Promoting Justice Across Borders

"This book develops a theory of the ethics of "reform intervention"-a category that includes any attempt to promote justice in a society other than one's own. It identifies several dimensions along which reform interventions can vary (the degree of control interveners exercise over recipients, the urgency of interveners' objectives, the costs an intervention poses to recipients, and how interveners interact with recipients' existing political institutions) and examines how these variations affect the moral permissibility of reform intervention. The book argues that, once one acknowledges the variety of forms reform intervention can take, it becomes clear that not all of them are vulnerable to the objections usually levelled against intervention. In particular, not all reform interventions treat recipients with intolerance, disrespect recipients' legitimate institutions, or undermine recipients' collective self-determination. Combining philosophical analysis and discussion of several real-world cases, the book investigates which kinds of reform intervention are or are not vulnerable to these objections. In so doing, it also develops new understandings of the roles toleration, legitimacy, and collective self-determination should play in global politics. After developing principles to specify when different kinds of reform interventions are morally permissible, the book investigates how these principles could be applied in the real world. Ultimately, it argues that some reform interventions are all-things-considered morally permissible and that sometimes reform intervention is morally required. It argues we should reconceive the ordinary boundaries of political activity and begin to see the pursuit of justice via political contestation as humanity's collective project"--

Global political actors, from states and NGOs to activist groups and individuals, exert influence in societies beyond their own in myriad ways--including via public criticism, consumer boycotts, divestment campaigns, sanctions, and forceful intervention. Often, they do so in the name of justice-promotion. While attempts to promote justice in other societies can do good, they are also often subject to moral criticism and raise several serious moral questions. For example, are there ways to promote one's own ideas about justice in another society while still treating its members tolerantly? Are there ways to do so without disrespecting their legitimate political institutions or undermining their collective self-determination? To understand the ethics of justice-promoting intervention, Lucia M. Rafanelli moves beyond the traditional focus of other scholarship in this area on states waging wars or employing other conventional tools of coercive foreign policy. Specifically, Rafanelli constructs a philosophically-grounded and nuanced ethics of intervention to determine when attempts to promote justice in foreign societies are morally permissible. Promoting Justice Across Borders develops ethical standards for justice-promoting intervention that call on us to rethink received notions about the ordinary bounds of politics, and to abandon the thought that politics does and should take place primarily within the state. These ethical standards also give us a model for how to engage in political struggles for justice on a global scale--not only in conditions of supreme emergency, but in the ordinary circumstances of everyday global politics. They therefore form the basis of a cosmopolitanism that is neither premised upon nor aimed at bringing about the end of politics. Ultimately, Rafanelli shows how the promotion of justice everywhere can be the legitimate (political) concern of people anywhere.

This book studies the struggle to enforce international human rights law in federal courts. In 1980, a federal appeals court ruled that a Paraguayan family could sue a Paraguayan official under the Alien Tort Statute – a dormant provision of the 1789 Judiciary Act – for torture committed in Paraguay. Since then, courts have been wrestling with this step toward a universal approach to human rights law. Davis examines attempts by human rights groups to use the law to enforce human rights norms. He explains the separation of powers issues arising when victims sue the United States or when the United States intervenes to urge dismissal of a claim and analyses the controversies arising from attempts to hold foreign nations, foreign officials, and corporations liable under international human rights law. While Davis's analysis is driven by social science methods, its foundation is the dramatic human story from which these cases arise.

In an increasingly globalised educational landscape, this book examines whether the principle of educational equality can be applied across nation state borders. Exploring the tension between the theory of educational equality and the reality that most educational institutions are rooted in local communities and national frameworks, the author thus probes the consequences for institutions, individuals and communities as the number of international students grows exponentially. A topic that has previously received limited attention, the author draws upon theoretical literature and an empirical study of how universities in the United Kingdom conceptualise and promote principles of educational equality for international as compared with home students. This pioneering work will be interest and value to students and scholars of international education, international students, educational equality and globalisation, as well as practitioners and policy makers.

The failure of current immigration policies in the United States has resulted in dire consequences: a significant increase in border deaths, a proliferation of smuggling networks, prolonged family separation, inhumane raids, a patchwork of local ordinances criminalizing activities of immigrants and those who harbor them, and the creation of an underclass--none of which are appropriate or just outcomes for those holding Christian commitments. Heyer analyzes immigration in the context of fundamental Christian beliefs about the human person, sin, family life, and global solidarity to illuminate the plight of and receptivity to undocumented immigrants in this country, particularly immigrants from Mexico. She demonstrates how current US immigration policies reflect harmful neoliberal economic priorities, and why immigration cannot be reduced to security or legal issues alone; rather, immigration involves a broad array of economic issues, trade policies, concerns of cultural tolerance and criminal justice, and, at root, an understanding of the human person. Grounded in scriptural, anthropological, and social teachings, a Christian ethic of immigration calls society to promote structures and practices reflecting kinship and justice. The person-centered approach Heyer proposes demands basic changes to systems and rhetoric that abet and disguise immigrants' exploitation and death, requiring enhanced human rights protections and respect for the rule of law. Central to this ethic is attentiveness to the lived experiences of immigrants and a theologically inspired summons to "subversive hospitality."

Justice Beyond Borders examines which political principles should govern global politics. It explores the ethical issues that arise at the global level and addresses questions such as: Are there universal values? If so, what are they? What human rights, if any, are there? Are there global principles of distributive justice? Should there be a system of supra-state institutions? Is national self-determination defensible? When, if ever, may political regimes wage war? Is humanitarian intervention justified? Justice Beyond Borders outlines and defends an egalitarian liberal brand of cosmopolitanism to address these questions. It maintains that there are universal principles. It argues, moreover, that these include universal civil and political human rights. It also defends the application of global principles of distributive justice. On this basis, it argues for a system of supra-state political institutions to further promote these universal principles of justice. Having set out principles of ideal theory, it then examines what principles should apply when injustices are committed. To do this it examines when political regimes may wage war and when they may engage in intervention. It thereby draws on cosmopolitan principles to derive and defend a cosmopolitan conception of just war and humanitarian intervention. To arrive at these conclusions, Justice Beyond Borders engages in a sustained analysis of the competing arguments on all the above issues, examining the arguments of nationalists, realists, and those who affirm the ideal of a society of states. It does so by exploring and integrating the work of philosophers, political theorists, and international relations scholars. It illustrates its ethical argument and theoretical analysis with empirical examples. Furthermore, Justice Beyond Borders argues that the issues examined in the book cannot be adequately treated in isolation from each other but must be treated as an interlinked whole.

'Coalitions Across Borders' examines aspects of transnational movements that mobilise in protest against the inequities of the neo-liberal international order.

The cosmopolitan idea of justice is commonly accused of not taking seriously the special ties and commitments of nationality and patriotism. This is because the ideal of impartial egalitarianism, which is central to the cosmopolitan view, seems to be directly opposed to the moral partiality inherent to nationalism and patriotism. In this book, Kok-Chor Tan argues that cosmopolitan justice, properly understood, can accommodate and appreciate nationalist and patriotic commitments, setting limits for these commitments without denying their moral significance. This book offers a defense of cosmopolitan justice against the charge that it denies the values that ordinarily matter to people, and a defence of nationalism and patriotism against the charge that these morally partial ideals are fundamentally inconsistent with the obligations of global justice. Accessible and persuasive, this book will have broad appeal to political theorists and moral philosophers.