Cosmopolitan War, by Cecile Fabre.

Abstract

The past decade has seen a turn toward individualism in the morality of war. Cecile Fabre’s book is sure to be regarded by future thinkers as a sine qua non of this development, continuing the trend of undermining the orthodoxy of traditional just war theory. In her book, Fabre seeks to show the conditions under which war is justified given a sufficientist cosmopolitan theory of morality, which holds that since individuals qua individuals are the fundamental locus of morality, political borders are irrelevant to what we owe to one at the most fundamental level: inter alia, equal respect as well as the freedom and resources necessary to lead a minimally decent life. This does not mean that borders are morally irrelevant — individuals who exercise their freedom to associate are entitled to allocate among themselves the fruits of their cooperative activity. And co-nationals have special obligations to one another, since they are better able to discharge to one another (rather than outsiders) the positive duties that we all have to fellow persons. But the cosmopolitan account Fabre develops does entail the view that the liability of individuals (most notably, to compensatory and defensive harm) is determined not by membership in a group but by their contributions to unjust activity. This seemingly benign claim has radical implications; Fabre argues convincingly that adopting a cosmopolitan framework requires revising all of the principles of traditional just war theory.