Globalization, Governmentality and Global Politics: Regulation for the Rest of Us? (RIPE Series in Global Political Economy)

Globalization is moving fast, impacting on the life of all nations with accelerating force. In this new study Ronnie Lipschutz shows how it is being handled by specific groups seeking positive outcomes for the people and causes they represent.

Globalization, Governmentality and Global Politics details how the widespread failure of states and corporations to regulate the impact of increased globalization has given rise to non-governmental organizations and movements, aiming to influence corporations regarding social responsibilities and address key issues such as human rights, environmental destruction, unhealthy working conditions and child labour.

Assessing the effectiveness of these efforts, it examines both the new movements and the issues they are tackling. With three key case studies on the clothing industry, sustainable forestry and corporate social responsibility, it explores the tensions between politics and management, examining the theoretical implications of regulation for politics, citizenship and the state. Finally, it takes a fresh look at what is to be done, calling for a return to politics centred on the direct participation of the individual in the social choices that affect quality of life, working conditions and the global future.

Ronnie D. Lipschutz is Professor of Politics and Associate Director of the Center for Global, International and Regional Studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz. He is also Chair of the Politics Ph.D. program at UCSC. His most recent books include Global Environmental Politics: Power, Perspectives and Practice (Washington, D.C.: CQ Press, 2004), After Authority-War, Peace and Global Politics in the 21st Century (Albany, N.Y.: State University of New York Press, 2000) and Cold War Fantasies-Film, Fiction and Foreign Policy (Lanham, Md.: Rowman and Littlefield, 2001). He is co-authoring an IR ^D<"ani-text^D>" with Mary Ann Tetreault, Global Politics Because People Matter, which Rowman and Littlefield will publish in 2005. He is also the author of When Nations Clash: Raw Materials, Ideology and Foreign Policy (New York: Ballinger/Harper and Row, 1989) and Global Civil Society and Global Environmental Governance (Albany: SUNY Press), editor of On Security (New York: Columbia, 1995), and co-author or co-editor of several other books.

James K. Rowe is a Ph.D. Candidate in Politics at UC-Santa Cruz. He does research on social movements and the global politics of corporate social responsibility.