Accountability and opposition to globalization in international assemblies
| Author | Tabea Palmtag,Wiebke Marie Junk,Pieter de Wilde |
| Date | 01 December 2016 |
| DOI | 10.1177/1354066115604032 |
| Published date | 01 December 2016 |
research-article2015
EJ R
I
Article
European Journal of
International Relations
Accountability and
2016, Vol. 22(4) 823 –846
© The Author(s) 2015
opposition to globalization
Reprints and permissions:
sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav
DOI: 10.1177/1354066115604032
in international assemblies
ejt.sagepub.com
Pieter de Wilde
WZB Berlin Social Science Center, Germany
Wiebke Marie Junk
University of Copenhagen, Denmark
Tabea Palmtag
University of Zürich, Switzerland
Abstract
Advocates of a global democratic parliament have expressed hopes that this would not only
legitimize global governance in procedural terms, but also bring about more cosmopolitan
policies. They point to the European Parliament as an example of a successful real existing
democratic parliament beyond the state with cosmopolitan intent. We analyse plenary
debates in the United Nations General Assembly and the European Parliament about the
issues of climate change, human rights, migration, trade and European integration between
2004 and 2011 to study the nature of opposition to cosmopolitanism within these two
assemblies. We find more vocal and better-organized opposition to cosmopolitanism in
the European Parliament than in the United Nations General Assembly. We demonstrate
the plausibility that direct and more proportional mechanisms of delegation and
accountability in the case of the European Parliament account for this observed difference.
Should further research confirm these initial findings, advocates of a global democratic
parliament may find that an empowered democratic World Parliament would support less
cosmopolitan policies than the current United Nations General Assembly.
Keywords
Claims analysis, cleavage, cosmopolitanism, European Parliament, globalization, United
Nations General Assembly
Corresponding author:
Pieter de Wilde, WZB Berlin Social Science Center, Reichpietschufer 50, 10785 Berlin, Germany.
Email: pieter.dewilde@wzb.eu
824
European Journal of International Relations 22(4)
Introduction
Advocates of a global democratic parliament point out that many of the protests against
globalization derive from dissatisfaction with the lack of democratic legitimacy of global
governance (Archibugi, 2010; Archibugi and Held, 1995; Falk and Strauss, 2001). These
protests from the Left, but also anti-globalization movements of the Right, could be
accommodated if citizens had a better say in world politics. The increasing ‘politiciza-
tion’ of international organizations due to their rising authority (Zürn et al., 2012) might
thus be matched by increasing democratic legitimacy.
At the same time, there is the hope that a genuinely global parliament could be a
champion of more cosmopolitan policies that take the individual human being — wher-
ever he or she may be — as the ultimate unit of moral concern (Nussbaum, 2010; Pogge,
1992). Such a universalist and individualist world view fosters demands for policies that,
in one way or another, imply an integration of formerly national societies — for example,
through the enforcement of human rights across the globe, through protecting the global
environment and combating climate change, or by welcoming the free movement of
people across borders for political or economic reasons.
Those campaigning for a global parliament as the would-be champion of human
rights and sustainable development, like the ‘Campaign for a United Nations
Parliamentary Assembly’ (UNPA, 2015) or ‘World Parliament’ (WP, 2015), imply that
the two quests of global democracy and cosmopolitan policies will easily go hand in
hand. As political scientists, we can question this underlying assumption. What would
happen if we were to create a democratic World Parliament or democratize the United
Nations General Assembly (UNGA)? Will it, indeed, become a champion of cosmopoli-
tan policies as the advocates hope? Unfortunately, no neat empirical answer lies readily
available to these big counterfactual questions. However, we can look to existing institu-
tions and ask what their workings may tell us about the potential of a global parliament.
