epistemic governance and synchronization of national policies
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EPISTEMIC GOVERNANCE AND SYNCHRONIZATION OF NATIONAL POLICIES. Remarkable isomorphism Nation-states as copies of each other National anthems, flags, genres of art Global standards in describing and measuring society, culture and economy Yet no world government. The global system. - PowerPoint PPT PresentationTRANSCRIPT
EPISTEMIC GOVERNANCE AND SYNCHRONIZATION OF NATIONAL POLICIES
The global system
Remarkable isomorphism Nation-states as copies of each other National anthems, flags, genres of art Global standards in describing and measuring
society, culture and economy Yet no world government
The dominant role of dominance theories
Applying the model of a state hierarchy to the global level The United Nations The World Bank International Monetary Fund The OECD
The dominant role of dominance theories
The idea of superpowers The cold war framework Huntington’s clash of civilizations The U.S. Unilateralism
Wilkinson’s point in “Unipolarity without Hegemony” (1999)
The realist paradigm in international politics
The dominant paradigm argues that the international system is driven by anarchy, egoism, groupism and power politics (Donnelly 2008)
Dependency theory and world systems theory The world is dominated by the “core” comprising
the global north
World society theory
Emulation Stresses the role of rationalized “world culture” that
gradually permeates the world, causing growing homogeneity
Actors as agents constituted by world culture enact cultural scripts
States and policymakers as unthinking conformists
World society theory
The diffusion model The empirical picture: world models stemming
from the global North to the global South The world history as “globalization”
From globalization to synchronization
The question of whether the world is becoming increasingly homogenous is different from the question of how national states synchronize their policies
States that adopt models from others are not becoming part of world culture and society
From globalization to synchronization
Rather, following other states’ policies, assessing the efficiency of different states and models and using all this information as justification for national policies is most common among developed countries
Synchronization of national policies takes place through such interdependent decision making
It is seldom easily recognizable “policy diffusion”
National differences
Table 1: Frequency of references to other countries in parliamentary debates in Canada, The United Kingdom and the United States (%)
Table 2: Frequency of references to other countries in parliamentary debates in Argentina, Chile and Mexico (%)
Epistemic governance
The bulk of the synchronization of national policies is voluntary
Of course states or any other actors in the interdependent world are never free to do what ever they wish – decisions are adaptations to external conditions
Epistemic governance
Governance in national, subnational or supranational contexts is always a power play
Power is most efficient when it is able to hide its own mechanisms
Hence the simple view of power as external coercion, as a pure limit set on freedom, is part of its acceptability (Foucault)
Epistemic governance Epistemic governance does not refer to a particular form or
resource of power, for instance “soft power” in contrast with coercion
We study governance as ways by which actors work on people’s conceptions of reality in order to make them behave in a particular way
This entails strategies that affect people’s wishes and aspirations, but (a threat of) military force and economic constraints are also means to affect people’s conceptions of the situation and hence make them adopt a particular line of action
Epistemic governance
Supranational contexts IGOs and INGOs Cross-national comparisons, benchmarking, ‘best
practices’ Country reviews and recommendations Conditions imposed on governments for economic
assistance or loans
Epistemic governance
National contexts Policymakers and stakeholders Scientists and policy experts Citizens through the media
Opinion pollsDemonstrations
Introducing references to other countries as justification for or against reforms
Epistemic governance
Introducing catchwords and phrases The national interest and group interests
Articulating a group interest as the common national good Articulating the global good also as the national interest
Subnational contexts Introducing international or national comparisons as justifications
for policies Introducing catchwords and phrases Constructing shared local interests articulated with group
interests