2007-11 - Corporate globalisation, civil society and post-political regulation - whither democracy?

8/9/2019 2007-11 - Corporate globalisation, civil society and post-political regulation - whither democracy?

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Corporate globalisation, civil society

and post-political regulation Whither democracy?

Christina Garsten and Kerstin Jacobsson

Introduction: Globalisation scenarios, asymmetries and

regulatory gapsGlobalisation is a word suggestive o many utures. For some, glo-

balisation provides scenarios or a better world. It entails enhanced

interconnectedness, seamless communications and the potential or

instant linking o distant communities. It promises easy access to

inormation and resources and an opening-up o boundar ies o var-

ious sorts. For others, it suggests a subordination o social equity

and justice to productivity and competitiveness. Rather than easy

access to resources it suggests widening gaps between the wealthy

and powerul and those isolated rom access to basic resources. And

or yet others, the more important issues are to do with the global

threats to environment, to ood and water and biological diversity.

Globalisation is essentia lly a process o risk diusion on a scale never

beore experienced.

Indeed there is more to globalisation than meets the eye. Unpacking

some o the globalisation scenarios reveals that just as there as many

scenarios there are great asymmetries o globalisation. Some groups

o people are authors o globalisation processes, some recipients; some

are winners, some losers. Globalisation, its possibilities and benets,has varying impacts across the world. Not all people are equally in-

volved in globalisation. Also, dierent processes o globalisation, such

as the movement o people, ideas, nance and technology, do not go

hand in hand, but dance unevenly with each other (see, or exam-

ple: Appadurai, 1990; Hannerz, 1992; Sassen, 1998). We are seeing

how corporate nance moves easily, whereas some basic resources,

or some groups o people, are let out o the circuits o mobility. The

term globalisation is no doubt expansionist in its universalising am-

bitions, yet it is something o a misnomer. Globalisation, in Baumans

words (1998: 2) divides as much as it unites; it divides as it unites the

causes o division being identical with those which promote the uni-

ormity o the globe. What seems to be an opening-up o the world

and its possibil ities or some is perceived by others as a closing-down.


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144 development dialogue november 2007 global civil society

In other words, globalisation translates dierently across the world

and its impacts and expressions vary greatly.

Corporations are drivers o globalisation processes, authors o globali-

sation scenarios. To a large extent, the new economies o scale mean

that corporations are increasingly operating across and beyond bor-

ders, at a transnational or even a supranational level. Ideological shits

in the late 20th century have also provided more leeway or global

corporate activity. Since the 1980s, when Ronald Reagan and Marga-

ret Thatcher were in power, corporations have beneted greatly rom

the shit away rom the notion o government as economic arbiter

towards a belie in market orces as the road to prosperity (Florini,

2003: 98). Indeed, corporations are now in command o considerable

resources across the world and, to that end, are important players in

the ashioning o global scenarios. Corporate power now extends be-

yond national borders, maximising the advantages o operating both

within and beyond national structures, while relying crucially on the

legal, scal, environmental and human organisation o the nation-

state (Appadurai, 1996: 168).

The increased presence o transnational corporations on the global

arena also implies that they are positioned to exert much greater in-fuence on the distribution o resources within and across societies.

Many command resources that are ormidably large in relation to

those o the nation-state. The eects o corporate activities can be

wide-ranging, impinging not just on economic actors, but also on

the environment and on social and cultural structures. Deregula-

tion in both rich and poor countries has opened the door to the play

o market orces across borders and to mergers and acquisitions that

have strengthened corporate power at the transnational level. With

the gradual dismantling o national regulations and trade barriers,

a related retreat rom welarism and corporatism, and the establish-ment o fexible and entrepreneurial corporations as the template or

organisational design, disorganised capitalism has taken a strong grip

on the world. In the absence o a world government with a mandate

to oversee and sanction the doings o corporations, nation-state gov-

ernments are acing severe challenges. Large-scale global economies

leave us with a ragmented political authority with limited power to

control markets (Palan, 2000). The regulatory activities o corpora-

tions will thus have an impact on what route globalisation will take,

and how it translates into everyday reality or people.

