Cultic Studies Review, Vol. 5, No. 2, 2006, Page 42
statutory or societal superstructure, allows us to approach the subject matter in a culture-
invariant and truly universal way.
It is precisely on this level that we can easily define human rights: Everybody has the right
of not being constrained in the development of his or her own free will (the affirmation of
his body and life). Nobody has the right to hamper others in the development of their
freedom. The freedom of any one person finds its natural limit at the point where it
constrains the freedom of any other person. These normative principles of justice find their
most succinct formulation in Immanuel Kant‘s definition of (moral) right:
―The whole of conditions under which the voluntary actions of any one person can be
harmonized in reality with the voluntary actions of every other person, according to the
universal law of freedom.‖[22]
This moral-philosophical fixing of the cardinal ethical gauge also establishes the borderline
up to which an individual (a community, a society, a state …) may carry on with its
development of freedom without negating the legitimate self-determination of another
individual entity. Simultaneously, the actions are being defined which, in transgression of
this borderline, have to be designated as unjust and morally illegitimate and whose
rejection and warding off can be morally justified.
In almost everything they do, humans find themselves in a social, political and societal
framework of interaction. Thus every ethically relevant decision stands in an interactive
context, and pertains to an external result that is invariably linked to the weal and woe of
other human beings or a community in the narrower or wider sense of the word. Although
the result of a deed—in the case of an unjust act the suffering of injustice—is of importance,
we must nevertheless accept that it is primarily the incentive and motivation, the intrinsic
meaning of an action, that decides the ethical value of an action and determines the right
and wrong inherent in it.
At this level of abstraction we can easily grasp that a violent act can only be morally
justified when it bears a reactive character, in the sense of the warding off of a positive act
of injustice in the normative meaning described above. A mere rational deliberation a priori
gives proof that the warding off of such an action—very much in contrast to this action
itself—may claim moral legitimacy. This rational law is: ―Causa causae est causa
effectus.‖[23] This principle tells us nothing else than whatever the one who is exposed to
injustice undertakes to ward off injustice and to re-establish just conditions, the one who
commits the unjust act must ascribe to himself. What happens to him as a result has been
triggered by his act of injustice and would otherwise not take place.
It is exactly within this ethical pattern of the relation between right and wrong where
terrorism finds itself for the terrorist always tries to legitimize his use of violence as
inevitably necessary to alter the unjust social or political conditions as he perceives them.
As shown above, a course of conduct provoked by an aggressor in reaction to an assault in
order to protect oneself has to be considered as being legitimate, inasmuch as this course of
action would not have taken place without the positive act of aggression. It is for this
reason that the defense and warding off must bear different moral quality than the
aggression itself because it is exactly following from it. Consequently, a major feature of the
legitimate application of physical force must have to be seen in the factor of inevitability and
unavoidability. In this context, however, there is a danger that the amount of physical force
necessary to ward off the aggression may be exaggerated. Therefore, the moral legitimacy
of the use of force is closely linked to another ethical principle, the principle of
proportionality.
statutory or societal superstructure, allows us to approach the subject matter in a culture-
invariant and truly universal way.
It is precisely on this level that we can easily define human rights: Everybody has the right
of not being constrained in the development of his or her own free will (the affirmation of
his body and life). Nobody has the right to hamper others in the development of their
freedom. The freedom of any one person finds its natural limit at the point where it
constrains the freedom of any other person. These normative principles of justice find their
most succinct formulation in Immanuel Kant‘s definition of (moral) right:
―The whole of conditions under which the voluntary actions of any one person can be
harmonized in reality with the voluntary actions of every other person, according to the
universal law of freedom.‖[22]
This moral-philosophical fixing of the cardinal ethical gauge also establishes the borderline
up to which an individual (a community, a society, a state …) may carry on with its
development of freedom without negating the legitimate self-determination of another
individual entity. Simultaneously, the actions are being defined which, in transgression of
this borderline, have to be designated as unjust and morally illegitimate and whose
rejection and warding off can be morally justified.
In almost everything they do, humans find themselves in a social, political and societal
framework of interaction. Thus every ethically relevant decision stands in an interactive
context, and pertains to an external result that is invariably linked to the weal and woe of
other human beings or a community in the narrower or wider sense of the word. Although
the result of a deed—in the case of an unjust act the suffering of injustice—is of importance,
we must nevertheless accept that it is primarily the incentive and motivation, the intrinsic
meaning of an action, that decides the ethical value of an action and determines the right
and wrong inherent in it.
At this level of abstraction we can easily grasp that a violent act can only be morally
justified when it bears a reactive character, in the sense of the warding off of a positive act
of injustice in the normative meaning described above. A mere rational deliberation a priori
gives proof that the warding off of such an action—very much in contrast to this action
itself—may claim moral legitimacy. This rational law is: ―Causa causae est causa
effectus.‖[23] This principle tells us nothing else than whatever the one who is exposed to
injustice undertakes to ward off injustice and to re-establish just conditions, the one who
commits the unjust act must ascribe to himself. What happens to him as a result has been
triggered by his act of injustice and would otherwise not take place.
It is exactly within this ethical pattern of the relation between right and wrong where
terrorism finds itself for the terrorist always tries to legitimize his use of violence as
inevitably necessary to alter the unjust social or political conditions as he perceives them.
As shown above, a course of conduct provoked by an aggressor in reaction to an assault in
order to protect oneself has to be considered as being legitimate, inasmuch as this course of
action would not have taken place without the positive act of aggression. It is for this
reason that the defense and warding off must bear different moral quality than the
aggression itself because it is exactly following from it. Consequently, a major feature of the
legitimate application of physical force must have to be seen in the factor of inevitability and
unavoidability. In this context, however, there is a danger that the amount of physical force
necessary to ward off the aggression may be exaggerated. Therefore, the moral legitimacy
of the use of force is closely linked to another ethical principle, the principle of
proportionality.
