Notes

INTRODUCTION

1. Richard Harries (ed.), and the Issues of Our Time (London: Mowbray 1986) 1. 2. Miller points to the irony in Niebuhr's celebration by these Luce publica­ tions, magazines which provide excellent examples of the cocky assurance and faith in American goodness which Niebuhr criticised so constantly. William Lee Miller, 'The Irony of Reinhold Niebuhr', Reporter (13 Jan­ uary 1955) 11. 3. William Lee Miller, 'In Strange Company', New Republic (21 April 1982) 30. 4. An observation of Arthur Schlesinger Jr, 'Prophet for a Secular Age', New Leader vol. 55, no. 2 (24 January 1972) 14. 5. Richard John Neuhaus (ed.), Reinhold Niebuhr Today (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans 1989) xi; Dennis P. McCann , 'The Case for Christian Realism: Rethinking Reinhold Niebuhr', Christian Century (7-14 June 1995). 6. President Clinton names Niebuhr's Moral Man and Immoral Society as a book which had a profound influence on him, along with the Bible, Marcus Aurelius' Meditations, Thomas a Kempis' Of the Imitation of Christ and Max Weber's Politics as a Vocation in Between Hope and History (New York: Times Books, Random House 1996). 7. Campbell Craig, 'The New Meaning of Modern War in the Thought of Reinhold Niebuhr', Journal of the History ofIdeas vol. 53, no. 4 (1992) 687-701; see also John C. Bennett, 'Niebuhr's Ethics: The Later Years', Christianity and Crisis XLII (12 April 1985) 91-5. 8. The German Evangelical Synod of North America, later the Evangelical Synod of North America, was founded in Missouri in 1841 and reflected the 1817 union of Lutheran and Reformed (Calvinist) Churches in Prus­ sia. In 1934, it merged with the Reformed Church in the United States to form the Evangelical and Reformed Church ; in 1957, this merged with the Congregational Christian Churches to create the United Church of Christ, which has its headquarters in Cleveland, Ohio. The union of Calvinism and Lutheranism gave Niebuhr a rich heritage politically as well as religiously. For politically, Calvinism departs radically from Lutheranism as regards the state. Whereas the Lutheran analysis of the state is as an 'order of necessity', Calvinism stresses the integrity of humans, the doctrines of natural justice and duties and rights and also justifiability of political revolution. 9. Reinhold Niebuhr, 'Intellectual Autobiography', in Charles W. Kegley and Robert W. Bretall (eds), Reinhold Niebuhr: His Religious, Social and Political Thought (New York: Macmillan 1961) 3. 10. Reinhold Niebuhr, Leaves From the Notebook ofa Tamed Cynic (Louis­ ville, KY: Westminster/John Knox Press 1990) 38. 11. Niebuhr, 'The Twilight of Liberalism', New Republic (14 June 1919),218.

154 Notes 155

12. Nathan A. Scott (ed.), The Legacy of Reinhold Niebuhr (London : Uni­ versity of Chicago Press 1975) xi. 13. Lovin cites Douglas Clyde Macintosh and Walter Marshall Horton as the founders of the 'realist' theological movement in the 1930s and credits John Bennett with the term Christian Realism; Robert W. Lovin, Rein­ hold Niebuhr and Christian Realism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1995) 1-2. 14. See Kenneth Durkin, Reinhold Niebuhr (London: Geoffrey Chapman 1989) 2-6. 15. Reinhold Niebuhr, Moral Man and Immoral Society (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons 1932) xxiii. 16. Reinhold Niebuhr, Christian Realism and Political Problems (London: Faber and Faber 1953) 119. 17. Reinhold Niebuhr, The Structure ofNations and Empires: A Study ofthe Recurring Patterns and Problems ofthe Political Order in the Nuclear Age (London: Faber and Faber 1959) 144. 18. Niebuhr, Leaves From the Notebook, 70, 103. 19. Ibid., 45. 20. Paul Merkeley comments that there was for a time something of a vogue for original sin with Niebuhr celebrated as the rediscoverer of original sin and depicted as the theologian of gloom: Merkeley, Reinhold Niebuhr: A Political Account (London: McGill-Queen's University Press 1975) 153 and 174. 21. Richard W. Fox, Reinhold Niebuhr: a Biography (New York : Pantheon 1985) ix. 22. Larry Rasmussen (ed.), Reinhold Niebuhr: Theologian of Public Life (London : Collins 1988) 13. 23. Reinhold Niebuhr, The ChildrenofLight and the Children ofDarkness: A Vindication of Democracy and a Critique of its Traditional Defense (New York : Charles Scribner's Sons 1944) 187. 24. Reinhold Niebuhr, Reflections on the End of an Era (London : Charles Scribner's Sons 1934) 209. 25. Michael J. Smith, Realist Thought from Weber to Kissinger (London : Louisiana State University Press 1986) 2. 26. See Herbert Butterfield, 'The Scientific vs the Moralistic Approach in International Affairs', International Affairs vol. 27, no. 4 (October 1951) 411-22; Hans Rommen, 'Realism and Utopianism in World Affairs', Review ofPolitics vol. 6, no. 2 (April 1944) 193-215; Kenneth Thompson, 'The Study of International Politics: a Survey of Trends and Develop­ ments', Review of Politics vol. 14, no. 4 (October 1952); Hans J. Mor­ genthau, Scientific Man vs Power Politics (Chicago: University ofChicago Press 1946). 27. E. H. Carr, The Twenty Years Crisis 1919-1939 2nd edn (London : Mac­ millan 1981) 10. 28. Hans J. Morgenthau, Politics among Nations (New York: Alfred Knopf 1973) 4. 29. Morgenthau, Politics among Nations, 10; Morgenthau, Scientific Man, 201; Morgenthau, Politics in the Twentieth Century, vol. 3 (London : Press 1962) 15. 156 Notes

30. Morgenthau, Politics among Nat ions, 12. 31. Reinhold Niebuhr, Man 's Nature and His Communities (London: Geof­ frey Bles 1966) 54. Yet, in a 1967 interview, Niebuhr described Mor­ genthau and himself as sharing 'basically common ideas with peripheral differences'; see Reinhold Niebuhr and Hans J. Morgenthau, 'The Ethics of War and Peace in the Nuclear Age', War Peace Report, vol. 7, no. 2 February 1967) 3. 32. R. N. Berki, On Political Realism (London: J. M. Dent and Sons 1981) 3. 33. Niebuhr, Christian Realism and Political Problems, 11. 34. A point made by Berki, On Political Realism, 37. 35. Berki writes that political realism recognises that political reality is com­ posed of 'interpenetrating opposites . . . of the immediately given and an underlying essence, the particular and the general, the subjective and the objective, fact and value, the lasting and the changeable, freedom and necessity, the individual and society, authority and power, justice and oppression. It reveals the identity of political reality as a welter of self­ contradictions'; On Political Realism, 69. 36. Ibid., 69-70. 37. Such an interpretation of Niebuhr as a political theorist was rejected by Tinder who views Niebuhr not as a political theorist but as a prophet. When viewed in this light, Tinder believes, the 'defects so conspicuous from a philosophical perspective largely disappear'. In particular, the time-bound character of Niebuhr's thought, and the dat­ edness of much of his political writing, no longer calls into question his greatness, for prophets are of their time, while philosophers are not; Glenn Tinder, 'The Challenge of History', New Republic (21 April 1982), 30-2. 38. A point made by K. W. Thompson, Christian Ethics and the Dilemmas of Foreign Policy (London: Cambridge University Press 1959) 28. 39. Niebuhr, 'Limited Warfare', Christianity and Crisis vol. XVII, no. 18 (11 November 1957), 146; Paul Nitze recalls that Kissinger himself misunderstood the destructive power of tactical nuclear weapons and that, as a consequence, the book was disconnected from the elemental facts of geography and nuclear weapons; Nitze, From Hiroshima to Glasnost: At the Centre of Decision (New York: G. Weidenfeld 1989) 298. 40. A common criticism made by Bennett, Taubes and Harland, in Harold R. Landon (00.), Reinhold Niebuhr: A Prophetic Voice in Our Time (Green­ wich, Cf: Seabury Press 1962) 82-4. 41. Aristotle The Politics, intro. by T. S. Sinclair (London: Penguin Books 1981) 14-15; see also J. L. Hyland, 'Review ofa Companion to Aristotle's Politics', Philosophic Studies (1993) 119-28. 42. Morgenthau in Landon (ed.), Reinhold Niebuhr: A Prophetic Voice in Our Time, 105. 43. Sidney Hook, Pragmatism and the Tragic Sense ofLife (New York: Basic Books 1974) 184. 44. Angus Dun and Reinhold Niebuhr, 'God Wills Both Justice and Peace', Christianity and Crisis 15 (13 June 1955) 77. Notes 157

