I examine the significance of the Stoic theory of pathē for Kant’s moral psychology, arguing against the received view that systematic differences block the possibility of Kant’s drawing anything more than rhetoric from his Stoic sources. More particularly, I take on the chronically underexamined assumption that Kant is committed to a psychological dualism in the tradition of Plato and Aristotle, positing distinct rational and nonrational elements of human mentality. By contrast, Stoics take the mentality of an adult human being to (...) be rational through and through, while recognising that this rationality is not normally in a state of health or excellence. I show how Kant’s account of affections—chiefly the “affects” and “passions” that he identifies as targets of a duty of apathy—draws substantive lessons from his Stoic sources, and how he accepts on his own terms the monistic principles of Stoic moral psychology. (shrink)

Journal of Social Philosophy, EarlyView.

Buying local is a prominent form of ethical consumption. We commonly assume that products that are local are in some respect ethically superior to ones that are not. This article contributes to research on local food by scrutinizing this assumption in light of some central values of the locavore movement. It identifies four central ethical causes from prior literature on locavorism: protecting the environment, promoting community, promoting small business, and contributing to the prosperity of one’s local economy. It then analyzes (...) whether the contribution of buying local to these causes can justify the general perception that buying local is a good way to be an ethical consumer. Its main finding is that these justifications fail to provide a strong positive ethical reason for consumers in general to adopt the practice of buying local. (shrink)

Over the last decades, the proliferation of ICTs and capitalist markets has created a new social-historical reality for communication, production and societal organisation, while social inequality has deepened. In this context, alternative forms of organisation based on the commons have emerged, challenging the core values of capitalism. Within this new form of egalitarian and transnational collaborative networks, a new concept of social coexistence has been proposed: cosmolocalism. This article presents the genealogy of cosmolocalism and compares it to previous conceptual universalist (...) reconfigurations, namely cosmopolitanism and internationalism. While the current discourse on cosmolocalism focuses on production and distribution, its political dynamics and limitations remain unexplored. Our ultimate goal is to open a path of inquiry for further reflection and deliberation. (shrink)

Kant’s account of “the radical evil in human nature” in the 1793 Religion within the Bounds of Reason Alone is typically interpreted as a reworking of the Augustinian doctrine of original sin. But Kant doesn’t talk about Augustine explicitly there, and if he is rehabilitating the doctrine of original sin, the result is not obviously Augustinian. Instead Kant talks about Stoic ethics in a pair of passages on either end of his account of radical evil, and leaves other clues that (...) his argument is a reworking of an old Stoic problem. “Radical evil” refers to the idea that our moral condition is — by default and yet by our own deed — bad or corrupt; and that this corruption is the root (radix) of human badness in all its variety, ubiquity, and sheer ordinariness. Kant takes as his premise a version of the Stoic idea that nature gives us “uncorrupted starting points” (Diogenes Laertius 7.89). What sense can be made of the origin of human badness, given such a premise? Kant’s account of radical evil is an answer to this old Stoic problem, which requires a conception of freedom that is not available in his Stoic sources. (shrink)

For both John Rawls and Martha Nussbaum, the concept of love plays a significant role in moral psychology. Rawls views the sense of justice as grounded in parental love, and continuous with love of mankind. Nussbaum’s recent defence of patriotism revives the emotio n of love as essential for political contexts. I argue that love ought to play a substantial part in the shaping of global politics, and that a moral psychology of love based merely on a combination of Rawls’s (...) and Nussbaum’s accounts fails to produce an ad equate ground for conceptualizing moral motivation with respect to addressing transnational concerns of justice. I contend that by critically synthesizing Rawls’s and Nussbaum’s conceptions of love and moral psychology with resources from Kant’s ethics, it is possible to develop a more attractive, and potentially politically effective, conception of love of human beings in the framework of political liberalism. (shrink)

