Cyber-threats and the ethics of international aggression: Reconsidering Just War Theory in the 21st century

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How should just war theory be framed in the 21st century? The recent and continuing changes in the nature of international aggression challenge the foundations of traditional just war theory. Cyberactionsprovide a lens that shows that the clear demarcation of war is becoming increasingly difficult. Without this demarcation, traditional just war theory, which treats war as an exceptional moralcircumstance, cannot provide an ethical framework appropriate for the 21st century.This project broadens the arguments in my MA thesis. It conceptually challenges the validity of just war theory by combining two threads of thought. Firstly, examples of cyber-actions are used to show thatthe definition of war is substantially blurred. This makes untenable the view that the moral rules governing war are distinct from those governing other contexts. This argument runs parallel to, andstrengthens, current reductivist challenges to just war theory such as those of McMahan and Frowe.Secondly, the same examples are used to argue that our intuitions about the moral challenges presented by war are not dependent on the methods of waging war, but are rather grounded inconcerns about the mass harm to individuals or groups. This change of view mirrors the recent change in the concepts of development and freedom that has been led by Sen and Nussbaum. Theresult is a strong challenge to the validity of just war theory and the provision of an alternative moral framework based on an idea of harm in respect of freedom, development and justice, that may beapplied to all acts of international aggression.