Judging Just War
Daniel Edward Young Thursday, 1 September 2005
Oliver O'Donovan, The Just War Revisited (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003). 150pp. $19.99.
In this short, demanding, but rewarding book, noted political theologian Oliver O'Donovan of Oxford University examines the theory of just war, or as he prefers to phrase it, "a proposal for doing justice in the theatre of war." While not explicitly engaging leading just war thinkers like James Turner Johnson and Michael Walzer, O'Donovan reframes the classical criteria, seeking to give them a more secure grounding in theology and shying away from a casuistic, "checklist" method that much contemporary just war theory uses. His main argument is laid out in a 63-page title essay, followed by short essays applying these principles to specific "problem areas" such as counter-insurgency war and immoral weapons.
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