Search

This article takes stock of the current debate on regime complexes. The specific relevance of such complexes for global governance is best grasped if these complexes are understood as systems [...]

The existing literature on regime complexity has generally focused on its impact on the behavior of states; in contrast, this article explores its implications for international organizations. Many organizations within [...]

Networks are often heralded as a promising strategy of global governance. This article examines the challenges encountered in managing one relatively successful network--the Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network (GOARN). [...]

The study analyzes urban planning practices in South Yorkshire to examine how European Union strategic spatial ideas and values are reproduced, specifically how the notion of spatial justice is interpreted. It finds that policy-making at such a large scale uses a construct of polycentric urban development that reasserts a model of economic growth based on the indigenous assets held in city centers at the cost of more redistributive measures aimed at the former coal-mining communities in the sub-region.

CASE DESCRIPTION The primary subject matter of this case concerns strategic decisions that global entities, their executives, and accountants face in light of the almost certain convergence of U.S. Generally [...]

CASE DESCRIPTION The primary focus of the case is mortgage valuation and building models from income statements that lead to cash flow projections under differing assumptions. This case is suitable [...]

A study was conducted to examine the formation of the Regional Cooperation for Development (RCD). The organization was set up to promote economic, technical, and cultural cooperation among Iran, Turkey, and Pakistan. RCD directed its activities through the Ministerial Council, the Regional Planning Committee, the Working Committee, and the Secretariat.

This paper analyzes the effect of the presence of multinational firms on endogenous tariff rates, using an analytically solvable two-country model with fixed terms of trade. Noncooperative tariffs are lower in the presence of market-seeking (horizontal) foreign direct investment (FDI). Such firms avoid trade and entail a loss of tariff revenues for importing countries. In the case of low-cost-seeking (vertical) FDI, the results are less clear-cut and the noncooperative tariff rate can turn out to be a subsidy. The world-welfare-maximizing policy is an import subsidy. (JEL: F 12, F 23)

A case study is presented to show how Bell Labs Security Framework can be used to enhance the International Organization for Standardization/International Electrotechnical Commission ( ISO /IEC) 27001series in implementing an organization's information security management system.

The article suggests the implementation of an international mechanism to provide basic needs of survival to all globally, and not only the rich countries for their citizens and to provide global health care.

The formation of organisations in Asia like the Collective Security Treaty Organisation and the Shanghai Co-operation Organisaton is presented and the reasons for their not possibly emerging to challenge the NATO are given.

Scholars expect International Courts (ICs) with private access and compulsory jurisdiction to be more independent and effective. This article shows a trend of creating and using ICs with compulsory jurisdiction and private access, using as evidence the founding statutes and usage rates of 20 ICs created since 1945. Analyzing where and for what private actors are granted access to ICs, the author finds that what is driving the expansion of private access and compulsory jurisdiction is an attempt to extend the types of juridical checks found at the domestic level to the international governance level. Although this trend will likely lead to more rights claiming by private actors, limitations on the types of cases that can be raised combined with a lack of usage suggests that outside of Europe, private right claiming potentials have yet to be exploited. Keywords: international organizations; international law; courts; delegation; Europe

The World Trade Organization and other intergovernmental organizations confront a crisis of legitimacy that is partly rooted in their perceived secretiveness. These organizations have attempted to address this crisis by promising 'the maximum possible level of transparency,' but in fact, the improvements have been modest. Policies regarding access to information about intergovernmental organizations' operations continue to accommodate conventions of diplomatic confidentiality. Such conventions are more likely to be breached in areas where disclosure of information is essential to economic liberalization. A true revolution in transparency would require more rigorous policies on disclosure of information held by intergovernmental organizations such as the World Trade Organization, and could be justified as a prerequisite for the exercise of basic human rights, such as the right to participate fully in the policy-making process.

Accused of being secretive, unaccountable, and ineffective, both the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank are seeking to become more transparent, more participatory, and more accountable. Yet few attempts [...]

What difference do institutional environments make? Do they primarily affect strategy, with constraining and enabling effects on behavior as rationalists hold? Or do they also affect attitudes, identities, and how interests are formulated as constructivists assert? Within a given institutional environment, what impact does the 'style' of decision making--which beyond formal characteristics such as the decision rule includes informal rules, norms, and shared understandings--play in determining bargaining outcomes? This article examines these questions in the context of EU decision making by focusing on the Committee of Permanent Representatives (Coreper). Coreper is an ideal laboratory to test these questions empirically, because this committee represents the needle's eye through which the legislative workload of the Council flows. And the permanent representatives who live in Brussels and meet weekly to prepare upcoming ministerial meetings are exemplars of state agents given their prominence in articulating and defending national interests across the gamut of EU affairs. Keywords: integration theory; constructivism; rationalism; socialization, Coreper.

