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Destroyed school in Zhytomyr, northwestern Ukraine, March 20, 2022
Photo: Roman Pilipey/EPA
The war in Ukraine has shaken much of what could have been considered an indisputable certainty just a few weeks ago.
Undoubtedly there are good reasons to reconsider some things in the face of this war.
However, parts of the public debate currently seem to be characterized less by uncertainty and thoughtfulness than by the fact that after a brief moment of shock, new certainties emerged very quickly and solidified into generally shared basic beliefs in a very short time.
In this context, there is talk in many places of a sudden awakening from idealistic dreams, which the Russian attack suddenly exposed as such.
What is usually meant by this is the supposedly naïve pacifist dreams of the peace movement of the last few decades, but not infrequently also the supposedly equally naïve hopes of an international peace and security policy oriented towards balance, cooperation and institutionalization.
Such "dreams" now seem to be replaced by a broad renaissance of political realism, which is reflected above all in the broad approval of a resolute rearmament policy and extensive arms deliveries to the Ukrainian government.
This surprising new popularity of the old "Realpolitik" may at times slip into an unconvincing "reflexive" denunciation of morality, as Nils Markwardt critically remarked recently.
However, large parts of the political and also the scientific debate of the last decades have had to put up with the accusation of a lack of a sense of reality.
In view of the speed with which current events are dissolving the obvious and even more unspoken self-evidences of political discourse, there is something to be said for a return to political realism.
However, only if this does not mean the plain old "Realpolitik" from the historical mothball of European nationalism, but rather that attitude
For Weber, this attitude was anything but self-evident, it was a mental feat that was difficult to realize and required the utmost intellectual discipline and self-monitoring.
Remembering this may be helpful.
Because then the question arises as to whether what is currently emerging in many places is actually "political realism" in the true sense of the word.
Are the new certainties, simply because they recognize the basic importance of the military for security and stability and, so to speak, rediscovered violence as a potential factor in (international) politics, an expression of a politically realistic attitude?
This is doubtful, especially when one realizes that
that the current approval of arms deliveries in particular is mostly understood in the sense of an active solidarity with Ukraine, which is above all morally necessary.
Not complying with the moral imperative of supplying weapons for self-defense to those who were attacked through no fault of their own seems to many to be not only callous, but downright morally reprehensible.
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Here it seems that there is less "Realpolitik" than a kind of "robust moral policy" (Markwardt).
It is often combined with an equally robust claim to be allowed to exclude dissenting voices from participation in the public debate in the name of “political hygiene”.
However, this mixture comes close to the kind of political moralism that political realism has always opposed with vehemence.
If there is one thing on which the classics of realism in the history of political thought, from Thucydides through Machiavelli and Max Weber to his predominantly Anglo-Saxon contemporary exponents (such as Bernhard Williams), agree,
What is meant by this is an attitude for which political judgment is largely limited to determining what is morally imperative.
From this perspective, there is always a clear and categorical answer to the question “What should we do?”, ie an absolute answer that does not allow for compromises or considerations (and in case of doubt, no criticism either).
What is to be done is the morally right thing or what one's own "attitude" pretends to be the morally right thing.
I act correctly as long as I know whose side I'm on and as long as I remain true to myself and my attitude, regardless of the question of what real effects and consequences my actions may trigger.
Max Weber described this type of political stance (which, by the way, frequently refers to Immanuel Kant's moral philosophy, not entirely rightly, but also not entirely wrongly) with the concept of "ethics of conviction."
And based on his experience of European politics before, during and after the end of the First World War, he found them to be extremely dangerous.
In his famous speech »Politics as a Profession« held in 1919, he countered it with his concept of a politically realistic »responsibility ethics«.
By this he meant an attitude that does not primarily ask about the attitude of those involved, but above all about the real consequences of their actions when it comes to answering what is politically and ethically imperative in a concrete situation.
act politically responsible
fiat justitia et pereat mundus
("Let justice be done, and the world perish thereby").
One does not necessarily have to find Weber's counter-proposal completely convincing.
For example, his ethics of responsibility leaves unanswered the question of how the consequences of actions can be ethically assessed without reference to a specific moral "attitude".
And it remains unanswered not least because Weber himself could always count as an answer, in the sense of his own, clearly "national" political sentiment.
Regardless of this, his vehement warning of the dangers of a purely consensual politics obviously has an extraordinarily great current relevance.
The almost literal sense that the turn from the dying world assumes against the background of the current crisis shows this very clearly.
A realism that is to be taken seriously is not shown in a simple denunciation of morality, but in an attitude that is aware of the dangers of one-sided moralistic rigorism in politics, that gets involved morally and politically with the complexity of reality, with its ambivalences and contradictions and nonetheless willing to take full responsibility for the consequences of their own actions.
Such an attitude is, as always, strenuous and is therefore not self-evident even today, on the contrary.
The current crisis is probably particularly well suited to promoting that political attitude that combines the simple demand for "realpolitik" with an unchanged rigorous, merely turned moralism.
In addition to the sudden disappointment of long-cherished ideals, the moral clarity of the current situation may also contribute to promoting this attitude.
We are witnessing a brutal war of aggression that violates international law.
With this war, the Russian government is not only guilty of a lack of consideration and international responsibility that was hard to imagine until recently, but also of serious crimes.
The moral assessment of this war and its causes cannot come to any other conclusion.
Realistically speaking, no moral judgment, no matter how clear, can alone provide us with the answer as to what needs to be done politically.
But the temptation to believe exactly that understandably becomes all the greater the clearer the moral judgment, and that also means:
Ominously, however, we are also dealing with a crisis situation that makes it more dangerous than ever to give in to this obvious moralistic impulse.
This war is causing great suffering and has placed Europe and the world in a highly dangerous situation, the potential for escalation of which seems almost unlimited.
In addition, there is a real danger that the longer the war lasts, this escalating situation will develop a momentum of its own that will become increasingly beyond the control of the actors and could become literally uncontrollable from a certain point.
In such a situation one desires clear and unequivocal, preferably categorical, answers of the kind moralism provides.
But in such a situation it is extremely dangerous
The urgently needed assessment of the specific consequences of our actions, which is based on incomplete information and always remains uncertain, including its unintended side effects, will not provide any clear answers, in contrast to our unequivocal moral judgement.
Perhaps with one exception: In view of the dangerous nature of the situation, it must be the first and foremost duty of everyone involved to prevent the point of loss of control being reached at all costs, and that ultimately means nothing other than starting this morally reprehensible and highly dangerous war as quickly as possible to finish as possible.
All concrete political decisions in the current situation must ultimately be based on this goal, from the decision for or against the delivery of certain weapon systems to the adjustment of the right level of sanctions to the question of how and between which participants threads of conversation are spun, maintained and used should.
The moral reputation of those involved will occasionally have to play a subordinate role, and the repertoire of options for action will have to include acts of active solidarity as well as political, economic and military pressure to force compromises.
And the latter will have to be supplemented by clever strategies of political appeasement, which for their part will have to refrain, at least in part, from the question of moral guilt,
The end of the war, the founding of peace is not only an existential, but also a moral imperative.
However, the question of how this goal can be achieved cannot be answered morally, but only with a realistic effort at political prudence.