NIEBUHR'S CRITIQUE OF PACIFISM

1. Reinhold Niebuhr, 'The World Council and the Peace Issue', Christianity and Crisis vol. 10, no. 14 (7 August 1950) 108. 2. Bennett, in Kegley and Bretall (eds), Reinhold Niebuhr: His Religious. Social and Political Thought, 67. 3. Tillich, in Landon (ed.), Reinhold Niebuhr: A Prophetic Voice in Our Time, 33. 4. Reinhold Niebuhr, letter in New Republic (22 February 1922) 372. 5. Niebuhr, Leaves From the Notebook, 47. 6. Ibid. 7. Reinhold Niebuhr, 'Why I am Not a Christian', The Christian Century (15 December 1927) 1482. 8. Devere Allen (00.), Pacifism in the Modern World (New York: Doubleday, Doran 1929) 17. 9. Bennett, in Kegley and Bretall (eds), Reinhold Niebuhr: His Religious. Social and Political Thought , 64. 10. Reinhold Niebuhr, 'Why I am Not a Christian', 1482. 11. D. B. Robertson (ed.), Love and Justice: Selections from the Shorter Writings of Reinhold Niebuhr (Louisville, KY: Westminster/John Knox Press 1957) 245. 12. Robertson, Love and Justice, 246. 13. Reinhold Niebuhr, 'A Critique of Pacifism', Atlantic Monthly 139 (May 1927) 639-41. 14. Reinhold Niebuhr, 'Let the Liberal Churches Stop Fooling Themselves', The Christian Century 48 (25 March 1931)402. 15. Reinhold Niebuhr, 'Germany Must be Told!', The Christian Century 50 (9 August 1933) 1015-15. 16. Niebuhr, Reflections on the End ofan Era, 247. 17. Reinhold Niebuhr, Christianity and Power Politics (New York : Charles Scribner's Sons 1940) 31. 18. Niebuhr, 'The Churches and the War', Town Meetings of the Air (27 August 1942). 19. Niebuhr, Moral Man , Chapter 7. 20. John H. Yoder, The Original Revolution: Essays on Christian Pacifism (Scottdale, PA: Herald Press 1971) 77; also The Politics ofJesus, Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans 1972) 106n. 21. Influenced by Niebuhr's criticisms, Yoder, a Mennonite, is keen to differ­ entiate his Christian pacifism from the liberal pacifism which claims pacifism to be a politically efficacious strategy. Yet Yoder cannot resist adding a pragmatic justification of pacifism: that it would be effective if only we would try it (The Possibility of Nonviolent Resistance', The Politics of Jesus, 89-93). In He Came Preaching Peace he writes that 'there are things that love alone can get done. There are kinds of non­ violent process which are quite effective in achieving valuable goals . . . .It can be shown as a fact of social science that massing destructive threat against destructive threat postpones the solution of problems, even if war never comes, to say noth ing of destroying most of what both parties wanted to save, if it does come. Gandhi and King demonstrated the 158 Notes

power of truth made effective through active non-cooperation with evil. It is costly, though hardly more costly than war. To recognise the sacredness ofthe adversary's life and dignity, to refuse to meet him on his own terms is at once a moral victory and the beginning of a tactical advantage' (yoder, He Came Preaching Peace, 39-40). He concludes that 'sometimes suffering love is powerful enough to effect social change' (He Came Preaching Peace, 44). Only then, having claimed that pacifism can be more effective means than war, does Yoder then say that the question itself is wrong and that it is 'wrong to assume that the measure of right decision or the validation of correct behaviour is its power to make events come out right' (He Came Preaching Peace, 40). Decades after Niebuhr's critique, a leading Christian pacifist and an informed critic of Niebuhr still cannot resist making claims of efficacy for pacifism. Yet, if efficacy is to be the measure, then Yoder's pacifism will not be granted the absolute status he seeks. Yoder's criticism of Niebuhr's approach is that it is fit for the age before Jesus and not the age after Jesus: 'It is not specifically Christian, and would fit into any honest system of social morality. If Christ had never become incarnate, died, risen, ascended into heaven, and sent His Spirit, this view would be just as possible, though its particularly clear and objective expression results partly from certain Christian insights' (The Original Revolution, 77). In Yoder's eyes, Niebuhr (along with pragmatic pacifists and just war thinkers) lacks an adequate eschatology. They are all 'Constantinians' who seek to control history (and resort to force in so seeking) rather than relying on the reign of Jesus in the Church (The Original Revolution, 62). The fault in Niebuhr's approach, of and of pragmatic pacifism is their 'urge to manage the world' (The Politics ofJesus, 240). Yoder, in contrast, espouses an ethic of imitation, and the example of Jesus includes pacifism. Such pacifism is not to be understood on the level of means alone. It is not simply the rejection of violent means; it is a rejection also ofthe end at which those means aim: namely, managing the world (The Politics ofJesus, 239). Pacifism is to be part of 'a way of life which is new, unprecedented, surprising, perhaps even unacceptable to respectable men' (The Original Revolution, 38). The issue is not whether evil may be done for the sake of good, but whether it is a good to make history move in the right direction. One might think that Niebuhr and Yoder are dealing with different issues, that Yoder is not advocating, not pacifism, but Christianity. The question he seeks to answer is not 'what is the most effective political strategy', but rather 'how should a Christian live?' But the latter is the very question that Niebuhr too seeks to answer. The difference in their approaches is that Niebuhr sees it as the duty of Christians to influence. history for the better, while Yoder does not. To Niebuhr, this is a task Christians share with their non-Christian fellows. Thus, Niebuhr can recommend his political approach to all, whether Christian or not, while Yoder does not recommend pacifism for non-Christians. Pacifism, though it has some efficiency, is unsustainable without Christian faith: 'Christian Notes 159

