In this article, I locate the Critical Theoretic and Republican themes of misrecognition and domination in transnational democracy, viewed as an emancipatory project. Contrary to John Dryzek, I argue that transnational democracy requires an appropriate account of mutual recognition and personal integrity in order to ground the emancipatory dimension of this project, especially given Dryzek's analysis of transnational contests in forming personal identifications. Beyond this, I argue that the same themes are needed to supplement James Bohman's account of the normative powers of dominated persons to initiate deliberation in circumstances of injustice. Primarily, my claim has been that the idea of personal integrity remains essential not only to motivating the project of transnational democracy, but also modifying the appeal to normative powers in the interest of enabling dominated persons to enter into communicative relationships and engage in public processes of critical self-examination.

Maintaining the essential features of local democracy, representation and contestation, my theory allows for the representation of the interest of subpopulations in the global community by actors such as nongovernmental organization and intergovernmental organizations. I will begin by outlining what features are necessary for a theory’s consideration as democratic in nature. Then, relying upon democracy in a broad sense, it will be my aim to demonstrate that the right to democracy is universal human right. The following stage will provide the backing, by way of the moral progress of human rights, that the right to democracy is expressible by “importantly affected” subgroups in the global arena. The final stage of my conceptual defense will focus on the validation of representatives who have no institutional connection with the populations they represent. With such established, the paper will proceed into a practical defense, discussing how claims made by actors can be accepted or rejected by represented subpopulations. It will then become necessary to demonstrate that the paternalistic claims made by representatives are incorporable into a democratic theory without forgoing the essence of democracy. To show this is feasible, methods of appealing paternalistic claims by way of international human rights courts will be explained. Finally, possibilities to mediate general feasibility issues will be explored.

Today, one of the most compelling issues facing students of environmental politics is global environmental governance’s democratic legitimacy. Critics of multilateral and transnational sustainable development negotiations and implementations perceive these as democratically deficient, due to non-state actors deciding over nation-state politics. Multilateralism is then seen as a governance structure which sacrifices state sovereignty, which is the pillar of modern democratic theory together with the concept of national demos. Yet, other theorists consider global environmental governance and multilateralism to foster democratization beyond the concept of the nation-state – something which by them is understood as necessary in a world with ever-increasing supranational environmental and developmental issues. Since 1992, the United Nations has implemented stakeholder models, meaning multi-stakeholder partnership and civil society involvement in sustainable development negotiations, as a way of raising democratic legitimacy and accountability. The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals is the culmination of these efforts and the globally guiding document on the subject. The Agenda is a result of the broadest deliberation strategy ever employed by the UN. Via typological content analysis and viewing the Agenda through our theoretical framework, we understand that the UN applying stakeholder models does not necessarily mean evoking stakeholder democracy. Furthermore, democracy is largely construed as a tool for sustainable development and less as an end per se, even if the two are sometimes communicated as equal objectives. All in all, whether one interprets sustainable development negotiations as democratically legitimate or deficient depends on one’s view of democracy beyond the nation- state, as either a possible and necessary notion or a directly undemocratic one. / Idag är global miljöstyrnings demokratiska legitimitet ett av de mest åtråvärda forskningsproblemen inom miljöpolitiska studier. Kritiker av multilaterala och transnationella förhandlingar rörande hållbar utveckling och implementering uppfattar dessa som demokratiskt bristfälliga, då icke-statliga aktörer bestämmer över nationalstaters politik. Multilateralism ses då som en styrelseskicksstruktur som offrar nationalstaters suveränitet, vilket tillsammans med konceptet nationellt demos är kärnan i modern demokratisk teori. Dock anser andra teoretiker att global miljöstyrning och multilateralism kan befrämja demokratisering bortom nationalstater - något som av dessa anses som nödvändigt i en värld med ständig ökning av överstatliga miljö- och utvecklingsproblem. Sedan 1992 har Förenta Nationerna verkställt intressentmodeller, alltså multi- intressentpartnerskap och civilsamhällsinvolvering i hållbar utvecklings-förhandlingar, som ett sätt att höja demokratisk legitimitet och ansvarsskyldighet. Agenda 2030 och dess 17 globala mål för hållbar utveckling är kulmineringen av dessa satsningar, och det globalt ledande dokumentet gällande ämnet. Agendan och dess grundarbete är resultatet av den till dagsdatum största och mest omfattande överläggningsstrategi som FN någonsin använt sig av. Via typologisk innehållsanalys, och granskning av Agendan genom vårt teoretiska ramverk, så tolkar vi att FN:s genomförande av intressentmodeller inte nödvändigtvis innebär en frammaning av ett uteslutande intressentdemokratiskt ideal. I tillägg så kommuniceras demokrati mestadels som ett verktyg för hållbar utveckling, även om dessa två koncept delvis beskrivs som likvärdi ga mål. Huruvida förhandlingar kring hållbar utveckling uppfattas som demokratiskt legitima eller bristfälliga beror på tolkarens syn på demokrati utanför nationalstaten, som antingen en möjlig och nödvändig uppfattning, eller som en direkt odemokratisk sådan.