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War & Peace

The “Ugliest of Things”?

Anja Steinbauer considers some criticisms of pacifists and pacifism.

When Immanuel Kant wrote his 1795 essay Perpetual Peace, he thought about what it would take for nations to coexist peacefully. While he did this by applying the principles of his moral philosophy, he is clear throughout that war and peace are a matter of politics, not of private ethics. Nonetheless, confronted with the reality of war – and there always are wars – it would be strange not to think about the rightness or wrongness of our individual responses to armed conflicts.

In a spectrum of possible standpoints the extremes at either end always stand out. Those who subscribe to an uncompromising embrace or rejection of warfare – militarism or pacifism – are under particular pressure to justify their positions.

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