Peter Olsthoorn | Netherlands Defence Academy (original) (raw)
Books by Peter Olsthoorn
In this history of the development of ideas of honor in Western philosophy, Peter Olsthoorn exami... more In this history of the development of ideas of honor in Western philosophy, Peter Olsthoorn examines what honor is, how its meaning has changed, and whether it can still be of use. Political and moral philosophers from Cicero to John Stuart Mill thought that a sense of honor and concern for our reputation could help us to determine the proper thing to do, and just as important, provide us with the much-needed motive to do it. Today, outside of the military and some other pockets of resistance, the notion of honor has become seriously out of date, while the term itself has almost disappeared from our moral language. Most of us think that people ought to do what is right based on a love for justice rather than from a concern with how we are perceived by others. Wide-ranging and accessible, the book explores the role of honor in not only philosophy but also literature and war to make the case that honor can still play an important role in contemporary life.
Review
CHOICE Choice Reviews July 2015. Olsthoorn (Netherlands Defense Academy) offers a timely philosophical examination of honor. He traces the intellectual history of honor and its transformation throughout philosophical and political thought in the West. He considers both honor generally and its various manifestations, such as the notion of honor among individuals, groups, and states. The book reveals important insights about comparative concepts such as integrity, respect, and humiliation. Though fewer people in today's world are concerned with honor in their everyday lives than in the past, the topic remains significant and continues to resonate in contemporary times in a variety of ways (as evidenced, for instance, by widespread interest in the phenomenon called "honor killing"). The book features an introduction, a conclusion, and five full-length chapters. Although the background framework is primarily philosophical, the scope of the book is deeply interdisciplinary, drawing from political science, literature, military ethics, and related areas. Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through researchers/faculty.
--B. Romaya, University of Massachusetts Lowell
Although long-established military virtues, such as honor, courage and loyalty, are what most arm... more Although long-established military virtues, such as honor, courage and loyalty, are what most armed forces today still use as guiding principles in an effort to enhance the moral behavior of soldiers, much depends on whether the military virtues adhered to by these militaries suit a particular mission or military operation. Clearly, the beneficiaries of these military virtues are the soldiers themselves, fellow-soldiers, and military organizations, yet there is little that regulates the behavior of soldiers towards civilian populations. As a result, troops trained for combat in today's missions sometimes experience difficulty in adjusting to the less aggressive ways of working needed to win the hearts and minds of local populations after major combat is over. It can be argued that today's missions call for virtues that are more inclusive than the traditional ones, which are mainly about enhancing military effectiveness, but a convincing case can be made that a lot can already be won by interpreting these traditional virtues in different ways.
This volume offers an integrated approach to the main traditional virtues, exploring their possible relevance and proposing new ways of interpretation that are more in line with the military tasks of the 21st century.
Most books and articles still treat leadership and ethics as related though separate phenomena. T... more Most books and articles still treat leadership and ethics as related though separate phenomena. This edited volume is an exception to that rule, and explicitly treats leadership and ethics as a single domain. Clearly, ethics is an aspect of leadership, and not a distinct approach that exists alongside other approaches to leadership. This holds especially true for the military, as it is one of the few organizations that can legitimately use violence. Military leaders have to deal with personnel who have either used or experienced violence. This intertwinement of leadership and violence separates military leadership from leadership in other professions. Even in a time that leadership is increasingly questioned, it is still good leadership that keeps soldiers from crossing the thin line between legitimate force and excessive violence.
Table of contents
1. Introduction. Peter Olsthoorn;
2. Armouring Against Atrocity: Developing Ethical Strength in Small Military Units. Lieutenant Colonel Tom McDermott DSO and Lieutenant Colonel (Retired) Stephen Hart RM;
3. Ethical Leadership in the Military: The gap Between Theory and Practice in Ethics Education. Miriam C. de Graaff, Peter W. de Vries, Walter J. van Bijlevelt and Ellen Giebels;
4. ABCA Coalition Operations in Afghanistan, Iraq and Beyond: Two Decades of Military Ethics Challenges and Leadership Responses. David Whetham;
5. Military Leaders, Fragmentation, and the Virtue of Integrity. Nathan L. Cartagena and Michael D. Beaty;
6. Military Integrity: Moral or Ethical? Patrick Mileham;
7. Soldiers’ Autonomy and Military Authority. Mihaly Boda;
8. The concept of Innere Führung: Dimensions of its Ethics. Angelika Dörfler-Dierken;
9. Intervening as a Moral Duty: Michael Walzer versus a Multilateralism Approach. Arseniy Kumankov;
10. When International Dialogue about Military Ethics Confronts Diverse Cultural and Political Practices: ‘Guilt And Confession’ as a Case in Point. George R. Wilkes;
11. Moral Judgement in War and Peacekeeping Operations: An Empirical Review. Miriam C. de Graaff, Femke D.A. den Besten, Ellen Giebels and Desiree Verweij;
12. The Disenchantment of Victory and Ethical Dilemmas For Military Leadership: Sovereignty, the Spell of War and Elusiveness of Victory. Boris Kashnikov;
13. Special Forces and Ethics: A Preliminary Assessment of the Leadership Challenge. Deane-Peter Baker.
Democratic societies expect their armed forces to act in a morally responsible way, which seems a... more Democratic societies expect their armed forces to act in a morally responsible way, which seems a fair expectation given the fact that they entrust their armed forces with the monopoly of violence. However, this is not as straightforward and unambiguous as it sounds. Present-day military practices show that political assignments, social and cultural contexts, innovative technologies and organisational structures, present military personnel with questions and dilemma’s that can have far-reaching consequences for all involved – not in the last place for the soldiers themselves. A thorough training and education, in which critical thinking is developed and stimulated, seems therefore a necessary condition for morally responsible behaviour. This book aims to contribute to this form of ‘reflective practitioning’ in military practice.
