Dialogue and Global Politics: for a lateral cosmopolitanism

1.  Alternative Models of Global Politics

From a historical perspective, global politics has been dominated chiefly by two models:  empire and inter-state rivalry.  Ancient history, both in the East and the West, is replete with examples of “empire” or at least strong imperial ambitions.  Digging deep into the past, we find records of a Sumerian empire, of Assyrian, Babylonian and other Mesopotamian empires.  Particularly impressive—stretching over several millennia—are the records of the Egyptian empire which left its imprint on many subsequent developments.  Of even greater longevity was the Chinese empire in the Far East.  Turning to the “Western” world, we find the examples of the Macedonian empire and somewhat later of the Roman Empire.  In all these cases, “empire” designated the effort to provide an efficient, more or less centralized administration for major segments of the then known world.

Empires, of course, are not confined to ancient history.  During the Christian Middle Ages we find the Byzantine Empire and the Holy Roman Empire.  As we know, these Christian structures were challenged by the rise of Muslim empires:  first, the Ummayyad and Abbasid caliphates, and later Ottoman, Safavid, and Mughal empires.  There is no need here to talk about familiar modern Western analogues:  the Spanish, the British, the French, the Portuguese, and other empires.  What characterizes all these empires, again, is the attempt to impose a uniform and more or less homogeneous structure, in “top-down” fashion, on vast expanses of territory (despite occasional concessions to regional or local customs and traditions).

As can readily be seen, the dialogue model clashes with imperial structures or arrangements.  Especially when seen as linked with “lateral” cosmopolitanism, the model resists the emphasis on uniformity and top-down control.  Following the religious wars in Europe, a new model emerged in the West:  the model of inter-state rivalry, also called the “Westphalian” system.  In terms of this model, nation-states live in their mutual relations in a “state of nature” which (in the language of Hobbes) is a state of overt or latent warfare due to the absence of a superior arbiter.  The justice or propriety of the claims of nation-states is ultimately decided by armed force—despite the slow emergence of an always fragile “law of nations” seeking to impose legal rules on the arbitrary conduct of states.  During modern times, the Westphalian system has steadily extended its sway from Europe to the rest of the world.  The school of international “realism” (so-called) is firmly wedded to this model and counts among its devotees politicians and experts around the world.

It is evident that the dialogue model cannot subscribe to the Westphalian paradigm.  What the dialogue model appreciates is the decentralization effected in that paradigm, that is, the replacement of a monistic top-down structure by lateral relationships and by the emphasis on regional, national, or ethnic freedom or autonomy.  Where the dialogue model parts company is in the conception of autonomy—which, in the Hobbesian-Westphalian paradigm, boils down to the pursuit of selfish interests (national interests, security interests), usually without any regard for lateral ethnical responsibilities.  Here the dialogue model insists on the close linkage of independence and inter-dependence, or differently put:  on the linkage of freedom and ethics or autonomy and civic virtue.  The question is how ethical interdependence can be cultivated in the modern context.

2.  World State, Global Government

I turn here to the second issue mentioned above.  The perceived need to foster interdependence and to overcome the pitfalls of the Westphalian system has prompted many scholars to seek refuge in the conception of a world state or global government.  For many or most of these scholars, the idea of a world state does not involve a simple return to traditional forms of “empire”.  Most of them do not favor heavy-handed or monolithic global structures; in opposition to top-down modes of imperialism they advocate a “democratic” world state or world government, where “democratic” means the active participation of people around the world as “world citizens.”  The so-called “anarchy” of states is overcome here through the establishment of global political institutions capable of effective global policy-making.

How should one respond to this global agenda from a dialogical angle?  Clearly, devotees of dialogue must appreciate the stress on global interdependence and the endeavor to curb the pointless rivalry between states—which in our time may issue in a global nuclear holocaust.  Moreover, one needs to emphasize that dialogue is not in principle opposed to political structures and institutions.  What is at stake is a matter of emphasis.   In the absence of ethical cultivation and transformation, the global world state is likely to follow in the footsteps of the modern nation-state which (in Max Weber’s terms) has become a soul-less machine or an “iron cage”.  In the absence of the dialogical fostering of civic responsibilities, world government is likely to function as a totalizing super-bureaucracy smothering freedom and difference—and this despite well-meant “democratic” rhetoric or intentions.  As it happens, my dialogical reservations concerning world government are supported by Kantian philosophy, and especially by Kant’s famous treatise on “Perpetual Peace”.  As will be recalled, Kant in that treatise proposed a “peaceful (or pacific) federation”, a “foedus pacificum”, which would link together states or political entities while respecting their integrity, autonomy, and diversity.  Thus, Kant’s proposal sought to correlate freedom and moral responsibility, political autonomy and public ethics—which is precisely also the aim of the “dialogue of civilizations”.

