Building Global Democracy

"This paper lays the foundations for a democratic defence of the argument that at least some non-citizens are entitled to claim rights of political participation with regard to states in which they are not resident. First I outline a distinctively democratic case for granting participatory rights to certain non-resident non-citizens, based upon the central claim that in a democracy those who are governed ought to have the opportunity to participate in the exercise of government. I offer support for extending rights of participation to some non-resident non-citizens by addressing two possible democratic objections, relating to political equality and reciprocity."

"This article argues that social democracy as a political ideology has much to contribute to a narrative of British democracy. Democracy is the central tenet of social democracy and this distinguishes it from Marxist socialism. However, despite the Labour Party in Britain emanating from a rich tradition of democratic politics, Labour elites have often been reluctant democratisers. Firstly, this article evaluates the ideological role of democracy in social democracy; secondly, it weighs New Labour's record on the democratisation agenda; and finally, it prescribes three democratic reforms to aspects of the British political system consistent with the aims of social democracy."

"French philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy is acting uneasily when it comes to contemporary politics. There is a sort of agitation in his work in relation to this question. At several places we read an appeal to deal thoroughly with this question and 'qu'il y a un travail à faire', that there is still work to do. From the beginning of the 1980s with the 'Centre de Recherches Philosophiques sur le Politique' and the two books resulting out of that, until the many, rather short texts he published on this topic during the last years of the century, the question of politics crosses very clearly Nancy's work. He not only fulminates against the contemporary philosophical 'content' with democracy. Instead of defending a political regime, he wants to think the form of politics in the most critical and sceptical way. To Nancy, the worst thing we can do in thinking contemporary politics, is taking it for granted that we know what politics is about today, given the evidence of the global democracy. So to him, we almost have to be at unease when it comes to politics. On the other hand, in thinking contemporary democracy, the work of Claude Lefort is undeniably the main reference. Long before the collapse of the Berlin Wall and the upsurge of an all-too-easy anti-Marxism, Lefort articulated in a nuanced way the formal differences between totalitarianism and democracy. According to Lefort, the specific 'form' of democracy is that it never becomes an accomplished and fulfilled form as such. In a certain sense, the only 'form' of democracy is formlessness, a form without form. In a democracy, the place of power becomes literally 'infigurable' as Lefort says. Democracy stands for formlessness or the relation to a void. Nancy objects so to say against a 'Leformal' conception of democracy - the empty place, the formless, the 'infigurable' or 'sans figure', the ever yet to come. … This conception of

"Global environmental politics is emerging as a key field for South African diplomacy and foreign policy, in which Pretoria is endeavouring to lead by example. Environmental summits and conferences such as Johannesburg (2002) and Copenhagen (2009) have been crucial stages for the performance of this role as an environmental leader, and in December 2011 Durban will host the seventeenth Conference of the Parties (COP17) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. There are also signs from within policy-making circles that 'the environment' is seen as a field in which some of the lustre of South Africa's post-1994 international high moral standing could be recovered. However, tensions remain between South Africa's performance and rhetoric on the global stage, and domestic development paths which continue to be environmentally unsustainable. The article concludes by suggesting that while the visibility and prominence of South Africa as an actor in global environmental politics is likely to grow, it remains doubtful whether this represents a sustained and committed new direction in South African foreign policy."

"Given the importance of informal ways of getting things done in postsocialist societies, research into the field of unwritten rules and informal practices has been slow to develop. In studying such rules and practices, the researcher often encounters skepticism or hostility stemming from the ways in which people relate to tacit agreements, or else she or he is greeted by an ambivalent smile of complicity-a knowing smile. This article draws a connection between knowing smiles and open secrets and argues that these notions illuminate a great deal about how the "grey areas" of social life function. It also suggests that such seemingly trivial aspects of everyday life can reveal profound features of social institutions and point in the direction of innovative research."

"The article proposes an interdisciplinary introduction to the notion of the political world as farce. More exactly, it advances the argument that, despite experiencing the world as a joke of cosmic proportions, an individual can still create meaning even in the most meaningless conditions (concentration camps, totalitarian societies, etc.). The article traces the presence of the topic in Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov and Primo Levi's Se questo è un uomo and discusses the particular case of Milan Kundera, for whom the historical world appears as nothing but a cruel joke. The treatment of the topic is framed in relation to the theologia ludens tradition, the theatrical elements of Communism, as well as the process of meaning creation in conditions of meaninglessness."

"The past three decades have seen the resurgence of China's civil society through the blossoming of NGOs that campaign for various marginalised interests, including environmental protection. Many studies have examined the co-evolution of the Internet and China's civil society. This paper examines the role of the Internet in strengthening grassroots environmental activism, taking into consideration the corporatised character of Chinese NGOs. Through a detailed ethnographic case study of a leading grassroots environmental group, the Global Village of Beijing (GVB), I argue that Internet technologies effectively empower resource-poor activists in their self-representation, information brokering, network building, public mobilisation and construction of discourse communities. The Net therefore contributes to the nascent formation of a green public sphere in China by fostering a discourse that counterbalances rapid economic development. Also discussed here are issues that hamper this process, including resource limitations, the fragmentation of online discourse communities, and the marginalisation and "caging" of environmental discourse."

