Democratizing Globalization and Globalization Democracy

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American Academy of Political and Social Science

Democratizing Globalization and Globalizing DemocracyAuthor(s): Barry K. GillsSource: Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, Vol. 581,Globalization and Democracy (May, 2002), pp. 158-171Published by: Sage Publications, Inc. in association with the American Academy of Political and Social

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Democratizing Globalizationand Globalizing Democracy

By BARRYK. GILLS

ABSTRACT:he article begins with a critique of the failure of thepresent world order, based on its exclusivity and reliance on a tradi-tional international relations paradigm, including nationalism andcultural particularism. The post-cold war impetus toward universalliberalism has brought about conditions rendering this paradigm un-tenable. Globalization requires a new political order if universal eco-nomic liberalism is to be stable. However, there remains a clash ofparadigms rather than a clash of civilizations, and a new balance isneeded between realist, liberal, and Marxist paradigms. An alterna-tive world order will require democratizing globalization and global-izing democracy and will rest on articulating radical new conceptionsand practices of citizenship bridging local, national, regional, andglobal political spaces. New concepts and values such as global jus-tice, global solidarity, global democracy, and global citizenship aretaking form and informing the course of the democratic revolution onthe global scale.

Barry K. Gills is a reader in international politics at the University of Newcastleupon Tyne in the United Kingdom. He received his Ph.D. in international relations fromthe London School of Economics and did additional postgraduate research at St. An-thony's College, Oxford. He is the chairperson of the World Historical Systems theorygroup of the International Studies Association and a faculty affiliate of the Globaliza-tion Research Center of the University of Hawaii. He directs the program in interna-tional political economy in the Department of Politics, University of Newcastle uponTyne.His recent works include Globalization and the Politics of Resistance (2001,Palgrave) and World System History (2000, Routledge, coedited). He is currently work-ing on a critical analysis of capital in global history.

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DEMOCRATIZINGLOBALIZATION,LOBALIZINGEMOCRACYIt is only fromthe nations themselvesthat reforms can be expected.

-Thomas Paine,Preface to the French Editionof TheRights of Man (1791)

The present world order is basedon very traditional thinking, bothpolitically and economically. Therehas been much discussion of the so-called nonstate actors and the riseand importance of nongovernmentalorganizations and other interna-tional societal factors in recent yearsof globalization. Yet we can observefor ourselves how it is still the mostpowerful governments of the worldthat determine the primarycourse ofaction and define the parameters ofmainstream discussion wheneverthere is a crisis. Thus, the embeddedpower structure of the world orderhas been highlighted even in the so-called era of globalization.Neverthe-less, if we look deeper, we can seethings differently, and we may real-ize the potential for positive change.Rather than acceptingthe still reign-ing paradigm of (past) internationalrelations,with its enduringfeature ofgovernance by a few great powersbased on their ability to use militaryforce,we must urgently look forwaysto turn to a positive alternative. Wemust search forways to break out ofthe iron cage of the old paradigms.

FAILURE OF THE POSTWARLIBERALWORLD RDERAt the end of the last world warand in the aftermath of the GreatDepression, it was already obviousthat nationalism and empire wereconcepts that had broughtenormous

human suffering, conflict, andupheaval. No stable or just worldorder could any longer be based oneither a narrow nationalism or thedriveforempirebythe Westernbour-geois (Carr 1968; Linklater 1997)with which it was historically associ-ated. It was objectively necessary togo beyond the confining limits ofnationalism and embrace a newordermarked by much higher levelsof international peace and coopera-tion. It was equally necessary toabandon imperialism and enter aperiod when potentially all peopleshad the right to sovereignty and inwhich all shared in internationalduties and responsibilities in thecommon world order.It was also rec-ognized, by realists as well as ideal-ists, that to enable the constructionofthis new worldorder, he Westwouldhave to abandon a narrow culturalparticularism and attempt to adoptmore universal and even cosmopoli-tan bases for the right to lead orgov-ern at the center ofworldpower(Bull1977).

