Article

Comment

War & peace

16 March 2023

4 min read

Just War and Just Peace

As the Ukraine War passes another milestone, can any war be considered just? Christine Schliesser explores Just War theory and a possible path to Just Peace.

Christine Schliesser

Christine Schliesser lectures in Theology and Ethics at Zurich University, and is a scientific collaborator with the Center for Faith & Society at Fribourg University.

Civilian evacuation across Irpin River during the Ukraine War.

Yan Boechat/VOA via Wikimedia Commons.

Will Germany deliver Leopard 2 tanks to Ukraine? No? Yes? When? Media discussion of the war that the Russian Federation started against Ukraine in 2014 and that entered a new stage one year ago, currently centres on questions of weaponry. Who else will send tanks? And what about fighter aircrafts? No? Yes? When?

In classical military ethics, which has long been dominated by the so called Just War Theory, these questions fall under ius in bello, the right conduct in war. This also includes discussions on proportionality, military necessity and the differentiation between combatants and non-combatants.

Just War Theory has a long tradition in Christian thought. Church Father Ambrose argued that whoever does not ward off injustice from his fellow man (or woman for that matter) when he can, is as guilty as he who commits it. Ambrose’s student, Augustine, then developed this thought in more detail as he laid the foundations for what could be called a bellum iustum, a just war.

Even before going to war, the criteria of the ius ad bellum, the right to go to war, must be satisfied. These include, for instance, a just cause, legitimate authority, prospect of success, right intention and last resort. We encounter these criteria again in slightly modified form in our modern international law. In view of these guidelines, of Russia’s breach of international law, and of Ukraine’s right to self-defence, the on-going war in Ukraine clearly seems to be a just war. Or is it?

Nothing holy or just

Two points need to be made in this discussion. Firstly, there are no just or holy wars. Period. Or as 150 churches, after the horrors of the Second World War, put it in Amsterdam in 1948: ‘War is contrary to the will of God.’ Wars are always an evil and an expression of the failure of human beings to strive for peace. This also holds true for the war in Ukraine. And this means that we need a new dimension in the debate, namely guilt.

Every action – and inaction – here involves guilt. As the German pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who was killed by the Nazis for his engagement in a plot against Hitler, put it:

‘everyone who acts responsibly becomes guilty’.

And even if we become guilty for the sake of the other person, our guilt remains just the same. Yet, as Bonhoeffer concludes, we trust in the grace of God, who calls us to responsible action. , Bonhoeffer’s ideas have been considered dangerous and easily misused to justify any crime, as forgiveness is always available. Nevertheless, we must acknowledge the reality of guilt that pervades any war, including the war in Ukraine.

Just Peace

Secondly, recent years have seen a new kid on the block: Just Peace Theory. While Just War Theory looks at a conflict from the perspective of violence, Just Peace Theory puts the focus on peace. This includes adding a third set of criteria. Ius post bellum looks at justice after a war. We know that after a conflict is before a conflict. We therefore need to pay more attention to what happens after the weapons finally fall silent.

Here, the experiences of truth and reconciliation processes worldwide can help. Both dimensions belong inseparably together and both already begin during a conflict, not just after it. Truth, for example, requires the documentation of war crimes committed by all parties to ensure the prosecution of war criminals later on. And reconciliation is the conditio sine qua non for sustainable peace.

Russia’s war against Ukraine and its threats against NATO and Western countries demonstrate, not least that after the end of the Cold War, opportunities for genuine and sustainable reconciliation were missed as latent hatred, prejudices and stereotypes were allowed to linger.

Just Peace Theory emphasizes that building peace is an art and a craft. It requires specific skills, training and preparation. It also requires virtues of grace, persistence and forgiveness, Countless documented examples world-wide supply empirical proof that these methods actually work. Perhaps it is worth devoting some of the $2,113 billion (2021) of global annual military expenditure for training non-military approaches to address conflict resolution? To learn how to build peace as much as how to wage war? No? Yes? When?

Pathways to Peace

One such initiative is Pathways to Peace. Aiming at peace, justice and reconciliation in times of war, this initiative is currently being developed through the Conference of European Churches, a group of some 120 member churches in 38 countries. With their long-term involvement and intimate knowledge at the grassroot level, faith actors in civil society seem uniquely positioned to connect people, heal relationships, offer a new social imaginary and facilitate practical help.

The objectives of Pathways to Peace include among others to facilitate safe spaces for honest exchange between Ukrainian and Russian church leaders, to develop a network of church leaders and other civil society leaders for exchange on the preparation of peace or to bring together European youth, in particular Ukrainian and Russian young refugees.

