Levels of analysis problems in international studies∗

The international studies literature often refers to the “level of analysis problem.” This paper points out that what has often passed for a single problem actually consists of at least three separate issues: the use of aggregate data to make ecological inferences in statistical analyses; the definition of primitive units in international relations theory; and the identification of the effects of systems on their individual constituent units. The paper goes on to show that some of the problems that have been discussed under the “level of analysis” rubric can be better understood if each of these different issues is considered separately.     

Knowing your audience: How the structure of international relations and organizational choices affect amnesty international’s advocacy

While research has addressed the effects of international nongovernmental organizations (INGOs) advocacy on human rights outcomes, less is known about how INGOs choose advocacy targets and tactics. We combine insights from political economy and constructivism to understand how INGOs come to choose targets and tactics through the concepts of information and leverage politics, first articulated by Keck and Sikkink (1998), and salience politics, or the need to select cases that energize organization members and donors. INGOs select potential targets for advocacy and choose their tactics based on considerations of leverage potential and political salience, both of which are a function of potential target states’ aid, trade, and security linkages with major Western powers. Using data on Amnesty International’s written advocacy efforts - background reports, press releases, and new data on Urgent Actions - we find robust evidence that Amnesty International accounts for these linkages with Western powers in choosing targets for its advocacy campaigns.     

Does participation in international organizations increase cooperation?

Recent research asserts that public commitments to international institutions promote behavior that is consistent with institutional purposes. Evidence for this proposition is based almost entirely on studies that compare the behavior of states that have and have not ratified treaties. This paper evaluates instances in which some member states temporarily experience increased entanglement with an IO because they or their nationals serve in a position of authority. Unlike selection into IOs, selection into positions of authority is often governed by a common, observable, and partially exogenous process. I exploit exogenous exit, random assignment to different term lengths, and competitive elections in three contexts: the International Criminal Court (ICC), the UN Human Rights Commission (UNHRC), and the UN Security Council (UNSC). The evidence implicates that acquiring a position of authority can make states more willing to reject U.S. advances to sign non-surrender agreements, adopt domestic legislation that changes the penal code (ICC case), ratify legally binding treaties (UNHRC case), and contribute to peacekeeping missions (UNSC case). On the other hand, there is no evidence that UN institutions successfully select more cooperative states for positions of authority. Similar research designs can gainfully be employed to identify the causal effects of other forms of institutional participation.     

The international community should do more to help Africa

Cooperation with Africa under the background of globalization is an important but also interesting topic. Globalization is changing the world,including Africa and international relations as well. Against such a background, it is meaningful to discuss how to strengthen, the cooperation between the international community and Africa.     

Putting the nation back into ‘the international’

Alex Callinicos and Justin Rosenberg have both drawn on the concept of uneven and combined development to resolve what they see as deficiencies in international relations theory: in the case of the former, the absence of a non-realist explanation for the persistence of the states system; in the case of the latter, the absence of a sociological dimension to geopolitics. However, Callinicos omits any consideration of the ‘combined’ aspect of uneven and combined development, while Rosenberg ascribes characteristics of transhistoricity and internationality to uneven and combined development which it does not possess. Against attempts to either restrict or over-extend use of the concept, I will argue that its theoretical usefulness depends on understanding the limits of its spatial and chronological reach. An alternative, if still partial, explanation for the continued existence of the states system will emphasize the continuing indispensability of nationalism as a means of both containing class conflict within capitalist states and mobilizing support for ‘national capitals’ engaged in geoeconomic and geopolitical competition.     

Will science and technology undermine the international political system?

The framework, actors and issues of international politics havechanged as a result of the massive effects of advances in scienceand technology, but the fundamental principles and organizationof the international system have not been substantially altered.Science and technology are no more or less subversive of theinternational political system than are other pressures forchange. Rather, the nation-state structure, with all its problems,will be essential to manage this increasingly complex and interdependentworld. The policy processes within nations, in fact, rarelyallow scientific and technological factors to dominate policy,even in international issues in which those aspects are clearlycentral, might be thought to be the overwhelming considerations,and might have been expected to overturn traditional patternsin the international system. With climate change as the primaryexample, it is seen how and why economic, political and socialconsiderations dominate, not the scientific and technological.     

Which type of international organizations can settle civil wars?