ethics calls for behaviour which is impossible except by the miracles of the Holy Spirit' (The Original Revolution, 115). 22. Niebuhr, Moral Man, 264. 23. Ibid., 171-2. 24. Ibid., 172. 25. Niebuhr, 'Is Peace or Justice the Goal?', World Tomorrow 15 (21 Sept­ ember 1932), 276. 26. Gordon Harland, The Thought of Reinhold Niebuhr: An Introduction (New York : Oxford University Press 1960) 220. 27. It was because ofpacifists' statements to the effect that the structures and policies of the liberal democracies were really no better than those of Nazism and Stalinism that Niebuhr wrote his defence of democracy in The Children ofLight and the Children ofDarkness, 1944. 28. Niebuhr, Moral Man, 173; see also Harries, in Harries (ed.), Reinhold Niebuhr and the Issues of Our Time, 106. 29. Niebuhr, 'Is Peace or Justice the Goal?', World Tomorrow 15 (21 Septem- ber 1932) 276. 30. Niebuhr, Moral Man, 220. 31. Ibid., 251. 32. Henry B. Clark, Serenity, Courage and Wisdom: The Enduring Legacy of Reinhold Niebuhr (Cleveland, OH: Pilgrim Press 1994) 38. 33. See Kenneth Thompson, in Scott (ed.), The Legacy ofReinhold Niebuhr, 104;and John Bennett, in Kegley and Bretall (eds), Reinhold Niebuhr: His Religious, Social and Political Thought, 66. 34. The focus of Niebuhr's attack is not Gandhi but those who misjudge the moral worth of his methods and seek to reproduce them in unfavourable circumstances (particularly those Americans who adopted pacifism and neutralism as a way of avoiding military involvement in Europe) . Gand­ hi's crusade in India attracted Niebuhr's approval for its recognition of political and military realities and its dislike of violent coercion. Niebuhr sees Gandhi, not as an absolute pacifist who would not countenance the use of force to combat evil in any circumstances, but as a pragmatic and moral political actor who saw the possibility of non-violent coercion as a way of challenging British rule in the prevailing circumstances (over­ whelming British military power combined with a morally developed British people with democratic influence on their leadership). Niebuhr admired Gandhi's political wisdom in perceiving these permissive condi­ tions and in acknowledging the moral and political benefits ofpacifism as a pragmatic and efficient means. But Niebuhr drew attention to the particular circumstanc es of Gandhi's successful resistance to British imperialism: he asserted that such non-violent resistance could succeed only when the oppressed have a potential ally in the consciences of their opponents. This was not the case for the enemies of totalitarianism in the 1930s. See Niebuhr, Moral Man, Chapter 7. 35. Fox, Reinhold Niebuhr, 79. 36. The Swiss theologian Karl Barth (1886-1968) was a contemporary of Niebuhr who, in the wake of World War I, also broke with liberal . There were many similarities in their lives and their thought. They were both pastors and the sons of pastors (Barth in the Swiss 160 Notes

Reformed Church) , they were both active in workers' rights (Barth organ­ ised a union for textile workers in Safenwil, Switzerland), and they were both involved in socialist politics (Barth in the Social-Democratic Party). Barth was influenced by Kierkegaard and broke with liberal theology to take up Reformation interests. He was known for his 'nee-orthodox' theology and for his striking attacks on the cherished assumptions of liberal theology. There are similarities in the political thought of Niebuhr and Barth too as Barth challenges the temptation to identify God with cultural expressions and national purposes . He warned how easily Christ­ ians could adopt the standards of the flag rather than the cross in dealing with social and political issues and then believe their state to represent the will of God on the world stage. This aspect of Barth's thought developed in opposition to the nationalism of Nazi Germany where he lectured from 1931 until expelled in 1935. He then became a leader of the Confessing Church, a group opposed to Hitler's policies. See Geoffrey Bromiley, Introduction to the Theology of Karl Barth (London: Eerdmans 1979); Karl Barth, Epistle to the Romans, 2nd edn (Oxford: Oxford University Press 1968). 37. Niebuhr was often called a neo-orthodox theologian himself for his emphasis on original sin and his contrasting of all historical achievements to God. But he denied being a Barthian and was to criticise both the theology and the politics of Barth. He disliked the way Barthian thought lent itself to conservatism. In particular, Barth's failure to condemn the Soviet invasion of Hungary in 1956 drew harsh criticism from Niebuhr who insisted that relative judgements could still be made between human achievements. Barthian neo-orthodoxy, like liberalism and Marxism, was an idea-system from which Niebuhr drew many insights but against which he was to rebel vigorously; see June C. Bingham, Courage to Change: An Introduction to the Life and Thought of Reinhold Niebuhr (New York, 1961) 337-40. 38. Fox, Reinhold Niebuhr, 117. 39. Donald B. Meyer, The Protestant Search for Political Realism 1911-41 (Berkeley: University of California Press 1960) 355. 40. Published as The Nature and Destiny of Man, vol. 1: Human Nature (London: Nisbet , 1941) and vol. 2: Human Destiny (London: Nisbet 1943). 41. Radical Religion 1 Autumn (1935). 42. Radical Religion 2 Winter (1935). 43. Fox, Reinhold Niebuhr, 132. 44. Meyer, The Protestant Search for Political Realism, 356. 45. Radical Religion 2 (Winter 1935) 25-30. 46. In Merke1ey, Reinhold Niebuhr, 132. 47. Ibid. 48. Dennis McCann, 'Reinhold Niebuhr and Jacques Maritain on Marxism', Journal ofReligion vol. 58, no. 2 (April 1978) 140-168. 49. Charles C. Brown, Niebuhr and His Age (philadelphia: Trinity Press International 1992) 100 and 120. Notes 161

2 FORCE AND ORDER

1. Niebuhr, Structure ofNations and Empires, 287. 2. Niebuhr, Nature and Destiny ofMan vol. 1,256. 3. Niebuhr, Man's Nature and His Communities, 13. 4. Niebuhr, Europe's Catastrophe and the Christian Faith (London: Nisbet 1940) 28. 5. Niebuhr, Europe's Catastrophe, 28. 6. Niebuhr, Structure ofNations and Empires, 135. 7. In Bingham, Courage to Change, 7. 8. Niebuhr, Nature and Destiny ofMan vol. 1,258. 9. Niebuhr, Faith and History: A ComparisonofChristian and Modern Views ofHistory (London: Nisbet 1938) 114. 10. Niebuhr, Faith and History, 9. 11. Niebuhr believes that faith makes clear very important elements of reality which rationalism misses. We must admit that we do not know, on the basis of rational analysis alone, all we need for our collective life. There is dogmatic hubris of reason which blinds us to important elements of reality such as evil and self-regard. We cannot understand our discordant nature or the world without 'suprarational' religion. This conclusion was reached by the mathematician, physicist, engineer and philosopher Blaise Pascal who decided that there is 'nothing so consistent with reason as this denial of reason' (A. J. Krailsheimer, Pascal: Pensees [Harmondsworth: Penguin 1966] no. KI82). 12. Niebuhr, Discerning the Signs of the Times: Sermons for Today and Tomorrow (London: Student Christian Movement Press 1946) 139-42. 13. Niebuhr, Nature and Destiny ofMan vol. 1, 182. 14. Rasmussen (ed.), Reinhold Niebuhr, 136-7. 15. Niebuhr, quoted in Bingham, Courage to Change, 143. 16. Niebuhr, Structure ofNations and Empires, 135. 17. Rasmussen (ed.), Reinhold Niebuhr, 174. 18. Niebuhr, The Self and the Drama of History (New York: Charles Scrib- ner's Sons 1955) 223. 19. Niebuhr, The Irony ofAmerican History (London: Nisbet 1952) 142. 20. Rasmussen (ed.), Reinhold Niebuhr, 174. 21. Niebuhr, Children ofLight, 65. 22. Ibid ., 59. 23. Rasmussen (ed.), Reinhold Niebuhr, 182. 24. See Niebuhr, Reflections on the End ofan Era, 210. 25. Niebuhr, Nature and Destiny ofMan vol. 1,224. 26. Augustine, The Political Writings, ed. Henry Paolucci (Chicago : Gateway Editions 1982) 1. 27. Augustine, The Political Writings, 1. 28. Ibid., 1-2. 29. Ibid., 94. 30. Ibid., 151-3. 31. Ibid ., 5. 32. Ibid., 29. 33. Ibid ., 44. 162 Notes

34. Niebuhr, Man's Nature and His Communities, 46. 35. Niebuhr, Christian Realism and Political Problems, 121. 36. See Dun and Niebuhr, 'God Wills Both Justice and Peace', Christianity and Crisis 15 (13 June 1955). 37. Niebuhr, Leaves From the Notebook, 92. 38. Niebuhr, Children of Light, 178; see also Discerning the Signs, 46. 39. Niebuhr, Children ofLight, 181. 40. Niebuhr, Structure ofNations and Empires, 5-6. 41. Rasmussen (00.), Reinhold Niebuhr, 218. 42. Robertson (ed.), Love and Justice, 36. 43. Niebuhr, Europe's Catastrophe, 29. 44. Rasmussen (00.), Reinhold Niebuhr, 182. 45. Ibid. 46. Ibid., 187. 47. In Niebuhr, Reflections on the End ofan Era, 1934. 48. Niebuhr, Christianity and Power Politics, 26. 49. Niebuhr, The Nature and Destiny ofMan vol. 2, 93. 50. Niebuhr, 'The Limits of American Power', Christianity and Society vol. 17, no. 4 (Autumn 1954) 5. 51. Niebuhr, 'Power and Justice', Christianity and Society vol. 8, no. 1 (Win­ ter 1942) 10.