The diering scenarios o globalisation have a lot to do with govern-

ance. The orms o governance, the ways in which groups o people

The increased presence oftransnational corporations onthe global arena also impliesthat they are positioned toexert much greater influenceon the distribution ofresources within andacross societies


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corporate globalisation, civil society and post-political regulation whither democracy? 145

collectively make choices and set the parameters or the ordering o

society, will to a large extent determine what globalisation eventu-

ally entails or people. Contemporary globalisation scenarios involvea dynamic and oten confictual relation between corporate powers

and markets on the one hand, and the multiaceted interests o civil

society on the other. Economic interest and social responsibility sel-

dom go hand in hand, and are oten at odds with each other.

With enhanced globalisation o markets, increasing nancial inter-

dependencies, transnational fows across borders, and re-ordering o

social relationships across o time and space, we are acing signi-

cant challenges in the regulation o market orces. In our view, the

attempts to regulate are increasingly characterised by a belie in the

possibility o consensus. Voluntary regulatory arrangements, sot law

and moral regulatory rameworks such as codes o conduct, standards

or corporate social responsibil ity (CSR) and the like, are gaining in-

creasing recognition. Oten these rameworks, although developed

by powerul corporations or multilateral organisations such as the

OECD, are taken to represent the voice o civil society.

In this ar ticle, we argue that the trend towards voluntarism ultimately

means that political conficts are transormed into moral rameworks.Likewise, confictual relationships are increasingly transormed into

consensual ones (see also Garsten and Jacobsson, 2007). The article

ocuses specically on global regulation and governance, which, we

argue, is highly post-political in nature. This has certain implications

or the conceptualisation o civil society, or the role o civil society

in challenging and regulating corporate globalisation and ultimately

or democracy. With an increasingly consensual, voluntary and moral

conception o regulation o market orces, what happens to demo-

cratic processes and political action?

Voluntary regulatory arrangements and the blurring of

boundaries

Even i there is no world government, the world is spanned by many

organisations with global governance concerns. However powerul

they may be, corporations thus do not exist in environments ree

o rules. On the contrary, they have to respond to rule-making or-

ganisations at dierent levels. There is large number o organisations

that seek to advise, guide or set rules or the conduct o corporationsin a global market. The emergence o such standard-promoting or-

ganisations is an expression o the broader growth o new orms o

organisations and governance that have been reerred to as constitut-


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ing part o world society (Meyer, 1994). These organisations expend

considerable eort convincing other organisations that it is in their

interest to accept and adopt these new, voluntary orms o regulation.(Brunsson, Jacobsson and associates, 2002). We are seeing the orma-

tion o new transnational legal regimes and regulatory institutions

that are either private or supranational and are taking over unctions

until recently located in nation-state institutions (Sassen, 1998).

Rules aimed at promoting a higher degree o corporate social ac-

countability are now increasingly being placed on the corporate agen-

da. Corporate leaders are, to varying degrees, responding to pressures

rom dierent kinds o organisations and movements, ranging rom

local civil society groups to international governmental organisa-

tions (IGOs). They are alerted that they need to make sure interna-

tional agreements on human rights, labour rights and environmen-

tal protection are not breeched. Alongside nancial interests, which

are clearly the primary ocus, social and ethical issues are brought

onto the agenda o corporate activities. As Marcus (1998:7) notes,

the emphasis on organizational competitiveness is still there, but the

discourse is infated with concerns about values, corporate person-

hood, the relation o individuals to community in general, those

topics that might have been considered beore as sot in relation tomeans-ends modications o organisational practices with the bot-

tom line o competitive enhancement always in sight.

Corporate social responsibility has since the 1960s emerged as a re-

sponse to concerns about the role o corporations in society at large.