Articles and Book Chapters by Peter Olsthoorn
Military Leadership Concepts - An International Perspective, 2024
This chapter is about how the Netherlands Armed Forces views leadership and educates and trains i... more This chapter is about how the Netherlands Armed Forces views leadership and educates and trains its leaders. To that end, the first section not only describes what can be found on leadership in the Netherlands Defence Doctrine, but also looks into the joint leadership vision of the Dutch forces, and some of the theory that underpins it. Next, we outline military leadership over the past decade: how and to what extent has the leadership culture changed within the armed forces. Subsequently we turn to some current and future developments, such as change management,
resilience training and work-life balance.
Handbook of Military Sciences, 2024
In this chapter, we examine the challenges military organizations face today in terms of their HR... more In this chapter, we examine the challenges military organizations face today in terms of their HRM policies and the effect of the institutional environment and strategy on these policies. We begin with an overview of the evolution of HRM over time, and how it is understood today, and will outline some general theories within the HRM domain. Today's changes in, for example, the internal and external environment of military organizations pose important challenges for the military's personnel policies and organizational fit. We will discuss the reactions by military organizations to these challenges. What trends do the challenges lead to in relation to the professionalization of the armed forces? Next, we elaborate on some of the more pressing challenges, such as motivating young people, the development in the field of talent management in relation to the organizational strategy, recent technological developments, labor market developments such as diversity in the workforce, but also private military companies, and of course the global security situation. We end this chapter with a short conclusion.
Reflections on the Russia-Ukraine War, 2024
War is almost always conducted with various restrictions in the form of rules, rituals, and taboo... more War is almost always conducted with various restrictions in the form of rules, rituals, and taboos. Many of the norms that regulate warfare can be found in the tradition of just war. This tradition seeks to provide a middle ground between an unrealistic (at least for politicians) pacifism that does not even allow war in self-defence and a too realistic realism that claims there is no place for ethics in war. The tradition of just war does not have the force of law; it provides, above all, a vocabulary to discuss war in moral terms. At the same time, the tradition does have an impact: it forms the basis of humanitarian law and the Geneva Conventions. Just like with laws, it is recognised here that imperfect adherence to these principles does not necessarily diminish their validity. Most proponents of the tradition believe that the principles of just war, even though some date back centuries, are sufficiently general to be applicable to contemporary conflicts, such as the Russo-Ukrainian War. If we apply the norms of the just war tradition to the current situation in Ukraine, we see that Russia is waging an unjust war in an unjust manner.
Handbook of Military Sciences, 2023
Leadership and ethics are habitually treated as related to separate spheres. It would be better, ... more Leadership and ethics are habitually treated as related to separate spheres. It would be better, perhaps, if leadership and ethics were treated as belonging to a single domain. Ethics is an aspect of leadership and not a separate approach that exists alongside other approaches to leadership such as the trait approach, the situational approach, etc. This holds especially true for the military, one of the few organizations that can legitimately use violence. Today, most militaries opt for a character-based approach for the ethics education of their leaders and espouse leadership theories that want leaders to be strong and visionary. Both the role of character and leadership are increasingly questioned, however, on the basis that situational factors are more influential than leadership and character. A closer look suggests that an interactionist perspective, with leadership, character, and the situation interplaying, is more accurate. It is still good leadership that keeps soldiers from crossing the line between the lawful use of force and excessive violence.
Moral Philosophical Perspectives of Ethical Leadership, 2023
Ethics and Armed Forces, 2023
Not only the direct physical experiences of deployment can severely harm soldiers’ mental health.... more Not only the direct physical experiences of deployment can severely harm soldiers’ mental health. Witnessing violations of their moral principles by the enemy, or by their fellow soldiers and superiors, can also have a devastating impact. It can cause soldiers’ moral disorientation, increasing feelings of shame, guilt, or hate, and the need for general answers on questions of right and wrong. Various attempts have been made to keep soldiers mentally sane. One is to provide convincing causes for their deployment, which risks an “end justifies the means” way of thinking. The good cause can provide a moral justification for horrible atrocities. Another method, introduced in the USA, Canada, and Australia, aims to strengthen military personnel’s resistance by promoting and maintaining a happy, optimistic state of mind through the use of positive psychology. Alongside making soldiers “morally fit” for all kinds of situations, the focus could also be on moral recovery and forgiveness. Such a care-based military ethics approach, aimed at mutual understanding and interdependence, could help soldiers handle the emotional impact of moral conflicts. This demands that military units reflect on their organizational culture and rethink oaths and codes of conduct that focus mainly on efficiency and readiness, as well as the soldierly self-image with its seemingly still deeply rooted warrior ethos. Today, resilience and positive psychology in the military is apparently mainly geared to assuring its soldiers’ readiness. An appropriate set of virtues and understanding of virtue ethics that are less centered on self-perfection and autonomy could point to a different form of character-building and lead to a better understanding of others.
Violence in Extreme Conditions: Ethical Challenges in Military Practice , 2023
Today, many armed forces consider teaching virtues to be an important complement to imposing rule... more Today, many armed forces consider teaching virtues to be an important complement to imposing rules and codes from above. Yet, it is mainly established military virtues such as courage and loyalty that dominate both the lists of virtues and values of most militaries and the growing body of literature on military virtues. Some of these virtues, however, may be less suited for today’s missions, which more often than not require restraint on the part of military personnel. This chapter looks into military ethics education from the perspective of military virtues and addresses the question of what we need to solve the aforementioned misalignment: a new set of virtues, a different interpretation of the existing virtues, or something else altogether?
