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Dual Morality
Simply put, dual morality is in play whenever an argument is being made to the effect that we are doing some bad thing only in response to some other bad thing, so our bad thing is actually a good thing, and anyway we are not responsible because "they" made us do it.
Inherent in dual morality is the harm in which the two parties are engaged. Each side sees its harm as morally justified because, in its view, it is responding to the other, whom it judges to be immoral and at fault ("an eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth," in practice since the Code of Hammurabi, 1,700 years ago). Thus, each side judges its acts through the "I'm moral, you're immoral" lens of dual morality and pushes responsibility onto the other party. Taking positions of moral superiority, both sides are blinded to the truth about the other.
Dual morality moves you into positions of moral superiority. It also requires that you live with a split mind, in which the division between "us" and "them" is always uncertain. Some in your own camp might judge you to be less worthy than they are, due to some perceived error or slight on your part, or perhaps out of "necessity," which can always be justified in the realm of dual morality. Those in control often resort to fear tactics to maintain control, because they themselves live in fear.
Dual Morality in Public Policy
When dual morality is exercised by national leaders, they justify their call to violence in terms consistent with the moral code as practiced within their culture or faction, even when that moral code continually fails to achieve peace or security. Each claims his right to engage in violence has been "earned," but alleges the other's was not, making peace an impossibility.
The result is endless violence, with no resolution. One side might even kill everyone on the other side or coercively subdue them, but this requires a huge diversion of resources and destruction of human capital that might otherwise be used in more productive ways. Thus, everyone pays the cost and the problem continues to fester until another day. As dual morality spreads, conditions become worse in one way or another for everyone, irrespective of their perceived guilt or innocence.
After WW I, the allies imposed reparations on Germany, crippled its economy and gave Hitler a stage to demand Germany's honor be restored with his call to defeat the rest of the worldthe dual morality approach. So we had to fight another war.
The result is endless violence, with no resolution. One side might even kill everyone
on the other side or coercively subdue them, but this requires a huge diversion of
resources and destruction of human capital that might
otherwise be used in more productive ways.
The US now employs a doctrine that has a low threshold for attack. The doctrine says if other nations even think of attacking the US, we are morally justified in attacking them even before preparations to attack us are made (i.e., the doctrine of preemptive war, which is the old doctrine of preventive war with a new name). Such dire action is justified by transferring, to those whom we attack, responsibility for our action on the grounds they might possess such lethal weapons that we can be attacked in minutes, so we cannot wait for verification or diplomacy, as with Iraq.
In our dual morality, we are giving Al Qaeda terrorists the stage necessary to recruit those willing to die for our defeat. Each of our violent attacks is evidence for Al Qaeda followers that we are the "immoral" people Al Qaeda claims we are, and in their eyes, makes their attacks on us moral. In the realm of dual morality, the "war on terror" will be without end.
The irony is that the US developed most of the super efficient weapons that we now fear will be used against us. At the same time we exercise the doctrine of preemptive war, we also hold that it is not permissible for other countries to do the same. It is this unequal application of moral standards that characterizes dual morality in international policy.
Dual morality causes a fragmented world, in which the whole is not adequately considered, making it impossible to arrive at the truth.
 Monomorality
Dual Morality
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