"'Information' is an enormously promising, if ambiguous term in post-Cold War development thinking. In the last three decades, international development agencies have argued that Latin American land reform policy should focus not on redistributing land but on creating more information about land and making it as widely accessible as possible. These proposals, which I call 'cadastral fixes' to rural underdevelopment, are understandably attractive and seem to fit well with democratic values of transparency and openness. But I argue that the use of the word 'information' to connote both democratic rights and the apparatuses devised by economists to improve the rural economy is misleading. 'Information' is productively vague, allowing development experts to change their projects in the face of failure without questioning the fundamental economic premises on which their reforms are built. As I show in this case study of Paraguayan cadastral reform, the history of these refinements shows a shift, under the rubric of open information, towards increasingly disciplinary forms of intervention in the politics of land."

"China's rise as a great power has promoted a great deal of soul searching among Chinese scholars, and concern about whether China's contribution to the world of International Relations scholarship lags behind its rise as an important shaper of the international system. There is a common understanding that China cannot escape addressing the role of theoretical discourse in directing Chinese foreign policy and framing its understanding of China's role in the world. A perception of China as suffering from a dependent relationship to International Relations (IR) theory, and a desire to transform the role of Chinese scholars from consumers of theory to its producers inspires a debate over the formation of a distinctive 'Chinese school'."

"The emergence of the G20 leaders' meeting during the recent global financial crisis as the 'premier forum for international economic cooperation' reflects a significant shift of hegemony over global governance towards the emerging economies but does not challenge the authority or objectives of the international financial institutions. On the contrary, successive G20 initiatives, culminating in the adoption of the Seoul Development Consensus for Shared Growth in November 2010, reveal both a further strengthening of the already close institutional relationship between the G20 and the Bretton Woods institutions and a strong shared commitment to a developmental form of global liberalism. This article charts the ascendancy of emerging economy perspectives through the lens of the G20, maps their ties to the imf and other international organisations, sets out the content of the new global developmental liberalism, and assesses the implications of emerging economy hegemony for the advanced and the emerging economies, respectively."

"How does the transnationalization of markets shape institution building, particularly in those countries that have few options other than to incorporate the rules and norms promulgated by advanced industrialized countries? Building on recent advances in international and comparative political economy, we propose a framework for the comparative study of the ways in which transnational integration regimes (TIRs) shape the development of regulatory institutions in emerging market democracies. The ability of TIRs to alleviate the supply and demand problems of institutional change in these countries depends in large part on the ways in which TIRs translate their purpose and power into institutional goals, assistance and monitoring. Integration modes can be combined in different ways so as to empower or limit the participation of a variety of domestic public and private actors to pursue and contest alternative institutional experiments. We illustrate the use of our framework via a brief comparison of the impact of the European Union accession process on post-communist countries and the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) on Mexico, with special attention to the development of food safety regulatory institutions."

"This article addresses the problem of filling in a missing component of David Miller's non-cosmopolitan theory of global justice, as elaborated in his recent National responsibility and global justice (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007). Miller originally included non-exploitation as one of the norms of global justice, but he does not provide a theory of exploitation in his recent book. This article is a preliminary attempt to suggest how Miller might fill in this gap. This article identifies the problems Miller faces in coming up with a theory of exploitation, given the limits imposed by the other parts of his theory of global justice. It examines and criticises several possible theories of exploitation that Miller might use. Finally, it argues that a modified version of Hillel Steiner's liberal theory of exploitation fits into Miller's overall theory of global justice."

"Through a case study of democratization movements in South Korea from 1980 to 1987, this study aims to contribute to further sophistication of social movement theories. Recognizing the limitation of the existing political opportunity approach, this paper presents a systematic definition of political opportunity structure and shows the mechanism through which it plays a role in the development of a social movement. In particular, in explaining South Korea's democratization movements, the authors distinguish political opportunity from its structure and suggest political opportunity as a framework that could explain the changes in risks and changes affecting social movements."

"The exposure of alleged coup plots in 2007 has shaken the guardian role of the Turkish military in politics. What were the conditions that led to the exposure of the coups and what is their significance for the future of Turkish democracy? Drawing on insights from southern Europe, the article argues that failed coup plots can lead to democratic civil-military relations especially if they work simultaneously with other facilitating conditions, such as increasing acceptance of democratic attitudes among officers, consensus among civilians over the role of the military, and the influence of external actors, such as the European Union. The article focuses on such domestic and international factors to analyse the transformation of the Turkish military, the splits within the armed forces and the resulting plots. It argues that one positive outcome of the exposed conspiracies in Turkey has been the enactment of new institutional amendments that would eradicate the remaining powers of the military. Yet, a negative outcome of the coup investigations has been an increase in polarization and hostility. Turkish democracy still lacks mutual trust among significant political groups, which creates unfavourable conditions for democratic consolidation."

