Critically evaulate the view that international organisations and Essay

Critically evaulate the view that international organisations and global governance systems are undemocratic - Essay Example Indeed, it is very much possible to see that global institutions such as International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank and World Trade Organisation (WTO) do play an active role in the governance, political and economic organisation of many countries from around the world. Importantly, the issue of deficit of democracy primarily arises from the fact that while the nation states are at least theoretically accountable to the national civil society, the international institutions are accountable to none. All the nation states do not wield equal power in many of the transnational institutions. Moreover, if we look at the internal structure and power balance within, most of the international institutions are tilting towards the rich countries of the Global South. Global Institutions, Global Governance and Lack of Global Democracy The making of accelerated globalisation was characterised by the shift of governance from the national to the global. The nation state is being increasingly chall enged by the forces of globalisation. At present, the democracy is solely expressed through national governments and their institutions. In other words, the national parliament is the only abode of democracy. However, the rise of international organisations has led to their growing clutch on the national economies, politics and policies. It is followed the rise of unaccountable forces of neoliberal capitalism which effectively surpass any idea of national and popular sovereignty. It has led to a kind of global elite consolidation as there exists no world parliament. Still, the absence of world parliament does not automatically translated as the absence of global sovereignty. Global sovereignty certainly exists as the consolidated and concentrated power of global market forces and their institutions. It is primarily because of this lack of democracy within, the meetings of international finance and trade institutions attract huge resistance from activists and political groups from ar ound the world. The voting rights in a major institution such international monetary fund is based on proportional vote wherein ‘one country, one vote’ principle is not followed. On the contrary, countries get their voting rights based on their economic share in the institution. The United States in particular and the West in general are also able to exert disproportional influence in the decision making bodes of IMF and World Bank. One of the major problems with international governance organisations is that they do not directly draw their legitimacy form any popular sources. In other words, the legitimacy of the global institutions is solely depended upon their ability to intervene and act decisively in certain situations and places. Although, there is a lot of talk on the emergence of a global civil society which could effectively counter the lack of democracy in global governance institutions, nothing yet has materialised. Conversely, the so-called global civil soci ety itself is predominantly dominated by many Non Governmental Organisations which are accountable not to the people but to the funding agencies. In the question of transparency too, the status of global transnational organisations is not very different from the global finance or political institutions. Here, the very lack of representation of the voice of the developing