2. Cosmopolitans are more likely to be repressed minorities, not elites.

Second, although urban elite cosmopolitans certainly exist, most world citizens do not fit this description. In fact, people in poor countries and repressed minorities, like the Iraqi Kurds, were more likely to identify as world citizens than were people in richer countries or members of more privileged social groups. These non-elites are the most numerous group of cosmopolitans.

In the United States, according to the ISSP, Americans with a household income of less than $100,000 a year are almost twice as likely as those in households making more than $100,000 a year to identify as world citizens (32 percent vs. 18 percent, respectively). Looking at the data, it appears that Hawley’s “broad middle” is more cosmopolitan than is his “leadership elite.”

3. Cosmopolitanism doesn’t break nations apart. It rises when nations are already broken.

Third, and perhaps most important, Hawley errs in thinking that cosmopolitanism has fragmented the nation. In fact, we have found that the opposite is true: Cosmopolitanism thrives when governments do the fragmenting, such as by designating certain ethnic or racial groups as the “real” members of the nation while marginalizing other groups. Marginalized and repressed people may then turn to the outside world for protection from perceived hostility at home. For them, world citizenship offers the hope of security and survival.