ó Idealism, Realism, and the Categorical Imperative in Kant's Perpetual Peace Gordon P. Henderson Widener University Immanuel Kant's philosophical system is devoted to reconciling the" a11ti­ nomy" between freedom and determmation. 111 Perpetual Peace, tlns becomes the related antinomy between morality and politics. This article reinterprets Kant's political essays as efforts to reconcile the modern dichot07i1Y in interna­ tional politics between idealism and realism. Kant's application of his famous moral rule, the categorical imperative, to the problem of war and peace captures the tension between these contradictory approaches tn interl1atinnal relatinl1S. The reconciliation he achieves allows contemporary practitioners to be guard­ edly hopeful in their peacemaking efforts. Propon.ents of the" democratic peace" thesis, which Kant originated, would do well to control their cnthusiasm; yct critics should contain their cynicism. This article understands Immanuel Kant's Perpetual Peace1 as a philo­ sophical and practical application of the classic dichotomy between po­ litical idealism and political realism in international relations.2 Philosophi­ cally, Kant defines and seeks to mediate the seeming contradiction be­ tween politics and morality through the application of several formula­ tions of his categorical imperative. In so doing, he insists upon hopefulness about the prospects for inorality, and peace in particular, while also warn­ ing that hope must not give rise to paralyzing illusions about the facts of political life. In his prescriptions for international political practice, Kant draws upon history, political science, and political logic to evaluate the philosophical worthiness of familiar types of political action. The result of these efforts is an essay that weaves together close analyses of the virtues, vices, and inextricable linkages between realism and idealism in politics. Kant's political thought is a product of his overall philosophical sys­ tem.3 In the Critique of Pure Reason,4 Kant declares a Copernican revolu­ tion in epistemology, in accordance with which he asks "whether we may not have more success ... if we suppose that objects must conform to our knowledge" (Kant 1929, Bxvi). In other words, what we count as knowledge consists of the systematic ordering by the categories of the understanding of -empirical and conceptual intuitions. This process of ordering is revolutionary because it means that we construct our knowl­ edge and experience rather than have them given to us. The Kantian project is to examine and understand the rules of construction and to turn away from any effort to know things in themselves. Kant thus un- 1 dertakes to make explicit the limits of knowing and the possibilities for action possessed by rational beings (Kant 1929, Bxxx). When presented with the results of the understanding's ordering of the data of empirical and conceptual experience, the faculty of pure rea­ son seeks to provide a single organizational scheme for all we know. Rea­ son determines, however, that neither causality nor freedom can be af­ firmed or denied as the controlling principle of what we call experience. Kant's solution to this "antinomy of reason" is the adoption of a critical standpoint from which reason is constantly checking these tendencies. Reason's knowledge of itself therefore becomes as important as its knowl­ edge of experience. As a result, "the doctrine of morality [freedom] and the doctrine of nature [causality] may each ... make good its position ... in so far as criticism has previously established our unavoidable ignorance of things in themselves" (Kant 1929, Bxxix; also see A807 /B835).5 Kant's understanding of political experience in general and of war and peace in particular can be extrapolated from this epistemological dualism. For Kant, political experience, like 0.11 experience, is best understood as the systematic ordering of empirical and conceptual intuitions by the categories of the understanding. Reason's efforts to find a single organi­ zational scheme by which to explain political experience spark its inter­ est in questions of war and peace. When the understanding apprehends all of the attendant suffering, death, and deprivation of war, it considers these as no more or less natural phenomena than the passing of a ship (Kant 1929, A192/B237). Rather than accept the phenomena of war with resignation, reason seeks to locate war within the causal chain, regard­ ing it as both cause and effect. Regarding war as effect, reason explores such causes as human na­ ture, the nation-state, and the whole of the state system until, consider­ ing these also as effects, it comes to seek a final original cause. Because of its "ignorance of things-in-themselves," however, reason cannot jdentify such a cause with certainty. Unable to confirm or deny the necessity of war, reason therefore considers the possibility that war is not necessi­ tated by nature (Kant 1929, Bxxiii; Kant 1957, 36, AA 371). Reason determines that it must think war unnecessary when it con­ siders war not as effect but as cause. First, reason will come to recognize that the attendant deprivations of war, such as fear, hunger, military oc­ cupation, economic collapse, and death, would obstruct reason in its ef­ forts to attain knowledge of nature. Reason is essentially rendered impo­ tent by war. Second, since