"In 2006, Bangkok's middle-class residents overwhelmingly supported the military coup that displaced the elected government of Thaksin Shinawatra. Survey research shows that opponents of Thaksin had a stronger commitment to liberal democracy and possibly to royalist values while rural voters supported Thaksin because he fulfilled their social demands. Opposition to Thaksin was not motivated by economic interests, but rather, there is some evidence that urban middle- and upper-class voters disliked Thaksin because they heard negative reporting about him, which were less available in the countryside. These findings are compatible with a new theory of democratic consolidation, in which the upper classes have the means that would enable and encourage them to pay sufficient attention to politics to discover that what they viewed as 'good government' was violated by the ruling party, which could have led to demands for more democracy historically. More recently, however, in Thailand and perhaps other instances in Southeast Asia and Latin America, those with the money and leisure to follow politics closely have heard reports about the 'bad government' of populist, democratically elected leaders, and thus have turned against them."

"This article, originally delivered in the Fall of 2011 at a seminar held in Beirut at the Centre for Arab Unity Studies, examines the 2011 amendments to the Moroccan Constitution in light of the historical background. The tumultuous events of the so-called 'Arab Spring' brought new urgency to the issue of constitutional reforms that had been broached initially on the accession of Muhammad VI to the throne in 1999. Since independence, Moroccan political society has typically been vibrant, democratic and home to numerous political parties of various orientations and, since the 1970s, has witnessed calls by various sides for constitutional reforms as well as for the institution of a constitutional or parliamentary monarchy. On 9 March 2011 Muhammad VI gave a momentous address subjecting the issue of royal authority to public deliberations. This topic had previously ranked as one of the few unapproachable taboos of the political scene. A vital driving force in the process of constitutional reform has been the youthful February 20 Movement that was instrumental in the mobilization of millions of Moroccans and led to submitting the new draft Constitution to popular referendum and its ratification on 1 July 2011. Unlike other Arab countries, Morocco's functioning democracy, its well-established political parties and the fact that the issue of constitutional reforms had already been on the table meant that when Moroccans descended into the streets they had a set of clearly defined demands - demands that were also less drastic than those being made in other countries. Yet while Moroccan politics have been highly developed and articulate since the 1940s, the events of the Arab Spring provided the necessary shock and catalyst to transform relative complacency into action. The dense topography of mature political parties and organizations in Morocco factored in two ways: first, it permitted a stable environment for democr

"This paper theorizes about the new international financial architecture as a manifestation of the 'second face of neoliberalism' - financial market reregulation through technocratic obfuscation and insularity from democratic political pressure. Using a more expansive definition of the new international financial architecture, one that includes the institutional nexus of international monetary management along with the rules and regulatory bodies governing capital, this argument is developed through an analysis of the origins and functions of two institutions comprising the new international financial architecture - the Basel Capital Accord and the diffusion of inflation targeting regimes across central banks. This paper excavates the neoliberal logic inscribed in these institutions and further shows how these new forms of institutional logic contributed to the financial crisis of 2008 by putting in place a set of opportunities and constraints that led to rapid growth in the market for asset-backed securities. The implications of this analysis for the future of regulatory reform are discussed, with particular attention paid to the question of what role central banks should play in this process."

"In the literature on the turn to the left in the wider Latin American region, Central America has generally been neglected. The aim of this article is to seek to fill that gap, while specifically assessing the left turn's impact on prospects for democratization in the sub-region. Using three case studies - El Salvador, Honduras and Nicaragua - the article questions the usefulness of transition theory for analysis and instead offers a framework based on state/civil society interaction within the context of globalization. Four key conclusions are made: First, democratization is not a linear process, but can be subject to simultaneous processes of democratization and de-democratization. Second, continued deep structural inequalities remain central to the region's politics but these often provoke unproductive personalistic and partisan politics which can inhibit or curtail democratization. Third, interference from local and/or international economic actors can curtail or reverse democratization measures, underlining the influence of globalization. Fourth, Central America is particularly revelatory of these tendencies due to its acute exposure to extreme oligarchic power and outside influence. It hence can help shed light on wider questions on the blurring of boundaries between state, civil society and market and its impact on democratization, especially within the context of globalization. In this way the article contributes to the analysis of Central America in the current context of the 'pink tide', underlines the importance of continued analysis of Central America for democratization studies, and brings new insight to debates on transition theory."

"This article explores the literature on democratization to account for the proscription of political parties in democratizing states. A survey of 22 party bans in 12 European states identifies two distinct classes of proscription derived from the 'degree of democratization' present in a banning state. I identify features of 'new' and 'incomplete' democracies that help explain proscription. Case studies on Germany, Austria, Russia, Latvia and Greece illustrate the impact of 'modes of transition', heightened uncertainty, political tensions and instability on 'new democracy bans', and the impact of illiberalism, limited checks on executive power and circumscribed political participation on 'incomplete democracy bans'."

"A Conservative accepts that democracy entails government by and (especially) for the people, but what constitutes the people is seen not in narrow but in expansive terms: the people are not confined to those who constitute a present transient majority but encompass rather past and future generations. Democracy is tempered by the need to avoid dictatorship of the masses, entrusting the task of governing to those chosen by the people and able to lead in interests of the people. Government entails a balance between accountability and autonomy, a balance delivered by the Westminster system of government, a system challenged by attempts at fundamental constitutional change."