The goal of this paper is to better understand Kant’s conception of philosophy as a “world concept”, which is at the heart of the Architectonic of Pure Reason. This is pursued in two major parts. The first evaluates the textual foundation for reading Kant’s world concept of philosophy as cosmopolitanism and concludes that he most probably never himself equated philosophy as a world concept with any form of cosmopolitanism. The second major part of the paper clarifies this concept of philosophy (...) through the specific role it plays in the argument of the Architectonic. Kant’s unique concept of science is examined and compared with several specific applications of it found elsewhere in Kant’s writings. From this it is concluded that Kant’s intention in the Architectonic was to derive his world concept of philosophy from its logical counterpart, namely the scholastic concept of philosophy, and that its function there is to provide the idea from which the entire structure of Kantian critical metaphysics can be derived. Philosophy as a world concept, it is further argued, is the complete system of critical or Kantian metaphysics in application and the philosopher in this sense is the ideal critical metaphysician who fully realizes its laws through her own understanding and will. (shrink)

In a post Cold-War world riven with ‘minor’ conflicts, and a West anxious about the intermittent threat of terrorist attack, human equality and sodality require urgent review. Among interesting proposals for a theoretical foundation to human equality is Martha Nussbaum’s call for a revived, modern version of Stoicism to teach indifference to race and a neighbourly goodwill. Yet in her concern to avoid ‘teleologies’ Nussbaum denatures Stoicism by disconnecting it from its transcendent foundations. A problem for the modern world is (...) to maintain the authority of states, with their capacity to produce relief for the poor and oppressed along with their capacity to dominate, while having them absorb the ideals of cosmopolitanism into their own policyformation. It is incumbent on the democratic state, the progenitor of the cosmopolitanism of both Cynicism and Stoicism, to promote the ideals of human dignity and equality. Nussbaum’s Stoicism scarcely helps, but there are globalizing organizations, such as the United Nations and its agencies, and globalized religious organizations, as advanced by Hans Küng, which may supply the institutional foundation. (shrink)

There is a tendency among scholars to identify Alfarabi’s political philosophy in general and his theory of the state in particular with that of Plato’s The Republic. Undoubtedly Alfarabi was well versed in the philosophy of Plato and was greatly influenced by it. He borrows the Platonic concept of the philosopher king and uses it in his theory of the state. However, we argue that the identification of Alfarabi’s virtuous city with that of Plato’s The Republic is an inaccurate assessment (...) as it involves overlooking Alfarabi’s unique religiopolitical context. Alfarabi was a Muslim political philosopher, and the present article intends to understand Alfarabi’s theory of the state in light of his historical context. The article shows that, viewed through the prism of Islamic religion and political history, Alfarabi’s virtuous city seems distinct from that of Plato’s The Republic. (shrink)

Recently, British Prime Minister Theresa May made a bold anti-cosmopolitan claim: ‘If you believe you are a citizen of the world, you are a citizen of nowhere. You don’t understand what citizenship...

The attempt in this article is to reflect on the notion of hospitality, building on Derrida's engagement with the notion. In doing so, I visit some of the debates on cosmopolitanism, a term which, I believe, is sometimes used overenthusiastically, neglecting the negative implications it might carry. Besides, I observe the same uncritical stance towards the reception of Kant's notion of `universal hospitality', developed in his famous piece on `Perpetual Peace', a text that has been at the core of the (...) recent debates on cosmopolitanism. I revisit Kant's text to discuss the implications of his project. I distinguish between `the other' and `the stranger', and try to develop a politics and ethics of hospitality due to the stranger. I conclude with some implications of `not being home'. (shrink)

The disconnection between the idea of nation-based citizenship and the current practices of migrants presents the opportunity to reconceptualize and redefine the idea of citizenship and thereby grasp the realities of movement. I employ Giambattista Vico's theories of universal rights and his history of civilizations to interrogate rhetorically national origins and expand on what I call a renovation of citizenship. This is a process that embraces daily practices of nation-based citizenship and encourages us to imagine new ways to express citizenship, (...) ways that comport with the realities of a mobile world, specifically the human right of freedom of movement. In formulating this renovation of citizenship based on mobility, I introduce the metaphor of stochastic citizenship to resolve the tension between the legal structures governing citizenship and the promotion of mobility as a human right. The Roma people in Europe serve as a test for stochastic citizenship. (shrink)

