By Daniel Chung

In recent decades, as scholars attempt to square American liberal internationalism with the remaining prevalence of war, discourse in international relations theory has been oriented to providing a normative foundation for armed international intervention. Recall, for example, that those defending US intervention in Afghanistan up to the last second argued that America had a moral obligation to preserve the rights of women and civil society. But it seems that such arguments based in humanitarianism have faltered, with Americans largely rejecting foreign intervention, especially that as grounded in lofty goals which detract from realist self-interest. In light of this apparent inability of modern theories to supply agreeable dictates of foreign policy, I suggest that we re-explore options from the deeper roots of our theoretical traditions, as Western political philosophy has long attempted to reflect on the just conditions of war and its just practice. The ancients, I think, can supply us with an alternative which could, at the very least, remind us of why we may choose to wage war as we do today.

Since at least Aristotle, there has been an explicit current of political thought which articulates the sentiment that “training in matters related to war should be practiced not for the sake of reducing to slavery those who do not merit it, but in the first place in order that they themselves will not become slaves to others.” This sentiment is also found at the outset of Plato’s Laws, where the Athenian Stranger, who seems to be the mouthpiece of his author, makes the case that, because we are fundamentally born into communities which are prior to us, and this cannot be escaped, we should be first and foremost concerned with the health of the regime on its own grounds, not with looking to external wars. Ultimately, foreign policy was subject to the political necessities of the domestic sphere. Of course, the notion that foreign policy is subject to domestic politics is not a strange one. Figures across the American political spectrum increasingly echo the notion that foreign policy should serve citizens, especially with regards to economics. I suggest, though, that foreign policy can serve domestic necessities by encouraging the development of political virtues, the existence of which within a certain political community would be a benefit to the community.

Naturally, performance of political virtue on the international stage would involve the demonstration of courage through attempts to achieve great acts, as with the organization of operations such as D-Day, or the Athenian attempt to launch an expedition to Sicily—although the latter resulted in disaster which the Athenian democracy never quite recovered for in the rest of the Peloponnesian war. However, foreign policy is also an opportunity to demonstrate magnanimity and self restraint on the international stage. One can create a “resplendent memory” of oneself not only in the minds of other nations and peoples, but among one’s own citizenry. Espousing a policy of fairness and justice abroad leads to better behavior by one’s fellow citizens at home. Contrast, for example, how the people of Athens became more moderate under a leader like Pericles, while under the reign of someone like Cleon, who Thucydides describes as the most violent among the Athenians, the regime became prone to civil dissension and external misadventure according to the consent of the people. And it is not only the effect of rhetoric which achieves this change between a virtuous and low minded statesman with regards to their impact on the character of the body politic, but also the unavoidable fact that statesmen simply provide us with examples of what behavior counts as high-minded, examples we feel naturally inclined to tend towards. Especially today in the age of mass political movements, it is required that a statesman have the appearance of possessing political virtues—for us, witnessing statesmen engage in actions we regard as virtuous, I think, has a salutary effect, as disturbing as the thought may seem. Nietzsche, over a century ago, wrote presciently that “the appearance of one who commands unconditionally strikes these herd-animal Europeans as an immense comfort and salvation from a gradually intolerable pressure, as was attested in a major way by the effect of Napoleon’s appearance.” Certainly, the desire of masses to be comforted by one who commands well, and does so while engaging in apparently effective foreign action, has not today subsided.

The ancient conception of foreign policy, which viewed it as a means to develop political virtue in such a way which would benefit the operation of domestic politics, is a conception I believe should be revisited in our own discourse. I acknowledge, of course, this would completely invert how we view foreign policy, being a view which precisely denies foreign policy its autonomy as a political matter, subjugating it beneath the realm of domestic politics. But then again, I think there might be cause to return to thinking about foreign affairs in this manner, especially as the US seems to return to a more non-interventionist stance in world affairs—and this perspective, if nothing else, is certainly worth considering.

This piece is a reproduction from its original issue in Hemispheres Volume 48 Issue 1. Read more here.