2
period of time as ‘postmodern’ even though the term was used before but in different
contexts (Anderson 1998:3,24). The position of Lyotard will be compared with the liberal
and egalitarian understanding of justice represented primarily by John Rawls (1921-2002) in
A Theory of Justice (1971). Rawls is perhaps one of the most influential writers within
political philosophy and this work has been regarded as a point of reference since he
attempted to elucidate and justify the institutions of a constitutional democracy and for this
reason it can be regarded as a continuation of a discourse which has its origins in the
Enlightenment.
The Enlightenment provided the root or the starting point of what most postmodern and some
modern thinkers define as modernity. For instance Fredric Nietzsche (1844-1900) and Martin
Heidegger (1889-1976) understood or defined modernity on the basis that the history of
thought is a ‘progressive enlightenment’ which justifies itself by the ‘manipulation’ of its
own ‘foundation’ or ‘origins’ (Vattimo 1985:2). On these lines, generally speaking,
postmodernism has criticised modernity appearing patronising and showing itself rather as a
fashionable position detached from everything else. This impotence recalls a certain nihilism
predominantly offered by Nietzsche. In fact, Nietzsche in France was assimilated in the
1960s and 70s by thinkers such as Derrida, Foucault and Lyotard who in turn were later
identified as postmodern thinkers and they also questioned the foundations of Western
political thought and its dogmatic character. Postmodernism as a way of thinking is a
consequence of modern Western thought. Any defence of what can be related to modernity
and therefore, what prevailed from the Enlightenment, is seen as a denial of ‘responsibility’
because considerations instead focus on the direction taken by modernity which can be
summarised in universal systematic expansionism in the light of ‘reason’ and concepts such
as justice constitute the legitimacy constructed to justify it.
Arguments about justice have always been concerned with arguments which carry ethical and
political implications. Ethical because justice attempts to determine what is ‘right’ from what
is ‘wrong’ and political because determination of what is right and wrong is influenced by
the social context in which judgment takes place. Those who have addressed arguments
about justice and its meaning , in Western philosophical thought this can be found since
Plato, have been concerned with the ‘virtuous’ aspect of justice but also with the attainability
of justice and what it would imply given the social condition in which they were writing and
their position within a particular group. This may suggest that justice and principles of justice
3
change according to social condition, meaning and values which a particular group of people
may share (Ryan 1993). However, Justice can be seen as a ‘necessary virtue’ for individual
to interact with each other and therefore institution should act according to ‘just’ principles
(Barry1994). It can be argued that theories of distributive justice are sophisticated
‘prescriptions’ for practice and they attempt to seek justice within the distribution of goods
and questioning the meaning of justice may imply questioning the acquisition of the
condition of the creation of goods and the attempt to justify them is clearly reflected in
contract theory and particularly in the works of 17
th
century philosophers such as Thomas
Hobbes (1588-1679) and John Lock (1632-1704).
Questions about the nature and meaning of justice when universal moral principles are
rejected may also suggest concerns for a broader understanding of justice as embedded in
International Law and to a certain extent the role of the United Nations. This may be
reinforced by the fact that over the years, the role of the United Nations has shown its
contradictions and limitations when faced with international conflicts. Most recently, with
the developments which led to the war against Iraq waged by USA and UK, it has come to a
point of political embarrassment. The ‘non-decision’ of the Security Council to legalise the
war and the ‘decision’ to strike of US and UK, backed by Italy, Spain and Portugal, caused
political disagreement on international level over the legitimacy of an attack to the regime on
Saddam Hussein in Iraq. This has shown that the controversial role of the UN is again, after
the cold war period, under strain since there has been a tendency in American foreign and
security policy to abandon international law in view of the fact that it may go against US
aspirations. It can be argued that the UN needs to undertake structural reform to gain a
certain degree of international credibility since the UN political structure reflects the
international situation of the post-war period and therefore is not able to react to ‘new
threats’ to international peace. In this light, given the antagonistic character of international
relations, the universal characteristic of justice and the totalitarian aspects of moral
principles, I will argue for a ‘re-consideration’ of the concept of justice.
This will point out that the failure of the UN, as guarantor of International law, poses critical
questions about its existence and that justice is instead the interpretation of an alliance
between few states, rather than the product of a wider agreement which the body of the UN
was intended to provide. The predominant feature of international law is that relations
4
between states are characterised by the objective of each single autonomous unit to aspire for
‘power’, which can be seen in the struggle to maintain it, to increase it and to demonstrate it.
The tension which international law is brought in to settle is between the struggle to maintain
the ‘status quo’, to expand (territorially and ideologically) and to maintain a recognised
reputation. The clash between one country to maintain the status quo and another country
trying to change it at the expenses of the former cause the frictions of international relations
(Morgenthau 1958:167,168).
According to this view, international relations are endless since struggle for power is at the
centre of relations between states and the UN was vested with powers, which obviously
clashed with national interests. It is clear that the initial establishment of the UN does in its
structure reflect the political spectre of the period in which it was brought into existence and
this reflection should point out the direction of this institution, and for our purpose, the
direction in which justice is asked to function.
