State civil disobedience: A republican perspective

Abstract

The article deals with the question of whether or under which circumstances it is reasonable to interpret some forms of illegal state action as civil disobedience and whether republican political theory can make a difference to the justification of those actions. It is argued that the theory of freedom as non-domination and the interpretation of the right to participation as the “right of rights” in a legitimate state provide a better justificatory scheme for cases in which developing or emerging countries break international trade laws for the purpose of protecting constitutional rights than Rawls’ theory of civil disobedience, because it takes the problem of power asymmetries in international relations and the status of social rights more seriously. However, these republican standards do not offer different practical solutions for a specific type of state disobedience, humanitarian intervention, because transferring the standards of non-domination and the fundamental right to participation to international relations would lead to a “maximalist” interpretation of human rights, which would undermine the function of such interventions as an instrument of last resort against oppressive governments.