The goal of this essay is to analyse the influence of Johann Bernhard Basedow and Rousseau on Kant’s cosmopolitanism and concept of cosmopolitan education. It argues that both Basedow and Kant defined cosmopolitan education as non-denominational moral formation or Bildung, encompassing—in different forms—a thin version of moral religion following the core tenets of Christianity. Kant’s encounter with Basedow and the Philanthropinum in Dessau helps to understand the development of Kant’s concept of cosmopolitanism and educational theory ‘in weltbürgerlicher Absicht’. Rousseau’s role (...) is more complex: he clearly influenced Kant; he is usually considered a precursor of modern nationalism and national education; and recent studies have stressed the cosmopolitan dimension of his educational programme. I claim that the dilemma of education according to Rousseau is that one has to choose between education of homme or education of citoyen, and that there is no way to avoid or go beyond this stark alternative. Kant’s reinterpretation of Rousseau is favourable and creative and has found many followers up to the present, but is misleading, as he ignores the dilemma and imposes his own conception of cosmopolitanism, of cosmopolitan education and of (possible) progress in history on Rousseau while claiming that this was actually Rousseau’s message. (shrink)

With the publication of A Theory of Justice in 1971, John Rawls not only rejuvenated contemporary political philosophy but also defended a Kantian form of Enlightenment liberalism called “justice as fairness.” Enlightenment liberalism stresses the development and exercise of our capacity for autonomy, while Reformation liberalism emphasizes diversity and the toleration that encourages it. These two strands of liberalism are often mutually supporting, but they conflict in a surprising number of cases, whether over the accommodation of group difference, the design (...) of civic education, or the promotion of liberal values internationally. During the 1980’s, however, Rawls began to jettison key Kantian characteristics of his theory, a process culminating in the 1993 release of Political Liberalism and completing the transformation of justice as fairness into a Reformation liberalism. -/- Reconstructing Rawls argues that this transformation was a tragic mistake because it jeopardized the most important features of his theory, viz. the lexical priorities of right, liberty, and fair equality of opportunity as well as the difference principle. Controversially, this book contends that Rawls’s so-called “political turn,” motivated by a newfound interest in diversity and the accommodation of difference, has been unhealthy for autonomy-based liberalism and has pushed liberalism more broadly towards cultural relativism, be it in the guise of liberal multiculturalism or critiques of cosmopolitan distributive-justice theories. The book then demonstrates that the central elements of justice as fairness can only be defended within the context of a Kantian Enlightenment liberalism and that Rawls’s hope for a more pluralistic grounding for his theory, endorsed by a wide variety of belief systems present in modern democratic societies, is illusory. -/- Reconstructing Rawls is the first book to systematically compare Rawls’s and Kant’s theories and the first to offer an internal critique and reconstruction of justice as fairness, reconceiving it as a comprehensive, universalistic Kantian liberalism. By doing so, it gives us both the vision of a liberal world order—“a republicanism of all states, together and separately,” as Kant put it—and a mode of justification addressed to all men and women, not as members of particular nations, races, and faiths, but as human beings, as citizens of the world. In short, it reclaims Rawls for the Enlightenment. (shrink)

Kant identifies the “highest moral-physical good” as that combination of “good living” and “true humanity” which best harmonises in a “good meal in good company”. Why does Kant privilege the dinner party in this way? By examining Kant’s accounts of enlightenment, cosmopolitanism, love and respect, and gratitude and friendship, the answer to this question becomes clear. Kant’s moral ideal is that of an enlightened and just cosmopolitan human being who feels and acts with respect and love for all persons and (...) such an ideal is temporarily manifested in the sort of social interaction achievable at a good dinner party. (shrink)

