Political Pluralism and the State

Beyond Sovereignty

Marcel Wissenburg

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2008
• Print ISBN: 9780415467391
• eBook ISBN: 9781134034895
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Globalisation
• Index: Politics & International Relations

The concept of a sovereign nation-state is a central part in many of the debates discussing the salient issues in political science today. Yet the debate on the state is fragmented and while the sub-disciplines within political science address the various possible consequences of different processes, the one thing they all share is uncertainty about the future shape and role of the state.

Political Pluralism and the State is the first work in political theory to bring together IR, comparative politics and political theory approaches to analyze the post-sovereign state and develop a new interpretative scheme for social and political scientists. A scheme that takes account not only of the fragmentation of the polity but also of the often ignored concurrent fragmentation of society. The book seeks to understand and interpret political pluralization as an expression of the continuous processes of cooperation and secession that define politics and legitimize institutions. It develops an alternative, sovereignty-free conception of the 'polis' sensitive to these unavoidable processes, and assesses the viability of liberal-democratic ideals in a radically pluralized world.

This book will be of interest to students and scholars in philosophy, politics, political economy, international relations, sociology and other social sciences.

1 Introduction

1.1 Sovereignty and the state

This book assumes the imminent demise of the state, and asks what may come next. Yet it is neither a Marxist text, nor Utopian or dystopian. As usual, the devil is in the detail. There are many conceptions of the state, and many different institutions, traits and procedures combined in each of them; the imminent demise is predicated of only some of these conceptions and some of these defining elements. So let me begin again and be more precise.

What I assume is the imminent demise of the sovereign state. Sovereignty, as a predicate of the state, is often taken to entail two things: external independence and internal absolute authority. An ideal-typical sovereign state recognizes no legitimate power above itself (except sometimes, though usually pro forma, God). It is the source of all legitimate power, and of all legitimate exercise of power within its territory. It exercises that power over all the people who live or reside there, over all their interests and all intraterritorial interests of non-resident foreigners, and over all material and all immaterial things within those borders. Only the laws of nature limit its power, and then only in a physical sense—if it could, it would make the laws of nature as well. It is a true Leviathan. In the words of Peter Steinberger, who distinguishes between a Hegelian ‘idea’ of the state and ‘governments’, the actual bodies incarnated by the idea of the state: The reach and power of the state is always and inevitably unlimited, constrained only by the vicissitudes of time and physical nature’ (Steinberger 2004:187)—from which it follows that: ‘To talk of a non-absolutist state is to talk nonsense’ (ibid. 228).

The state exercises its absolute power through the attribution of rights: permissions and non-permissions to perform or not perform certain acts, thus creating, maintaining or excluding specific states of affairs (cf. Wissenburg 1999a, Kanger and Kanger 1966 for a more detailed description of ‘rights’ thus construed). It can permit individuals or organizations to attribute sets of rights in its stead. It can, for example, allow nuclear families to exercise procreative rights among members of the family as the heads of families see fit, or permit churches to attribute salvation, or shopkeepers to attribute goods. Yet these delegated rights remain just that: delegated, lent, borrowed, until recalled. ‘It is the institution that directs all the lesser institutions of society—universities and churches and all the rest’ (Steinberger 2004:22). The state can also permit individuals or organizations to exercise rights to the use of violence in order to execute other rights, protect them or undo violations—this is what is known in political science literature as the state’s monopoly on the use of violence or force. All of this constitutes internal sovereignty—and by mutual recognition of each other’s internal sovereignty, states become externally sovereign.

It is this sovereign state of which the imminent demise is assumed. I do not, however, assume that other traits associated with the (concept of the) state will disappear. I shall assume the continued existence of faceless institutions and organizations attributing or delegating rights within communities or territories, their continued facelessness as bureaucratic organizations or impersonal procedures, the possibility of a link to territories and the goods and peoples therein, to armies and legal borders (cf. Dittgen 1999:173ff.), and even the continued claim to sovereignty. I merely dismiss the feasibility of making this claim true. As Harold Laski often argued (cf. Nicholls 1975:46ff.), sovereignty is a legal fiction, not a political reality.

