Rawls's discussion with Aron on "peace by satisfaction" and the cotours of a realist normative theory of international relations

Abstract

Starting from the realist revival in contemporary political theory, this article asks what the contours of a realist normative theory of international relations might be. It advances the hypothesis that the discussion that John Rawls establishes with Raymond Aron over the concept of “peace by satisfaction” in The Law of Peoples can be approached as a way of delineating such contours. Rawls’s The Law of Peoples and Aron’s Peace and War: A Theory of International Relations are presented as important works for exploring what a realist normative theory of international relations might look like. Both investigate the moral principles that should guide the foreign policy of a liberal democracy, yet they offer divergent paradigms for conceiving peace. On the one hand, we argue that Rawls’s concept of realistic utopia contains elements relevant to a realist normative theory of international relations. On the other hand, by reconstructing the way Rawls appropriates Aron’s concept of “peace by satisfaction,” we identify a departure from the ethic of responsibility characteristic of the realist tradition of political thought, insofar as this peace is inseparable from a just war against “outlaw states,” the potentially undesirable consequences of which are not integrated into Rawls’s theory. We conclude that the principles of the defensive strategy that Aron advocated for liberal democracies during the Cold War prove more compatible with the ethic of responsibility. These principles involve a peace established through the balance of power among great powers and the defense of the values promised by liberal democracy.