Abstract

David Held created an impressive body of work with a great ambition: to redefine the rules of the world. He lived through three major phases in the development of democracy during the past several decades in Europe: the cold war; the brief period described as the “end of history”; and the current era. These troubled times we live in, with the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, terrorism, and nationalism, force us to rethink the dynamics of our world. In his own words, Held operated at three levels: “normative-philosophical, empirical-analytical and as […] an advocate ” for what he saw as the “fundamental bedrock of cosmopolitanism”, “the principle of equal worth and dignity” of every human being. The title of my paper is “Globalisation and social democracy: European politics at the crossroads”. I will focus among the 50 countries of the continent Europe, on the 27 members of the Union.