Humane

We tend to think of the rise of humanitarian laws constraining the exercise of force as an unalloyed good. But Samuel Moyn's stunning new book, Humane, fundamentally upends this conventional wisdom, highlighting the extent to which efforts to rationalize war-making have gone hand in hand with an American Century marked by preemptive violence, forever wars, and a near-limitless global military footprint. In the process, Moyn also recovers and places at the center of political debate the now long-forgotten abolitionist tradition, which sought to end war rather than to reform it. This profound historical retelling is an essential and groundbreaking contribution. It will be debated for years to come, and should be read by any scholar, lawyer, or activist concerned with issues of war and peace -- Aziz Rana, author of <i>The Two Faces of American Freedom</i> Ours is an era of endless conflict, whose ideal symbol is the armed drone - occasionally firing a missile, which may kill the wrong people, but too far removed from everyday American life to rouse public objections...Moyn's argument goes beyond the expected humanitarian critique -- Dexter Filkin * The New Yorker * Smart and provocative...Arriving 20 years after 9/11, as the United States has withdrawn its troops from Afghanistan, Humane encourages readers to ask central questions too often lost amid the chatter of the foreign policy establishment * New York Times * [A] learned and provocative book...The biggest value of Moyn's book is the ethical questions he raises. Since war today has become so much less bloody, and involves so many fewer Americans, what is to stop it from becoming perpetual? -- Edward Luce Moyn skilfully takes us through the debates prompted by Vietnam about international law and how it should be adapted and enforced. Out of this came a determination to find a more humane way to fight such wars. -- Lawrence Freedman * New Statesman * Provocative -- Lawrence R. Douglas * Times Literary Supplement * [A] remarkably direct, focused and yet passionate analysis ... Moyn demonstrates throughout why war itself is the continuing problem. -- Arvind Sivaramakrishnan * The Hindu * A ground-breaking work -- Marc Martorell Junyent * Global Policy Journal * Important -- Henrietta Cullinan * Peace News *