Das Buch ergründet die aktuelle dynamische und folgenreiche Entwicklung der europäischen Sicherheitspolitik. Dabei liefert es einen wichtigen und originellen Beitrag sowohl für die Praktische Philosophie als auch für die Bereiche der Security- und European Studies. Durch konkrete Analysen und die Herausarbeitung möglicher Lösungsansätze, verwirklicht das Buch einen philosophischen Ansatz, der in der Realität verankert ist und gleichzeitig auf Theorie und Normativität besteht. Im Fokus stehen die Charakteristika von neuen Sicherheitstechnologien und -verständnissen sowie deren Einfluss auf die "kopernikanische Wende" der Neuzeit, mit der das Individuum und der Schutz seiner Grundrechte ins Zentrum der politischen Legitimation gerückt sind.
This article focuses on the so-called "Area of Freedom, Security and Justice" (ASFJ), namely the policy field of the European Union (EU) that covers judicial and police cooperation, migration and asylum policies and the control of external borders. The article explores how the AFSJ has emerged and how, within it, the relationship between freedom and security has evolved over time and brought about a shift towards a "Security Union". Considering the whole process of European integration and compared with other areas such as economic integration, the policy area today covered by the AFSJ started to develop relatively late. However, during the last two decades, it has advanced to one of the most dynamic policy fields within the EU. During this process, a critical shift has occurred. At the very beginning of the construction of this area, freedom (of movement) as one of the four freedoms of the common market was the core value and objective to be realised. Although a close link between freedom and security was established since the beginning, "security" (and "justice"), were seen as supporting means functional to the realisation of the freedom of movement. During the affirmation and expansion of the AFSJ, however, security has more and more infiltrated the space of freedom and justice and has become an aim in itself. Out of the AFSJ, thus, a "Security Union" has emerged as the vision to guide the development of EU integration in the upcoming years.
This essay focuses on the approach to the study of political and legal phenomena that can be defined "critical realism" and with its apparent paradox. By "critical realism" I understand a way of looking at political and legal phenomena that combines a blunt analysis of social reality with a transformative, non-resigned critical attitude towards the status quo. I argue that this is the approach that inspired Danilo Zolo's lifelong reflections on politics and law. The same approach, moreover, is in my opinion shared by authors such as Raymond Geuss and Bernard Williams, who, since the beginning of the new millennium, have contributed to re-shape the international debate on the methods of political philosophy. Inherent in this approach is a paradox that can be encapsulated in the following two questions. First, if the theoretical analysis should not start from ideals and principles, but must instead take as point of departure the social and political situation in which we are inescapably entangled (both central assumptions of the critical realism), how is it possible to gain the distance necessary for criticisms? Second, if we cannot transcend our societal reality and cannot therefore rely on external and objective values, on which basis is it possible to suggest "better" alternatives to the status quo? The mentioned authors could not explain convincingly, in my opinion, how these two questions can be answered. However, and this is the central claim of the article, the paradox is not unresolvable. The two questions mentioned above can be answered, so my argument, by recurring, respectively, to the negativism characteristic of Judith Shklar's approach to political and legal theory and to the concept of "immanent critique" as understood by Rahel Jaeggi. Shklar convincingly shows that the critique of the status quo can be made not notwithstanding the blunt analysis of social reality, but exactly in reason of it. In order to recognise abuses of power and injustices, so her argument, we do not need an ideal theory of justice or of the perfect state. On the contrary, nothing better than history and the analysis of contemporary social reality can show us that injustices and abuses of power are a recurring and ever possible characteristics of politics. Jaeggi's concept on immanent critique, moreover, indicates how it is possible to build an alternative to the criticized situation that is not anchored on transcendent principles and yet can plausibly explain why the suggested alternative is "better" than the status quo. Finally, I argue that both Shklars' negativism and Jaeggi's concept of immanent critique operate implicitly in Zolo's approach, but that they, having not being made explicit, could not develop their whole potential.
Bolzaneto, Abu Grahib, Guantanamo: luoghi in cui la tortura è riemersa nel "civile"occidente contemporaneo. A perpetrarla sono i rappresentanti di uno Stato che si definisce "di diritto": uno Stato la cui giustificazione ultima è la difesa e la protezione dei diritti inviolabili degli individui. La tortura, lungi dall'essere scomparsa, dunque permane come tecnica di potere nei moderni stati democratici. Essa non solo persiste come dato di fatto. Al contrario, negli ultimi decenni sono riemerse giustificazioni della tortura come pratica legale e legittima per garantire la sicurezza dello Stato. Di fronte a queste nuove giustificazioni della tortura è oggi più che mai importante lasciarsi guidare dall'esperienza storica piuttosto che da ipotetici scenari futuri e, seguendo l'amonimento della studiosa statunitense Judith Shklar, fondare la difesa dei diritti sull'assunto, "ampiamente giustificato da ogni pagina di storia politica, che alcuni rappresentanti del potere statale si comporteranno regolarmente, su piccola o grande scala, in modo illegale e brutale, a meno che non venga loro impedito di farlo".
Surveillance, understood as the collection of information about populations for supervision purposes, is a critical technique of social control. As such, it can reveal important features of the power that exercises it. The article analyses two contemporary surveillance measures in Europe: the Schengen Information System and the Directive 2006/24/EC on data retention. The analysis aims to identify the structural characteristics of the changing power of the European Union and the role security plays in it. The main thesis is that security is a key element of the legitimacy claim of the expanding power of the European Union.
