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Democratic globalisation is a social movement towards an institutional system of global democracy. In their view, this would bypass nation-states, corporate oligopolies, ideological NGOs, cults and mafias. One of its most prolific proponents is the British political thinker David Held. In the last decade, Held published a dozen books regarding the spread of democracy from territorially defined nation states to a system of global governance that encapsulates the entire world. For some, democratic mundialisation (from the French term mundialisation) is a variant of democratic globalisation stressing the need for the direct election of world leaders and members of global institutions by citizens worldwide; for others, it is just another name for democratic globalisation.
These proponents state that democratic globalisation's purpose is to:
  • Expand globalisation and make people closer and more united. This expansion should differ from economic globalization and "make people closer, more united and protected" because of a variety of opinions and proposals it is still unclear what this would mean in practice and how it could be realized.
  • Have it reach all fields of activity and knowledge, including governmental and economic, since the economic one is crucial to develop the well-being of world citizens.
  • Give world citizens democratic access and a say in those global activities. For example, presidential voting for United Nations Secretary-General by citizens and direct election of members of a United Nations Parliamentary Assembly.
Supporters of the democratic globalization movement draw a distinction between their movement and the one most popularly known as the anti-globalization movement, claiming that their movement avoids ideological agenda about economics and social matters. Democratic globalization supporters state that the choice of political orientations should be left to the world citizens via their participation in world democratic institutions. Some proponents in the anti-globalization movement do not necessarily disagree with this position. For example, George Monbiot, normally associated with the anti-globalization movement (who prefers the term global justice movement), has proposed in his work Age of Consent similar democratic reforms of most major global institutions, suggesting direct democratic elections of such bodies and a form of world government.

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