The reality, however, fell some-what short of this expectation. Post-war international history wasmarredby decades of endemic globalconflict, which historians call thecold war era. During that period,thegreat powers often acted brutallyand cynically in pursuit of their per-ceived power interests. The foreignpolicy of the West, led by the UnitedStates, sometimes sacrificedeven itscentral value-liberty-in whosename the conflict was ultimatelywaged, by making expedient politicalalliances with reactionary andantidemocratic forces and govern-ments. Rather than constructing a

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truly inclusive world order, anddespite the existence of the UnitedNations Organization, world orderremained based on a clear hierarchyof power among states. This interna-tional hierarchy, once established,exacerbated the problem of histori-cally embedded asymmetry of powerand wealth between the Westernpowersand the formerlycolonialpeo-ples ofthe world.The opportunityforinclusion was therefore compro-mised. The world order was main-tained by the traditional means ofbalance of power, alliances, anddiplomacyin a manner that perpetu-ated the old international relationsparadigm. The Westphalian system,being based on the principleof sover-eignty for states and their intrinsicright to use military force,producedasystem dominated by a few stateswielding the greatest military andeconomicpower.With the end of the cold war camean opportunityfor the Westto reviewits policies andto reassess the projectof universal liberalism. Suddenly,there was more official support fordemocracythan during the previouscold war period of ideological andstrategic rivalry, during which theWest had often supported undemo-cratic regimes and suppressed popu-lar movements for social, economic,and political change (Cox,Ikenberry,and Inoguchi 2000). Above all, how-ever,there was a renewed and vigor-ous attempt to construct a liberalizedworldeconomyandmake this systemuniversally inclusive. Within a shorttime, this impetus toward universalliberalism based on the social andeconomic practices of the Westbecame popularly known as

globalization. In a previous genera-tion, this impetus had been under-stood simply as Westernization ormodernization.

It is the very extension of thisWestern projectof universal liberal-ism that has broughtabout new con-ditions that now renderthe oldpara-digm of international relations andworld order historically inadequate.Taking globalization seriously mustimply taking its logic to logical con-clusions. In otherwords,to the extentthat there is now-in the post-coldwar interregnum-already a trulyglobal economicsystem based on thefree movement of capital, then thereis also an objective and logical needfor new formsofglobalpoliticalorderto accompany this global economicsystem. Simply maintaining theinternational political status quowillnot suffice. Without a correspond-ingly new global political order,theworld(economic)orderwill be unsta-ble. By remaining too exclusive, theWest will guarantee instability anddisorder in the future. You cannotsustain a truly international, orglobal, political and economicsystemon the basis of the exclusion of themajorityfromreal powerorinfluenceover it. If the West fails to measureup to this challenge, it risks undoingthe liberal and capitalist orderit hassought to construct since the lastgreat world crisis and most recentlyunder the slogan of globalization.Toput it differently,having largelyalready succeeded in bringing abouta global liberal and capitalist eco-nomicorder, he West,in partnershipwith all the world, must now realizethat this economicorderrequires anaccompanying global political

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system. This new political order isnecessary to stabilize the worldecon-omy and make it function properly.However, if we have learned any-thing from the past century of theexpansion of capitalism to a globalsystem, it must be that the marketalone cannot maintain a stablesocial, political, or economic orderover the long term. The classic nine-teenth century liberal world orderended in a historic cataclysm(Polanyi 1944) and revealed itself tobe unstable and unsustainable. Thereal character of that world orderwas not, however, truly liberal butrather a condition of the coexistenceofantagonistic principles: iberal andimperial, competitive and monopolycapitalism, freedom and slavery(including the colonial enslavementof whole populations to imperialrule). These contending antagonisticprinciples coexisted not in a stableharmony but rather in a very highstate of historical tension. In theaftermath of the debacle of thatworld order, t was widely recognizedand accepted that the market econ-omy needed stabilizing through newtypes of state regulation and inter-vention and new socialcompacts.Thestate, popular political processes,anddomestic andinternational insti-tutions have all been crucialin main-taining the conditions for both thestability and expanded reproductionof the capitalist economic system(Habermas 1988). In fact, it is legiti-mate to argue that the lesson of thefailure of the previous liberal-impe-rial world orderwas that capitalismitself could not exist without anappropriate role for the state or aninclusive social contract that gave

labor essential rights and legitimatepolitical participation. The post-WorldWarII world orderwas based,therefore, on the pragmatic need toestablish a balance that avoided theextremes represented by the Scyllaof market-oriented savage capital-ism and the Charybdisof state-domi-nated and imperial or monopolycapitalism.

