Hostname: page-component-745bb68f8f-kw2vx Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-01-31T11:50:34.283Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Global governance in the age of epistemic authority

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 December 2020

Vincent Pouliot Open the ORCID record for Vincent Pouliot [Opens in a new window]
Vincent Pouliot*
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, McGill University, Montreal, Canada
*
Corresponding author. E-mail: vincent.pouliot@mcgill.ca
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Today's global governance is qualitatively different from the past, according to Michael Zürn's penetrating analysis. With the rise of epistemic authority, reflexivity, service, and request have come to surpass command and control as key modes of global governance, leading to new forms of legitimation and contestation. I engage with this rich and thought-provoking argument on three counts. First, it remains doubtful that states defer to international organizations because the latter ‘know better’. There exist many gaps in epistemic authority and politics often trump rationality in global governance. Second, it is not clear how global hierarchy, which Zürn equates with ‘pockets of authority’, could emerge out of demands and requests, precisely because epistemic authority is so fluid and prone to contestation. Third, as historically young and increasingly based on service authority as it may be, contemporary global governance still rests on a body of inherited practices whose legitimation principles seem closer to tradition than to reflexive justification.

Keywords

global governanceinternational organizationsauthorityhierarchypractice
Type
Symposium: Authority, Legitimacy, and Contestation in Global Governance: Edited by Orfeo Fioretos and Jonas Tallberg
Information
International Theory , Volume 13 , Issue 1 , March 2021 , pp. 144 - 156
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Adler, Emanuel. 2019. World Ordering: A Social Theory of Cognitive Evolution. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Autesserre, Séverine. 2014. Peaceland: Conflict Resolution and the Everyday Politics of International Interventions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Avant, Deborah D., Finnemore, Martha, and Sell, Susan K., eds. 2010. Who Governs the Globe? Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barnett, Michael. 2020. “Change In or Of Global Governance?” International Theory 13 (1): 131–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barnett, Michael, and Finnemore, Martha. 2004. Rules for the World: International Organizations in Global Politics. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Best, Jacqueline. 2014. Governing Failure: Provisional Expertise and the Transformation of Global Development Finance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Deitelhoff, Nicole, and Daase, Christopher. 2020. “Rule and Resistance in Global Governance.” International Theory 13 (1): 122–30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hurd, Ian. 2007. After Anarchy: Legitimacy and Power in the United Nations Security Council. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Hurrell, Andrew. 2007. On Global Order: Power, Values, and the Constitution of International Society. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kelley, Judith, and Simmons, Beth A.. 2020. “Governance by Other Means: Rankings as Regulatory Systems.” International Theory 13 (1): 169–78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Keohane, Robert O. 2020. “The Global Politics Paradigm: Guide to the Future or Only the Recent Past?” International Theory 13 (1): 112–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Krisch, Nico. 2017. “Liquid Authority in Global Governance.” International Theory 9 (2): 237–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lake, David. 2009. Hierarchy in International Relations. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Leander, Anna. 2020. “Locating (New) Materialist Characters and Processes in Global Governance.” International Theory 13 (1): 157–68.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Littoz-Monnet, Annabelle. 2017. “Expert Knowledge as a Strategic Resource: International Bureaucrats and the Shaping of Bioethical Standards.” International Studies Quarterly 61 (3): 584–95.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mitzen, Jennifer. 2013. Power in Concert: The Nineteenth-Century Origins of Global Governance. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Murphy, Craig. 1994. International Organization and Industrial Change: Global Governance since 1850. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Nay, Olivier. 2014. “International Organisations and the Production of Hegemonic Knowledge: How the World Bank and the OECD Helped Invent the Fragile State Concept.” Third World Quarterly 35 (2): 210–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Neumann, Iver B. 2002. “Returning Practice to the Linguistic Turn: The Case of Diplomacy.” Millennium: Journal of International Studies 31 (3): 627–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pedersen, Susan P. 2015. The Guardians: The League of Nations and the Crisis of Empire. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Phillips, Andrew, and Sharman, J. C.. 2015. International Order in Diversity: War, Trade and Rule in the Indian Ocean. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pouliot, Vincent. 2008. “The Logic of Practicality: A Theory of Practice of Security Communities.” International Organization 62 (2): 257–88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pouliot, Vincent. 2016. International Pecking Orders: The Politics and Practice of Multilateral Diplomacy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pouliot, Vincent. 2017. “Against Authority: The Heavy Weight of International Hierarchy.” In Hierarchies in World Politics, edited by Ayse Zarakol, 113–133. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pouliot, Vincent. 2020. “Historical Institutionalism Meets Practice Theory: Renewing the Selection Process of the United Nations Secretary-General.” International Organization 74 (4): 742–72.Google Scholar
Pouliot, Vincent, and Thérien, Jean-Philippe. 2015. “The Politics of Inclusion: Changing Patterns in the Governance of International Security.” Review of International Studies 41 (2): 211–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pouliot, Vincent, and Thérien, Jean-Philippe. 2018a. “Global Governance: A Struggle over Universal Values.” International Studies Perspectives 20 (1): 55–73.Google Scholar
Pouliot, Vincent, and Thérien, Jean-Philippe. 2018b. “Global Governance in Practice.” Global Policy 9 (2): 163–72.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Raymond, Mark. 2019. Social Practices of Rule-Making in World Politics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Reus-Smit, Christian. 2017. “Cultural Diversity and International Order.” International Organization 71 (4): 851–85.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Scholte, Jan Aart. 2020. “Beyond Institutionalism: Toward a Transformed Global Governance Theory.” International Theory 13 (1): 179–91.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Seabrooke, Leonard. 2014. “Epistemic Arbitrage: Transnational Professional Knowledge in Action.” Journal of Professions and Organization 1 (1): 49–64.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sending, Ole Jacob. 2015. The Politics of Expertise: Competing for Authority in Global Governance. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sharman, Jason C. 2013. “International Hierarchies and Contemporary Imperial Governance: A Tale of Three Kingdoms.” European Journal of International Relations 19 (2): 189–207.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Steffek, Jens. 2003. “The Legitimation of International Governance: A Discourse Approach.” European Journal of International Relations 9 (2): 249–75.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Taylor, Charles. 1993. “To Follow a Rule…” In Bourdieu: Critical Perspectives, edited by Calhoun, Craig, LiPuma, Edward and Postone, Moishe, 45–60. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Voeten, Erik. 2005. “The Political Origins of the UN Security Council's Ability to Legitimize the Use of Force.” International Organization 59 (3): 527–57.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weaver, Catherine. 2010. “The Politics of Performance Evaluation: Independent Evaluation at the International Monetary Fund.” Review of International Organizations 5 (3): 365–85.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Widmaier, Wesley W. 2004. “The Social Construction of the ‘Impossible Trinity’: The Intersubjective Bases of Monetary Cooperation.” International Studies Quarterly 48 (2): 433–53.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zarakol, Ayse, ed. 2017. Hierarchies in World Politics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zürn, Michael. 2018. A Theory of Global Governance: Authority, Legitimacy, and Contestation. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar