Planetarism: a paradigmatic alternative to internationalism

ABSTRACT

What is a robust theoretical alternative to nationalism? For many seasoned cosmopolitan thinkers the answer is internationalism, which is generally perceived to be a sound foundation for creating a global polity in the form of a federation of nations. But this assumption is here criticised on the basis that it is founded on an inherent fallacy – internationalism is only a modification of nationalism, where the latter remains the ideological nucleus in conceptual terms – which therefore means that today many renowned cosmopolitan thinkers in the last instance seek to build a global polity on the same divisive ideational foundation that brought on the World Wars in the last century. Because of the shared roots of nationalism and internationalism, the salient question is really; what comes after the international? The answer argued for here is; a novel paradigm of ‘planetarism’ that is not a compromise with the extant nationalisms.

KEYWORDS:

• World order
• global imaginary
• cosmopolitanism
• internationalism
• planetarism
• planetarist

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 This work was originally published in French with the title Terre-patrie in 1993. Note: Even though Morin and Kern are listed as co-authors, it appears evident from e.g. the accompanying preface that the work primarily is a presentation of Morin’s ideas.

2 This is graphically depicted in an image of children contemplating a globe with ‘territorial boundaries, boundaries that are concepts, not real markings on the planet’ that Carl Sagan helped pick out and send with the Voyager space probe into interstellar space (Sagan, 1978, p. 107).

3 Kant’s is commonly interpreted as one of the first articulations of an internationalist cosmopolitan standpoint. This interpretation is based on his essay ‘Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch’ (1795) (Kant, 1991, pp. 93–130; Bohman & Lutz-Bachmann, 1997).

4 It is here assumed, as long argued by Michael Freeden, that an ideological system of thought should be understood as a multi-conceptual construct with its own ‘morphology’ centred on its core conceptual attributes (see: Freeden, 2013, pp. 115–137).

5 The literal conception of ‘post-international’ employed here is alluded to in James N. Rosenau’s work on ‘postinternationalism’ but it is not identical to the way it is employed there (see: Rosenau, 2000, pp. 219–237).

6 A typical example is the recent work of Jo Leinen and Andreas Bummel, who argue for establishing a world parliament – but within a world order where ‘the states will remain the most important organs of governance in the world’ and that ‘each country would send at least two delegates’ to it – i.e. their design applies an internationalist ordering principle (Leinen & Bummel, 2018, pp. 376, 381).

7 For Taylor, that ‘secular time’ replaces ‘higher time’ is one of the distinguishing features of modern thinking and the modern state. For an early articulation of this position (see: Taylor, 1998, pp. 198–199).

8 For insight into this process, see Rapport (2008).

9 For the most recent iteration of Steger’s ‘globalisms’ typology, see Steger (2013, pp. 214–231).

10 Steger, together with Heikki Patomäki, have also used this phrasing when mentioning ‘a global or “planetary” imaginary’, though in this instance they apparently see the terms as synonyms that are conceptually identical (Patomäki & Steger, 2010, p. 1062).

11 For an exemplary present notion of socialist internationalism, see for instance Samir Amin’s call for the creation of a Fifth International, in e.g. Amin (2008). The late Amin’s ideas were extensively discussed in these pages recently by for instance: Robinson (2019) and Worth (2019). Worth argues for a turn away from left nationalism in a way consistent with how internationalism is understood here, but the ‘global’ alternative mentioned by Worth is not fleshed out in any detail in what is a notably brief contribution.

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Stefan Pedersen

Stefan Pedersen has a PhD in political theory from the University of Leeds, where he presently is Teaching Fellow in Radical Political Ideas. He is also an Earth System Governance research fellow, engaged with its Taskforce on Planetary Justice.