World Beyond Difference

Ronald Niezen is Visiting Professor of Anthropology at McGill University and Guest Researcher at the Institut für Europäische Ethnologie at Humboldt University in Berlin, and former Associate Professor of Anthropology and of Social Studies at Harvard University. He is the author of The Origins of Indigenism: Human Rights and the Politics of Identity (2003), Spirit Wars (2000), and Defending the Land (1998).

• Preface ix1 Introduction 12 The Tradition of Rational Utopianism 113 The Cultural Contradictions of Globalization 354 (Anti) Globalization from Below 575 Human Rights Pluralism and Universalism 826 Postmodernism’s Revolt Against Order 1027 The New Neo-Marxism 1228 Paradigms of Postcolonial Liberation 1449 Conclusion 168Notes 179References 204Index 213

“Debates about globalization have become stereotyped. Universalists hope for one world united under rational law; postmodernists and their postcolonial and neo-Marxist allies dream of a heterotopia of autonomous free agents. In this book, Ronald Niezen steps outside this sterile dualism to show how each side subscribes to the same Western utopian ideals, which are then imposed on the facts. Case material from his wide experience illustrates the failings of ideologically generated theories and offers a more realistic approach to the actual experience of globalization. Elegantly written, free of cant, empirically grounded, theoretically sophisticated, and passionately argued, this brilliant book is required reading.”Charles Lindholm, Boston University "This volume is a thought-provoking, intellectually exciting analysis of the quest for a global borderless society ... The author presents many inspired and thought-provoking challenges to the reader and one cannot but be impressed by the logic of his arguments." Cambridge University Press