Let me cite a central passage from “Perpetual Peace.”  Reason, Kant says,
absolutely condemns war as a test of rights and sets up peace as an immediate duty.  But peace can neither be inaugurated nor secured without a general agreement between the nations; thus a particular kind of league, which we might call a pacific federation (foedus pacificum) is required.  It would differ from a peace treaty in that the latter terminates one war, whereas the former would seek to end all wars for good.  This federation does not aim to acquire any power like that of a state, but merely to preserve and secure the freedom of each state in itself, along with that of other confederated states, although this does not mean that they need to submit to public laws and to a coercive power which enforces them, as do men in a [Hobbesian] state of nature.

This is surely an admirable statement—and one which can be endorsed by proponents of dialogue, although the latter would wish to recast the proposed federation as an alliance not so much of nation states as of broader civilization and cultures.

I have in the past endorsed such a loose, multicultural alliance under the label of an “un-managed” or perhaps un-manageable, but certainly non-coercive public community.  My inspiration there came from Jean-Luc Nancy’s book La communaute desoeuvree (of 1986), translated (awkwardly) under the title The Inoperative Community.  The idea here is not a community where nothing works or functions or where nobody works.  Rather, the idea is that of a community which is not centrally organized or managed and whose initiatives cannot be subsumed under a totalizing structure.  In an essay published in 1998, titled “An ‘Inoperative’ Global Community,” I have tried to extend Nancy’s idea to the global political arena.  As I wrote in that essay:  the centralization or monopolization power is clearly Nancy’s main concern.  “In the face of the prevailing economic, military and technological concentration of power, the chances of political democracy on a global scale are placed in jeopardy. . . .  The notion of an ‘inoperative community’ is meant to serve as a bulwark against both a totalizing globalism (dominated by hegemonic powers) and the surrender of politics to the relentless self-interest of antagonistic agents (be they states, corporations, or private individuals).”   The path pointing beyond both totalizing globalism and self-centered particularism is precisely that of dialogue (of civilizations).

3.  Partisan-Political Implications

The last point I want to address concerns the political—meaning:  partisan-political—implications of the dialogical model.  I can be relatively brief on this issue, because it is somewhat tangential to my presentation.  In an essay published earlier this year (2009) titled “Mapping Alternative Models of Global Politics”, my friend and our chair Raffaele Marchetti has compared the dialogue model with three other paradigms labeled respectively “neo-liberalism”, “cosmopolitanism,” and “alter-globalism”—were the first is basically an economically driven market model, the second a universalist Enlightenment-type model, and the last a kind of anti-globalization model.  He finds four main features characterizing the dialogue model.  First, there is the assumption of a pluralism of cultural frameworks (in opposition to both neo-liberal and Enlightenment universalism); secondly, this pluralism requires “equal treatment” among cultures and between members of civilizations; and thirdly and fourthly, the model presupposes mutual good will and non-violence.
I do not have much quarrel with this portrayal—except for a few minor and some major points.  Minor points:  Marchetti claims that “cultural frameworks are irreducible to each other”.  This holds only to a certain degree.  “Irreducible” cannot mean incompatible or incommensurable—because this would vitiate or nullify the possibility of dialogue.  It would also vitiate good will and non-violence.  Thus, there is not a radical separation but rather (what the scholastics called) a “compossibility” or (what Derrida called) a “differance”.

The essay also makes two other stronger claims:  namely, that the dialogue model is based on a “top-down” exchange between “cultural elites” and that it is hence basically “conservative”.  With all due respect to my distinguished colleague, I find that these claims are simply wrong.  Dialogue across boundaries—across the boundaries of languages and cultural traditions—cannot in any way be restricted to cultural elites.  Anyone who tries to move across boundaries has to try to “understand”, that is, has to employ some hermeneutical skill, and this skill is exercised primarily through dialogue, that is, question and answer.  This is by no means a privilege of elites but a challenge for everyone, including democratic citizens.  Grassroots diplomacy or citizens diplomacy is predicated on this kind of endeavor.  Actually, all human learning is based on this premise.  For this reason, I also do not see why dialogue should be called “conservative.”  Learning across boundaries is often quite disruptive—disruptive of old habits and ingrained prejudices.  To the extent that the dialogue model is connected with good will and non-violence—that is, the promotion of peace—I think the model is actually quite “progressive’ and even visionary.  Ultimately it stands in the tradition of Kant’s vision of perpetual peace.

Notes

Compare in this regard my essay “Cosmopolitanism:  Religious, Moral, and Political”, in Peace Talks—Who Will Listen? (Notre Dame:  University of Notre Dame Press, 2004), pp. 89-110.
See Immanuel Kant, “Perpetual Peace:  A Philosophical Sketch”, in Kant’s Political Writings, ed. Hans Reiss, trans. H. B. Nisbet (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1970), p. 104.
See my “An ‘Inoperative’ Global Community? Reflections on Nancy”, in Alternative Visions:  Paths in the Global Village (Lanham, MD:  Rowman & Littlefield, 1998), p. 294.
Raffaele Marchetti, “Mapping Alternative Models of Global Politics,” International Studies Review, vol. 11 (2009), pp. 133-156, at p. 148.