The book “Cosmopolitanism:
Ethics in the world of strangers” was written by Kwame Anthony Appiah
(2006), British philosopher of Ghanaian origin with roots in Asante ethnic
group, but primarily human being and cosmopolitan person. The work of prominent
in the field of cosmopolitanism author, comprises a range of disciplines as
well as Appiah’s personal experience to build a main argument that
cosmopolitanism is the philosophy, ideology and, as written on the back cover
of his book, a “moral manifesto for a planet of strangers” who need to live
together. Ten chapters of the book complemented by introduction present an insightful
and engaging reading for the scholars as well as for sophisticated readers who
are accustomed with philosophical school of thought. Author builds his work drawing
a general picture of what is the cosmopolitanism referring to influential
thinkers as well as examples from literature and history. In the next chapters,
he proceeds to outline his philosophical position, illustrate fallacies of
other schools of thought and continues by giving us a practical approach
towards understanding, living and collaboration with people inhabiting our
planet. Appiah also brings to attention a set of responsibilities which we
share as human beings.
The main argument of the book is an appeal to humanity
to take a responsible stance over our relations with varying strangers coming
from different parts of the planet and sharing diverse beliefs and values. It
is Appiah’s urge to take a stance of cosmopolitanism as the driving philosophy
and ethical way of living. Author is sure that “cosmopolitanism is an adventure
and an ideal” (p. xviii) and, at the same time, “there’s a sense in which
cosmopolitanism is the name not of the solution but of the challenge” (p.
xiii). Indeed, the book defined by Kofi Annan as “the great human project of
trying to live together” needs a solid philosophical stance and moreover it
should be a practical and manageable motivation for action. Kwame Anthony
Appiah is not a slave of illusions and he believes that “we need to develop
habits of coexistence: conversation [emphasis
added] in its older meaning, of living together, association” (p. xvii). But
how do we approach this conversation? Appiah believes that the dialogue from
positivist and relativist positions is circled to not bring us to final
destination. For instance, he suggests that the cornerstone of positivists thinking,
namely rationale, fails when labeling our values as true or false (p. 22). Appiah
proposes that even if such universal values as kindness or humanness cannot be
rationally justified, they still make sense to us and we still value them (p. 21).
Indeed, Appiah’s concern about vision of the world in black and white colors,
labeled as true or false has to be demolished by scholars again and again as a
remnant of the past which does not make sense today. Yet another extreme –
relativism (p. 31) – has nothing to offer for conversation of strangers as it denies
any objectivity of values, certain universal agreements which are valued by the
whole humankind.
Appiah develops his argument of the need for
thoughtful conversation throughout the chapters of the book. It should be said
that he proposes a kind of guide to enter this interaction. To begin with, author
states that “we enter every conversation … without a promise of final agreement”
(p. 44). It is reality and this should not stop us from making this
conversation happen. It is always easy to say that someone is not possible to
convince, however even if the dialogue is not about consensus it may be about understanding of positions. Appiah’s
second argument is that even if we do not take values of our interlocutors seriously
we are able to listen and understand why they make sense to them (p. 56). Putting
it simply, the conversation – in Appiah’s position it is not limited to
physical presence but is about “engagement with the experience and the ideas of
others” (p. 85) – in which people are trying to understand one another may be a
first step for them “to get used to another” (p. 85). As a result, distant
strangers are no more strangers for us but people we know. Third, Appiah talks
about the language of conversation itself. When the dispute may have the same
vocabulary of values, it does not guarantee us that we share the same criteria
of their evaluation, interpretations and degree of importance (p. 67). This is
to say that even universal from a first look values may be rooted into local
context differently. As a solution, author comes to the main from my
perspective conclusions “we can agree about what
to do even when we don’t agree why”
(p. 67) and “we can live together without agreeing on what the values are that
make it good to live together” (p. 71). Indeed, if in our conversation we are
trying to stick to these powerful insights, we may find ourselves far beyond
those who share different understanding of the dialogue. Finally, Appiah stipulates
that we as human beings have a lot in common and are connected to one another
“despite difference” (p. 135). Rationally
or not, we have certain obligations to strangers, as put by Appiah “we owe to
others” (p. 165), and we are responsible to contribute feasible efforts (p.
164) to sustain basic needs every human being has (p. 163). By saying this,
author concludes his appeal to cosmopolitanism leaving us with many answers,
questions and, at the same time, actions to do.
This reading highly resonates with my perception of
the word and surely adds many perspectives for my order of though on this
matter. I see many connections to what I have read during my course of studies
as well as connections to my research project in the process. For example, I
find that writers whose readings fascinate me the most do talk about certain
concepts in the similar way. Appiah mentions Adam Smith (2002) who states that
there is no guarantee that strangers “have the same grip on our sympathies” (p.
158) and we cannot “demand” (p. 158) them to have. The word “demand”
simultaneously triggered me to think about Nel Nodding’s philosophy of care where
she acknowledges that when we care about someone we do not wait or do it to
receive response. From my perspective, cosmopolitanism may theoretically
benefit taking ideas of caring relations in conversation it is talking about.
Yet another sentence which caught my attention is Appiah’s reflections on the
nature of culture: “we do not need, have never needed, settled community, a homogeneous
system of values, in order to have a home. Cultural purity is an oxymoron” (p.
113). Similarly, Pieterse (2015) talks about “cultural differentialism” (p. 42)
and “cultural convergence” (p. 42) as opposed to “cultural hybridization” (p. 42).
I find that authors correlate in their position that neither emphasizing
difference neither stressing homogeneity does not move us closer to conversation
capable to bring shared understanding. We may also find an inference to United
Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization’s (2017) call for
“building a sense of belonging to a common humanity” (para. 1). Not surprising
that many powerful thinkers and recognizable organizations take for ideological
basis what cosmopolitanism talks about. In turn, when making connections to my
research project, I should acknowledge that the philosophical position of
cosmopolitanism may offer me a more comprehensive picture of the reality and
our social role inside of it. For example, when it is easy to apply the theory
of the knowledge based economy for the notion of the 21st century
skills, which I use in my thesis, I would better think about turning it into
the discourse of human rights and creation of cosmopolite identities through
the mean of education.
In conclusion, the book of Kwame Anthony Appiah (2006)
is certainly kind of a desk book which talks about complex issues simply. Complemented
by sound philosophical discussion, it presents a practical claim for action to
start a conversation between people from cosmopolitan position of thought. Appiah
builds his argument around necessity of this conversation when stressing the
importance of mutual understanding and recognition of obligations which “we owe”
(p. 165) to humanity. This book widens the horizons of thinking and presents us
alternatives we did not know before. I find this book highly relevant to my
dissertation and intent to use it as a moral reference in my research
activities. Jason’s future students might find this interesting given its
relevance to our course themes and topics. For example, Appiah’s book comprises
the most appealing to the problems of humanity concepts and puts them into one
theory of cosmopolitanism capable to bring the question of morale into the
matter of education in relation to globalization.
References
Appiah, K. A. (2006). Cosmopolitanism:
Ethics in the world of strangers. England: Penguin Books.
Noddings,
N. (2012). Philosophy of education (3 ed.). Westview Press.
Pieterse,
J. N. (2015). Globalization and culture: Three paradigms. In J. N. Pieterse, Globalization
and culture: Global mélange (pp. 41-58). USA: Rowman & Littlefield.
Smith,
A. (2002). The theory of moral sentiments. (K. Haakonssen, Ed.)
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
UNESCO.
(2017). Global Citizenship Education. Retrieved March 12, 2017, from
WWW.UNESCO.ORG: http://en.unesco.org/gced/approach
