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We suggest to use an ample concept of democracy which embraces both the political and the
socioeconomic fields. The political field structures the procedural dimension of decision
making and the possibilities of the affected persons to influence the decisions. The
socioeconomic field structures the entitlement dimension, where an inclusive society provides
universal social and economic rights. For this purpose, we propose a two-dimensional concept
of democracy which takes both the procedural and the material dimensions of democracy into
account (cf. Table 1).
TABLE 1
Modalities of Democracy
PROCEDURAL DIMENSION
CONTENT DIMENSION
Domain?
Political Socioeconomic
What about?
RULE-MAKING RESULT-ORIENTED
Prime Value?
Freedom Equality
and
justice
How?
Access to decision making:
Control of state apparatus:
bureaucracy/ public control/
private control
Participation/ empowerment
Access to resources
Social & economic rights as
entitlements: universal
or targeted
Forms of democracy
Direct, representative,
participatory
Socioeconomic citizenship
(welfare)
Utopian Form of
Socioeconomic
organisation
Democratization and
participation
Embedded capitalism, post-
capitalism, solidarian
economy, socialism
CAHIERS DU CRISES
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Governance theory is generally applied to rethink the role of the state. Differing from the
usage in former times when it was either synonymous with government or with steering by
market forces, governance can be defined as the totality of theoretical conceptions on
governing, which, according to Jan Kooiman (2003: 4), “can be considered as the totality of
interactions, in which public as well as private actors participate, aimed at solving societal
problems or creating societal opportunities”. This indicates a shift in the conceptualisation of
state and power. The state is no longer treated as the only agent responsible for societal
development but is recognized to have a crucial role in steering society. The emphasis thus
shifted towards the analysis of the interplay between state and non-state actors (Kooiman
1993; Rhodes 1997).
Therefore, the rising interest for governance analyses has to be related to the exhaustion of the
old ideological dispute between market and state concerning their respective failures. While
neoliberalism was successful in discrediting top-down state planning, its inner contradiction
led to a process which Polanyi already described for liberalism before World War II: The self
regulating market is a liberal utopia which destroys people and environment (Polanyi 1978:
19f.). Governance seems to be a conceptual reaction, reintroducing other agents and
organisations than markets. It is an institutionalist approach which reflects on how to organize
socioeconomic coordination. “Governance is a negotiation mechanism for formulating and
implementing policy that actively seeks the involvement of stakeholders and civil society
organisations besides government bodies and experts” (García 2006: 745, emphasis added).
It is a mode of coordination, relating to the questions of control, resistance and steering
(cf. Arthur et al. 2007: 2), analysing fields of power where states do not hold monopolies
(cf. Fontan et al. 2007: 2).
1.1.
Normative and Analytical Discourses on Governance
The highly normative concept of good governance – favoured by important international
institutions such as the World Bank (1992), the OECD (1995), the United Nations (UNDP
1997) or the European Commission (CEC 2001; 2003) – recognizes the importance of the
legal framework. These institutions have developed various slightly different but nevertheless
similar notions of ‘good’ governance (cf. Weiss 2000 for a good comparison) which are all
based on a clear commitment to economic liberalisation. Thus, the state has been recognized
as the central regulatory institution to guarantee functioning markets, which themselves are
seen as necessary for socio-economic development (cf. especially World Bank 2002). The way
governance and democracy are related by the major international financial institutions can be
GOVERNANCE AND DEMOCRACY
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shown by the World Bank and the way structural adjustment programs are used to implement
a liberal mode of governance. The good governance approach came up due to the exhaustion
of the so-called “Washington Consensus” (Williamson 1990) based on privatisation,
liberalisation and deregulation. Structural adjustment programmes imposed by the
international financial institutions on developing countries resulted in weak productivity gains
and the rise of poverty and social crisis (Adedeji 1999, Cornia et al. 1988; Lopes 1999; Imhof
2003), and it became evident that the Washington Consensus was outdated. “Governance” was
a welcome response and helped to foster a “Post-Washington Consensus” (Williamson 2004;
cf. also JEP 2/2003; Helleiner 2003; Schwank 2003; Burchardt 2004) and to “bring the state
back in” (Evans et al. 1985), without having to withdraw from the arguments against state
intervention (cf. Abrahamsen 2000: 47ff.; Ziai 2006: 70ff. for discourse analysis).
The EU’s concept of good governance differs somewhat from the World Bank’s concept. The
five principles of good governance are openness, participation, accountability, effectiveness
and coherence (CEC 2001: 10). As the EU’s “legitimacy today depends on involvement and
participation […] the linear model of dispensing policies from above must be replaced by a
virtuous circle, based on feedback, networks and involvement from policy creation to
implementation at all levels” (CEC 2001: 11). The main emphasis lies on improved
communication to and consultation of national and sub-national governments and civil society
by the European Union, while the “European Commission alone makes legislative and policy
proposals. Its independence strengthens its ability to execute policy, act as the guardian of the
Treaty and represent the Community in international negotiations” (CEC 2001: 8). Thus, the
principles designed to reinforce subsidiarity and democratic governance (García 2006: 745)
are accompanied by a centralization of powers at EU executive level, which is legitimized by
the principle of “effectiveness”. Thus, governance claims normatively to be a concept of an
integrative form of governing which “is supposed to correct both state and market failure”
(Wassenhoven 2007: 12).
In a more analytical perspective, governance represents an approach to politics different from
the state-centred perspective on government being employed before. This was linked to socio-
economic transformations which will now briefly be explained. During the crises of Fordism,
the neoliberalism of Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman grew in importance in connection
with the criticisms of the welfare state and was explicitly anti-socialist (Harvey 2005). In fact,
it was directed against all efforts to limit the liberty of the few via the power of the majority
(Hayek 1978). Neoliberalism criticised not only big government and planning in general, but
democratic planning and government as well: “democracy is an enemy of freedom – perhaps
not the worst enemy, but an enemy nonetheless” (Lehmann 1990: 79). Right from the