Justified Secession: When is Leaving the Right Thing To Do?

Secession is never easy, and should never be undertaken lightly; previous secession movements have led to instability, hardship, and sometimes violence. Nonetheless, secession is bound up with the ideals of self-determination and the liberal commitment to rule by the consent of the governed. It is the underlying moral legitimacy of arguments regarding self-determination that often undergird secessionist movements since, as this book argues, secession can be morally justified. The difficulty is determining when and how it is justified.

This book offers an account that begins with the metaphysical nature of social relations at the root of self-determination. This account reveals that while the ideal of self-determination grants secession a moral grounding, those same ideals of self-determination require a process that is deliberate and accounts for cross-cutting obligations. It then considers the cases of Quebec, South Sudan, Ukraine, and Scotland to apply the theory to reality.