reason is unable ultimately to complete the determination of human beings in the causal chain, it must consider them as beings in possession of a self-determining will, that is, as ends in them­ selves. War thus has the additional consequence of obstructing human freedom. If humans are required always to act in response to the instru- 2 11H'lltalities of war, they cannot also exercise treec10m m pursmt of hIgher moral ends. Practical reason therefore is also rendered impotent. Given these conclusions, the eradication of \'var becomes a moral im­ }wrative. Kant (1937, ] S, AA 356) insists that reason, "from its throne of supreme morallegis1ating authority, absolutely condemns war as a legal r~'course and makes peace a direct duty." Elsewhere he writes, "morally priJchcal reason pronounces in us its irresistible veto: There is to be no "var" (Kant 1991, 160, AA 354, emphasis in the original). But while war's t'rndication is an impcrntive whose possibility is enhanced by our inabil­ j t ~I to affirm the necessity of war, its achievement is fraught with empiri­ (,11 obstacles. If the end is peace, the means must at least sometimes be vv,w. This familiar dichotomy of peace and war makes manifest in the po­ litical realm the dichotomy between freedom and causality in epistemol­ ()gy. The resultant political antinomy of idealism and realism is also con­ I ill110US with those of religion and science as well as those of autonomy ,mel heteronomy. Each of the poles of these antinomies has the force of its uwn truth in the struggle between them. As with epistemological antino­ mies, a critical standpoint from which mediation can take place is required. I n the various fields of human action, practical reason turns to the cat­ l·gorical imperative as that standpoint. Although an extensive explication of the categorical imperative is be­ yond the scope of this article, a few brief remarks will help prepare for the analysis of Kant's application of it to the antinomy of idealism and realism in international politics. In the Ground'work for l7 Metaphysics of l'vlorals, Kant seeks a fundamental principle for moral choice universally applicable to all human situations (Sullivan 1989, 149; also see Kant 1956). As with critical reason in his epistemology, the categorical imperative and the procedures used to derive it are grounded in the limitations and possibilities of human practical reason, as Kant understood them. That is, we cannot know whether actions that contradict the categorical im­ perative would be appropriate for beings other than ourselves. To Kant, thought they are never appropriate for human beings. In the FOUlzdatiollS of the Metaphysics of Morals, Kant articulates three formulations of the categorical imperative: 1. Universalizability: I should never act except in such a way that I can also will that my maxim should become a universal law (Kant 1959, 18, AA 402). 2. Mutual Respect: Act in such a way that you always treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of any other, never simply as a means, but always at the same time as an end (Kant .1959,47, AA 429). 3. PubliCity: Never act in such a way that the maxim of your action could not be regarded as legitimate by all parties (Kant 1959, 47, AA 381). 3 This article argues that Kant's application of each of these formula­ tions of the categorical imperative to questions of war and peace in Per­ petual Peace mediates between the idea of peace and the realities of in­ ternational politics. I In his poignantly ironic introduction to the essay, Kant (1957, 3, AA 343) says that his title is derived from" a satirical inscription [perpetual peace] on a Dutch innkeeper's sign upon which a burial ground was palnled."6 The image of the graveyard suggesls lhat death 1::; the unly sort of perpetual peace likely to result from the failure to construct a careful balance of idealism and realism in politics. Realists, who tend to accept and even relish the inevitability of war, put themselves and the rest of humanity in the grave by applying only force and instrumental reason to conflict. Idealists neglect tactics and the verity of force in favor of some totalistic vision that lands themselves and humanity, again, in the grave. Whether in pursuing knowledge or peace, the uncritical use of reason, metaphorically, is death. As F. H. Hinsley (1963, 69) notes, the structure of Perpetual Peace takes "the form of a treaty ... with a preliminary and definitive articles and a seCl"et article .... This tripartite structure includes, first, the conditions to be achieved; second, the measures necessary to achieve them; and third, the conditions under which it may be hoped that such measures will successfully be undertaken. Each of these parts of the essay describes political arrangements that derive from the structure of the understand­ ing itself. We begin with the "pJ:eliminary Articles." . The "Preliminary Articles" are a catalogue of the concepts constitut­ ing the relations between nations living under perpetual peace. They are summed up in the idea that the only peace reason can know and com­ mand is perpetual. A peace treaty is to be "the end of all hostilities" (Kant 1957,4, AA 33, emphasis mine). To call the seeming peace of a truce or ceasefire perpetual is "a dubious pleonasm." As Hinsley (1963, 74) ob­ serves, "[w]hen Kant wrote peace, he meant peace" (emphasis