Cosmopolitanism: Ethics in a World of Strangers. By Kwame Anthony Appiah. (New York: W. W. Norton, 2006. Pp. xxii + 196, preface, introduction, acknowledgments, notes, index. $24.95 cloth, $15.95 paper) Kwame Anthony Appiah's Cosmopolitanism is meant as a guide for identifying and confronting complex ethical issues in a multi-perspectival world. Its author, an Oxford-educated philosopher of Ghanaian-British parentage, bridges worlds. The term cosmopolitanism - the author prefers it over globalizations narrow association with economics and multiculturalismi observed tendency to prescribe - encompasses two core values: "the idea that we have obligations to others, obligations that stretch beyond those to whom we are related by the ties of kith and kin, or even formal ties of a shared citizenship," and the idea "that we take seriously the value not just of human life but of particular human lives, which means taking an interest in the practices and beliefs that lend them significance" (xv). Terms such as tolerance, kindness, and pluralism are central to cosmopolitan thinking. Appiah presents a wide range of issues that can serve as frames through which to examine how we as individuals and professionals make ethical decisions - essential for the humanities scholar, student, and public-sector folklorist: How real are values? What do we talk about when we talk about differences? Is any form of relativism right? When do morals and manners clash? Can culture be owned? What do we owe strangers by virtue of our shared humanity? And all this is good... and yet, and yet. Too often, the resolutions Appiah proposes for these key issues are so one-sided and misleading, so bolstered by irrelevant, erroneous, and outdated sources, that they are of little help in sorting through the paradoxical interfaces of pluralism and autonomy, diversity and democracy, and globalization and protection of what is valuable in the local. In his central chapter, "Cosmopolitan Contamination," Appiah proposes a change of priorities - away from purity, peoples, authenticity, tribalism, and cultural protection, and toward individuals, mixture, modernity, rights, and what he calls contamination (his term for healthy hybridization) . His philosophical underpinning ("The right approach, I think, starts by taking individuals - not nations, tribes or 'peoples' - as die proper object of moral concern" [Appiah 2006] ) is a hallmark of rightist thought and practice. The left emphasizes social, political, and environmental factors that can constrain the ability of individuals to choose freely. Both perspectives are needed, but only one is developed in this book. Many folklorists are familiar with issues of cultural change and preservation as discussed at UNESCO and WIPO. Appiah reveals no understanding of the complexities of diese dynamics. He wrongly assumes many anthropologists to be cultural relativists who tolerate such practices as female genital mutilation (15) and that UNESCO's Declaration of Cultural Diversity celebrates a pluralism that could embrace the likes of the KKK conveniently ignoring Article IV: "No one may invoke cultural diversity to infringe upon human right. …

Cosmopolitanism: Ethics in a World of Strangers

The Rights of Others: Aliens, Residents, and Citizens. By Seyla Benhabib. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2004. 251p. $65.00 cloth, $23.99 paper. Between 1910 and 2000, the world's population more than tripled, from 1.6 to 5.3 billion. The number of persons who live as migrants in countries other than those in which they were born increased nearly sixfold, from 33 million to 175 million, and more than half of this increase has occurred since 1965. Almost 20 million of these are refugees, asylum seekers, and internally displaced persons. In her book, Seyla Benhabib grapples with both the political and moral implications of this rapid increase in transnational migration, arguing that the central principles that shape our thinking about political membership and state sovereignty are in tension, if not outright contradiction, with one another. “From a philosophical point of view,” she writes, “transnational migrations bring to the fore the constitutive dilemma at the heart of liberal democracies: between sovereign self-determination claims on the one hand and adherence to universal human rights principles on the other” (p. 2). She argues for an internal reconstruction of both, underscoring the significance of membership in bounded communities, while at the same time promoting the cultivation of democratic loyalties that exceed the national state, supporting political participation on the part of citizens and noncitizen residents alike.