3 FREEDOM AND CONSTRAINT

1. Machiavelli, The Discourses, intro. Bernard Crick (Harmondsworth: Pen­ guin Books 1970) Book 2, Chapter 1,273. 2. Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince, trans. George Bull (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books 1961) Chapter 25, 130. 3. Ibid. 4. Ibid., Chapter 6, 50. 5. Ibid. 6. Machiavelli, Discourses, Book I, Chapter I, 102. 7. P. Bondonella and M. Musa, The Portable Machiavelli (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books 1979) 23. 8. Robert E. Osgood and Robert W. Tucker, Force, Order and Justice (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press 1967) 266-7. 9. Edmund Burke, Works and Correspondence of Edmund Burke (London: Francis and John Rivington 1852) Vol. 4, 446. 10. Burke, Works,461. 11. Ibid. 12. Ibid., 458. 13. Niebuhr, The Nature and Destiny ofMan, vol. 2, 155-6, 190. 14. Ibid., vol. 2, 80. 15. Ibid., vol. 2, 255-6, 256; Niebuhr, Faith and History 94, 123,232-3. 16. Ibid., vol. 2, 2. 17. Niebuhr, Faith and History, 105. 18. Ibid. 105. Notes 163

19. Niebuhr, Moral Man, xxiv. 20. The Nature and Destiny ofMan, vol. 1,221-2. 21. Ibid., vol. I, 222. 22. Niebuhr, Moral Man , 85. 23. Ibid., 87-8. 24. Ibid., 88. 25. Ibid., 89-91. 26. Ibid., 95-6. 27. Niebuhr, Faith and History, 108. 28. Niebuhr, Irony ofAmerican History, 2-3. 29. Niebuhr, Faith and History, 22. 30. If our 'principles of justice, ideally conceived and transcending the more dubious and ambiguous social realities . . . have an equivocal relation to the ideal of brotherhood, this twofold character is even more dubious . . . in the structures and systems, the organisations and mechanisms of so which these principles . .. are imperfectly embodied and made historically concrete', Niebuhr, The Nature and Destiny ofMan vol. 2, 259. 31. Ibid., vol. 2, 267. 32. Niebuhr, Man's Nature and His Communities, 22. 33. Niebuhr, Christian Realism and Political Problems, 75. 34. Niebuhr, The Nature and Destiny ofMan, vol. 2, 278. 35. Niebuhr, Faith and History, 102. 36. Niebuhr, Irony ofAmerican History, 143. 37. Niebuhr, Faith and History, 102. 38. Ernest W. Lefevre (ed.), The World Crisis and American Responsibility: Analyses by Reinhold Niebuhr (New York: Association Press 1958) 81. 39. Niebuhr, Irony ofAmerican History, 42. 40. Niebuhr, Structure ofNations and Empires, 299. 41. Ursula M. Niebuhr (ed.), Justice and Mercy (New York: Harper & Row 1974) v.

4 MORALITY AND THE STATE: JUST WAR

1. , Grounding for the Metaphysic of Morals, trans J. W. Ellington (Cambridge, MA: Hackett Publishing Company 1981). 2. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae (Cambridge: Blackfriars 1963-75). 3. For an introduction to utilitarianism and consequentialism, see J. D. Mabbott, An Introduction to Ethics (London: Hutchinson 1966); Samuel Schemer (ed.), Consequentialism andits Critics (Oxford: Oxford Univer­ sity Press 1988); Amarthya Sen and Bernard Williams (eds), Utilitarianism and Beyond (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1982). 4. Kant, Grounding, sections 1 and 2. 5. Ibid.. 7. 6. Terry Nardin, 'The Problem of Relativism in International Ethics ', Mil­ lenium: Journal ofInternational Studies vol. 18, no. 2 (1989) 155. 7. Bernard Williams , Morality: An Introduction to Ethics (Cambridge: Cam­ bridge University Press 1972) 97-9. 164 Notes

8. Nardin, 'The Problem of Relativism in International Ethics', 153. 9. Kant, 'On a Supposed Right to Tell a Lie from Altruistic Motives', in Critique of Practical Reason and Other Writings in Moral Philosophy, trans. and ed. Lewis White Beck (Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1949) 346-50. 10. Mabbott, An Introduction to Ethics, 24. 11. R. G. Peffer, Marxism, Morality and Social Justice (Princeton, NJ: Prin­ ceton University Press 1990) 185. 12. John Duns Scotus (1265--1308) provides an example of a wholly deonto­ logical morality. In one current of his thought, Scotus based moral rules on the revelation of God's will. God does not will a thing because it is good; rather, a thing is good because God wills it. In such a morality, consequences play no role. All acts which are wrong are wrong because they are forbidden . None is forbidden because it is wrong (has bad consequences). See C. R. S. Harris, Duns Scotus, vol. 2: The Philosophical Doctrines ofDuns Scotus (New York: Humanities Press 1959) 333-6. 13. Robert L. Holmes, On War and Morality (princeton, NJ: Princeton Uni­ versity Press 1989) 120. 14. James Turner Johnson, Can Modern War Be Just? (London: Yale Uni­ versity Press 1984) 29. 15. The major figures in this resurgence were the Catholic author ofMorality and Modern War (New York: Church Peace Union 1959); John Courtney Murray, and the Methodist Paul Ramsey, author of War and the Chris­ tian Conscience (Durham, NC: Duke University Press 1961). 16. For that debate, see John Langan S. J., 'The Just War Theory after the Gulf War', Theological Studies vol. 53, no. 1 (1 March 1992) 95-112; J. Bryan Hehir, 'Just War Theory in a Post-Cold War World', Journal of Religious Ethics 20:2 (Fall 1992) 237-59; John H. Yoder, 'Just War Tradition: Is It Credible?' Christian Century vol. 108, no. 9 (13 March 1991) 295--8. 17. F. H. Russell, The Just War in the Middle Ages (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1975) 292. 18. James Turner Johnson, Ideology, Reason and the Limitation of War: Religious and Secular Concepts 1200-1740 (princeton, NJ: Princeton Uni­ versity Press 1975). 19. Robert E. Osgood and Robert W. Tucker, Force, Order and Justice (London: Johns Hopkins University Press 1967) 213. 20. A point made by Yoder, 'Just War Tradition: Is It Credible?' Christian Century (13 March 1991) 108:9. 21. Osgood and Tucker, Force, Order and Justice 234. 22. Johnson, Ideology 8. 23. Ibid., 26. 24. Ibid., 203. 25. Yet there is an important connection between the ad bellum requirement of a wrongful aggressor and the restrictions of jus in bello, at least in Catholic thinking. This connection relates to the principle of double effect. The justification of killing found in just war theory rests on an incongruence between moral good and human ones, but it is not an accidental and unforeseen one. The principle of double effect permits Notes 165