mine). Despite the term "preliminary," these articles are not a list of actions whose outcome is to be peace. Rather, they describe those relationships between and' among nations that for Kant are truly peaceful. Characterized by Hinsley (1963, 69) as 1/ a statement of the law of nations as it ought to be," the Preliminary Articles insist upon mutual sovereign independence among nations while recognizing that their inherent competitiveness will drive them into conflict with each other. Tn the tradition of contract theory, Kant's Preliminary Articles are the terms to which he believed nations would agree if they wanted to coexist and compete peacefully.7 They combine a genuine idealism in the commitment to peaceful coexistence 4 with a sensible realism that recognizes the strain that competitiveness f1l"l'sents. Any treaty whose terms fail to realize any of the Preliminary ;\ rticles will end in war and is, in fact, no treaty at all. All parties must ,lgree at the outset that these are to be the outcome of their negotiations hdme they can even begin discussing the details of a treaty. The Prelimi- 11<1 ry Articles are the terms of international coexistence to which all na­ tions would agree. The six preliminary articles are divided into two parts, each consist­ ing of three provisions. The first three preliminary articles grouped ac­ (Ourding to this division are: I. "No treaty of peace shall be held valid in which there is tacitly n'st'rved matter for a future war" (Kant 1957, 3, AA 343). 2. "No state shall by force interfere with the constitution or govern­ l1ll'nt of another state" (Kant 1957, 7, AA 346). 3. "No state shall, during war, permit such acts ot hostility which \Vt )uld make mutual confidence in the subsequent peace impossible: Such ,lrt' the employment of assassins, poisoners, breach of capitulation, and incitement to treason in the opposing state" (Kant 1957, 7, AA 346). These three articles express idealism's vision of a genuine peace. Fur­ I h.,1' evidence that Kant understood them this wav is found in his insis- 01 It'nce that they "hold regardless of circumstances" and that they "de- Illillld prompt execution" if the peace is to be genuine (Kant 1957,8, AA '\47). Hence, these three articles are essential to the internal logic of trea­ li~'s, requiring at a minimum that the genuine intent be to establish peace. 'I 'rea ties that look to future battles and victories violate the categorical Imperative's universalization reqUirement and are little more than veiled weapons of war (Gr 18, AA 402). Likewise, interventions in the affairs of uther states are inconsistent with the mutual respect requirement of the categorical imperative (Gr 47, AA 429). Realist objections to such com­ mitments and forbearance fail to recognize that insecurity in any part of Ilw statf' systf'm will tmdprminf' the SPC'll1'ity of 311 stBtes, If the resort to war is to be IJ annihilated by the treaty of peace," the pLlte of peace among men living side by side is not the natural state; the Il.ltural state is one of war. This does not always mean open hostilities, htl! at least an unceasing threat of war" (Kant 1957 la, AA 348-349). The l'stllblishment of peace, contrary to the skepticism of the realists, is both morally necessary and empirically possible. Contrary to the dogmatism I lithe idealists, however, peace must be established in the natural context .1Ild thus prudentially. This duty to establish a peace consistent with both I Ill' standards of morality and the constraints of nahm:> le8cls Kant to con­ ('Iude that it can be achieved only if relations among people are arranged .IS if it is their will to be at peace with one another. They need not actually will peace but merely do so externally (juridically) by conforming to laws I hilt have them act as though they do. While political idealism is restricted I (I sdting as ends the standard of human behavior, political realism must devise morally legitimate means, in nature, to accomplish it. In view of these considerations, Kant (1957, lOn, AA 350) postulates Ihat "[a]l1 men who can reciprocally influence one another must stand tinder some civil constitution." That is, in order to assure the law-abiding hl'havior necessary to peace, humans must codify right conduct contrac­ IUi:llly. In all contracts, parties must agree on what their relations ought to he and then on those means of achieving them that are most consistent vvith the moral principles that require those relations. Peace rests upon SL'CUrity /I against hostility ... pledged to each by his neighbor." Such pledges, howevel~ "can occur only in a civil state"; otherwise, "each may treat his neighbor, from whom he demands this security, as an enemy" . (Kant 1957,10, AA349). Peace thus requires the establishment of a consti­ tutional context. Without this context, such pledges would be empty and ('(mld not effectuate the moral requirement for peace. Hence, idealism's nptimistic faith in the effectiveness of mutual pledges of friendship is tem­ pered by realism's cautioning on the need for sufficient civil authority to ,1 void the deterioration of pledges into empty promisE'S. ThE' specific 111E'anS devised to achieve that security will differ among different societies as well as among different levels of political relations. Each of the three "De­ finitive Articles" describes that constihltion (contract) consistent with