The politics of belonging

The Politics of Belonging explores the contemporary conundrum between preservation and encounter: between deep national dependencies on migration and diversity, in parallel with a determined political resistance to recognise more fluid and hybrid forms of belonging in a highly mobile, uneven and interconnected world. Ash Amin's notion of a ‘politics of the commons’ provides the paper's orientation for how to engage in forward-looking as opposed to retrospective processes of updating notions of belonging. The paper connects three perspectives across the political, cultural and social spheres: a ‘constitutional commons’ (Taylor 2009), ‘social solidarities’ (Calhoun 2003 Calhoun, C. 2003. “Belonging” in the cosmopolitan imaginary. Ethnicities, 3: 531–568. Crossref , Google Scholar), and ‘cosmopolitan vernaculars’ (Pollock 2000 Pollock, S. 2000. Cosmopolitan and vernacular in history. Public Culture, 12: 591–625. Crossref, Web of Science ® , Google Scholar).