Globalizing Democracy and Human Rights

In this 2004 book Carol Gould addresses the fundamental issue of democratizing globalization.

Carol C. Gould (Author)

9780521833547, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 2 August 2004

292 pages
23.6 x 6 x 3 cm, 0.582 kg

"Globalizing Democracy and Human Rights is a magnificent book. The final chapter, 'terrorism, empathy and democracy' is particularly revealing in the current global climate. By highlighting the ways in which the lack of democratic possibilities may contribute to the conditions of terrorism, Gould moves the debate beyond the facile moralizing of good and evil toward an approach grounded in the actual political conditions of the contemporary world order. This book should be required reading not just for political philosophers and international relations scholars but also, and perhaps especially, for foreign policy makers in the world's most powerful countries." - Fiona Robinson, Carleton University

In her 2004 book Carol Gould addresses the fundamental issue of democratizing globalization, that is to say of finding ways to open transnational institutions and communities to democratic participation by those widely affected by their decisions. The book develops a framework for expanding participation in crossborder decisions, arguing for a broader understanding of human rights and introducing a new role for the ideas of care and solidarity at a distance. Reinterpreting the idea of universality to accommodate a multiplicity of cultural perspectives, the author takes up a number of applied issues, including the persistence of racism, cultural rights, women's human rights, the democratic management of firms, the use of the Internet to enhance political participation, and the importance of empathy and genuine democracy in understanding terrorism and responding to it. Accessibly written with a minimum of technical jargon this is a major contribution to political philosophy.

Acknowledgements
Introduction: between the personal and the global
Part I. Theoretical Considerations: 1. Hard questions in democratic theory: when justice and democracy conflict
2. Two concepts of universality and the problem of cultural relativism
Part II. Democracy and Rights, Personalized and Pluralized: 3. Embodied politics
4. Racism and democracy
5. Cultural identity, group rights, and social ontology
6. Conceptualizing women's human rights
Part III. Globalizing Democracy in a Human Rights Framework: 7. Evaluating the claims for a global democracy
8. Are democracy and human rights compatible in the context of globalization?
9. The global democratic deficit and economic human rights
Part IV. Current Applications: 10. Democratic management and the stakeholder idea
11. Democratic networks: technological and political
12. Terrorism, empathy, and democracy
Index.

Subject Areas: Political science & theory [JPA], Social & political philosophy [HPS]