The Institutional Structures of World Government

The concept of a universal government for all humanity has been envisioned in vastly different ways, from the galactic empires of science fiction to the minimal federations of political theorists. As such, it is important to clarify the version presented here and distinguish it from other variants, and one key area for this is institutional structure. The objective in this paper is to describe the broad features of what a world government’s institutions would look like, rather than to create a detailed blueprint of the exact specifications. While some previous visionaries of world government have tried to come up with fully-fledged constitutions or charters, there is perhaps no point in coming up with this level of detail until the final stages of the union’s establishment (Fed. 17), when national divisions are dissolved and the world government is linked directly to the people. This paper shall thus mainly discuss only the essential features, and ‘deal-breakers’, of world government.

Hence it is unfair on the part of sceptics of world government to criticize other political theorists for insufficient detail on the institutional specifications of what their model of world government would look like, for it would hardly be fitting or justified for theorists like me or the other advocates of world government to prescribe a full structure. This is an issue of the utmost significance at the humanity level, and requires insights from many political scientists and legal experts. It is not a question that can be solved in one paper, but rather warrants the consideration and deliberation of the best minds amongst humanity. It requires inputs from a broader knowledge base than any one individual can possess.

To fit the definition of world government as set out in Fed. 1, the global institutional structure should at a minimum incorporate the following features:

First, the existence of each of the three main branches of government (the executive, legislature, and judiciary at the global level. Some previous proposals for limited reform call for only one of these, such as a global parliamentary assembly or an international court to resolve disputes between nations. These primarily view such institutions as enhancements to the national system to improve its representativeness or functionality rather than constitutive of a world government. However, it is also necessary to have the executive branch for there to be true government and the actual implementation of policy rather than its delegation to sub-units. All three of these organs must exist at the global level independently of vertically lower levels of government.

Second, there must be a vertical separation of powers, with each level of government having constitutionally defined jurisdictions. Limited world government proposals envision giving the global level only those powers that nations agree to give it (which presumably would be very few). But the global level must not be dependent on the cooperation of the subunits below it; rather it must have its independent jurisdiction. The same goes for provinces or other levels below the global—their scope of power should not be contingent on the world government’s discretion. Furthermore, each level of government should have those powers which would be most efficiently exercised at that level.

This contrasts with the subsidiarity principle proposed by many others as part of limited world government, whereby powers are to be placed at the lowest level possible, and granted only to the higher levels when absolutely necessary. After all, what purpose is there to government but to ensure the welfare of the people—and the best way to organize the government is the way that best serves the people’s needs. Powers should be distributed at the level where the government would be most effective at furthering the people’s welfare, and not arbitrarily biased towards the lower end of the hierarchy. The world government, in particular, should have all the power and agency it needs to act in the interests of all humanity on global issues rather than being hobbled by lower levels.

Third, a world government cannot entertain the presence of sovereignty at any subordinate levels, for that would be contrary to the concept itself. Sovereignty is a status of being unanswerable to any authority and having supreme power to control internal governance. It thus goes against one of the core principles a system of governance should follow, the rule of law, which necessitates that all entities in government are subject to the law. If any sub-unit possesses this status, then world government does not exist and we are back to a state of anarchy. Thus, much as some limited world government advocates would like to preserve national sovereignty, no sub-unit of the world can be above the law of all humanity. The rule of law should prevail over the entire government, meaning that there can be no sovereignty except at the level of all humanity.

Fourth, each level of the government has to have a direct connection to the people as individuals. This means that the people should have representation at each level rather than having indirect representation from one level to another, such as for example having a world government elected only through national/provincial sub-units. Thus, there must be at least one global legislative body based on popular equal vote. Layers of indirectly elected bodies only create a sense of alienation and distance between the government and the population. When the vote is of the people and accountability is to the people, then the government should be sourced from the people themselves.

Fifth, the representation and inclusion of all people in the world government must be on equal terms, not to be weighted by nationality, or economic status, or for that matter anything else. The idea of political equality amongst all humans, or ‘one person one vote’, is indispensable to a world government which seeks to unify rather than stratify humanity. While this may seem like an obvious point, prior theorists on world federalism (especially from the 1940s) did actually suggest weighting representation by the size of a country’s economy or equally for each nation regardless of population, in what was often a thinly veiled expression of group supremacism or self-interest. Within a democracy, it is inconceivable that some people can have a greater say in politics because of their financial or identity status, and so must this apply to the world government.

To reiterate, this definitively rules out any sort of representation based on national units as they exist today—the ‘billion Chinese and Indians’ objection cannot be entertained. People in smaller nations are not any more important than those in larger ones. With the status of sovereignty itself being highly dependent on historical coincidence, it does not confer any right upon people in smaller nations to have a greater influence on global decision-making. It is inherently undemocratic to give 11,000 people in the smallest countries the same representation as 1.4 billion in the largest. Hence, as I have maintained throughout these papers, the world government should not be structured around existing nation-states.

Sixth, the world government must have financial autonomy and its own power to collect taxes (rather than being funded from sub-unit contributions as some proposals envision). Financial autonomy is essential at the global level for the world government to effectively govern in its own right; otherwise, it will be left at the mercy of whichever sub-units are funding it. A degree of financial independence should extend to all sub-units as well, but subject to some fiscal control and oversight from the world government to safeguard them from the sort of debt and financial crises so many nations fall into today.

Beyond these minimum features, the exact institutional specifications of the government should be guided by political science research. This includes questions such as whether to have a presidential or parliamentary system, or the number of members and chambers in the legislature, or the electoral system. Let the best minds come together and discuss what would be best for the future of humanity. It is also not necessary to go into great detail about how each institution will work, because their functions are similar to those existing in nations today and are well understood.

One point that must be clarified is that the case for world government, and particularly one that dispenses with the existing national structures, should not be misinterpreted as an argument necessarily for unitary government or high centralization. As envisioned above, decentralization is an important aspect of vertical separation of powers. I fully support decentralization as much as necessary to achieve this goal and maximize government efficacy, only with the reservation that this should not follow or involve existing identity group structures.  Political power at lower levels must not be handed out to identity groups directly, but to local institutions which are independent of groups and directly accountable to the people. Excessive decentralization combined with group-based political power may lead only to further alienation rather than unification of humanity, and even undo the gains that national centralization has brought.

By the same token, there is nothing against federalism in world unity either, and a world government can very much be compatible with a federal system. It is only important that we do not restrict theorizing on world government to exclusively federal forms, as virtually the entire existing literature does. It is also essential, for reasons detailed above, that the federal units are not simply a retention of the nation-states that exist today (a common assumption in the literature). Federalism should be treated as a mechanism to strengthen the bonds of the world, and not for the divisive purpose of institutionalizing identity groups. To this end, it may also be worth considering granting the world government some power to reasonably modify the sub-units, rather than having their boundaries set in stone.

A final important consideration on global government institutions is that their establishment must come with institutional legitimacy. The world government must be accepted by all humanity as ‘the’ government, through a process that involves the full transfer of legitimacy and allegiance. This means that, for example, world government cannot be just proclaimed by a few individuals, civil society organizations, or groups, as many charters and declarations in the past tried to do. Institutions are pointless if they exist only in name or without full recognition. True world government shall be attained only when it has the acceptance and representation of the entire world.