Political science often holds itself out as queen of social sciences so long as economics is king. However, political philosophers and political scientists from their respective schools have historically not been in agreement; the former concentrates on what ought to be, whereas the latter focuses on what is. In other words, the normatively oriented political philosophers and empirically oriented political scientists do not have a history of conversing extensively. Even if they did talk to one another, the fusion of normative political philosophy and empirical political science has occurred only within the last quarter of the last century and the first quarter of this century (Inoguchi 2008). As a matter of fact, both Jean-Jacques Rousseau and John Locke have never been systematically and scientifically modeled prior to this work (Le et al. 2014; Inoguchi and Le 2016; Inoguchi 2018).

The theoretical underpinnings of the global social contract drawing from the two great philosophers, Jean-Jacques Rousseau and John Locke, have been provided in Chap. 2. Both Rousseau and Locke formulated their versions of social contract theories in the national context of seventeenth and eighteenth-century Europe. This chapter attempts to extend their theories from cantonal and national to the global context. In other words, this chapter sets out to answer the question: Is a global social contract possible? In what follows, an attempt is made to construct a global model of social contract extended from the two metaphors of Rousseau and Locke by using two sets of data: the global citizens’ preferences about values and norms as gauged by the results of the World Values Survey (WVS), which are presented in Chap. 3, and sovereign states’ participation in 120 multilateral treaties deposited to the United Nations, which have been presented in Chap. 4. By establishing the relationship between these two datasets, this chapter theoretically reveals that imagining a global social contract is possible and that empirically validating such ideas is feasible. Moreover, to clarify the correlation between citizens and treaties (quasi-legislative outcomes, in a sense), dimensional similarities between the cosmos of citizens’ preference and the cosmos of sovereign states’ willingness to join multilateral treaties are examined. Once done, the sovereign states are located in one of the two cosmoses, citizens’ or states’, and the correlation coefficients between them are measured. On the basis of these empirical results, the nature of the global quasi-legislative process is clarified; additionally, conclusions and implications are drawn.

1 Introduction

Global politics employs quasi-legislative processes similar to national legislative processes (Volgy 1973; Popovski and Fraser 2014) with the following differences: (1) there is no institutionalized world government; hence, none claims sovereign power in global politics; and (2) there is no formal institutional legislative body unlike a national parliament that aggregates citizens’ preferences into government policy. However, there are mechanisms whereby citizens’ preferences are selectively chosen to generate multilateral treaties in which sovereign states either join or not join.

It is widely accepted that signing and ratifying agreements and treaties among similar-minded nations helps facilitate cooperation among states for solving global issues, i.e., increasing free trade and democracy. In forming a global legislation system, global citizens’ preferences are expressed and transformed into global legislative products called multilateral treaties. Notably, the term “quasi-legislative processes and outcomes” has been adopted since global legislative processes and outcomes are qualitatively very different from national legislative processes and outcomes.

On what we refer to as the global quasi-legislative process and outcome, there have been an abundance of studies: examining how global climate policy initiatives have been attempted in Tokyo, Copenhagen, and Paris (Kutney 2013; Sovacool and Dworkin 2014); analyzing how the global trade liberalization scheme has been agreed upon only with a less than global and comprehensive scope, i.e., bilateral, regional, and partial (Jones 2015); examining how the nuclear non-proliferation treaty has experienced the diffusion of new nuclear powers (Joyner 2013; Solingen 2013); and tracing how a multilateral agreement on fire-control radar was crafted during the meeting of navies of some 22 countries assembled in Shandong, China amidst the Japanese-Chinese disputes in the East China Sea in 2013 (Inoguchi 2015). When the quasi-legislation process and outcome is focused on one policy area, this genre of academic research is often called regime theory (Krasner 1983; Yamamoto 2008). There are many regimes, including the nuclear non-proliferation regime, climate change regime, free trade regime, intellectual property regime, public health regime, and human rights regime. Regime research provides a view of global quasi-legislative processes when they are digested as a whole in terms of quasi-legislative impulses, interactions, and impacts. Yet so far, no research has been conducted in this genre to see how these three key knots in the global quasi-legislative processes are related in numerical terms. One exception to this, however, is nuclear non-proliferation regime analysis (Brenner 1981/2009), which has been conducted to shed new light on quasi-legislative processes in terms of impulses, interactions, and impacts in statistical terms. Among the most important findings is the positive correlation between technologically advanced countries’ assistance to less technologically advanced countries in the area of nuclear power generation for peaceful purposes and nuclear proliferation. This is one strong step forward in making regime analysis more holistic.

