Theoretical Foundations onTheoretical Foundations on

Global GovernanceGlobal Governance

By: Cheunboran Chanborey

What is theory?

Why we need to study theory?

Introduction

1. Basic Ideas

Human nature is basically good

Injustice, aggression and war are products of inadequate or corrupt social institutions

These can be eliminated through collective or multilateral actions and institutional building.

The expansion of human freedom is a core liberal belief that can be achieved through democracy and market capitalism.

I. Liberalism

2. Roots of Liberalism

Hugo Grotius (1583-1645): Father

of international law

Enlightenment: Individuals are rational human beings and have capacity to improve their condition by creating a just society.

Immanuel Kant (1724-1804):

perpetual peace among democratic

states

I. Liberalism

2. Roots of Liberalism

Adam Smith: free trade could create interdependencies

Woodrow Wilson: collective

security, international institutions

I. Liberalism

Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the US (1913-1921)

3. Sociological Liberalism

IR is not only about states and states relations, but about transnational relations (pluralism).

Karl Deutsch: Interconnecting activities helps create common values and identities among people from different state and paves the way for peace.

James Rosenau: IR have been supplemented by relations among private individuals, groups, and society, referred to as mobius-web of global governance.

I. Liberalism

4. Interdependence

Through trade, investment, people-to-people contact, interdependence among states is increasingly high.

War is more costly.

Keohane & Nye:

“even if … anarchy constrains the willingness of states to cooperate, states nevertheless can work together and can do, esp. with the assistance of international institutions”

I. Liberalism

5. Institutional Liberalism

With a high degree of interdependence, states often set up international institutions/rules to deal with common problems.

Woodrow Wilson: transformation from a jungle of chaotic power politics to a zoo of regulated and peaceful intercourse through the building of IGOs.

I. Liberalism

6. Republic Liberalism

Democracies never go to war with each other due to three reasons: (1) peaceful conflict resolution (2) common moral values or ‘pacific union’ and (3) interdependence.

Francis Fukuyama: “The End of History and the Last Man”- the triumph of Western democracies, which is the final form of government.

I. Liberalism

1. Basic Ideas and Assumptions

Human nature: bad, selfish, power-seeking

Actors: Nation-states (rational and unitary)

International system: anarchic and conflictual

John Mearsheimer: International cooperation is impossible due to the problems of cheating and relative gain.

Thucydides: … the standard of justice… is the fact that the strong do what they have the power to do and the weak accept what they have to accept…

International Law and IOs: tools to maximize interests

II. Realism

Hans Morgenthau:

IL and IOs are largely weak and ineffective, tool of states, and reflect the distribution of power.

Main issues: national security, survival and existence, balance of power, security dilemma

Future of IR: no progressive change

2. Neo-realism/Structural Realism Kenneth Waltz:

“Theory of International Politics” A basic feature of IR is the structure of anarchy. State leaders are prisoners of the structure as there is

no room for foreign policymaking. All states are equal only in a formal-legal sense; they

are unequal, profoundly in a substantive or material sense.

To ensure peace and stability, it is needed to maintain the balance of power.

Bipolar system (CW system) is more stable.

II. Realism

Founder of Neorealism (1924)

3. Hegemonic Stability Theory

It is believed that international economic system is most likely to be open and stable when there is a single dominant or hegemonic state, which has a sufficiently large share of resources and is willing to take a leadership and provide public goods

Pax Britannica during 19th century

Pax Americana after the WWII

Pax Sinica???

II. Realism

The evolution of the production process is a basis for explaining how patterns of social relations develop between those who control the production and those who execute the tasks of production.

Every society divides into two main classes: a small class of those who own the means of production and a large class with nothing. Ex. in the Capitalist system: bourgeoisie ><proletariat.

So, IL and IOs are just products of a dominant group of states, dominant ideas, and the interests of the capitalist class.

Dependency Theory???

III. Marxist Theory

Periphery

How the global governance can be seen through the lenses of the three conceptual

frameworks?

Reading:

Chapter 2, International Organizations: the Politics and Processes of Global Governance, page 35-59