ABSTRACT
International relations (IR)—as a field of study and as a real-world pursuit—has always been concerned with international organization (IO) and global governance. Realism, in both its classical and neorealist variants, has as a constitutive tenet an assumption of how the world is organized. Liberal internationalists and their modern (neo)liberal institutionalist, neofunctionalist, cosmopolitan, and constructivist counterparts also recognize the pernicious aspects of the way world politics is organized. There is a need to address a related problem first if global governance is to realize its potential as a core rather than a peripheral IR pursuit. Global governance should help us understand where we came from and why we have got to where we are, as well as a way to develop strategies for where we should be going. The chapter also presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in this book.