Washington University Review of Philosophy, 2022
Unmanned systems bring risk asymmetry in war to a new level, making martial virtues such as physi... more Unmanned systems bring risk asymmetry in war to a new level, making martial virtues such as physical courage by and large obsolete. Nonetheless, the dominant view within the military is that using unmanned systems that remove the risks for military personnel involved is not very different from using aircrafts that drop bombs from a high altitude. According to others, however, the use of unmanned systems and the riskless killing they make possible do raise a host of new issues, for instance the question to what extent the willingness to take risks is part of the military profession. This article addresses that existential question, but also the question of whether the elimination of all risk would make the military profession a less moral one. To that end, it juxtaposes the military viewpoint that riskless killing by means of drones is morally uninteresting with the more critical view that such riskless killing is in fact highly problematic.
Ethics and Military Practice, 2022
Ethics and Armed Forces, 2021
How can military personnel be prevented from using force unlawfully? A critical examination of ty... more How can military personnel be prevented from using force unlawfully? A critical examination of typical methods and the suitability of virtue ethics for this task starts with the inadequacies of a purely rules-based approach, and the fact that many armed forces increasingly rely on character development training. The three investigated complexes also raise further questions which require serious consideration – such as about the general teachability of virtues. First, the changing roles and responsibilities of modern armed forces are used to refute the notion that timeless, “classic” military virtues exist, for example physical courage. With regard to today’s missions, virtues of restraint seem more
necessary. Reflecting on the four interrelated and less military-specific cardinal virtues of courage, wisdom, temperance and justice could bring the military and civil society closer together. At the same time, this would be a logical step towards promoting personality development. Respect is one example of such a “contemporary” inclusive virtue that some armed forces have adopted into their canon of values. Apparently, however, it often refers only to members of one’s own organization. And it is no less inappropriate to use it to justify moral relativism or excuse immoral practices, such as the widespread sexual abuse of Afghan boys by men in positions of power (“boy play”). Finally, the essay asks about the general suitability of a virtue-based approach in ethical education, since social psychological research has shown that situational factors strongly influence behavior. The research findings do not render such an approach worthless, but they should be integrated into military personality training.
Ethics of Drone Strikes Restraining Remote-Control Killing, 2021
Until recently most militaries tended to see moral issues through the lens of rules and regulatio... more Until recently most militaries tended to see moral issues through the lens of rules and regulations. Today, however, many armed forces consider teaching virtues to be an important complement to imposing rules and codes from above. A closer look reveals that it is mainly established military virtues such as honour, courage and loyalty that dominate both the lists of virtues and values of most militaries and the growing body of literature on military virtues. Although there is evidently still a role for these traditional martial virtues, it is equally evident that they are not particularly relevant to, for instance, military personnel operating drones. This chapter looks into the ethics of unmanned warfare from the perspective of military virtues and military ethics education, and addresses the question of what we need to solve that just-mentioned misalignment: 1) a new set of virtues; 2) a different interpretation of the existing virtues; or 3) a different approach altogether, that is, an alternative to teaching virtues? That we have to think about such questions is at least partly because unmanned systems bring risk asymmetry in war to a new level, making warlike virtues such as physical courage by and large obsolete. The last section of this chapter therefore addresses the question: to what extent does the possibility of riskless warfare makes drone use ‘virtue-less’?
Journal of Peace and War Studies, 2021
Chivalrous Combatants? The Meaning of Military Virtue Past and Present, 2019
Journal of the Royal Army Medical Corps , 2019
When militaries mention loyalty as a value they mean loyalty to colleagues and the organisation. ... more When militaries mention loyalty as a value they mean loyalty to colleagues and the organisation. Loyalty to principle, the type of loyalty that has a wider scope, plays hardly a role in the ethics of most armed forces. Where military codes, oaths and values are about the organisation and colleagues, medical ethics is about providing patient care impartially. Being subject to two diverging professional ethics can leave military medical personnel torn between the wish to act loyally towards colleagues, and the demands of a more outward looking ethic. This tension constitutes a test of integrity, not a moral dilemma.
The Heythrop Journal, 2019
Authors from Cicero to Smith held honor to be indispensable to make people see and do what is rig... more Authors from Cicero to Smith held honor to be indispensable to make people see and do what is right. As they considered honor to be a social motive, they did not think this dependence on honor was a problem. Today, we tend to see honor as a self‐regarding motive, but do not see this as problematic because we stopped seeing it as a necessary incentive. Bernard Mandeville, however, agreed with the older authors that honor is indispensable, but agreed with us moderns that it is a self‐interested motive. Honor might be necessary to keep society functioning, but that does not make it less self‐serving. Mandeville thus combined the classical preoccupation with honor and the modern view of man as self‐seeking. That our motivations are self‐serving is something we wish to hide from others and ourselves; society benefits because we generally behave well in order to live up to this inflated (self‐)image. Hypocrisy is the price we pay for living together peacefully. It is this sobering view on honor that sets Mandeville apart from later authors on the subject, particularly David Hume and Adam Smith.
In this history of the development of ideas of honor in Western philosophy, Peter Olsthoorn exami... more In this history of the development of ideas of honor in Western philosophy, Peter Olsthoorn examines what honor is, how its meaning has changed, and whether it can still be of use. Political and moral philosophers from Cicero to John Stuart Mill thought that a sense of honor and concern for our reputation could help us to determine the proper thing to do, and just as important, provide us with the much-needed motive to do it. Today, outside of the military and some other pockets of resistance, the notion of honor has become seriously out of date, while the term itself has almost disappeared from our moral language. Most of us think that people ought to do what is right based on a love for justice rather than from a concern with how we are perceived by others. Wide-ranging and accessible, the book explores the role of honor in not only philosophy but also literature and war to make the case that honor can still play an important role in contemporary life.
