License withdrawn : a moral evaluation of Norwegian arms export to Turkey

Abstract

License Withdrawn A Moral Evaluation of Norwegian Arms Export to Turkey On March 13, 1992, the Norwegian Foreign Ministry granted Raufoss A/S a license to export ammunition to Turkey. Two weeks later the Foreign Ministry withdrew the license, and Raufoss A/S was consequently denied the possibility to export. The aim of this thesis is to give a moral evaluation of the decision to withdraw the license for ammunition. This evaluation is partly based on the question whether it was right to grant the license in the first place. To evaluate the decision to withdraw the license is therefore a way to discuss some of the moral issues involved in arms export. The decision to withdraw the license was made in a situation where the conflict between the banned Kurdish Workers' Party (PKK) and Turkish government forces was intense and violent. At the end of 1992, it was announced that over 2,300 people had been killed on Turkish territory that year. On the basis of a pluralist view of morality, I will evaluate the policy decision on arms export from three different moral perspectives. The three perspectives are utilitarianism, Kantianism, and raison d etat. These theories have different views of what morality consi sts of and which considerations are morally relevant. The first moral perspective, utilitarianism, is a consequentialist theory which accords moral importance to the consequences of decisions on individual well-being. The second theory, Kantianism, is deontological and claims that there are certain restrictions on what we might legitimately do, regardless of the consequences: the morally right action is that which conforms to the demands of the categorical imperative. The third moral perspective, raison d 'etat, is based on moral partiality and claims that national leaders have a special responsibility toward their own citizens: they should promote the national interest. The discussion will point to and illustrate some of the problems connected with making moral judgments - problems which in some cases may lead to unclear or indeterminate answers. Despite the complexity of reaching moral judgements, however, the conclusion in the case I discuss is quite clear: There were few good reasons for the Norwegian government to grant the license in the first place, and even after the government had made that decision, it was not wrong to withdraw the license.