From Metics to the Erased, or How to Ground Cosmopolitanism: A Post-Socialist Perspective on Current Theories of Cosmopolitanism
From Metics to the Erased, or How to Ground Cosmopolitanism: A Post-Socialist Perspective on Current Theories of Cosmopolitanism

Summary/Abstract: The paper is a critical contribution to contemporary theory of cosmopolitanism which takes into account specific socio-cultural and political contexts of postsocialist Central and Eastern Europe. It is argued that in order for cosmopolitanism to become effective politics and the practice of democratic citizenship, it has to be grounded in daily processes of negotiation of loyalty and patriotism to the national society. In this regard, it should not be conceptualised as nationalism’s other but rather as an alternative patriotic sentiment, which combines the global ethos of humanity and responsibility towards political and cultural organization of local social life. The paper illuminates this approach from the perspective of post-socialist citizenship in Slovenia and the tragic experience of the “erased”.

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