Citizens, Elites, and the Legitimacy of Global Governance

At this webinar, we will discuss the new book “Citizens, Elites, and the Legitimacy of Global Governance” (Oxford University Press) with the authors. The book offers a comparative study of citizen and elite legitimacy beliefs towards global governance and shows how individual characteristics, including socioeconomic status, values, institutional trust and identities have an important impact on these beliefs. Yet, the authors also found that there is a significant gap between elites and citizens, with the general public being more sceptical toward global governance. The book thereby provides an important input into the study of opportunities and constraints in international cooperation, and the importance of legitimacy beliefs in assessing the current state of global governance. The book is an open access title and available here.

Presenters: 

Ass. Prof. Dr. Soetkin Verhaegen is Assistant Professor in European Politics at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, Department of Political Science, Maastricht University.  

Prof. Dr. Jan Aart Scholte is Professor of Global Transformations and Governance Challenges at Leiden University. 

Moderation:   Dr. Miriam Prys-Hansen is Lead Research Fellow at the GIGA Institute for Asian Studies and Head of the GIGA’s Research Programme “Global Orders and Foreign Policies.”