Taxation, sovereignty and just cooperation: realizing a model for distributive justice in global tax governance

Forsyth, Saba Majidi (2024) Taxation, sovereignty and just cooperation: realizing a model for distributive justice in global tax governance. LL.M(R) thesis, University of Glasgow.

Abstract

This thesis is intended to explore the normative questions surrounding the pursuit of global tax justice, through the lens of its conflicting demands of just cooperation and state sovereignty. Among the many pressing global problems which require cooperation between states, coordination on taxation presents particularly acute challenges. It is designed to protect tax sovereignty within the interdependence and interaction of diverse tax systems, while also requiring ever closer cooperation to secure this task for all countries. Considering the extent to which the international tax regime’s commitment to sovereignty preservation has enabled a framework which restricts the autonomy of developing countries and produces inequitable outcomes, it is argued that reconciling this conflict requires a normative commitment to principles of global distributive justice.

The thesis pursues this argument by exploring the relational account given by John Rawls, which places duties of distributive justice as central to ensuring just forms of social cooperation, but argues that its applicability is limited to sovereign states. Seeking to account for the central problems of relational power and inequitable treatment within global tax cooperation, and utilizing the relational model of global justice as freedom from domination within republican theory, the thesis builds a normative account of global tax justice which reframes sovereignty as a reciprocal and collective value, in which the exercise of autonomy is constrained by commitments to the freedom of all states. Within this framework, it is argued, there are duties of distributive justice which can direct the aims of global tax governance to provide more genuinely equitable participation and a just distribution of power.

• Item Type: Thesis (LL.M(R))
• Qualification Level: Masters
• Subjects: K Law > K Law (General)
• Colleges/Schools: College of Social Sciences > School of Law
• Supervisor's Name: Pavlakos, Professor George
• Date of Award: 2024
• Depositing User: Theses Team
• Unique ID: glathesis:2024-84117
• Copyright: Copyright of this thesis is held by the author.
• Date Deposited: 14 Mar 2024 14:16
• Last Modified: 14 Mar 2024 14:18
• Thesis DOI: 10.5525/gla.thesis.84117
• URI: https://theses.gla.ac.uk/id/eprint/84117