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Any global political theory must start by asking whether there are in fact universal moral values, and this chapter addresses precisely this question. Section I engages in a conceptual analysis of the terms ‘moral universalism’ and ‘cultural relativism’. Sections II–V then critically examine four arguments for moral universalism, finding three unpersuasive and one (the ‘General Argument for Moral Universalism’) more promising. Sections VI–XIV analyse nine challenges to moral universalism that argue for cultural relativism; none of these, it is argued, is persuasive, since some rest on implausible assumptions or misconceive the nature of universalism, while others, on closer inspection, have claimed that they rest on moral universalism. Section XV summarizes the overall case made for moral universalism.

Describes the aims, approaches, and structure of the book. The basic issue addressed is the political principles that should govern global politics, and to analyse this the book posits six sets of questions, each of which is addressed in separate chapters that separately examine (moral) universalism, civil and political justice, distributive justice, political structures, just war, and humanitarian intervention. The author makes four points: that his concern is with political philosophy; that he refers to global rather than international political theory; that he examines global political theory rather than global ethics; and that he distinguishes three levels at which global political theory may operate—its relation to domestic political theory, the principles and institutions involved, and the application of these principles to specific issues. He also identifies the aims of the book, which are: to provide a defence of what is commonly termed a cosmopolitan political morality; to explore in depth and evaluate competing philosophical perspectives on these issues; and to emphasize that the topics examined in the book are very closely intertwined and cannot be engaged satisfactorily in isolation from one another. The four competing approaches that may be taken to global political theory (cosmopolitanism, realism, the ‘society of states’, and nationalism) are outlined in turn in order to provide a framework within which the six questions posited in the book are examined, and to stake out and defend the cosmopolitan approach taken.

This chapter traces the historical origins and early developments of European welfare states up to the Second World War in terms of external and internal boundary building. It highlights the role of cleavage and centre periphery structures in moulding institutional choices, in particular, the choice between a universal and an occupational approach to social insurance — the former prevailing in the Anglo-Saxon and Nordic countries, and the latter prevailing in Continental and South European countries.

Christianity, for Eusebius, finds legitimation over against the other nations as the restored Hebrew nation. This chapter identifies passages that offer ethnographical sketches of the results of Christianity’s spread throughout all nations (‘Persians no longer sleep with their mothers nor Scythians practice cannibalism, as was their ancestral custom,’ etc.). The chapter shows that Eusebius simultaneously blends universalism (people from any nation may join this restored Hebrew nation) and particularism (conversion involves the total rejection of one’s ancestral ethnic customs for a new way of life) through his ethnographical rhetoric.

Having argued, in Ch. 2, that there are universal moral values, the next logical step is to ask what these universal moral values are; this question is pursued in Chs 3 and 4, which consider arguments for two different types of universal value and link together to provide an analysis of what universal principles of justice should apply at the global level. This chapter examines claims that there are universal principles of civil and political justice, that is, those principles that specify what rights people have to what freedoms, and argues for universal human rights to certain civil and political liberties. It is arranged in 13 sections: Section I presents an analysis of human rights, since this term plays a central and important role in a plausible account of civil and political justice; Section II puts forward a general thesis about justifications for civil and political human rights; this is followed, in Sections III–VII, by an analysis of four cosmopolitan arguments for human rights that criticizes three of them but defends the fourth; Section VIII considers an alternative non-cosmopolitan approach to defending civil and political human rights, presented by John Rawls in The Law of Peoples (1999b); the next three sections (IX–XI) of the chapter explore misgivings about civil and political human rights, including the objections that such human rights are a species of imperialism and do not accord sufficient respect to cultural practices (IX), produce homogeneity/uniformity (X), and generate egoism/individualism and destroy community (XI); Section XII considers a further objection—the realist charges that foreign policy to protect civil and political human rights is in practice selective and partial and a cloak for the pursuit of the national interest. Section XIII summarizes the overall case made for civil and political justice.

