Heimat bedeutet für mich …

Ich habe mein Junior Fellowship am University of Bayreuth Centre of International Excellence 'Alexander von Humboldt' nun abgeschlossen. Angegliedert war ich dem Institut für Fränkische Landesgeschichte der Universitäten Bayreuth und Bamberg. Ich werde „mein Schloss“, den Arbeitsplatz des Instituts im beeindruckenden Schloss Thurnau, und die tolle Atmosphäre, die von den dort arbeitenden Menschen geschaffen wurde, sehr vermissen. In dieser Zeit... Continue Reading →

Future of AI

You know who else has a 5-year plan? AI does. AI will achieve AGI in 5 years. And it won't care about YOUR 5-year plan. To better understand this trajectory, consider exploring the free course “The Future of AI” by BlueDot Impact. It requires no more than two hours and offers valuable insights into the evolution of... Continue Reading →

Beck, Ulrich — The Cosmopolitan Vision

Work Cited Beck, Ulrich. The Cosmopolitan Vision. Cambridge: Polity Press, 2006. Summary of the Introduction The introduction opens with the opposition cosmopolitanism/patriotism. Today this old debate is over because the human condition has become cosmopolitan (2) Cosmopolitanism is no more a controversial rational idea. The “cosmopolitan outlook”: “Global sense, a sense of boundarylessness. An everyday,... Continue Reading →

Held, David — Culture and Political Community: National, Global and Cosmopolitan

Work Cited Held, David. “Culture and Political Community: National, Global, and Cosmopolitan.” In Conceiving Cosmopolitanism: Theory, Context, Practice, edited by Steven Vertovec and Robin Cohen, 48-58. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002. 1. Historical backdrop The globalisation of culture has a long history. The expansion of great religions, pre-modern empires, etc. “For most human history, these... Continue Reading →

Copp, David — International Justice and the Basic Needs Principle

Work Cited Copp, David. “International justice and the basic needs principle.” In The Political Philosophy of Cosmopolitanism, edited by Gillian Brock and Harry Brighouse, 39-54. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005. “Justice requires a state in favourable circumstances to enable its members to meet their basic needs throughout a normal lifespan”: the “basic needs principle” (39).... Continue Reading →

Benhabib, Seyla — The Claims of Culture: Equality and Diversity in the Global Era

Benhabib, Seyla (2002), The Claims of Culture: Equality and Diversity in the Global Era, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Global integration is progressing parallel to social disintegration (separatisms, international terrorism, national revival). “Yet wether [sic] we call the current movements “struggles for recognition” (Charles Taylor, Nancy Fraser, and Axel Honneth), “identity/difference movements,” [sic] (Iris Young,... Continue Reading →

Rosenfeld, Sofia — Citizens of Nowhere in Particular: Cosmopolitanism, Writing and Political Engagement in Eighteenth-Century Europe

Work Cited Rosenfeld, Sophia. “Citizens of Noweher in Particular: Cosmopolitanism, Writing and Political Engagement in Eighteenth-Century Europe.” National Identities 4, no. 1 (2002): 25-43. Contention of the essay: the development of the conceptual space of political engagement among private subjects cannot be reduced to the creation of national loyalties. A body of literature existed, produced... Continue Reading →

Fink, Gonthier Louis — “Cosmopolitisme” in Dictionnaire européen des lumières

Work Cited Fink, Gonthier Louis (1997) “Cosmopolitisme.” In Dictionnaire européen des lumières, edited by Michel Delon, 277-279. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France. « Le XVIIIe siècle est le siècle du cosmopolitisme » (L. Réau). (277) «  En 1690, le Dictionnaire universel de Furetière, qui ne connaît pas encore le terme « cosmopolite », le définit indirectement à l’article... Continue Reading →

O’Brien, Karen — Narratives of Enlightenment

Introduction: cosmopolitanism, narrative, history Cosmopolitan history: “‘Cosmopolitanism’ is no longer a term much favoured by intellectual historians: as an idea, it seems to lack intellectual content; as a category of political thought, it has no referent. [footnote: “the last investigation of this idea was Thomas J. Schlereth]. The term is occasionally invoked by literary and... Continue Reading →

Avenel’s biography of Anacharsis Cloots

Avenel, Georges (1865), Anacharsis Cloots: L’orateur du genre humain, Paris : Librairie internationale. This is one of the very first biography existing on this not so well-known history character of the French Revolution, Anacharsis Cloots. The merit of this book is its weakness: the tone in which it is written. The author is writing in a... Continue Reading →

Bélissa, Marc: Les patriotes européens et l’ordre républicain cosmopolitique 1795-1802

Bélissa analyses the conquests made by the new French Republic in Italy (an IV-V), Switzerland (an VI-VII), Holland (an III), and Belgium (an III-IV). These countries are called “sister-Republics.” Patriots in these “sister-Republics” are European militants and support the French Republic, at first, in its fight against monarchical Europe (91). These patriots have conscious to... Continue Reading →

Dédéyan: le cosmopolitisme européen sous la révolution et l’empire

Dédéyan, Charles (1976) Le cosmopolitisme européen sous la Révolution et l’Empire. 2 vols. Paris: Société d’édition d’enseignement supérieur. One of the rare books of intellectual history about cosmopolitanism in Europe. Written in French, it is focusing on the periods immediately after the Enlightenment: the French Revolution and the first Empire under Napoléon Bonaparte. It is... Continue Reading →

Schlereth: The Cosmopolitan Ideal in Enlightenment Thought

Schlereth, Thomas (1977) The Cosmopolitan Ideal in Enlightenment Thought: Its Form and Function in the Ideas of Franklin, Hume, and Voltaire, 1694-1790. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press. Thomas J. Schlereth studied how the cosmopolitan ideal had a “noticeable impact on Enlightenment intellectual life throughout the trans-Atlantic community”.[1] But Schlereth does not advance that... Continue Reading →

Thesis graded

My thesis has been graded and I received the best grade possible in the Danish system: 12. That makes it an A in the ECTS system. Plus an excellent assessment of my work by my supervisor and my 'censor'. I am very happy and very proud. Still, it does not give me a relevant job... Continue Reading →

Obama in Berlin: ich bin ein Weltbürger?

Senator Barck Obama was Thursday 24 July 2008 in Berlin where he delivered his much anticipated speech in front of a massive crowd. Of course the reference to "ich bin ein Berliner" was obvious and too easy to mention. He opened his speech toning down expectations, stating he was there as a simple US citizen, and a "citizen of the world." Rhetorically he is leaving it up to the media coverage to make the link: "ich bin ein Weltbürger."

To my knowledge, this must be one of the very first time a politician declares so openly a cosmopolitan ideal to be his. There is certainly much to celebrate for a cosmopolitan in this speech, but I would like to present a few remarks as to the alleged cosmopolitan nature of his commitment.

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