Culture War Goes Global? Geopolitics in a new era

Culture War Goes Global? Geopolitics in a new era

Wednesday 20 November 2024
11:00 - 17:00
The Hotel Brussels, Bd de Waterloo 38, 1000 Bruxelles

By bringing together a diverse range of speakers, we hope to probe the way that competing cultural narratives – what is commonly called the culture war – are increasingly shaping not just politics domestically, but also internationally. We see this transformation in geopolitics in the rise of discussion around so-called “civilisation states” but also in the increased focus that “values” seem to play in foreign policy discussion. At the same time, global policymakers are increasingly attuned to potential cultural conflicts in the domestic politics of their geopolitical rivals.

We see a renewed discussion around what “Western Values” are and if and how these are at stake in major conflicts. For example, the idea of Western civilisation and values being “on the line” is often invoked in relation to support for Ukraine or Israel. At the same time, in both conflicts the West’s actions sometimes seem to catalyse support for those who position themselves explicitly against the West. As a Columbia University anti-Israel student protest group put it, ‘We are Westerners fighting for the total eradication of Western civilization. We stand in full solidarity with every movement for liberation in the Global South’.

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