Autocracies and Global Governance

While we know a lot about the effect of democracy in international relations, less is known about the role that autocracies and processes of autocratization play in global politics. However, a range of scholars from different sub-fields have started to work on different aspects of the topic over the last years. This section aims to address this emerging scholarly debate along four dimensions. First, we examine how autocracies undermine global governance by reshaping international institutions from within. For instance, they construct strategic coalitions in international organizations to block democratic initiatives. Second, we analyze how autocracies contribute to regime complexity and how this affects global governance. For example, China plays an increasing role in organizing informal organizations such as the G20 and BRICS+. Third, we assess how illiberal actors promote illiberal norms in global governance. For instance, we observe autocrats promoting ‘bad’ norms in internet governance and non-proliferation regimes. Fourth and finally, we observe how democracies respond to these autocratic challenges. For example, we are interested in whether democracies see decreasing opportunities for mutually beneficial cooperation. By analyzing these developments, we can better understand the consequences of authoritarian politics for the transformation of global governance. Panel Proposal 1: "Authoritarian Subversion and Global Governance" Chair: Maria Debre As authoritarian regimes deepen their engagement in global governance, they increasingly employ tactics aimed at reshaping international institutions from within to promote illiberal agendas and challenge liberal norms. This panel will explore the variety of methods used by authoritarian states to undermine global governance. Key questions the panel will investigate include: How do authoritarian regimes construct strategic coalitions within international organizations to block democratic initiatives or promote authoritarian policies? In what ways do government-organized NGOs (GO-NGOs) allow these regimes to represent state interests as civil society perspectives? To what extent do informal practices—such as personal networks — enable authoritarian influence in decision-making processes? How does vote-buying, through financial incentives or diplomatic backing, sway voting patterns in IOs? To what extent do authoritarian actors influence the allocation and management of financial resources and bureaucratic positions within IOs to support their agendas? How are direct and indirect threats used to secure compliance from smaller or economically dependent states? By examining these tactics and practices, the panel aims to assess the impact of authoritarian subversion on the effectiveness, legitimacy, and resilience of global governance structures, ultimately exploring how these dynamics challenge the integrity of multilateralism, international cooperation, and the global liberal order. Panel proposal 2: “Autocracies in Ascendance? Power Shifts, Regime Diversity, and Global Governance” Chair: Matthew Stephen This panel focuses on the rise of authoritarian influence in global governance. The rising power of non-democratic states has produced a new dynamic of regime diversity in global governance. Informal platforms such as the G20 and BRICS+ provide a new focus for global governance that is not based on democratic identity but are driven by more pragmatic concerns. China plays a growing role in such informal forums while increasing its influence in traditional organizations such as the United Nations. This panel focuses on papers that explore the interaction of power shifts, autocratization, and governance complexity. Panel proposal 3: “Bad actors, bad norms: illiberal actors as norm entrepreneurs” Chair: Danielle Flonk The norm literature has a liberal bias. First, norms are often seen as liberal norms. Second, norm entrepreneurs are often conceptualized as liberal and democratic actors. However, since norms are collectively shared standards of appropriate behavior for actors with a given identity, norms can be both liberal and illiberal, both democratic and authoritarian. We observe autocrats promoting ‘bad’ norms in areas such as internet governance and non-proliferation. This panel tries to fill this empirical gap by focusing on illiberal actors promoting illiberal norms. What do illiberal norms look like? What strategies do illiberal norm entrepreneurs use? What are the theoretical implications of broadening the scope to non-liberal actors? This panel aims to answer these and other questions in order to address the biases in existing norm literature. Panel Proposal 4: “Democracies and the autocratic challenge” Chair: Jana Lipps Extensive scholarly work has engaged with the ways that autocrats have challenged global governance frameworks by violating international law, blocking proposals, creating new institutions, subverting norms and discursively constructing alternative economic, security and cultural orders. This panel invites paper submission that analyze how democratic countries globally perceive and reacted to the “autocratic challenge”. Do they see the opportunities for mutually beneficial cooperation decreasing at all? Is non-cooperative behavior traced back to the non-democratic constitution of the challenger or attributed to other factors? What determines whether democracies take an accommodative or exclusionary stance towards autocratic challengers? What role do international organizations’ secretariats play in constructing the autocratic challenge and devising responses? We seek submissions presenting original qualitative or quantitative empirical work which investigates the time trends, cross-country, or cross-institutional variation in democratic responses to the autocratic challenge.