Justice, Legitimacy, and Self-Determination: Moral Foundations for International Law, Allen Buchanan (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004), 507 pp., $35 cloth.

TLDR: The notion of distributive subsidiarity was first proposed by Kuper as discussed by the authors, who argued that the distribution of wealth globally is a matter to be settled by the democratic polity consisting of the whole world population.

Abstract: 123 raises important questions. For example, if migration is restricted by law anywhere in the world, what is the appropriate democratic constituency for the sovereign agent empowered to restrict immigration for a given territory—only those already living there or all who have an interest in access to the opportunities there? Can distributive subsidiarity countenance any sovereign agent that commands military capabilities of global reach while excluding a subset of the world’s population from its democratic constituency? What about the sovereign power to institute coercive redistributive institutions? The idea of distributive subsidiarity could suggest that the distribution of wealth globally is a matter to be settled by the democratic polity consisting of the whole world’s population. Yet if all these powers of the state were truly consigned to the democratic constituency comprising all affected by them, the consequence could be an unweildy global jurisdiction concentrating many of the most significant sovereign powers at the top. It may be possible to specify the idea of distributive subsidiarity in a way that lays this worry to rest, but both the feasibility and the attractiveness of Kuper’s model will turn on the specifics. In the fourth part of the book, “Transforming Global Institutions,” Kuper advances a number of concrete institutional reforms that could move us incrementally toward his proposed ideal. He suggests, for example, that certain appropriately qualified IGOs and NGOs be given standing before existing international judicial bodies; that some be given voting rights in the UN General Assembly; and that some NGOs be given indirect representation in the UN Security Council. Noting that they can sometimes wield more influence than foreign governments in conflict-prone regions, Kuper even suggests that transnational corporations should have Security Council representation. These reform proposals will not make it onto the agenda overnight, but they are clearly feasible and warrant consideration. If the overarching institutional model proposed by Kuper remains provisional in many matters, its normative foundations are elaborated in detail and rigorously defended. The most significant and fully developed of these is a novel conception of democratic representation, which Kuper calls “representation as responsiveness.” It is presented with an eye to the global context, but this conception stands on its own as a contribution to democratic theory, and as a rival to prominent deliberative-democratic accounts. In sum, Democracy Beyond Borders lays out an intriguing model of global governance; grounds it in a developed and substantial theory of democracy; and proposes some concrete reforms that are worth serious consideration. —Eric Cavallero Tulane University