The discussion on "European cosmopolitanism", which has been intensifying for some time now, seems to reproduce a fundamental conceptual problem. Whenever authors start out from a specific answer, in the sense of a solution — in this case, European cosmopolitanism — it leaves them with only one main task. As this task is simply to justify their basic assumption, it is not too surprising when this justification becomes purely normative; or, more problematically, when normative and analytical elements are mixed. All too often this approach considerably limits discussion.