Rethinking the Foundations of Just War Theory

Abstract

Kai Draper’s War and Individual Rights: The Foundations of Just War Theory (2016) seeks to “give birth to an alternative approach” to traditional just war theory (pp. 2–3). This review seeks to analyse and evaluate this alternative approach. Draper’s approach to just war theory differs from other approaches in three ways. First, it is “highly individualistic.” Second, Draper’s approach avoids reliance upon the principle of double effect. Third, this approach is “largely rights-based”—it seeks “to understand the ethics of war mostly by way of understanding certain fundamental moral rights” (pp. 3). This review will argue that Draper succeeds in offering an alternative to traditional just war theory that is both rights-based and capable of dispensing with the needless complexities of the principle of double effect. However this review will argue that Draper falls short of his ultimate goal of refuting Rousseau’s claim that war is “a relationship between State and State, in which individuals are enemies only by accident” (1967, Social Contract, Book I, chapter IV).