Resumen de Cosmopolitanism and Nationalism

Kok-Chor Tan

• The European Union, although a continental project, can be described as a cosmopolitan one in some fundamental respects. (One might say that it is contingently European but ideally cosmopolitan). This cosmopolitanism, however, seems to be fundamentally contradicted by the fact of European state nationalism. In this paper, I will examine the different aspirations cosmopolitanism can take, on the one side, and the different forms of nationalism on the other, to see if there are cosmopolitan aspirations and proper forms of nationalism that are mutually compatible. I close with some speculations on the applicability of my discussion to the realities of the European Union.