  According to the sort of plurality of perspectives endorsed by a pragmatist philosophy of social science, a historical account of the emergence of single and multiple institutions would be helpful. In Gerald Ruggie’s masterful analysis of the development of a global order beyond the nation-state, he shows that the modern sovereign state and the social empowerment of citizens emerged within the same epistemic era as the single point perspective in painting, cartography, or optics. “The concept of sovereignty then represented merely the doctrinal counterpart of the application of single point perspective to the organization of political space” (Ruggie, 2000, 186). Unbundling sovereignty would lead to new political possibilities, including the re-articulation of international political space in a new way that cannot be anticipated in dominant theories of international relations.  Focusing on the shifts in the authority of states and the development of the European Union, Ruggie sees the “EU as the first multiperspectival polity to emerge in the modern era” and thus the emergence of a new political form. The concept of “the multiperspectival form” does seem to offer “a lens through which to view other possible instances of international transformation today” (Ruggie 2000, 196). Such an account also applies to the theory of practical knowledge that might inform reflection on the possibilities of democracy in an era of uneven globalization.