A CLASHOFPARADIGMS,NOTA CLASHOF CIVILIZATIONSSpeaking as an internationalpolitical economist, it may be worthsaying that we are still witnessing ahistorical clash of paradigms ratherthan a clash of civilizations as the

defining dynamic of world order.Inthe present impetus toward(neo)lib-eral economic globalization, we areseeing the continued playing out ofthe attempt to realize the liberal uto-pia first fully explicated by AdamSmith more than two hundred yearsago. In the liberal paradigm'svisionof the future, the traditional interna-tional relations paradigm-with itsbasis in state sovereignty exercisedover a national economy and thestates' intrinsic right and ability touse military force-is overthrown.Rather than warfare and survival askey concerns, liberalism promisespeace andprosperityto all humanity.The idea that we can eliminate alldistortions introducedinto the worldeconomy by the interventions andother actions of governments hasbeen a constant in the whole historyof liberalism and in its recent rein-carnation as neoliberalism. One cen-tral liberal idea is the harmonizationof interests, despite the inequalities

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generated by private property,com-modity production and exchange,andcapital-wagerelations, as well asthe uneven development in spaceand time that is a feature of worldeconomic history. In the liberal uto-pia, all productionwill be maximizedas market actors are free to allocateresources most efficiently, and allconsumptionwill be optimized as allconsumers are free to choose the bestproducts at the best prices. In thisvision, the prosperity of humanity ismaximized due to the optimum eco-nomicefficiencyof the entire system,which then comesto operateas a self-regulating mechanism, finding itsown equilibrium and having a ten-dency to allow prices, profits, andwages to equalize over time andspace in the system as a whole. Thistoo is the utopian promise of neo-liberal economic globalization asespoused today.Once again, the reality is very dif-ferent, and it has been formore thantwo hundred years of liberalism'shistory.The liberal paradigmhas notentirely replacedthe realist or drivenit out. The realist international rela-tions paradigm, with the survivaland the powerof states as its centralinterests, refuses to disappear,and itconstantly reasserts its prerogatives,thus distorting the presumed purenatural orderof the liberal economy.Moreover,as Marx's critique of thepolitical economy of capitalist socialrelations tried to argue, there is aningrained exploitative feature in theunceasing quest for greater profits,in the expansion ofcapital-wagerela-tions, and in the process of commodi-fication of more and more spheres oflife. This exploitation is not easily

amenable to any natural harmoniza-tion of interests; rather, it generatesa continued source of social conflict,displacement, and antagonism,which Marx referred to as the "classstruggle"though others may simplycall it politics and now the politics ofglobalization.The Marxist critique rejectedboththe realist and the liberal paradigmsand argued that both were fatallyflawed. The Marxist alternativevision of the future of the world econ-omy was, however, every bit as uto-pian as was the liberal. Marx pre-dicted a world without states,without classes, without money,without poverty, without exploita-tion, in which production would bemaximized and all human needswould be met, all "uneven develop-ment"wouldbe resolved, and a greatharmony of interests would prevailover permanent social peace. Thiswas to be achieved through meansopposite those of the liberal para-digm, that is, via the abolition of pri-vate property and the market andtheir substitution by common prop-erty and a plannedeconomy,which inthe medium term would require amajordirect role for the state in theeconomicsystem.We can easily recognize elementsof truth in all three paradigms,whichis to say that while none of the threeis really an accurate or perfect para-digm,there is something in each thatwe can recognize, even on thegrounds of commonsense. In reality,all three paradigms are in historicaltension with one another, and theycontinue to contendwith one anotherin the worldtoday.It is naive in bothanalytical and historical terms to

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believe that one of the three is likelyto, or indeed ought to, entirely suc-ceed and completely displace theother two. This being the case, thereal question is how to shape the pro-cess of economicglobalization,whichis already so powerful, in ways thatcan reducethe levels of social disrup-tion and human suffering involvedand that do not repress the popularwill but rather empower it. In short,the emergence of a new paradigm ofworld order suited to the materialconditions of economic globalizationtoday is not a technical, technologi-cal, or purely economicmatter but athoroughly and profoundly politicalmatter to be resolved through politi-cal processes alone. This is thereforenot a matter of calibrating onlystates and markets but rather states,markets, and social forces (orclassesif you prefer) and their mutual rela-tions. In short, it is not a question ofthe ultimate victory of one paradigmover the others but of constructing asustainable andjust worldorderthatbrings some new balance among allthree contendingparadigms ofworldorder:realist, liberal, and Marxist.

