Global Governance

Question 1

What is the purpose of global governance

Answer 1

• To face issues that don’t just involve a few countries - they are global issues
• E.g. climate change or a global disease epidemic
• Global norms/laws and institutions have been formed to deal with issues similar to these
• Global governance regulates political and economic systems and sets up, monitors and enforces rules

Question 2

What are laws?

Answer 2

Established through international agreement, laws cover human rights, labour standards and trade regulations

Question 3

What are norms?

Answer 3

• Unofficial, accepted standards of behaviour

- There are usually negative impacts for countries who don’t follow them

Question 4

What are institutions?

Answer 4

Political/legal organisations who exist to pass laws or decide if a law has been broken

Question 5

Why are rules important?

Answer 5

• By setting rules, all participants act in a certain way

- E.g. In 2011, Sudan joined the UN and started having to follow all its rules

Question 6

What are positives of global governance?

Answer 6

• Promotes growth and stability
• Norms and laws make a country’s reaction to a certain situation more predictable, helping prevent wars
• WTO increases global trade through common rules - more trade results in more interdependence, economic growth, predictability and stability
• WTO combats disease epidemics, increasing social stability

Question 7

What are negatives of global governance?

Answer 7

• Promotes inequalities and injustices
• Countries must sign up voluntarily and sign a specific treaty to do so. Not singing up means the rules don’t have to be followed and no benefits are reaped
• Can be difficult to make some TNCs comply with the rules
• E.g. In 2016, China denied court ruling about its claims over the South China Sea - no economic charges were pressed against China because it’s so important to the economy

Question 8

What is the UN

Answer 8

• The United Nations
• Set up in 1945 to keep world peace
• Has 193 members currently, so has lots of authority and power

Question 9

What are the basic principles of the UN?

Answer 9

• Maintaining world peace
• Using co-operation to solve national problems
• Developing friendly relations between countries
• Bringing countries together to settle disputes

Question 10

How does the UN promote growth and stability?

Answer 10

• Has reduced the number of people in poverty, child mortality rates and maternal mortality rates
• Increase number of children in primary school
• Peacekeeping missions have helped stop wars
• E.g. Peaceful elections held in Côte d’ loire in 2015 after years of civil war

Question 11

How does the UN promote inequalities and injustices?

Answer 11

• Develoed countries hold most of the power
• E.g. Most issues dealt with are in African countries, but there are no African countries on the UN security council, who make the final decisions about a country
• The UN have been ineffective at times
• E.g. They failed to stop a massacre in south east europe where 8000 people got massacred