With the future of liberal internationalism in question, how will China's growing power and influence reshape world politics? We argue that views of the Liberal International Order (LIO) as integrative and resilient have been too optimistic for two reasons. First, China's ability to profit from within the system has shaken the domestic consensus in the United States on preserving the existing LIO. Second, features of Chinese Communist Party rule chafe against many of the fundamental principles of the LIO, but could coexist with a return to Westphalian principles and markets that are embedded in domestic systems of control. How, then, do authoritarian states like China pick and choose how to engage with key institutions and norms within the LIO? We propose a framework that highlights two domestic variables—centrality and heterogeneity—and their implications for China's international behavior. We illustrate the framework with examples from China's approach to climate change, trade and exchange rates, Internet governance, territorial sovereignty, arms control, and humanitarian intervention. Finally, we conclude by considering what alternative versions of international order might emerge as China's influence grows.

At a point when global governance appears to be at a crossroad, caught between globalizing and national populist forces, International Relations theorists are deeply immersed in debating what brought the world to this point. This contribution enlists Michael Zürn's A Theory of Global Governance (2018) to explore the state of global governance theory through a focus on three substantive themes: authority, legitimacy, and contestation in global governance. It identifies the current state of theorizing on each theme, situates Zürn's claims within these literatures, and previews counterpoints from a variety of theoretical perspectives.

A Theory of Global Governance is a long awaited book that finally theorizes the increasing authority of international institutions and the conflicts emerging from it. With its focus on reflexive deference as a basis for international authority it covers important elements of global governance but also leaves some critical blind spots regarding the forms of super- and subordination. In our engagement with Michael Zürn's book we propose to conceptualize international authority as a subcategory of international rule instead of its essence and to investigate various forms of rule by way of analyzing the resistance they provoke instead of institutionalized mandates.

Prompted by both promises and pitfalls in Michael's Zürn's A Theory of Global Governance, this paper reflects on challenges going forward beyond liberal institutionalism in the study of world politics. Six suggestions are particularly highlighted for future theorizing of global governance: (a) further distance from state-centrism; (b) greater attention to transscalar qualities of global governing; (c) more incorporation of social-structural aspects of global regulation; (d) trilateral integration of individual, institutional, and structural sources of legitimacy in global governance; (e) more synthesis of positive and normative analysis; and (f) transcendence of Euro-centrism. Together these six shifts would generate a transformed global governance theory – and possibly practice as well.

Today's global governance is qualitatively different from the past, according to Michael Zürn's penetrating analysis. With the rise of epistemic authority, reflexivity, service, and request have come to surpass command and control as key modes of global governance, leading to new forms of legitimation and contestation. I engage with this rich and thought-provoking argument on three counts. First, it remains doubtful that states defer to international organizations because the latter ‘know better’. There exist many gaps in epistemic authority and politics often trump rationality in global governance. Second, it is not clear how global hierarchy, which Zürn equates with ‘pockets of authority’, could emerge out of demands and requests, precisely because epistemic authority is so fluid and prone to contestation. Third, as historically young and increasingly based on service authority as it may be, contemporary global governance still rests on a body of inherited practices whose legitimation principles seem closer to tradition than to reflexive justification.

Michael Zürn's A Theory of Global Governance is a major theoretical statement. The first section of this essay summarizes Zürn's argument, pointing out that his Global Politics Paradigm views contestation as generated endogenously from the dilemmas and contradictions of reflexive authority relationships. Authoritative international institutions, he maintains, have difficulty maintaining their legitimacy in a world suffused with democratic values. The second section systematically compares Zürn's Global Politics Paradigm with both Realism and Cooperation Theory, arguing that the three paradigms have different scope conditions and are therefore as much complementary as competitive. The third section questions the relevance of Zürn's argument to contemporary reality. Great power conflict and authoritarian populism in formerly democratic countries generate existential threats to multilateralism and global institutions that are more serious than Zürn's legitimacy deficits.

As global governance institutions appear increasingly contested by state and non-state actors alike, understanding their origin, operation, and impact is becoming ever more urgent. This symposium uses Michael Zürn's A Theory of Global Governance: Authority, Legitimacy, and Contestation (OUP, 2018) as a springboard to explore the state of global governance theory. A Theory opens new terrain and advances bold and original arguments, including the contention that global governance is itself best understood as a political system. It analyzes a cycle from rising authority beyond the state through the 20th century, to ensuing legitimation problems toward the century's end, to the politicization and contestation triggered by such problems. A book of such ambition inevitably elicits queries within diverse international relations research communities. This symposium features seven articles from diverse traditions in engagement with A Theory's understanding of global contestation, authority, and legitimacy. These are followed by a response from Zürn. An introduction situates A Theory within extant research on global governance, highlights its endogenous theory of global politics, and identifies the stakes of deepening research on the sources of global authority, contestation, and political legitimation.

This response to my critics discusses four claims that are central for A Theory of Global Governance. The first claim is that observing a high level of conflict and contestation in world politics is not proof of the unimportance of global governance, since many of the current conflicts and contestations are about international institutions. The second claim is that the 1990s saw a rise of trans- and international authority beyond the nation-state that is essential for the rise of a global political system. Third, a global system of loosely coupled spheres of authority relies on ‘critical deference’ (reflexive authority) but also contains numerous elements of coercion. And fourth, a technocratic legitimation of intrusive international authorities cannot build on emotions or a sense of belonging. This deficit creates a political opportunity structure that allows for the rise of a myriad of dissenters. The relative importance of them depends on the availability of resources for mobilization and not on the quality of reasons for resistance.

Michael Zürn's Theory of Global Governance is an original, bold, and compelling argument regarding the causes of change in global governance. A core argument is that legitimation problems trigger changes in global governance. This contribution addresses two core features of the argument. Although I am persuaded that legitimacy matters, there are times when: legitimacy appears to be given too much credit to the relative neglect of other factors; other times when the lack of legitimacy has little discernible impact on the working of global governance; and unanswered questions about how the legitimacy of global governance relates to the legitimacy of the international order of which it is a part. The second feature is what counts as change in global governance. Zürn reduces change to either deepening or decline, overlooking the possible how of global governance. In contrast to Zürn's map of global governance that is dominated by hierarchies in the form of international organizations, an alternative map locates multiple modes of governance: hierarchies, markets, and networks. The kinds of legitimation problems that Zürn identifies, I argue, can help explain some of the movement from hierarchical to other modes of global governance.

The complex issues of the twenty-first century cannot be addressed by disparate actors in the global arena. This has become even more apparent in 2020, as we celebrate the seventy-fifth anniversary of the UN and have witnessed the outbreak of the global COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic has put the UN system to the test, demonstrating weaknesses in regard to peace and security, sustainable socioeconomic development, and human rights, the three core mission areas of the organization. The underlying tensions between the ideals of liberalism associated with the UN's human rights and socioeconomic-development agendas and the institution of sovereignty, under nationalist strongman leaders throughout the world, stood in the way of an effective response. This is especially true as powerful states are able to thwart collective action in favor of their own perceived national interests. While the UN and its affiliated agencies, such as the World Health Organization, are still able to foster cooperation, their success is limited by the organization's inability to establish some form of authority and command.