Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
  1. Home
  2. Books
  3. Ethics in International Relations
  • Cited by 149
Publisher:
Cambridge University Press
Online publication date:
September 2009
Print publication year:
1996
Online ISBN:
9780511521706
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511521706
Series:
Cambridge Studies in International Relations (45)
Subjects:
Politics and International Relations, International Relations and International Organisations, Philosophy, Political Philosophy
Information

Book description

Most questions commonly asked about international politics are ethical ones. Should the international community intervene in Bosnia? What do we owe the starving in Somalia? What should be done about the genocide in Rwanda? Yet, Mervyn Frost argues, ethics is accorded a marginal position within the academic study of international relations. In this book he examines the reasons given for this, and finds that they do not stand up to scrutiny. He goes on to evaluate those ethical theories which do exist within the discipline - order based theories, utilitarian theories, and rights based theories - and finds them unconvincing. He elaborates his own ethical theory, constitutive theory, which is derived from Hegel, and highlights the way in which we constitute one another as moral beings through a process of reciprocal recognition within a hierarchy of institutions which include the family, civil society, the state, and the society of states.

Reviews

‘Frost’s is one of those rare works which is ambitious theoretically and provides responses to some pressing concrete problems, all the while opening up fruitful areas for further thought. The book … stands in my mind as one of the most important recent works on ethics and world affairs.’

Source: International Relations

‘ … an important and distinctive contribution to the discussion of ethics in international affairs.’

Source: Peace Research

Refine List

Actions for selected content:

Select all | Deselect all
  • View selected items
  • Export citations
  • Download PDF (zip)
  • Save to Kindle
  • Save to Dropbox
  • Save to Google Drive

Save Search

You can save your searches here and later view and run them again in "My saved searches".

Please provide a title, maximum of 40 characters.
Cancel
×

Contents

Contents

Metrics

Full text views

Total number of HTML views: 0
Total number of PDF views: 0 *
Loading metrics...

Book summary page views

Total views: 0 *
Loading metrics...

* Views captured on Cambridge Core between #date#. This data will be updated every 24 hours.

Usage data cannot currently be displayed.