The Creation Of A Cosmopolitan Society Essay

The Internet is playing a very important role in the evolution of digital technology, but although it has seen remarkable growth over the last few years, its dispersion remains highly asymmetric. It is widely believed that the so called information age will bring radical change and improvement, and countries all over the world are busy with constructing the necessary infrastructure, the "information superhighways," in order to meet the challenges of the information society of the twenty-first century. Kwame Anthony Appiah’s essay “Making Conversation” tell us about human’s conversation

All around the world today, there is a lot of tension revolving around concepts of morality. In Moral Disagreement by Kwame Anthony Appiah, Appiah writes about differing values and morals around the world and within our society. He points out, “we aren’t the only people who have the concepts of right and wrong, good and bad; every society, it seems, has terms that correspond to these thin concepts” (658). However, these concepts are not always the same with each other in every society. In the same way that not everyone in our society believes in the same moral concepts. Unfortunately, it is these disagreements that often separate us as people. Forming different cultures, large and small, throughout the world. This is not a bad thing, but it does separate us as a race, leaving us to care more for one group of people rather than humanity as a whole. In Patriotism and Cosmopolitanism, by Martha Nussbaum, Nussbaum suggest that a way to fix this problem, and to become a cosmopolitan person, is to teach students in our education systems more of different cultures throughout the world. Yet not only should we learn to accept other cultures and their beliefs, but we should also educate ourselves to accept everybody we meet, giving respect to them as individuals, if we ever truly want to become a citizen of the world.

The world’s population is continuously increasing and laws are being made to maintain a global social order. The social order includes, and is not limited to, world peace, free international economy, international trade, and assurance that basic human rights are respected by all nations and humans live a decent life, full of opportunities. This is an ideal that we all aspire to, in a way or another and although we want to create a perfect world, it is impossible to do so because of people’s interests and their own view of “perfection.” We, as humans, are not perfect, and therefore we cannot have a perfect world. Many have tried to create ideas of what would make a perfect society. Socrates, Plato and Aristotle have diligently tried for centuries to establish a well-balanced world in which each individual has their own freedom. More than two thousand years have passed since then and the world is still struggling to find a way to create a harmonious international society. Cosmopolitanism and anti-cosmopolitanism have different ideas on how we can achieve this goal. To me, a combination of the two sounds more achievable. In this paper, I will try to demonstrate that today’s world is a combination of the two and ideas from both will take us a few steps forward towards an international goal.

According to Kwame Anthony Appiah’s text, Moral Disagreement and Majane Satrapi’s cartoon, From Persepolis, morals and values are something that everyone grows up with and cannot always be easily understood. One may be referred to as ethnocentric if he or she devalues or disrespects other morals and values. This is the belief that one culture is better or superior to others. One major problem that rises with this argument is that all cultures have done both positive and negative things in their histories, which may influence how others evaluate them. Kimmel and Satrapi show that it is essential to be open-minded about one another’s morals and values.

Another argument Appiah makes is for the liberties and freedoms that are entitled to us as individuals, an idea supported by cosmopolitans. In “A Case for Contamination”, he mentions the Unesco document for which its members’ priority was to protect and promote cultural diversity while shielding it from globalization. However, as Appiah points out the document is a paradox for it carefully upholds the significance of new ideas, human rights and values, and the freedom of thought and expression. Individuals should be able to make their own decisions based on their moral convictions and desires, isn’t that what freedom is? Shouldn’t societies operate with a moral compass, too? It should be in their best interest to take into account their members

While cosmopolitanism can be viewed as a concise concept, it can also be viewed to have two different strands. The first strand, as Appiah explains, focuses on the obligations we have to one another as universal citizens of the cosmos; obligations that stretch beyond family or local community. The second strand is more intensive stating that not only are we obligated to those whom we share nothing in common with but also find ourselves accountable for knowing other individuals on a more profound level of their practices and belief systems. Yet, while there do exist these two varying strands Appiah also acknowledges that it is not desirable nor probable that as a collective population we want to live under a single model of living. All the while, he briefly states that these two varying strands of the same descending concept may conflict in certain instances. Those who advocate fiercely for the cause of unification and understanding were often mocked for their own hypocritical actions.

So many of the problems we face today as a country and as a world are the result of ignorance and ethnocentrism. The misguided War on Terror, one of the more important examples in our time, is the result of religious and cultural intolerance on both sides. In her essay “Patriotism and Cosmopolitanism,” Martha Nussbaum argues that to remedy such issues, we should forgo our nationalist tendencies and view ourselves first and foremost as citizens of the world, or cosmopolitans. The majority of her suggestions are well taken, but her belief that national boundaries are morally irrelevant and that patriotism is altogether poisonous may be taking the idea too far, and in a very impractical direction. In this paper, I will argue for a vision of cosmopolitanism more in line with that of Anthony Appiah in his book Cosmopolitanism. His theory of a “rooted cosmopolitanism” takes into account the moral significance of nations and is better suited to a democratic world.

