Sage Journals: Discover world-class research

Abstract

Politics at any level relies heavily on genuine sentiments of solidarity and allegiance citizens have for the political community. But how could solidarity be kept real, feasible, and effective while remaining judiciously open to cosmopolitan ideals of global citizenship? Drawing on Kwame Appiah’s concept of ‘cosmopolitan patriotism’ and cognate insights on political identity and its construction, the essay argues that patriotic solidarity and cosmopolitan solidarity are not mutually exclusive. It shows how patriotic solidarity embodies a ‘glocal’ duality – both local and global. Accordingly, to be a patriot is to have overcome the ethnocentric shortsightedness that blurs a global vision. A patriot is a veritable cosmopolitan. But a patriot ought to be a ‘rooted’ cosmopolitan and not a ‘rootless’ cosmopolitan. A patriot’s commitment to the local should never be undermined. To unpack these ideas, the essay explores the concepts of concentricity and political ‘cost-effectiveness’ in a novel fashion. Since this whole question of patriotic solidarity has particular implications for Africa, the essay addresses and problematizes the ‘state’ in postcolonial Africa.

Keywords

solidarity postcolonial Africa cosmopolitanism patriotism Kwame Appiah

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Abbink

Jon

. 2014. “Religion and Politics in Africa: The Future of ‘The Secular.” Africa Spectrum 49, no. 3: 83–106.

Appiah

Kwame

. 1992. In My Father’s House: Africa in the Philosophy of Culture. Oxford University Press.

Appiah

Kwame

. 1996. “Cosmopolitan Patriot.” In Nussbaum Martha (With Respondents), for Love of Country: Debating the Limits of Patriotism, edited by Joshua

Cohen

, 21–29. Beacon Press.

Appiah

Kwame

. 2005. The Ethics of Identity. Princeton University Press.

Benhabib

Seyla

. 2002. The Claims of Culture: Equality and Diversity in the Global Era. Princeton University Press.

Benhabib

Seyla

. 2004. The Rights of Others: Aliens, Citizens, and Residents. Cambridge University Press.

Benhabib

Seyla

. 2006. Another Cosmopolitanism. Oxford University Press. Edited and introduced by Robert Post.

Benhabib

Seyla

. 2009. “Cosmopolitanism and Democracy: Affinities and Tensions.” Hedgehog Review: Critical Reflections on Contemporary Culture 11, no. 3: 30–41.

Benhabib

Seyla

. 2014. “Defending a Cosmopolitanism Without Illusions: Reply to my Critics.” Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy 17, no. 6: 697–715.

10.

Calhoun

Craig

. 2002. “Imagining Solidarity: Cosmopolitanism, Constitutional Patriotism, and the Public Sphere.” Public Culture 14, no. 1: 147–71.

11.

Davidson

Basil

. 1992. The Black Man’s Burden: Africa and the Curse of the Nation-State. James Currey Limited.

12.

Eze

Michael

. 2023. “Religious Nationalism and the Politics of Identity in Contemporary Nigeria.” In Fragmented Identities of Nigeria: Sociopolitical and Economic Crises, edited by Bewaji

J. A. I.

Omosulu

, 31–50. Lexington Books.

13.

Fanon

Frantz

. 2004. The Wretched of the Earth. Grove Press. Translated by Richard Philcox.

14.

Fukuyama

Francis

. 2018. Identity: Contemporary Identity Politics and the Struggle for Recognition. Profile Books.

15.

Habermas

Jürgen

. 1993. “Citizenship and National Identity: Some Reflections on the Future of Europe.” Praxis International 12, no. 1: 1–19.

16.

Habermas

Jürgen

. 1998. The Inclusion of the Other, edited by Cronin

De Greiff

. MIT Press.

17.

Habermas

Jürgen

. 2003. “Making Sense of the EU: Toward a Cosmopolitan Europe.” Journal of Democracy 14, no. 4: 86–100.

18.

Habermas

Jürgen

. 2008. Between Naturalism and Religion. Polity Press. Translated by C. Cronin.

19.

Haggard

Stephan

. 2018. Developmental States. Cambridge University Press.

20.

Held

David

. 1995. Democracy and the Global Order: From the Modern State to Cosmopolitan Governance. Stanford University Press.

21.

Held

David

. 2004. Global Covenant: The Social Democratic Alternative to the Washington Consencus. Polity Press.

22.

Held

David

Anthony

McGrew

. 2002. Governing Globalization: Power, Authority, and Global Governance. Polity Press.

23.

Lupel

Adam

. 2005. “Tasks of a Global Civil Society: Held, Habermas, and Democratic Legitimacy beyond the Nation-State.” Globalizations 2, no. 1: 117–33.

24.

Markell

Patchen

(2000) Making Affects Safe for Democracy? On ‘Constitutional Patriotism’. Political Theory 28(1): 38–63.

25.

Nkrumah

Kwameh

. 1965. Neocolonialism: The Last Stage of Imperialism. Nelson & Sons Ltd.

26.

Nussbaum

Martha

. 1996. For Love of Country: Debating the Limits of Patriotism, edited by Joshua

Cohen

. Beacon Press.

27.

Nussbaum

Martha

. 2008. “Toward a Globally Sensitive Patriotism.” Dædalus 137, no. 3: 78–93.

28.

Nussbaum

Martha

. 2013. Political Emotions: Why Love Matters for Justice. Harvard University Press.

29.

Oriji

J. N

. 2011. Political Organization in Nigeria Since the Late Stone Age: A History of the Igbo People. Palgrave Macmillan.

30.

Robertson

Roland

. 1992. Globalization: Social Theory and Global Culture. Sage.

31.

Robertson

Roland

. 1995. “Glocalization: Time-Space and homogeneity-heterogeneity.” In Global Modernities, edited by Featherstone

Lash

Robertson

, 25–44. Sage.

32.

Rodney

Walter

. 2018 [1972]. How Europe Underdeveloped Africa. Verso.

33.

Taylor

Charles

. 1995. Philosophical Arguments. Harvard University Press.

34.

Taylor

Charles

. 2004. Modern Social Imaginaries. Duke University Press.

35.

Ude

Donald Mark C

. 2022. “Coloniality, Epistemic Imbalance, and Africa’s Emigration Crisis.” Theory, Culture & Society 39, no. 6: 3–19.

36.

Ude

Donald Mark C

. 2024. Endangered African Knowledges and the Challenge of Modernity: An Igbo Response. Routledge.

37.

Wallerstein

Immanuel

. 1980. The Modern World-System II: Mercantilism and the Consolidation of the European World-Economy, Vol. 1600–1750. Academic Press.

38.

Wallerstein

Immanuel

. 2011. The Modern World-System I: Capitalist Agriculture and the Origins of the European World-Economy in the Sixteenth Century. University of California Press.

Solidarity as a political resource: Keeping it real,feasible,and effective

Abstract

Keywords

Get full access to this article

References