Review
CHOICE Choice Reviews July 2015. Olsthoorn (Netherlands Defense Academy) offers a timely philosophical examination of honor. He traces the intellectual history of honor and its transformation throughout philosophical and political thought in the West. He considers both honor generally and its various manifestations, such as the notion of honor among individuals, groups, and states. The book reveals important insights about comparative concepts such as integrity, respect, and humiliation. Though fewer people in today's world are concerned with honor in their everyday lives than in the past, the topic remains significant and continues to resonate in contemporary times in a variety of ways (as evidenced, for instance, by widespread interest in the phenomenon called "honor killing"). The book features an introduction, a conclusion, and five full-length chapters. Although the background framework is primarily philosophical, the scope of the book is deeply interdisciplinary, drawing from political science, literature, military ethics, and related areas. Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through researchers/faculty.
--B. Romaya, University of Massachusetts Lowell
Although long-established military virtues, such as honor, courage and loyalty, are what most arm... more Although long-established military virtues, such as honor, courage and loyalty, are what most armed forces today still use as guiding principles in an effort to enhance the moral behavior of soldiers, much depends on whether the military virtues adhered to by these militaries suit a particular mission or military operation. Clearly, the beneficiaries of these military virtues are the soldiers themselves, fellow-soldiers, and military organizations, yet there is little that regulates the behavior of soldiers towards civilian populations. As a result, troops trained for combat in today's missions sometimes experience difficulty in adjusting to the less aggressive ways of working needed to win the hearts and minds of local populations after major combat is over. It can be argued that today's missions call for virtues that are more inclusive than the traditional ones, which are mainly about enhancing military effectiveness, but a convincing case can be made that a lot can already be won by interpreting these traditional virtues in different ways.
This volume offers an integrated approach to the main traditional virtues, exploring their possible relevance and proposing new ways of interpretation that are more in line with the military tasks of the 21st century.
Most books and articles still treat leadership and ethics as related though separate phenomena. T... more Most books and articles still treat leadership and ethics as related though separate phenomena. This edited volume is an exception to that rule, and explicitly treats leadership and ethics as a single domain. Clearly, ethics is an aspect of leadership, and not a distinct approach that exists alongside other approaches to leadership. This holds especially true for the military, as it is one of the few organizations that can legitimately use violence. Military leaders have to deal with personnel who have either used or experienced violence. This intertwinement of leadership and violence separates military leadership from leadership in other professions. Even in a time that leadership is increasingly questioned, it is still good leadership that keeps soldiers from crossing the thin line between legitimate force and excessive violence.
Table of contents
1. Introduction. Peter Olsthoorn;
2. Armouring Against Atrocity: Developing Ethical Strength in Small Military Units. Lieutenant Colonel Tom McDermott DSO and Lieutenant Colonel (Retired) Stephen Hart RM;
3. Ethical Leadership in the Military: The gap Between Theory and Practice in Ethics Education. Miriam C. de Graaff, Peter W. de Vries, Walter J. van Bijlevelt and Ellen Giebels;
4. ABCA Coalition Operations in Afghanistan, Iraq and Beyond: Two Decades of Military Ethics Challenges and Leadership Responses. David Whetham;
5. Military Leaders, Fragmentation, and the Virtue of Integrity. Nathan L. Cartagena and Michael D. Beaty;
6. Military Integrity: Moral or Ethical? Patrick Mileham;
7. Soldiers’ Autonomy and Military Authority. Mihaly Boda;
8. The concept of Innere Führung: Dimensions of its Ethics. Angelika Dörfler-Dierken;
9. Intervening as a Moral Duty: Michael Walzer versus a Multilateralism Approach. Arseniy Kumankov;
10. When International Dialogue about Military Ethics Confronts Diverse Cultural and Political Practices: ‘Guilt And Confession’ as a Case in Point. George R. Wilkes;
11. Moral Judgement in War and Peacekeeping Operations: An Empirical Review. Miriam C. de Graaff, Femke D.A. den Besten, Ellen Giebels and Desiree Verweij;
12. The Disenchantment of Victory and Ethical Dilemmas For Military Leadership: Sovereignty, the Spell of War and Elusiveness of Victory. Boris Kashnikov;
13. Special Forces and Ethics: A Preliminary Assessment of the Leadership Challenge. Deane-Peter Baker.
Democratic societies expect their armed forces to act in a morally responsible way, which seems a... more Democratic societies expect their armed forces to act in a morally responsible way, which seems a fair expectation given the fact that they entrust their armed forces with the monopoly of violence. However, this is not as straightforward and unambiguous as it sounds. Present-day military practices show that political assignments, social and cultural contexts, innovative technologies and organisational structures, present military personnel with questions and dilemma’s that can have far-reaching consequences for all involved – not in the last place for the soldiers themselves. A thorough training and education, in which critical thinking is developed and stimulated, seems therefore a necessary condition for morally responsible behaviour. This book aims to contribute to this form of ‘reflective practitioning’ in military practice.
Military Leadership Concepts - An International Perspective, 2024
This chapter is about how the Netherlands Armed Forces views leadership and educates and trains i... more This chapter is about how the Netherlands Armed Forces views leadership and educates and trains its leaders. To that end, the first section not only describes what can be found on leadership in the Netherlands Defence Doctrine, but also looks into the joint leadership vision of the Dutch forces, and some of the theory that underpins it. Next, we outline military leadership over the past decade: how and to what extent has the leadership culture changed within the armed forces. Subsequently we turn to some current and future developments, such as change management,
resilience training and work-life balance.
Handbook of Military Sciences, 2024
In this chapter, we examine the challenges military organizations face today in terms of their HR... more In this chapter, we examine the challenges military organizations face today in terms of their HRM policies and the effect of the institutional environment and strategy on these policies. We begin with an overview of the evolution of HRM over time, and how it is understood today, and will outline some general theories within the HRM domain. Today's changes in, for example, the internal and external environment of military organizations pose important challenges for the military's personnel policies and organizational fit. We will discuss the reactions by military organizations to these challenges. What trends do the challenges lead to in relation to the professionalization of the armed forces? Next, we elaborate on some of the more pressing challenges, such as motivating young people, the development in the field of talent management in relation to the organizational strategy, recent technological developments, labor market developments such as diversity in the workforce, but also private military companies, and of course the global security situation. We end this chapter with a short conclusion.