The main aims into which the UN Charter is vested are those of maintaining international
peace and security, to take appropriate measures to strengthen universal peace, to develop
friendly relations based on equal rights, to achieve international cooperation and to play a
central role in attaining these objectives. These propositions are in contradiction with the
very nature of international relations since adherence to the common ends indicated in the
Charter by member states implies to enforce a universal interpretation of international law
over the individual character of each state. The contradiction revels itself not as much in the
content of international law, even though its universal character is rather desirable and
optimistic, but in the way these prepositions are implemented given the aspiration for power
of each singular state, the moral weight which they carry and the uneven influence in
interpretation which characterise international relations. In a ‘postnational’
1
situation where
the mutual interest of ‘bloc politics’ dominates the international arena this contradiction does
not change and the content of the Charter has become a tool to legitimise political decisions.
However, the most recent structural crisis pointed out the inability of the UN to endow the
norms of the Charter which would have provided arguments for legitimacy to act, instead the
self legitimation of the US was not based on rules but by ‘realities created on the ground’.
1
Term used by Jurgen Habermas in ‘Dispute on the past and future of international law; Transition from a
national to a postnational constellation’ to describe the ending of autonomous sovereignty of individual states
and the beginning of increasingly globalised international relations (XXIst World Congress of Philosophy,
August 10
th
-17
th
2003, Istanbul)
5
The influence of the US on international law or better the fusion of international law with
American foreign policy which has been criticised by the American neoconservative
movement for costing and harming the US, poses critical questions about the kind of justice
on which international law is based. On the one hand, justice is characterised by the influence
of a super power which has the means and the influence to implement it, and on the other
hand the political structure of the UN, which either constrains or favours the US, attempt to
act as an interpreter of international law facing the contradictions of international relations
and demonstrating its inappropriateness in enforcing international law. If postmodernism
challenges the possibility of universal values, how can this approach be related to the concept
of justice and to ethics? And what is the ‘meaning’ of justice within international law and the
UN institutions if broadly speaking one superpower and arguably one ideology is prevailing?
To put some light on these questions this work has been divided into two parts. The first will
concentrate on determining a postmodern perspective on justice represented by Lyotard as
opposed to the modern understanding of justice exemplified by Rawls and their ethical
implication. The second is an attempt to understand the pattern of international relations and
the direction of justice given the nature of international law and the possibility of a
postmodern understanding of justice.
In chapter 1 the attempt is mainly to clarify Lyotard’s distrust towards universal claims
perceived as perpetrators of totalitarian elements within political thought. One too evident
objection to this position is that the denial of universalism, intentionally, does not provide
any alternative to avoid a state of ‘impotence’ which characterises postmodern thought in
general. From this assumption, the intention is to consider the motivation for adopting a
position which rejects universal values and to reflect from this stagnation in a critical
manner. This will involve an attempt to identify the ‘difference’ between modernism and
post-modernism in continental thought and which aspects of philosophical discourse can be
consigned to this distinction. By looking at the usage of the term the intention is to define the
implication of postmodernism before Lyotard’s conceptualisation of the term and the
intellectual developments which brought him to the stance expressed in the Postmodern
Condition.
6
In chapter 2, I will set out to define the modern understanding of justice embodied in the
work of John Rawls and the postmodern perception of justice represented in some of the
works of Lyotard. In A Theory of Justice Rawls develops a conception of justice which seeks
to overcome fundamental differences of the notion of the ‘good’ since justice is only
attainable when an established understanding of the political good is agreed by individuals
within a polity. This agreement which takes the form of a contract requires the autonomy of
the individuals who can determine interests and ends according to their political needs. On
the other hand, in Lyotard interpretation of justice seek to avoid universal moral principles
and questions the modern approach to justice where justice is characterised by the derivation
of the just from the true which are conceptually different. To maintain this Lyotard questions
the role of language and argue that the distinct nature of language games characterises the
function of language and therefore justice becomes the recognition of differences rather than
the attempt to unify them.
Chapter 3 evaluates the ethical implications of the positions of justice explained by Lyotard
and Rawls. Here the concern will be directed towards the justifications that both thinkers
imply when developing their position on justice, particularly in the construction of the
original position exposed in Rawls and in the notion of obligation in Lyotard. Crucially these
two concepts form the basis from which prescriptions are possible to be made and also
provide the possible point of contrast since Lyotard, contrary to Rawls, argues that ‘there is
no community of ethical phrases’. An attempt will be made to show that ethics understood by
Levinas differs from that of Kant in the fact that there is not symmetry between ‘I’ and ‘you’,
which constitutes the ethical justification for justice. This difference is based on the
assumption that for Levinas the ethical rests on the relationship between the self and the
‘Other’ as a moment of encounter prior to any generalisation of being explained as an
‘ontological event’ which would not recognise and exclude the particularity of the Other. On
the other hand, Kant’s ethic is based on choice of autonomous, rational and free individuals
which disregard the ‘dissymmetry between ‘I’ and ‘you’…disregarded for the benefit of a
universal “humanity”’.
In chapter 4 the focus will be on the international context which the UN was established and
its structure bearing in mind that it developed as a successor of the League of Nations and
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