CFP // PANEL 10 // BETWEEN TRENCHES AND IVORY TOWERS // 16th Braga Meetings on Ethics and Political Philosophy - 29 June - 1 July // University of Minho , Braga

[Sara Cruz]

Call for Papers

16th Braga Meetings on Ethics and Political Philosophy

29 June- 1 July

University of Minho, Braga – Portugal

 

PANEL 10 // BETWEEN TRENCHES AND IVORY TOWERS: SOCIETAL, INSTITUTIONAL AND PROFESSIONAL ROLES IN THE ETHICS OF CONTEMPORARY CONFLICT

 

CONVENORS: Sara Cruz (University of Minho) ; Jesse Hamilton (University of Oxford)

 

For most of its history, just war theory has focused almost exclusively on war-making: how wars are waged (jus ad bellum), fought (jus in bello), and concluded (jus post bellum). By contrast, far less attention has been devoted to the conditions, institutions, and policy choices that make war possible in the first place—what may be called war-building. With a few recent exceptions (Parry & Easton; Robillard 2024; Strawser 2024), these issues have been explored more extensively within alternative frameworks such as political pacifism than within mainstream ethics of war.

A range of contemporary developments underscores why the ethics of war must now extend to the ethics of war-building. Heightened geopolitical tension, the reallocation of public resources toward defence, renewed debates about conscription and compulsory service, and widening social polarization all reveal how states shape the material and human foundations of war long before conflict begins. Parallel dynamics within academia—including increased investment in military research, pressures on critical scholarship, and concerns about educide—highlight the role of universities and academics within this broader ecosystem of war-building. These developments also raise questions about how those with lived experience of war should inform public debate, and whether closer civil–military relations foster civic resilience or risk entrenching forms of institutionalised warmaking.

Taken together, these interlocking political, social, and institutional conditions illustrate the need for a systematic normative assessment of how societies prepare for war—and what such preparation means for state legitimacy and the justice of the wars they fight. This panel invites contributions that examine these under-researched dimensions of the ethics of war and peace, and that expand the field’s conceptual and practical boundaries.

 

Possible topics include

·       Novel forms of civilian complicity and non-combatant liability in contemporary conflict

·       The ethics of military recruitment

·       The normative role of soldiers in institutions and civil society

·       The normative role of academic institutions and moral philosophers in times of conflict

·       Educide as a distinct form of violence

·       Alternatives to war

 

Submission Deadline: February 15th, through the form available at the conference website

Notifications of Acceptance: March 15th

 

For additional info please check the official website

For any further inquiries, email 16thbrag...@gmail.com.