ABSTRACT
When it comes to envisaging the kind of world order better suited to accommodate the democratic demands of a plurality of different constituencies, we find a similar evasion of the antagonistic dimension of the political. This is indeed one of the main shortcomings of the cosmopolitan approach, which, under different guises, is presented as the solution to our present predicament. A lot is at stake in the current debate about the most desirable type of world order and this is why we need to examine carefully the arguments of those who assert that with the end of the bipolar world the opportunity now exists for the establishment of a cosmopolitan world order. The theorists associated with this trend claim that, with the disappearance of the communist enemy, antagonisms are a thing of the past and that, in times of globalization, the cosmopolitan ideal elaborated by Kant can finally be realized.
