Land, Conflict, and Justice : A Political Theory of Territory

"Territorial disputes have defined modern politics, but political theorists and philosophers have said little about how to resolve such disputes fairly. Is it even possible to do so? If historical attachments or divine promises are decisive, it may not be. More significant than these largely subjective claims are the ways in which people interact with land over time. Building from this insight, Avery Kolers re-evaluates existing political theories and develops an attractive alternative. He presents a novel link between political legitimacy and environmental stewardship, and applies these new ideas in an extended and balanced discussion of the Israeli-Palestinian dispute. The result is the first systematic normative theory of territory, and an impressive example of applied philosophy. In addition to political theorists and philosophers, scholars and students of sociology, international relations, and human geography will find this book rewarding, as will anyone with wider interests in territory and justice."--Jacket Half-title 3 Title 5 Copyright 6 Dedication 7 Contents 9 List of tables 10 List of figures 11 Foreword and acknowledgments 13 Introduction 17 Of elephants and living rooms 17 Core ideas 19 A note on terminology 22 1 Everything you always wanted to know about taking other people's land (but were afraid to ask) 24 1.1 Territorial goods 24 1.2 The problem 26 1.2.1 Levy on territorial disputes 28 1.2.2 Claims 30 1.2.3 Claimants 35 1.2.4 Framework 38 1.3 Territory, sovereignty, property 43 2 Land and territory in political theory 48 2.1 Public goods arguments 50 2.1.1 Political development 52 2.1.2 Self-determination and democracy 53 2.1.3 Global efficiency 55 2.2 The ethics of the international system 56 2.3 Dissolutions 62 2.3.1 Global equal opportunity 65 2.3.2 Global equality of resources 67 2.3.3 Beyond domestic organization statism 73 2.4 The Anglo-American ethnogeography 75 2.5 Applying the framework 77 3 Groundwork 82 3.1 The concept of territory 83 3.1.1 Juridical territoriality 86 3.1.2 Resilience 89 3.2 Whose country? 98 3.2.1 Eligibility and liberal nationalism 98 3.2.2 Ethnogeographic communities 102 3.2.3 Contrasts 106 3.2.4 Individuation across time and space 109 3.3 Conclusion 113 4 Plenitude 116 4.1 Accounts of attachment 117 4.1.1 Particularist accounts 118 4.1.2 Beyond particularism 122 4.2 Diachronic and rooted criteria 124 4.2.1 Understanding rootedness 125 4.3 Plenitude 127 4.3.1 Sketching the notion 128 4.3.2 Empirical plenitude 131 4.3.3 Intentional plenitude 133 4.3.4 Plenitude or settlement? 136 4.4 The ethics of plenitude 139 4.4.1 Actual acceptance 140 4.4.2 State legitimacy 143 4.4.3 Resilience and sustainability 146 4.4.4 The return of settlement? 152 5 Territorial disputes 155 5.1 Applying the plenitude criterion 155 5.2 Conservative claims 159 5.3 Radical claims 163 5.4 Revisionist claims 169 5.4.1 Type i: controllers seek to settle 169 5.4.2 Type ii: inhabitants seek to control 169 5.4.3 Types iii and iv: abandonment 176 5.4.4 Secession 177 5.5 Epistemological and worldview axes 179 5.5.1 Worldview axis 179 5.5.2 Epistemological axis 180 5.6 Concluding considerations for plenitude 181 6 Implementation 187 6.1 Two aspects of global order 188 6.1.1 Scale 188 6.1.2 The conservation principle 189 6.2 Competing claims 192 6.2.1 Type 1: conservative vs. revisionist (ii) 194 6.2.2 Type 2: conservative vs. radical 197 6.2.3 Type 3: revisionist (i) vs. revisionist (ii) 199 6.2.4 Type 4: revisionist (i) vs. radical 200 6.2.5 Type 5: revisionist (ii) vs. revisionist (ii) 201 6.2.6 Type 6: revisionist (ii) vs. revisionist (iii) 201 6.2.7 Type 7: revisionist (ii) vs. radical 202 6.2.8 Type 8: revisionist (iii) vs. radical 202 6.2.9 Type 9: radical vs. radical 203 6.2.10 Remaining issues 203 6.3 The Israeli-Palestinian dispute 205 6.3.1 Against standard solutions 206 6.3.2 1880 212 6.3.3 Circa 1900 213 6.3.4 Partition 214 6.3.5 Circa 1955 218 6.3.6 After 1967 219 6.3.7 Today 220 6.4 Conclusion: indigenous land claims 232 Works cited 236 Index 246 Can territorial disputes be resolved fairly? This groundbreaking book argues that they can, through attention to ways in which people interact with land. The author offers a theory of territory linking political legitimacy and environmental stewardship, and provides a novel application of his ideas to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.