ABSTRACT
In a world filled with unjust inequalities, it is fitting that theorists should be turning their attention to the ethical ideal known as “cosmopolitanism,” a view that holds that our loyalties and our ethical duties ought to transcend the local and even the national, focusing on the needs of human beings everywhere. In a world in which reasonable people differ about religious and secular values, however, this new theoretical attention will prove productive for the practical political debate only if we insist on the distinction between cosmopolitanism, the comprehensive ethical doctrine, and a set of basic political principles for a minimally just and decent world.
