Ethics in International Relations
A Constitutive Theory

Mervyn Frost argues that ethics is accorded a marginal position within the study of international relations and evaluates those ethical theories which do exist within the discipline.

Mervyn Frost (Author)

9780521555302, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 21 March 1996

268 pages
22.8 x 15.2 x 2.1 cm, 0.425 kg

' … an important and distinctive contribution to the discussion of ethics in international affairs.' Peace Research

Most questions commonly asked about international politics are ethical ones. Should the international community intervene in Bosnia? What do we owe the starving in Somalia? What should be done about the genocide in Rwanda? Yet, Mervyn Frost argues, ethics is accorded a marginal position within the academic study of international relations. In this book he examines the reasons given for this, and finds that they do not stand up to scrutiny. He goes on to evaluate those ethical theories which do exist within the discipline - order based theories, utilitarian theories, and rights based theories - and finds them unconvincing. He elaborates his own ethical theory, constitutive theory, which is derived from Hegel, and highlights the way in which we constitute one another as moral beings through a process of reciprocal recognition within a hierarchy of institutions which include the family, civil society, the state, and the society of states.

Introduction
1. The place of normative theory in international relations
2. Sceptical and realist arguments against normative theory in international relations: a critical approach
3. Normative issues in international relations: the domain of discourse and the method of argument
4. Towards the construction of a normative theory of international relations
5. Reconciling rights and sovereignty: the constitutive theory of individuality
6. The justification of unconventional violence in international relations: a hard case for normative theory
7. Who gets what state where? The Bosnian conflict
Conclusion.

Subject Areas: International law [LB], International relations [JPS], Ethics & moral philosophy [HPQ]