Abstract
Despite recent cracks in the dominant Hobbesian world picture of international relations (IR) – as the resurgence of neo-Kantianism in the area of ‘global justice’ bears witness – a discussion of friendship still remains absent. This article focusses on the important debate concerning the possibility of a global ‘difference principle’: that principle which John Rawls in A Theory of Justice considers an ‘expression of fraternity’ between citizens. Although in his later work Rawls explicitly denies that his difference principle applies worldwide and between ‘people’, others (most famously Charles Beitz and Thomas Pogge) defend a global version of it nonetheless. Yet, there is no talk of fraternity by these latter thinkers. I argue that both these positions are mistaken. Not only is an analysis of friendship necessary for any adequate account of justice – whether domestic or global – but the form this political friendship takes emerges as critical to the substantive debate.
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Notes
For just some examples, see Beitz, 1979; Pogge, 1989, 2001, 2002; Rawls, 1971, 1999; Wendt, 1999; O’Neill, 2000; Gould, 2004; Brock and Moellendorf, 2005.
For instance, Deutsch, 1957; Adler and Barnett, 1998; Wendt, 1999; Kacowicz et al, 2000; Oelsner, 2007.
For my critique of the anti-globalization argument, see Schwarzenbach (2009, Chapter 8), where I argue that this group of thinkers overstates their case; integration need not be exploitation, even if at present it often is.
Even the (nearly all male) United Nations has recently called on the wealthy member nations to give 0.7 per cent of their GNP to end world hunger (2007). Granted such a call is ‘voluntary,’ but it clearly shows that many in the Third World desire to move in this direction and also think it feasible.
From 1990–2000, for example, two million children died in wars, roughly three times the total number of American soldiers killed throughout history (Jamieson, 2005, p. 155).
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Schwarzenbach, S. Fraternity and a global difference principle: A feminist critique of Rawls and Pogge. Int Polit 48, 28–45 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1057/ip.2010.40
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/ip.2010.40