Extra rempublicam nulla justitia?

Abstract

Thomas Nagel’s (2005) contention that global justice is impossible to achieve without the establishment of a global state is challenged. After differentiating between the notions of weak & strong statism & reviewing Nagel’s contention that strong statism is required to achieve justice, several aspects of Nagel’s statist argument for realizing global justice are reviewed. Attention is subsequently dedicated to explaining why Nagel perceives the establishment of a strong state as a prerequisite for creating the capacity to achieve justice. Rather than accepting Nagel’s extrapolation of the necessity of a strong state for achieving justice to the global community, it is stressed that the formation of a supranational state necessitates going beyond satisfying humanitarian normative criteria in order to properly achieve global justice. Hypothetical scenarios involving various international organizations, eg, the International Labor Organization or the World Trade Organization, are then given to demonstrate how problems of resource distribution, governance, & human rights are complicated by attempts to create a global state. J. W. Parker