Dani Rodrik — How to tell apart trade agreements that undermine democratic principles from those that don't

I discussed in an earlier post on Brexit how to think about international agreements and the constraints on state action they entail in terms of democratic legitimacy. Since that discussion has relevance beyond Brexit, I've pasted the relevant part here below. The basic point is this: the fact that an international rule is negotiated and accepted by a democratically elected government does not inherently make that rule democratically legitimate.…

Another paradox of liberalism: Just because a policy decision has been arrived at "democratically" does not imply that the policy is democratic (of the people, for the people, and by the people).

Dani Rodrik's Weblog
How to tell apart trade agreements that undermine democratic principles from those that don't

Dani Rodrik | Ford Foundation Professor of International Political Economy at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University