CSR suggests that corporations have an obligation to consider the

interests not only o shareholders, but also o customers, employees,

and communities, in all aspects o their operations. This obligation

extends beyond their statutory obligation to comply with legislation.

These new orms o governance, or regulation, are most oten volun-tary in nature. They build on the voluntary adoption o standards and

codes o conduct by corporations, rather than on orce or sanctions.

They rely on the voluntary engagement o corporations in issues o

human rights, workers rights and social responsibility, rather than on

clear directives. Moreover, we see a multiplicity o actors being in-

volved in these voluntary transnational governance activities: state ac-

tors, corporations, non-prot organisations, proessional associations,

intergovernmental organisations, sometimes in networks o private

and public actors. Corporations are entering into partnerships withcivil society organisations, with NGOs, as well as with IGOs and

state agencies, to develop common rameworks or social responsi-

bility, codes o conduct or ethical policies. Oten, these rameworks

Corporate social responsibility... suggests that corporationshave an obligation to considerthe interests not only ofshareholders, but also of

customers, employees, andcommunities, in all aspects oftheir operations


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although isare taken to represent the voice o civil society. Civil so-

ciety is thus drawn onto the agenda o corporations, as a stakeholder

to be reckoned with, a partner. Generally, it is considered importantto develop good relations with the surrounding community, to pro-

mote an image o goodwill and thus to secure the backing o the

social context o corporate operations. To a great extent, these eorts

are part o a brand positioning, o reputation management, as well as

maintaining stable employee relations.

In the new orms o global governance, states are just one type o ac-

tor among others involved in regulatory activity; the state must in-

creasingly share rule-making authority with other actors. Hierarchi-

cal orms o governance are being replaced by network governance

or by governance without government. This means that systems o

regulation are developed which lack an authoritative centre and thus

have a dispersed power and authority structure. (On dispersion o au-

thority see Strange, 1996, and on private authority in international

aairs, see Cutler et al., 1999; Hall and Biersteker 2002). Scott has

used the concept o post-regulatory states (Scott, 2004) to capture

the blurring between public and private actors and the introduction

o more de-centred orms o regulation, relying less on state authority

and sanctioning power. We can in this case speak o post-sovereignorms o regulation and governance. Governments still govern but

increasingly in partnership with other actors.

The multiplicity o actors involved in global governance has its cor-

respondence in the variation in regulatory modes: sel-regulation by

private actors (whether by delegation by a public actor or on their

own initiative and on a voluntary basis), co-regulation o public and

private actors, or the use o sot law, such as guidelines, recommen-

dations and codes o conduct, by public as well as private actors. Sot

law bridges the dichotomy o law and non-law as well as o public andprivate actors (Mrth, 2006: 120). Sot law is normative in content but

is not backed up by sanctions or hierarchy (Mrth, 2004).

Others have spoken o post-regulatory orms o governance: While

traditional regulation imposes mandates that are relatively specic and

uniorm, hierarchically determined, static, and substantive, in post-

regulatory governance there is a preerence or procedures or general

standards with wide allowances or variation rather than detailed rules,

or intensive consultation to set and modiy standards, or standardsthat are wholly or partly voluntary, and or adjustments over time in

response to eed-back. Post-regulatory governance is fexible in the

ace o dierent conditions across space and time (Mosher, 2000: 6).


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New governance is procedural, heterarchical and fexible, in contrast

with old-style governance which is regulatory, top-down and uniorm

(Eberlein and Kerwer, 2004; Mosher and Trubek, 2003).

These new modes o governance rely on the voluntary adoption and

acceptance o involved actors. Generally, they are more fexible and

adaptable to varied business operations and social contexts. By rely-

ing on partnership ideas and multi-stakeholder involvement, they also

tend to blur the boundaries between business and civil society, and

between the interests o dierent organisations and collectivities. But

what interests us here is not so much their capacity or incapacity to

ensure commitment and abidance through this orm o governance,

but their normative and post-political character. It is to this topic that

we now turn.

