Abstract:
As to Ulrich Beck, the reason why war exists is because differences among cultures and regions exist, thus he puts forward the plan to realize peace in the world from the particular to the general; Bruno Latour doubts it, arguing that Beck has not taken the Western fundamentalism into discussion. In his view, fundamentalism was first born in the premodern West, and conflicts between various fundamentalists formed the fuse of world wars. Latour argues against all forms of fundamentalism. He puts forward the concept of “cosmopolitics” in the paper, and he thinks that it’s time to make a choice between “cosmopolitics” and “cosmopolitanism” of Western centralism or ethnocentrism. He also criticizes Beck’s offhand attitude towards religion. As to him, religion is the very first issue which we must treat seriously in order to achieve peace in the world , thus he proposes to realize peace on the premise of respecting religious beliefs. In his article, Latour presents the second path toward world peace which is different from Beck’s plan: from naturalism to constructivism. He advocates constructivism and believes that it is universal. In his view, to advocate constructivism means to oppose naturalism. Naturalism, like any kind of fundamentalism, contains the prejudice against fabrication. Constructivism makes people identify good from bad, teaches people to improve themselves and helps to achieve healthy competition. In short, Latour argues that Beck’s cosmopolitanism is too idealistic and metaphysical ,and is divorced from the realities of cosmopolitics. In Latour’s view, the world in the future is a world which is based on constructivism and dialogism.
