Will Transnational Issues Lead to Global Governance? 439
ety is “global” not only because of those connections that cross national
bound aries and operate within the “global, nonterritorial region,” but also
as a result of a growing ele ment of global consciousness in the way the
members of global civil society act.^24
Some liberals would find this a desirable direction in which to be moving— a goal to
be attained— whereas others fear that global governance might undermine demo cratic
values: as the focus of governance moves further from individuals, democracy becomes
more problematic. Others worry that a global civil society implies cultural convergence.
If convergence is to happen, in other words, some cultures may become extinct and
others dominant. Who is to say which cultures should be favored? In December 2012,
for example, 89 of the UN’s 193 members at an International Telecommunications
Union conference in Dubai voted to approve a treaty giving states new powers to close
off Internet access to their countries.^25 While countries like France and the United
Kingdom were disappointed, others such as Iran and the Rus sian Federation were
delighted. Each has argued that a perfectly open Internet fundamentally abridges state
sovereignty, or each state’s right to manage its own domestic affairs as it sees fit. Many
of the 89 states who voted for the treaty see an open Internet as a proxy for the imposi-
tion of “Western” values on their own, diff er ent values.
Skeptics of global governance do not believe that anything approaching it, how-
ever defined, is pos si ble or desirable. For realists, there can never be global governance
because the more closely it is approached, the more dangerous it is perceived, and the
more likely a countervailing authority or alliance is to halt or reverse the pro cess of
convergence. Outcomes are determined by relative power positions rather than by law
or other regulatory devices, however decentralized and diffuse those devices might be.
For Kenneth Waltz, the quin tes sen tial neorealist, the anarchic structure of the inter-
national system is the core dynamic. For other realists, such as Hans Morgenthau, there
is space for both international law and international or ga ni za tion. His textbook includes
chapters on both, but each is relatively insignificant in the face of power politics and
the national interest. Few realists would talk in global governance terms. Radicals are
also uncomfortable with global governance discourse. Rather than seeing global gov-
ernance as a multiple- actor, multiple- process, decentralized framework, radicals fear
domination by hegemons that would structure global governance pro cesses to their own
advantage. Skepticism about the possibility of global governance does not diminish the
fact that there may be a need for it in the age of globalization.