Chapter 21: Transnational Actors
The UN sees all NGOs as being eligible for ECOSOC consultative status
1) can be small number of high-status NGOs concerned with most of the council's work 2) Specialist NGOs concerned with a few fields of activity and having high reputation in them 3) a Roster of other NGOs that are expected to Make occasional contributions to the Council.
The same 4 sovereignty problems arise with tackling criminals as with regulating the TNCS
1) criminal financial flows can be massive, and money-laundering threatens the integrity of banking and other financial institutions. 2) criminal trade has been so extensively diversified through triangulation that no government could confidently claim that their country is not a transit route for drugs or arms. 3) As with regulatory arbitrage by TNCs, police action in one country may displace well-organized gangs to another country rather than stop their activities. 4) illicit rugs and money-laundering involve question of extraterritorial jurisdiction. However, in contrast to the regulation of TNCs, transnational police activities involve high levels of cooperation.
There are three factors involving TNCs push towards globalization of politics
1) governments can reassert control only by acting collectively 2) consumer pressures are leading to global codes of conduct being accepted by companies and implemented in collaboration with NGOs. 3) there is a push for global companies to submit to social and environmental auditing.
ECOSOC defines an acceptable NGO as having
1) should support teh aims and the work of the UN. 2) identifiable headquarters and are not membership organizations 3) cannot be profit-making body 4) cannot use or advocate violence 5) respect norm of "non-interference in the internal affairs of states"... should not restrict their activities to a particular group, nationality or country 6) an international NGO is one that is not established by intergovernmental agreement.
US law has defined terrorism as
"the unlawful use of force or violence against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives"
There are 4 major flaws with the state-centric appraoch
A) confusion over three meanings of "state" B) The lack of similarity between countries C) State systems and international systems D) The difference between State and Nation
BRICs newly emerging economies
Britain, Russia, India, and China.
A) State-centric problem 1: confusion of the three meanings of state
Easily confused with concrete concept of a country with a distinct system of people with common values. There is a very dissimilar concept of a state as the apparatus of Government. Civil society is understood to be part of the state.... But when we talk about the state in terms of government, then it doesn't encompass civil society
Company vs State interets
Government and company policy both want to increase employment and promote economic growth. Conflicts arise over the regulation of markets to avoid the risks of MARKET FAILURES or externalization of social and environment costs of production. Domestic deregulation and globalization of economic activity mean that regulation is now occurring at the global level rather than within individual countries.....
Regulatory Arbitrage
If a company objects to one government's policy, it may threaten to limit or close down its local production and increase production in another country. The governemtn that imposes the least demanding health, safety, welfare, or environmental standards will offer competitive advantages to less socially responsible companies. There is also a strong global trend towards the reduction of corporation taxes. It becomes difficult for any government to set high standards and maintain taxes.
C) International systems and state systems
Inconsistencies in that the state-centric approach does not allow you to consider the states necessarily as a collective... By exaggerating the coherence of states and downplaying the coherence of global politics, both transnational relations and intergovernmental relations are underestimated.
D) thE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN STATE AND NATION
Loyalty to the sate- country-- which can have people of multiple nationalities is different than having loyalty to one's nation in which people are ethnically similar. Loyalty is complex, with certain hierarchies at domestic levels, while also claiming certain loyalties like belonging to the European Union.
How has traditional state sovereignty been challenged with these new TNCs?
No longer possible to regard each country as having its own separate economy... Two of the most fundamental attributes of sovereignty-- control over the currency and control over foreign trade--- have been diminished substantially. Governments have lost control of financial flows. Successive financial crises in the 1980s and 1990s established that governments are helpless against banks and speculators...
Triangulation
Only if a UN security council resolution obliges all the countries of the world to impose sanction is there a reasonable prospect of a determined government preventing TNCs from evading sanctions.
B) the Lack of similarity between countries
States aren't the same... e.g. in terms of economic size, after the end of the cold war in 1989, the US economy was 2x the size of the Soviet Union. At the end of the 20th century, the US economy was 9x as big as China and 55x bigger than Saudi Arabia. They also have different governments... democracies,, feudal regimes, ethnic oligarchies, economic oligarchies, populist regimes, theocracies, military dictatorships... The only thing they have in common is their right to have their own government.
Violence is most codon when nationalist movements or ethnic minorities reject the legitimacy of a government... These groups can be called
Terrorists--- to express disapproval Guerrillas-- by those who are more neutral National liberation movements-- by their supporters
Governments have great difficulty in regulating international transactions.
There is no guaranteed method of preventing indirect trade form one country to another. This is known as triangulation. . Triangulation: occurs when trade between two countries is routed indirectly via a third country.
What are some actors in the global system?
