CRANFIELD UNIVERSITY DAREN BOWYER JUST WAR DOCTRINE

armed force when necessary, to prevent violations of individual rights so gross as to
‘shock the conscience of mankind’, on the other. The solution can only be found,
therefore, in the political and moral arenas. Ultimately states will have to act as their
political and moral instincts dictate. Politics is important because, in Western
democracies at least, it will dictate that governments act in accordance with the mood of
their electorates. And they will have to act in a manner constrained by consideration for
international norms, convention and prevailing opinion. Both public and international
opinion are influenced by an understanding of what is morally right; so too, then, must
be the actions of even the most ‘realist’ government.
Just war, never simply formulaic, cannot solve the dilemma, nor offer a simple answer
in any individual case, but it can provide the framework for debate and consideration.
A greater focus on right intent may provide a more objectively measurable standard,
than can emphasis on just cause – which is never easily discernable. Whilst, ideally, we
should like sovereign authority to rest with the UN or some other supra national body in
order to prevent nations acting wrongly under the guise of humanitarianism, experience
has shown this to be unworkable. The compromise advanced here, is that we recognise
that such decisions reside not in the legal sphere but in the moral (and also political).
States may have to make intervention decisions on their own authority – though we
have intuitively ruled out any sub-state grouping from this authority – but in the full
understanding that they must stand ready fully to justify their actions not only to their
own people but to the international society of states. This should not be taken as arguing
that international law should be dispensed with; far from it. International law, the legal
paradigm for use of force, and most importantly the presumption against intervention,
all ensure that the onus is on the intervener to articulate the specific conditions which
justify his deviation from the established norm. For, as Vattel argued: ‘we must
necessarily have recourse to certain rules of more certain and easy application, and this
in the interest of the safety and welfare of the great society of the human race. These
rules are those of the voluntary Law of Nations.’ 168 The existence of such rules marks
out intervention as the exception; something that must therefore be fully justified with
the burden of proof placed on the state stepping beyond the law. The questions a state
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