BUILDINGANALTERNATIVEWORLDORDERWhile a few years ago, many peo-ple could still believe that a liberalglobal capitalist economywould lookafter itself and constitute a naturalorder, t is now all too apparent thatno such natural economic orderexists. The advocates of global eco-nomic liberalization as the only wayforward,the single best practice forall economies, have learned that theprocess is far from being apolitical.

However,they have apparently stillnot accepted the full political conse-quences of the liberal economicorderthey espouse. The "politics of resis-tance" to globalization (Gills 2000c;2001) and the rise of the myriad so-called anticapitalist movementsaroundthe worldduringthe past fewyears should be understood as beingrepresentative of the popularly per-ceived need to construct a universal,just, and inclusive form of worldorder.This new conception of worldorder is based on radically new con-ceptions and practices of citizenshipbridging local, national, and globalpolitical spaces. It clearly brings intofocus, in terms of political discourse,the need felt by ordinarypeople to befully included in the majordecisionsthat determine their life chances.Most important, therefore, it is notonly elites and governments thatmust be directly included in thereconfigured world order of global-ization but ordinarypeople, from allwalks oflife, all genders,all religions,and all regions of the globe.This con-stituency is in fact the globalcitizenry.Whatwas onceposedas a nationalquestion (i.e., political order) nowbecomes a truly global question, per-haps forthe first time in human his-tory.This debate is no longer a mat-ter of Whether globalization butrather ofWhichglobalization.This isessentially a political matter, not anarrow technical or economic issue.Thus, it is not very useful to under-stand the new (global) social move-ments arising to protest the presentdirection of globalization processesas simply being antiglobalization (oreven anticapitalist for that matter,

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since this invokes an all-encompass-ing but inherently vague notion ofcapitalism itself). Nor is it fruitful orright to merely reject the legitimacyof such growing popular protest toeconomicglobalization and its socialand environmental effects as beingmerely wrongheaded. Ignoring theproblem or resorting to repressivetactics will only further exacerbatethe underlying reasons for theseglobal protests, which in fact repre-sent onlythe tip of an icebergofpopu-lar responses to the myriad impactsof globalization on our lives(Bourdieuet al. 1999).

So we should view today's globalprotest movements as being symp-tomatic of something far greaterthan a merereaction to globalization.They represent a popularresponse tothe question of Which globalizationand as such,they are an expressionofthe popular desire for meaningfulpolitical participation in its govern-ing processes. As John KennethGalbraith (2000, 2001) has argued,the governing elites of the pastdecade have tended to talk too muchabout free trade and not enoughabout social justice and stability.Moreover, he new resistance move-ments instinctively represent theview that whatever globalizationmay be, it should not come at theexpense of the social gains of the pastcentury.Norshould the imperative offurther economic globalization vialiberalization and free trade consti-tute an obstacle to improving social,political, economic, and humanrights in the future, particularly oflabor and in regard to women, agri-culture, and the environment. Inother words, perhaps the people of

the worldwould like globalization torepresent a continuation of socialand political progress rather than asacrifice of this progress on the highaltar of the free market.

When I recently asked a group ofmy students, studying the politicaleconomy of development, to discussthe differences between nationaldevelopment and global develop-ment, their responses were some-what surprising, and enlightening.They stronglytended to associate thenational not onlywith welfarist goalsbut also with selfish, zero-sum, andconflict-orientedgoals and behavior.They associate global development,however, with an aspiration for orpotential of transcending the barri-ers that governments erect betweenpeoples and with finding commonsolutions to common problemsthrough increasing cooperation.That is, their instincts are search-ingly positive when it comes to theglobal dimension of world order, asopposedto their suspicions ofthe tra-ditional national framework ofaction and understanding, whichthey seem to think has toomany neg-ative aspects.Given that the popular move-ments of this era, as in the past,should be assumed to represent anexpression of the popularwill ratherthan an irrelevant minority, weshould heed the words of that greatdemocratic revolutionary ThomasPaine, that it is fromthe popularwillthat real reforms can be expected.The recent financial and economiccrises in east Asia illustrated thepotential negative side of globaliza-tion, that is, that as neoliberal eco-nomic globalization proceeds, it

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generates increased risk of macro-economicdestabilization. But it alsocreates popular demands for democ-ratization and greater opposition toexisting oligarchic-authoritarianpowerstructures (Gills 2000a). Glob-alization, therefore, cannot be left toelites alone or to governmentsonly tosort out, which would only reinforcethe reigning paradigm of interna-tional relations and reproduce theembedded global inequality overwhich the states system presides.What we need is a very strong,healthy dose of globalization frombelow. Only this can create a neces-sary balance between governmentaland popular political will and ade-quately redress the question of whocontrols the direction ofglobalization.

