Linkage deficits in transnational politics

Abstract

Globalization entails the development of a set of transnational organizations, and these are becoming major arbiters of power and policies. These organizations are headed by elites and thus, in addition to national elites, we now have a second layer of transnational elites. This article examines the linkages between such elites and the public in two organizations: the International Monetary Fund and the European Union. Its argument is that such links, or couplings, between elites and the public are of crucial importance to democracy, and to progress toward a more egalitarian distribution of socioeconomic resources. Further, it documents a series of deficits in elite-public linkages in the two organizations analyzed. When linkages are deficient this means that democracy in these transnational organizations is flawed as well. Concomitantly, and partly because of the same inadequacy in their coupling with the public, these elites are also instrumental in increasing socioeconomic inequalities.