Moral frameworks and post-political regulation

A powerul example o the voluntary base o global governance o

corporate aairs is the UN Global Compact. In an address to the

World Economic Forum on 31 January 1999, the ormer Secretary-

General o the United Nations, Ko Annan, challenged business

leaders to join an international initiative the Global Compact thatwould bring companies together with UN agencies, labour and civil

society to support universal environmental and social principles. The

Global Compact was launched at the UN Headquarters in New York

on 26 July 2000. Today, thousands o companies rom all regions o

the world, international labour and civil society organisations are en-

gaged in the Global Compact, working to advance 10 universal prin-

ciples in the areas o human rights, labour, the environment and anti-

corruption .

The Global Compact seeks to promote responsible corporate citi-zenship so that business can be part o the solution to the challenges

o globalisation. In this way, the private sector in partnership with

other social actors can help realise the ormer Secretary-Generals

vision: a more sustainable and inclusive global economy (http://www.

unglobalcompact.org/AboutTheGC/index.html, visited 12.5.07).

The Global Compact is a purely voluntary initiative with two objec-

tives: to mainstream the 10 principles in business activities around

the world, and to catalyse actions in support o UN goals. To achieve

these objectives, the Global Compact oers acilitation and engage-

ment through several mechanisms: policy dialogues, learning, coun-

try/regional networks and partnership projects. The Global Compact


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is not a conventional regulatory instrument it does not police, en-

orce or measure the behaviour or actions o companies. Rather, it

relies on public accountability, transparency and the enlightenedsel-interest o companies, labour and civil society to initiate and

share substantive action in pursuing the principles upon which the

Global Compact is based.

The Global Compact denes itsel as a network that involves all the

relevant social actors: governments, who dened the principles on

which the initiative is based; corporations, whose actions it seeks to

infuence; labour, in whose hands the concrete process o global pro-

duction takes place; civil society organisations, representing the wid-

er community o stakeholders; and the United Nations (http://www.

unglobalcompact.org/AboutTheGC/index.html, visited 12.5.07). The

voluntary nature o the Global Compact has proved successul in at-

tracting a large number o corporations to join, but has also attracted

a great deal o criticism or being an initiative with zero teeth, and

with no power to sanction or otherwise pursue corporations who ail

to meet the principles.

The rhetoric o the Global Compact thus relies on voluntarism, con-

sensus and humanitarianism, rather than on orce, confict and poli-tics. It works by encouraging and providing incentives to responsibil-

ity and accountability. Indeed, the rhetoric o social responsibility

has to a large extent displaced the political interests o corporations.

Following in the wake o the new vocabulary o social concern and

accountability, the classic antagonisms o state and market, welare

and prot, have also been eradicated, or at least blurred. Ethics and

moralities are now replacing politics. The conditions are claimed to

be ripe or deliberative or dialogic orms o democracy, at a global

level (Moue, 1999: 2).

Voluntarism is an idea that ts nicely with the market. Corporations

have shown a distinct preerence or limiting the debate to voluntary

standards and sel-regulation. Many intergovernmental organisations,

such as the OECD, the EU and the UN, have reinorced this ten-

dency. Also, advocacy groups tend to promote voluntary initiatives

beore the idea o legally binding rules. The general understanding

is that corporations should commit themselves to, not be orced into,

nding suitable means to ensure that their commitments are ullled.

The UN Global Compact is a clear example o this belie.

Behind such voluntary regulation lies an oten illusory consensus.

Since the principles, codes or standards are oten abstract in char-

The rhetoric of the GlobalCompact thus relies onvoluntarism, consensus andhumanitarianism, rather thanon force, conflict and politic


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acter, agreement and consensus can easily be reached at the level

o principle. Drawing on Moue (1999), it is important here to

recognise the distinct ion o the politica l, with the post-politica l.Whi le the political is characterised by confict, the post-political

vision implies that conficts can be transcended. In contemporary

political discourse, and not least in relation to corporate power,

conficts and conrontations are increasingly considered outdated.

