In Search of Legitimacy in Times of Crisis

Abstract

At first sight, the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) seems to be a least likely candidate for a regional organization (RO) prescribing and promoting (good) governance in its member states: It consists of authoritarian monarchies and is a strong proponent of the principles of national sovereignty and non- interference. This paper, however, shows that the GCC does engage in governance transfer. Reacting to a crisis of legitimacy, the rulers of the GCC states have resorted to governance transfer as a strategy of legit-imation. In certain policy fields they prescribe and promote good governance standards to suggest to their respective citizenry as well as to external investors that they are actively trying to tackle their governance problems in these fields. Governance transfer by the GCC can be conceptualized as an institutional choice by the rulers of the GCC states which is supposed to ensure their regimes’ survival in times of a crisis of legiti-macy.