"Review of William P. Robinson's Promoting Polyarchy. Contemporary Sociology. 26,6:726-7 
(November). 
Promoting Polyarchy: Globalization, US Intervention, and Hegemony, by William I. Robinson. New 
York: Cambridge University Press, 1996. 466 pp. $59.95 cloth. ISBN: 0-521-56203-1. $22.95 
paper. ISBN: 0-521-56691-6.

Christopher Chase-Dunn
Sociology Department
Johns Hopkins University
chriscd@jhu.edu

Promoting Polyarchy  is a close study of recent changes in American foreign policy  that employs 
the world-systems perspective and a Gramscian analysis of ideological hegemony.  Robinson 
argues that neo-liberal economic globalization has required U.S. foreign policy to shift  from 
supporting authoritarian regimes in the periphery and the semiperiphery to supporting limited 
democratization based on engineered consensus through formally free and fair elections. The 
book complements and extends an excellent earlier  work, Tom McCormick's America's Half 
Century. Whereas McCormick dealt with the policies and ideologies that emerged when the 
United States took up the mantle of world policeman and "Free World" protagonist after World 
War II,  Robinson  focuses on the policy changes that have accompanied and facilitated further 
economic globalization since the 1970s. 
Robinson  presents four case studies: Phillipines,  Chile,  Nicaragua and Haiti.  In each 
of these U.S.  political operations coordinated by the National Endowment for Democracy 
(NED)  and other agencies managed to convert authoritarian regimes  or  populist democracies 
into "low-intensity democracies" that  preserve class inequalities  and openness to  global 
capitalism. He also examines briefly  the cases of South Africa and the ex-Soviet Union.  One of 
the great things about Robinson's work is that he effectively combines macro-structural analysis 
with a conjunctural  approach to historical events.
	Robinson  assays the contested nature of the idea of democracy. He contends that the 
real purpose  and effective outcome of the policy of "democracy promotion" has been  to create 
stable and legitimate governments that can facilitate the free mobility of capital on a global scale.  
The hegemonic specification of the idea of democracy  as polyarchy [" a system in which a small 
group actually rules and  mass participation in decision-making is confined to leadership choice 
in elections carefully managed by competing elites" (p. 49) ] is intended to prevent the 
emergence of more egalitarian popular democracy that  would threaten the rule of those who 
hold  power and property.  The notion of popular democracy stresses human equality,  
participatory forms of decision-making, and a holistic integration of political, social and 
economic realms that are artificially kept separate in the polyarchic definition of democracy. 
	The U.S. government,  now an agent of the global capitalist class,  engineers consent by 
penetrating the civil societies of  peripheral  and semiperipheral countries. Covert operations by 
the CIA  have been largely replaced by ostensibly "non-governmental"  flows of money and 
consultation from  private and  non-profit organizations in the U.S. to  political parties,  business 
groups,  labor federations,  youth organizations and women's movements in peripheral 
countries. NED coordinates these actions with U.S. diplomatic and CIA operations in order to  
undercut popular threats to the stability of polyarchic democracies and  transnational capital. 
	Robinson points to the fundamental contradiction between the moral basis of capitalism 
– liberty,  equality and human solidarity – and the actual outcome of global capitalism – 
increasing inequalities within and between countries.  He depicts welfare capitalism  and 
Keynesianism  within the core states as a temporary anodyne that has been diminished by neo-
liberal globalization. Robinson explains rising inequality within the United States as the extension 
of "low-intensity democracy" from the periphery to the core. 
In opposition to "low-intensity democracy", Robinson poses an alternative vision of 
popular democracy, stressing human equality, participatory decision-making , and a holistic 
integration of the political, social and economic realms. Unlike critics who advocate renewed 
economic nationalism or a retreat to cultural identity, Robinson sees  "globalism from below"  
as the solution to the problems created by transnational capitalism.  Local  victories by popular 
democratic movements cannot hope to prevail against global capital.  Rather, popular forces 
should embrace a new vision of a humane world society and construct global democratic 
institutions, thus building a counter-hegemony that can contend with the universalist claims of 
neo-liberalism. 
Robinson  suggests that the international unionism of the past (in which leaders 
attended occasional  international conferences)  must be replaced by a transnational unionism in 
which rank and file workers coordinate ideas and actions across national, racial, religious and 
cultural borders.  He mentions global feminism and the other "new social  movements" as 
contributors to a  transnational popular  formation  with the potential to transform neo-liberal 
hegemony into a democratic and collectively rational global  commonwealth.  He  suggests that 
new communications technologies could help overcome the barriers that have long pitted 
popular movements against one another.  But Robinson offers much more than a political 
manifesto – the core of the book is a well-considered analysis of the role of U.S. foreign policy 
in constructing and maintaining the contemporary global ideological hegemony, exemplified by 
four fascinating case studies. For that alone, Promoting Polyarchy is a worthy contribution to 
political sociology.


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