ABSTRACT

This article examines the role of national parliaments in policy processes related to the realization of the 2030 Agenda for sustainable development, adopted in the UN General Assembly in 2015. We outline three main roles of parliaments in the case of national policy-making based on intergovernmental agreements: legislative and policy approval, citizen representation, and accountability. The cases of Sweden and Ghana are examined with regard to those roles, looking for factors that impact the degree of parliamentary involvement with the 2030 Agenda. The cases show that while formal features of political systems impact how parliaments exercise those roles, political choice among policy-making elites and voters is an equally important factor shaping how those roles play out. Yet, political choice can in turn be circumscribed by competing domains, issues and actors in national 2030 Agenda processes. Even if the two countries chosen for comparison are dissimilar with regard to substantive challenges faced in realizing the 2030 Agenda, they are alike with regard to weak involvement of their parliament in policy-making related to the 2030 Agenda thus far. The conclusion puts forward possible implications of a lack of parliamentary involvement for the domestic democratic legitimacy and realization of the 2030 Agenda.

摘要

本文探讨了国家议会在与实现 2015 年联合国大会通过的 2030 年可持续发展议程相关的政策进程中的作用。我们概述了议会在基于政府间决策的国家决策中的三个主要作用。协议：立法和政策批准、公民代表和问责制。针对这些角色对瑞典和加纳的案例进行了研究，寻找影响议会参与 2030 年议程程度的因素。这些案例表明，虽然政治制度的正式特征会影响议会如何发挥这些作用，但决策精英和选民之间的政治选择是影响这些作用如何发挥的同样重要的因素。然而，政治选择反过来又会受到竞争领域的限制，国家 2030 年议程进程中的问题和参与者。即使被选作比较的两个国家在实现 2030 年议程所面临的实质性挑战方面存在差异，但它们的议会迄今为止在与 2030 年议程相关的政策制定中参与不足方面却是相似的。结论提出了缺乏议会参与对国内民主合法性和实现 2030 年议程的可能影响。