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2002VIKTOR VANBERG
Globalization, Democracy and Citizens' Sovereignty: Can Competition Among Governments Enhance Democracy?
ABSTRACT
The expansion of markets known as globalization creates new options, new avenues for trade in
goods and services, as well as new opportunities for capital investment and the allocation of
mobile resources. It is a common, and uncontested, claim that globalization and the resulting
competition among jurisdictions imposes restrictions on the freedom of action of national
governments. Competition is always a matter of accessibility of alternative options, and, to the
same degree that the globalization of markets creates additional options for citizens and for
those whom one may call jurisdiction-users, competition among jurisdictions restricts the power
governments can exercise over them. The focus of the present article is on an argument
frequently heard in this context, namely that the developments referred to as globalization
represent a threat to democracy, and that there is a systematic conflict between the market forces
of competition among jurisdictions and the principles of democratic politics.
Keywords: Globalisation, competition among jurisdictions, Citizen sovereignty, comparative
institutional analysis,
JEL classification: H0 H7 H10
1
The present paper was presented “Freiburg-Padua Joint seminar”: Networks, institutions, and organisational learning,
september 28, 2001.
