IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/pal/palcom/v2y2016i1d10.1057_palcomms.2015.44.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

“Confusion is a fundamental state of mind”—On the peculiar intellectual career of global governance in international relations

Author

Listed:
  • Matthias Hofferberth

    (Department of Political Science and Geography, University of Texas at San Antonio, San Antonio, USA.)

Abstract

More than 20 years after global governance was introduced to the discipline of International Relations (IR), confusion about its conceptual status remains. In fact, how to even speak and think global governance—whether as a description of world politics, as a theoretical perspective to explain it, or as a normative notion to be realized through global policy—remains debated. This state of confusion affects debates within the Political Science subfield of IR as well as dialogue between different disciplines beyond IR. More specifically, the article argues that the current state of confusion exists not because of a lack of debate but rather because of different understandings of global governance that were attached to the concept during its emergence and which are still advanced and reproduced within debates today. These different understandings have their origin in certain real-world and disciplinary dynamics and constitute global governance in present discourse as a “condensation symbol” of different meanings. It is argued that precisely because of this status, global governance has obtained its “celebrity status”, within and beyond IR. By structuring different understandings of global governance and by reconstructing real-world and disciplinary contexts of emergence, the article goes beyond stating the obvious and provides a discussion of various sources and consequences of the confusion surrounding global governance. On the basis of this state-of-the-art overview, it is argued that to realize the full potential of global governance in IR and ensure interdisciplinary dialogue beyond it, one needs to engage with the concept and its immanent confusion in a reflective and cautious way by becoming aware of different meanings attached to it instead of arbitrarily reducing the concept to a single meaning to define its conceptual status. This article is published as part of a thematic collection on global governance.

Suggested Citation

  • Matthias Hofferberth, 2016. "“Confusion is a fundamental state of mind”—On the peculiar intellectual career of global governance in international relations," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 2(1), pages 1-11, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:pal:palcom:v:2:y:2016:i:1:d:10.1057_palcomms.2015.44
    DOI: 10.1057/palcomms.2015.44
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1057/palcomms.2015.44
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1057/palcomms.2015.44?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Tanja A. Börzel & Thomas Risse, 2010. "Governance without a state: Can it work?," Regulation & Governance, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 4(2), pages 113-134, June.
    2. Ruggie, John Gerard, 1998. "What Makes the World Hang Together? Neo-utilitarianism and the Social Constructivist Challenge," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 52(4), pages 855-885, October.
    3. Annamaria Simonazzi & Michele Faioli, 2015. "Introduction," Economia & lavoro, Carocci editore, issue 2, pages 7-10.
    4. Ruggie, John Gerard, 2004. "Reconstituting the Global Public Domain: Issues, Actors and Practices," Working Paper Series rwp04-031, Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Eero Palmujoki, 2009. "Global principles for sustainable biofuel production and trade," International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 9(2), pages 135-151, May.
    2. Hamish van der Ven & David Barmes, 2023. "The uneasy marriage of private standards and public policies for sustainable commodity governance," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 32(8), pages 5161-5173, December.
    3. Glen Whelan & Jeremy Moon & Marc Orlitzky, 2009. "Human Rights, Transnational Corporations and Embedded Liberalism: What Chance Consensus?," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 87(2), pages 367-383, August.
    4. Ecker-Ehrhardt, Matthias, 2013. "Why do they want the UN to decide? A two-step model of public support for UN authority," TranState Working Papers 171, University of Bremen, Collaborative Research Center 597: Transformations of the State.
    5. Andreas Follesdal, 2011. "The distributive justice of a global basic structure: A category mistake?," Politics, Philosophy & Economics, , vol. 10(1), pages 46-65, February.
    6. Philipp Pattberg & Johannes Stripple, 2008. "Beyond the public and private divide: remapping transnational climate governance in the 21st century," International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 8(4), pages 367-388, December.
    7. Felix Heiduk, 2015. "What is in a name? Germany’s strategic partnerships with Asia’s rising powers," Asia Europe Journal, Springer, vol. 13(2), pages 131-146, June.
    8. Nina Seppala, 2009. "Business and the International Human Rights Regime: A Comparison of UN Initiatives," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 87(2), pages 401-417, August.
    9. Mikkel Kruuse & Kasper Reming Tangbæk & Kristjan Jespersen & Caleb Gallemore, 2019. "Navigating Input and Output Legitimacy in Multi-Stakeholder Initiatives: Institutional Stewards at Work," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(23), pages 1-27, November.
    10. Kenneth Abbott & Duncan Snidal, 2010. "International regulation without international government: Improving IO performance through orchestration," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 5(3), pages 315-344, September.
    11. van der Ven, Hamish & Sun, Yixian & Cashore, Benjamin, 2021. "Sustainable commodity governance and the global south," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 186(C).
    12. Shenkar Oded & Arikan Ilgaz, 2010. "Business as International Politics: Drawing Insights from Nation-State to Inter-Firm Alliances," Business and Politics, De Gruyter, vol. 11(4), pages 1-33, January.
    13. Harriet Bulkeley & Andy Jordan, 2012. "Guest Editorial," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 30(4), pages 556-570, August.
    14. Rajat M. Nag, 2012. "Transforming Asia: Realizing the Asian Century through Good Governance," IIM Kozhikode Society & Management Review, , vol. 1(1), pages 1-9, January.
    15. van der Ven Hamish, 2014. "Socializing the C-suite: why some big-box retailers are “greener” than others," Business and Politics, De Gruyter, vol. 16(1), pages 31-63, April.
    16. Kingston, Suzanne & Wang, Zizhen, 2023. "How do nature governance rules affect compliance decisions? An experimental analysis," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 211(C).
    17. Hainmueller, Jens & Hiscox, Michael J., 2006. "Learning to Love Globalization: Education and Individual Attitudes Toward International Trade," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 60(2), pages 469-498, April.
    18. Sreya Maitra Roychoudhury, 2014. "State Securitization and Internal Ethnic Conflicts in India: Re-examining the Punjab Crisis," Jadavpur Journal of International Relations, , vol. 18(2), pages 155-173, December.
    19. Resnick, Danielle & Babu, Suresh & Haggblade, Steven & Hendriks, Sheryl L. & Mather, David, 2015. "Conceptualizing Drivers Of Policy Change In Agriculture, Nutrition, And Food Security: The Kaleidoscope Model," Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Food Security Policy Research Papers 258732, Michigan State University, Department of Agricultural, Food, and Resource Economics, Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Food Security (FSP).
    20. Johannes M Waldmüller & Mandy Yap & Krushil Watene, 2022. "Remaking the Sustainable Development Goals: relational Indigenous epistemologies [Assessing national progress and priorities for the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): Experience from Australia]," Policy and Society, Darryl S. Jarvis and M. Ramesh, vol. 41(4), pages 471-485.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:pal:palcom:v:2:y:2016:i:1:d:10.1057_palcomms.2015.44. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.nature.com/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.