Transnational Companies (Wal-Mart, Dole, Monsanto, Microsfot) Single-country non-governmental organizations ( World Development Movement) {IGOs} Intergovernmental organizations (UN, Nato) {INGOs} international non-governmental organizations (Amnesty International, Baptist World Alliance...) And also some networks of NGOs
When NGOs cooperate transnationally, they may use on of four different types of structure
You can have INGOs which are established with permanent headquarters and a secretariat and a regular programme and meetings... Or we can ahve advocacy networks.. At the meetings of INGOs, Ngos may combine into a caucus. thi SIS A TEMPORARY NETOWRK FORMED SOLEY FOR THE PURPOSE OF LOBBYING ON THE AGENDA ITEMS AT THE particular MEETING. thERE ARE ALSO governance networks formed by NGOs to maintain and enhance the participation rights of NGOs in intergovernmental meetings. They differ form advocay networks and caucuses in not having common political goals, other than their common interest in being allowed to access the policy-making process 1) INGOS 2) caucuses 3) advocacy networks 4) governance networks
Transnational companies
all companies that export or important are engaging in transnational economic activities. If they lobby foreign governments about trade, they become transnational political actors. However they cannot be known as TNCs until they have branches or subsidiaries outside their home country. Increasingly, transitionals are not clearly based in a single country. E.g. the world's biggest steel company-- Arcelor-Mittal has it legal headquarters in Luxembroug, is run from London, and was created by an indian takeover of Spanish and French steel producers.
NGOs
are norm entrepreneurs, initiating and sustaining change in global political debates that determine policy-making
Internet-based companies like Google and Amazon
attribute their operations to offices in countries with low corporate tax rates. Several other motives might induce a company to distort transfer prices, including to avoid controls on the cross-border movements of profits or capital.
Historically, terrorism has mainly been an instrument of internal conflict within a single society.... In fact, extensive political violence used by governments against their citizens was commonplace and immune from diplomatic criticism as recently as the 1970s.
but Al Qaeda suddenly present the world with a new threat of a transnational global network.
Defeat of terrorist groups will not be achieved by military counter-terrorism
but by global political change that delegitimizes fundamentalism
A state-centric appraoch involves
distinguishing between high politics of peace and security taking place in military alliances and uN diplomacy from the low politics of other policy questions debated in specialist UN bodies, other IGOs and INGOs. The move from a state-centric to a pluralist model depends on rejecting a static unidminsentioanl concept of power. Contrary to the realist view, capabilities alone do not determine influence. Explaining outcomes requires examining whether the resrources of the actors are relvant to the goals being pursued
International resgimes
formulate policy for an industry whether it is governmental or intergovernmental will encourage the strengthening of the global links among NGOs concerned with its activities. It's an implicit or explicit set of norms and rules around which actor's expectations converge.
Intra-firm trade
governments cannot have clear expectations of the effects of their financial and fiscal policies on TNCs. It involves international trade rom one branch of a transnational company to an affiliate of the same company in a different country
Groups can gain transnational support for political violence
if they have widespread support, when political channel have been closed to them, when the target government is oppressive, and when violence is limited to "military targets'
Politically, the most important criminal industries are ...
illicit trading in arms and in drugs They have been estimated to be the 2 most valuable commodities in world trade
Hybrid international organizations
in which governments work with NGOs. Among the most important hybrids are the International Red Cross and the World Conservation Union... These are economic bodies combining companies and governments... To be regarded as a hybrid, the organization must admit as full members BOTH NGOs, parties, or companies AAANDDD governments or governmental agencies. Both types of member must have full rights of participation in policymaking. including the right to vote on the final decisions. When the principle of formal equality of NGOs and governments is acknowledged by both sides in this manner, the assumption that government can dominate must be abandoned.
Extraterritoriality
is inherent to the structure of TNCs... E.g you have a subsidiary in the UK and a parent company in the US. They can each exercise control over these bodies because it would be exercising government's sovereignty over internal affairs... But what happens when US government's decisions over the global operations of the TNC? There is a clash of sovereignty.... Does the subsidiary obey the UK government or the orders of the US?
Challenges to the idea of an international system
not as ingle international system of nearly 200 states but a variety of policy domains, each involving their own distinct actors. Governments have special role in linking different domains..... While transnational actors and international organizations are generally more specialist and involved in a limited range of policy questions... They specialize like Greenpeace concerning itself with the environment In both domestic and global politics, civil society is the source of change.
It is difficult for governments regulate the commercial activities of companies within their country, because companies may choose to engage in _____
regulatory arbitrage
Pluralism
says that all types of actors can affect political outcomes
Civil society is is the source of change
see examples of 335
Civil Society
society considered as a community of citizens linked by common interests and collective activity.
Transnational Actors vs Countires
the largest transnational actors are considerably larger than many of the countries. In 2011, the fifty largest TNCs by global sales each had annual revenues greater than the GDP of 113 members of the United Nations. Using people as the measure, many NGOs, particularly trade unions, churches and campaigning groups in the fields of human rights, women's rights, and the environment, have memberships measured in the millions whereas 39 of the 193 countries in the UN had populations of less than one million...
A company using primary commodities such as Starbucks processing coffee may respond to higher tax rates b changing its ______ to reduce its tax billl
transfer prices
