



下载本文档
版权说明:本文档由用户提供并上传,收益归属内容提供方,若内容存在侵权,请进行举报或认领
文档简介
1、globalizations democratic deficit: how to make international institutions more accountableby joseph s. nye, jr.joseph s. nye, jr., is dean of harvard universitys kennedy school of government. this article draws on his address to the march 2001 meeting of the trilateral commission in london and on hi
2、s work with robert o. keohane in the recent book governance in a globalizing world.seattle; washington, d.c.; prague; quebec city. it is becoming difficult for international economic organizations to meet without attracting crowds of protesters decrying globalization. these protesters are a diverse
3、lot, coming mainly from rich countries, and their coalition has not always been internally consistent. they have included trade unionists worried about losing jobs and students who want to help the underdeveloped world gain them, environmentalists concerned about ecological degradation and anarchist
4、s who object to all forms of international regulation. some protesters claim to represent poor countries but simultaneously defend agricultural protectionism in wealthy countries. some reject corporate capitalism, whereas others accept the benefits of international markets but worry that globalizati
5、on is destroying democracy. of all their complaints, this last concern is key. protest organizers such as lori wallach attributed half the success of the seattle coalition to the notion that the democracy deficit in the global economy is neither necessary nor acceptable. for globalizations supporter
6、s, accordingly, finding some way to address its perceived democratic deficit should become a high priority.its a small worldglobalization, defined as networks of interdependence at worldwide distances, is not new. nor is it just economic. markets have spread and tied people together, but environment
7、al, military, social, and political interdependence have also increased. if the current political backlash against globalization were to lead to a rash of protectionist policies, it might slow or even reverse the worlds economic integration - as has happened at times in the past - even as global war
8、ming or the spread of the aids virus continued apace. it would be ironic if current protests curtailed the positive aspects of globalization while leaving the negative dimensions untouched. markets have unequal effects, and the inequality they produce can have powerful political consequences. but th
9、e cliche that markets always make the rich richer and the poor poorer is simply not true. globalization, for example, has improved the lot of hundreds of millions of poor people around the world. poverty can be reduced even when inequality increases. and in some cases inequality can even decrease. t
10、he economic gap between south korea and industrialized countries, for example, has diminished in part because of global markets. no poor country, meanwhile, has ever become rich by isolating itself from global markets, although north korea and myanmar have impoverished themselves by doing so. econom
11、ic globalization, in short, may be a necessary, though not sufficient, condition for combating poverty.the complexities of globalization have led to calls for a global institutional response. although a hierarchical world government is neither feasible nor desirable, many forms of global governance
12、and methods of managing common affairs already exist and can be expanded. hundreds of organizations now regulate the global dimensions of trade, telecommunications, civil aviation, health, the environment, meteorology, and many other issues.antiglobalization protesters complain that international in
13、stitutions are illegitimate because they are undemocratic. but the existing global institutions are quite weak and hardly threatening. even the much-maligned world trade organization (wto) has only a small budget and staff. moreover, unlike self-appointed nongovernmental organizations (ngos), intern
14、ational institutions tend to be highly responsive to national governments and can thus claim some real, if indirect, democratic legitimacy. international economic institutions, moreover, merely facilitate cooperation among member states and derive some authority from their efficacy.even so, in a wor
15、ld of transnational politics where democracy has become the touchstone of legitimacy, these arguments probably will not be enough to protect any but the most technical organizations from attack. international institutions may be weak, but their rules and resources can have powerful effects. the prot
16、esters, moreover, make some valid points. not all member states of international organizations are themselves democratic. long lines of delegation from multiple governments, combined with a lack of transparency, often weaken accountability. and although the organizations may be agents of states, the
17、y often represent only certain parts of those states. thus trade ministers attend wto meetings, finance ministers attend the meetings of the international monetary fund (imf), and central bankers meet at the bank for international settlements in basel. to outsiders, even within the same government,
18、these institutions can look like closed and secretive clubs. increasing the perceived legitimacy of international governance is therefore an important objective and requires three things: greater clarity about democracy, a richer understanding of accountability, and a willingness to experiment.we, t
19、he peopledemocracy requires government by officials who are accountable and removable by the majority of people in a jurisdiction, together with protections for individual and minority rights. but who are we the people in a world where political identity at the global level is so weak? one state, on
20、e vote is not democratic. by that formula, a citizen of the maldive islands would have a thousand times more voting power than would a citizen of china. on the other hand, treating the world as a single global constituency in which the majority ruled would mean that the more than 2 billion chinese a
21、nd indians could usually get their way. (ironically, such a world would be a nightmare for those antiglobalization ngos that seek international environmental and labor standards, since such measures draw little support from indian or chinese officials.) in a democratic system, minorities acquiesce t