One of the most striking features of contemporary EU governance is the ubiquity of Commission and member-state committees known under the rubric of 'comitology.' The significance of these committees, however, remains a matter of dispute, with two distinct theoretical images of comitology being put forward in the literature. The first of these approaches, drawn from sociological institutionalism and constructivism, suggests that EU committees provide a forum in which national and supranational experts meet and deliberate in a search for the most efficient solutions to common policy problems. A second view, derived from rational choice theory, depicts comitology committees as control mechanisms designed by EU member governments to supervise the Commission in its executive duties. This article engages in a direct competitive test of these two approaches, examining the empirical record of institutional choice of comitology committees and demonstrating that the weight of both quantitative and qualitative evidence supports rationalist hypotheses. Deliberation may well take place under certain conditions within comitology committees, but it is likely that such deliberation takes place only within a relatively narrow domain, and under conditions yet to be identified. Keywords: delegation; principal; agent; Commission; comitology; European Union.

In this article, the authors address the rationalist-constructivist debate head on. They start by discussing a significant empirical phenomenon in contemporary EU politics: the changing pattern of political competition in the European Parliament (EP), from a 'grand coalition' of the two main parties in the 1994-1999 EP, to a new structure of left-right competition in the 1999-2004 EP. The authors then illustrate how rational choice and constructivist assumptions offer competing explanations of this shift in the 'culture of competition' in the EP, which in turn generate competing empirically testable hypotheses. These propositions are tested using a logistic analysis of more than 400 roll-call votes in a period from the 1994-1999 and the 1999-2004 parliament. The authors conclude that neither basic theoretical framework performs well and that the best explanation needs to incorporate assumptions from both frameworks. Keywords: European Parliament; coalitions; rational choice theory; constructivist theory.

The interplay among intergovernmental and supranational actors is a defining feature of the institutional life of the European Union (EU). Too often, however, these actors are considered independent of each other, and their autonomy is assessed in a vacuum. This is problematic because if there is such a thing as 'endogenous preferences' in the EU, it appears exactly through this interdependence of intergovernmental and supranational actors. None of the institutionalist approaches to the EU has come to grips with this fact yet. Based on some very simple game-theoretic ideas, I offer in this article a rationale for 'endogenous preferences' and discuss their impact on issues of delegations. Some cursory empirical evidence supports the claims that the preferences of supranational actors are related to those of the actors who select or appoint them. Similarly, the analyses presented here suggest that preferences over delegation to supranational actors are influenced by differences in policy views between principals and agents. Keywords: European Union; delegation; Commission; endogenous preferences; appointment; European Parliament.

Three central goals motivate this introductory essay and the articles that follow. First, we seek better understanding of the EU's own institutions, especially to the extent that they play a role in or represent the process of integration. Second, we seek better integration of the multiple general understandings of institutions and primarily of rationalist and constructivist conceptions. Third and most important, we seek to promote the integration of institutional research. Our overarching argument is that metatheoretical debate about institutions has run its course and must now give way to theoretical, methodological, and carefully structured empirical dialogue. To this end, we offer specific strategies for promoting greater synthesis among competing institutional schools. Keywords: institutional theory; rationalism; constructivism; European Union; research design; methodology.

These authors propose that an international environmental organization should focus on being a forum for debate and an enforcer of international agreements.

This article creates a model of creditibility that suggests it arises from the expectation of continual future gains by maintaining an honest record, because diplomatic statements are only believed if a country's creditibility is unmarred. The authors suggest that leaders keep their word in order to be believed in the event of a later crisis; they contrast a country whose creditibility resides in the leader and one in which its creditibility resides in the country itself.

There is a tension within the United Nations between intergovernmentalism and transnationalism, two forces that encompass different sets of interests and reflect distinct constituencies. As an intergovernmental institution, the UN [...]

The relations between the UN system and what is referred to as civil society are dynamically growing and changing. In this article I focus on five aspects: (1) evolving procedures [...]

Michael J. Gorges is Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. His research focuses on the new institutionalism, interest intermediation in the European Union, and [...]

This article examines the democratization process in Poland and its reliance on international organizations which are mediated by the Polish states domestic and and political institutions. The author suggests that the state's response to and interaction with external agencies is conditioned by the democratization process that these agencies wish to influence, implying that Poland's foreign relations are shaped by democratization.