Only by democratizing globaliza-tion, which means enacting an inclu-siveness in the political sphere inways that incorporatethe expressionof the popularwill not only ofcitizensof the rich countries but of all peo-ples, canwe establish such a balance.That is, only by global democraticrevolution will economic globaliza-tion find its appropriate politicalcounterpart. The alternative to thisis further exclusiveness and a nar-rowing of political power to a smallelite. Such an elitist alternative infact represents the antithesis of theglobalization of democracy. Weshould remember that Adam Smithhimself, the founderofthe liberaltra-dition in international political econ-omy,was reacting against a mercan-tilist order that was dominated byand favored a small collusive elite offinanciers, manufacturers, mer-chants, and state rulers. He saw both

political freedom and economicfree-dom as the necessary revolutionarycounterpoint to the oligarchic-authoritarian capitalism that he soabhorred and that he intellectuallydenouncedas parasitic onthe nation,indeed all nations, andtheir commonwealth. If in the end, the project ofuniversal economic liberalism isunderstood in the popular imagina-tion to mean onlythat real powerhasbeen taken from the people or thenation and concentrated in an elite,even if this is a global or transna-tional class, then increasing resis-tance to this world orderwill be his-torically inevitable. Again, this veryreal political problem will not goaway simply by ignoring it or byrepressing it. In fact, the extent towhich repression is used against thepopular movements is a measure ofthe extent to which globalizationactually undermines democracy.This tension, which we have allrecently witnessed in the officialandpolice responses to a series of majorglobal protest events staged at eco-nomic summits, indicates the possi-bility of a serious contradiction oreven open antagonism between pop-ular democracy and neoliberal eco-nomic globalization.

CONCEPTSAND VALUESOFA GLOBALDEMOCRATIC HEORY

If there is global capitalism, thenthe system gives rise to and in factrequires fundamental counterparts,including global justice, global soli-darity, global democracy,and globalcitizenship, the last of these perhapsbeing especially significant. Weneeda credible political theory of global

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democracy based on the new conceptof global citizenship rather thanmerely a pragmatic problem-solvingapproach. If democracy is a process ofbuilding countervailing powers, thenthe democratic theory we have atpresent, which is based on countriesand their domestic political order,must be transposed to the globallevel. To do so, we must also elevateor transpose the classic enlighten-ment democratic ideals of equality,justice, solidarity (fraternity), andliberty to the global level. Defining"global equality," "global justice,""global solidarity," and "global lib-erty" will be the prerequisites to for-mulating a theory of global democ-racy and global citizenship. In myown view, these definitions and thisglobal democratic theory does notnecessarily require a global or "worldpolity" (Ruggie 1998) or a theory of a"global state" as such (Shaw 2000).

The tenor of this new period,which is above all given to a diversityof social movements from across theglobe, does not provide grounds foreasy acceptance of a centralization ofpower and authority, but actually theopposite. As in the history of manyother world orders, states, and civili-zations of the human past, there maycome a point when whatever the eliteat the apex of the social system havedesigned or intended, they can nolonger hope to control the direction ofchange. Rather, it is the social forcesfrom below, often representing thelowest social orders, that do at suchtimes make the real difference.Christianity, for example, began as atiny movement within a great andpowerful empire, and its member-ship was drawn from the lowest

