Special Symposium on the Afghanistan War Published by Ethics & International Affairs, the Journal of the Carnegie Council

NEW YORK, July 5, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Coinciding with President Obama's announcement of a major troop withdrawal from Afghanistan, Ethics & International Affairs has published a special symposium on the ethics of the War in Afghanistan.

The symposium features a lead article by Richard W. Miller of Cornell University, author most recently of Globalizing Justice: The Ethics of Poverty and Power (Oxford, 2010) and responses by George R. Lucas (U.S. Naval Academy), Darrel Moellendorf (San Diego State), Jeff McMahan (Rutgers), David Rodin (Oxford), and Fernando R. Teson (Florida State).

Miller argues that the United States has a moral duty actively to pursue negotiations with the Taliban and Pakistan to achieve a political settlement conceding control of the Pashtun countryside to the Taliban. Sharply opposing the President's approach, he urges an end to the U.S. offensive in the Taliban's heartland and a quick, steep reduction of U.S. forces. "Every day spent on more violent paths," he claims, "has added to the toll of deaths and wrecked lives wrongfully caused by the United States."

The five distinguished respondents engage with Miller's argument, challenging its premises and prescriptions. For instance, Fernando Teson argues that "the United States would be perpetrating a major injustice if it enabled the Taliban to rule over any part of the territory and over any person," and that "the only way to stop principled evildoers" such as the Taliban is by continued military action.

Full-length articles from the symposium are available for a limited time through the Carnegie Council at www.carnegiecouncil.org/resources/journal/index.html and from the journal's publisher, Cambridge University Press, at http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayIssue?jid=EIA&tab=currentissue.

Additionally, symposium participants may be available for comment on President Obama's recent troop withdrawal announcement or the ethics of the Afghanistan War more generally.

The Carnegie Council's flagship publication, Ethics & International Affairs (www.ethicsandinternationalaffairs.org), is an interdisciplinary resource for scholars, students, journalists, and policy analysts concerned with the moral dimensions of global issues. The journal covers global justice, civil society, democratization, international law, intervention, sanctions, and related topics.

The Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs (www.carnegiecouncil.org), established in 1914 by Andrew Carnegie, is an independent, nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to increasing understanding of the relationship between ethics and international affairs.

Cambridge University Press publishes over 270 peer-reviewed academic journals across a wide spread of subject areas, in print and online. Many of these journals are the leading academic publications in their fields and together they form one of the most valuable and comprehensive bodies of research available today.

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SOURCE Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs