ABSTRACT
My topic is the relation between cosmopolitanism and human rights. Let me begin with a rough-and-ready formulation of this relationship. Cosmopolitanism imagines a world order in which the idea of human rights is a basic principle of justice and mechanisms of global governance are established specifi cally for their protection. The cosmopolitan imagination is not restricted to this agenda. It incorporates wider issues concerning social solidarity across borders, the legitimacy of international law, the effectiveness of global governance, the role of global civil society, and the establishment of peaceful relations between and within states. It also envisages the reformation of political community at national and transnational levels to render them compatible with and supportive of cosmopolitan values. However, it would be implausible to think of the cosmopolitan imagination apart from some notion of human rights, that is, of rights that belong to all people by virtue of their human status. If the closeness of the relationship between cosmopolitanism and human rights is straightforward enough, it still begs the question of what we mean both by the idea of human rights and by the idea of cosmopolitanism. To explore further this question I shall focus fi rst on the human rights side of this relationship and then on the cosmopolitan.
