Paper short abstract:

This paper examines some of the paradoxical consequences of the proliferation of actors and arenas of norm production and adjudication using empirical material on India. It focuses on the role of the USAID in institutionalising the new population policy as well as that of the World Bank in shaping new resettlement policies.

Paper long abstract:

Global governance has involved the loss of the monopoly of the state over law and policy-making for its citizens. Sub-national and supra-national non-state actors have increasingly begun to shape the formulation of norms and watch over their implementation. This paper examines some of the paradoxical consequences of the proliferation of actors and arenas of norm production and adjudication using empirical material on India. It focuses on the role of the USAID in institutionalising the new population policy as well as that of the World Bank (and its Inspection Panel) in shaping the new norms for the resettlement of those forcibly displaced by infrastructure projects. The contestation of these norms at the local, national and transnational scales by NGOs is analysed in terms of the resulting juridification of politics. Problems of overlapping sovereignties and fragmentation of citizenship rights are discussed in this context and their consequences for democratic decision-making are delineated.