Date: 1 October 2025
Time: 10:00-11:45
Venue: Institute for Futures Studies, Holländargatan 13 in Stockholm or online
Research seminar with Nils Holtug, Professor at the department of communication at the university of Copenhagen. His primary research areas are in political philosophy: egalitarianism, prioritarianism, migration, identity politics, secularism, social cohesion, population ethics and global justice.
Abstract
According to a popular narrative, identity politics derives from leftist postmodernism and is antithetical to liberalism and Enlightenment universalism. However, this narrative is false. Identity politics is propagated not only by the left but also by the right, and some forms can be justified on the basis of liberal principles, including liberal egalitarian principles. In this talk, Holtug will provide an account of what identity politics is, exemplify identity policies on the left and the right, address the (liberal) normative basis for assessing them, and discuss in greater detail two particular forms of identity politics, namely pulling down statues of morally compromised historical figures and out-group representation in art. The talk will be based on Holtug’s new book, Identity Politics – Left and Right (Oxford University Press 2025).
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