Reflections on the Russia-Ukraine War, 2024
War is almost always conducted with various restrictions in the form of rules, rituals, and taboo... more War is almost always conducted with various restrictions in the form of rules, rituals, and taboos. Many of the norms that regulate warfare can be found in the tradition of just war. This tradition seeks to provide a middle ground between an unrealistic (at least for politicians) pacifism that does not even allow war in self-defence and a too realistic realism that claims there is no place for ethics in war. The tradition of just war does not have the force of law; it provides, above all, a vocabulary to discuss war in moral terms. At the same time, the tradition does have an impact: it forms the basis of humanitarian law and the Geneva Conventions. Just like with laws, it is recognised here that imperfect adherence to these principles does not necessarily diminish their validity. Most proponents of the tradition believe that the principles of just war, even though some date back centuries, are sufficiently general to be applicable to contemporary conflicts, such as the Russo-Ukrainian War. If we apply the norms of the just war tradition to the current situation in Ukraine, we see that Russia is waging an unjust war in an unjust manner.
Handbook of Military Sciences, 2023
Leadership and ethics are habitually treated as related to separate spheres. It would be better, ... more Leadership and ethics are habitually treated as related to separate spheres. It would be better, perhaps, if leadership and ethics were treated as belonging to a single domain. Ethics is an aspect of leadership and not a separate approach that exists alongside other approaches to leadership such as the trait approach, the situational approach, etc. This holds especially true for the military, one of the few organizations that can legitimately use violence. Today, most militaries opt for a character-based approach for the ethics education of their leaders and espouse leadership theories that want leaders to be strong and visionary. Both the role of character and leadership are increasingly questioned, however, on the basis that situational factors are more influential than leadership and character. A closer look suggests that an interactionist perspective, with leadership, character, and the situation interplaying, is more accurate. It is still good leadership that keeps soldiers from crossing the line between the lawful use of force and excessive violence.
Moral Philosophical Perspectives of Ethical Leadership, 2023
Ethics and Armed Forces, 2023
Not only the direct physical experiences of deployment can severely harm soldiers’ mental health.... more Not only the direct physical experiences of deployment can severely harm soldiers’ mental health. Witnessing violations of their moral principles by the enemy, or by their fellow soldiers and superiors, can also have a devastating impact. It can cause soldiers’ moral disorientation, increasing feelings of shame, guilt, or hate, and the need for general answers on questions of right and wrong. Various attempts have been made to keep soldiers mentally sane. One is to provide convincing causes for their deployment, which risks an “end justifies the means” way of thinking. The good cause can provide a moral justification for horrible atrocities. Another method, introduced in the USA, Canada, and Australia, aims to strengthen military personnel’s resistance by promoting and maintaining a happy, optimistic state of mind through the use of positive psychology. Alongside making soldiers “morally fit” for all kinds of situations, the focus could also be on moral recovery and forgiveness. Such a care-based military ethics approach, aimed at mutual understanding and interdependence, could help soldiers handle the emotional impact of moral conflicts. This demands that military units reflect on their organizational culture and rethink oaths and codes of conduct that focus mainly on efficiency and readiness, as well as the soldierly self-image with its seemingly still deeply rooted warrior ethos. Today, resilience and positive psychology in the military is apparently mainly geared to assuring its soldiers’ readiness. An appropriate set of virtues and understanding of virtue ethics that are less centered on self-perfection and autonomy could point to a different form of character-building and lead to a better understanding of others.
Violence in Extreme Conditions: Ethical Challenges in Military Practice , 2023
Today, many armed forces consider teaching virtues to be an important complement to imposing rule... more Today, many armed forces consider teaching virtues to be an important complement to imposing rules and codes from above. Yet, it is mainly established military virtues such as courage and loyalty that dominate both the lists of virtues and values of most militaries and the growing body of literature on military virtues. Some of these virtues, however, may be less suited for today’s missions, which more often than not require restraint on the part of military personnel. This chapter looks into military ethics education from the perspective of military virtues and addresses the question of what we need to solve the aforementioned misalignment: a new set of virtues, a different interpretation of the existing virtues, or something else altogether?
Washington University Review of Philosophy, 2022
Unmanned systems bring risk asymmetry in war to a new level, making martial virtues such as physi... more Unmanned systems bring risk asymmetry in war to a new level, making martial virtues such as physical courage by and large obsolete. Nonetheless, the dominant view within the military is that using unmanned systems that remove the risks for military personnel involved is not very different from using aircrafts that drop bombs from a high altitude. According to others, however, the use of unmanned systems and the riskless killing they make possible do raise a host of new issues, for instance the question to what extent the willingness to take risks is part of the military profession. This article addresses that existential question, but also the question of whether the elimination of all risk would make the military profession a less moral one. To that end, it juxtaposes the military viewpoint that riskless killing by means of drones is morally uninteresting with the more critical view that such riskless killing is in fact highly problematic.
