Lecture 7
                                           12 April 2006

                   Globalisation and Governance II: Supraterritorialisation, IGOs

                                        G as an opportunity

*      G offers an opportunity to think of and produce alternative, post-national forms of community
and belonging

*      Nation seen as only one frame of reference among many

*      De-territorialisation, pluralisation, hybridisation

                                      Political dimension of G

*      Political G means intensification and expansion of political inter-relations across the
world.

*      This means that the principle of state sovereignty is put to question.

*      Political arrangements beyond the borders of the nation-state

*      Political G is most visible in the rise of supraterritorial institutions and associations
that are held together by common interests and shared norms

*      Growing impact of intergovernmental organisations (IGOs)

                                                IGOs

*      In the past hundred years we have seen the emergence of intergovernmental organisations

*      "IGOs are associations of states created to deal with problems and manage issues that affect
many countries at once or involve high levels of interdependence among countries." (Lechner & Boli,
2005)

                                          Examples of IGOs

*      League of Nations `a UN (United Nations, 1945) & its UNESCO, WHO...

*      GATT (General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, 1947) `a WTO (World Trade Organisation, 1995)

*      IMF (International Monetary Fund)

*      NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organisation)

*      OECD (Organisation for ... Cooperation and Development)

*      Universal Postal Union, International Organisation for Standardisation, International
Telecommunications Union, etc.



                                      (De)territorialisation?

*      Hyperglobalisers claim that since the 1960s onward we are seeing a radical
`deterritorialisation' of politics and governance. For them, G involves the decline of bounded
territory; they are pronouncing the rise of a borderless world.

*      Globalisation sceptics think such views are exaggerations and suggest that nation-states are
still relevant political units. They also show how the emergence of regional blocs is evidence of
new forms of territorialisation.

                                  The demise of the nation-state?

*      Hyperglobalisers: yes

*      Nation-states have lost their role in global economy

*      Territorial divisions are becoming increasingly irrelevant; states are less capable of
determining social life within their borders

*      Political power is located in global social formations and expressed through global networks,
NOT through territorially based states

*      Sceptics: no

*      Continued relevance of conventional political units

*      Territory still matters

*      The rapid expansion of global economic activity in fact originated with political decisions
of neoliberal governments in the 1980s and 1990s to lift international restrictions on capital
(hence cannot be reduced to natural law of the market or development of computer technology)

                                  The demise of the nation-state?

*      Nation-states find it increasingly more difficult to manage the new networks of social
interdependence

*      Global markets frequently undermine the capacity of governments to set independent national
policy objectives

*      So, as the state power transfers to local, regional but also various supranational
institutions, we are in fact seeing the decline of the nation-state as a sovereign entity

*      However, the nation-states are far from dead; e.g. governments still can make their economies
less or more attractive to global investors, they retain control over education, infrastructure,
immigration control, population registration and monitoring, drastic national security measures,
etc.

                                  The demise of the nation-state?

*      "... we ought to reject premature pronouncements of the impending demise of the nation-state
while acknowledging its increasing difficulties in performing some of its traditional functions.
Contemporary globalization has weakened some of the conventional boundaries between domestic and
foreign policies while fostering the growth of supraterritorial social spaces and institutions that,
in turn, unsettle traditional political arrangements. At the outset of the 21^st century, the world
finds itself in a transitional phase between the modern nation-state system and postmodern forms of
global governance." (Steger, 2003)

                                       Readings for Lecture 8
                                          (26 April 2006)

*      From Lechner & Boli The Globalization Reader:

*      "Wawasan 2020" William Greider

*      "Commodity ...: Nike and the Global Athletic Footwear Industry" Miguel Korzeniewicz

*      "Growth is Good for the Poor" David Dollar & Aart Kraay

*      "Growth with Equity is Good for the Poor" Oxfam

*      the remaining 3 excerpts from Part IV (Mary Robinson, David Henderson, Joseph E. Stiglitz)
are also suitable