Instead, collaborat ion and partnership are seen to oer more con-

structive ways o reaching policy agreements. Moue takes issue

with the consensus model implicit in the thinking around notions

o deliberative democracy. The consensus model postulates the

possibility o win-win politics, and suggests that there are solu-

tions that are supposedly benecia l or all people in society. Along

the same lines, we suggest that the role o corporations today is

largely being reconceptualised as one not necessarily in opposi-

tion to, but rather complementary to, that o the state and welare

politics. The us and them distinction, so crucial in much politi-

cal thinking, is no longer there. Instead, corporations are drawn

into circles o discussion, negotiation and agreement around pos-

sible ways o regulating world trade and corporate activities. And

with the blurr ing o the us and them dist inction politics tends to

disappear rom centre stage. Instead, we are let with an il lusion oconsensus and agreement.

For Moue, the excess o consensus is dangerous because it is poten-

tially socially explosive. Democracy is in peril not only when there

is insu cient consensus and allegiance to the values it embodies, but

also when its agonistic dynamic is hindered by an apparent excess o

consensus, which usually masks a disquieting apathy (Moue, 1993:

6). According to Moue, it is a typical liberal illusion that we can

have pluralism without antagonism. To Moue, pluralism without

antagonism is pluralism without the dimension o the political. Shedraws on Carl Schmitt in insisting on the dimension o confictual-

ity as inherent in the political. Confict is the crucial category o

politics. According to both Moue and Schmitt, politics needs an us

and them distinction. In the realm o corporate social responsibility

(CSR), the us and them is basical ly outdated, and substituted or by

notions o partnership and collaboration. There is no basic antago-

nism between state and market, social accountability and business.

Instead there is the potentiality o agreement, complementarity and

consensus. The power o corporations to impact on social, culturaland environmental aspects o the surrounding society is still there,

but downplayed. The market, despite its ideology o competition,

works best by silencing conficts o interest and shadowing power.

With the blurring of the usand them distinction politicstends to disappear fromcentre stage. Instead, weare left with an illusion ofconsensus and agreement


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Whither democracy?

In the area o CSR, which is by nature a political area with high politi-cal stakes, politics are downplayed in avour o normative and morally

imbued exhortations. In Moues view, political conficts are increas-

ingly played out in the moral register (Moue, 2005: 3). She illustrates

with the war against terrorism, but also with the rise o right-wing

populism and the moral condemnation och such populism by the po-

litical establishments. By moralisation Moue means that political an-

tagonisms are ormulated in terms o good and evil (2005: 75). In her

view, this is a problem since when politics is played out in the register

o morality, antagonisms cannot take an agonistic orm (2005: 76). In

the realm o CSR, this is clearly evinced in the vocabularies used byactors, such as partner, partnership, commitment and agreement.

There is little in the way o antagonism, confict, party or interest ex-

cept at grassroots level, where the actual consequences o ailures to live

up to the codes o conduct are experienced.

True, the economic and the moral domain have always been nested

into each other in dierent ways. In this regard, the moralistic turn

o business in the area o CSR is nothing new. But what is perhaps

new is the particular ways in which the relevance o the political or

understanding and or regulation o the economic domain is down-

played in avour o the moral. The regulatory gaps and the ragment-

ed political authority o nation-states in the globalised economy leave

a space or normativity and moralisation to enter. The economy is

to be understood in terms o its own laws and challenges, and politi-

cal interventions in the economic sphere are thereore to be limited.

But the moral domain, as a confuence o ideology, conscience and

conduct, is to be understood as an increasingly important part o the

economy.

