Networks and Partnerships of Global Governance: Three Missing Legitimacies

Abstract

Recently, literature on the problem of legitimacy in/of global governance institutions, networks and/or partnerships has considerably increased. However, as this paper argues, the problem of legitimacy, in what James N. Rosenau called post-international relations, has remained inadequately problematized. The paper suggests that global governance lacks three specific types of legitimacy: legitimacy of global governance as a theory, legitimacy of global governance as a practice and legitimacy of global governance even as a conception in the daily language of international politics scholars and practitioners as well. One further – still critical – shortcoming within the current theoretical framework is that of undervaluing normativity as a larger context within which the debate on legitimacy(ies) is still being fueled. The paper is divided into three sections. The first section briefly offers a conceptual introduction to the paper’s terminology – global governance; networks and partnerships; and legitimacy. Next, the second one attempts to bring the suggested multiplicity of global governance’s legitimacies into analysis. Finally, the third section draws conclusions about the significant value of bringing normativity back to global governance studies and how it matters to the question of legitimacy.