| Publication |
2008.
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| Summary/Abstract |
While `world opinion' is a staple in political discourse, the concept has received little attention in IR. Locating it along the `realist-idealist' divide, existing studies have conceptualized `world opinion' empirically, as an aggregative or intersubjective phenomenon, annexed or opposed to state sovereignty, and embodying a normative standard. Drawing on Luhmann's conception of public opinion and Foucault's governmentality approach, this article reconceptualizes `world opinion' discursively (functionally and semantically), as a medium of communication that enables post-sovereign forms of international governance irrespective of an inherent normativity.
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