The Universal Republic: A Realistic Utopia?

Can humanity achieve collective self-government in a highly interdependent world? Catastrophic climate change, biodiversity loss, pandemics, war and displacement, the dangers of nuclear weapons and new technologies, and persistent poverty and inequality are among the global challenges that expose the weaknesses of existing international institutions as well as the profound disparities of power and vulnerability that exist among the world’s people.

The Universal Republic: A Realistic Utopia? examines whether a democratic world state is a feasible and desirable solution to the problem of establishing effective and just governance on the planet we share. While this question has haunted thinkers and doers for centuries, this book opens up novel perspectives by putting the powerful methods and rich data of contemporary social science into the service of a systematic analysis of several key dimensions of the broader theme. The first part of the book shows why a democratic world state -a universal republic- is possible: why it can be achieved, and how it can endure without generating a frightful global despotism. The second part of the book shows why the universal republic is desirable, by exploring how it can help bring under our collective control the persistent sources of coercion, harm, and other processes that affect us deeply across national borders. By combining insights from political philosophy and empirical political science, this work sheds new light on a crucial question of our time: how to bring about a more democratic world.

Mathias Koenig-Archibugi, Associate Professor of Global Politics, London School of Economics and Political Science

Mathias Koenig-Archibugi is an Associate Professor of Global Politics at the London School of Economics and Political Science, as a joint appointment of the Department of Government and the Department of International Relations. His work has appeared in the British Journal of Political Science, European Journal of International Relations, European Journal of Political Research, International Organization, International Studies Quarterly, Journal of Political Philosophy, Journal of Politics, Philosophy & Public Affairs, Review of International Organizations, Social Science & Medicine, World Development, World Politics, and other journals.