- Sharing the universal
Chorus
Sharing the universal
Cultural appropriation
Decolonizing knowledge
Divisions and commons
Varia
Cultures
Esprit asks how the idea of universalism fares in a globalized society attuned to difference, diversity and inequality. While recent statements by Emmanuel Macron reaffirmed the traditional French defence of political universalism against particularism and fragmentation, in a world where rhetoric often trumps reality the meanings of the universal are shifting.
Even in a postcolonial age, writes Nadia Yala Kisukidi, the universal remains the preserve of particular agents, and ‘contemporary usages of the term “universalism” are sometimes twisted and distorted’. Returning to key moments in the contestation of the universal reminds us that ‘beneath the question of the universal there always lurks that of identity – of the identification of the subject who is speaking’.
Archaeology: Interviewed about joint research projects between universities in the global North and in former colonies, archaeologists Karima Dirèche, Clémentine Gutron and Emmanuelle Sibeud discuss whether, even today, ‘equal collaboration’ is possible. The postcolonial era saw a delicate balance struck between loosening control over local universities and sustaining international cooperation. Today, uneven access to international networks, and disparities in funding and education, are compounded by governments’ use of archaeological work as political capital.
To really understand how the independence of former colonies has and has not impacted on collaborative research, Sibeud suggests that we must ‘trace the complex transformation of the frameworks of the production and hierarchization of knowledge over the long and often contradictory process of epistemological decolonization’.
Ecology: Lucile Schmid takes a critical look at the moral and political universality of ecology as extolled in Pope Francis’s 2015 encyclical Laudato si’. A platitude echoed by governments around the world, the ambition tends to falter when it comes to implementing concrete measures against climate change. According to Schmid, the challenges of the Anthropocene call for a rethinking of the guiding principles of modern globalized societies, including the attitude of industrialized countries towards developing nations. Pursuit of ‘an ecology for all’ requires confronting difference: ‘in order for the universality of ecology to be implemented, it is crucial to recognize the diversity of actors, approaches, and ways of getting things done.’
Also: An interview with philosopher of technology Andrew Feenberg; and articles on European citizenship, the Hong Kong protests and the situation of social workers.
Source: The Eurozine Review, “Time will tell: The limits of universalism”
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- ISBN 9782372341189
