ABSTRACT
Can cosmopolitanism be taught? Social and political theory concerned with supporting cosmopolitanism – whether as ‘ironic distance from the self’ (Turner 2002) or a world government (Archibugi and Held 1995) – certainly assumes that it can be fostered. Precisely how remains neglected. Even as the questions about the possibility of teaching cosmopolitanism and the kinds of methods required for the task remain unanswered there is no shortage of programmes that purport to do exactly that. The last decade has seen a phenomenal rise in the number and range of programmes that support inter-civilizational dialogue as a way to teach cosmopolitanism. The most prominent among them is the UN’s Dialogue of Civilizations. Islam, and Muslim societies, have been singled out for great attention and over the last decade there has been a wild proliferation of programmes that focus on a ‘dialogue’ between Muslim ‘civilization’ and the rest.
