Cosmopolitan Patriotism in J. S. Mill’s Political Thought and Activism

No one disapproves more, or is in the habit of expressing his disapprobation more strongly than I do of the narrow, exclusive patriotism of former ages which made the good of the whole human race a subordinate consideration to the good, or worse still, to the mere power & external importance, of the country of one's birth.I believe that the good of no country can be obtained by any means but such as tend to that of all countries, nor ought to be sought otherwise, even if obtainable. 1 Mill's reputation is as a thinker; but we shall never fully understand his thought if we fail to recognize that he was always politically engaged and had a strong sense of himself as a shrewd strategist. 2 1 Like many other aspects of John Stuart Mill's thought, his attitude towards nationhood, nationalism, and related issues has been subjected to all sorts of misinterpretations and partial readings.In a vast body of literature (from at least as early as the publication of John [later Lord] Acton's essay "Nationality" (1862) to the beginning of the twenty-first century), Mill has been seen as representing -and often incarnating -some of the most extreme -and, at the same time, mutually contradictory -positions vis-a-vis nationality and related phenomena.3 2 I have already argued elsewhere that despite a common misunderstanding, Mill was far from being an uncritical and naïve supporter of "nationalism" or "nationality".Rather, Cosmopolitan Patriotism in J.