The Informational Role of International Institutions and Domestic Politics

Why did President Bush attempt to acquire a UN Security Council resolution authorizing the use of force before the war with Iraq, even though there was a substantial risk that his request would be rejected? This article presents a game‐theoretic model to investigate how international institutions can shape the behavior of democratic leaders by influencing domestic politics. While it seems unsurprising that unbiased leaders who are truly concerned about foreign policy outcomes would consult international institutions, the results show that biased leaders with private agendas can also be forced to behave like the unbiased type because of their electoral concerns. The equilibrium results are illustrated with the cases of U.S. use of force in international crises.     

The Investment Theory of Wars: Belligerent Dictators in the McGuire/North-Model of Autocracy

In the early 90s Martin C.McGuire and Mancur Olson Jr. developed aneconomic explanation of autocracy. Thedifferentiation between roving andstationary bandits is the core of theirtheory. The authors claim that an``invisible hand'' leads to a conversion ofroving bandits into stationary bandits. Inthis respect, stationary bandits are``public goods providing kings'' who reignpeacefully. Thus, war is hardly a rationalpolitical option. However, this resultstands in contradiction to the overwhelmingevidence for wars in human history.Therefore, war as a political option isintroduced. It is shown that theMcGuire/Olson argument challenging the ideathat the welfare of people ruled bystationary bandits is always higher thanwelfare of people ruled by roving banditsproves to be valid only under certaincircumstances.     

Social Change and Moral Politics: the Irish Constitutional Referendum 1983

The dominance of the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland has been challenged by rapid socioeconomic change. To counter emerging secularist trends, anti-abortion activists pressurized the political parties to agree to hold a referendum for a constitutional amendment to ban abortion. Opposition to the referendum, and party divisions, led to the active involvement by the Catholic Church and the hierarchy in the campaign. Although the amendment was passed, the intervention of the Church has not been beneficial to it as an institution. This is the first time since the establishment of the Irish state that a significant cleavage has emerged around a religious issue. The referendum reflected a change in Irish politics—new divisions had emerged, based on age, class, religion and place of residence. This change is now having an impact on the political parties.     

Identifying Welfare State Regimes: The Links Between Politics, Instruments and Outcomes

With new sources of cross-national data appearing on income distribution and the characteristics of redistributional policy instruments, it is now possible to take the comparative analysis of welfare states well beyond the conventional focus on government expenditures. This study of 18 OECD nations examines the linkages between various aspects of the income redistribution process, elaborates a typology of welfare state regimes and locates the political origins of each of these regimes.     

International Institutions and Domestic Compensation: The IMF and the Politics of Capital Account Liberalization

Certain governments have been faster than others in relaxing their restrictions on the cross‐border movement of capital. How can we explain the timing and extent of financial liberalization across countries since the 1970s? We argue that IMF stabilization programs provide a window of opportunity for governments to initiate financial reforms, but that policy makers are more likely to seize this opportunity when welfare expenditures are high. Large loans from the IMF shield policy makers from the costs of financial reform, while welfare expenditures provide credibility to the government's ex ante promises of compensation to individuals who are harmed by the reforms. We test this hypothesis on data for 87 countries from 1975 to 2002. We employ a spatial autoregressive error sample selection model which accounts for the nonrandom participation of countries in IMF programs as well as the processes of international policy diffusion. The results provide strong support for the interactive effect of IMF programs and domestic welfare expenditures on financial liberalization.     

统治与治理:国家与社会关系的演进

国家与社会关系分离程度较低,国家的相对自主程度在某种程度上超越社会的限度或制约,统治也就成为政府管理的基本实现形式。政府的失效与市场的失败出现,治理理论应运而生。从取向而言,政府治理所依赖的国家与社会的关系体现在:国家存在于社会;国家受制于社会;国家统一于社会。政府管理方式由统治方式向治理方式转变必须以国家与社会关系的调整变化为基础:从两者合一到两者分离的转变;从两者的分离到两者的合作。     

Why International Trusteeship Fails: The Politics of External Authority in Areas of Limited Statehood

International trusteeship is widely touted as a solution to the problem of failed states, an extreme form of limited statehood. Current theories of legitimacy and statebuilding suggest that trusteeships should produce more capable states. These theories, however, fail to take into account the self‐interest and political strategies available to trustees and politicians within new states. We pose a more political model of statebuilding by the international community, the trustee, and national politicians that predicts that trusteeship will fail to produce states with greater capacity. We test for the effects of trusteeship on state capacity, measured by service provision, by creating a matched sample of countries. We find that there is no evidence that states under trusteeship develop greater capacity leading to better provision of public goods than comparable states not under trusteeship. Would‐be statebuilders must be more aware of the political incentives of all parties involved in the process.     

西方政治与行政关系的历史演变及趋势

在西方政治与行政的发展过程中,政治与行政的关系一直是一个悬而未决的实践和理论问题。本文以西方主要国家为参照,考察了其在近代以来在政治与行政关系上,由政治化行政关系,经政治与行政二分关系,到政治行政混合关系的演变过程,揭示这种关系可能的发展方向,及隐含在西方社会政治经济制度中的导致其政治与行政关系发展的内在动因,即民主与效率的矛盾。     

Humanitarian Crises and the International Politics of Selectivity

How has the international community responded to humanitarian crises after the end of the Cold War? While optimistic ideational perspectives on global governance stress the importance of humanitarian norms and argue that humanitarian crises have been increasingly addressed, more skeptical realist accounts point to material interests and maintain that these responses have remained highly selective. In empirical terms, however, we know very little about the actual extent of selectivity since, so far, the international community’s reaction to humanitarian crises has not been systematically examined. This article addresses this gap by empirically examining the extent and the nature of the selectivity of humanitarian crises. To do so, the most severe humanitarian crises in the post-Cold War era are identified and examined for whether and how the international community responded. This study considers different modes of crisis response (ranging from inaction to military intervention) and different actors (including states, international institutions, and nonstate actors), yielding a more precise picture of the alleged “selectivity gap” and a number of theoretical implications for contemporary global security governance.