The idea of cosmopolitan solidarity

In this chapter I shall discuss a concept that perhaps ought to be more central to the cosmopolitan literature than it is: ‘cosmopolitan solidarity’. In political thought the notion of solidarity does not have the brio that it once had in the heady days of class and international solidarity. In sociology the concept of solidarity, which used to be pivotal to understanding the ties that bind people to one another, now tends to be relegated to a sub-field relating to the role of altruism, compassion and sympathy in social life. It is in this context that the idea of ‘cosmopolitan solidarity’ has arisen as an extension of or alternative to the kind of solidarity that once existed at the level of class and nation (e.g. Brunkhorst 2005; Habermas 1998; Habermas 2003; Pensky 2000; Stevenson 2006). My aim in this paper is to explore the nature of cosmopolitan solidarity and raise some of the difficulties that its conceptualisation raises.