Kwame Anthony Appiah is a philosopher who deserves great recognition in this age. After earning his Ph.D at Cambridge University he went on to teach at many Ivy League schools. He wrote the book Cosmopolitanism: Ethics in a World of Strangers which touches on many of the controversial topics of our present time and connects them to past problems that now seem to have a clear solution. Appiah 's discussions of various topics point out many of the difficulties faced by the HIV/AIDS victims, who are gone into more detail by Helen Epstein, author of "AIDS, Inc.," and the ordeals that women have been put through in order to escape the gruesome rituals that have been required for their marriage.

Moralization in our society can lead to conflict as to right and wrong. While moralization is generally thought of as a positive force, The Moral Instinct by Steven Pinker shows how moralization can lead two groups to identify against each other. While smaller communities may be stronger systems of support and justice, their genesis can create isolation from other communities, leading to misunderstanding, and eventually, conflict or violence. As one reads The Moral Instinct, the more striking ideas that alter our understanding of Ta-Nehisi Coates’ Between the World and Me and Nayomi Manaweera’s Island of a Thousand Mirrors, are those which show us how the lack of completely universal morality leads to smaller identities within our world, and

In the pursuit to gain the greatest understanding and respect of human rights projects and global social justice cosmopolitanism is necessary. Looking at cosmopolitism’s roots, features and limits through the lenses of authors Fine, Held and Calhoun to further address the importance of this ideal regardless of its weaknesses. Following the debate of whether critics are right about cosmopolitanisms liberal biases undermining its critical potential will be discussed, to suggest where cosmopolitanism needs adjustments in order to progress. Lastly, this paper will consider the idea that cosmopolitan ideals are more necessary then ever given the resurgence of nationalist and isolationist politics worldwide. Through an overall analysis of

Our society today has in a metaphorical sense shrunk compared to our nomad ancestors. To further prove this point, we have so many resources available today that allow us to network and discover other cultures. This in turn makes all parts of the world seem a lot smaller because our worlds are intertwined by the internet, public transportation, restaurants, etc. We are no longer bound to the communities we share morals, location, or resources with. In the introduction of his book Cosmopolitanism: Ethics in a world of Strangers, Kwame A. Appiah delves into the world of cosmopolitanism on a global scale while discussing other possible ideologies and his arguments for and against them. Appiah’s perspective of cosmopolitanism is that all people in the world belong in a single community that share a set of morals and rules. I believe that by creating a set of rules that everyone can adhere to, we can avoid unnecessary conflict with one another and coexist peacefully since human interaction outside our local community will be inevitable.

Thanks for your post, you present an interesting approach. Reminds me of Frost and Walker (2007), they stated, “We all bring values, beliefs, and experiences to bear in our role as leaders, many of which are deeply rooted in our national or regional cultures”. This is one of the main reason why I project cosmopolitanism would be the best approach regardless of the organization’s composition. Every person is different, regardless of their nationality or culture. We all develop individual experiences due to our home lives, parents, and the way we grew up. Therefore, there is diversity in every environment, whether is cultural or individual. Additionally, like Bjugstad, et al. (2006), stated, “Followers and leaders are linked together in

I believe that one of the main purpose of schools is to foster morally sound citizens who will be able to go out into the world and create change for the better. That being said, I feel that it is the responsibility of school foster global citizens. A global citizen is some who is aware that everyone in the world is interconnected and we need to be understanding, responsible and accepting of one another. Therefore, explicitly teaching the notion of cosmopolitanism in schools is essential for the betterment of the world.

In today’s society, different cultures interact with each other every single day in many different environments. There are 195 countries in the world today, with most of them allowing people to freely travel from one to another and for people to emigrate to other countries. Think of how many different races there are in the world. According to the CIA World Factbook, there are six major races in the United States alone. A smaller country like Angola has five major race groups in their country, four of which are not major race groups in the United States. This certainly brings up the question, how should we all live so all of our different cultures can live together in harmony? The book Cosmopolitanism by Kwame Anthony Appiah is

Tolerance and coexistence are two things that most modern people struggle with. In Kwame Appaih’s work Cosmopolitanism, he writes about unity, and how every human being has a responsibility to one another. A character from Chinua Achebe’s work Things Fall Apart, Mr. Brown, essentially embodies the concepts Appaih calls attention to in his writing.