4.3.5 International Moral Influence
Individuals and politicians can exert international moral influence to promote causes that they believe in, sometimes using coercion.
People and politicians want to affect what is going on in other countries for various reasons. These range from offering help to attempting control, as described in the following sub-sections:
● People can offer humanitarian assistance to countries in need (4.3.5.1). They can make individual charitable donations or put pressure on politicians to give aid.
● People can participate in human rights activism (4.3.5.2). They can join protests, criticise other governments, buy fair-trade products, or even urge military interventions to punish or deter rights abuses.
● Environmental activists are trying to persuade people and politicians to act to save the planet (4.3.5.3). This is for the benefit of everyone in the world, now and for future generations.
● International moral influence can be exerted by missionary activity and colonialism (4.3.5.4). This may be very unwelcome if it involves the use of force. And colonisation was usually driven by economic considerations.
● Governments should apply ‘just-war’ criteria before taking military action (4.3.5.5), to satisfy the concerns of their own populations and the attitudes of people in other countries. The international community does not support countries engaging in unjust wars.
● Politicians can influence other countries by setting a moral example (4.3.5.6). They can attract support by being respected (or lose the country’s reputation by bad behaviour).
This page is intended to form part of Edition 4 of the Patterns of Power series of books. An archived copy of it is held at https://www.patternsofpower.org/edition04/435b.htm