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Forum: Global Governance: Decline or Maturation of an Academic Concept?
Journal
International Studies Review
ISSN
0079-1760
ISSN-Digital
1521-9488
Type
journal article
Date Issued
2010-12-01
Author(s)
Abstract
This forum discusses contemporary scholarship on global governance in light of various problems that have commonly been associated with the global governance concept and literature. In the first contribution, Henk Overbeek maintains that global governance talk has undergone a profound transformation. While the concept initially referred to a radical restructuring of the global economic order, it is nowadays used as a reformist concept that seeks to accommodate the interests of neo-liberal globalization with relatively marginal reforms that are seen as necessary to keep the system running. Because definitions of global governance, including that of the Commission on Global Governance, tend to presuppose rather than question the existence of common interests and the willingness to cooperate at the global level, they serve to depoliticize the debate about world order. Moreover, the concept is analytically misleading given the rise of traditional forms of interstate bargaining that followed both the global financial crisis and the rise of the BRIC states.
In the second contribution, Klaus Dingwerth and Philipp Pattberg revisit the common critique that "global governance" is essentially a misnomer, as it overestimates the actual globality of existing governance schemes and as it portrays transboundary regulation as a mostly apolitical or post-political activity. Finding some truth in both claims, the authors however note that the more recent contributions to the global governance literature are very much aware of these conceptual challenges and frequently manage to address them without depriving the concept of global governance of its particular strengths. However, the authors identify a third challenge that has largely gone unnoticed thus far, namely the tendency of global governance research to almost exclusively focus on densely regulated policy areas while at the same time neglecting the more fundamental question why some issues become considered global governance issues and others not.
In the third contribution, Daniel Compagnon brings the conceptual debate down to earth. He takes issue with the common claim that global governance ignores the South. As a matter of fact, and in spite of the structural imbalances in the distribution of power and resources in the global political economy, Third World countries have not been lacking overall influence both on the international state system and on transnational politics. Rather than assuming that Third World countries are structurally excluded from global governance, the author argues for a more nuanced and fact-based assessment of global governance in the South and the inclusion of Third World countries in global governance research.
In the second contribution, Klaus Dingwerth and Philipp Pattberg revisit the common critique that "global governance" is essentially a misnomer, as it overestimates the actual globality of existing governance schemes and as it portrays transboundary regulation as a mostly apolitical or post-political activity. Finding some truth in both claims, the authors however note that the more recent contributions to the global governance literature are very much aware of these conceptual challenges and frequently manage to address them without depriving the concept of global governance of its particular strengths. However, the authors identify a third challenge that has largely gone unnoticed thus far, namely the tendency of global governance research to almost exclusively focus on densely regulated policy areas while at the same time neglecting the more fundamental question why some issues become considered global governance issues and others not.
In the third contribution, Daniel Compagnon brings the conceptual debate down to earth. He takes issue with the common claim that global governance ignores the South. As a matter of fact, and in spite of the structural imbalances in the distribution of power and resources in the global political economy, Third World countries have not been lacking overall influence both on the international state system and on transnational politics. Rather than assuming that Third World countries are structurally excluded from global governance, the author argues for a more nuanced and fact-based assessment of global governance in the South and the inclusion of Third World countries in global governance research.
Language
English
HSG Classification
contribution to scientific community
HSG Profile Area
SEPS - Global Democratic Governance
Refereed
Yes
Publisher
Blackwell
Publisher place
Malden, Mass.
Volume
12
Number
4
Start page
696
End page
719
Pages
24
Subject(s)
Division(s)
Eprints ID
239136