to self defense than the reality and severity of the threat. As
John Locke pointed out, the man who breaks into your house may intend only to
rob, not hurt, you, but you can’t assume that’s the case, and therefore you’re
entitled to respond to the fullest degree possible while you have the chance.
The ethicist Philip Montague adds that among several “non-standard”
justifications of self defense are those in which a deadly threat is posed “by
someone’s negligence or recklessness.” Another ethicist, David Rodin, argues
that the principle of reciprocity likewise sanctions a justifiable response to
life-threatening harm. Each of us has an obligation not to kill another person,
Rodin says, as long as that person observes the same obligation toward us.
When that reciprocal relationship is ruptured by an aggressive act, the
aggressor loses the right not to be killed in self defense by his victim.[7]
As I also mentioned above, the harms caused by global warming are not as direct or
dramatic as those caused by guns or bombs, but ultimately many people are going
to end up just as homeless, and just as dead. Thus all these justifications for
a self-defensive response to aggressive threats can be applied to the threat of
climate change.
This brings me to the second fundamental justification for
the initiation of aggressive action: the preservation of basic human rights.
Henry Shue, who with Michael Walzer is probably the best known expert on just
war theory, defines a basic human right as a right that must be satisfied
before any other right can be enjoyed. As Shue puts it, “No one can fully, if
at all, enjoy any right that is supposedly protected by society if he or she
lacks the essentials for a reasonably healthy and active life. Deficiencies in
the means of subsistence can be just as fatal, incapacitating, or painful as
violations of physical security.”[8]
Obviously basic rights would include
such necessities as food and shelter, both of which are threatened by global
warming. This threat has been recognized from the earliest stages of
international efforts to deal with environmental degradation. Principle 1 of
the 1972 “Declaration of the United Nations Conference on the Human
Environment” reads in part: “Man has the fundamental right to freedom, equality
and adequate conditions of life, in an environment of a quality that permits a
life of dignity and well-being, and he bears a solemn responsibility to protect
and improve the environment for present and future generations.” Similar
language has been added to any number of national and international statements
ever since.[9]
Philip Montague frames the rights argument in terms of “basic
justice,” which he defines as “the very general principle that the good and bad
things that happen to people should have some reasonably direct connection with
their responsible behavior.” According to this principle, he adds, “good things
should befall those who behave well, and bad things those who behave badly.”
This is consistent with the virtually unanimous view of international panels
and commissions that the developed nations bear the lion’s share of
responsibility for cleaning up the damage caused by greenhouse gases because
they are the ones most responsible for causing that damage.[10]
The recognition of basic rights is another area in which
contemporary just war theory has shifted from a primary focus on upholding the
rights of states toward upholding the rights of human beings. This was one of
the central conclusions of the International Commission on Intervention and
State Sovereignty. In its final report, “The Responsibility to Protect,” the
commission states that people’s fundamental rights to security include “their
physical safety, their economic and social well-being, respect for their
dignity and worth as human beings, and the protection of their human rights and
fundamental freedoms.”[11]
That all people have a fundamental right to
security brings me to the last basic requirement of just cause I’d like to
mention, and that is the responsibility of governance. Simply put, just war
theory operates under the assumption that responsible governments protect their
people. This responsibility maintains whether the threat is from other nations
or from groups or individuals within a nation. The ethicist James G. Murphy
defines the state’s obligation to protect its people as coming under “the
general heading of promoting the public good, including making and enforcing
laws to maintain justice, equity and social order…” More broadly, Murphy adds,
governments are responsible for the enforcement of laws that defend or improve
quality of life.[12]
This perspective is another manifestation of the
recent shift of emphasis in just war theory from protecting state’s rights to
protecting human rights. As the International Commission on Intervention and
State Sovereignty put it, “The ‘responsibility to protect’ implies above all
else a responsibility to react to situations of compelling need for human
protection. When preventive measures fail to resolve or contain the situation
and when a state is unable or unwilling to redress the situation, then
interventionary measures by other members of the broader community of states
may be required.”[13]
I mentioned earlier the recent study that cited climate
change as a significant factor in the unrest that led to the current conflict
in Syria. That study also cited as a contributing factor there the failed
agricultural and environmental policies of the government of President Bashar
al-Assad. To bring the argument closer to home, it could be said that by
allowing carbon emissions from automobiles and factories to continue at levels
that have proved dangerous to the environment, the United States set the stage
for the disastrous series of droughts and wildfires that have recently
afflicted the Western states. It doesn’t seem too great a stretch to see this
as a failure on the part of the government to protect the basic rights of its
citizens, and therefore as a potential justification for the use of aggressive
force in defense of those rights.
