Vulnerability and Defencelessness

In ordinary thinking about the morality of war, the vulnerability and defencelessness of civilians is at the heart of their privileged moral status. But we lack both analyses of what these concepts are, and explanations of why they matter. This chapter analyses defencelessness in terms of vulnerability, then presents a series of arguments to show that harming those who are more defenceless and vulnerable is worse than harming those who are less so, drawing on prioritarian moral considerations, reasons of fairness, and the special wrong of disempowering one’s victims, as well as killing them. Although there are exceptions, civilians are typically more vulnerable and defenceless than soldiers, so killing innocent civilians is worse than killing innocent soldiers (vulnerability and defencelessness are irrelevant when the target is not innocent).