killing where it is the foreseen but unintended side-effect of doing good, and where the good done outweighs the bad done. It permits the deliber­ ate killing ofhumans (a human evil) but seek a balancing ofhuman goods and human evils. If the balance is correct and sufficient human good is done, then the choice to take life is a wholly (morally) good one. Some human evils are produced , but no moral evil. The normally expected moral evil of producing human evils (killing) is not present because other human goods are produced by the same action and these other human goods outweigh the human evils of killing. There are three fundamental rules within the principle of double effect. The first is the rule of proportionality; the human good done must out­ weigh the human bad done. The second is the intentionality rule; one must intend only the good effect ofone's action and not the bad one. The third rule requires that the two effects be causally independent: the bad effect must not be the cause of the good effect; it must be only a contingent by-product of the good effect; or if the bad effect was the cause of the good effect, then one must not have intended to produce the bad effect as the means to the good effect. And because it is morally evil to intend to produce human evil, one cannot use human bad as the means to human good (when that human bad is the ultimate one of killing). Yet in war, even in a justified war of self-defence, the killing (even when it is necessary and the last resort) is the means to the achievement of the good effect. Killing is not unintended nor is it causally independ­ ent of successful defence. Catholic just war theorists get out of this problem by claiming that the intentionality on the part of the attacker, being itself evil, removes the right to life that he otherwise has. This is the crucial role played by the ad bellum requirement of a 'wrongful aggressor'. A person's right to life is inviolable but, once he chooses to do evil, he is held to lose this right and can thus be treated as a means to an end. If one party, in lawfully pursuing his aims, infringes on those of another, the latter party cannot treat the former as an aggressor. There must be the moral evil of a choice to do human evil. The rise in relativism, and the shift towards jus in bello thus present major difficulties as regards the traditional just war theory. The ad bellum requirement of a wrongful aggressor was crucial to Catholic just war theory; if it is found to be indeterminate, and or abandoned altogether on the grounds of relativism, then a central element of the traditional justification of deliberate killing has been lost. 26. Osgood and Tucker, Force, Order and Justice, 213. 27. Paul Ramsey, The Just War (London: University Press of America 1968); Michael Walzer, Just and Unjust Wars, 2nd edn (New York: Basic Books 1992). 28. 'In this principle of discrimination there are two ingredients. One is the prohibition of' "deliberate, direct attack". This is the immutable unchan­ ging ingredient in the definition of justice in war . . . .The second ingredi­ ent is the meaning of "non-combatancy", This is relativistic and varying in application. "Non-combatancy" is a function of how the nations or the forces are organised for war, and of military technology'; Ramsey, The Just War, 502. 166 Notes

29. The problems with the weak Machiavellian position are recognised by Stuart Hampshire who adopts the argument that if one is in a position of political responsibility then one is justified in suspending the operation of intrinsic values in one's political acts if that is the only way to maintain the preconditions for the implementation of intrinsic values in people's lives. Hampshire imposes the limitation that, if one can maintain stability only by actions which rule out minimum standards of justice, then the suspension is not justified. Hampshire realises that one must be able to differentiate a short-run suspension of values (in order to secure the preconditions for the realisation of those values) from the never-ending short-term where the values never get implemented. One can justify a different morality for politics on the same basis of individual morality if and only if one can show that the conditions for the suspension of individual values are limited. If they are not limited, then one gets a permanently bifurcated morality and political expediency becomes uncon­ ditio nal. Hampshire recognises the problem but does not solve it; his limitation concerning minimum standards of justice hardly yields clear and applicable criteria. See Hampshire, Innocence and Experience (Lon­ don: Penguin Books 1989).

5 MORALITY AND THE STATE: NIEBUHR

I. Reinhold Niebuhr, Moral Man and Immoral Society: A Study in Ethics and Politics (New York : Charles Scribner's Sons 1932) 271. 2. Niebuhr, 'Ten Years That Shook My World', The Christian Century (26 April 1939) 544. 3. Niebuhr, Moral Man, 272; Niebuhr, The Irony ofAmerican History, 42. 4. Niebuhr, The Nature and Destiny ofMan vol. 2, 88. 5. Paul Ramsey, in Kegley and Bretall (eds.), Reinhold Niebuhr, 113. 6. Niebuhr, Moral Man, 270-1. 7. Ibid., 259. 8. Ibid., 258. 9. This criticism is made by Emil Brunner, in Kegley and Bretall (eds.), Reinhold Niebuhr, 30. John C. Bennett also perceives this problem and describes, as the missing link in Niebuhr's social ethics, his failure to provide an adequate method of relating the perfectionist norm of love to the social situation: Bennett, in Kegley and Bretall (eds.), Reinhold Niebuhr, 58-9. 10. Niebuhr, An Interpretation ofChristian Ethics (London: Student Christian Movement Press 1936) 108 and 149. 11. H. R. Davis and R. C. Good (eds.), Reinhold Niebuhr on Politics: His Political Philosophy and Its Application to Our Age as Expressed in His Writings (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons 1958) 134. 12. Niebuhr, The Godly and the Ungodly(London: Faber and Faber 1958)140. 13. Niebuhr, quoted in June C. Bingham, Courage to Change: An Introduction to the Life and Thought of Reinhold Niebuhr (New York : Charles Scrib­ ner's Sons 1961) 199. Notes 167

14. Robertson (ed.), Love and Justice, 32. 15. Daniel F. Rice Reinhold Niebuhr and John Dewey: an American Odyssey (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press 1993) 6. 16. Niebuhr does not believe it possible for humans to act always in accord­ ance with the norm of Christian perfectionism; he went so far in an interview as to claim that 'Only mothers, martyrs, mystics and monastics can perform acts of self-sacrifice'; Niebuhr and Morgenthau, 'The Ethics of War and Peace in the Nuclear Age', War Peace Report, vol. 7, no. 2 (February 1967). 17. Niebuhr, Moral Man, 174. 18. Ibid., 179. 19. Ibid., 173. 20. Ibid., 174. 21. Ibid., 171. 22. Ibid., 175. 23. Ibid., 171. 24. Niebuhr, Interpretation of Christian Ethics, 76-7. 25. Rasmussen (ed.), Reinhold Niebuhr, 205. 26. Ibid., 207. 27. H. R. Davis and R. C. Good (eds), Reinhold Niebuhr on Politics: His Political Philosophy and Its Application to Our Age as Expressed in His Writings (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons 1960) 168. 28. Angus Dun and Reinhold Niebuhr, 'God Wills Both Justice and Peace', 77. The article was a reply to Peace is the Will ofGod: A Testimony to the World Council of Churches issued by the Continuation Committee of the Historic Peace Churches in Europe in 1953. 29. On Niebuhr's attitudes, and services, to Catholicism, see James V. Schall, 'The Political Theory of Reinhold Niebuhr', Thought vol. 33, no. 128 (Spring 1958) 62-80. 30. Dun and Niebuhr, 'God Wills Both Justice and Peace', 77. 31. Davis and Good (eds), Reinhold Niebuhr on Politics, 168. 32. Rasmussen (ed.), Reinhold Niebuhr, 199. 33. Niebuhr, Interpretation of Christian Ethics, 144. 34. Rasmussen (ed.), Reinhold Niebuhr, 211. 35. Niebuhr, Interpretation of Christian Ethics, 205. 36. Niebuhr, Moral Man , 171. 37. Niebuhr, Interpretation of Christian Ethics, 205. 38. Ibid., 205. 39. Niebuhr, Children ofLight, 181. 40. Niebuhr, Interpretation of Christian Ethics, 207. 41. Ibid., 196. 42. Robertson (ed.), Love and Justice, 49. 43. Ibid ., 48. 44. Niebuhr, The Nature and Destiny ofMan vol. 2, 259. 45. Robertson (ed.), Love and Justice, 49-50. 46. Rasmussen (ed.), Reinhold Niebuhr, 139. 47. Niebuhr, The Godly and the Ungodly, 62. 48. Niebuhr, Moral Man , 237-8 . 49. Niebuhr, Irony ofAmerican History, 5. 168 Notes