The word ‘cosmopolitan’, which derives from the Greek word kosmopolitês (‘citizen of the world’), has been used to describe a wide variety of important views in moral and socio political philosophy. The nebulous core shared by all cosmopolitan views is the idea that all human beings, regardless of their political affiliation, do (or at least can) belong to a single community, and that this community should be cultivated. Different versions of cosmopolitanism envision this community in different ways, some focusing on (...) political institutions, others on moral norms or relationships, and still others focusing on shared markets or forms of cultural expression. The philosophical interest in cosmopolitanism lies in its challenge to commonly recognized attachments to fellow citizens, the local state, parochially shared cultures, and the like. (shrink)

This paper offers two possible readings of the Earth Charter that are informed by current scholarship in the field of environmental politics. The first reading finds much in the document to suggest congruence with emerging discourses of cosmopolitanism and global environmental citizenship. The second reading, a more sceptical one, identifies aspects of the Earth Charter that seem more resonant with depoliticizing United Nations-style light green globalism than with an inclusive ethical vision of environmentalism. After setting out these two readings, I (...) argue that, although potentially undermining of its endorsability, thinking critically about problematic aspects of the Earth Charter is an exercise that may point in the direction of a cosmopolitan environmentalism that is less banal and instrumental and more dialogically open, reflexive, and democratic. (shrink)

This article considers the virtue of tolerance as it is found in Epictetus and MarcusAurelius. It defines the virtue of tolerance and links it to the Stoic idea of proper control of the passions in pursuit of both self-sufficiency and justice. It argues that Stoic tolerance is neither complete in difference nor a species of relativism. Finally, it discusses connections between the moral virtue of Stoic tolerance and the idea of political toleration found in modern liberalism.

In this chapter, Daniel Layman argues that there is not one Lockean conception of IR but rather (at least) two mutually incompatible conceptions: one a Ciceronian moral cosmopolitanism and the other a colonialism centered on British interests. Opposing Locke’s philosophical writings with his economic works, Layman’s reading acknowledges the contradictions and incoherence present in Locke’s IR theory.

This article diagnoses and critiques pervasive forms of teleological thought about basic structures of political organization in modern and contemporary political thought: arguments that the sovereign state, the nation-state, or some variant of a cosmopolis both represents the unfolding of history’s moral logic and offers us full moral personhood, agency, and maturity. Despite the received wisdom that modern political thought broke with teleology, I argue that early modern social contract theory was deeply teleological. The emergence of the normatively self-contained sovereign (...) state from the state of nature represented both decisive historical-moral progress from the medieval European non-state polities and the possibility of true moral personhood, thanks to the unity of will and judgment created by a unified authority structure. The article then argues that this overattachment to unity, both as an historical culmination and as a prerequisite to full personhood, was carried over into subsequent nationalist and cosmopolitan thought, where we see over-moralizations of historical processes, excessive claims for the teleological causal force of moral progress, and critiques of the immaturity of those persons who do not live in the recommended political form. The article closes with a sustained critique of both historical and individual-moral teleologies of these sorts. (shrink)

This article diagnoses and critiques pervasive forms of teleological thought about basic structures of political organization in modern and contemporary political thought: arguments that the sovere...

ABSTRACT This article argues that there is an elemental confluence between the moral ideal of cosmopolitanism and the economic and commercial practices of globalization. By looking at Foucault's and Arendt's readings of Kant, I show that the cosmopolitan premise of humanity is bound to an eschatological vision of the end of politics. In aligning Foucault's discussion of state-phobia with Arendt's discussion of world alienation, I argue that the eclipse of the public realm is intrinsic to the liberal conception of progress. (...) While critics have viewed Arendt's social/political distinction with suspicion, less attention has been paid to the parallel contrast between intimacy and privacy in her work and to the ways in which her critique of intimacy's worldlessness converges with her depiction of the crisis of modernity. In Arendt's account, the social swallows up and depoliticizes the public realm and spits out intimacy as the consolation for this loss. (shrink)

