Practical Philosophy Seminar: Mathea Slåttholm Sagdahl

This talk considers the moral justifiability of military conscription. I will outline the severe ethical challenges for military conscription through a Rawlsian framework for liberal democracies. Ultimately, however, conscription must be compared with other systems for defence and military recruitment. Philosopher James Pattison has developed a theoretical framework for this purpose that he calls the Moderate Instrumentalist Approach. This framework assesses forms of military recruitment in light of a weighted comparison of three main factors: military effectiveness, democratic control, and proper treatment of military personnel. According to Pattison, All Volunteer Force-systems are morally preferable by comparing better to these factors than other systems of military recruitment, notably conscription. However, I argue that Pattison fails to evaluate certain hybrid systems, in particular what I call the Nordic Model of Conscription. I show that there are good reasons to think that such a hybrid system compares just as good or even better overall to these factors than an All Volunteer Force, making the Nordic Model of Conscription at least as morally justifiable and, arguably, also morally preferable.