Actors and Agency in Global Social Governance

Actors and Agency in Global Social Governance seeks to advance our understanding of the global dimension of social policy by applying the notion of global social governance on actors, their relations to each other, and their pathways as well as their footprints of influence in the specific policy fields of social concern in which they are active.

Focusing on a broad array of individual and corporate global social policy actors, ranging from internationally operating intergovernmental organizations to state formations and NGOs, the contributions to this volume draw a fuller picture of agency in global social policy than what current accounts provide. It considers the multiple facets of individual scope and legitimacy for a particular actor in conjunction with the configuration of global social governance as characterised by multi-centred and multi-scaled obstacles as well as diverse forms of collaboration.

The volume studies the contextualised actor's range and power in designing, shaping, and facilitating various global social policies. Thus, the contributions discuss the role of particular (corporate) actors within global social policy structures and assess the impact of a number of key organizations, states, groups, and individuals in the governance of global social policy. At the same time, a variety of social policy fields in which these actors are involved are addressed, including labour market issues, family policy, health policy, education policy, migration issues, and global (re)distribution via various forms of development aid or remittances.

Professor Dr Alexandra Kaasch is Junior Professor in Transnational Social Policy at the University of Bielefeld. Her research interests include global social policy, health policy, and international organisations. She has published both in comparative and global social policy. Among her recent publications are a guest-edited special issue for the journal Global Social Policy (13.1), and a co-edited volume with Paul Stubbs, Transformations in Global and Regional Social Policies (2014). She is editor of the Global Social Policy Digest.


Professor Dr Kerstin Martens is Associate Professor of International Relations at the University of Bremen, Germany. Her research interests include theories of international relations, international organizations, global governance, and global public policy, in particular education and social policy. She heads the research project on 'Internationalization of Education Policy' located at the University of Bremen. She is co-editor of several books, amongst other Internationalization of Education Policy? (Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan 2014), and Education in Political Science: Discovering a Neglected Field (London & New York: Routledge 2009). She holds a PhD in Social and Political Sciences from the European University Institute, Florence, Italy.

Preface, Stephan Leibfried
Part I - Introduction & Theoretical Reflections
1. Actors and Agency in Global Social Governance, Alexandra Kaasch & Kerstin Martens
2. A Cultural Political Economy Approach to Global Social Policy, Bob Jessop
Part II - International Governmental Organisations Designing Global Social Governance
3. The ILO and Global Social Governance: the 100 Year Search for Social Justice within Capitalism, Bob Deacon
4. The World Bank as an Education Policy Governor, Karen Mundy & Antoni Verger
5. The OECD, Gender, and Social Policy: Parallel Stories, Rianne Mahon
Part III - Old and New State Formations Exerting Global Social Governance
6. The European Union as a Global Social Policy Actor: Discourse and Policy Practice, Valeria Fargion & Marco Mayer
7. 'New Kids on the Block?' The Implications of the BRICS Alliance for Global Social Governance, Rebecca Surender & Marian Urbina-Ferretjans
8. Slowly Succeeding: G20 Social Policy Governance, John Kirton, Julia Kulik & Caroline Bracht
Part IV - Civil Society shaping Global Social Governance
9. NGOs as Actors in Global Social Governance, Johannes Kruse & Kerstin Martens
10. Global Social Governance in the Media, Frank Nullmeier
11. Policy Flexians in the Global Order, Paul Stubbs & Janine Wedel
Conclusion
12. Conclusions: Complexity in Global Social Governance, Alexandra Kaasch