Thinking about Global Governance：Why People and Ideas Matter

One of the more prolific and influential analysts of multilateral approaches to global problem-solving over the last three decades is Thomas G. Weiss. Thinking about Global Governance, Why People and Ideas Matter, assembles key scholarly and policy writing.

This collection organizes his most recent work addressing the core issues of the United Nations, global governance, and humanitarian action. The essays are placed in historical and intellectual context in a substantial new introduction, which contains a healthy dose of the idealism and ethical orientation that invariably characterize his best work.

This volume gives the reader a comprehensive understanding of these key topics for a globalizing world and is an invaluable resource for students and scholars alike.

Introduction Part 1: United Nations, Plus ça change 1. Reinvigorating the International Civil Service 2. How UN Ideas Change the World 3. What Happened to the Idea of World Government? 4. Moving Beyond North-South Theatre 5. World Politics: Continuity and Change since 1945 with Sam Daws 6. An Unchanged Security Council: The Sky Ain’t Falling Part 2: Non-State Actors and Global Governance 7. The ‘Third’ United Nations" with Tatiana Carayannis, and Richard Jolly 8. Framing Global Governance, Five Gaps With Ramesh Thakur 9. Governance, Good Governance, and Global Governance: Conceptual and Actual Challenges 10. Pluralising Global Governance: Analytical Approaches and Dimensions with Leon Gordenker Part 3: Humanitarian Action in a Turbulent World 11. Political Innovations and the Responsibility to Protect 12. The Fog of Humanitarianism: Collective Action Problems and Learning-Challenged Organizations with Peter J Hoffman 13. The Humanitarian Impulse 14. The Sunset of Humanitarian Intervention? The Responsibility to Protect in a Unipolar Era 15. The Politics of Humanitarian Ideas 16. Principles, Politics, and Humanitarian Action 17. A Research Note about Military-Civilian Humanitarianism: More Questions than Answers