Reinhold Niebuhr: The law of love and the omnipresence of power
| Published date | 01 June 2021 |
| Date | 01 June 2021 |
| Author | David Clinton |
| DOI | 10.1177/1755088220985881 |
https://doi.org/10.1177/1755088220985881
Journal of International Political Theory
2021, Vol. 17(2) 139 –150
© The Author(s) 2021
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DOI: 10.1177/1755088220985881
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Reinhold Niebuhr: The law
of love and the omnipresence
of power
David Clinton
Baylor University, USA
Abstract
The twentieth-century theologian and public intellectual Reinhold Niebuhr frequently
employed a formulation confounding to his readers, simultaneously appealing to the
loftiest altruism as summed up in his identification of the “law of love” and compelling
attention to the grittiest realism as encapsulated in his recognition of a universal struggle
for power. This sharp contrast was no careless error on Niebuhr’s part, but rather an
insistence on describing in the most sharply contrasting tones the paradoxical character
of human nature. In his Christian Realist view fear and a consequent desire for power
over others to protect oneself are inescapable components of human existence within
history. The human need for community and refusal to be satisfied with anything less
than devotion to the wellbeing of others unsullied by self-love are nevertheless also
implanted in the human heart, which recognizes that reality extends beyond human
history. Niebuhr demanded attention to both.
Keywords
Dialectic, human nature, justice, love, power, Reinhold Niebuhr
To explore the thought of Reinhold Niebuhr is in the best of circumstances a challeng-
ing task, and the interpreter sometimes has the sense of doing what Niebuhr himself
quoted from George Santayana: “holding the candlelight of the obvious to the daylight
of common experience.” That is, Niebuhr was a complex and powerful thinker, but one
who always laid great stress on the limitations of the human mind; he devoted his intel-
lect to demonstrating all the ways in which power, passions, and parochialism could
distort the intellect and bend it to the command of those other forces. One often has the
Corresponding author:
David Clinton, Department of Political Science, Baylor University, One Bear Place, Box 97276, Waco, TX
76798, USA.
Email: David_Clinton@baylor.edu
985881IPT0010.1177/1755088220985881Journal of International Political TheoryClinton
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