50. Rasmussen (ed.), Reinhold Niebuhr, 128. 51. Niebuhr, 'Halfway to What?' The Nation no. 170 (14 January 1950) 28. 52. In fact, non-omniscience is a problem for most moralists whether con­ sequentialist or legalist; only the extreme legalism like that suggested by John Duns Scotus (which operates on the basis of revelation or biblical literalism) can escape this problem of limited knowledge of the con­ sequences of our actions; see Chapter 4, n. 12. 53. Discerning the Times, 91. 54. Ibid., 96. 55. Niebuhr, Structure ofNations and Empires, 298. 56. As a consequentialist, Niebuhr could rule out in advance the use of any means including nuclear weapons: 'The notion that the excessiveviolence of atomic warfare has ended the possibility of a just war does not stand up ... While the avoidance of excessive and indiscriminate violence [remains a moral imperative] in a just war, it does not seem possible to draw a line in advance, beyond which it would be better to yield than to resist'; Angus Dun and Reinhold Niebuhr, 'God Wills Both Justice and Peace', 78. 57. Niebuhr, Discerning the Times, 93. 58. Niebuhr, Reflections on the End ofan Era, 246--7. 59. Niebuhr, Faith and History, 146. 60. Robertson (ed.), Love and Justice, 222. 61. Niebuhr, quoted in Bingham, Courage to Change, 149. 62. Rasmussen (ed.), Reinhold Niebuhr, 191. 63. This is a second point of agreement between Niebuhr and the Christian pacifist John Yoder and is an implication of the first: Niebuhr's and Yoder's shared perfectionist interpretations of the ethic of Jesus. Yoder, however, draws a different conclusion from the inevitable guilt of histor­ ical action: that Christians should not seek to control history but rather rely on the reign of Jesus in the Church ; Original Revolution, 65.

6 NIEBUHR'S ETHIC OF INTERNATIONAL POLITICS

1. John C. Bennett, in Harold R. Landon (ed.), Reinhold Niebuhr: A Pro­ phetic Voice in Our Time (Greenwich, Ct: Seabury Press 1962) 60. 2. In Charles W. Kegley and Robert W. Bretall (eds), Reinhold Niebuhr: His Religious, Social and Political Thought (New York : Macmillan 1956) 168. 3. Landon (ed.), Reinhold Niebuhr, 50. 4. Harold R. Landon, in Landon (ed.), Reinhold Niebuhr, 22. 5. Niebuhr, 'Moralists and Politics', The Christian Century 49 (6 July 1932) 857. 6. Niebuhr, The Contribution ofReligion to Social Work (New York: Colum- bia University Press 1932) 92. 7. Niebuhr, Moral Man , 234. 8. Morgenthau, in Landon (ed.), Reinhold Niebuhr, to2. 9. Niebuhr, Reflections on the End ofan Era, 232. to. Niebuhr, Moral Man, 231. Notes 169

I I. Ibid., 23I. 12. Ibid., 233. 13. Niebuhr, 'The Good People of Britain', Radical Religion vol. 4, no. 3 (Summer 1939) 7. 14. Niebuhr, 'Our Responsibilities in 1942', Christianity and Crisis vol. 1, no. 24 (12 January 1942) I. 15. Niebuhr, 'Streaks of Dawn in the Night' , Christianity and Crisis vol. 9, no. 21 (12 December 1942) 162. 16. Niebuhr, in Emest W. Lefever (00.), The World Crisis and American Responsibility: Analyses by Reinhold Niebuhr (New York: Association Press 1958) 40. 17. Larry Rasmussen (ed.), Reinhold Niebuhr: Theologian of Public Life (London: Collins 1988) 125. 18. Niebuhr, Man's Nature and his Communities, 54. 19. Reported by Kenneth W. Thompson, 'Toward a Theory ofIntemational Politics', American Political Science Review, vol. 49 (1955) 741. 20. Niebuhr, Moral Man, 175. 21. Paul Merkeley, Reinhold Niebuhr: A Political Account (London: McGill­ Queens University Press 1975) 118. 22. Niebuhr, 'The Marshall Plan', Christianity and Crisis vol. 7, no. 17 (13 October 1947) 2. 23. Niebuhr, Christianity and Society, vol. 12, no. 4 (Autumn 1947), 3. 24. Niebuhr, 'Repeal the Neutrality Act!', Christianity and Crisis vol. I (October 20 1941) 1-2. He saw Lend-Lease as a shrewd and politically dexterous response to the two contradictory impulses which drove US policy since the start of the war: to aid Britain in defeating Germany and to stay out of the war. See Niebuhr, 'The Necessity of Decision', Chris­ tianity and Crisis vol. I, no. 9 (2 June 1941), 1-2. 25. In December 1941, he wrote: 'History has overtaken us while we were still debating whether or not we should assume the obligations toward which history pointed ... our past unwillingness to face facts will now exact a terrible toll as we gird ourselves for a grim, and probably long, struggle'; 'We Are At War', Christianity and Crisis vol. I, no. 23 (29 December 1941) 2. 26. Niebuhr, Europe's Catastrophe and Christian Faith (London: Nisbet 1930) 40. Niebuhr's warning against pride and pure self-interest in intemational relations were also a feature of his writings on the Intemational Military Tribunal in Nuremburg. He approved of the war crimes trials but urged much greater 'restraint upon the pride of the powerful and victorious nations' and warned that the trials would be more successful if 'we remember that the decisions of men and nations who are "judges in their own case" are viewed with considerable cynicism by those who are too weak to defy such judgements'. He opposed any policies such as the 'angry economics' of Roosevelt's Secretary of the Treasury Henry J Morgenthau Jr which called for the de-industrialisation or dismember­ ment or 'wholesale destruction' of Germany (Niebuhr, 'A Lecture to Liberals', The Nation [10 November 1945], 491-3). His opposition was based on a characteristic combination of moral and prudential reasoning: such policies were the product of a thirst for vengeance; such policies 170 Notes

