Does coercion constitute peace? The authors Lothar Brock und Hendrik Simon discuss this question in PRIF Working Paper No. 35 „Eigenmächtige Gewalt, zwingendes Recht: Zur Selbstbehauptung und Selbstgefährdung des Friedens als Rechtsordnung“ (Arbitrary Force, Coercive Law. On the Self-Assertion and Self-Destruction of Peace as a Legal Order). According to Hans Kelsen, peace is a state characterized by the absence of force. At the same time, however, peace is guaranteed by coercive acts of enforcement. Peace is conceivable only as a legal order, and, according to Kelsen, a legal order is by its very nature a ‘coercive order’.
Thus peace and coercion do not exclude each other, but rather refer to each other in the concept of law. In PRIF Working Paper No. 35, Lothar Brock and Hendrik Simon elaborate and problematize the paradoxical relationship of coercion and (legal) peace in theoretical and historical perspective. For this, the authors differentiate between arbitrary force and legal enforcement. While they argue in favor of the coercive peace through law as principally preferable to arbitrary force (vigilante justice), Brock and Simon also emphasize the arbitrariness in the concept and historical formation of law. This arbitrariness is especially evident at the international level. While national peace is based on a strong coercive legal system, international law is still comparatively weak. On both levels, however, the stabilization of peace through legal coercion goes hand in hand with its simultaneous destabilization. This dilemma can only be mitigated through the creation of the rule of law, which allows for a reflexive treatment of the tension between peace and coercion.