Frdric Ramel is Professor of Political Science at the University Paris-Sud XI. He achieved a post-doctorate in Canada and
had been a teaching assistant at the University Jean Moulin Lyon 3 for years. His research interests include normative and
cultural change in international relations as well as the links between philosophy, sociology and international relations.
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aspect of security
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Frdric Ramel
They abandoned the idea of religious sin when Contribution to human security
defining cruelty. Not only did the French moralists
refuse religion (in response to the failure of Spanish There are some clear implications of this thought
policies on the New Continent) but also the moral on the discipline of human security, four of which
arguments made by Machiavelli. Cruelty was are discussed here:
instead a psychological feeling: "It is the deliberate
infliction of physical, and secondarily emotional, 1. The Harvard Program on Humanitarian Policy
pain upon a weaker person or group stronger ones Conflict Research, quoted at the beginning of this
in order to achieve some end, tangible or intangible, essay, defines human security as a people-centric
of the latter."12 Public cruelty could
concept. Similarly, Shklar, in her
not be explained by sadistic trends
towards the centricity of
"Fear is a result of inclination
because "it is made possible by
the people rather than of power, tends
the cruelty created to underline the function of politics
differences in public power and it is
almost always built into the system of by power ."
as a process against the perversion of
coercion upon which all governments
power in specific contexts. In political
have to fulfil their essential functions."13 Fear thus science, there are two different perspectives: topis an emotion linked with the presence of power down that insists on leaders and legitimation of
in modernity (or, in other words, the monopoly of power (e.g., Weber)20 or bottom-up that deals with
legitimate physical violence).14 Fear is a result of the the obedience of the people (La Boeties discourse
cruelty created by power. Fear from cruelty is not on servitude volontaire).21 Shklar does not focus on
anxiety (a normal fear against an external danger "power centricism", but professes instead a "people
or about human condition) but "fear of fear itself"15 centric" approach.
which inhibits people; as a result of which they
can neither express themselves, nor be free.16 The 2. Several States put people in jeopardy, and
idea underpinning the argument is that "cruelty [is] one has to be aware of some States that can
the summum malum, the most evil of all evils."17 clearly be a threat. Several analysts try to explain
such accumulation of power by mobilising the
4. Liberalism relies on an emotion (fear) and liberalism of fear (e.g., Ignatieff;22 Gourevitch).23
not on reason. It is an instinctive liberalism There are some differences, though, which this
and not a rational one; it is "based on common paper believes are not of much relevance. For
and immediate experiences" 18 that all people example, Shklar tackles strong States whereas
could share. Such liberalism is strong, even Ignatieff and Gourevich handle failed States. For
if it is not deeply implanted in human nature the latter, issues of ethnic warfare and culture are
conventionally defined by rational components. sources of fear while Shklar believes that it is
Shklars liberalism stems from Montesquieu and politics that creates fear. Of more interest, though,
Tocqueville. The risks of terror justify rule of law, a is the new dimension that Shklar introduces in
fragmented power, tolerance, social pluralism and Hobbes reasoning, as a result of which the reader
"a strong defense of equal rights and their legal is compelled to view the State as a source of
protection."19 This makes clear what Shklar meant fear. Shklar upholds the rule of law and rejects
by "freedom from fear." Politics relies on a struggle absolute and monarchical power. In this context,
against terror created by the development of strong human security should be a "frame of mind"
States that generate "fear of fear." While Hobbes sets that has its closest equivalent in Claude Leforts
up the idea of peace produced by social contracts concept of "savage democracy,"24 which demands
of submission by society with the State, Shklar that people ought to participate in civil debate.
argues that the State could be a source of fear itself.
3. Shklars school of thought also articulates
the notion of injustice.25 She makes a distinction
between misfortune and injustice: misfortune is
linked with external forces of nature, akin perhaps
30
31
Frdric Ramel
32
Conclusion:
political philosophy as a
new field for human security studies
33
Frdric Ramel
Notes
Leo Strauss, The Political Philosophy of Hobbes: its Basis and its Genesis (Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1963).
On the state of nature as a fiction, see Pasquale Pasquino, Thomas Hobbes : la condition naturelle de lhumanit Revue Franaise de Science Politique 2 (April 1994): 294-307.
3
See this study of fear in Corey Robin, Fear: The History of a Political Idea (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004).
4
The liberal interpretations of Hobbes underline this dimension because his philosophy aims at protecting above all else individuals and their rights even
against the State when it does not respect its function of security. Jean-Jacques Roche uses this interpretation in order to see in Hobbes the first philosopher of human security. Jean-Jacques Roche, Le ralisme face la scurit humaine, in Jean-Franois Rioux, ed., La Scurit humaine. Un nouveau
concept des relations internationales (Paris, Montral: LHarmattan, 2003), 57-71. Upholding an absolutist interpretation of Hobbes, Bertrand Badie
denies such fatherhood but he acknowledges the hobbesian influence on modern political practices in Europe and abroad. Bertrand Badie, Un monde sans
souverainet (Paris: Fayard, 1999).
5
Ulrich Beck has described this issue for several years.
6
Robert O. Keohane. The Globalization of Informal Violence, Theories of World Politics, and the liberalism of fear in Understanding 11 September,
ed. Craig Calhoun, Paul Price and Ashley Timmer, (New York: Social Science Research Council, September 2002).
7
Stanley Hoffmann, Judith Shklar as a Political Thinker in Liberalism Without Illusions: Essays on Liberal Theory and the Political Vision of Judith
N. Shklar, ed. Bernard Yack (Chicago & London: University of Chicago Press, 1996), 86.
8
Ibid, 82.
9
Judith Shklar, The Liberalism of Fear in Liberalism and the Moral Life, ed. Nancy Rosenblum, (Harvard: Harvard University Press, 1989), 21.
