The United Nations Global Compact as a Facilitator of the Lockean Social Contract

Bäumlisberger Damian

Abstract

The United Nations Global Compact (UNGC) has difficulties in attracting new voluntary members and inciting them to implement its ten principles. The present article analyzes this implementation deficit from the perspective of Lockean social contract theory and derives new strategies for reducing it. On this view, the UNGC presents itself as the attempt to realize a set of moral norms, typically enforced by an impartial minimal state, protecting its citizens from violations of their natural rights, negative externalities and discrimination by bribed officials. It will only succeed in facilitating the realization of those norms on a strictly voluntary basis, if it manages to overcome the underlying n-person prisoner's dilemma. This requires the existence of a critical mass k