Moral equivalence

Moral equivalence is a term used in political debate, usually to deny that a moral comparison can be made of two sides in a conflict, or in the actions or tactics of two sides.

The term had some currency in polemic debates about the Cold War. "Moral equivalence" began to be used as a polemic term-of-retort to "moral relativism", which had been gaining use as an indictment against political foreign policy that appeared to use only a situation-based application of widely held ethical standards.

International conflicts are sometimes viewed similarly, and interested parties periodically urge both sides to conduct a ceasefire and negotiate their differences. However these negotiations may prove difficult in that both parties in a conflict believe that they are morally superior to the other, and are unwilling to negotiate on basis of moral equivalence.

Cold War

In the Cold War context, the term was and is most commonly used by anticommunists as an accusation of formal fallacy for leftist criticisms of United States foreign policy and military conduct.

Many such people believed in the idea that the United States was intrinsically benevolent and that the extension of its power, influence, and hegemony was an extension of benevolence and would bring freedom to those people subject to that hegemony. Therefore, those who opposed the United States were by definition evil, trying to deny its benevolence to people. The Soviet Union and its allies, in contrast, practiced a totalitarian ideology. A territory under US hegemony thus would be freed from possibly being in the camp of the totalitarian power and would help to weaken it.