World Statehood: The Future of World Politics

Description

Developing a processual understanding of world statehood, this book combines history, political philosophy, explanatory social science, and critical-reflexive futures studies. While doing so, it poses essential questions about world political integration, especially (i) whether and to what degree elements of world statehood exist today, (ii) whether the development of further elements of world statehood in some stronger sense can be seen as a tendential direction of history, and (iii) whether, and under what conditions, a world state could be viable? The book is organised into three parts. The first part, “Cosmopolitical processes”, explores whether world history as a whole is directed towards planetary integration, focusing on the emergence of cosmopolitanism, the world economy, and the peace problematic. The second part of the book, “Reflexive futures and agency”, focuses on the contemporary 21st-century processes of world history in terms of how non-fixed pasts, changing contexts, and anticipations of the future interact. The author explains how certain rational directionality is compatible with the possibility of deglobalisation, disintegrative tendencies, and “gridlock” in global governance in the key areas of the economy, security, and environment. In the final part of the book, “World statehood and beyond”, the author develops further the processual and open-ended account of the formation of interconnected elements of world statehood by discussing the cases of a global greenhouse gas tax and world parliament. He also analyses the feasibility of different paths towards global-scale integration and the potential for conflicts, divisions, and disintegration. This book is a must-read for students and scholars of political science, international relations, history, sociology, political philosophy, and futures studies interested in a better understanding of world statehood, world political integration, as well as the future of world politics. Preface Contents 1: Introduction: The Future of World Politics The Basic Idea Summary of the Contents of the Book References Part I: Cosmo-political Processes 2: Cosmological Sources of Critical Cosmopolitanism Introduction Aristotle vs. Cosmopolitans: Two Different Cognitive Perspectives A Cosmic Perspective: The Identity of Human Beings Living on Planet Earth Transformative Cosmopolitanism: The Rise of the Notion of a World State The Reaction Against the Copernican Perspective: Nietzsche, etc. Conclusion: Towards a New Cosmological Imaginary? References 3: A Creation Myth and Origin Story Suitable to our Globalised World? A Friendly Critique of the Big History Storyline about our Place in Cosmos Introduction On the Narrative Dimension of Scientific Explanations and Future Scenarios The Basic Mythologems of Contemporary Liberal-Capitalist Society A Methodological Critique of the Cosmic Mythologeme of Meaninglessness and Death An Alternative Mythologeme: The Power of Life and Culture Analysing and Assessing the Big History Storyline Conclusions References 4: Overcoming Eurocentrism: Towards a Universal History of the Industrial Revolution and the Peace Problematic Introduction: The European States-System and Modernity Are Not Unique Learning from Counterfactual World Histories A Universal History of Humanity in Terms of Stages The Development of the Modern Peace Problematic Overcoming the Problematic: The Concepts of Global Security Community and Democracy Conclusions References 5: Problems of Democratising Global Governance: Time, Space, and the Emancipatory Process Introduction The Model of Cosmopolitan Democracy Space, Time, and Otherness in the Model of Cosmopolitan Democracy A Critical Realist Interrogation Concerning the Split between Moral Reason and the World Bringing Real Geo-history Back in: Time, Space, and the Process of Peaceful Democratic Emancipation Space Time A Key Presupposition: A Pluralist Security Community Conclusions References Part II: Reflexive Futures and Agency 6: How Will the Cold War End? Non-fixed Pasts, Reflexive Futures, and the Transformation of the Temporality of Human Existence Introduction On the Complexity of Time and Temporality The Contingency of the Cold War and its End in 1989–1991 The Meaning of the Past Is Undetermined The Temporality of Human Existence Is Changing Conclusions References 7: Resolving Problems and Overcoming Contradictions through Global Law and Institutions: A Post-Deutschian Perspective Introduction The Emergence of Common Problems A Deeper Problem: Disintegrative Tendencies and Contradictions in Global Political Economy The Problem of Fixed Identities and Hard Will: Deutsch and beyond The Dialectic Among Three Logics of Identities in the Early Twenty-First Century Reflexivity, Self-Other Relations, and the Ethical Circle of Non-violence Overcoming Contradictions through Learning and Building Common Institutions Conclusion: Reflexivity and the Ethos of Critical Responsiveness Appendix: On the Role of Religion References 8: On the Dialectics of Global Governance in the Twenty-First Century: A Polanyian Double Movement? Introduction Polanyi’s Historical Double Movement The Return to the Market: A Puzzle to Polanyians Towards a Better Explanation of the Market-revival Constructing the Double Movement: The Problem of Agency Overcoming Contradictions in Global Political Economy Collective Learning Towards Holoreflexivity Concluding Remarks References 9: Transformative Agency: Towards a World Political Party Introduction Different Meanings of Modern Civil Society: Four Possibilities The Emergence and Development of Global Civil Society Ambiguities and Limits of Global Civil Society Activities Predecessors of World Party and the Decline of Democracy Since 2000 Future-oriented Democratic Visions of Global Political Parties DiEM25: A Seed Crystal? Learning Lessons: A Sketch of a Possible Global Political Party Concluding Remarks and Two Additional Issues References Part III: World Statehood and Beyond 10: Emergence of World Statehood: A Processual and Open-Ended Account Introduction Debates About the World State in the 1940s Wendt’s Argument About the Inevitability of World State A Critique of Wendt’s Account Conclusion: A Processual and Open-ended Account of the Formation of World Statehood References 11: The Transformative Potential of Responding to Climate Change: Towards a Dynamic Global Tax Introduction Characteristic Problems of Carbon Trading The Clean Development Mechanism and Article 6 of the Paris Agreement: Global Carbon Markets? An Alternative to Carbon Trading: A Greenhouse Gas Tax The Case for a Global Keynesian Greenhouse Gas Tax Conclusions References 12: Rethinking World Parliament: Beyond the Indeterminacy of International Law Introduction The Campaign for a United Nations Parliamentary Assembly (UNPA) World Parliament: In a Search for a Third Way The Indeterminacy of International Law World Parliament: Beyond the Categories of Modern Liberal-Democratic States A Feasible Process of Establishing a World Parliament Conclusions References 13: After World Statehood? Legitimation and Potential Conflicts in a World Political Community Introduction Materialist, Structuralist, and Functionalist Arguments for a World State On the Elusive Nature of Overlapping Consensus and Public Opinion On the Idea of a “Civilising Process” Functional Differentiation, Institutions, and Ethical-Political Learning Why Higher-level Identifications and Purposes are Normatively Better Conflicts and the Potential Collapse of a World Political Community Conclusions References