Conspiring with the Enemy: The Ethic of Cooperation in Warfare (by Yvonne Chiu)

Session Submission Type: Author meet critics

Session Description

Although military mores have relied primarily on just war theory, the ethic of cooperation in warfare—between enemies even as they are trying to kill each other—is as central to the practice and morality of warfare. War is rife with contradiction, and its chaos coexists alongside orderliness and rules. Neither game theory nor unilateral moral duties (God-given, human rights-derived, or otherwise) can comprehensively explain the explicit language and practices of cooperation in developing and enforcing principles of military ethics and the law of armed conflict, often even to one’s own detriment and in ways that can make it harder to win the war.
This “author meets critics” panel explores Yvonne Chiu’s book Conspiring with the Enemy: The Ethic of Cooperation in Warfare (Columbia University Press, 2019), which offers an original perspective on warfare ethics. Most contemporary just war theory and military ethics focus on explicating the rights that are owed to and duties incurred by individuals or groups. This book explores instead the equally, if not more, influential normative force of convention on warfare, which has been overlooked.
Human history is in some ways the story of trying to concurrently wage and tame war, and this book explores three historical manifestations of this ethic of cooperation in warfare: (1) for a “fair fight,” (2) to protect classes of individuals (e.g., non-combatants or prisoners of war), and (3) to end the war quickly. Cooperation ranges from ad hoc decisions on the battlefield to institutionalization in international law, and influences the very architecture of modern warfare. Recognizing the ethic of cooperation’s existence and features is essential because it generates some critical tensions in contemporary war, especially how to handle terrorism or other forms of warfare that lie outside the purview of international law and its cooperative framework.
This panel will discuss the various manifestations of the ethic of cooperation in warfare, their underlying complex of motivations (reciprocity, self-preservation, and efficiency, but also warrior honor, virtue ethics and professional ethics, humanitarianism, and altruism), tensions within and between the different types of cooperation, how their well-meaning motivations often lead to tragic unintended consequences, and their implications for the boundaries of justice and international law in contemporary warfare challenges such as terrorism and guerrilla fighting.
The critics bring a broad range of expertise in political and moral philosophy, just war theory, global governance, global justice, international criminal law, national security, political conflict, comparative history, social movements, and historical and philosophical methodology: Michael Walzer (Emeritus Professor of Social Science, Institute for Advanced Study); David Luban (University Professor, Professor of Law and Philosophy, Georgetown University Law Center), Jack Goldstone (Hazel Professor of Public Policy, George Mason University), and Barbara Buckinx (Associate Research Scholar, Lecturer, Woodrow Wilson School, Princeton University). The author, Yvonne Chiu (Visiting Scholar, Goldman School of Public Policy, UC Berkeley), writes on just war theory, military ethics, international affairs, and authoritarianism.

Sub Unit

• DIVISION 3: Normative Political Theory

Chair

• Margaret Moore Queens University

Presenters

• Michael Walzer Institute for Advanced Study

• David Jay Luban Georgetown University

• Jack A. Goldstone George Mason University

• Barbara Buckinx Princeton University

• Yvonne Chiu University of California, Berkeley