Conflicts and Antinomies of Multiple Modernities from Eisenstadt

Abstract

The idea of multiple modernities implies that the best way to understand the contemporary world and to explain the history of modernity is to conceive of it as a history of the successive constitution and reconstitution of a multiplicity of cultural programmes. The concept “multiple modernities” has two implications. The first is that modernity and Westernization are not identical; the Western pattern or patterns of modernity do not constitute the only “authentic” modernities, although they have been historically precedent and constitute a central reference for other visions of modernity. The second is that the term modernities includes the recognition that these modernities are not “static” but are in continuous transformation. These transformations lead to the postmodernity that has occupied a primary place in the contemporary debate of ideas, pervading a myriad of diverse issues with a wide range of political ramifications.