Today’s political reality is one of what I call political pluralization: the emergence of polities other than the state, where polity stands for any form of social organization within which (among other things) politics takes place, specifically the attribution of rights within that organized form of life. This is still a bit vague—I shall expand on it in Chapter 2. Suffice it for the moment to say that political reality is about power not legality. States, the assumption is (cf. Walker 2003, Prokhovnik 2007), no longer have the power to make good on their claim to sovereignty: on the one hand they share power with other states and other entities low and high, on the other they cannot (always, fully) control those other entities—nor other states directly or indirectly operating within their respective territories.

I assume the demise of the state, I do not predict it or claim that there is empirical proof for its decline, as that is partly a matter of definition. Recent debates on the decline of the state (see Chapter 2) even suggest that at least some of the processes of political pluralization actually contribute to the survival and strengthening of the role of the state. The assumption I make does not deny or contradict this: any player of a game can become more influential, decisive and important by joining coalitions—but that is not the same thing as becoming more powerful, and it is in fact the opposite of maintaining sovereign power (cf. Ilgen 2003). What I ask the reader to imagine, then, is that the state is just one of the boys (though most likely to be the bully), just one player wielding power among others; and that its claim to sovereignty, to being the absolute source of power from which all legitimate rules and legislation emanate, is false. This is an easy thing to do; all it requires is to understand law as a form of religion, and to stop believing.

At this point, the critic may rightly ask whether there is any sense in talking of the demise of something that never existed in the first place—for states have never truly been sovereign. They have always had to share power and they have always had to recognize human-made limits to their power even in their own grounds. Is there, moreover, not a contradiction in terms in the idea that sovereignty is predicated on the recognition of sovereignty by other entities claiming sovereignty—is not ‘sovereignty’ then merely the temporary toleration of self-rule by others? The critic’s premises are correct, but the conclusion is arrived at too quickly. There is a confusion here of power with legality. As a legal fiction, state sovereignty existed, and exists to this day, and the idea exerts a tremendous influence in politics as well as in political science and political philosophy—both of which in turn occasionally help to shape real politics. The fact that legal sovereignty is a fiction does not make it any less of a fact—just a different kind of fact.

In thinking about politics, whether academically or as a citizen or politician, it obviously makes a fundamental difference if one assumes the state to be (capable of being) sovereign or not, and if one believes sovereignty to be a desirable attribute of the state or not. If the state is sovereign and cannot be otherwise, then it is responsible for its acts and omissions to act, it is the natural object of analysis for academic research, and it is the primary instrument of all social good and evil. If the state is not sovereign, but can and should be, then the same applies and it should be held accountable for its failure to deliver. If the state cannot or should not be sovereign, however, then the perspective changes. Political scientists then need to redefine their object of research; political philosophers need to reconsider their ideas on the most desirable shape and order of the political community, on loyalty and obligation, on power and inequality; and citizens have to look elsewhere (or to an additional source) for their instruments of salvation.

It is only when we let go of the fiction of the sovereign state, once we allow its demise, that we can sensibly ask why a sovereign state would be desirable (or not), whether it is possible (or not), and what kind of alternatives we face. Here, I assume that it is not possible for states (note the plural) to be sovereign. Whether ‘not possible’ means ‘not possible any more’ or ‘not possible in any case’ is immaterial; my interest lies in a normative assessment of the alternatives: in the absence of sovereign states, what can we hope to achieve in politics, and which institutions to realize those hopes would be legitimate? This type of question may remind some readers of a venerable but short-lived school in English political philosophy known as British political pluralism, representatives of which (among other things) rejected state sovereignty and defended the authority and independence of voluntary associations (Nicholls 1975). Although some of the ideas I defend in this book are similar, I shall argue below (in Chapter 2) that the resemblance is relatively superficial. British political pluralism failed to acknowledge that the denial of sovereignty goes hand in hand with the denial of the unity of society.

