ABSTRACT
A huge amount has been written on this topic—a fact that should testify to its importance, since many of the writers are serious philosophers. In this essay, I will consider just what pacifism is, starting with ambiguities in the term. But there is a sort of “ur-thesis,” what I call “General Pacifism”: that we are not to use violence, no matter what, or at least with much heavier restrictions than most people think justified. I will then suggest that, for one thing, this ur-version doesn’t really make sense, and second, narrower applications of it, especially to the context of international wars, really inherit the problems of the “ur-thesis.” We are left with a kind of strong prima facie objection to using violence with which, surely, all reasonable people agree.
