How cosmopolitanism reduces conflict: A broad reading of Kant’s third ingredient for peace
| DOI | 10.1177/1755088217702528 |
| Date | 01 February 2018 |
| Author | Luigi Caranti |
| Published date | 01 February 2018 |
https://doi.org/10.1177/1755088217702528
Journal of International Political Theory
2018, Vol. 14(1) 2 –19
© The Author(s) 2017
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DOI: 10.1177/1755088217702528
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How cosmopolitanism
reduces conflict: A broad
reading of Kant’s third
ingredient for peace
Luigi Caranti
Università degli Studi di Catania, Italy
Abstract
Kant’s theory of peace has been reinterpreted under one of the most influential
research programs of our times: The so-called democratic peace theory. In particular,
the third ingredient of Kant’s “recipe” for peace —the cosmopolitan right to visit—has
been recognized as a powerful and effective instrument to reduce militarized interstate
conflicts. In the hands of political scientists, however, this ingredient has often become
nothing more than a set of rules for securing and facilitating international trade and
economic interdependence. This article argues that this narrow reading mistakes
international trade as the essence of the third definitive article. Kant sees economic
interdependence as a means to realize what cosmopolitan right is truly about, that
is, the affirmation of a set of rules for protecting humans qua humans, the creation
of communal bonds among individuals beyond national or group loyalties, and the
promotion of a global moral conscience modeled on the natural rights of man. An
accurate understanding of cosmopolitan right is essential to avoid the popular - yet
mistaken - idea that Kant sees progress towards peace as possible without individuals’
and peoples’ moral progress.
Keywords
Conflict, cosmopolitanism, democratic peace, global conscience, Kant
In the last three decades, Kant’s theory of peace has attracted the attention of scholars
well beyond the circle of political philosophers. The three political reforms advocated in
Towards Perpetual Peace—republicanism within states, international federation, and the
Corresponding author:
Luigi Caranti, Università degli Studi di Catania, Via Vittorio Emanuele II, 49, 95131, Catania, Italy.
Email: lcaranti@unict.it
702528IPT0010.1177/1755088217702528Journal of International Political TheoryCaranti
research-article2017
Article
Caranti 3
right to visit—have been reinterpreted under one of the most influential research pro-
grams of our times, namely, the so-called democratic peace theory (DPT), and therefore
made accessible to a vast public of political scientists, International Relations (IR) schol-
ars, and even politicians. In particular, the third ingredient of Kant’s “recipe”—the cos-
mopolitan right1 to visit—has been recognized as a powerful and effective instrument to
reduce militarized interstate conflicts. In the hands of political scientists, however, this
ingredient has become nothing more than a set of rules for securing and facilitating inter-
national trade and economic interdependence. Kant’s overall cosmopolitanism has thus
been reduced to the thesis—commonplace among liberal thinkers before and after
Kant—that international trade promotes peace (Doyle, 1983a, 1983b, 2005; Gartzke,
2007; Oneal and Russett, 1999; Rosato, 2003; Russett and Oneal, 2001).
This article argues that this narrow reading mistakes international trade as the
essence of the third definitive article. Kant sees economic interdependence as a means
for the realization of what cosmopolitan right is truly about, namely, the affirmation of
a set of rules for protecting humans qua humans, the creation of communal bonds
among individuals beyond national or group loyalties, and the promotion of a global
moral conscience modeled on the natural rights of man. The mainstream narrow read-
ing of Kant’s cosmopolitanism, assumed by all democratic peace scholars, is not only
one-sided and limited but also, in a crucial respect, wrong. In fact, this reading does not
merely isolate one dimension of Kant’s cosmopolitanism—the promotion of economic
interdependence—at the expense of all the others. It actually misconstrues the very
dimension on which it focuses. It is in fact assumed that economic interdependence
works as a peace-promoting factor in all circumstances, independently of whether it is
conducted according to minimal standards of fairness, as defined precisely by those
“natural rights of man.” Not only is this reading unfaithful to Kant’s spirit—think of
his condemnation of the “commercial states” and their “trading companies” for the
way they were exploiting non-Europeans—but it also encounters a set of obvious his-
torical counter-examples—colonial wars and the First World War, just to name two—
in which international trade, carried out on unfair terms, was the cause of conflict
rather than peace (Mearsheimer, 1990, 2001; Pogge, 2008; Uchitel, 1993; contra
Gartzke and Lupu, 2012).
Given this state of the debate, the article falls into four parts. The first spells out
the content of Kant’s cosmopolitan right and highlights its novelty and significance
within the larger picture of Kant’s theory of peace. The second contrasts the narrow
and the broad reading of Kant’s cosmopolitanism. Endorsed by the totality of demo-
cratic peace scholars, some Kant scholars, and most erudite readers, the narrow read-
ing reduces cosmopolitan right to the rules enabling economic interdependence or
even to economic interdependence tout court. Defended by relatively few Kant
scholars (Archibugi, 1995; Anderson-Gold 2006) and recently at length by Pauline
Kleingeld (2012), the broad reading interprets such interdependence as a means for
the realization of cosmopolitan right, as opposed to its essence. The third part intro-
duces an original version of the broad reading, which I consider the most faithful to
Kant’s text and spirit. The fourth abandons the field of Kant exegesis to show how
the specific reading here defended contributes to construing a promising normative
model for the promotion of peace.
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