Cosmopolitanism
[1] The idea encompasses different dimensions and avenues of community, such as promoting universal moral standards, establishing global political structures, or developing a platform for mutual cultural expression and tolerance.
[3] In a looser but related sense, "cosmopolitan" is also used to describe places where people of various ethnic, cultural and/or religious backgrounds live together and interact with each other.
[4] The word derives from the Ancient Greek: κοσμοπολίτης, or kosmopolitês, formed from "κόσμος", kosmos, i.e. "world", "universe", or "cosmos", and πολίτης, "politês", i.e. "citizen" or "[one] of a city".
[9] The ancient Chinese philosopher Mozi in preserved scripts said that "universal love and mutual benefit" could be attained "to regard other people's countries as one's own".
[10] The Chinese term tianxia (all under Heaven), a metonym for empire, has also been re-interpreted in the modern age as a conception of cosmopolitanism, and was used by 1930s modernists as the title of a Shanghai-based, English-language journal of world arts and letters T'ien Hsia Monthly.
[15] The philosophical concepts of Emmanuel Levinas, on ethics, and Jacques Derrida, on hospitality, provide a theoretical framework for the relationships between people in their everyday lives and apart from any form of written laws or codes.
Globalization, a more common term, typically refers more narrowly to the economic and trade relations and misses the broader cultural, social, political, environmental, demographic, values and knowledge transitions taking place.
Nhat Hanh's philosophical beliefs are grounded in the precepts of Buddhist teachings, which involve compassion and understanding to protect and live in harmony with all people, animals, plants, and minerals.
[20] He further describes what he calls "Mindfulness Training of the Order of Interbeing" as being aware of sufferings created by, but not limited to, the following causes: fanaticism and intolerances that disrupt compassion and living in harmony with others; indoctrination of narrow-minded beliefs; imposition of views; anger; and miscommunication.
Paul Gilroy offers a possible alternative to this emphasis on familiarity arguing that "methodical cultivation of a degree of estrangement from one's own culture and history ... might qualify as essential to a cosmopolitan commitment.
[23] The Venus Project, an international, multidisciplinary educational organization created by Jacque Fresco, works to spread cosmopolitan ideas by transcending artificial boundaries currently separating people and emphasizing an understanding of our interdependence with nature and each other.
[citation needed] Frantz Fanon, in The Wretched of the Earth, observes that when nations achieved independence from European colonizers, frequently there was no system in place to secure their economic future, and they became "manager[s] for Western enterprise...in practise set[ting] up its country as the brothel of Europe.
Drawing on classical realism, they consider liberalism insufficient to promote equality between nations, breaking the iron laws of competition between states; instead, they look at Byzantine and other pre-modern cultures.
With the advance of globalization and the increased facility of travel and communication, some thinkers consider that the political system based on the nation-state has become obsolete and that it is time to design a better and more efficient alternative.
Rejecting as muddled the metaphysical notion of free will, he focuses on political freedom, the absence of coercion or interference by others in personal decisions.
Mosterín thinks that the nation-state is incompatible with the full development of freedom, whose blossoming requires the reorganization of the world political system along cosmopolitan lines.
She uses Richard Rorty as a triangulation point in that he remains neutral about multiculturalism, but his philosophical analysis of truth and practice can be deployed to argue against Searle and in favor of Taylor.
[33] Emile Durkheim (1858–1917) observed the development of what he called the 'cult of the individual', which is a new religion that replaced the Christianity that was dying out, and which is centered around the sacredness of human dignity.
Thus, rather than finding solidarity through national culture, or a particular traditional religious doctrine, society would be unified by its adherence to political values, i.e. individual rights and a defence of human dignity.
[36]Ulrich Beck (May 15, 1944 – January 1, 2015) was a sociologist who posed the new concept of cosmopolitan critical theory in direct opposition to traditional nation-state politics.
Rather, political and sociological cosmopolitanism rests upon these fundamental foundations: A number of philosophers, including Emmanuel Levinas, have introduced the concept of the "Other".
[37] Cosmopolitanism shares some aspects of universalism – namely the globally acceptable notion of human dignity that must be protected and enshrined in international law.
[citation needed] As an example, Judith Butler discusses a Western discourse of "human" in Precarious Life: The Powers of Mourning and Violence.
Others have extended this idea to examine how animals might be reconfigured as cosmopolitan, present the world-over with varying identities in different places.
Individuals who embrace Western ideals are considered fully "human" and are more likely to be afforded dignity and protection than those who defend their non-Westernized cultural identities.
According to those who follow Beck's reasoning, a cosmopolitan world would consist of a plurality of states, which would use global and regional consensus to gain greater bargaining power against opponents.
States would also utilize the power of civil society actors such as Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and consumers to strengthen their legitimacy and enlist the help of investors to pursue a cosmopolitan agenda.
Cosmopolitan democracy, for example, suggests strengthening the United Nations and other international organizations by creating a World Parliamentary Assembly.
[45] Television journalist Jeff Greenfield believes that in the 21st century cosmopolitanism was viewed by Vladimir Putin as a threat to Russian nationalism, and also by nationalists in Hungary and Poland.
[46] In modern times, Stephen Miller, a Trump administration senior policy advisor, publicly criticized CNN reporter Jim Acosta as exhibiting "cosmopolitan bias" during a discussion on the government's new immigration plan.
