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Recognition Going Awry: NGOs and the Global Rise of the Unelected

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Recognition in International Relations

Part of the book series: Palgrave Studies in International Relations Series ((PSIR))

Abstract

There is a growing consensus that the key to social and global justice is to overcome the sense of powerlessness and the lack of self-respect that prevails among impoverished, marginalized, and oppressed populations. As political theorist John Rawls puts it, self-respect is a ‘primary good’ whose production depends on the make-up of basic social and political institutions. More precisely, justice is the name of behaviours that form the ‘social bases of self-respect’ (1993, p. 319). Like Rawls’s liberal theory of justice, neo-Hegelian theories of recognition emphasize the centrality of mutual respect and esteem in the development of human relations and identities (Honneth, 1995; Ikäheimo, 2014; Ricoeur, 2005; Taylor, 1994). The core notion underpinning theories of recognition is that human autonomy and agency are not givens, but are the result of a continuous and dynamic process of mutual recognition between persons and groups. Recognition is about constituting and performing inclusion, actorness, and membership. To be recognized as a legitimate actor and a full member of society implies more than simply having legal rights. In modern societies, there is a wide range of social relations based on respect, esteem, and affection, which, taken together, constitute ‘the opposite of practices of domination or subjection’ (Honneth 2007b, p. 325; Honneth, 2014).

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Authors
  1. Volker M. Heins
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Goethe University Frankfurt and Peace Research Institute Frankfurt, Germany

    Christopher Daase (Professor of International Organizations) (Professor of International Organizations)

  2. Peace Research Institute Frankfurt, Germany

    Caroline Fehl (Senior Researcher) (Senior Researcher)

  3. University of Magdeburg, Germany

    Anna Geis (Professor of International Relations) (Professor of International Relations)

  4. Goethe University Frankfurt, Germany

    Georgios Kolliarakis (Senior Researcher) (Senior Researcher)

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© 2015 Volker M. Heins

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Heins, V.M. (2015). Recognition Going Awry: NGOs and the Global Rise of the Unelected. In: Daase, C., Fehl, C., Geis, A., Kolliarakis, G. (eds) Recognition in International Relations. Palgrave Studies in International Relations Series. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137464729_11

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