Explores what both Enlightenment and contemporary philosophers have to say about the idea of the nation-state, who exercises power in the world, whether there is such a thing as a right to rights, and the past, present, and future of the state in a time of globalization. This spirited and engaging conversation between two of America’s most influential cultural critics and international theorists of the last decade explores what both Enlightenment and contemporary philosophers have to say about the idea of the nation-state, who exercises power in today’s world, whether there is such a thing as a right to rights, and the past, present, and future of the state in a time of globalization. In a world of migration and shifting allegiances caused by cultural, economic, military, and climatic change, the nation-state, as Judith Butler and Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak argue, has become a more provisional place – and its inhabitants, more stateless.