Having argued, in Ch. 2, that there are universal moral values, the next logical step is to ask what these universal moral values are; this question is pursued in Chs 3 and 4, which consider arguments for two different types of universal value and link together to provide an analysis of what universal principles of justice should apply at the global level. This chapter examines what universal principles of distributive justice (if any) should be adopted. It is arranged in 14 sections: Section I presents a conceptual analysis of the nature of distributive justice; Section II makes some preliminary points about the nature of cosmopolitan accounts of distributive justice and the general nature of the reasoning underlying these; Sections III–V then analyse three types of arguments for cosmopolitan principles of distributive justice, and Section VI reflects on these, and suggests and defends four principles of cosmopolitan distributive justice; Sections VII–VIII consider objections (counter-arguments) to cosmopolitan concepts of distributive justice, some of them outlined by John Rawls in his account of international justice and others by nationalist political thinkers such as David Miller; Sections IX–XI examine three nationalist claims about the nature of distributive justice, all of which emphasize the moral relevance of persons’ membership in nations, while Sections XII–XIII investigate two realist claims (XII–XIII). Section XIV sums up the findings of the chapter.

The case for pluralistic relativism begins with discussing a discomforting kind of moral disagreement that gives rise to moral ambivalence: this is not simply disagreement in which both sides run out of reasons that are persuasive to the other, but is also a disagreement in which coming to understand the other side brings along an appreciation of its reasons. The root of moral ambivalence is the existence of plural and irreducible moral values (e.g., special duties to particular people and groups, rights, utility, perfectionist ends or values, commitment to one’s own projects and undertakings, and attunement to the world) and our coming to understand how others could have made choices different from the ones we make in the face of conflicts among these values. Moral ambivalence poses difficulties for universalism. A case in point is ambivalence in the face of conflict between personal values (special duties, commitment to one’s own projects) and impersonal values (rights possessed by everyone, utility).

Ultimately, the challenge of Mormon culture is to assert individualism without elitism, and to embrace universalism without compromise. Mormonism must ultimately represent the best of what is human. The question is: how can a Mormon aesthetic capture be both particular and universal, capturing the essence of Mormonism while reaching for transcendence?

Four kinds of ethical view have appeared and reappeared in this book. The first is virtue ethics, which counsels people to concentrate on realizing the good throughout our lives. The second and third categories comprise Kantian and intuitionist views. These tell people to concentrate on the quality of acts, though they also take motives into account. The Kantian ethic is a master principle view, whereas intuitionist views affirm a plurality of basic moral principles. The fourth category, utilitarian theories, tells people to maximize the good. The pluralist universalism presented here, which integrates Kantian, utilitarian, intuitionist, and other elements, stresses three variables: character, type of action, and overall consequences for happiness.

Questions the optimism for international relations cited in the 1975 Handbook of Political Science. Unprecedented global change has divided international relations, and optimism for consensus has eroded. Through a diversity of viewpoints, feminism provides optimism for the broadening of theory and of empirical base. Using a post‐positivist methodology, feminism challenges ethnocentrism and state‐centrism, and rejects universalism and claims of objectivity. Feminism's appreciation of difference provides realistic optimism for the future of international relations.

This chapter explores the theory that liberal universalism “erases difference” in regards to women and other cultures, and considers the conflict and agreement between feminist and multicultural agendas. It identifies a “close family relationship” between the two opposing ideas of feminism and multiculturalism. Both share a critique of universalism for falsely generalizing one sex or one culture, both address oppressions that have a common structure, and tackle issues of inequality.

Although multicultural claims are widely accepted by liberal states, debates about their range, coherence, and effects continue. This introductory chapter offers an outline of the four multicultural questions that structure the authors’ contributions to the volume.

Martin Hollis (in one of his last writings before his untimely death) opens up the first section, Is Universalism Ethnocentric?, with a fiery defence of Enlightenment universalism and an attack on the relativist who says ‘Liberalism for the liberals; cannibalism for the cannibals.’ Focusing especially on universal claims about human nature, civil society, and the best forms of government, Hollis argues for a substantive and not merely procedural liberalism as a ‘fighting creed with universalist pretensions’ that can justify ‘robust and sharp‐edged moral declarations’. As Hollis argues, universalism works for minorities too. This is because excluded minorities must show that they have been wrongly excluded; they need a standpoint that is ‘not cognitively arbitrary’ to exclude racists and sexists.

Seyla Benhabib's case for universalism is somewhat more cautious. She approaches the lead question through the negative, by contesting various fashionable versions of cognitive relativism, radical incommensurability, and untranslatability. She then shows the untenability of the (mosaic) multicultural version of relativism. Such relativism, Benhabib says, is ‘poor man's sociology’, relying upon a holistic view of cultures and societies (even evident in the work of Kymlicka) that is at odds with our mixed‐up global world, a context‐transcending ‘pluralist universalism’ becomes ever more a necessity, but fortunately also a reality.