'We are the Guardians of Democratic Values': The G8 as Manifestation of Liberal Self-Confidence in a Transient World Order

Following the end of the Cold War, many Western political actors were confident that a liberal world order – marked by the spread of democracy, human rights and market economy – was to emerge. 25 years later, the international discourses rather indicate an end of a putative triumph of liberalism. The “return” of “authoritarian” great powers such as Russia and China, the destabilizing results of forceful democratization attempts, or the violent resistance by Islamist non-state actors have fuelled debates on global power transitions and a decline of the West. So, who governs the world – and who should govern it? While one might expect ideas of a liberal democratic “club governance” to have a rough time nowadays, such discourses and practices seeking to legitimate international privileges for a certain regime type still exist. Liberal democracies are portrayed as more legitimate states that are committed to global common goods. Since the non-democratic “others” in the UN Security Council keep on blocking necessary initiatives and military interventions, so one legitimating narrative goes, democratic states have to align and to orchestrate global affairs. Given the pressure on Western political actors to defend their governance privileges, we analyze the manifestations of their self-legitimation both within academia and politics: First, the analysis of scholarly debates on liberal and transient world order shows that a certain liberal self-confidence is still present in recent IR discourses. Based on declarations, the following empirical analysis of the G8’ self-legitimation discourses shows that the idea of an informal “democratic club” has not lost any of its relevance in a pluralist world, reflected by the G20. The G8’s suspension of Russia underlines the club’s self-perception of a like-minded group sharing democratic values. Finally, the implications of the mutually enforcing dynamics between academia and the self-legitimation of the G8 will be discussed.