The framework proposed here aims to clarify the nature of global quasi-legislative processes in a vast array of regime domains of global politics today, from not only the human rights; peace and disarmament; and trade, commerce, and communication regimes but also the environment, intellectual property, and labor health and safety regimes. The main task is empirically and statistically analyzing the links between citizens’ preferences and states’ joining in multilateral treaties to posit a model of global social contract using the metaphors of Rousseau and Locke.

The Rousseauesque metaphor focuses on citizens’ preferences and sovereign states’ participation in multilateral treaties, setting aside intermediaries of quasi-legislative bodies. Regarded as a direct democracy, Rousseau’s Social Contract does not envisage any legislative bodies even in the national setting. The Locke metaphor, however, focuses on the gradual expansion of parliamentary power and the politics therein, i.e., the growth of a representative democracy. The Lockean metaphor of representative democracy in global social contract consists of three knots: (1) citizens’ preferences, (2) quasi-legislative bodies, and (3) states’ participation in multilateral treaties. A new element is the quasi-legislative bodies. How should we define this? As regime research has amply shown, a bundle of intermediaries exist in the global quasi-legislative processes: some 200 sovereign states and members of the United Nations, tens of thousands of non-governmental organizations, UN specialized institutions, non-UN affiliated international and transnational organizations, etc. Thus, an important question to be answered is the following: How should we generate numerical indicators for quasi-legislative bodies?

We must recall that Rousseau and Locke are used as metaphors. They were immensely constrained by the historical background of seventeenth and eighteenth century Europe; therefore, there are some conceptual difficulties when attempting to introduce their models writ large on a global scale. Our proposed model, which is inspired by their philosophical thrusts, is not necessarily strict in distinguishing Rousseau and Locke for two reasons: first, because they did not imagine the world of globalization and digitalization; second, because neither of them articulated or specified how their models of direct or representative democracy would possibly function in a steadily globalizing world.

In this book, citizens’ preferences are linked with states’ participation in multilateral treaties. Performing a factor analysis of the two separately enables us to see whether their dimensionalities are more or less the same. To carry out this analysis, the correlation coefficients between the factor scores of citizens’ preferences and the factor scores of states’ participation in multilateral treaties are useful to see the similarity of dimensionalities. Additionally, the states’ locations on those dimensions derived from two factor analyses will be used to understand with two dimensional locations of states that citizens’ preferences and states’ participation in multilateral treaties function on similar dimensionalities. If these operations are carried out successfully, then the idea of a global social contract extended from Rousseauesque and Lockean metaphors will be roughly useful.

2 Gauging Links Between Citizens’ Preferences and States’ Treaty Participation

The focus so far has been on describing the procedure of linking global citizens’ preferences and states’ participation in multilateral treaties. The question that should be tackled before gauging such links is as follows: Should one assume the scheme of a global quasi-legislative process in a global political system, where there are no sovereign institutions, with democratically elected representatives and professionally chosen bureaucrats who together construct agreements and execute laws facing seven billion citizens without borders? The answer is no. The first task—the most important task—is to describe citizens’ preferences in terms of collectively unconscious desires and passions. Since the WVS continues to inquire about values and norms, or in other words, about what citizens aspire to and want to materialize, the fairly strong collective desires are highlighted via statistical methods. Secondly, since the Multilateral Treaties Survey continues to register the common ground between states in treaties and conventions, the fact that fairly strong collective passions are part of such multilateral treaties and conventions is highlighted via statistical methods. After these two tasks are carried out, the next task is to assess their connection methodically.

The kind of statistical procedure that best fit these tasks was factor analysis via varimax rotation. By carrying out this analysis, the correlation coefficients between the factor scores of citizens’ preferences and the scores of states’ participation in multilateral treaties will allow us to know whether their dimensionalities are more or less of the same kinds. Citizens’ preferences have been most intensively studied by the WVS team (Inglehart and Welzel 2005; Welzel 2013; Basanez 2015); states’ participation in multilateral treaties has been studied by the Multilateral Treaties project team (Le et al. 2014). The former task has been carried out by Welzel (2013); his results are summarized only to the extent to which they are pertinent to the present task.

Welzel utilizes the data of World Values Survey executed in 2005–2009 that cover 95 societies (including Hong Kong and Taiwan) spreading all around the globe, and including the largest populations and biggest economies from each world region. Thus the data represents almost 90% percent of the world’s population. Welzel places the previously mentioned ten geo-historico-cultural country groups into these two dimensions. The first dimension is Emancipative versus Protective and the second dimension is Secular versus Sacred. Welzel’s grouping focuses on the West, and therefore, the differences among the West are sharply delineated, whereas the non-West is less so. Nevertheless, the most striking is the predominance of the West. The rough order of high scores in the Emancipative versus Protective dimension is as follows: Reformed West → Old West → New West → Latin America → Returned West → Sub-Saharan Africa → Orthodox East → Sinic East → Indic East → Islamic East. Similarly, in the Secular versus Sacred dimension, the rough order is as follows: Sinic East → Reformed West → Returned West → Orthodox East → Old West → New West → Indic West → Islamic West → Latin America → Sub-Saharan Africa.