social strata, such as slaves, politicaloutcasts, women, and downtroddenand oppressed peoples such as theJews of Palestine. In the end, how-ever, it was not the mighty empire ofthe Romans that prevailed, butrather the strikingly antipodal com-munal and compassionate ideologyrepresented by the Christian religionthat transformed Rome itself into aholy city and remade the whole ofWestern civilization. The search forhuman liberty does not usually findits true expression in the construc-tion of huge edifices of centralizedand bureaucratic state power, how-ever welfarist the claims withinwhich their attempts at legitimationmay be couched.Rather, liberty, when popularizedand captured by the popular will andimagination, immediately tends tobecome a truly revolutionary ideaand brings in its train the challeng-ing of the status quo. As the greatstudent of American democracy,Alexis de Tocqueville (1840), re-marked on the process of the demo-cratic revolution,a people that has existed for centuriesunder a system of castes and classes canarrive at a democratic state of societyonly by passing through a long series ofmoreor less critical transformations,ac-complished by violent efforts, and afternumerous vicissitudes, in the course ofwhich property,opinions, and power arerapidly transferredfrom one to another.(P.320)It is clear that we can expect the dem-ocratic revolution on a global scalenot to be a smooth and easy politicalprocess but rather one of conflict, tu-mult, and upheaval, indeed even one

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in which the world turns upsidedown.There is therefore a particularimportance in addressing theemphasis given to the idea of free-dom in the past twenty years of dis-course on economic liberalizationand globalization. This neoliberaldiscourse has emphasized aHayekian understanding of freedomas freedom above all for capital, for

the movement of commodities, andformarkets, that is, a freedomfortheholders of property to pursue maxi-mum flexibility and profit. In con-trast, freedomas a popularconceptisaligned with the protection of popu-lar rights and the extension of popu-lar participation, and thus withdemocracy.Freedomfor the commonman and woman is only possiblewhen equality, ustice, solidarity,citi-zenship, and finally democracy tself,are all fully integrated aspects ofboth theory and practice. Indeed,"the price of freedom is redistribu-tion" s oneway offormulatingdemo-cratic theory (Sartori 1987). AsGalbraith has pointedout,nothing soconstrains the freedom of the indi-vidual as a complete absence ofmoney.It bears repeating that economicglobalization, and indeed the entirerange of processes we are currentlyreferringto as globalization,does notbring convergence to one narrowlyconstructed set of choices.Globaliza-tion actually opens up a wider rangeof choices to a wider range of socialactors than any previous social sys-tem in world history.That is, global-ization adds immense complexity toourglobal social order,not simplicity.This providessocial forcestodaywith

an unprecedented scope for action,within which they may define newsites ofaction and new forms ofsocialpower,form new coalitions and soli-darities (including transnational),find new institutional forms, andexplorenew ways ofpracticinggover-nance in world order. By linkingtogether directly the many diverseformsbeing experimentedwith in somany manifestations of social action,the potential resistance to globaliza-tion becomes the locus and mediumof the transformation of globaliza-tion into global democracy. There-fore, analytically speaking, weshould not understand resistance asbeing something external to global-ization but rather as intrinsic orinternal to the processofopeningandto the greater complexitythat global-ization brings about.Globalization scharacterizednotby a uniformitybutrather by a historical dialecticbetween homogenization andheterogenization, both processesoccurring simultaneously andthroughout the globe.

Thus, there is likewise a historicaldialectic between globalization anddemocratization, a process that isunavoidable.I firmlybelieve, on bothhistorical and moral grounds, thatthis historical dialectic leadsstrongly,even inexorably, oward thepractices and theory ofglobaldemoc-racy, that is, to the globalization ofdemocracy and the democratizationofglobalization.Insofar as neoliberaleconomic globalization has suc-ceeded, it creates the conditions forfurther critical social responses thatlead to renewed struggles for demo-cratic freedoms and participation bythe ordinary people affectedby these

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changes. In these processes ofrenewed democratic struggles, wemay expectto see continuedefforts atself-government by many peoplesand also expanded representation.Globalization allows the transcend-ing of old established and fixed terri-torial units and borders of politicalrepresentation, thus allowing a moreterritorially diffuse pattern of politi-cal community to emerge, and to doso globally. This process deepensdemocracy by extending it to theglobal arena but moreover by alsodevolving power to self-constitutingcommunities seeking self-govern-ment and representation in the polit-ical order,whether this be on a local,national, regional, or global level.Anascent and informalglobalpeo-ples'assembly is thereforeone aspectof these efforts to redefine andextend political representationbeyond the confines of the presentterritoriallyboundedentities, that is,the states of the present interna-tional order and the United Nationssystem. Such processes are begin-ning to formulate global popularini-tiatives based on common concernsand to communicate these concernsto a whole panoply of political enti-ties, above and beyond the nationalor state framework.Thus, a new tierofpopular-and Iwouldargue, legiti-mate-governance is graduallyemerging alongside the existingglobal political order constituted ofstates and governments (Kiely 2000;Kumar 2000; Markoff1999). We arewitnessing ever-increasing popularwill for initiatives on global environ-mental preservation, global peaceand conflict resolution, global emer-gency relief, global rights or common

