To me, this also intersects with what David A. Hollinger calls the problem of solidarity. Beyond revisionist history and fact-checking, modern democracies face a deeper identity tension between balancing the need for broad alliances and the desire to preserve inherited cultural bonds and traditions. This tension is intensified by immigration, capitalism, and cultural mixing - all of which shake up what we once saw as “stable” and “fixed” identities. As Hollinger points out, this raises the big question of who “we” actually are. And in democratic societies, it often feels like everyone is left to figure that out on their own. So democracies end up relying on supposedly fixed ideals to hold things together, even though those ideals, such as "human rights," or urgent global threats like climate change, are always open to debate. The reliance on universal ideals or “noble lies” is even more complicated in today’s world and becomes increasingly challenging as growing diversity brings new, sometimes conflicting, demands about what “human rights” should encompass - making it much harder to uphold in practice.
To me, this also intersects with what David A. Hollinger calls the problem of solidarity. Beyond revisionist history and fact-checking, modern democracies face a deeper identity tension between balancing the need for broad alliances and the desire to preserve inherited cultural bonds and traditions. This tension is intensified by immigration, capitalism, and cultural mixing - all of which shake up what we once saw as “stable” and “fixed” identities. As Hollinger points out, this raises the big question of who “we” actually are. And in democratic societies, it often feels like everyone is left to figure that out on their own. So democracies end up relying on supposedly fixed ideals to hold things together, even though those ideals, such as "human rights," or urgent global threats like climate change, are always open to debate. The reliance on universal ideals or “noble lies” is even more complicated in today’s world and becomes increasingly challenging as growing diversity brings new, sometimes conflicting, demands about what “human rights” should encompass - making it much harder to uphold in practice.
The idealized concept of the 'nation-state' needs a revisit!