10
Ibid, 26-27.
11
Isaiah Berlin, Two Concepts of Liberty, Four Essays on Liberty (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1982), 118-172. According to him, the definition
of liberty is plural. Negative freedom is the mere fact of not beeing interfered with ones business whereas positive freedom is a wish for self-expression
to be somebody, not nobody (p. 131).
12
Judith Shklar, The Liberalism of Fear, 29.
13
Ibid.
14
This potentiality of modern power comes closer to Anthony Giddens explanation of totalitarism. Totalitarian regimes or systems are developed in modernity by the possibility of surveillance (Michel Foucaults notion) created by States. See Anthony Giddens, The Nation-State and Violence, (Cambridge:
Polity Press, 1987).
15
Judith Shklar, The Liberalism of Fear, 29. Julien Freund highlights the impact of imagination on this kind of fear. Julien Freund, La peur de la peur,
Actions et recherches sociales, 21, no. 4, (1985): 20.
16
Systematic fear is the condition that makes freedom impossible. Judith Shklar, The Liberalism of Fear, 29.
17
Judith Shklar, Putting Cruelties First, Daedelus, (1982), 12.
18
Shklar, The Liberalism of Fear, 32.
19
Ibid., 37.
20
Max Weber, Economy and Society: an Outline of Interpretive Sociology (New York: Bedminster Press, 1968).
21
Discours sur la servitude volontaire in Etienne de La Botie, uvres politiques (Paris: Ed. sociales, 1963)
22
Michael Ignatieff, Blood and Belonging: Journeys into the new Nationalism (London, Vintage, 1994)
23
Philip Gourevitch, We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will be Killed with Our Families: Stories from Rwanda (London: Picador, 1999).
24
Claude Lefort, Elements dune critique de la bureaucratie (Paris: Droz, 1971); Miguel Abensour, Dmocratie sauvage et principe danarchie, Revue
europenne des Sciences Sociales, 31, no. 97 (1993): 229-235.
25
Judith Shklar, The Faces of Injustice (New Haven: Tale University Press, 1990).
26
Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The Confessions in The Collected Writings of Rousseau, vol. 5 (Hanover: University Press of New England, 1995), Book I.
27
For instance, see the debate between Robert Meister and Catherine Lu in Ethics and International Affairs, 16, no. 2 (2002). See also paper by Giorgio
Baruchello, where he underlined a tradition of liberalism (especially in Beccaria) that conceived cruelty to be pertaining to the liberal organisation of
society: Baruchello, The Cruelty of Liberalism : An Essay on Judith Shklar, Richard Rorty, John Kekes and Cesare Beccaria, Philosophy and Social
Criticism, 30, no. 3 (2004): 303-313.
28
Judith Shklar, The Liberalism of Fear, 29.
29
Ibid., 31.
30
Ibid., 29.
31
Ibid., 34.
32
Amitav Acharya, in Imperfect Unions: Security Institutions over Time and Space, ed. Holga Hafterndorn and Robert O. Keohane (New York: Oxford
University Press, 1999), 55.
33
Amitav Acharya, Human Security East versus West, International Journal, LVI, no. 3, (Summer 2001): 442-460.
34
Amitav Acharya, Human Security, Identity Politics and Global Governance: From Freedom from Fear to Fear of Freedoms (paper presented at the
International Conference on Civil Society, Religion and Global Governance: Paradigms of Power and Persuasion, Canberra, Australia, September 1-2,
2005), http://law.anu.edu.au/nissl/acharya.pdf (accessed 4 December 2007).
35
Amita Etzioni, Communitarianism, in Encyclopedia of Community: From the Village to the Virtual World, ed. Karen Christensen and David Levinson,
vol. 1, A-D (London: Sage Publications, 2003), 225.
36
Michael Walzer, On Negative Politics in Yack, Liberalism Without Illusions, 18.
37
Amita Etzioni, From Empire to Community: A New Approach to International Relations (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004), 160.
38
Intervention in Afghanistan after 9/11 is an element of this new global architecture. Amita Etzioni, Implications of the American Anto-Terrorism
Coalition for Global Architectures, European Journal of Political Theory, 1, no. 1 (2002): 9-30.
39
Robin, Fear.
40
For the mechanism of legitimation in international relations, see Ian Clark, Legitimacy in International Society (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2005).
1
2
34
Conclusions (The G8 Foreign Ministers Meeting, Grzenich/Kln, Germany, June 10, 1999), Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Trade of
Canada, http://www.dfait-maeci.gc.ca/g8fmm-g8rmae/concl-en.asp (accessed 4 December 2007).
42
Noemi Gal-Or, Klaus-Gerd Giesen, The Concept of War, Peace Review: A Journal of Social Justice, 19 (2007): 149-156.
43
Martha Cottam, Foreign Policy Decision Making. The Influence of Cognition (Boulder: Colorado, Westview Press, 1986); Richard Herrmann, Michael
P. Fischerkeller, Beyond the Enemy Image and Spiral Model. Cognitive-Strategic Research After the Cold War, International Organization, 49, no. 3
(Summer 1995): 415-450.
44
Michael Walzer, On Negative Politics, 18.
45
Berlin, Two Concepts of Liberty.
46
Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities. Reflections in the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London: Verso, 2006).
47
Frdric Ramel, ed., Philosophie et relations internationales. Regards contemporains, Etudes internationales, XXXVIII, no. 1, (Mars 2007): 5-109.
48
For Jonas, fear is not a passion that resulted from current war but a feeling about future threats linked to technologic progress or natural disasters. Hans
Jonas, The Imperative Responsbility. In Search of an Ethics for the Technological Age (Chicago: the Chicago University Press, 1984).
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Frdric Ramel