Is a nation ever justified in attacking before it has been attacked? If so, under precisely what conditions? This volume of new, specially commissioned chapters provides the most definitive assessment to date of the justifiability of preemptive or preventive military action.

David Rodin is Research Fellow in Philosophy at the Changing Character of War Program, University of Oxford, and Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics, the Australian National University. His research covers a wide range of topics in moral philosophy including the ethics of war and conflict, business ethics, and international justice.
Henry Shue is Professor of International Relations, University of Oxford, and Senior Research Fellow, Merton College. Best known for Basic Rights (Princeton 1980; 2nd ed., 1996) and "Torture " (1978), he also edited Nuclear Deterrence and Moral Restraint (Cambridge, 1989).

• Introduction


• 1: Hew Strachan: Preemption and Prevention in Historical Perspective


• 2: Marc Trachtenberg: Preventive War and U.S. Foreign Policy


• 3: Suzanne Uniacke: On Getting One's Retaliation in First


• 4: Neta C. Crawford: The False Promise of Collective Security Through Preventive War


• 5: Allen Buchanan: Justifying Preventive War


• 6: David Rodin: The Problem with Prevention


• 7: David Luban: Preventive War and Human Rights


• 8: Walter Sinnott-Armstrong: Preventive War - What Is It Good For?


• 9: Henry Shue: What Would A Justified Preventive Military Attack Look Like?