Legitimacy, Identity and Climate Change: moving from international to world society?

Thomas Weiss and Martin Burke

Third World Quarterly, 2011, vol. 32, issue 6, 1057-1072

Abstract: Resource scarcity and climate change could provoke major inter-state and intra-state violence and humanitarian emergencies, an especial threat to the global South. This article examines the dynamics that have followed the major violent crises of the past few centuries to determine whether climate-change-induced conflict might paradoxically generate norms of non-violence and collective identification, and in turn lead to a more co-operative culture of anarchy. Especially since 1945 we have witnessed the development of a ‘security community’ in the North Atlantic—that is, a group of states that not only resolve conflict without resort to violence but also consider war among their members unthinkable. Such communities might develop in other regions in two stages. First, state internalisation of liberal norms of democracy and human rights may enhance the role of intergovernmental organisations in mitigating climate-change-induced conflict. Second, collective identification among states and individuals may be stimulated by structural similarity between increasingly democratic states, the perception of a common fate arising from shared threats, and an expanding global civil society and epistemic communities preoccupied with climate change. Climate change could thus spur movement towards more legitimate and authoritative intergovernmental organisations within a world society that would be more effective at solving common problems than those operating within today's more fragmented international society.

Date: 2011
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DOI: 10.1080/01436597.2011.584721

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