resume
The theme of state reasons, and more generally, of reasons of "political order" affects a type of "prohibited knowledge", which makes us perceive that there are circumstances where a large gap is widened between ethics and politics, moral and security, between the fair and the good, between what is suitable "for us" and what is universally suitable, and so on. It is perhaps because of this relationship with the "forbidden" and the transgression, that the concept has been evaporated from the field of political theory. His discredit makes that the use of this concept is politically inadvisable and that the field of questions to which he sought to address is occupied by another set of similar concepts: thus we say it is a question of "national interest" or of a man that he has the "sense of the State". While these expressions do not mean the same thing, they are intimately linked to the universe of reason and the one of caution and political judgment. Thus, a "matter of national interest" requires caution, perhaps even secret. The "sense of state" requires responsibility and political judgment capable to appreciate the highest finalities of the state community (its survival or the maintenance of its core values) on whose behalf it is possible to sacrifice the partisan interests or the ethical coherence. Thus, state reasons, in spite of appearances, did not disappear from this world
[ texte integral : fr ]