ABSTRACT
In this chapter, I pay some critical attention to visions of the city as cosmopolis. Influenced by, and contributing to, the revival of cosmopolitanism in social and political theory more generally (see, for example, Cheah and Robbins 1998; Archibugi 2003), these visions of cosmopolis are intended to act as a counter-factual against which the conditions of urban life in particular places might be critically compared. For Sandercock (1998: 7), the cosmopolis is not an actually existing city, but rather a ‘construction site of the mind’, a kind of social imaginary designed to offer both grounds for critique and inspiration for alternatives. Similarly, Tajbakhsh (2001: xv) argues that ‘the idea of cosmopolis is a radical alternative to both social homogeneity and a plurality of mutually exclusive enclaves – which in the end are the same’. The influence of cosmopolitanism in contemporary urban theory should come as no surprise – the city has always been a privileged site for those interested in cosmopolitan ethics and politics, as a space in which parochial loyalties to kin, tribe, ‘race’ or nation might give way to more radically uncertain and explicitly humanitarian identifications.
