Doyle, Michael. "A Few Words on Mill, Walzer, and Nonintervention". Ethics and International Affairs, Vol.23, No.4 (2009): 349-369.

Doyle, Michael. "A Few Words on Mill, Walzer, and Nonintervention". Ethics and International Affairs, Vol.23, No.4 (2009): 349-369.

• The author will engage with both John Stuart Mill and Dr. Michael Waltzer's opinions on intervention in a historical context (350). Both authors are prominent within liberal thought and express the essential conundrums which drive the debate within liberalism on the merits of intervention (349, 351).
• The underlying principles of Mill's international theory and his worldview is based on Utilitarian beliefs that human sympathy should cause us to strive towards minimizing pain, which Mill believed could be best attained through increasing individual freedom and promoting positive values. Walzer has a less ideological worldview, but still makes basic assumptions about the necessity of consent by the governed and respect for human rights (351).
• Both philosophers defend two principles for ideal justice: an equal maximalization of individual liberty, and a belief in the importance of representative government as a domestic institution (352).
• Mill bases his theory of intervention on the core tenant that all foreign policy must be moral and stem from charity toward fellow humans, not just one's countrymen. Thus any intervention to promote 'national interests' must be rejected, unless it would also benefit the country where the intervention is occurring (352). Since a plethora of individual independence was central to Mill's concept of well-being, most cases of intervention have to be rejected as limiting internal opportunities for self-determination or 'forcing freedom' on a people who are not prepared for that responsibility  (352-354).
• Several practical arguments against intervention are also posited, namely the probable resistance of the native population to any intervention. Even despotic states produce nationalism, and will likely fight any foreigners. Furthermore, Mill recognized the difficulties of proper governance, and feared that intervention would quickly become destruction and exploitation (354).
• Mill provides three exceptional circumstances under which intervention in a foreign nation is legitimate:
• Intervention or interference in the affairs of another nation is legitimate in cases of self-defense, including the protection of nationals. However, this mainly applies to intervening in cases of extreme international hostility, when not supporting allies might be dangerous to vital interest of national security (355).
• Following a victorious defensive war against a despot, a liberal power can continue forward in momentum and invade the aggressor to move the leadership or regime as a threat to future peace. Contemporary examples include the exile of Napoleon to St. Helena, whereas modern cases include Reconstruction after the American Civil War or the post-WW2 de-Nazification of Germany (358).
• Walzer accepts a similar circumstance where intervention is allowed, but is even more limited in its application. Preferably he would have liked to see negotiation or domestic revolution rather than invasion result in the change Mill envisions. For example, Walzer is deeply uncomfortable with the occupation of Japan, preferring some kind of peace settlement with the fascist government (359).
• In the case of a protracted civil war with sides are evenly matched and there is no hope of victory except through massacres and genocide, foreign nations may intervene to stop the bloodshed and use force of arms to reach a peace agreement on humanitarian grounds (359).
• Such circumstances often end in territorial changes enforced from the outside, such as the intervention and independence of Greece from the Ottoman Empire, or of Belgium from the Netherlands. These mediations must be impartial and based on equitable compromise, or they are not longer legitimate (360).
• Mill's golden standard for the application of his principles of intervention was the 1846 intervention in Portugal following a palace coup when a powerful force of Septembristos, radical constitutionalists, was prepared to fight the Portuguese monarchy, backed by France and Spain. To prevent this full-scale civil war, Britain pressured France and Spain into mobilizing a joint-force against the Septembristos in exchange for some liberal concessions from Queen Maria II (360-361).
• A closer look finds that Mill's example does not really hold to his ideals. Although Britain prevented total civil war and Spanish intervention, the joint intervention neither solved the base social issues nor guaranteed continued peace in Portugal. It also gave Britain a strong position relative to Portugal, which they continually exploited until the establishment of the Novo Estado (361).
• Walzer and Mill both establish some conditions in which the principle of nonintervention should be totally disregarded, because the rule is so obviously undermining the self-determination that it is meant to protect. Walzer provides three such cases where intervention is not only legitimate, but necessary:
• In cases where a people have demonstrated a clear national identity and willful expression of self-determination, but are being oppressed in their exercise of that right by an imperial government, foreign intervention to support independence is necessary and moral (362).
• When a civil war is ranging and another, less scrupulous country, has already intervened on behalf of one party, it is necessary for another nation to intervene on behalf of the opposing side to restore balance to the situation (362).
• Intervention for humanitarian purposes is necessary when gross and systematic violations of human rights occur, such as genocides, crimes against humanity, or the institutionalization of slavery and the slave trade (363).
• The most controversial element of Mill's philosophy on intervention would be his distinction between civilized and uncivilized nations. The rules outlined above and his article only apply to 'civilized nations', while a separate and more tolerant set of circumstances allow for intervention against barbarian peoples -- ostensibly due to the lack of these uncivilized people to demonstrate the self-determination that nonintervention is supposed to protect (364).
• Mill goes on to claim that foreign intervention against these uncivilized nations is always justified, because enlightened colonialism and paternalist policies will always benefit the savages being conquered by instill within the colonized people a respect for order and the conditions for future self-determination (364).
• Mill provides an important baseline for liberal perspectives on intervention in general, and the seven case for acceptable intervention laid down by Mill should not be limited to those three also accepted and developed by Walzer. While all have merit, the arguments for invading aggressors and intervening in protracted civil wars have only been strengthened since Mill's day, and should be evaluated despite Walzer's rejection of them (366).