According to Moue, politics proper is replaced by moralisation and/

or juridication. Given the growing impossibility o envisioning the

problems o society in a proper political way, either is a marked ten-

dency to privilege the juridical eld and to expect the law to provide

the solutions to all types o confict. The juridical sphere is becom-

ing the terrain where social conficts can nd a orm o expression

(Moue, 2000: 115). In the case o CSR, juridication, in the sense

o the laws expansion into new policy areas and dierentiation into

sub-elds as well as increased confict-solving with reerence to law

(Blichner and Molander, 2005), is not an accurate description o what

is happening. Given the act that the existing base o international

law or extending international legal obligations to corporations in

the area o human rights and workers rights is di cult to implement,


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the tendency is, rather, one o a delimiteda role or international law

and binding rules, and an enhanced role or sot-law initiatives such

as guidelines, standards and codes o conduct. And these orms oenorcement are by nature voluntary and inused with a moral dis-

course.

Hence, while we agree with Moue that there is a shit rom politics

to moralisation we wish to emphasise here the enhanced role o what

we call post-political orms o governance in contemporary polity,

which are, indeed, legitimised by ideology and discourse.Regulatory

codes is that theywork byt taking ewhat is essentially a political prob-

lem, removinge it rom the realm o political discourse and recasting

it in neutral language. Regulatory codes oten present themselves as

rational, objective and neutral, based on the sound principles o hu-

man solidarity and market dynamics working together to orm a hu-

mane capitalism. Corporate citizenship and social accountability gain

legitimacy by enabling corporations to strike a balance, at least theo-

retically, between prot and greed, moral considerations and univer-

sal values (Garsten, 2003).

As stated by Parker (2002: 245), Corporate responsibility, or citizen-

ship, is constituted in interaction between ormal regulation throughthe state, inormal social action (the penumbra o democracy and in-

stitutions o civil society) and corporate sel-regulation. Despite the

power o corporations to shape everyday social lie and their com-

mand o huge resources, international as well as national polity lacks

the adequate tools and techniques to oversee their capacity or sel-

regulation and to respond to avoidance o accountability. Generally,

new orms o post-political governance are not tied adequately to in-

stitutions o democracy. Oten, there is little in the way o organizsed

ollow-up on the extent to which corporations actually take action on

accountability. The corporate shell is rarely permeated by civil soci-ety stakeholders or by the general public, but despite talk o transpar-

ency the corporation remains largely inaccessible to the public eye

(Garsten and Lindh de Montoya, orthcoming). Dialogue and nego-

tiation are rarely pursued to the extent where they can actually infu-

ence additional responsibilities or changes in sel-regulatory arrange-

ments by corporations. Hence, the legitimacy o post-political orms

o regulation must, by denition, be questioned.

Following Schmitt, we contest that the absence o the political is alsodue to liberal thinking as such and liberal thinking is hegemonic in

world aairs today. According to Schmitt, liberalism can only oscil-

late between ethics and economics and is bound to miss the speci-

The corporate shell is rarelypermeated by civil societystakeholders or by the generalpublic, but despite talk oftransparency the corporationremains largely inaccessible tothe public eye


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city o the political. State and politics disappear in liberal thinking.

In a very systematic ashion liberal thought evades or ignores state

and politics and moves instead in a typical, always recurring polarityo two heterogeneous spheres, namely ethics and economics, intel-

lect and trade, education and property (Schmitt, quoted in Moue,

2000: 46). In this perspective, both moralisation and marketisation

ull a truly de-politicising unction. In our view, the transorma-

tion o politics into ethics or economics is a better example o post-

politics than o juridication. Global regulation and governance, in

our view, by its very nature implies a moving away rom conficts, or

surace conficts hide the real conficts in the world. Voluntary mar-

ket mechanisms are believed be more eective than politics. To draw

on Moues vocabulary: ivoluntary regulation postulates that a world

without antagonisms is possible.

What we nd useul or our purposes is the concept o the post-po-

litical as well as the notion that it is a liberal illusion that we can have

a pluralism without antagonism, that power can be thrown out o the

window. Here, we would like to add one dimension to the post-politi-

cal nature o global governance and regulation that is not ully covered

in Moues analysis, namely the act that the nature o power relations

and control is made invisible in CSR types o regulation. There is adisplacement o the political rom the realm o corporate accountabil-

ity. As Torng puts it, the new orms o governance [take] us beyond

both hierarchical state regulation and competitive market regulation.