The immense potential of faith actors in transforming conflict and building sustainable peace seems to have gone largely unnoticed in the public sphere. Given the prominence of faith in this conflict, it is about time that all relevant actors in our societies, including faith-based initiatives, joined forces to counter this major crisis of our time.

Article

Character

Comment

Mental Health

Politics

4 August 2025

4 min read

Why reducing the voting age is a mistake

Adolescence should be a safe space to be a bit daft

Graham Tomlin

Graham is the Director of the Centre for Cultural Witness and a former Bishop of Kensington.

A band and audience are back lit against a stage.

Let it out.

Kylie Paz on Unsplash

The haunting book of Ecclesiastes carries these memorable words:

For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:

a time to be born and a time to die,

a time to weep, and a time to laugh

a time to keep silence, and a time to speak

They came to mind recently when reading of the UK government’s plan to reduce the minimum voting age to 16. Now I understand why this government might want to do this. Lowering the voting age has proved popular in other places such as Scotland. Some well brought up 16-year-olds are mature beyond their years, show an interest in politics, and are smart, articulate people. And, of course, younger people tend to be more inclined to vote for left-leaning parties like Labour. It makes electoral sense.

But does it make generational sense?

Adolescence is a time when we try out being grown-up for a while. Mid-teenagers are no longer children, but they are not yet fully adult. They are in the process of spreading their wings, most of them still at school, living at home under their parents’ roofs, not yet fully responsible for their own time, income, life choices and so on. They can’t legally buy alcohol, fireworks or drive a car. Yet they can buy a pet or a lottery ticket. It’s a kind of middling time, not one thing nor the other.

And rightly so. Adolescence is a time for a certain controlled irresponsibility. We all look back with embarrassment on things we did in our teenage years. A few years ago, I watched a cricketer called Ollie Robinson make his debut for England at Lords. The best day of his life turned into the worst when some journalist desperate for a story dug up some semi-racist tweets he had posted several years before as a teenager. Some say he has never recovered, as he struggled with the media attention into his life, and has not played international cricket for over two years. We all said stupid things when we were 16 and that should be expected and forgiven as what they were – immature posturing, attempts to work out who we are in the big world, testing the water of the adult world before we dive in. Adolescence should be a safe space to be a bit daft, to get some things wrong and some things right. Hopefully we learn from our mistakes and our successes and grow up a bit through them.

The attempt to make 16-years olds politically responsible seems to encroach upon that safe space. It risks skewing an important stage of growing up. And this seems to be a modern trend.

Teenage years are a vital period enabling us to grow into mature adults, learning to become responsible over time.

In the past, 21 was the age when people legally became adults, being given the ‘key to the door’, trusted to come in and out of the house independently of parents. Yet that has shifted within living memory. The legal age of adulthood was reduced to 18 in 1969.

Jonathan Haidt recently complained that we are seeing “the complete rewiring of childhood.” The childhood of mammals, he claimed, involves rough and tumble play, chasing games, activities that develop adult skills. In recent times, he says, we have put into the pockets of children and young teenagers, a video arcade, a porn theatre, a gambling casino, and access to every TV station. The result of indiscriminate access to smartphones has been the loss of what we recognise as childhood and its replacement by gazing at screens all day long.

This shift to the voting age is also part of the drift to politicise everything. Everything becomes political, from your artistic tastes, to gender differences, to the food you eat, to family relationships. If politics is everything then surely everyone affected by it must vote? Yet politics has its limits. Politicians can only do so much. They can try to fix the economy, close loopholes that let harmful behaviour flourish, organise life a little better for most of us. They cannot fix the human heart, get us to love our neighbours or teach us gratitude, humility, faith, or what to worship – the most important choice of our lives.

Not everything is political, but everything is spiritual. Everything moulds us in some way, shaping us into the people we become over time, like plasticene in the hands of a child. Teenage years are a vital period enabling us to grow into mature adults, learning to become responsible over time, being given leeway to develop our moral senses and to work out our opinions as we encounter the wider world.

There is indeed a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to choose, and a time to play; a time to be an adult and a time to be child. Perhaps we should respect the times and seasons of life a little better, letting teenagers be teenagers and not expecting them to become adult too quickly. Most will hopefully have many years to vote if they live long healthy lives. The distinctions of time and the delicate, slow process of maturity need to be respected. We erode them at our peril.

Support Seen & Unseen

Since Spring 2023, our readers have enjoyed over 1,500 articles. All for free.
This is made possible through the generosity of our amazing community of supporters.

If you enjoy Seen & Unseen, would you consider making a gift towards our work?

Do so by joining Behind The Seen. Alongside other benefits, you’ll receive an extra fortnightly email from me sharing my reading and reflections on the ideas that are shaping our times.

Graham Tomlin
Editor-in-Chief

Pledge now