In international law and the ethics of war, there are a variety of actions which are seen as particularly problematic and presumed to be always or inherently wrong, or in need of some overwhelmingly strong justification to override the presumption against them. One of these actions is assassination, in particular, assassination of heads of state. In this essay I argue that the presumption against assassination is incorrect. In particular, I argue that if in a given scenario war is justified, then (...) assassination of the enemy state's leader is also justified, and in fact ought to be pursued as a means short of war. I defend this position on both consequential and deontic grounds, arguing that assassination is both more discriminate than war and serves to harm only those most responsible for the situation which justifies war in the first place. I conclude by arguing that a norm of assassination, far from being a destabilizing force, as some have argued, would in fact serve to reinforce international norms of rights and respect for persons by making clear that tyrants and would-be oppressors cannot hide behind military forces or notions of sovereignty to protect themselves from judgment and retribution. (shrink)

Terrorist violence is often condemned for targeting innocents or non-combatants. There are two objections to this line of argument. First, one may doubt that terrorism is necessarily directed against innocents or non-combatants. However, I will focus on the second objection, according to which there may be exceptions from the prohibition against killing the innocent. In my article I will elaborate whether lethal terrorism against innocents can be justified in a supreme emergency. Starting from a critique of Michael Walzer’s account of (...) supreme emergency, I will argue that the supreme emergency exemption justifies the resort to terrorism against innocents to avert moral disasters such as genocide and ethnic cleansing, provided that the criteria of last resort, proportionality and public declaration are satisfied. (shrink)

Economic sanctions are often portrayed as peaceful alternatives to traditional warfare and have been distinguished from uses of force. This has the unfortunate effect of distracting us from the impact and nature of so-called maximum pressure sanction campaigns. This paper argues against this distinction by examining maximum pressure sanctions under several definitions of terrorism. Using the sanctions program against Iran as a case study, I begin with a consideration of the impact that sanctions have on ordinary citizens. Next, I weigh (...) the nature of these sanctions against several accounts of terrorism, considering definitions of terrorism from Michael Walzer, Tamar Meisels, David Rodin, Eric Reitan, Joshua Glasgow, and Samuel Scheffler in order to show that sanctions can in fact escalate to terrorism—specifically, economic terrorism—under multiple definitions. In uncovering the terroristic aspects of sanctions that intentionally threaten the welfare, livelihoods, and lives of ordinary citizens, I call for a shift in our moral evaluations of this widely accepted practice. (shrink)