Ethics and Military Practice, 2022
Ethics and Armed Forces, 2021
How can military personnel be prevented from using force unlawfully? A critical examination of ty... more How can military personnel be prevented from using force unlawfully? A critical examination of typical methods and the suitability of virtue ethics for this task starts with the inadequacies of a purely rules-based approach, and the fact that many armed forces increasingly rely on character development training. The three investigated complexes also raise further questions which require serious consideration – such as about the general teachability of virtues. First, the changing roles and responsibilities of modern armed forces are used to refute the notion that timeless, “classic” military virtues exist, for example physical courage. With regard to today’s missions, virtues of restraint seem more
necessary. Reflecting on the four interrelated and less military-specific cardinal virtues of courage, wisdom, temperance and justice could bring the military and civil society closer together. At the same time, this would be a logical step towards promoting personality development. Respect is one example of such a “contemporary” inclusive virtue that some armed forces have adopted into their canon of values. Apparently, however, it often refers only to members of one’s own organization. And it is no less inappropriate to use it to justify moral relativism or excuse immoral practices, such as the widespread sexual abuse of Afghan boys by men in positions of power (“boy play”). Finally, the essay asks about the general suitability of a virtue-based approach in ethical education, since social psychological research has shown that situational factors strongly influence behavior. The research findings do not render such an approach worthless, but they should be integrated into military personality training.
Ethics of Drone Strikes Restraining Remote-Control Killing, 2021
Until recently most militaries tended to see moral issues through the lens of rules and regulatio... more Until recently most militaries tended to see moral issues through the lens of rules and regulations. Today, however, many armed forces consider teaching virtues to be an important complement to imposing rules and codes from above. A closer look reveals that it is mainly established military virtues such as honour, courage and loyalty that dominate both the lists of virtues and values of most militaries and the growing body of literature on military virtues. Although there is evidently still a role for these traditional martial virtues, it is equally evident that they are not particularly relevant to, for instance, military personnel operating drones. This chapter looks into the ethics of unmanned warfare from the perspective of military virtues and military ethics education, and addresses the question of what we need to solve that just-mentioned misalignment: 1) a new set of virtues; 2) a different interpretation of the existing virtues; or 3) a different approach altogether, that is, an alternative to teaching virtues? That we have to think about such questions is at least partly because unmanned systems bring risk asymmetry in war to a new level, making warlike virtues such as physical courage by and large obsolete. The last section of this chapter therefore addresses the question: to what extent does the possibility of riskless warfare makes drone use ‘virtue-less’?
Journal of Peace and War Studies, 2021
Chivalrous Combatants? The Meaning of Military Virtue Past and Present, 2019
Journal of the Royal Army Medical Corps , 2019
When militaries mention loyalty as a value they mean loyalty to colleagues and the organisation. ... more When militaries mention loyalty as a value they mean loyalty to colleagues and the organisation. Loyalty to principle, the type of loyalty that has a wider scope, plays hardly a role in the ethics of most armed forces. Where military codes, oaths and values are about the organisation and colleagues, medical ethics is about providing patient care impartially. Being subject to two diverging professional ethics can leave military medical personnel torn between the wish to act loyally towards colleagues, and the demands of a more outward looking ethic. This tension constitutes a test of integrity, not a moral dilemma.
The Heythrop Journal, 2019
Authors from Cicero to Smith held honor to be indispensable to make people see and do what is rig... more Authors from Cicero to Smith held honor to be indispensable to make people see and do what is right. As they considered honor to be a social motive, they did not think this dependence on honor was a problem. Today, we tend to see honor as a self‐regarding motive, but do not see this as problematic because we stopped seeing it as a necessary incentive. Bernard Mandeville, however, agreed with the older authors that honor is indispensable, but agreed with us moderns that it is a self‐interested motive. Honor might be necessary to keep society functioning, but that does not make it less self‐serving. Mandeville thus combined the classical preoccupation with honor and the modern view of man as self‐seeking. That our motivations are self‐serving is something we wish to hide from others and ourselves; society benefits because we generally behave well in order to live up to this inflated (self‐)image. Hypocrisy is the price we pay for living together peacefully. It is this sobering view on honor that sets Mandeville apart from later authors on the subject, particularly David Hume and Adam Smith.
Ethics and Education, 2018
Although the notion of universal human rights allows for the idea that states (and supranational ... more Although the notion of universal human rights allows for the idea that states (and supranational organizations such as the European Union) can, or even should, control and impose restrictions on migration, both notions clearly do not sit well together. The ensuing tension manifests itself in our ambivalent attitude towards migration, but also affects the border guards who have to implement national and supranational policies on migration. Little has been written on the ethics that has to guide these border guards in their work. Juxtaposing the ethics of border guarding against the ethics of the somewhat related military profession, this article attempts to (a) describe border guarding as a comparatively rule-guided profession; (b) outline the aim and basis of the ethics education that prepares border guards for their work; and (c) propose a research agenda for the future that should further our understanding of (a) and (b), but also help us improve the moral education of border guards.
The Changing Scope of Technoethics in Contemporary Society, 2018
Although most unmanned systems that militaries use today are still unarmed and predominantly used... more Although most unmanned systems that militaries use today are still unarmed and predominantly used for surveillance, it is especially the proliferation of armed military robots that raises some serious ethical questions. One of the most pressing concerns the moral responsibility in case a military robot uses violence in a way that would normally qualify as a war crime. In this article, we critically assess the chain of responsibility with respect to the deployment of both semi-autonomous and (learning) autonomous lethal military robots. We will start by looking at military commanders, as they are the ones with whom responsibility normally lies. We will argue that this is typically still the case when lethal robots kill wrongly – even if these robots act autonomously. Nonetheless, we will next look into the possible moral responsibility of the actors at the beginning and the end of the causal chain: those who design and manufacture armed military robots, and those who, far from the battlefield, remotely control them.
Journal of Military Ethics, 2017
In recent years, it has been argued more than once that situations determine our conduct to a muc... more In recent years, it has been argued more than once that situations determine our conduct to a much greater extent than our character does. This argument rests on the findings of social psychologists such as Stanley Milgram, who have popularized the idea that we can all be brought to harm innocent others. An increasing number of philosophers and ethicists make use of such findings, and some of them have argued that this so-called situationist challenge fatally undermines virtue ethics. As virtue ethics is currently the most popular underpinning for ethics education in the military, it is important to know to what extent the claim situationists make is correct. Fortunately, a closer look indicates that an interactionist perspective, with our character and the situation interplaying, is more accurate than the situationist perspective.