1.2 Replies to political pluralization

Why should we be interested in the consequences of the demise of the state, let alone worry and look for things we can do about it? I will not provide a general answer to the first part of this question: it is quite legitimate, even if one has the rare luxury of time to spare, not to be interested in politics.

Yet if one is interested, one should worry. The sovereign state may be a Leviathan, a tyrant, a monster of unequalled power and knowledge, reined in only, imperfectly and perhaps merely accidentally, by actively enforced constitutional freedoms, by vigilant citizens and interest groups and by the reality of other powers—but it was conceived of for a very good reason. Quoting Peter Steinberger again:

The state is best understood as a structure of intelligibility. (…) The propositions of which the state is composed are those that collectively embody the various judgments that the citizens of the state have made about how things really are. As such, they reflect a complex and comprehensive intellectual world—an immense world of concepts and beliefs. The state is the orderly and authoritative arrangement of this intellectual world, formulated so as to reflect and promote the social good.

(Steinberger 2004:13)

The state brings order into the chaos of social life. The sovereign state made possible (in theory) a life of security and safety, prosperity and a perspective on happiness, for all within its territory. It was the modern (i.e. post-medieval) answer to the eternal quest for a political order that would guarantee an as harmonious as possible satisfaction of both the desires and demands of individuals, and of the demands posed by the necessity of life in community with others. It solved, at least in theory, the problem of choosing who should govern whom, while taking the risk that the ruler(s) ruled according to their self-interest—a problem haunting political philosophy since at least Aristotle’s times. ‘Who’ has simply been replaced by ‘what’: an institution rather than an individual or individuals. It solved, at least in theory, the question of divided loyalties and contradictory freedoms and obligations—not only those of the feudal lord holding land and rights from two overlords, not only those of the Christian torn between Church and Emperor, but also those of Antigone torn between her blood and her love of Athens. All loyalty henceforth simply derived from that owed to the sovereign state. More importantly, the concept of a sovereign state contributed, in practice, to the restriction of self-interested rule and social conflict, to the rise of liberal democracy and the rule of law—to the advancement of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for all, and not just a happy few.

In the absence of a state, anything is possible again. Loyalties can be divided again and no clear ranking or reconciliation technique is available, political agents can again serve the interests of some at the expense of others, competing institutions can claim dominion over the same act of the same citizen, and no right whatsoever is warranted. Chaos will rule supreme—homo homini lupus, bellum omnia contra omnes. Or that, at least, is the worstcase scenario, the dystopian nightmare that should haunt anyone prudent enough not to believe in the inevitability of Kingdom Come or communist paradise.

Thus rises the question what our reply to political pluralization should be. Many answers are imaginable, from the absurd through the reasonable to the impossible; I can discuss only a few. In Chapter 3, I investigate the reply that I hold to be insufficient: coping with political pluralization by using the instruments we already have. The major premise of the argument against coping is the need (under the presumably classic circumstances of a ‘closed’ sovereign state) for authoritative, decisive interference in society, aimed at perpetuating the existence of said society. The argument also applies under different circumstances—the need for authoritative and decisive interference exists in any social and political constellation, not merely within a sovereign state. However, political pluralization by definition precludes the existence of an agent with the necessary clout to warrant such interference. In the special case of (economic) globalization, one could argue that this problem is not only recognized but is actually being addressed through international treaties and the creation of treaty organizations: coalitions are formed there, forces combined in the hope that states may be stronger together. Yet rather than diminishing the degree of political pluralization, treaties increase it (as I show in Chapter 2). In a way, states dig their own graves by partaking in the modern treaty culture.

‘Coping’, I conclude, may lead to viable and even effective policies, but not to the restoration of an unfragmented sovereign state, and nor, therefore, to a perfect cure for the effects of political pluralization. This raises the question of whether and how we can design alternative institutions or policies that are aimed either directly or indirectly at the creation of a limited degree of order among competing authorities and rules, and aimed at the creation of some limited kind of reference frame or polity. The remaining chapters explore this question by investigating the legitimization of cooperative ventures and institutions, and the various forms this legitimization can take. In doing so, we shall discover that there is no final cure, at least none that warrants liberal-democratic values, and perhaps there does not have to be one. Political pluralization itself can be understood as a legitimate structuring of social and political life—imperfect as it may be.

