The UN is able to recognize key global challenges, but beset by difficulties in trying to resolve them. In this, it represents the current global political balance, but is also the only international institution that could move it forward. Civil society can be a catalyst for this kind of change. In this book, Nora McKeon provides a comprehensive analysis of UN engagement with civil society. The book pays particular attention to food and agriculture, which now lie at the heart of global governance issues. McKeon shows that politically meaningful space for civil society can be introduced into UN policy dialogue. The United Nations and Civil Society also makes the case that it is only by engaging with organizations which legitimately speak for the 'poor' targeted by the Millennium Development Goals that the UN can promote equitable, sustainable development and build global democracy from the ground up. This book has strong ramifications for global governance, civil society and the contemporary debate over the future of food.
A universal criminal court : the emergence of an idea -- The global civil society campaign -- The victory : the independent prosecutor -- The defeat : no universal jurisdiction -- The controversy : gender and forced pregnancy -- The missed chance : banning weapons -- A global civil society achievement : why rejoice?
John Keane, a leading scholar of political theory, tracks the recent development of a big idea with fresh potency - global civil society. In this timely book, Keane explores the contradictory forces currently nurturing or threatening its growth, and he shows how talk of global civil society implies a political vision of a less violent world, founded on legally sanctioned power-sharing arrangements among different and intermingling forms of socio-economic life. Keane's reflections are pitted against the widespread feeling that the world is both too complex and too violent to deserve serious reflection. His account borrows from various scholarly disciplines, including political science and international relations, to challenge the silence and confusion within much of contemporary literature on globalisation and global governance. Against fears of terrorism, rising tides of xenophobia, and loose talk of 'anti-globalisation', the defence of global civil society mounted here implies the need for new democratic ways of living.
This study challenges the dominant tendency of civil society to negate international trade as such. The authors argue that it is necessary to frame differentiated trade rules based on levels of economic development, and also to shift from subsidies to shore up uncompetitive livelihoods to productivity-enhancing investments.Most importantly, the book ends with a case for trade unions, women's organizations and other civil society organizations to imagine and create themselves as being global -- in order to take up the challenge of strengthening global countervailing power to capital.
Featuring a diverse and impressive array of authors, this volume is the most comprehensive textbook available for all interested in international organization and global governance. Organized around a concern with how the world is and could be governed, the book offers: in-depth and accessible coverage of the history and theories of international organization and global governance; discussions of the full range of state, intergovernmental, and nonstate actors; and examinations of key issues in all aspects of contemporary global governance. The book’s 50 chapters are arranged into 7 parts and woven together by a comprehensive introduction to the field, separate section introductions designed to guide students and faculty, and helpful pointers to further reading. International Organization and Global Governance is a self-contained resource enabling readers to better comprehend the role of myriad actors in the governance of global life as well as to assemble the many pieces of the contemporary global governance puzzle.
Once the exclusive preserve of member states, international organizations have become increasingly open in recent decades. Now virtually all international organizations at some level involve NGOs, business actors and scientific experts in policy-making. This book offers the first systematic and comprehensive analysis of this development. Combining statistical analysis and in-depth case studies, it maps and explains the openness of international organizations across issue areas, policy functions and world regions from 1950 to 2010. Addressing the question of where, how and why international organizations offer transnational actors access to global policy-making, this book has implications for critical issues in world politics. When do states share authority with private actors? What drives the design of international organizations? How do activists and businesses influence global politics? Is civil society involvement a solution to democratic deficits in global governance?
While most studies focus on states as principals and international bureaucrats as agents, [the author] demonstrates that many international bureaucrats have mastered the art of insulating themselves from state control.
Since the end of the Cold War, international organisations have assumed a greater importance on the world stage. The United Nations has played a key role in all of the major security issues during this period - increasingly called upon to address other global problems such as poverty and international crime - while the European Union has created a single currency and moved towards the adoption of a constitution. The growing significance of the World Trade Organisation and other economic institutions has led some to talk of the emergence of a structure of global governance; and international non-governmental organisations and social movements are now widely seen as forming a kind of global civil society that both challenges and participates in these developments. Building on the success of the previous edition (Versailles to Maastricht: International Organisation in the Twentieth Century), this book is a valuable introduction to the complex history of modern international organisation. David Armstrong, Lorna Lloyd and John Redmond: - Pay close attention to the League of Nations, the UN and the EU. - Offer chapters on the new regionalism, global governance and international regimes and global civil society. - Adopt a thematic and analytical approach to the subject. - Provide a concise factual account of the rise of the international organisation.