would prove right the Nazi propaganda that allies wanted to destroy Germany and result in bitterness; such policies would also result in Europe as a whole suffering (Niebuhr, 'Victor's Justice', Common Sense vol. 15, no. 1 [January 1946], 6-9). He approved of the concept of crimes of humanity but came out against making aggressive war a crime. He pointed out that there was no international law which made aggressive war a crime and that it would be 'dubious' to make it a crime ex post facto: 'In our victorious pride, we put ourselves in the wrong against these criminals and give them a chance to accuse us of displaying flagrantly partial justice' (Niebuhr, 'Victor's Justice', Common Sense vol. 15, no. 1 [January 1946], 6-9). Writing in 1961 about the Eichman trial, he denied Israel's right to try the former Nazi but also rejected the suggestion of an international court: 'The Nuremburg trials give us no cause for confidence in internationally conducted criminal trials' (Nie­ buhr, 'The Eichman Trial', Christianity and Crisis vol. 21, no. 5 [3 April 1961], 47-48). 27. Niebuhr, 'Repeal the Neutrality Act!', Christianity and Crisis vol. 1 (20 October 1941), 1. 28. Niebuhr, 'Repeal the Neutrality Act!', 1. 29. June C. Bingham, Courage to Change: An Introduction to the Life and Thought ofReinhold Niebuhr (New York: Scribners 1961) 384. 30. Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan, ed. C. B. MacPherson (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books 1982) 186. 31. See lain Hampsher-Monk, A History ofModern Political Thought: Major Political Thinkers from Hobbes to Marx (Oxford: Blackwell 1992) 25. 32. Hobbes, Leviathan, Part 1, Chapters 14-15 , 189-214. 33. Niebuhr, Discerning the Signs of the Times: Sermons for Today and Tomorrow (London: Student Christian Movement Press 1946) 51 and 48. 34. Niebuhr, in Nils Ehrenstrom et al., Christian Faith and the Common Life (London: George Allen and Unwin 1938) 69-70. 35. A source in Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's office, quoted in the Guardian Weekly (3 November 1996) 4. 36. The term comes from eschaton, the last thing, the end which imparts to life a meaningfulness which it would not other wise have. Eschatology is thus a doctrine of that which is ultimate; it is 'a hope which, defying present frustration, defines a present position in terms of the yet unseen goal which gives it meaning' (Yoder, The Original Revolution, 53). The charge of an inadequate eschatology is made against Niebuhr by Yoder. To Yoder, Niebuhr seeks to control history rather than relying on the reign of Jesus in the church. To this, Yoder could add that Niebuhr not only seeks to control history, he seeks rewards within history too . 37. David Gauthier gives a broader version of the Hobbesian argument which is similar to that implicit in Niebuhr (though, like Hobbes , Gauthier is concerned with individuals and not with states). Gauthier aims to show that one can argue, on Hobbesian premises, for cooperation on more than just stability and security. One can argue for justice as well as peace on the grounds of self-interest. See David Gauthier, Morals By Agreement (Oxford: Clarendon Press 1986). Notes 171

38. Friedrich Meinecke, Die Idee der Staatsrdson in der Neuren Geschichte (Munich: R. Oldenbourg Verlag, 1924), trans . by Douglas Scott as Machiavellism : The Doctrine of Raison D'Etat and its Place in Modern History, with an introduction by William Stark (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul 1984). The choice of the term Machiavellism for the title is curious as Meinecke distinguishes clearly between Machiavellism and Staatsrdson in the course of the work and sees Machiavellism as a nar­ rower and simpler notion than Staatsrdson or raison d'etat or state necessity. See Meinecke, Machiavellism , 140. 39. Ibid., 433. 40. Hans J. Morgenthau, Politics in the Twentieth Century, vol. 3 (London: University of Chicago Press 1962) 15. 41. Niebuhr, 'Plans for World Reorganisation', Christianity and Crisis, vol. 2, no. 17 (19 October 1942), 4. 42. Niebuhr, 'The Christian Perspective on the World Crisis', Christianity and Crisis, vol. 4, no. 7 (1 May 1944), 2-5. 43. A comment on Kennan's American Diplomacy 1900-1950 in Editorial Notes, Christianity and Crisis, vol. 11, no. 18 (29 October 1951), 139. 44. Niebuhr, 'The Two Sources of Western Culture', in Edmund Fuller (ed.), The Christian Idea ofEducation (New Haven, CT: Press 1957) 241; see also Niebuhr, 'The Christian Perspective on the World Crisis', Christianity and Crisis, vol. 4, no. 7 (1 May 1944),2-5. 45. Niebuhr, The Christian Idea ofEducation, 241. 46. Rice, Reinhold Niebuhr and John Dewey, 119.

CONCLUSIONS:A PRAGMATIC APPROACH TO JUST WAR

1. Niebuhr, 'Ten Years that Shook My World', The Christian Century vol. 56, (26 April 1939),544. 2. Religiously, Niebuhr was a liberal, though he may appear as a conservat­ ive with his emphasis on original sin and the classic Protestant sources of Paul, Augustine and the Reformation. But, in his religion as in his politics, Niebuhr was really a liberal Christian of a realist bent. He rejected Christian pessimism, Christian literalism and the consequent clash with science; see Europe's Catastrophe and Christian Faith (London: Nisbet, 1940). Most significantly, Niebuhr was a liberal Christian in his concentration on the law of love as the final norm and the only absolute, though his liberalism was coloured by his realism in describing that absolute as an 'impossible possibility', Niebuhr, 'Ten Years That Shook My World', 544. 3. Ibid., 545. 4. Niebuhr, Man 's Nature and His Communities, intro. 5. June C. Bingham, Courage to Change (New York: Scribners 1961) 342. 6. Fox, Reinhold Niebuhr, 295. 7. Ibid.,200. 8. Merkeley, Reinhold Niebuhr, 183. 9. Ernest W. Lefevre (ed.), The World Crisis and American Responsibility: Analyses by Reinhold Niebuhr (New York: Association Press 1958) 3. 172 Notes

10. Fox, Reinhold Niebuhr, 295. 11. See William Lee Miller, 'The Irony of Reinhold Niebuhr', Reporter (13 January 1955) 11-14. 12. Speer sees a paradox in Niebuhr's stressing the urgency of reform domes­ tically and the futility of it internationally; James P. Speer, 'Reinhold Niebuhr Plays Hamlet', The Christian Century vol. 84, no. 11 (15 March 1967), 337. 13. Craig Campbell, 'The New Meaning of Modem War in the Thought of Reinhold Niebuhr', Journal ofthe History ofIdeas 53:4 (1992) 687. 14. Miller points to this irony that the vehemence of Niebuhr's criticisms of liberalism meant that he inadvertently helped to boost the conservative position: Miller, 'The Irony of Reinhold Niebuhr', (1955) 11-14. 15. Lovin , Reinhold Niebuhr and Christian Realism, 169. 16. Fox, Reinhold Niebuhr, 227-31. 17. Cornel West takes a different angle on Niebuhr's contribution: 'a vague mismash of democratic socialism and prophetic religion held together by a pragmatist stress on human creative powers .. . an attempt to salvage Emersonian theodicy for a distraught middle-class numbed by depression and war'; Cornel West, The American Evasion of Philosophy (Madison, WI : University of Wisconsin Press 1989) 159, 161. 18. Kennan reported that Niebuhr had no impact on the PPS because his political views were unexceptional in that company. Fox sees vanity on both sides: Niebuhr 'basked in the aura of high affairs of state' while Kennan and Dean Acheson 'lingered briefly in the presence of a celebrity intellectual' Fox, Reinhold Niebuhr, 239. 19. Ibid., 254. 20. Ibid., 275. 21. Vietnam is a prime example of the pragmatism of Niebuhr's ethical judgements on politics and war and of how, as a consequence, he could change his mind on practical political issues. In 1962 he came out against involvement and thought it a 'mistake to commit our prestige unqualif iedly to the defence of this nation' (Niebuhr, 'Can Democracy Work?', New Leader 45 [28 May 1962],9). Diem was too corrupt and the political situation in Vietnam was too serious to warrant US support. By 1963 he had moved to supporting limited US aid (economic aid and military advisers): 'If we withdraw, the Communists will overrun the whole of S. E. Asia' (Niebuhr, 'The Problem of South Vietnam', Christianity and Crisis [5 August 1963], 143). As late as 1965 he still thought the United States justified: 'we cannot criticise the Administration for failing to solve an impossible problem' (Niebuhr, 'Vietnam: an Insoluble Problem', Chris­ tianity and Crisis [8 February 1965], 1-2). By 1966 he was against the war again and criticised the 'pretense that we are helping a small nation preserve its independence', though he still believed that 'our military presence is obviously necessary in Asia' (Nie­ buhr, 'Reinhold Niebuhr Discusses the War in Vietnam', New Republic [29 January 1966], 16). In 1967 he was put his opposition on record: 'I do not think that the Vietnam war is justified' and refused to back Hubert Humphrey because ofthe issue (Niebuhr and Morgenthau, 'The Ethics of War and Peace in the Nuclear Age', War Peace Report, vol. 7, no. 2 Notes 173

