Globalization and Governance: Bleak Prospects for Sustainability* JAMES N. ROSENAU ARTIKEL /ARTICLES A t first glance, the prospects for effective global governance in the realm of environmental sustainability would appear to be considerable. Re­cent decades have witnessed a profound and discernible shift to a world­wide consciousness of the vast scope of environmental challenges. We have collectively moved from a fragmented nimby (not in my backyard) syndrome to a keen awareness of an integrated future symbolized by the picture of the earth from outer space. 1 But appearances can be deceiving. Or at least the ensuing pages argue that the prospects for effective governance leading to sustainability are, on balance, quite bleak. Our generation lacks the orientations necessary to sound assessments of how the authority of governance can be brought to bear on the challenges posed by the prevailing disarray. As will be seen, we have not adjusted our conceptual equipment to facilitate the analysis of how authority gets exercised in a decentralized world. We are still deeply ensconced in a paradigm that locates authority exclusively in states and environmental challenges exclusively in their shared problems – the so-called tragedy of the commons. In effect, we have elevated the nimby syndrome to the national level. Our preoccupation with global problems posed by recognizing the earth as a lonely spheroid in a vast universe has led us to minimize the extent to which environmental challenges at local levels are marked by variability. Today societies can have as much diffi­culty exercising authority within their own jurisdictions as they do with respect to the commons. The world, in other words, is both fragmenting * An extended version of this article will be published in: James N. Rosenau, Ernst­Ulrich von Weizsäcker and Ulrich Petschow(eds.), Governance and Sustainability. Exploring the roadmap to sustainability after Johannesburg (Sheffield: Greenleaf Pub­lishing, 2004). 1. Sheila Jasanoff,»Image and Imagination: The Formation of Global Environmental Consciousness«, in: Paul Edwards and Clark A. Miller(eds.), Changing the Atmos­phere: Science and the Politics of Global Warming (Cambridge: The mit Press, 2001, pp. 309 – 37. ipg 3/2003 Rosenau, Globalization and Governance 11