Level 59
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Political and Social Philosophy

Nationalism, Cosmopolitanism, and Global Justice

The tension between particularist loyalties to nation and community and universalist claims of global moral obligation, from the Romantic origins of nationalist thought to contemporary debates on migration, poverty, and global institutions.

60-Second Review

Express review

A condensed, point-by-point summary of the module, for reviewing right before a test or exam.

  1. The Philosophical Roots of Nationalism: Herder and Fichte. Herder's cultural pluralism and Fichte's political nationalism gave the nation its first philosophical grounding.
  2. Civic versus Ethnic Nationalism. Nationalism divides into civic models based on shared citizenship and ethnic models based on shared descent.
  3. Kant's Perpetual Peace and Cosmopolitan Right. Kant's 1795 essay proposed a federation of republics and a cosmopolitan right of hospitality to secure lasting peace.
  4. Contemporary Cosmopolitanism: Appiah and Nussbaum. Appiah's "rooted cosmopolitanism" and Nussbaum's capabilities-based universalism update Kantian cosmopolitan ethics.
  5. Communitarian Defenses of National Particularity. Communitarians such as MacIntyre, Sandel, and Walzer argue particular community, not abstract universalism, grounds ethics.
  6. Global Poverty and the Duties of the Affluent: Singer's Argument. Singer's drowning-child analogy argues affluent people are morally obligated to give far more to prevent global poverty.
  7. Migration, Borders, and the Ethics of Exclusion. Philosophers debate whether states have a moral right to exclude migrants or whether open borders are required by justice.
  8. Cosmopolitan Democracy and Global Institutions. Theorists debate whether justice requires democratizing global institutions beyond the current system of sovereign states.

This module continues after "Philosophy of Law and Human Rights" in the syllabus. If you haven't reviewed it yet, it may help set the context.

Key points

Visual module map

1The Philosophical Roots of Nationalism: Herder and Fichte
2Kant's Perpetual Peace and Cosmopolitan Right
3Communitarian Defenses of National Particularity
4Global Poverty and the Duties of the Affluent: Singer's Argument
5Cosmopolitan Democracy and Global Institutions

Alternative visual view: a simplified sequence of some of the module's key points, in their order within the syllabus.

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Final test

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Memory

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Chronological Order

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Further reading

Bibliography and cited sources used to create this module.

  • Kant, I. (1795). Toward Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch. (Various modern translations, e.g. Cambridge University Press, 1996, ed. Mary J. Gregor).
  • Anderson, B. (1983). Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. London: Verso.
  • Miller, D. (1995). On Nationality. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  • Singer, P. (1972). "Famine, Affluence, and Morality." Philosophy & Public Affairs, 1(3), 229–243.
  • Appiah, K.A. (2006). Cosmopolitanism: Ethics in a World of Strangers. New York: W.W. Norton & Company.
  • Carens, J.H. (2013). The Ethics of Immigration. Oxford: Oxford University Press.