Yeah, democracy is a word of the order today[.] The whole world is talking about it and it has to be practiced rather than just getting entangled in the word democracy. (Interview WSF25)
The 20th century has seen a global expansion of democracy (Huntington 1991). For example, between 1988 and 1991 the number of democracies rose from around 30 to 50 percent in the world. In 2010 about 60 percent of all states met at least minimal democratic standards (Welzel 2013, 265). Still, complete democracies only account for 28 percent in 2010 (ibid., 267). In 2015 not even half of the world population lived in a democratic or semi-democratic state (The Economist Intelligence Unit 2016, 1).
Despite this mixed picture about the institutionalization of democracy, surveys show that âgreat majorities of almost every society express a strong desire for democracy, even where authoritarian practices persistâ (Welzel 2013, 307). The recurrent protest movements in which people demand more democracy or âreal democracyâ support this assessment (see e.g., Ortiz et al. 2013). Even most of the authoritarian regimes pay at least rhetorical tribute to democracy or simulate democratic institutions. At this point in history democracy is the normative yardstick of political rule around the globe, but it is less practiced than proclaimed.
This book analyzes concepts and models of democracy of two entities that are entangled in globalization processes: the European Union (EU) and the World Social Forum (WSF). The EU and the WSF stand for promoters and protagonists of democracy because â in quite different ways â they promote democracy as the preferred mode of political organization, and for their own activities at the transnational level they implement to some extent organizational models that are supposed to be democratic.
The EU is a supranational institution sui generis that pools its member statesâ capacities in order to respond to and shape globalization processes. Democracy assistance is one means of the EU to engage with a globalized world. In this work, I will carve out from policy documents how the EU defines democracy and democratization. Based on this analysis, I will argue that the EU promotes an ambivalent concept of democracy which allows for more (intermediate) citizen participation in transnational politics but also prioritizes a technocratic and managerial way of doing politics which renders citizen participation ineffective. Despite significant changes in EU democracy assistance in recent years, my findings suggest that these changes do not result in substantially more democracy â neither in the target countries nor in transnational politics.
The WSF is an arena in which civil society actors, for instance grassroots social movements and non-governmental organizations (NGOs), discuss how to cooperate in an increasingly interconnected world. At the same time, the WSF is a form of cooperation at the transnational level. It is an attempt to create transnational political agency for citizens. The organizers have defined democracy as one of its core principles. Smith and her colleagues (2008, xii) hold that â[i]n a global system where opportunities for citizen participation are rare, the WSF serves as a laboratory for global democracy.â My aim is to understand how this laboratory functions, which model of democracy the organizers apply in the Forum and which role the Forum plays in globalization processes.
I will show that the Forumâs potential contribution to âdemocratizing globalizationâ consists in its focus on democracy within the cooperation of (global) civil society. However, the WSF cannot be said to have contributed to the democratization of global governance as the evidence that I present in this work shows.
Analysts have well captured the WSFâs âfuzzy structureâ (Wallerstein 2004, 634) and they have described it as âa transborder political body with an organizational architecture that remains fluidâ (Smith et al. 2008, 133). However, their analyses address insufficiently the consequences of the Forumâs fuzziness for democracy. The characteristics of democracy applied by the WSF organizers are not fully taken into account in social movement studies: Democracy in the WSF takes a hybrid form that applies organizational elements to a network order. In other terms, the organizers have chosen a model of democracy that reconciles the need for some organizational structure with the preference of social movements for a network logic of collaboration. As I will show, by applying a hybrid model of democracy in the WSF the organizers have made headway in the democratic quality of a transnational meeting space. However, they have not been able to overcome anti-democratic tendencies (for instance, informal elites) that are well-known to appear in social movements.
Both of my cases â EU democracy assistance as well as democracy in and by the WSF â are ambivalent: In both cases I will identify a strong rhetorical commitment to democracy, but also deficits in turning the commitment into practice at the transnational level. The EU and the WSF stand for two contrasting attempts to deal with globalization processes. Both have developed the capacity to act in a globalized era, each in their own way. This book provides an in-depth analysis of these cases drawing from approaches in global studies, political sociology, the sociology of organization, and social movement studies.
1.1 Globalization and EU Democracy Assistance
There are many different approaches to study globalization processes (see e.g., Steger 2003; Osterhammel and Petersson 2005; Bisley 2007). Globalization has mostly been treated as an interdisciplinary topic that covers the domains of economics, politics and culture (e.g., Held and McGrew 2003; Appelbaum and Robinson 2005). Despite broad theorization about globalization over the last three decades, James (2012, 755) notes that âthere was no attempt to develop a theory of globalization as such.â Rather, analysts âsought to explore the complexity of globalization across different domainsâ (ibid.). James closes his overview on the study of globalization in the following way:
Globalization may simply be the name given to a matrix of processes that extend social relations across worldspace, but the way in which people live those relations is incredibly complex, changing, and difficult to explain. Thus, we remain in search of generalizing methodologies (not a singular grand theory) that can sensitize us to those empirical complexities while enabling us to abstract patterns of change and continuity. (ibid., 756)
One approach that meets Jamesâ request is to focus on critical junctures of globalization. Matthias Middell and Katja Naumann define the latter âas periods and arenas in which new spatial relationships are established as a reaction to the effects of globalizationâ (Middell and Naumann 2010, 168â69; see also Engel and Middell 2005, 21). This view on globalization is rooted in the spatial turn of the social sciences and builds on a variety of approaches by political geographers (see Engel and Middell 2005, 22). Globalization is characterized as a dialectic process of de- and re-territorialization. De-territorialization refers to processes of increased interconnectivity, faster communication, and higher mobility. Re-territorialization denotes the attempts by actors to maintain action resources in the context of de-territorialization processes. Among others, critical junctures are characterized by the search for new spatial orders which may concern a societyâs internal organization or its relationship with its neighbors. Critical junctures may be the midwifes of actors that respond to and shape globalization processes such as international and regional organizations, international non-governmental organizations (INGOs), transnational social movements, and many more.
The EU is one of these actors. The European integration process was â apart from the European post-World War II context â the Western European statesâ response to the decolonization process in the 20th century. Decolonization significantly changed the political landscape in many regions of the world and, therefore, can be considered a critical juncture of globalization. The former colonial powers in Europe risked marginalization in world politics. Some have argued that Europe was on the route to become âprovincializedâ (Chakrabarty 2008; Melegh 2012). The member states of the European Communities, which are the predecessor of the EU, pooled their sovereignty by creating supra-national institutions, which consolidated their political role in the world (see Böröcz and KovĂĄcs 2001; Böröcz 2010). The European Communitiesâ engagement in world politics until the 1990s predominantly concerned economic relations with the rest of the world. Their trade agreements pursued the economic interests of the member states and established them as a promoter of economic globalization.
Democracy assistance did not advance to a significant political competence at the Community level until the collapse of the Eastern Bloc, which was another important critical juncture of globalization. Eastern Europe went through a radical de-territorialization proce...