Notably, the most secular position is occupied by the Sinic East. It is not widely known as the origin of meritocracy (Young 2011). Contrary to what is widely believed in the West meritocracy, i.e., merit-based bureaucracy, was practiced in the Sinic East, centuries before civil service examination emerged in the West (Woodside 2006). Next in line for secular is the Reformed West (those countries established after the Reformation). Non-Catholic populations in the Reformed West are placed at this level of secularity. In terms of secularity, the Returned West (post-Cold War Central and Eastern Europe) comes in third. The Orthodox East comes next. Seven decades of communist rule resulted in very secularized societies. Yet, the post-communist societies have revived non-secularity significantly. Following the Orthodox East is the Old West (those countries established after the Roman Empire). The Republic of France’s culture for laïcité leads it to endeavor for secularity in schools and other institutions. The Old West, with new settler societies, is the most religious of the West; in particular, the United States of America is known for high religiosity. Next comes a whole range of non-Western countries, albeit not including the Sinic East. Religiosity was higher in the order of the Indic East, Islamic East, Latin America, and Sub-Saharan Africa. The Indic East is the most religious in Asia, but outside of Asia it is the least religious.

Next, the data pertaining to the Multilateral Treaties Survey about states’ participation in multilateral treaties was factor-analyzed. For that purpose, the principal component analysis with varimax rotation, and Kaiser normalization based on six variables that represent six attributes of multilateral treaties was implemented (Table 5.1).

Table 5.1 Six variables of the factor analysis on multilateral treaties data
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Table 5.2 lists the three most important dimensions that emerged from the factor analysis of the multilateral treaties data. These dimensions explain nearly 70% of cumulative variance. The two items Year of Membership and Year of Deposit tap the first component that is named Agile versus Cautious. The second dimension, the so-called Global Commons versus Individual Citizens’ Interests, is based on the two items Policy Domain and Number of Current Members. Thirdly, the two items Treaty Participation Index and Modified Welzel Regional Group form the third dimension that is labeled as Aspirational Bonding versus Mutual Binding.

Table 5.2 Factor analysis of six instrumental variables with varimax rotation and Kaiser normalization: Sovereign States’ participation in multilateral treaties
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The first dimension Agile versus Cautious has to do with how nimble or prudent the country is regarding joining multilateral treaties. Naturally those countries that became independent immediately after the Second World War and those countries that became independent in the fourth quarter of the last century are cautious—always apprehensive of the possibility of being constrained by such treaties when their precious national independence has only been recently obtained. The accumulation of skills of professional expertise and organizational leadership by Western countries has made a huge difference in joining multilateral treaties. The rough order of high scores on the first dimension is as follows: Reformed West → Old West → Sinic East → Latin America → Islamic East → Indic East → New West → Sub-Saharan Africa → Returned West → Orthodox East.

The second dimension that is labeled as Global Commons versus Individual Citizens’ Interests is concerned with whether primary concerns are the environment, peace and disarmament, and intellectual property rights on the one hand, or labor health and safety and human rights on the other. The rough order of those country groups is as follows: Returned West → Reformed West → Orthodox East → Old West → Latin America → Islamic East → Sinic East → Sub-Saharan Africa → Indic East → New West.

Most striking are the most global positions held by the Returned West and the Reformed West. Their concern about global commons is reflected in the generation of highly skilled professionals manning UN and other special international organizations and transnational social movements. The Nobel peace prize, Copenhagen initiative in environmentalism, and yearning for Ikea-style innovation and invention are some of the features of the Reformed West. Then follow the Orthodox East, Old West, and Latin America; these areas balance the global commons with the individual citizen’s interests. Not surprisingly the New West (including the United States) leans toward individual citizen’s interests. The Islamic East, the Sinic East, the Indic East, and Sub-Saharan Africa reveal their yearning for independence and state sovereignty.

The third dimension is called Aspirational Bonding versus Mutual Binding. Multilateral treaties are often qualitatively different from national laws in terms of the degree of binding. They often contain those appealing to aspirational bonding. They try to appeal their common desires and dreams and to achieve them together. High on Aspirational Bonding are Sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America, the Sinic East, the Islamic East, the Indic East, and the Orthodox East; all of these regions represent the Global South’s collective voice, registering their yearning rather than being mutually bound. In contrast, the Returned West, the Old West, the New West, and the Reformed West quietly generate rules that bind the rest as much as possible. The rough order from high to low on the third dimension is as follows: Sub-Saharan Africa → Latin America → Sinic East → Islamic East → Indic East → Orthodox East → Returned West → New West → Old West → Reformed West (Table 5.3).