Il volume di Gustavo Gozzi, Diritti e civiltà. Storia e filosofia del diritto internazionale (Bologna, il Mulino, 2010) ha a nostro avviso colmato una lacuna importante nel panorama filosofico-giuridico italiano. Si tratta infatti della prima pubblicazione in lingua italiana che, da un punto di vista insieme storico e filosofico, affronta in modo sistematico lo sviluppo del diritto internazionale dall'età moderna ai giorni nostri. Questo primato è già un eccellente motivo per discutere Diritti e civiltà. Ma c'è di più. Una parte consistente del saggio è dedicata alla ricostruzione e discussione di contributi non-occidentali al dibattito contemporaneo sulla natura e il ruolo del diritto internazionale. Si può anzi dire che Gozzi fa proprio il punto di vista di questi autori: il volume si distingue infatti per un approccio critico nei confronti della pretesa universalità delle dottrine occidentali del diritto internazionale. Questo scetticismo si fonda sulla tesi fondamentale del volume, secondo la quale il diritto internazionale è caratterizzato dalla "continuità del discorso dell'egemonia occidentale dalla prima età moderna fino alla realtà contemporanea" (p. 11). Prendendo avvio dall'approccio sistematico e insieme critico del volume e dai temi in esso trattati, questo forum intende (ri)discutere temi chiave della storia e filosofia del diritto internazionale e metterne a fuoco un programma di ricerca.
AbstractThe idea that transnational dynamics challenge the regulatory capacity of the state has hardly ever received as much attention as in contemporary debates. Different voices denounce the crisis of the state and advocate the establishment of supranational institutions with legally coercive power. It is tempting to jump to the conclusion that these voices are concerned with the same cluster of problems. We think that one should resist this temptation. Firstly, not all theproblemspointed out by the advocates of supranational sovereignty are of the same kind and structure. Some concern the need to limit the power of states, whereas others address the almost opposite necessity to support and strengthen their problem-solving capacity through forms of international regulation. Secondly, the correspondingsolutionsare different. In particular, although they may all imply the establishment ofsupranationalinstitutions, not all such institutions need beglobal. The creation of a full-blown global rule of criminal law, for instance, would raise serious concerns of global despotism and cultural imperialism, and we therefore make a case forregionaland context-sensitive solutions in this case. However, problems of supranational socioeconomic justice can only be addressed through global regulatory institutions, for regional institutions would, in this case, only recreate current problems at the interregional level.
Ausgangsthese des Buches ist, dass die verbreitete Metapher einer Abwägung zwischen Sicherheit und Privatheit konzeptuell inadäquat ist und zentrale Aspekte von Überwachungs- und Kontrollmaßnahmen verdeckt. Die Autoren betonen hingegen die symbiotische Beziehung zwischen Freiheit und Sicherheit und zeigen die Leere beider Konzepte auf, sobald sie voneinander isoliert und außerhalb konkreter Machtverhältnisse verstanden werden. Über eine stärkere Kontextualisierung von Risikokonzeptionen, Überwachungs- und Kontrollpraktiken zeigen sie dabei den Wert von Privatheit und Datenschutz auf. Als Kaleidoskop von Perspektiven, die von den Critical Studies über Internationale Beziehungen, Rechtswissenschaften und Philosophie bis hin zur Soziologie reichen, macht das Buch deutlich, dass Überwachungs- und Kontrolltechniken keineswegs immer mehr Sicherheit und weniger Privatheit implizieren – und umgekehrt, dass der Schutz von Privatheit nicht nur zuungunsten von Sicherheit zu haben ist.
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Das Buch ergründet die aktuelle dynamische und folgenreiche Entwicklung der europäischen Sicherheitspolitik. Dabei liefert es einen wichtigen und originellen Beitrag sowohl für die Praktische Philosophie als auch für die Bereiche der Security- und European Studies. Durch konkrete Analysen und die Herausarbeitung möglicher Lösungsansätze, verwirklicht das Buch einen philosophischen Ansatz, der in der Realität verankert ist und gleichzeitig auf Theorie und Normativität besteht. Im Fokus stehen die Charakteristika von neuen Sicherheitstechnologien und -verständnissen sowie deren Einfluss auf die "kopernikanische Wende" der Neuzeit, mit der das Individuum und der Schutz seiner Grundrechte ins Zentrum der politischen Legitimation gerückt sind.
The Passenger Name Record (PNR) Directive has introduced a pre-emptive, risk-based approach in the landscape of European databases and information exchange for security purposes. The article contributes to ongoing debates on algorithmic security and data-driven decision-making by fleshing out the specific way in which the EU PNR-based approach to security substantiates core characteristics of algorithmic regulation. The EU PNR framework appropriates data produced in the commercial sector for generating security-related behavioural predictions and does so in a way that gives rise to a paradoxical normativity directly dependent on empirical states. Its 'securitisation move' is moreover characterised by an inherent tendence to expand. As a result, the PNR Directive poses challenges for existing check and balance mechanisms and for human autonomy. These challenges could be partially addressed by strengthening ex-post control procedures and independent auditing. Yet in the decision to adopt a risk-based security model, something more fundamental seems to be at stake, namely, the preservation of the idea of human beings as moral agents able to direct and modify their behaviour in accordance with an intelligible, reliable and predictable normative order.
