IMMANUEL KANT, PERPETUAL PEACE: A PHILOSOPHICAL SKETCH (1795)
PERPETUAL PEACE
Whether this satirical inscription on a Dutch innkeeper's sign upon which a burial ground
was painted had for its object mankind in general, or the rulers of states in particular,
who are insatiable of war, or merely the philosophers who dream this sweet dream, it is
not for us to decide. But one condition the author of this essay wishes to lay down. The
practical politician assumes the attitude of looking down with great self-satisfaction on
the political theorist as a pedant whose empty ideas in no way threaten the security of
the state, inasmuch as the state must proceed on empirical principles; so the theorist is
allowed to play his game without interference from the worldly-wise statesman. Such being
his attitude, the practical politician (and this is the condition I make) should at least
act consistently in the case of a conflict and not suspect some danger to the state in the
political theorist's opinions which are ventured and publicly expressed without any
ulterior purpose. By this clausula salvatoria the author desires formally and emphatically
to deprecate herewith any malevolent interpretation which might be placed on his words.
SECTION I: CONTAINING THE PRELIMINARY ARTICLES FOR PERPETUAL PEACE AMONG
STATES
1. "No Treaty of Peace Shall Be Held Valid in Which There Is Tacitly Reserved Matter
for a Future War";
Otherwise a treaty would be only a truce, a suspension of hostilities but not peace, which
means the end of all hostilities, so much so that even to attach the word
"perpetual" to it is a dubious pleonasm. The causes for making future wars
(which are perhaps unknown to the contracting parties) are without exception annihilated
by the treaty of peace, even if they should be dug out of dusty documents by acute
sleuthing. When one or both parties to a treaty of peace, being too exhausted to continue
warring with each other, make a tacit reservation (reservatio mentalis) in regard to old
claims to be elaborated only at some more favourable opportunity in the future, the treaty
is made in bad faith, and we have an artifice worthy of the casuistry of a Jesuit.
Considered by itself, it is beneath the dignity of a sovereign, just as the readiness to
indulge in this kind of reasoning is unworthy of the dignity of his minister.But if, in
consequence of enlightened concepts of statecraft, the glory of the state is placed in its
continual aggrandisement by whatever means, my conclusion will appear merely academic and
pedantic.
2. "No Independent States, Large or Small, Shall Come under the Dominion of Another
State by Inheritance, Exchange, Purchase, or Donation"
A state is not, like the ground which it occupies, a piece of property (patrimonium). It
is a society of men whom no one else has any right to command or to dispose except the
state itself. It is a trunk with its own roots. But to incorporate it into another state,
like a graft, is to destroy its existence as a moral person, reducing it to a thing; such
incorporation thus contradicts the idea of the original contract without which no right
over a people can be conceived. [1]
Everyone knows to what dangers Europe, the only part of the world where this manner of
acquisition is known, has been brought, even down to the most recent times, by the
presumption that states could espouse one another; it is in part a new kind of industry
for gaining ascendancy by means of family alliances and without expenditure of forces, and
in part a way of extending one's domain. Also the hiring-out of troops by one state to
another, so that they can be used against an enemy not common to both, is to be counted
under this principle; for in this manner the subjects, as though they were things to be
manipulated at pleasure, are used and also used up.
3. "Standing Armies (miles perpetuus) Shall in Time Be Totally Abolished";
For they incessantly menace other states by their readiness to appear at all times
prepared for war; they incite them to compete with each other in the number of armed men,
and there is no limit to this. For this reason, the cost of peace finally becomes more
oppressive than that of a short war, and consequently a standing army is itself a cause of
offensive war waged in order to relieve the state of this burden. Add to this that to pay
men to kill or to be killed seems to entail using them as mere machines and tools in the
hand of another (the state), and this is hardly compatible with the rights of mankind in
our own person. But the periodic and voluntary military exercises of citizens who thereby
secure themselves and their country against foreign aggression are entirely different.
The accumulation of treasure would have the same effect, for, of the three powers (the
power of armies, of alliances, and of money) the third is perhaps the most dependable
weapon. Such accumulation of treasure is regarded by other states as a threat of war, and
if it were not for the difficulties in learning the amount, it would force the other state
to make an early attack.
