• Sovereignty "Must Be Altered"

    From Steve Asher@3:800/432 to All on Saturday, April 01, 2006 00:33:07
    State sovereignty must be altered in globalized era

    In the age of globalization, states should give up some sovereignty
    to world bodies in order to protect their own interests

    By Richard Haass

    For 350 years, sovereignty -- the notion that states are the central
    actors on the world stage and that governments are essentially free
    to do what they want within their own territory but not within the
    territory of other states -- has provided the organizing principle
    of international relations. The time has come to rethink this notion.

    The world's 190-plus states now co-exist with a larger number of
    powerful non-sovereign and at least partly (and often largely)
    independent actors, ranging from corporations to non-governmental
    organizations (NGOs), from terrorist groups to drug cartels, from
    regional and global institutions to banks and private equity funds.
    The sovereign state is influenced by them (for better and for worse)
    as much as it is able to influence them. The near monopoly of power
    once enjoyed by sovereign entities is being eroded.

    As a result, new mechanisms are needed for regional and global
    governance that include actors other than states. This is not to argue
    that Microsoft, Amnesty International, or Goldman Sachs be given seats
    in the UN General Assembly, but it does mean including representatives
    of such organizations in regional and global deliberations when they
    have the capacity to affect whether and how regional and global
    challenges are met.

    Less is more

    Moreover, states must be prepared to cede some sovereignty to world
    bodies if the international system is to function. This is already
    taking place in the trade realm. Governments agree to accept the
    rulings of the WTO because on balance they benefit from an
    international trading order even if a particular decision requires
    that they alter a practice that is their sovereign right to carry out.

    [...]

    Globalization thus implies that sovereignty is not only becoming
    weaker in reality, but that it needs to become weaker. States would
    be wise to weaken sovereignty in order to protect themselves, because
    they cannot insulate themselves from what goes on elsewhere.
    Sovereignty is no longer a sanctuary.

    [... ...]

    The goal should be to redefine sovereignty for the era of globalization,
    to find a balance between a world of fully sovereign states and an international system of either world government or anarchy.

    The basic idea of sovereignty, which still provides a useful constraint
    on violence between states, needs to be preserved. But the concept needs
    to be adapted to a world in which the main challenges to order come from
    what global forces do to states and what governments do to their citizens rather than from what states do to one another.

    Richard Haass is president of the Council on Foreign Relations and the
    author of The Opportunity: America's Moment to Alter History's Course.

    Copyright: Project Syndicate

    Copyright (c) 1999-2006 The Taipei Times. All rights reserved


    Full article at Raiders News Updates http://www.raidersnewsupdate.com/lead-story24.htm


    Cheers, Steve..

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    * Origin: Xaragmata / Adelaide SA telnet://xaragmata.thebbs.org (3:800/432)