PR 1450
Introduction to Globalization
Lecture 9
Globalization and democracy
Chris Rumford
Which country is
the most
democratic in the
world?
Answer: Sweden
Which country is the
least democratic?
Answer: North Korea
Source: EIU’s index
of democracy
www.economist.com/media/pdf/DEMOCRACY_INDEX_2007_v3.pdf
This is according to the Economist Intelligence Unit
Other highly democratic counties include:
 Iceland
 Netherlands
 Norway
 Denmark
Countries are measured according to the following
criteria:
 electoral process
 functioning of government
 political participation
 political culture
 civil liberties
Britain and the USA did not
score as highly
Britain was ranked 23rd and
the USA 17th
In both countries there was a
marked decline in civil
liberties, and a lack of
political participation
The ‘war on terror’ has been
responsible for the
curtailment of some
freedoms
Democracy and globalization
Is globalization a threat to democracy?
On the one hand, globalization may mean that
democratically elected governments no longer have
total control over their own affairs
On the other, globalization has seen the world-wide
spread of the democratic nation-state
Since the end of the communism democracy has
become the universally acceptable form of
government
The relationship between
globalization and democracy
provokes some important
questions
Under conditions of
globalization is democracy
tied to the nation-state?
Or can democracy be transnational or global?
Big questions
Big issues
Democracy now enjoys universal
support – politicians, leaders and
citizens in all parts of the world
profess respect for democracy
But globalization makes
democracy difficult to realize:


calling into question its ‘natural’
grounding in the nation-state
can we imagine non-national
sources of democracy?
Globalization as a threat
Benjamin Barber (2001) says that we have
globalized the marketplace but not democracy
As a result we have a highly organized system
of global capital but ‘an anarchic global political
climate’ (p.301)
‘We are destroying the national institutions,
including the nation-state itself, which have
been the seedbed for democratic institutions’
(P. 301-2)
Internationalization of democracy
The League of Nations (1919) wanted to protect
minority rights within nation-states and saw
sovereignty as less important than ‘new international
norms as the basis for legitimate government’ (Hirst,
2001: 256)
In the post-WWII period the United Nations has
promoted the idea of human rights – that people have
rights independently of those granted to them (or not)
by their nation-state
The UN’s ‘Universal Declaration of Human Rights’
dates from 1948 www.un.org/Overview/rights.html
David Held and
‘cosmopolitan democracy’
Democracy is not always threatened by globalization
Held et al argue for trans-national governance to
ensure that the democratic state will be the global
norm
It is a conception of democracy which recognises the
continuing significance of the nation-state while
arguing for a layer of governance to limit national
sovereignty (Held, 1998)
The affairs of nation-states
are interrelated and many
contemporary issues require
cooperative responses
(pollution, diminishing
resources, terrorist threats,
migration)
‘Cosmopolitan democracy’
looks to the ‘creation of a
democratic community which
both involves and cuts across
democratic states’ (Archibugi
and Held, 1995)
Daniele Archibugi on
‘cosmopolitan
democracy’
‘cosmopolitan democracy aims at a parallel
development of democracy both within and among
states’ (Archibugi and Held, 1995)
Read Daniele Archibugi’s article on ‘Cosmopolitan
democracy’ at:
http://newleftreview.org/?page=article&view=2261
Read an interview with David Held
‘Globalization, cosmopolitanism and democracy’
www.polity.co.uk/global/globalization-cosmopolitanism-anddemocracy.asp
Global democracy
Cosmopolitan democracy looks towards a global
institutional framework which works with
existing system of nation-states
But reserves the right for cosmopolitan
institutions to intervene in cases where:
peoples are being oppressed
 actions of states have transnational consequences
(migration)
 global initiatives are required (transnational crime,
epidemics)

The role of citizens
Cosmopolitan democracy is possible because
citizens have been empowered (by UN) and
through INGOs
Human rights give citizens rights independent
of membership of nation-state
‘human rights have posited and sustained the
duties of individuals to a legal order beyond
that of nation-states’ (Goldblatt, 1997)
Is the world ready for cosmopolitan
democracy?
Archibugi (1998) says that two important things
are lacking:


existing forms of global governance lack sufficient
legal competence
agencies of existing global governance are not
necessarily guided by principles of democracy
However, there is one very good example of
actually existing cosmopolitan democracy …
Real cosmopolitan democracy?
‘the first international
organization which
begins to resemble the
cosmopolitan model is
the European Union’
(Archibugi, 1998)
Iraq and cosmopolitan democracy
The USA and Britain have tried to bring about
democracy in post-Saddam Iraq, and the rudiments of
parliamentary democracy now exist
Archibugi (1998) is sceptical about the possibility of
genuine democracy developing under these conditions
Democracy will only take hold when society is willing
and able to embrace democratic principles
The development of democracy is endogenous not
exogenous
Concluding comments
It is not necessarily the case that globalization
is a threat to democracy
Globalization has also helped spread democracy
round the world
It is possible that in the future globalization will
also provide the means and the incentive to
create a truly democratic world order
References
Archibugi, D. and Held, D. 1995: ‘Editors’ introduction’ in D.
Archibugi and D. Held (eds) Cosmopolitan Democracy: An
Agenda for a New World Order (Polity Press)
Barber, B. 2001: ‘Challenges to democracy in an age of
globalization’ in R. Axtmann (ed) Balancing Democracy
(Continuum)
Goldblatt, D. 1997: ‘At the limits of political possibility: the
cosmopolitan democractic project’ New Left Review 225
Held, D. 1998: ‘Democracy and globalization’ in D. Archibugi, D.
Held, and M. Kohler (eds) Re-Imagining Political Community
(Polity Press)
Hirst, P. 2001: ‘Between the local and the global: democracy in
C21st’ in R. Axtmann (ed) Balancing Democracy (Continuum)