Table 5.3 The major dimensions that emerged from the CMW factor-analyzed data (Welzel 2013) and LMW factor-analyzed data, listed along with their abbreviated forms
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To gauge the link between the Two-Dimensional Cultural Map of the World (CMW) produced from Welzel’s World Values Survey data and the Three-Dimensional Legislative Map of the World (LMW) obtained from factor-analyzed of Multilateral Treaties Survey, the relationships between citizens’ preferences and sovereign states’ multilateral treaties participation are examined. Data are available for 93 countries in the Welzel dataset (after excluding Hong Kong and Taiwan), while data of states’ participation in multilateral treaties are available for 193 countries. To match these two sets of data, we extracted the data of sovereign states’ multilateral treaties participation for 93 states (from the original dataset of 193 states of the Multilateral Treaties Survey) that are correspondent with Welzel’ s data of World Values Survey. Next, the correlation coefficients between the two major dimensions of CMW and the three major dimensions LMW are calculated and presented in Table 5.4.

Table 5.4 Correlation coefficients among the CMW and the LMW
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In order to see the relationship between the CMW and the LMW in our sample data of 93 countries is strong enough to represent the relationship in the whole population, the significance of each correlation coefficient is examined and displayed in Table 5.5. The significance level (or p-value) is the probability of obtaining results as extreme as the one observed. The results show that the significance level for the correlation coefficient between Pr-Em and Ag-Ca, Pr-Em and Gc-Ic, Pr-Em and Ab-Mb, Sa-Se and Gc-Ic, Sa-Se and Ab-Mb are very small (less than 0.01), then the correlations are significant. It is important to note that the significance level for the correlation coefficient between Sa-Se and Ag-Ca is relatively large (0.579), then the correlation is not significant and the two variables are not linearly related. In general, this test statistically reveals that imagining a global social contract is possible and that empirically validating such ideas is feasible.

Table 5.5 The significance of the correlation coefficient among the CMW and the LMW
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Next, we have mapped the ten modified Welzel groups’ locations on the CMW and the LMW as follows (Figs. 5.1, 5.2, 5.3, 5.4, 5.5, and 5.6).

Fig. 5.1
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Ten groups of countries located onto dimensions (Ag-Ca x Pr-Em)

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Fig. 5.2
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Ten groups of countries located onto dimensions (Gc-Ic x Pr-Em)

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Fig. 5.3
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Ten groups of countries located onto dimensions (Ag-Mb x Pr-Em)

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Fig. 5.4
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Ten groups of countries located onto dimensions (Ag-Ca x Sa-Se)

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Fig. 5.5
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Ten groups of countries located onto dimensions (Gc-Ic x Sa-Se)

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Fig. 5.6
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Ten groups of countries located onto dimensions (Ab-Mb x Sa-Se)

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3 Conclusion

We have proposed a model of global social contract derived from Rousseau’s and Locke’s metaphors by linking global citizens’ preference and states’ participation in multilateral treaties. The results show that global citizens’ preferences on norms and values as represented by the WVS (Welzel 2013) and sovereign states’ participation in multilateral treaties as represented by the Multilateral Treaties Survey (Le et al. 2014) work in tandem. In other words, the key dimensions of each of the citizen’s data and the states’ data are more or less parallel. More specifically, the emancipative versus protective dimension is reasonably correlated with the agile versus cautious participation; the sacred versus secular orientation and the global commons versus individual citizens’ interests orientation run more or less parallel. The correlation coefficients between the citizens’ preference scores and the states’ participation scores are reasonably high. Simultaneously, we have found that Rousseau’s and Locke’s ideas of direct democracy and representative democracy are not easily amenable to operationalization. Rather, Rousseau’s and Locke’s metaphors will continue to help us envisage a more sophisticated model of global quasi-legislative processes and outcomes. This is simply the first result in our search for global quasi-legislative politics.

The next task is to see what national regime type and national characteristics will make a difference. It is absolutely necessary and important to show that multilateral treaties are shaped by sovereign state actors whose political regime characteristics influence legislative outcomes. In Chap. 7, some positive empirical evidence will be presented to show that the states’ locations on these key dimensions provide quite succinct and excellent snapshot-like profiles. For example, Sinic East as a whole is cautiously agile and well mixed between global commons orientation and the national interest orientation. The United States, one of the New West countries, manifests a good mix of emancipative and protective orientation as well as the significantly religious and secular orientation. Sovereign states’ participation requires a deeper analysis of what might be called the states’ treaty behavior. Each of the 193 sovereign states and each of the 10 geo-culturally similar groups needs to be researched further to gain a deeper understanding of treaty behavior.