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EVEN UNDER DEONTOLOGY, THE RIGHT TO NOT BE THREATENED MAY
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| EVEN UNDER DEONTOLOGY, THE RIGHT TO NOT BE THREATENED MAY BE OVERRIDDEN BY OTHER CONCERNS William H. Shaw. Nuclear Deterrence and Deontology.” Ethics, Vol. 94, No. 2 (Jan, 1984) pp. 248-260. There is, though, abetter way of understanding this situation. One could view the obligation not to threaten innocent persons as a prima facie principle, one which is outweighed in the present circumstances by the duty to preserve the lives and liberties of the innocent assuming, what is widely believed, that reliance on nuclear deterrence has accomplished this. The difference is that one would be saying that deterrence is justified, all things considered, rather than that criminal conduct is tolerated out of necessity. Given that overridden prima facie duties continue to exert some moral weight, one would still be obliged to endeavor strenuously to extricate oneself from a situation in which the duty not to threaten had to be overridden in order to fulfill a more stringent duty. Walzer's construal of the situation places us, implausibly, in a continual state of moral emergency in which moral norms, rather than being overridden by other moral principles, are simply disregarded because of consequentialist considerations that are external to his deontological framework. Moreover, Walzer himself should prefer this characterization of deterrence since an important theme of Just and Unjust Wars is that those who condemn war absolutely leave themselves with no guidelines when they are forced to fight, thus opening the door to all sorts of atrocities. One must not suppose, Walzer rightly argues, that war suspends all moral judgments and thus refuse to draw moral distinctions on the battlefield. Yet to repudiate morally nuclear deterrence, only to tolerate it as a practical necessity, is to countenance too quickly the suspension of ethical principle in this realm. Download 1.23 Mb. Share with your friends:
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