The idea that there is an inherent and inevitable contradiction between populism and cosmopolitanism, then, rests on a hasty, overly cynical interpretation of both ideas, one that narrows populism to communitarian self-interest and self-aggrandizement, and cosmopolitanism to elite self-interest and self-aggrandizement. Such an interpretation overlooks important moments in the histories of both cosmopolitanism and populism, exceptional but promising cases where they overlapped
