International integration and democracy: No love at first sight

• 成果类型: Review
• 署名作者: Stein, E
• 刊物名称: AMERICAN JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL LAW
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0002-9300
• DOI: 10.2307/2668491
• 发表日期: 2001
• 页码: 489-+
• 关键词: DISPUTE SETTLEMENT; european-union; HUMAN-RIGHTS; free-trade; WTO; NAFTA; legitimacy; LAW; TRANSPARENCY; institutions

摘要

In this essay I suggest a correlation between the integration level of an international institution and the public discourse(1) about the lack of democracy and legitimacy in the institution's structure and functioning. This discourse includes ideas for remedial action at both the national and international levels; it also becomes inevitably intertwined with other reform proposals that may call for an incremental or-particularly in the case of a more integrated organization-a radical restructuring. Having originated in the highly integrated European Community, the debate on the democracy-legitimacy deficit has reached other institutions, particularly the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the international financial bodies, and has become one component of the backlash rhetoric against globalization. I first provide a glimpse of the ongoing mutations in the national and international Systems and in the idea and practice of democracy. I next discuss the basic concepts including the process of integration. I offer a list of normative-institutional and empirical-social attributes germane to international organizations at discrete levels of integration. I then focus on public discourse regarding the democracy-legitimacy deficit in these organizations, with specific attention to two global organizations (the World Health Organization [WHO] and the WTO) and two regional groupings (the North American Free Trade Agreement [NAFTA] and the European Union [EU]). I conclude with some general observations and note the suggestions for possible reform, both modest and ambitious, reaching the heart of the international system.