ABSTRACT
Globalization has increased the influence of nonstate actors in multilateral diplomacy. Nonstate actors play a variety of roles in multilateral diplomacy. Nonstate actors play important roles in negotiations and decision making before, during, and after international conferences and in policy making on issues with other international actors—states and international secretariats—even without international conferences. Nonstate actors are involved in all areas of multilateral diplomacy, with individual non-governmental organizations (NGOs) usually specializing in key issue areas, such as the focus of Human Rights Watch on human rights issues and of the US Chamber of Commerce on core business issues. Multilateral diplomacy has changed greatly due to the increase in influence of the unprecedented number and variety of civil society—and business-related organizations and their globalization. While nonstate actors were involved in the past, the increase in their numbers and the growing importance of their involvement represent a major change in multilateral diplomacy.