Military Ethics and Leadership, 2017
Scandals in business (such as Volkswagen’s dieselgate and, earlier, the Enron scandal)... more Scandals in business (such as Volkswagen’s dieselgate and, earlier, the Enron scandal), politics and the public sector (the Petrobas affair in Brazil, for in-stance), sports (think of the corruption charges against fifa’s Sepp Blatter) and the military (Abu Ghraib springs to mind) have brought the matter of ethical leadership to the forefront. But although this increased attention has had the collateral benefit that most handbooks on leadership now pay more attention to the importance of leading ethically, this will generally still be in a separate chapter. To make thing worse, that chapter on leadership is more often than not one the last chapters of the book, perhaps followed by a chapter on, say, diversity. This all testifies to the fact that leadership and ethics are ha-bitually treated as related though separate spheres. It would be much better, of course, if leadership and ethics were treated as belonging to a single domain. Ethics is clearly an aspect of leadership, and not a separate approach that ex-ists alongside other approaches to leadership such as the trait approach, the situational approach, etc.. Interestingly, this thinking and writing about ethical leadership as just one approach among many other leadership styles appears to be a relatively recent invention. In the works of Plato, Plutarch, Machiavelli and Locke, for example, we see (political) leadership and ethics dealt with as a single subject. It was not before the twentieth century that we saw the rise of a separate leadership industry. Its results are largely unimpressive; it has not made leaders necessarily more effective, let alone more ethical.
The Review of Politics, 2020
Clausewitz made the intuitively appealing claim that wars tend to “absoluteness,” and that all li... more Clausewitz made the intuitively appealing claim that wars tend to “absoluteness,” and that all limitations imposed by law and morality are in theory alien to it. Clausewitz of course knew that there are in practice many limitations to how wars are fought, but he saw them as contingent to what war is. Since then, however, historians such as John Lynn (Battle: A History of Combat and Culture [Westview Press, 2003]), John Keegan (A History of Warfare ([Random House,1993]) and Victor Davis Hanson (The Western Way of War [Oxford University Press, 1989]) have taught us to see things differently: war is a cultural phenomenon, and the limitations that rituals and taboos impose are essential to what war is. With Conspiring with the Enemy, her intelligent and erudite book on cooperation in war, Yvonne Chiu builds on that work by showing the wide variety of forms cooperation in war can take—something that, Chiu claims, we tend to overlook and take for granted at the same time.
Journal of Moral Philosophy , 2019
Utilitarianism has a fairly bad reputation in military ethics, mainly because it is thought to ma... more Utilitarianism has a fairly bad reputation in military ethics, mainly because it is thought to make military expedience override all other concerns. The atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki is a famous instance of such a skewed utilitarian calculation that “the rules of war and the rights they are designed to protect” should have stopped (Walzer 1992: 263-8). Most of its critics seem to think that utilitarianism is not bad per se, but prone to be misapplied in a self-serving way. That idea, William H. Shaw argues in his careful and mostly convincing defense of utilitarian thinking about the moral issues that war occasions, is misguided, as are most of the other common objections to utilitarian thinking about the moral issues war raises.
Officiersvorming in klare taal, 2023
Eind 2005 doodt een groep Amerikaanse mariniers 24 Iraakse burgers bij de stad Haditha, nadat een... more Eind 2005 doodt een groep Amerikaanse mariniers 24 Iraakse burgers bij de stad Haditha, nadat een collega van hen was omgekomen in een hinderlaag. De Britse krant The Guardian bericht naar aanleiding van dit incident dat alle Amerikaanse militairen in Irak een spoedcursus militaire ethiek gaan volgen. Het illustreert hoe sinds het begin van dit millennium internationaal de aandacht voor de ethische vorming van militairen sterk is toegenomen. Dit hoofdstuk beschrijft hoe academisch onderwijs in de militaire ethiek een bijdrage aan die vorming kan leveren. Het doel van dat ethiekonderwijs is het morele besef te vergroten en de kans op (het tolereren van) onethisch gedrag te verkleinen – het belang daarvan ziet tegenwoordig iedereen wel in. Dat biedt mogelijkheden om de plaats van militaire ethiek in de curricula te versterken, maar het gevaar bestaat dat men veel tijd en moeite investeert in ethiekonderwijs zonder een duidelijk idee over wat men daarmee wil bereiken en op welke manier. Wat dit hoofdstuk wil doen is uiteenzetten wat militaire ethiekonderwijs in een academische setting behelst, en ingaan op enkele keuzes en uitdagingen die daarbij komen kijken. Daarbij zal de aandacht met name uitgaan naar de invloed van de situatie en de mogelijkheden en beperkingen van een op karaktervorming gerichte benadering. Het doel van die exercitie is ook om aan het einde van dit hoofdstuk meer duidelijkheid te hebben wat betreft het verschil tussen wetenschappelijke en militaire vorming – en over hoe beide elkaar kunnen versterken.
Archined, 2023
BLUE Architecture of UN Peacekeeping Missions van architect onderzoeker Malkit Shoshan is de omva... more BLUE Architecture of UN Peacekeeping Missions van architect onderzoeker Malkit Shoshan is de omvangrijke papieren neerslag van zo’n vijftien jaar onderzoek naar de sociale, economische, ecologische en fysieke impact van de VN-kampementen op gemeenschappen in conflictgebieden.
