ABSTRACT
Sovereignty is usually characterised as having four inter-connected dimensions that are embedded in empirical and normativen practices, internal, external, formal and effective. Internal sovereignty defines and identifies the ultimate authority within the state and the relationship between rulers and ruled. In this sense, sovereignty is the juridical principle that establishes the entitlement to rule over a bounded territory. The global politics of the environment is characterised by a differentiated division of labour in which actors besides sovereign states have independent authority and contributions. Power is shared and governance is increasingly diffuse, located in both public and private spaces, characterised by authority in multiple institutional arenas. Morgan identifies this as a process whereby sovereignty is being reconstructed from state actors to other units of rights and responsibilities. James Rosenau refers to these as the criss-crossing flow of transformed authority and Bradley Karkkainen characterises it as a nascent polycentric substitute for the more familiar forms of sovereign authority.
