Good Governance in International Organizations

Abstract

ood governance moved onto the agenda of many international or ganizations at the end of the Cold War when calls for democracy ^*??^ and better government became louder and as expectations were heightened as to what international organizations might do to further this aim. Many multilateral agencies?from the UN to multilateral develop ment banks?took up the summons. They are now part of a chorus of voices urging governments across the world to heed higher standards of democratic representation, accountability, and transparency. Much more slowly, multilateral organizations have begun to question what good governance means for the way in which they themselves are structured and in which they make and implement decisions. They have been very slow to set down a standard for themselves?and there is little precedent in the international system for doing so. To quote former UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali: Democracy has not featured in the history of the international system of states. Sovereignty, rather than democracy, has been its guiding principle. . . . [Today,] the democratization of the international system can be seen as both necessary and possible.1 Yet if international organizations are going to become more partici patory, accountable, and transparent, what standards are relevant to them? In this article, I set out to provide one part of an answer to this question, primarily probing what good governance means for relations among states in multilateral organizations. The first section of the article explores the concept of good governance, how it has emerged, and what its core prin ciples mean. I draw a distinction between applying principles of good gov ernance to relations among states within international organizations (in ternational governance) and applying the principles more broadly to links between individuals, peoples, groups, and international organizations (global governance). My emphasis in the following sections is on interna tional governance. I have chosen several institutions to illustrate the ten sions and trade-offs. These include the regional development banks, the UN Security Council, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and World Trade Organization (WTO), the International Fund for Agricultural Development, the Global Environment Facility of the UN De velopment Programme/World Bank, and the European Union.2 By looking 39