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How to diagnose democratic deficits in global politics: the use of the ‘all-affected principle’

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 April 2017

Mathias Koenig-Archibugi
Mathias Koenig-Archibugi*
Affiliation:
Department of Government and Department of International Relations, London School of Economics and Political Science, London, United Kingdom
*
E-mail: [email protected]
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Abstract

Is there a ‘democratic deficit’ in global politics? If so, which changes in institutions and practices can mitigate it? Empirically oriented scholars who ask such questions often use as a yardstick the normative principle that people significantly affected by a decision should be able to take part in reaching that decision. This ‘all-affected principle’ is also endorsed by prominent political theorists. However, its most logically consistent interpretation seems so demanding that it casts doubt on the principle’s usefulness to guide the assessment of real-world situations, since it appears to require that virtually everyone in the world should have a say on any proposal or any proposal for proposals. The argument presented here intends to rescue the principle as a tool for empirical assessments of real-world situations by stressing its role in comparative judgments and especially by showing that its implications are not too expansive and/or indeterminate, once we take into account that certain types of prior decisions significantly restrict the agenda of other decisions in a systematic way. The theoretical guidance for empirical research offered in the first part of the article is then illustrated with an application to global child labor policies.

Keywords

global governanceglobal policydemocratic deficitall-affected principle
Type
Original Papers
Information
International Theory , Volume 9 , Issue 2 , July 2017 , pp. 171 - 202
Copyright
© Cambridge University Press 2017 

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