The Great Takeover: Mapping Multistakeholderism in Global Governance

This book, The Great Takeover: Mapping of Multistakeholderism in Global Governance, seeks to expose how corporate capture is achieving dominance in world affairs.

From health, to food and agriculture, from education to internet, from environment to public services and human rights, the research shows that decisions made in these “multistakeholderism” mechanisms as well as in captured multilateral institutions, have direct impact on on people’s health, children’s education, digital rights, access to basic public services and human rights in the territories, including the right to a healthy environment.

By dislocating the locus of key policy decisions from the multilateral system into mixed mechanisms where the private sector rules – with the support of some states, international institutions, and big philanthropists – the phenomenon of “multistakeholderisation” of the global governance has become systemic.

This trend has emerged in the nexus of relationships between the World Economic Forum (WEF), the Davos Class and the United Nations (UN) – more noticeably since the establishment of the Global Compact (2000), a non-binding agreement giving Corporations access to the UN. There have been several critiques and ‘push-backs’ raised by social movements and affected sectors on this dislocation of the multilateral institutions – including in 2021, on the Strategic Partnership signed between the WEF and the UN.

The book was built in a dialogical way between the two researchers and the members of the People’s Working Group on Multistakeholderism: Corporate Accountability, FIAN International, Focus on the Global South, Friends of the Earth International, Geneva Global Health Hub, Global Campaign for Education, IT for Change, People’s Health Movement, Public Services International, Society for International Development, and Transnational Institute.

The resulting data is accessible in the report Annex and this online database.

It is clear that instead of being a solution, “multistakeholder” mechanisms accelerate the route towards a more undemocratic, unsustainable and unequal world. This book presents demanding challenges and invites active participation in this effort to unveil the Takeover of our common future by the actors of global corporate power. It is urgent to mobilise in building a stronger democratic multilateral system accountable to the public interest and committed to a sustainable planet.