Hence, the visible hand o the state and the invisible hand o the

market should be supplemented by the continuous handshake o ne-

gotiated interaction through partnerships and governance networks

(Torng, 2005: 4). Governance networks tend to be networks o actors

held together by common principles, procedures and norms (Ayres and

Braithwaite, 1992; Sahlin-Andersson, 2004).

What is problematic, in our view, is that the implicit consensus model

in much o the new orms o governance goes hand in hand with a

displacement o the political. Inspired by Harper (2000: 47), we sug-

gest that ethical standards, codes o conduct, and principles aimed at

regulating global business, are to some extent in the business o cre-

ating a moral order. In this moral realm, the standards and codes are

given a status beyond political contestation, as morally and ethically

sound, and hence, di cult to question in principle (Garsten, 2003).

The multi-stakeholder model, with its principle o inclusiveness,

used in much o the global governance eorts, can be seen as a way

to increase legitimacy in the absence o a representative democracy.


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It is a societally-based legitimacy rather than one deriving rom a

state-centric representative model (Mrth, 2006). It is, indeed, in

the eld o transnational relations that we nd the other type o ex-pression o a consensus model criticised by Moue, namely delib-

erative democracy. Moue is crit ical o the very idea o deliberative

democracy, with its presumption that society requires a stronger

orm o consensus, namely a moral one, based on impartiality and

resulting rom rational deliberation (Moue, 1999: 3). In her v iew,

agonistic politics is a struggle between hegemonic projects, which

can never be reconciled rationally (Moue, 2005: 21). Moreover,

both the deliberative democratic model and the aggregative model

o democracy, with its negotiation o interests, in her view under-

play the importance o passion as the driving orce in politics. We

can not ully discuss her critique o deliberative democracy here.

Su ce it to note that deliberative democracy has been advanced

in the discourse o transnational democracy. With the di culties

in institutionalising orms and principles o representative democ-

racy transnationally, and with transnational corporations outgrow-

ing national regulation, hopes have been placed in other types o

democracy, notably deliberative democracy (see or instance Erik-

sen and Fossum, 2000; Eriksen, 2005; Closa and Fossum, 2004; Jo-

erges and Neyer, 1997a, 1997b). There are also more skeptical voices(Jacobsson and Viell, 2005; Mrth, 2006). Others basically deend

the principles o statist representative democracy, hoping that it wil l

be possible to extend it to the global level, or instance through a

world parliament (Held, 1995).

Concluding notes: Global democracy on the slippery road

In our view, it is questionable whether new post-political orms o

regulation, with the accompanying moralisation o political discourse

and the reliance on market mechanisms, can contribute in any strongsense to democracy at an international level. It is hard to conceive o

a democratic project where neutralisation and displacement o poli-

tics are ever-present. Democracy, in the Western representative orm,

comes with ideas o diering interests, separation o powers, o areas

o responsibility, o accountability and even liability. And it is exact-

ly the notion o accountability that is di cult to pursue in corporate

social responsibility, with its post-political orms o governance. And

without su cient openness and transparency, dialogue and negotia-

tion with the public and with civil society as stakeholder is hampered.

Decisions taken, and the procedures preceding them, are oten di -

cult to track backwards.


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To conclude, whether or not CSR as a orm o post-political gov-

ernance on the global scene will lead to more or less democracy is

an open question. Corporate social responsibility and democracy arepart o the same conceptual amily, but they are not twin siblings.

Whereas democratic theory acknowledges the variety o interests and

the dierences in power o interacting parties, corporate social re-

sponsibility orms o governance generally presume the good will o

equal actors. The question remains, can normative appeals to volun-

tary moral action replace politics? We think not.

Corporate social responsibilityand democracy are part of thesame conceptual family, butthey are not twin siblings


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2007-11 - Corporate globalisation, civil society and post-political regulation - whither democracy?

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