Morele vorming van militairen Bijdragen van de geestelijke verzorging, 2023
Liberale Reflecties, 2022
Ethiek en de militaire praktijk, 2020
Militaire Spectator , 2019
Militaire Spectator, 2019
De ambitie van de krijgsmacht om robuust én wendbaar te zijn in een complexe dynamische wereld vr... more De ambitie van de krijgsmacht om robuust én wendbaar te zijn in een complexe dynamische wereld vraagt om een bredere blik op strategisch leiderschap. De organisatie moet het vermogen ontwikkelen om aan dat leiderschap collectief invulling te geven. Dat komt niet spontaan tot stand binnen de bestaande bureaucratische kaders en met de huidige opvattingen over wat leiderschap is. Het vraagt iets van de hele organisatie en het vermogen om te kunnen schakelen tussen hiërarchie en de invulling van leiderschap als gezamenlijk proces speelt daarbij een cruciale rol. Kan de organisatie relevante belemmeringen overwinnen of is dat voorlopig een brug te ver?
Algemeen Nederlands Tijdschrift voor Wijsbegeerte, 2019
Ethics for Cyber War and Cyber Warriors Although some claim that the term cyber war is merely m... more Ethics for Cyber War and Cyber Warriors
Although some claim that the term cyber war is merely metaphorical, there are good reasons to see cyber war as a form of warfare ‐ even if it is not war as we have hitherto known it. This poses the question whether the principles of the Just War Tradition, which claims to offer an alternative for pacifism and realism, apply to this specific kind of war too. This article argues that the jus in bello principles of discrimination and proportionality are applicable, and that actually applying them would limit the harm cyber-attacks currently cause. Most cyber-attacks of recent years wrongly target civilians, and this amounts to a serious breach of these principles. The final part of this article looks at those who actually conduct the cyber-attacks, the cyber soldiers ‐ how do they fit into the military profession, and to what extent can we expect them to uphold the principles of Just War?
Hoewel moed een lastig te definiëren concept is, is er wel overeenstemming over het feit dat er t... more Hoewel moed een lastig te definiëren concept is, is er wel overeenstemming over het feit dat er ten minste twee vormen zijn: fysieke moed en morele moed. Morele moed staat dan onder meer voor de bereidheid de eigen reputatie op het spel te zetten voor een hoger, moreel doel. Veel auteurs nemen aan dat morele moed een afgeleide is van fysieke moed, en dat wie het laatste niet heeft, ook op het eerste niet hoog scoort, maar dat is niet per se het geval. Het is wel duidelijk dat de prijs van morele moed doorgaans hoog is. Om te verklaren waarom dit juist ook in de krijgsmacht zo is, gaat dit artikel in op het belang dat zij hecht aan sociale cohesie. Ook de nadelen van sociale cohesie komen daarbij aan de orde.
Magazine nationale veiligheid en crisisbeheersing , 2017
Defensie ziet leidinggeven als haar core business en besteedt terecht veel aandacht aan het train... more Defensie ziet leidinggeven als haar core business en besteedt terecht veel aandacht aan het trainen en opleiden van haar (toekomstig) leidinggevenden. Maar ook buiten defensie zien we een voortdurende fascinatie met leiders en een roep om sterker leiderschap als er iets niet gaat zoals we willen. Toch is de achterliggende aanname dat leiders het verschil maken minder vanzelfsprekend dan deze ooit was. Zo verscheen in 2014 The End of Leadership van Barbara Kellerman, als professor in Public Leadership verbonden aan de Harvard Kennedy School. In dit provocatieve boek schetst Kellerman de crisis waarin zowel leiderschap als de leiderschapsindustrie vandaag de dag volgens haar verkeren.
Krijgsmacht en samenleving. Over de inzet van een geweldsinstrument: bestuurlijke, politieke en veiligheidsaspecten, René Moelker, Jörg Noll, Michiel de Weger (eds) Boom, 2009
Liberaal Reveil, 2003
De koers die de Verenigde Staten op dit moment onder de regering Bush vaart is volgens de auteurs... more De koers die de Verenigde Staten op dit moment onder de regering Bush vaart is volgens de auteurs geen conservatieve. Los van geschiedenis en cultuur in andere naties (economische) vrij-heid en democratie te willen introduceren duidt eerder op universalistische aspiraties en daarmee op een revolutionaire koers.
Liberaal Reveil, 2004
Eer wordt vaak afgedaan als iets van het verleden. Als hedendaagse liberalen teruggrijpen op klas... more Eer wordt vaak afgedaan als iets van het verleden. Als hedendaagse liberalen teruggrijpen op klassieke liberale teksten uit de zeventiende en achttiende eeuw, lezen ze daarom vaak heen over de passages over eer. Dat is te betreuren, zo meent de auteur, want de klassieke liberalen hadden een overtuigend antwoord op de vraag waarom een calculerende burger zich rechtvaardig zou moeten gedragen.
Archined, Apr 19, 2016
Malkit Shoshan presenteert tijdens de komende Architectuurbiënnale Venetië in het Nederlandse pav... more Malkit Shoshan presenteert tijdens de komende Architectuurbiënnale Venetië in het Nederlandse paviljoen haar onderzoek BLUE: Architectuur van VN Vredesmissies. In Het Nieuwe Instituut vertelde zij over haar bezoek aan Kamp Castor in Mali, een casestudy binnen dat onderzoek.
Is er een Western Way of War, die zich vanaf de antieke Grieken continu ontwikkeld heeft? Sommige... more Is er een Western Way of War, die zich vanaf de antieke Grieken continu ontwikkeld heeft? Sommige auteurs menen van wel, maar je mag twijfels hebben bij hun conclusie. Is de westerse manier van oorlog voeren ingebed in verworvenheden als democratie, vrijheid, kapitalisme en
wetenschap? Ook dat mag je betwijfelen. Als er al een ‘gemene deler’ bestaat in de huidige ‘westerse’ manier van oorlog voeren, dan ligt de oorsprong bij de manier waarop Napoleon
oorlog voerde. De huidige ‘niet-westerse’ combattanten moeten zich echter niet rijk rekenen met de veronderstelde geringe ‘westerse’ bereidheid om slachtoffers te aanvaarden.