Rousseau tries to show that civic patriotism is compatible with genuine moral cosmopolitanism as well as republican cosmopolitanism (the compatibility thesis). I try to clarify these concepts, and distinguish them from other types of cosmopolitanism, such as moral, cultural, economic, and epistemological cosmopolitanisms. Rousseau winds up with a form of rooted cosmopolitanism that tries to strike a balance between republican patriotism and republican as well as thin moral cosmopolitanism, offering a synthesis through education. A careful reading of Émile shows that (...) this is a book about the formation of a moral and cognitive cosmopolitan who avoids the deformations of a commercial society influenced by processes of globalisation. (shrink)

This article analyses the teleological argument justifying historical progress in Kant's Guarantee of Perpetual Peace. It starts by examining the controversies produced by Kant's claim that the teleology of nature supports the idea of a providential development of humanity towards moral progress and the possibility of achieving a cosmopolitan political constitution. It further illustrates how Kant's teleological argument in Perpetual Peace needs to be assessed with reference to two systematically relevant issues: first, the problem of coordination linked to the necessity (...) of realizing the ‘highest good’ as a historical end of practical reason, and secondly the problem of continuity posed by the temporal limitation of all individual efforts to cultivate moral dispositions. To illustrate the implications of both issues for the teleological argument in Perpetual Peace, the article draws attention to some important developments in Kant's analysis of teleology following the Critique of Judgment. (shrink)

Social identity poses one of the most important challenges to rational choice theory, but rational choice theorists do not hold a common position regarding identity. On one hand, externalist rational choice ignores the concept of identity or reduces it to revealed preferences. On the other hand, internalist rational choice considers identity as a key concept in explaining social action because it permits expressive motivations to be included in the models. However, internalist theorists tend to reduce identity to desire—the desire of (...) a person to express his or her social being. From an internalist point of view, that is, from a viewpoint in which not only desires but also beliefs play a key role in social explanations as mental entities, this article rejects externalist reductionism and proposes a redefinition of social identity as a net of beliefs about oneself, beliefs that are indexical, robust, and socially shaped. (shrink)

Environmental philosophers have argued that Kant’s philosophy offers little for environmental issues. Furthermore, Kant scholars typically focus on humanity, ignoring the question of duties to the environment. In my dissertation, I turn to a number of underexploited texts in Kant’s work to show how both sides are misguided in neglecting the ecological potential of Kant, making the case for the green Kant at the intersection of Kant scholarship and environmental ethics. I build upon previous literature to argue that the green (...) Kant matters for both sides. Rather than a liability, Kant is indeed a conceptual resource. Though many conceive of Kant’s philosophy as environmentally problematic, I argue that underappreciated evolutionary, aesthetic, and holistic sides of Kant’s philosophy can provide conceptual resources for issues in climate change and environmental ethics. Some aspects, such as the pre-critical view of nature, are quite green and merely require an application, while others, such as Kant’s philosophy of history, require a green appropriation to be relevant. The theoretical foundations I develop in these texts will allow Kantians to articulate duties regarding nature and duties for sustainability. This re-thinking of Kant redresses the complaints environmental thinkers hold against Kant. By means of a philosophical interpretation, defense, and application of particular texts from Kant’s works such as Universal Natural History, Critique of Judgment, and Idea for a Universal History, I show how the greening of Kant is not only helpful for contemporary issues, but also defensible. This will make the green Kant agreeable to Kant scholars yet all the while relevant for today with regard to environmental ethics and, more importantly, climate change. (shrink)

The attempt in this article is to reflect on the notion of hospitality, building on Derrida's engagement with the notion. In doing so, I visit some of the debates on cosmopolitanism, a term which, I believe, is sometimes used overenthusiastically, neglecting the negative implications it might carry. Besides, I observe the same uncritical stance towards the reception of Kant's notion of `universal hospitality', developed in his famous piece on `Perpetual Peace', a text that has been at the core of the (...) recent debates on cosmopolitanism. I revisit Kant's text to discuss the implications of his project. I distinguish between `the other' and `the stranger', and try to develop a politics and ethics of hospitality due to the stranger. I conclude with some implications of `not being home'. (shrink)