1.3 From politics to policy

One criterion of legitimate rule—in addition to deliberate effectiveness and efficiency—is that of justification: the exercise of authority, be it in the form of the attribution of rights or the application of violence, must be supported by good reasons. What constitutes a good reason has always been open to debate—a debate rooted in Plato’s suspicion that democracy tends to rule good those reasons that are ‘felt’ to be good by the mob, rather than reasons that are warranted by careful deliberation, let alone reasons that are good by some objective standard.¹ Taking a more or less realistic perspective, and accepting that what moves politics is not being right but being thought to be right, the best we can aim for is reasons warranted by deliberation. In Chapter 4, I expand on this concept and investigate how discord on normative (ethical, moral, political) principles is usually dealt with in political philosophy.

In a world of political pluralization, good reasons are of vital importance; there is, by definition, no longer one unitary overpowering actor to push through decisions that are not perceived as legitimate (or desirable, or effective and efficient) by all the parties that make up a polity—be they reasonable or not. Under such circumstances, the possibility of political rule, let alone legitimate rule, is predicated on the possibility of what is nowadays often called multilevel governance: coordinated action by (all) factions, groups and political actors who have at least ‘obstructive power’—that is the power to thwart or nullify the actions of others. The conclusion I draw in Chapter 4 is perhaps predictable: the solutions for discord that political philosophy ‘normally’ offers focus on agreement on the principles underlying action, and the procedures for reaching that kind of agreement will only work effectively under very special conditions. In real politics, consensus or rather adequate agreement on good reasons behind which parties can unite can seldom be reached at such abstract levels—even assuming that it would be sufficient to solve disagreements on the practical (policy) implications of shared principles.

In Chapter 5, I therefore offer an additional mechanism and an additional conception of legitimate rule as based on good reasons: the notion of a policy telos. A policy telos is a policy aim that more or less causes itself to come into existence—hence its status as ‘telos’. Rather than defining precisely what the goals of policies are, and by what criteria (shared principles) the results should be assessed, the role of policy teloi is to unite stakeholders and actors on particular policies, regardless of the higher principles each hopes to realize. Thus, for instance, ‘sustainable development’ has in practice been used as such a policy telos. The parties involved in environmental policy do not agree on what it is they hope to achieve: there are many mutually exclusive conceptions of a sustainable society, and the added notion of development only further complicates any discussion. On a practical level, however, these same parties can and often do agree on the policies to be pursued, and, once executed, such policies reduce both the number of possible future worlds and the range of disagreement on sustainable development.

Policy teloi are, however, not a panacea for all the troubles of political pluralization; they only add an extra instrument to the toolbox of philosopher and politician. The concept, like so many others, is useful only under specific circumstances which include: rough equality of power among all parties involved, their involvement as such, and substantive disagreement on principles. I address the first two conditions in Chapters 8–10, and the last one in Chapters 6 and 7: can we move beyond the sheer accidental coincidence of policy preferences and offer more stability, even in the form of ethical agreement, under circumstances of moral pluralism? In Chapter 6, I try to extend the application of deliberative political discourse to include principles at a higher level than politics, i.e. principles based not on an overlapping Rawlsian consensus but on justifiable criteria for the procedures by which political principles are chosen.

In the end, no number or kind of agreement-building strategy can guarantee that any political action is taken, even when parties agree that something needs to be done. It is at this point that politics takes the shape of decision-making in the sense outlined by Carl Schmitt (cutting the Gordian knot) rather than in the sense known in liberal democracy (consensus building). Here, politics becomes Alexandrism: overruli...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• List of Illustrations
• Preface
• 1 Introduction
• 2 Political pluralization
• 3 The need to interfere
• 4 Principles, discord and concord
• 5 Sustainability as a policy telos
• 6 Beyond political principles
• 7 Alexandrism
• 8 The new polis
• 9 Citizenship in the metropolis
• 10 The princes of industry
• 11 Harmony and political pluralization
• Notes
• Bibliography