Against sceptics (e.g. Dahl, 1999), cosmopolitan democrats point to the success story
of the European Parliament (EP) as a democratic assembly beyond the state (Archibugi,
1995: 139; Falk and Strauss, 2001: 217). Our research empirically probes this alleged
success. To get a glimpse of a likely scenario regarding a global parliament, we set out to
compare the currently existing UNGA, as the closest proxy to a global assembly, to the
EP, as the currently best-established democratic assembly beyond the state. We draw on
cleavage literature documenting a growing divide between cosmopolitan advocates of
globalization and their various communitarian opponents, and relate this to global gov-
ernance. We thus analyse whether democratic mechanisms may affect the conflict pat-
terns between cosmopolitans and their opponents, assuming that this also affects the
nature of the policies that international organizations adopt. To enable empirical research,
we ask, first, to what extent international assemblies feature conflict between cosmopoli-
tans and their opponents. Second, we investigate what effects democratic mechanisms of
accountability and proportionality have on this conflict. More precisely, we analyse
debates and claims-making about globalization issues within the UNGA and the EP, and
the patterns of conflict formation therein.
The next section presents our theoretical underpinning at the intersection of the litera-
tures on cleavages and on global democracy. It formulates four expectations that inform
De Wilde et al.
825
our empirical analysis. These expectations posit, first, the mobilization of a cleavage
dividing cosmopolitan and opposing communitarian positions. Second, following Zürn
(2014), we expect to find a cosmopolitan bias dominating in international assemblies on
this division. Third, based on principal–agent theory, we argue that accountability mech-
anisms affect the force of this bias. Fourth, and finally, we posit that the proportionality
in the election system is a second factor affecting the balance between cosmopolitan and
communitarian positions. Subsequently, the research design and our method of claims
analysis are explained. The results presented in the next section lend support to these four
expectations, though the degree of cleavage mobilization varies in the two assemblies.
Finally, we discuss the limitations of our research design before drawing conclusions and
discussing their implications for cosmopolitan democracy. This certainly does not pro-
vide a definitive answer to the big question of whether an empowered and democratized
World Parliament would turn out to be a force for cosmopolitan policies — such as pro-
tecting human rights and the global environment — but it does provide a thoroughly
grounded piece of the puzzle.
Theory
This section focuses on manifestations of cleavage formation within international assem-
blies. The logic behind this is simple. We assume that the cosmopolitan nature of policies
adopted or supported by international assemblies depends on the weakness of opposition
to them within these assemblies. The more numerous and the more coherent or organized
opposition to cosmopolitanism is in international assemblies, the less cosmopolitan the
policies supported by this assembly will be. We thus approach the question of whether a
global parliament will further the cosmopolitan cause by empirically gauging the mani-
festation of cleavage formation within assemblies. First, this section posits the possibility
of the development of a cosmopolitan versus communitarian cleavage around globaliza-
tion issues. Second, it introduces transnational parliaments as a forum for manifesting
this cleavage in the form of speech acts. Third, our four expectations on how the cleavage
plays out at this level are formulated, including the expected effects of accountability
mechanisms and proportionality in the election system.
A globalization cleavage?
Issues of globalization, defined as exchanges of goods, services, people, political authority
and norms across borders (Held et al., 1999), are a major bone of contention. The terms of
cooperation have to be negotiated, and not everyone is convinced that the benefits provided
by open borders in terms of consumption, travel, prosperity or otherwise outweigh the
costs in terms of job insecurity, international crime, loss of cultural distinctiveness and loss
of sovereignty. Western Europe, where countries rank among the most open and interna-
tionally interwoven (Dreher et al., 2008), features a growing division between winners and
losers of globalization. It pits those favouring international integration against those favour-
ing the demarcation of the nation-state (Kriesi et al., 2008). Once these conflict lines in
society translate into politics in the form of politically mobilized dividing lines (Bartolini,
2000: 19), we can speak of a ‘cleavage’ (Lipset and Rokkan, 1967). We suggest that the
826
European Journal of International Relations 22(4)
conflict between advocates and critics of open borders extends far beyond a narrow eco-
nomic understanding of globalization. Rather, it constitutes a cleavage encompassing many
issues surrounding transactions, movements and communication more broadly. In particu-
lar, the issues of...
To continue reading
Request your trial