Abstract: Alongside recent modifications of the Just War Tradition such as Jus ad Vim (Brunstetter 2021a; Brunstetter and Braun 2013; Emery and Brunstetter 2016), this paper proposes the concept of Jus ad Proelium, or Just Struggle. I use Jus ad Proelium to analyze and appraise the US’s problematic, disastrous, heartbreaking, but also at times hopeful struggle against Covid. I also argue that seeing fights against Climate Change and Covid, and to make Black Lives Matter, all as Just Struggles, can generate four inter-related effects or functions: recognizing the sacrifice of frontline workers, grief and commemoration, accountability, and quiet pride, acknowledgment and empathy.

Bio: Brent J. Steele is is the Francis D. Wormuth Presidential Chair, Department Chair and Professor of Political Science at the University of Utah, and the co-editor in chief of Global Studies Quarterly. He is the author of the recently published Vicarious Identity in International Relations (Oxford University Press, 2021), with Chris Browning and Pertti Joenniemi, and Restraint in International Politics (Cambridge University Press, 2019), the co-winner of the 2020 ISA Theory section book award. He teaches courses in International Ethics, US. Foreign Policy and International Relations theory.