Kojève’s journey from philosophy to diplomacy was not a case of accidental wandering but the outgrowth of his Hegelian convictions. He held that critique without action is frivolous, dismissing the “fundamentally nihilist elements, known as ‘intellectuals,’ for whom non-conformity is in itself an absolute value”—those who, like Albert Camus, reveled in moral dissent yet sidestepped the arduous institutional work needed for durable change. A critique, Kojève said, that wants to be taken seriously cannot operate at a distance from the state.

The idea that diplomats today could help us articulate what divides us should not be abandoned. But it needs to be resituated in a new environment.

Through its aesthetic liberation of things, ideas, and layers of time, art constructs imaginaries of interdependence, which in their own way contribute to a society of solidarity. Today, during this time of pandemic, we like to talk about us all being in the same boat, a metaphor that has replaced the catastrophic image of overcrowded boats of refugees crossing the Mediterranean. But the most powerful metaphor of the present time is the metaphor of the virus, which represents how everything influences everyone. But this is only our view of viruses, our exploitation of its properties. What viruses themselves think about this, nobody knows.