Pragmatic pluralism denotes a particular approach to problems of international human rights and protections that departs from conventional cosmopolitan approaches. Pragmatic pluralism argues for situated and localized forms of cooperation between state and non-state actors, particularly religious groups and organizations, that may not share the secular, juridical understandings of rights, persons, and obligations common to contemporary cosmopolitan theory. A resource for the development of such a model of pragmatic pluralism can be found in the work of Hannah Arendt. Arendt's early (...) dissertation "Love and Saint Augustine" affords a model of religious community and obligation that can be read productively alongside her later political writings. The possibilities inherent in a cooperative reading of these two parts of her work can be illustrated in relation to an issue of particular concern to cosmopolitan theorists: the international refugee crisis. (shrink)

s theory of cosmopolitan right is widely viewed as the philosophical origin of modern cosmopolitan thought. Hegel’s critique of Kant’s theory of cosmopolitan right, by contrast, is usually viewed as regressive and nationalistic in relation to both Kant and the cosmopolitan tradition. This paper reassesses the political and philosophical character of Hegel’s critique of Kant, Hegel’s own relation to cosmopolitan thinking, and more fleetingly some of the implications of his critique for contemporary social criticism. It is argued that Hegel’s critique (...) was neither regressive nor nationalistic, but rather that he advanced the theory of cosmopolitan right beyond the Kantian framework of formal natural law. The main proposition is that Hegel was not only the first to recognize cosmopolitanism as a definite social form of right, relative to other forms in the modern system of right, but that his ‘scientific and objective’ approach to the issue makes a substantial contribution to restoring the severed connections between the realism of war between nations and the normativism of perpetual peace. Key Words: cosmopolitanism • Habermas • Hegel • Kant • nationalism • peace • right • war. (shrink)

For many centuries now, those considering themselves civilized have carried out numerous atrocities—from abductions to dispossession to massacres—against those thought to be less civilized, all in the name of civilization. This has particularly been the case in the last 500 years when Europeans came into contact with indigenous peoples in their voyages of discovery and subsequent settlement. One of the justifications for these offences was often couched in terms of the self-appointed duty of “civilized” Europeans to bring the blessings of (...) civilization to the “savage” and “barbarian” hordes, also called the “white man's burden” or the “burden of civilization.” Many nations took up this sacred trust of civilization and the challenge of bringing enlightenment and salvation to the uncivilized peoples of the world, during which the latter were either subjugated or perished. In this article I trace the intellectual heritage of the sacred trust and note its inherent contradictions, ranging from debates between Sepúlveda and Las Casas over Spain's rights of conquest in the New World to the musings of key Enlightenment thinkers such as Locke, Hegel, Kant, and J. S. Mill. As some of its advocates acknowledge the sacred trust and concomitant civilizing missions were inevitably and invariably violent and went against the very idea of civilization. And as Las Casas deftly highlighted, much of the reasoning underpinning the sacred trust was in the form of “poisons disguised with honey.”. (shrink)

This dissertation is intended as an intervention in the interminable and apparently antinomical philosophical exchange between political theories of radical democracy descended from Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe and liberal democracy descended from John Rawls. Radical democrats have deployed the friend-enemy distinction of Carl Schmitt to criticize liberal democracy as hypocritical and ultimately undemocratic in its refusal to critique its own ground; liberal democrats have riposted by characterizing radical democracy as dangerously anarchic. In this project, I read Immanuel Kant in (...) dialog with the work of Ingeborg Maus to show in a novel way that contemporary radical democratic theories ultimately fall to the very critique upon which they indict liberal democracy, that they degenerate into the valorization of mere war, and that it was in fact in full recognition of this dynamic that Kants theory of liberal democracy begins. Kants theory of countervailing liberalism is ultimately discovered to be a politics of love over barbarism. The project ranges over a wide ground, from a close reading of Kant, to the 19th Century Pantheismusstreit, to works by Arendt, Hardt and Negri, Žižek, and Strauss. (shrink)

