THE BATTLEFIELD OF METAPHYSICS:PERPETUAL PEACEREVISITED

Abstract

Basic questions about Kant's international theory remain unresolved, in part because the ambiguous language and sketchy blueprints given inPerpetual Peacelend themselves to a wide variety of interpretations. This essay proposes a novel solution for this difficulty: a careful reconsideration of the political concepts embedded in Kant's first philosophy. In the First Critique, the “Conflict of the Faculties,” and in particular his neglected essay “Perpetual Peace in Philosophy,” Kant repeatedly draws on the language of sovereignty, war, and international law, in order to describe how the critical philosophy will bring peace to what he terms the “battlefield of metaphysics.” The most striking feature of this program for “perpetual peace in philosophy” is that it does not end disagreement over ideas, but rather prevents it from becoming pathological by subjecting it to the “discipline” of critical reason. And I argue that Kant's proposal for global peace is precisely parallel: a sovereign world court that arbitrates decisively between states, while otherwise leaving them free to clash, compete, and disagree.