In this new book, Ulrich Beck develops his now widely used concepts
of second modernity, risk society and reflexive sociology into a
radical new sociological analysis of the cosmopolitan implications
of globalization. Beck draws extensively on empirical and
theoretical analyses of such phenomena as migration, war and
terror, as well as a range of literary and historical works, to
weave a rich discursive web in which analytical, critical and
methodological themes intertwine effortlessly.

Contrasting a 'cosmopolitan vision' or
'outlook' sharpened by awareness of the transformative
and transgressive impacts of globalization with the 'national
outlook' neurotically fixated on the familiar reference
points of a world of nations-states-borders, sovereignty, exclusive
identities-Beck shows how even opponents of globalization and
cosmopolitanism are trapped by the logic of reflexive modernization
into promoting the very processes they are opposing.

A persistent theme running through the book is the attempt to
recover an authentically European tradition of cosmopolitan
openness to otherness and tolerance of difference. What Europe
needs, Beck argues, is the courage to unite forms of life which
have grown out of language, skin colour, nationality or religion
with awareness that, in a radically insecure world, all are equal
and everyone is different.