In view of recent articles citing the Stoics as a defence or refutation of cosmopolitanism it is legitimate to ask whether the Stoics did in fact have an argument for cosmopolitanism which may be useful to contemporary political philosophers. I begin by discussing an interpretation of Stoic views on cosmopolitanism by Martha Nussbaum and A.A. Long and show that the arguments they attribute to the Stoics are not tenable in the light of present day philosophy. I then argue that the (...) Stoics did offer a very different argument for cosmopolitanism which is both more interesting and more plausible in that it draws on a conception of human nature similar to Aristotles and contemporary virtue ethics. Lastly I consider an objection made to their particular brand of cosmopolitanism by Martha Nussbaum, namely that a Stoic cosmopolitan life is devoid of personal affiliation and therefore unbearably lonely. I argue that this objection is in fact unfounded. (shrink)

This essay investigates the Confucian cosmopolitan aspiration. First, it examines the nature of cosmopolitanism and its distinction from universalism. It demonstrates that cosmopolitanism is a phil...

In this article I discuss whether from Kant’s philosophy we can determine a moral duty to deal with global inequality, a problem that in Kant’s time was inexistent since it is a modern trend resulting from the industrial revolution. In doing this, I consider three main issues related to Kant’s thought and partially re-developed by contemporary authors: the individual moral duty to collaborate with nature’s purposiveness, which is aimed at attaining perpetual peace through humans fully developing their capacities, the normative (...) requirement to reform the global economic structure so as to prevent cases of coercion and deception suffered by vulnerable economic agents, and the validation of global property titles, in the same way as occurs at the national level when people leave the state of nature and enter a civil condition. The aim of the article is to investigate whether in Kant’s philosophy of history and of right, which can be considered as the theoretical connection point between the ancient cosmopolitan aspiration and a modern and articulate cosmopolitan philosophy, we may find some first moral insights regarding the contemporary debate over the existence of global duties of socio-economic justice. (shrink)

En este trabajo se intenta mostrar en primer lugar que la noción de providencia que Kant presenta en obras como Sobre la paz perpetua e Idea para una historia universal en clave cosmopolita corresponde en algunos puntos centrales a la idea estoica de providencia; segundo, que es en este contexto donde puede evaluarse correctamente la noción kantiana de cosmopolitismo; y, por último, que este modo de enfrentar filosóficamente los problemas de la historia y la política responde a una exigencia de (...) sistematicidad exigida por la propia razón, según Kant, y que esta misma idea de sistema se conecta en buena medida con la filosofía de los estoicos. (shrink)

The article reviews the uses of the term ‘oikonomia’ in Greek-speaking antiquity and illustrates how the term was used in all spheres of human existence and in various arts and sciences, usually denoting the prudent dispensation of the field resources. In this era the arts and sciences also received their own economies, and the term oikonomia, designating in most cases the prudent management of resources, appears in political theory, military strategy, law, finance, medicine, literary criticism, architecture, music, history and rhetoric. (...) Among all the spheres, arts and sciences that were economized, the story of oikonomia in the field of rhetoric is at the center of this article’s attention. As shown, the concept of oikonomia took an intermediate form between the realm of thought – that is, the domain of philosophy – and the realm of public speech – the domain of politics. (shrink)

The discourse and practice of humanism is at a cross-road, now challenged by posthuman reflections on what it means to be human. Our understanding of human and humanism is also challenged by transformations in nation-state and citizenship. In this context, the present article explores pathways of a new global humanity emerging out of cross-cultural reflections and new intellectual and social movements.

