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The legitimacy of international organizations The legitimacy of international organizations Edited by Jean-Marc Coicaud and Veijo Heiskanen United Nations a University Press TOKYO u NEW YORK u PARIS ( The United Nations University, 2001 The views expressed in this publication are those of the authors and do not necessarily re¯ect the views of the United Nations University. United Nations University Press The United Nations University, 53-70, Jingumae 5-chome, Shibuya-ku, Tokyo, 150-8925, Japan Tel: 81-3-3499-2811 Fax: 81-3-3406-7345 E-mail: [email protected] http://www.unu.edu United Nations University Of®ce in North America 2 United Nations Plaza, Room DC2-1462-70, New York, NY 10017, USA Tel: 1-212-963-6387 Fax: 1-212-371-9454 E-mail: [email protected] United Nations University Press is the publishing division of the United Nations University. Cover design by Andrew Corbett Printed in the United States of America UNUP-1053 ISBN 92-808-1053-7 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data The legitimacy of international organizations / edited by Jean-Marc Coicaud and Veijo Heiskanen. p. cm. Includes bibliographicla references and index. ISBN 1. International organization. 2. Legitimacy of governments. I. Coicaud, Jean-Marc. II. Heiskanen, Veijo (Veijo Aulis) KZ4850 .L44 2001 341.20090051Ðdc21 2001004004 Contents Acknowledgements. ................................................. vii Introduction. ........................................................ 1 Veijo Heiskanen Theoretical and structural issues...................................... 45 1 Democracyandinternationalgovernance........................ 47 Susan Marks 2 Intergovernmental societies and the idea of constitutionalism. 69 Philip Allott 3 Constitutional interpretation in international organizations . 104 Jose E. Alvarez 4 The rationality of the use of force and the evolution of internationalorganization......................................... 155 Veijo Heiskanen Current issues: The changing environment of international organizations........................................................... 187 5 International organizations in a period of globalization: New (problemsof) legitimacy.......................................... 189 G. C. A. Junne v vi CONTENTS 6 Thechangingimageofinternationalorganizations.............. 221 Jan Klabbers 7 International democratic culture and its sources of legitimacy: The case of collective security and peacekeeping operations in the1990s........................................................... 256 Jean-Marc Coicaud 8 The legitimacy of Security Council activities under Chapter VII oftheUNCharteraftertheendoftheColdWar............... 309 Tetsuo Sato Selected contexts: International organization in transition.......... 353 9 ThelegitimacyoftheWorldTradeOrganization................ 355 Robert Howse 10 The process towards the new international ®nancial architecture ........................................................ 408 Marc Uzan 11 Distributive justice and the World Bank: The pursuit of gender equityinthecontextofmarketreform........................... 438 Kerry Rittich 12 Legitimacy in the real world: A case study of the developing countries, non-governmental organizations, and climate change.............................................................. 482 Joyeeta Gupta Conclusion: International organizations, the evolution of internationalpolitics,andlegitimacy................................. 519 Jean-Marc Coicaud Acronyms.............................................................. 553 Contributors........................................................... 555 Index................................................................... 559 Acknowledgements This book is the product of a two-year research project conducted under the auspices of the Peace and Governance Programme of the United Nations University (UNU). The project was headed by Dr. Veijo Heis- kanen, then-Director of the Institute of International Economic Law of the University of Helsinki, and coordinated on the UNU side by Jean- Marc Coicaud, Senior Academic Of®cer of the Peace and Governance Programme. The project was made possible by the ®nancial support of the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs. In the course of the project, the editors and authors bene®ted from the hospitality offered by the Carnegie Council on Ethics and International Affairs (New York) and the Graduate Institute of International Studies (Geneva). Thomas Franck of New York Uni- versity and Bonaventura de Sousa Santos of the University of Coimbra participated in the initial brainstorming session in New York and helped the editors to focus on key issues. Daniel Warner of the Graduate Insti- tute of International Studies stood ready to provide moral and intellec- tual support, and of®ce space, during the Geneva session. In Tokyo, Yoshie Sawada of the UNU provided administrative support with ef®- ciency and care. The editors and authors wish to thank the above individuals and in- stitutions for their support and assistance. The authors would also like to thank the anonymous reviewers of the manuscript for their helpful com- ments and, in the of®ce of the United Nations University Press, Manfred vii viii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Boemeke, Janet Boileau, and the copy-editors Kieran Macdonald, for their help in ®nalizing the book. Finally, the authors thank Nathaniel Bergson-Michelson for his editorial work on an earlier version of the manuscript. Introduction Veijo Heiskanen Most of the intergovernmental organizations that are important today were created some ®fty years ago in the aftermath of the Second World War. These include: the United Nations organization; the Bretton Woods organizations (the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank); the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), which sub- sequently evolved into the World Trade Organization (WTO); and the many agencies of the United Nations family. The establishment of these organizations was the outcome of a particular political-historical bargain- ing process, re¯ecting the balance of political power as well as the polit- ical, social, and economic interests and concerns that prevailed at the time. But the purposes and functions of these organizations also embody a certain socio-philosophical and political-philosophical understanding of their legitimate role in the international system. Over the past ®fty years, fundamental changes have taken place in the operating environment of these international organizations (IOs). These changes, many of which have, of late, been lumped together under the term ``globalization,'' include: decolonization; growing awareness of the global nature of many social, environmental, and public health prob- lems; multiplication of non-governmental organizations; globalization of mass media and the economy; the end of the Cold War; rapid develop- ments in the ®eld of biotechnology; and the emergence of the Internet. As a result of these changes, many international organizations, in partic- ular the United Nations, have been struggling to maintain or re-establish 1 2 HEISKANEN the role that they once were perceived, or expected, to have in inter- national relations.1 On the other hand, new international organizations have been created, while the structures of certain existing organizations (such as the WTO) have been upgraded, and their functions enhanced and redirected. These ambivalent developments, which involve both a sense of a ``legitimacy de®cit'' as well as one of opportunity and momen- tum, along with the magnitude of changes in the operating environment of the international system, suggest that the time has come to take a fresh look at the philosophy of international organization. This book under- takes such a philosophically-oriented examination. More speci®cally, this book attempts to understand the present state of international organization in terms of its ``legitimacy.'' Approaching international organization in these terms raises a number of conceptual dif®culties, which are compounded by the fact that there has been very little political-philosophical or socio-philosophical interest in the subject. While the problem of legitimacy has been the central problem of modern political and social philosophy, the two main traditions of modern politi- cal and social philosophy ± the predominantly Anglo-American Liberal- ism and the predominantly continental-European Enlightenment ± have focused almost exclusively on legitimacy issues raised by the internal structures and workings of the nation-state and by its relationship with civil society, largely disregarding international organizations. Moreover, while there appears to be a broad consensus among political and social philosophers