Despite ubiquitous calls for their reform, international organizations (IOs) often suffer from legitimacy deficits. What explains the emergence of legitimacy deficits and what effects do they produce? This article discusses the gradual emergence of legitimacy deficits through the concept of...

Indian policy makers have welcomed India's framing as a "rising power" and celebrated the BRICS initiative as a common front in reforming aspects of global governance. Yet China's rise in Asia has unsettled the balances of power which have underpinned the region, as a consequence of which India...

This article analyses the phenomenon of rising powers from a historical materialist perspective. It (1) elaborates the key concepts of historical structures of world order, state–society complexes and transnational class formation, and (2) applies them to Brazil, Russia, India, China and other...

This article introduces the concept of indirect speech and shows what it can contribute to understanding "legitimacy talk" regarding international institutions. Indirect speech occurs when one kind of illocutionary act is used to communicate another. Examples include euphemism, some forms of...

China has recently taken the lead in fostering several new multilateral initiatives which mirror the policy tasks of existing institutions. This article provides a framework for studying such 'parallel institutions' and sketches an emerging research agenda. First, it provides an empirical...

In this WZB Discussion Paper we develop an analytical framework for the research project 'Contested World Orders', a collaborative effort between researchers based at the German Institute of Global and Area Studies (GIGA), the Peace Research Institute Frankfurt (PRIF), and the Berlin Social...

China has recently taken the lead in fostering several new multilateral initiatives which mirror the policy tasks of existing institutions. This article provides a framework for studying such 'parallel institutions' and sketches an emerging research agenda. First, it provides an empirical...

In this WZB Discussion Paper we develop an analytical framework for the research project 'Contested World Orders', a collaborative effort between researchers based at the German Institute of Global and Area Studies (GIGA), the Peace Research Institute Frankfurt (PRIF), and the Berlin Social...