The limits of the all affected principle: attending to deep structures

ABSTRACT

It is submitted that the all affected principle (AAP) can be combined with the all subjected principle (ASP) to more effectively identify affected groups and peoples. Historically, the AAP and ASP were first articulated by the colonised peoples during their liberation struggles against imperialism. For meaningful implementation, these principles must take cognizance of deep, intermediate, and proximate structures of global capitalism, as also the class, gender, and race fractures in national and global societies. A principal problem of the affected groups and peoples of developing nations is the loss of policy space. Therefore, a principal mode of implementing AAP and ASP is to devolve critical decisions to the nation-state which is also the principal site of struggle of organisations of affected groups and peoples. Alongside international law initiatives like the Global Administrative Law project can be invoked to democratise international law.

KEYWORDS:

• Affectedness
• all subjected principle
• colonialism
• representation
• Global Administrative Law
• democracy

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank the editors of this volume for their comments.

Notes

1. Koenig-Archibugi, “How to diagnose democratic deficits in global politics”, 2.

2. Sändig et al., “Affectedness in International Institutions.”

3. Koenig-Archibugi, “How to diagnose democratic deficits in global politics”, 3.

4. Fraser, “Abnormal Justice,” 411; and for her earlier view see Fraser, Fortunes of Feminism, 202.

5. Fraser, “Abnormal Justice,” 411.

6. Ibid., 401.

7. Ibid., 413.

8. Koenig-Archibugi, “How to diagnose democratic deficits in global politics”, 1.

9. See, for instance, Anghie, Sovereignty, Imperialism and International Law.

10. Chimni, “International Institutions Today.”

11. Chimni, “Anti-Imperialism.”

12. Chimni, “International Financial Institutions and International Law,” 48–51.

13. Chimni, “Anti-Imperialism.”

14. Human Rights Council, “Revised draft United Nations declaration on the rights of peasants and other people working in rural areas.”

15. Kingsbury et al., “The Emergence of Global Administrative Law’.

16. Falk and Strauss, A Global Parliament.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

B. S. Chimni

Dr. B. S. Chimni is former professor of international law, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. He has been a visiting professor at Brown, Tokyo and the American University in Cairo. He has also held visiting scholar/fellow positions in several universities including Cambridge, Harvard, Minnesota and at the Max Planck Institute of Comparative and International Law in Heidelberg. He is an associate member of the Institut de Droit International and Member Academic Council, Institute of Global Law and Policy, Harvard Law School. His recent publications include International Law and World Order: A Critique of Contemporary Approaches (2017, 2nd edition) and (with Siddharth Malvarrapu) edited International Relations: Essays for the Global South (New Delhi: Pearson 2012).