these 9 requirements that would exist at three levels of political relationship: be­ hveen individuals in a nation, behveen nations of the world, ,mel beh .... ,pell individuals considered as world citizens (Kant 1957, 10-11n, AA 350). At the level of individuals in a nation, Kant offers the "First Definitive Article for Perpetual Peace," the iuea that "The Civll Conslitution of :ev­ ery State Should be Republican." It is "[t]he only constitution which de­ rives from the idea of the original compact, and on which all juridical legislation of a people must be based" (Kant 1957, 11, AA 350). Kant's enthusiasm for the republican form, which he defines as a separation of the executive and legislative powers, stems from the idea that republi­ canism takes the social contract seriously in acknowledging the princi­ pal role of the citizenry in constituting political societies. There can be no domestic peace without the contract, and there can be no contract with­ out the participation of the entire society in its construction. The repubH­ can constitution, then, is founded upon the idealist notion that all gov­ ernment derives from the contractual COIl~ellt of Lhe governed. Several implications for the treatment of citizens derive from this ide­ alist foundation of the republican constitution. First, each person is en­ titled to a liberty consistent with that of other people. Without this prin­ ciple, there could have been no consent, and no ongoing consent, to the social contract. Second; each person is to be subject to one common law, without which there could be no ground for agreement in conflicts. Fi­ nally, each person is to be exactly equal to every other person with re­ spect both to the law and to responsibility. Without such equality, there could be no true contract because the stronger party would have dic­ tated its terms to the weaker (Kant 1957, 12, AA 349-350). Like othert; ill Lhe conLracL Lradition, particularly Rousseau, Kant re­ gards the will of the citizenry as the foundation of authority over it. Politi­ cal authority is never exercised over people without their consent, even when they are passive or have never explicitly given it. In giving this con­ sent, they commit themselves to a social rather than private existence. They become citizens. The categorical imperative's insistence on autonomy (lib­ erty), universalizability (law), and respect for people (equality) is most closely approximated in the republic because it is by definition a society co"nstituted by citizens. Consequently, republic;:!ni"m "ie; thf' original basis of every form of civil constitution" (Kant 1957, 12, AA 351). Although the fundamental idea behind the constitution is that it will establish a common law to which all consent and are equally subject, Kant is not suggesting that the citizens directly formulate that law in an empirical sense. The principal function of the law is to institute the con­ ditions of peace. It must not be construed as an expression of collective self-interest. It is a law that expresses the "general will" of the people, to which they "would" consent (Kant 1957, 12n, AA 351). In other words, 10 II)" republic is not a direct denlOcracy. I )emocracy is "necessarily a despotism, because it establishes an ex­ "'lilive in which all ... who are not quite all, decide, and this is a contra­ ,Ill lion of the general will with itself and with freedom" (Kant 1957,14, \;\ :'52). Direct democracy returns people to a state of war by placing ',I 1\'l'reignty in the hands of the majority. Kant thus dismisses the idealist \\ Illl might mistake him as saying that political legitimacy requires the "Illpirical consent of people who, by nature, are self-interested. To the (I lillrary, it requires the consent of reason as expressed by rational beings II]J'( lugh the general will. With a nod toward the realists, Kant further (" ,..;c'rves that the law can be effective even in thfl conduct of /I a race of d,'vils," as long as the state is organized well and the citizens are intelll­ :,~I 'nl enough to follow its incentives. Specifically, "the powers of each selfish inclination are so arranged in oppo­ si tion that one moderates or destroys the ruinous effects of the other. The consequence for reason is the same as if none of [these inclinations] existed, and man is forced to be a good citizen even if not a morally good man." (Kant 1957, 30, AA 366) Kant's republic, then, is governed for and through the people but not 'll'cL'ssarily by them. It would be ruled by a preferably small number of 1i'11rI>sentrltivflS, fllthflr an aristocracy or a monarchy who would frame 1,)\vS that facilitate the orderly clash of interests. On the one hand, Kant's !'I ,,]1 ism warns that the larger the number of rulers (such as collective Illonarchies, corporatist aristocracies, or representative democracies), he ,~~rl',lter is the likely influence of self-interest (Kant 1957, 15, AA 353). On Ilw other hand, realism also warns that however small the number of n IIL'rs, they might become just as despotic as democracies by ruling in Ilwi r self-interest. Nevertheless, "it is at least possible for [aristocracies ,1Ild monarchies] to assume a mode of government conforming to the "pi rit of a representative system/' while it is impossible in democracies "since everyone wishes to be master" (Kant 1957, 14, AA 353). Idealism pft'vails in the insistence