The Role of Non-State Actors in the International Climate Change Negotiations: Functionalism, Global Corporatism or Democratic Pluralism?

The participation of non-state actors in international politics has been suggested as a way of reducing the democratic deficit that international organizations are perceived to suffer from. According to this view, non-state actors are part of a global civil society that can help bring accountability to international organizations that operate on a weak electoral mandate. In addition, non-state actors can through their participation in international organizations bring attention to issues that are of a global concern that the nation-state system has failed to address. Nevertheless, little is known about whether non-state actors in fact succeed in representing marginalized voices at the international level. Which non-state actors represent marginalized views and what difficulties do they face in being heard in international organizations? According to global democratic theory, increased non-state actor participation can take three forms: functionalism, global corporatism, or democratic pluralism (Willetts 2006). In other words, authority of non-state actors can depend largely on expertise, being a major stakeholder in the issue, or being legitimate representatives of concerned constituencies, including marginalized voices. There are inherent tensions between these perspectives where functionalism sees a more elitist function for non-state actors while democratic pluralism sees a more grass-roots oriented role. This paper thus argues that greater attention be directed at the question of which non-state actors are participating in international organizations and to what capacity. These questions are important in assessing what the efficiency and distributive effects of greater participation by non-state actors in international organizations are. Using unique survey material from two international climate change conferences as well as interviews with negotiators and observers, we propose that different categories of non-state actors have diverse functionality profiles that have wide-spread implications for how their involvement in international organizations can realize the democratic potential.