Who Joins? Democracy and State Participation in Transnational Governance

I offer a systematic account of the effect of democracy on countries’ participation in transnational
public-private governance initiatives (TGIs) in which states and/or intergovernmental
organizations cooperate with business and civil society actors. First, I argue that the governments
of democratic political regimes have incentives to join TGIs because of the demand and
availability of non-state actors at the domestic level to participate in global governance institutions
that grant access to them. Democratic governments also use TGIs as foreign policy
instruments because they provide them with strategic advantages in bargaining and allow them
to project elements of good governance from the domestic to the global realm. Second, I posit
that the strategic incentive of democratic governments to become involved in TGIs is most pronounced
in issue areas in which non-state actors are numerous and active, and weaker in areas
in which they are less prominent. I test these arguments using new data on state participation
in 636 transnational public-private governance initiatives in 2015. The results support my expectations.