Years ago I mused, briefly, that we could apply the just war tradition not just to military conflicts but to foreign policy more generally. “The normative framework developed for thinking about the application of coercive force thus applies to a far broader range of state behavior than formal interstate war,” I wrote, suggesting we could apply the just war tradition “to virtually any field of policy.” Throughout my writing on reconstruction, stability operations, counterinsurgency, counterterrorism, and nation-building, I’ve tried to apply the just war framework to a wide array of policy challenges aside from conventional war. (Somewhere, I swear, I used the phrase “just grand strategy,” though I cannot find the reference).
I thus applaud Eric Patterson’s concept of “just statecraft.” It perfectly summarizes and captures what has been increasingly evident through decades of just war scholarship: just war isn’t just about war. Just war scholars have applied the framework to cyber security, artificial intelligence, economic sanctions, espionage, covert action, and more. Let’s not multiply entities unnecessarily. Let’s follow the path of simplicity. Let’s recognize that we’ve been using the concept of just statecraft all along.
It isn’t really new. To talk of just war is to talk of justice. Justice is the paramount virtue of political life. Justice should inform everything we do; it should be the goal of every political act and decision—including, but not limited to, war. The concept of just statecraft is a new entry in the perennial discussion about justice, politics, and power.
Focusing on justice in every political endeavor helps us avoid the pitfalls of aiming solely at any other goal, such as victory, wealth, security, or the ever-elusive “national interest.” There is nothing wrong with victory (in a just war), nor with wealth or security, nor with pursuing a nation’s interest—so long as that interest is consistent with justice. To be consistent with justice, justice has to inform the overarching vision. There has to be some kind of big plan—a grand strategy—that is, itself, ethically justifiable.
An endemic problem with American statecraft is its siloed nature: the pursuit of individual, disconnected ends by discrete parts of the bureaucracy without coordination or even much concern for a broader vision. That is why American foreign policy is so often strategically incoherent—but also why various bits and pieces of American foreign policy can be well-intentioned but end up counterproductive and even unjust.
Say you want to prevent Iran from building nuclear weapons. Opening talks with Iran and conducting diplomacy with them is a sensible thing to do. But if that is all you do, you will fail. If diplomacy is the whole of your strategy, it is a stupid strategy. More: it is quite possibly an unjust strategy because of its willful stupidity, its naivete, and because it will enable, not prevent, Iran’s nuclear program.
So, should we do the opposite? Should we threaten Iran with military action? We move ships and troops into position, give fiery speeches, and conduct large “training exercises” on the Iranian border. That, also, could be a sensible thing to do. But, again, if that is all we do, our strategy is both stupid and probably unjust—not for naivete, but for recklessness, bullying, and needless provocation.
Statecraft is the integration of all instruments of national power—diplomacy and the military, for example—to achieve a common purpose. Threaten Iran while offering talks; conduct diplomacy while carrying out a training exercise. Cohesive, coordinated action is far more likely to succeed. And if it is done for a just end, the integrated strategy is an example of just statecraft.
To do that, policymakers have to put every discussion under the framework of justice. It cannot only be the military that talks about just war. Diplomats have to think about just diplomacy. Treasury officials have to think about just sanctions. Every decision has to be subordinated to justice.
It is possible, of course, to have effective policy coordination towards some other goal—power, for example, or wealth. That’s the goal of autocratic states and, I fear, many of the nationalist movements on the rise within the democratic world. They can, sometimes, succeed in having a more cohesive foreign policy.
Our choice should be different. We should pursue the national interest—so long as it is a just national interest. We should pursue our own power—so long as we use it justly. We should pursue wealth—so long as we acquire it fairly. Justice should be the common sheet music that gets the whole choir of the national security establishment singing together. It should be the common blueprint for our collective architecture. Paul Ramsey somewhere wrote that the highest calling of statecraft is to align the national interest with the international common good. That’s a good description of just statecraft.