4. "National Debts Shall Not Be Contracted with a View to the External Friction of
States";
This expedient of seeking aid within or without the state is above suspicion when the
purpose is domestic economy (e.g., the improvement of roads, new settlements,
establishment of stores against unfruitful years, etc.). But as an opposing machine in the
antagonism of powers, a credit system which grows beyond sight and which is yet a safe
debt for the present requirements (because all the creditors do not require payment at one
time) constitutes a dangerous money power. This ingenious invention of a commercial people
[England] in this century is dangerous because it is a war treasure which exceeds the
treasures of all other states; it cannot be exhausted except by default of taxes (which is
inevitable), though it can be long delayed by the stimulus to trade which occurs through
the reaction of credit on industry and commerce. This facility in making war, together
with the inclination to do so on the part of rulers--an inclination which seems inborn in
human nature - is thus a great hindrance to perpetual peace. Therefore, to forbid this
credit system must be a preliminary article of perpetual peace all the more because it
must eventually entangle many innocent states in the inevitable bankruptcy and openly harm
them. They are therefore justified in allying themselves against such a state and its
measures.
5. "No State Shall by Force Interfere with the Constitution or Government of Another
State";
For what is there to authorise it to do so? The offense, perhaps, which a state gives to
the subjects of another state? Rather the example of the evil into which a state has
fallen because of its lawlessness should serve as a warning. Moreover, the bad example
which one free person affords another as a scandalum acceptum is not an infringement of
his rights. But it would be quite different if a state, by internal rebellion, should fall
into two parts, each of which pretended to be a separate state making claim to the whole.
To lend assistance to one of these cannot be considered an interference in the
constitution of the other state (for it is then in a state of anarchy). But so long as the
internal dissension has not come to this critical point, such interference by foreign
powers would infringe on the rights of an independent people struggling with its internal
disease; hence it would itself be an offense and would render the autonomy of all states
insecure.
6. "No State Shall, during War, Permit Such Acts of Hostility Which Would Make Mutual
Confidence in the Subsequent Peace Impossible: Such Are the Employment of Assassins
(percussores), Poisoners (venefici), Breach of Capitulation, and Incitement to Treason
(perduellio) in the Opposing State";
These are dishonourable stratagems. For some confidence in the character of the enemy must
remain even in the midst of war, as otherwise no peace could be concluded and the
hostilities would degenerate into a war of extermination (bellum internecinum). War,
however, is only the sad recourse in the state of nature (where there is no tribunal which
could judge with the force of law) by which each state asserts its right by violence and
in which neither party can be adjudged unjust (for that would presuppose a juridical
decision); in lieu of such a decision, the issue of the conflict (as if given by a
so-called "judgement of God") decides on which side justice lies. But between
states no punitive war (bellum punitivum) is conceivable, because there is no relation
between them of master and servant.
It follows that a war of extermination, in which the destruction of both parties and of
all justice can result, would permit perpetual peace only in the vast burial ground of the
human race. Therefore, such a war and the use of all means leading to it must be
absolutely forbidden. But that the means cited do inevitably lead to it is clear from the
fact that these infernal arts, vile in themselves, when once used would not long be
confined to the sphere of war. Take, for instance, the use of spies (uti exploratoribus).
In this, one employs the infamy of others (which can never be entirely eradicated) only to
encourage its persistence even into the state of peace, to the undoing of the very spirit
of peace.
Although the laws stated are objectively, i.e., in so far as they express the intention of
rulers, mere prohibitions (leges prohibitivae), some of them are of that strict kind which
hold regardless of circumstances (leges strictae) and which demand prompt execution. Such
are Nos. 1, 5, and 6. Others, like Nos. 2, 3, and 4, while not exceptions from the rule of
law, nevertheless are subjectively broader (leges latae) in respect to their observation,
containing permission to delay their execution without, however, losing sight of the end.
This permission does not authorise, under No. 2, for example, delaying until doomsday (or,
as Augustus used to say, ad calendas Graecas) the re-establishment of the freedom of
states which have been deprived of it - i.e., it does not permit us to fail to do it, but
it allows a delay to prevent precipitation which might injure the goal striven for. For
the prohibition concerns only the manner of acquisition which is no longer permitted, but
not the possession, which, though not bearing a requisite title of right, has nevertheless
been held lawful in all states by the public opinion of the time (the time of the putative
acquisition).
See Immanuel Kant Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch <http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/kant/kant1.htm>
Or Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch by Immanuel Kant 1795
Supplied by Francis K Krause 11th September 2002
e-mail: SapereAudeFKK@hotmail.com