Hospitality, Coercion and Peace in Kant

: In this essay, I discuss Kant ’ s right of hospitality in Toward Perpetual Peace. In the proposed reading, the right of hospitality protects foreigners from the xenophobic practices of the locals, while protecting the locals from the colonial practices of foreigners. The main question guiding this paper is whether hospitality is for Kant a moral injunction calling for a ‘ humane ’ treatment of foreigners; or whether it is rather a right senso strictu — namely, one that entails full coercive authority against violations. I argue that once the con-nections between the dilemma of coercion and the so-called ‘ institutionalization dilemma ’ are properly understood, they may be resolved in favor of the first op-tion, namely, coercion. Additionally, by examining the notions of non-central-ized coercion and transnational political participation, this paper explores a way to match hospitality ’ s need of coercion with Kant ’ s federalist proposal. to decisive some-how grounded in our common humanity, or is it strict right, coercive norm to which individuals, groups, and — notice — autonomous political entities are subject? This interrogation is the subject of this essay.