[February 1967)). He pointed to the ironies that the 'liberation' was destroying Vietnam, that the US was ideologically anti-imperialist, and that it was only America's 'plutocratic wealth allows us to commit these stupidities in international relations' (Niebuhr, 'Vietnam: Study in Iron­ ies', New Republic [24 June 1967], 12). What is clear is the pragmatism of Niebuhr's political outlook and the absence of overt moral statements in his discussion of the issue. It should be no surprise that Niebuhr's argument against the war was based primarily on pragmatic political and strategic judgements: that Vietnam was not vital to the non-communist cause, that analogies with Munich were unfounded, that bombing North Vietnam was not achieving the goal of stopping the flow of supplies, that US public opinion was turning against the war. As a consequentialist, Niebuhr looked at circum­ stances, probable outcomes and available alternatives to see if war was justified in this case. His Christian realism, however, did lead him to see the pride of an imperial nation as the main (though unconscious) motive for US escalation of the war. He also made use of two just war criteria in his evaluation: the requirements of strategic proportionality and of a reasonable chance of success. US involvement in Vietnam failed on both counts. The war did not have a good prospect of success, and the 'means were not proportionate to the ends, either in blood or money, in Vietnam' (Ronald H. Stone, 'An Interview with Reinhold Niebuhr', Christianity and Crisis [17 March 1969], 50). 22. Niebuhr, 'The Twilight of Liberalism', New Republic (14 June 1919),218. 23. Niebuhr, Man 's Nature and His Communities (London: GeotTrey Bles 1966) 16. 24. 'It is not that the young person is necessarily more imaginative, more creative in his mind, than the mature or old person, but that he is more apt to take his imagination seriously, to expect much closer and evident links to exist between his imagination and the real conditions of his life, to "realise" his ideals, to set out in earnest to translate his imagination into actual practice. This is because, in a very relevant sense, the young person has nothing else but his imagination; his experi­ ences, whether good or bad, frustrating or encouraging, are sparse and undigested'. Berki, On Political Realism (London: J. M. Dent 1981) 233. 25. Ibid., 35. 26. Ibid ., 27-8 . 27. Niebuhr, Christian Realism and Political Problems, 74. 28. Robertson (ed.), Love and Justice, 248. 29. Angus Dun and Reinhold Niebuhr, 'God Wills Both Justice and Peace', Christianity and Crisis 15, (13 June 1955) 77. Some commentators classify him not as a just war thinker but as a realist: John Yoder, 'Reinhold Niebuhr and Christian Pacifism', Mennonite Quarterly Review vol. 29, no. 2 (1956), 101-17, and 'How many Ways Are There to Think Morally About War?', Journal of Law and Religion vol. 11, no. 1 (1994) 83-107; and D. Stephen Long, 'Ramseyian Just War and Yoderian Pacifism: Where is the Disagreement?', Studies in Christian Ethics vol. 4, no. I (1991),58-72. 174 Notes

30. 'In all that I have ever written on the morality of war I have been quite consciously drawing upon a wider theory of statecraft and of political justice to propose an extension within the Christian realism of Reinhold Niebuhr - an added note within his "responsibilistic" ethics. There is more to be said about justice in war than was articulated in Niebuhr's sense of the ambiguities of politics and his greater/lesser evil argument on the use of force. That more is the principle of discrimination; and I have tried to trace out the meaning of this as well as the meaning of dispropor­ tion in kinds ofwarfare that Niebuhr never faced'; Paul Ramsey, The Just War (London: University Press of America 1968) 260. 31. Ibid., 502-3. 32. Ibid., 28. 33. Ibid., 486. 34. Michael Walzer, Just and Unjust Wars, 2nd edn (New York : Basic Books 1992) preface. 35. Mary C. Smith Fawzi and Sarah Ziadi, 'Sanctions, Saddam and Silence: Child Malnutrition and Mortality in Iraq', Washington Report on Middle East Affairs vol. 14, no. 6 (1 January 1996), 13. Bibliography

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Carr, E.H., 10 Kant, Immanuel, 71-9 consequentialism, 71-3, 75-9, 88, Kennan, George, 8,9, 139, 144. 144n 103-17, 116n, 120 Kissinger, Henry, 15 conservatism, 143-5 Kuwait, 82,84.89, 151, 153;see also constraint, 12, 54-8, 65-6 Desert Storm deontology, 71-5, 77-9 Lend-Lease Act, 129n Desert Storm, 81-2,87,89, 151, 153; legalism, 79-81,85-6,95, 103-4, see also Kuwait 111 Detroit, 2-3, 7 liberalism, discrimination, principle of, 89-90, political, 36-7,51, 141-2 89n, 152 religious, 141n double effect, principle of, 87n Liberal Party, 36 dualism, 95-103 love, 25-7, 48-49, 96-103, 109, 119 Dun, Bishop Angus, 107 Machiavelli, Niccolo, 54-6, 69-70 Eichman, Adolf, 129n Machiavellism, 89,90-4, 93n, eschatology, 135, 135n 108-9 Evangelical Synod of North Manchuria, 34 America, 2n Marshall Plan, 128, 144 Fellowship of Reconciliation, 22, 35 Marxism, 7, 19,22,35-7, 142 force, 50 Meinecke, Friedrich, 137, 137n Moore, G.E., 78 Gandhi, Mohandas K., 25-7,3On moral goods, 71-2 Gauthier, David, 136n morality, 129 German Evangelical Synod, 2 Moral Man and Immoral Society, 7, Gifford Lectures, 33, 36 29, 30, 32-4, 103

179 180 Index

Morgenthau, Hans J., 9, 10, 17, 123, Ramsey, Paul, 89, 89n, 149n, 149-51 137 realism, Morgenthau, Henry J., 129n Christian,S, 19,95-103, 130-4 Mussolini, Benito, 35 political, 9-13, 12n, 19, 54, 95, 112, 127, 145-8, 146n national interest, 125-30, 139 Roosevelt, Franklin Delano, 4 Nazism, 19, 35 Ruhr, 20 necessity of state, argument of, 56-8, 90-4 St Thomas Aquinas, 71-2,79-80, neo-orthodox theology, 32,32n 82, 84, 86 Neutrality Act, 128 St Augustine, 44-5,82, 83-4, 86 noncombatant immunity, principle Scheiermacher, F.D., 2,5 of, 89-90,89n, 152 Scotus, John Duns, 80n, 116n nonmoral (human) goods, 71-2 selfishness of nations, 62-6 non-omniscience, 116-17, 116n Socialist Party, 4, 36, 142 non-resistance, 25-27 non-violent resistance, 25-7 Thomas, Norman, 4 nuclear weapons, 116n Tillich, Paul, 19-20, 121 tactical, IS tragic view of politics, 117-20 Nuremburg Trials, 129n Union for Democratic Action, 142 order, 49-50, 110--13 United Church of Christ, 2n original sin, 38-42, 182 utilitarianism, 77-81, 114-16 pacifism, 19-37, 97 Versailles Peace Treaty, 20 Pascal, Blaise, 40 Vietnam war, 2, 15, 143, 145, 145n, Pearl Harbor, 19, 129 149, ISO perfectionism, Christian, 95-103, violence, moral limits on, 28-9 103n, 130-4 pessimism, 11-12, 37, 44-8 Walzer, Michael, 89, 151 Policy Planning Staff, 144, 144n political theory, 13n, 13-18, 147-8 Yoder, John H., 25, 25n, 120n, 135n, power, 51-3 140 pragmatism, 113-16