that a citizen's right to pursue self-interest is lundamental to the good constitution, whereas realism points away from ,h'l1locracy and is only guardedly optimistic about the republican poten­ I i,ll of monarchy and aristocracy. Ultimately, the republican mode of gov­ ernment is to harness the selfish inclination against war. The "Second Definitive Article for Perpetual Peace," that "The Law of 1\J(ltions Shall be Founded on a Federation of Free States," depends upon l he first article. According to Kant, it is not only conflict among them­ sl'lves as individuals that inclines people to form themselves into a state I If ordered liberty. "Even if a people were not forced by internal discord [n submit to public laws," he writes, "war would compel them to do so" 11 (Kant 1957, 29, AA 365). Thev will inevitably find themselves surrounded . . and threatened by individual states in the same way they are threatened by other individuals. The need to defend against this threat requires the formation of a state in which selfish inclinations can be prevented from interfering with collective self-defense. Domestic peace, albeit among "uevlb," l~ e~~elllidllu llLlenldliollal peace, which is likewise essenliallo the fruits of domestic peace. This continuum of domestic and interna­ tional political order means that the two are not much different from each other and that idealism and realism will occupy the same positions in framing an international peace as they do at the domestic level. According to Kant, citizens of republics will be disinclined to go to war because the true general will, expressed by citizens or their repre­ sentatives, would not consent to a declaration of war. "[N]othing is more natural," he writes, than that people would be livery cautious in com­ mencing such a poor game, decreeing for themselves all the calamities of war" (Kant 1957, 12, AA 351). Even if people are naturally inclined to­ ward war when they dre uut~iue the ~tdle, lhey would nol consenllo il if their liberty under a republican constitution, if not their own morally developed individual wills, prohibits it (Kant 1957, 17, AA 355). The fea­ ture of republics that inclines them to peace thus lies in their constitu­ tion. A republic is a state in which the citizenry has a direct stake. Its existence is dependent upon their individual as well as collective wills and is at least implicitly formed and maintained by them for the sake of their liberty to pursue their particular interests. For Kant, the republican stl'ltp has pprsona lity. Tts citizens will only reluctantly go to war, and then only to preserve their freedom from outside invasion. The personality of republican states also makes untenable the achieve­ ment of global peace by means of a world republic. An idealist might advocate a world republic on the ground that all peoples could live to­ gether under one global personality. Realists might advocate a world republic or government as the only way to prevent wars, skeptically sub­ stituting a powerful central regime for the hope that republics would refrain from war. Yet republics, having been formed by the will of a spe­ cific group of people, will be reluctant to surrender the autonomy achieved in that act of will to the will of other peoples. Thus, while the republican personality might give the idealist cause for hope, the realist wlll pm­ phasize that "personalities," however much inclined they are toward com­ munity over conflict, will nevertheless insist on their autonomy. These cunsideralions necessitate the federation of free states. Although conflicts inevitably will arise among their differing personalities, the fed­ eration preserves the autonomy of each member state. Republican states, animated by their individual personalities and reluctant to go to war unnecessarily, are mindful of the need for a system of law to provide 12 \111 iL,ctive security that is least threatening to individual autonomy. While lllld i ng such law in the federation, they no more attribute a truly good \\ i II to the participant states than they do to the citizens of the republic. I .i kc the republic, the federation is necessarily a weak alternative never­ tlll'il'ss dictated by reason. It can come about when "a powerful and en­ lightened people" makes itself a republic, thereby inclining itself to per­ Jld UC11 peace, and in thp intel"!?st of extending its freedorn., coming to serve .1'-; ,1 "fulcrum to the federation" (Kant 1957, 18-19, AA 356). At best, it \ \' i II become" only the negative surrogate of an alliance which averts war, "l1d ures, spreads, and holds back the stream of Lhose hosLile pdssiuns which fear the law, though such an alliance is in constant peril of their I 1 I'l'11. Idealism obtains its de facto peace, whereas realism restrains the incli- 11.1lion toward a global autarchy that would ultimately prove fatal. 'rhe federation is also consistent with the mutual respect formulation lli the categorical imperative. The formation of a league among states, whose relationships are defined by a law they collectively choose, imple­ ll11'nts the requirement that they treat each other as ends. That they may II )ntinue to regard each other's actions with suspicion and maintain their 11.1 tional identity is consistent with the permission they have to treat each nlher as means. For idealism, states must treat each other as ends; for I"l'