Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Figures
- List of Tables
- Notes on Contributors
- Acknowledgments
- List of Abbreviations
- 1 Rethinking Demand, Purpose and Progress in Global Governance: An Introduction
- Part I The Changing Concept of Global Governance
- 2 The Great Descent: ‘Global Governance’ in Historical and Theoretical Perspective
- 3 Who Is Liberal Now? Rising Powers and Global Norms
- 4 The Social Purposes of Global Governance
- Part II Issue Areas
- Bibliography
- Index
4 - The Social Purposes of Global Governance
from Part I - The Changing Concept of Global Governance
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 September 2016
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Figures
- List of Tables
- Notes on Contributors
- Acknowledgments
- List of Abbreviations
- 1 Rethinking Demand, Purpose and Progress in Global Governance: An Introduction
- Part I The Changing Concept of Global Governance
- 2 The Great Descent: ‘Global Governance’ in Historical and Theoretical Perspective
- 3 Who Is Liberal Now? Rising Powers and Global Norms
- 4 The Social Purposes of Global Governance
- Part II Issue Areas
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Why govern? Because there is a demand for global governance, say some of my colleagues. To report that there is a “demand” for a form of governance, is to in some manner, at a microeconomic level, to explain why institutions of public global governance, e.g. international organization and regimes, and institutions of private global governance, e.g. myriad private actors such as transnational corporations (TNCs), nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and networks of these, act to provide governance. Yet this answer cannot explain the source of power and more particularly the authority of global governance institutions of any form. There is a demand for global governance. This is undeniably true. When I now report that man is a featherless bipedal vertebrate this is also undeniably true. Man is indeed a featherless biped. But while this may be an adequate answer to a biologist attempting to ascertain the biological genus and phylum in which to locate the human species, it's not a very useful explanation of man to a social scientist or to a disciplinary expert in the humanities. What constitutes an adequate answer to a question depends crucially upon what it is that we wish to know.
Much of this debate about the demand for global governance puts me in mind of a previous debate in international relations theory regarding the sources of demand for international regimes. In that debate, Robert Keohane put forward a functional theory of international regimes. Constructivist analysis of global governance has from its earliest days parted with the purely functionalist view of neoliberal institutionalism that, for example, international regimes are generated and function due to a purely utilitarian “demand” for them. Over three decades ago, Keohane argued in this context, “I explore why self-interested actors in world politics should seek, under certain circumstances, to establish international regimes through mutual agreement; and how we can account for fluctuations over time in the number, extent, and strength of international regimes, on the basis of rational calculations under varying circumstances.” He cited asymmetric information among actors, problems of moral hazard, and problems of deception and irresponsibility between and among states as explanations for the demand for regime structures.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Why Govern?Rethinking Demand and Progress in Global Governance, pp. 74 - 92Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2016