Democracy Beyond Borders

The complete series 1-4 of the award-winning BBC satirical political comedy drama written and directed by Armando Iannucci. Peter Capaldi stars as Number 10's ferociously foul-mouthed policy enforcer Malcolm Tucker, whose job is to bully and cajole the wayward ministers of the Ministry for Social Affairs and Citizenship (DoSAC) through a catalogue of gaffes, crises, Prime Ministerial resignations and possible election dates.

Democracy Without Borders? assesses the worldwide prospects of liberal democracy. In an era of globalization and in an intellectual climate in which the idea of national sovereignty is under assault, Plattner identifies the essential features of modern liberal democracy and offers guidance about what is required to sustain it. This examination comes at a critical moment. After three decades of global advance, liberal democracy today is being challenged from many quarters. Among the reasons why its future looks cloudy is the popular election of candidates hostile to liberalism_in Palestine, Russia, Venezuela, and elsewhere. An investigation of the complex and tension-filled relationship between liberalism and majority rule is at the heart of this essential book. PlattnerOs contention is that liberalism needs democracy and that liberal democracy needs the nation-state. He argues that transnational bodies like the European Union cannot overcome their 'democratic deficit.' Hence he recommends an approach that will enable the United States to promote international cooperation without sacrificing the fundamental elements of national sovereignty or American democracy.

An innovative conception of democracy for an era of globalization and delegation of authority beyond the nation-state: rule by peoples across borders rather than by "the people" within a fixed jurisdiction. Today democracy is both exalted as the "best means to realize human rights" and seen as weakened because of globalization and delegation of authority beyond the nation-state. In this provocative book, James Bohman argues that democracies face a period of renewal and transformation and that democracy itself needs redefinition according to a new transnational ideal. Democracy, he writes, should be rethought in the plural; it should no longer be understood as rule by the people (dêmos), singular, with a specific territorial identification and connotation, but as rule by peoples (dêmoi), across national boundaries. Bohman shows that this new conception of transnational democracy requires reexamination of such fundamental ideas as the people, the public, citizenship, human rights, and federalism, and he argues that it offers a feasible approach to realizing democracy in a globalized world. In his account, Bohman establishes the conceptual foundations of transnational democracy by examining in detail current theories of democracy beyond the nation-state (including those proposed by Rawls, Habermas, Held, and Dryzek) and offers a deliberative alternative. He considers the importance of communicative freedom in the transnational public sphere (including networked communication over the Internet), human rights as the normative basis of transnational democracy, and the European Union as a transnational polity. Finally, he examines the relationship between peace and democracy, concluding that peace requires democratization on interacting state and suprastate levels.

This book carves out a new area of democratisation studies by analysing the transnational dimension and the role of non state actors across three different geographical regions. Chapters utilise empirical data from Europe, Africa and Latin America.

Global challenges such as war, climate change, poverty and inequality are overwhelming nation-states and today's international institutions. Achieving a world community that is peaceful, just and sustainable requires a democratic world parliament. This book describes the history, relevance and practical steps to implement this monumental project.