Competent Authority
I’ll
conclude my remarks today with a couple of quick comments on competent
authority, which may be the trickiest requirement to consider when applying
just war theory to climate change. The question this requirement seeks to
answer is simple: If aggressive action is justified, who can justifiably take
the responsibility of launching it?
The traditional answer is another nation state or the
Security Council of the United Nations. Neither option is very satisfactory in
the case of global warming, for several reasons. For one, the nations most
responsible for global warming are by definition the most developed nations,
and therefore the most powerful nations militarily. Iceland may be justified
in launching an attack on the United States to stop the activities that are
destroying its glaciers, but its chances of winning would be slim. Also to be
considered is that, in the Western democracies, the businesses most responsible for greenhouse gas emissions have, in many cases, successfully
undermined or evaded the regulatory machinery of the countries in which they
operate.
It’s possible that one or more developed nations will
recognize, soon, that radical steps are necessary if climate change is going to
be adequately addressed, and resolve to take those steps. It’s also unlikely.
As I mentioned above, change on the scale required is simply too disruptive to
be contemplated, voluntarily, at least. Neither can we expect the United
Nations to initiate any meaningful response. As Michael Walzer puts it, the
UN’s decrees “do not command intellectual or moral respect,” and therefore have
little meaningful impact.[14]
It’s hard to know who would qualify as a competent authority
when it comes to combating climate change. Certainly there is cause for concern
when self-described revolutionaries assume the right to act unilaterally, as
Theodore Kaczynski – the Unabomber – did. Although Kaczynski claimed to be
acting on behalf of a group called the “Freedom Club,” in truth he acted alone,
and the targets he chose were both idiosyncratic and immoral, not to mention ineffective.
Still, necessity may at some point both dictate and justify some sort of
non-governmental, non-institutional, grass-roots response. What that response
might be is difficult to imagine.
For these reasons, it seems clear that the launching of any
aggressive action to combat climate change will have to engage the requirements
of just war theory not only intelligently but also creatively. The requirements
of proportion and likelihood of success are among the questions that need to be
answered, along with the question of who can and who can’t be considered the
enemy. Any proposed solutions will be creative by definition because the
nations of the world have never before faced a situation like this one.
Unfortunately, one thing is clear, and that is that no consensus will form in
favor of aggressive action to counter climate change until conditions become
desperate enough to force one. To what degree any of the requirements of just
war are considered at that point remains to be seen. Just war theorists are
well aware that, when supreme emergency prevails, moral justifications often
become superfluous.
Notes:
[1] “Climate change in the Fertile Crescent and implications
of the recent Syrian drought,” Kelly, Mohtadib, Canec, et al.
Proceedings of
the National Academy of Sciences of the United States, Vol. 112, no.
11.
The
White House, National Security Strategy, 2015, p. 12.
[4] Ibid, p. 252-254.
UN Charter 1945, Chapter VII, Article 51.
[7] Philip
Montague, “Self Defense and Choosing Between Lives,” Philosophical
Studies, Vol. 40, No. 2 (Sept., 1981), p. 210. David Rodin, “War and Self-Defense,” Ethics & International
Affairs, Volume 18.1 (Winter 2004)
[10] Montague, p. 216. On the responsibility of developed
nations to bear the responsibility of climate change, see Stephen M. Gardiner, “Ethics
and Global Climate Change,” Ethics,
114 (April 2004), p. 579-580.
©Doug Hill, 2015
