US power and transnational governance

A number of commentators have followed Levi-Faur and Jordana, in identifying recent years as a 'golden era of regulation', with the 'proliferation of regulatory activities, actions, networks or constellations' leading to 'an explosion of rules and to the profound reordering of our world.' Beyond the territories of particular nation states 'an increasing share of this intense governance activity takes place between and across nations'. And much of this developing 'culture' of transnational governance relies upon 'voluntary' rules, 'to which formal legal sanctions are not attached.' The implication is that of a significant expansion of the rule of law or of quasi-legal self-regulatory practices, built upon democratic participation and consensus in transnational affairs, replacing an earlier rule of force or no rule at all. This paper argues that this is a misleading picture of transnational governance in the contemporary world, insofar as much that it identifies as 'voluntary', 'democratically decided' and/or 'self-regulatory' principles and practises are really built upon the use of force, threat and coercion, including both the economic and military force of the United States ('US'). At the same time, it is as true to see recent decades as a time of deregulation, as much as of regulation, including the winding back of regulations which really were built upon a foundation of democratic and ethical legitimacy to leave the field free for the exercise of the raw economic power of big transnational corporations.