22、o the will of the majority when they feel they are generally full-fledged participants in the larger community. there is little evidence, however, that such a strong sense of community exists at the global level today, or that it could soon be created. in its absence, the extension of domestic votin
23、g procedures to the global level makes little practical or normative sense. a stronger european parliament may reduce the democratic deficit within a union of relatively homogeneous european states, but it is doubtful that such an institution makes sense for the world at large. alfred, lord tennyson
24、s parliament of man made for great victorian poetry, but it does not stand up to contemporary political analysis. democracy, moreover, exists today only in certain well-ordered nation-states, and that condition is likely to change only slowly. still, governments can do several things to respond to t
25、he concerns about a global democratic deficit. first, they can try to design international institutions that preserve as much space as possible for domestic political processes to operate. in the wto, for example, the procedures for settling disputes can intrude on domestic sovereignty, but a countr
26、y can reject a judgment if it pays carefully limited compensation to the trade partners injured by its actions. and if a country does defect from its wto trade agreements, the settlement procedure limits the kind of tit-for-tat downward spiral of retaliation that so devastated the world economy in t
27、he 1930s. in a sense, the procedure is like having a fuse in the electrical system of a house: better the fuse blow than the house burn down. the danger with the wto, therefore, is not that it prevents member states from accommodating domestic political choices but rather that members will be tempte
28、d to litigate too many disputes instead of resolving them through the more flexible route of political negotiations.clearer connectionsbetter accountability can and should start at home. if people believe that wto meetings do not adequately account for environmental standards, they can press their g
29、overnments to include environment ministers or officials in their wto delegations. legislatures can hold hearings before or after meetings, and legislators can themselves become national delegates to various organizations. governments should also make clear that democratic accountability can be quit
30、e indirect. accountability is often assured through means other than voting, even in well-functioning democracies. in the united states, for example, the supreme court and the federal reserve board respond to elections indirectly through a long chain of delegation, and judges and government bankers
31、are kept accountable by professional norms and standards, as well. there is no reason that indirect accountability cannot be consistent with democracy, or that international institutions such as the imf and the world bank should be held to a higher standard than are domestic institutions.increased t
32、ransparency is also essential. in addition to voting, people in democracies debate issues using a variety of means, from letters to polls to protests. interest groups and a free press play important roles in creating transparency in domestic democratic politics and can do so at the international lev
33、el as well. ngos are self-selected, not democratically elected, but they too can play a positive role in increasing transparency. they deserve a voice, but not a vote. for them to fill this role, they need information from and dialogue with international institutions. in some instances, such as judi
34、cial procedures or market interventions, it is unrealistic to provide information in advance, but records and justifications of decisions can later be disclosed for comment and criticism - as the federal reserve and the supreme court do in domestic politics. the same standards of transparency should
35、 be applied to ngos themselves, perhaps encouraged by other ngos such as transparency international.the private sector can also contribute to accountability. private associations and codes, such as those established by the international chemical industry in the aftermath of the bhopal disaster, can
36、prevent a race to the bottom in standards. the practice of naming and shaming has helped consumers hold transnational firms accountable in the toy and apparel industries. and although people have unequal votes in markets, the aftermath of the asian financial crisis may have led to more increases in
37、transparency by corrupt governments than any formal agreements did. open markets can help diminish the undemocratic power of local monopolies and reduce the power of entrenched and unresponsive government bureaucracies, particularly in countries where parliaments are weak. moreover, efforts by inves
38、tors to increase transparency and legal predictability can spill over to political institutions. new democratsrather than merely rejecting the poorly formulated arguments of the protesters, proponents of international institutions should experiment with ways to improve accountability. transparency is essential, and international organizations can provide more access to their deliberations, even if after the fact. ngos could be welcomed as observers (as the world bank has done) or allowed to file friend of the c
温馨提示
- 1. 本站所有资源如无特殊说明,都需要本地电脑安装OFFICE2007和PDF阅读器。图纸软件为CAD,CAXA,PROE,UG,SolidWorks等.压缩文件请下载最新的WinRAR软件解压。
- 2. 本站的文档不包含任何第三方提供的附件图纸等,如果需要附件,请联系上传者。文件的所有权益归上传用户所有。
- 3. 本站RAR压缩包中若带图纸,网页内容里面会有图纸预览,若没有图纸预览就没有图纸。
- 4. 未经权益所有人同意不得将文件中的内容挪作商业或盈利用途。
- 5. 人人文库网仅提供信息存储空间,仅对用户上传内容的表现方式做保护处理,对用户上传分享的文档内容本身不做任何修改或编辑,并不能对任何下载内容负责。
- 6. 下载文件中如有侵权或不适当内容,请与我们联系,我们立即纠正。
- 7. 本站不保证下载资源的准确性、安全性和完整性, 同时也不承担用户因使用这些下载资源对自己和他人造成任何形式的伤害或损失。
最新文档
- 文学作品中性别符号的符号学解读与权力关系研究
- 公司在逃人员管理办法
- 根据银企对账管理办法
- 河源冷库库存管理办法
- 江苏苗木休眠管理办法
- 硬笔书法教学设计与实施指南
- 季节性施工的技术难点及应对策略
- 制定管理办法提升管理
- 生产安全事故报告和调查处理条例规定事故
- 新疆暖气收费管理办法
- 营运车辆入股协议书
- 高中数学专项提升计划
- 2025年国家公务员考录《申论》真题及参考答案(行政执法卷)
- 企业数字化转型与员工绩效的关联性分析报告
- 水工程概论课件
- 小学管理考试题及答案
- 研学活动协议书合同协议
- 2025杭州市富阳区辅警考试试卷真题
- 延长石油招聘笔试题库2025
- 2025年粤东西北教师全员轮训心得体会2篇
- 兽医学基础试题及答案
评论
0/150
提交评论