This article explores what Cicero as a political thinker can offer to the study of international relations. Although previous readings of Cicero have emphasized his Stoic influences and his natural law teaching as the basis of a cosmopolitan world society, I emphasize the way in which Cicero can deepen the concept of international society. International society relies on certain norms and institutions to function properly, such as international law, sovereignty, and the use of war to restrain violence and redress injustice. (...) We find all these concepts articulated clearly in Cicero’s moral and political thought. Cicero also shows the limits of these institutions and norms, explaining why none of them is absolute. Finally, Cicero adds to our theorizing about international society by drawing attention to the role of honor, ruling, and inequality in international society. As such, classical political thought, and Cicero’s in particular, provide a valuable resource for future thinking about international theory. (shrink)

The article explores the demands that the conflictual dimension of globalization poses for a cosmopolitan education. Such an emphasis seems necessary in times where the populations who undertake inter- and intra-national border crossings are increasingly those who are forced to: those trying to escape unbearable poverty, atrocious wars, the disenfranchised and victims of racist, sexist or religious persecution. Reflecting on the experiences articulated in the two graphic novels, Persepolis and American Born Chinese, the dimension of the globalizing world and its (...) impact and demands on its future world citizens which comes to the fore is one that highlights the necessity for learning how to take a critical and political stance rather than the search for how education can facilitate a smooth adaptation to a new mobile order. Stanley Cavell’s examination of the relationship between autobiography, philosophy, and the founding of a self-reliant voice will be reconsidered in light of its contribution to re-thinking the meaning of a cosmopolitan education between critical self-appropriation and developing a transformative political vision of a new societal order. (shrink)

L’éthique de la vertu d’Annas est confrontée à l’objection de la circularité. Annas affirme qu’une âme juste est disposée à poser des actes justes. On contourne l’objection de la circularité si l’on ne définit l’âme juste ni en termes d’actes bons, ni en termes de règles. En m’appuyant sur les récents travaux de Korsgaard, je démontre que l’argument d’Annas se heurte de nouveau à l’objection de la circularité. Ensuite, j’examine de quelle façon Annas tente une fois de plus d’éviter l’objection (...) de la circularité en faisant appel à la communauté des vertueux. Je soutiens que cette démarche ne préserve sa théorie ni du relativisme, ni de l’objection de la circularité. (shrink)

_ Source: _Volume 9, Issue 2, pp 284 - 305 Despite the ubiquity of contemporary debate in learned and popular cultures concerning the place of the cosmopolitan and cosmopolitanism, the historical background to this peculiarly Western vision of world unity remains understudied and virtually unknown. This is particularly the case, rather surprisingly, for the early modern period, when the term “cosmopolite” reappeared in European vocabularies for the first time since antiquity. It is during this period, however, that the most significant, (...) enduring and problematic features of the cosmopolitan concept are articulated, particularly in those conceptions of world community which drew on Pauline notions of heavenly citizenship. Employing a modified Begriffsgeschichtliche approach, this article utilizes several case studies of cosmopolitan thought from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries – including Erasmus, Guillaume Postel, Johann Valentin Andreae and others – in order to critique the history of the concept of the cosmopolitan. This essay argues, on the basis of this evidence, that there is an aporia which is constitutive of cosmopolitan concept, and which impacts on all attempts to understand, analyse and apply the category from antiquity to the present. Namely, although the cosmopolitan ideal is a peculiarly Western mythology which has always possessed a patina of benevolent inclusivity, it is contingent on establishing boundaries and establishing exclusivity. (shrink)

The American Journal of Bioethics, Volume 12, Issue 9, Page 14-16, September 2012.

This paper returns to the theme of the academic turn to cosmopolitanism as a response to the challenges of globalisation, conflict, inequality and diversity discussed here previously. The discussion of cosmopolitanism here refers to the context of current policy relating to research and what it means to be a researcher in the European Union today or, as current policy frames it, ‘the Innovation Union’. The understanding of the researcher found in current policy relates closely to the particular understanding of citizenship (...) promoted in Europe today, consisting in active participation, mobility, adaptability and innovation, that is permanent learning for permanent adaptation to our current conditions. This understanding of citizenship and of research works in the name of democracy, community and their sustainability; and respect for diversity and equality and intercultural dialogue are important facets. (shrink)