Commentary on Susan Meld Shell's ‘Kant on Just War and “Unjust Enemies”: Reflections on a “Pleonasm“’

Kantian Review 11:117-124 (2006)
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Abstract

In her essay , 82–111), Shell wants to demonstrate that 1. Kant's theory of the right of nations ‘can furnish us with some much needed practical help and guidance’, and 2. ‘Kant is less averse to the use of force, including resort to pre-emptive war… than he is often taken to be’ . The first claim is unconvincing. The second one is in need of clarification. Shell turns Kant into a kind of realist and just-war theorist, into a liberal who is prejudiced against illiberal regimes. In the end, her Kant is closer to Locke, Vattel and other early liberal international lawyers than to himself. Almost all that is unique in Kant's theory of the right of nations gets lost. In this, Shell follows a general trend among some Kant interpreters: the interpretation is only loosely based on Kant; it claims to follow his ‘spirit’ and offers creative ‘Kantian perspectives’. Amidst interpretational creativity, Kant's texts more or less disappear in the mist

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Georg Cavallar
University of Vienna

References found in this work

Practical philosophy.Immanuel Kant - 1996 - New York: Cambridge University Press. Edited by Mary J. Gregor.
Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals.Immanuel Kant - 1785/2002 - In Practical Philosophy. Cambridge University Press. pp. 37-108.
On the citizen.Thomas Hobbes - 1998 - New York, NY: Cambridge University Press. Edited by Richard Tuck & Michael Silverthorne.
Preventive War.David Luban - 2004 - Philosophy and Public Affairs 32 (3):207-248.

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