The Rights of Others: Aliens, Residents, and Citizens

In its hundred and seventy-ninth plenary meeting held on 9 December 1948, the General Assembly approved the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide and proposed it for signature and ratification or accession in accordance with its article XI. This chapter contains the text of the Convention. The General Assembly also invited the International Law Commission to study the desirability and possibility of establishing an international judicial organ for the trial of persons charged with genocide or other crimes over which jurisdiction will be conferred upon that organ by international conventions.Keywords: genocide convention; International Law Commission; prevention and punishment of crime; United Nations General Assembly

Convention On The Prevention And Punishment Of The Crime Of Genocide

The year 2002 saw several substantive milestones in the development of international human rights law.' However, many developments in state practice from the United States and other countries suggested that some government officials were willing to compromise individual human rights in fighting the war on terror. The most important human rights development of 2002 was the long-anticipated creation of the International Criminal Court (ICC), providing a new forum in which to prosecute the most serious violations of human rights, including genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity.? The United States was one of only seven states to vote against the Rome Statute, but President Clinton had the United States sign the treaty on the eve of his departure from office. In an unprecedented act in international law, the Bush administration "withdrew" the U.S. signature on May 6, 2002.4 The United States also demanded that other nations enter into special agreements to exempt U.S. nationals from being placed on trial before that court. Additionally, in August, President Bush signed the American Servicemembers' Protection

International human rights

International law defines genocide in terms of violence committed “with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group,” yet this approach fails to acknowledge the full impacts of cultural destruction. There is insufficient international discussion of “cultural genocide,” which is a particular threat to the world's indigenous minorities. Despite the recent adoption of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, which acknowledges the rights to culture, diversity, and self-determination, claims of cultural genocide are often derided, and their indicators dismissed as benign effects of modernity and indigenous cultural diffusion. This article considers the destruction of indigenous cultures and the forced assimilation of indigenous peoples through the analytical lens of genocide. Two case studies—the federally unrecognized Winnemem Wintu tribe in northern California and the Inuit of northern Canada—are highlighted as illustrative examples of groups facing...

The Destruction of Identity: Cultural Genocide and Indigenous Peoples

Background
The "right to health," including access to basic healthcare, has been recognized as a universal human right through a number of international agreements. Attempts to protect this ideal, however, have relied on states as the guarantor of rights and have subsequently ignored stateless individuals, or those lacking legal nationality in any nation-state. While a legal nationality alone is not sufficient to guarantee that a right to healthcare is accessible, an absence of any legal nationality is almost certainly an obstacle in most cases. There are millions of so-called stateless individuals around the globe who are, in effect, denied medical citizenship in their countries of residence. A central motivating factor for this essay is the fact that statelessness as a concept is largely absent from the medical literature. The goal for this discussion, therefore, is primarily to illustrate the need for further monitoring of health access issues by the medical community, and for a great deal more research into the effects of statelessness upon access to healthcare. This is important both as a theoretical issue, in light of the recognition by many of healthcare as a universal right, as well as an empirical fact that requires further exploration and amelioration.

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Debate: Limitations on universality: the "right to health" and the necessity of legal nationality

The Rohingya in Burma have been called ‘the world's most persecuted minority' and subjected to pervasive human rights violations, including ethnic cleansing, statelessness and possibly genocide. Despite the international community's commitment to the responsibility to protect (R2P), which includes violence prevention, the plight of vulnerable populations such as the Rohingya has been relatively ignored. This article encourages dialogue about the R2P's potential for preventing direct and structural violence, building on its foundation of sovereignty as responsibility. While preventative action to assist the Rohingya comes with an array of challenges, the normative foundations of R2P – including connections to combatting internal displacement and ‘unbundling' protection to challenge structural inequalities – provide a toolkit of responses apart from military force. It is imperative that scholars and practitioners alike critically consider the practical value of R2P, as well as re-examine glaring and overloo...

Protecting the world's most persecuted: the responsibility to protect and Burma's Rohingya minority

Online Advocacy: Analysis of Human Rights NGO Websites

Despite international laws guaranteeing the right to a nationality, statelessness remains a pervasive global problem that has been termed a “forgotten human rights crisis.” The issue highlights an important question for scholars that has not yet received enough attention: Why do some issues make it onto the international agenda while others do not? This study examines the characteristics necessary for successful issue emergence, or the step in the process of mobilization when a preexisting grievance is transformed from a problem into an issue. Using qualitative data from interviews with 21 decision makers at leading human rights and humanitarian non-governmental organizations, the study highlights shortcomings in the existing literature and provides additional explanations for issue emergence (or non-emergence). Statelessness serves as a case study for better understanding this process, and the article ends with specific recommendations for addressing key obstacles to its full emergence within the international community.

Lindsey N. Kingston

Papers

The Destruction of Identity: Cultural Genocide and Indigenous Peoples

Debate: Limitations on universality: the "right to health" and the necessity of legal nationality

Protecting the world's most persecuted: the responsibility to protect and Burma's Rohingya minority

Online Advocacy: Analysis of Human Rights NGO Websites

“A Forgotten Human Rights Crisis”: Statelessness and Issue (Non)Emergence