standards, and the global alleviationof poverty,debt, illiteracy, and injus-tice. Thus, in my view, we are wit-nessing the birth of a common set ofvalues that will define and animatethe practice and the theory of globaldemocracy.Theemergenceofa globalcivil society is indeed linked to theemergence of an alternative worldorder(Cox 1999)andto the prospectsfor a more cosmopolitan form ofdemocracy(Held 1997).

THE END OF THEWORLDAS WE KNOWIT?THE IMPERATIVEOFMULTICIVILIZATIONALIALOGUEIn this sense, we may concludethat we are living through the (grad-ual or sudden?) demise of the oldworld orderandthe (sloworsudden?)birth of a new one.Economically, hisnew order is based on an increasedlevel of global economic integrationand unison. Politically,however,it ispremised on the need to translategrassroots participatory politicalaction into increasingly populardemocratic forms of governance atlocal, national, regional, and globallevels (Gills 2000c; 2001). Moreover,it is also based on a real need to com-bine the peoples and social forces ofNorth and South in new ways, bring-ing together new coalitions drawnfrom movements around the world.The governments and the corpora-tions of the world must now listen toand accommodate the demands ofthe peoples of the whole world, whorepresent the voice of the governed.This new reality,which in my view isan objectiveone and not mere ideal-ism, therefore requires a new

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by which we can strive to achieve anew sense of humanity's oneness, itsunity, and its common interests,which will animate the popularpoli-tics of the comingworld order.Globalhistory, moreover, is the idea of ahumanocentric account and appreci-ation of the common heritage of allhumankind, based on the mutualand cumulative contributions andinfluences of all peoples and culturesto the commonprogress ofhumanity.We must reconstruct knowledge ofthe human past so that we canescapefromthe narrowconfines of nationalhistory and teach new generations aglobal vision of humanity's past andits future. On this basis, we canestablish a more common basis forboth civilization and democracy,which unites all humanity in onecommonheritage and future.This is the United Nations year ofcivilizational dialogue, and that, inmy view, is symbolic of the call to analternative world order. We cannottolerate the old order any longer,where a few ultrarich and militarilypowerful states rule via a universal-ism that is in fact neither truly uni-versal nor even cosmopolitan. Norcan we allow the world orderto driftinto a nightmare scenario of a clashof civilizations where intoleranceand hatred begin to tear our worldapart and leave us all spiritually andmaterially impoverished. We haveonly one choice,and it is in fact basedonrealism, not utopianidealism. Theold world order is unstable, and onlya leap into multicivilizational dia-logue can providea real solution. Wehave the historic choice of eitherbringing about this new world orderbased on the fruits of dialogic

communicationor suffering the con-sequences of failing to do so. It is theend of the world as we know it, butthis should be a cause not fordespairbut rather for renewed hope and vig-orous effort. There is a whole newworld to be gained and so much in itto be shared.Despite anger andhurt,we must turn fromvengeance andbyour nobler reason find our virtue inthat rareraction that leads us tojus-tice and peace, for all humanity,nowand to come.

The terrible events of 11 Septem-ber 2001 have changed the world.Apart from the horrorand revulsionthat so many people have felt at wit-nessing such atrocities, there hasalso emerged a widespread sense ofunease and foreboding about thefuture. This malaise of the spirit isfueled by fears that even worse actsof terrorism and perhaps wideningwarfare and conflict are to come andby a pervasive sense that we do notknow what the future will bring.Onething seems apparent, however: westand at a crossroadsof modern andhuman history, facing a choicebetween world orders based on verydifferent principles.Will we enter anage of chaosandconflict, n whichtheclaims of security override those ofliberty and in which the rich andpowerful protect themselves at thecontinued expense of the poor andpowerless? Or will we once and foralways rise above and go beyondtheold paradigms of international rela-tions and economics and invent anew form of world orderin which allpeoples share in both its governanceand its benefits? This, to my mind, isthe real significance of the presentcrisis and will remain its central

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problem until we find a genuine andcommon solution that will be, ineffect, part of the global democraticrevolution.

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