International organizations (IOs) take on an increasing share of civil war mediation around the world. The determinants of IO mediation effectiveness remain poorly understood, partly because prior research has not adequately captured the institutional heterogeneity of peace-brokering IOs. To explore how mediation effectiveness depends on institutional variation, I combine newly gathered data on the design of 13 peace-brokering IOs with existing data on 109 civil war mediation episodes in the 1975-2004 period. I find that IOs with institutionalized capabilities to deploy field missions, such as peacekeeping operations, outperform other IOs as mediators of civil wars, whereas information-gathering capacity does not yield a significant advantage. The results suggest that IO enforcement assistance has a forward-looking effect: the ability to credibly signal, ex ante, that peacekeeping or monitoring forces will be deployed to enforce an agreement, helps IOs shape negotiations long before forces are actually deployed. Reaffirming the credible commitment theory of conflict resolution, the study demonstrates that there is considerable variation among external guarantors, which explains why some IOs can shift civil war disputants away from violent bargaining strategies whereas other cannot.     

Greening an international organization: UNIDO’s strategic responses

The United Nations Industrial Development Organization’s (UNIDO) portfolio of technical cooperation projects changed radically between 1992 and 2004. In 1992, industrial-development-related projects constituted 98% of the portfolio in monetary terms, and environment-related projects 2% while, in 2004, the former constituted 43% and the latter 57%. However, the larger share of the environment-related projects in 2004 was only marginally, if at all, linked to UNIDO’s industrial development agenda. A compelling explanation for this radical change in the organization’s technical cooperation portfolio is provided by a model of strategic choice that draws on resource dependency and institutional approaches and that allows for staff strategic actions. Two factors, UNIDO’s financial and confidence crisis in the 1990s and an organizational culture wedded to industrial development, shaped UNIDO’s strategic responses, which, for the most part, did not integrate environmental concerns into industrial development projects and programs as instructed by its principal governing body.

Small states and the ‘throughput’ legitimacy of international organizations

Abstract

The unequal participation of member states in international organizations (IOs) undermines IOs’ legitimacy as global actors. Existing scholarship typically makes this assessment by referencing a combination of input—the interests IOs serve—and output—the decisions they take. This scholarship does not, however, pay enough attention to how IOs have responded to these concerns. We argue that IOs have used the participation of small states—whose membership most studies typically ignore—as an important means of generating what Vivian Schmidt calls ‘throughput’ legitimacy for their operations. We organize our analysis of ‘throughput’ legitimacy in IOs around four institutional mechanisms—(1) agenda setting; (2) leadership (s)election; (3) management and operation; and (4) service delivery—in which all states seek to exert influence. What emerges is an account of IOs seeking to balance ‘inputs’ and ‘outputs’ by way of ‘throughputs’. We conclude by arguing for an expanded focus on the means by which IOs generate ‘throughput’ legitimacy in future research.     

What wars and ‘war bodies’ know about international relations

What happens when the ‘international’ as a distinct social space is approached from the perspective of war rather than war from the perspective of the ‘international’? Tarak Barkawi's question (Millennium, 39:3, 2011, 701–706) is best answered by attempts to understand war not as part of inter/intra-state relations but as a socio-cultural, trans-historical institution that impacts on the ‘everyday’ lives of men, women and children. In this article I argue that war is not a disruption of the ‘everyday’, an abstraction that has a definite beginning and end, something we enter into and exit. Instead, it can be captured in daily and mundane lived experiences of people and in powerful emotions that constitute ‘self’, community and the ‘other.’ Drawing upon my research on wars in South Asia, I particularly reflect on how war shapes the banal and the fervent and how cultural and political narratives of ‘war bodies’ perform the ‘international’ in a variety of ways. Most significantly I want to draw attention to how international relations as a scholarly discipline is so deeply engaged with war and yet seems to have an estranged relationship with it.     

Forget(ting) feminism? Investigating relationality in international relations

Abstract

What kind of theoretical or methodological changes are needed to more effectively theorize global politics? This question is one increasingly posed, one reason being the ever burgeoning weight of violence on our global political landscapes. To investigate this, the central concept examined at the workshop from which this special section emanates was relationality. Motivated by feminist scholarship, my initial question was, ‘Why did we not focus the whole workshop around feminist theory?’ This question is posed alongside the clear knowledge that the workshop was not ‘about’ feminism and thus it might not seem rational to choose such a focus. Yet given the concept and practice of relationality was so deeply embedded in feminist work, I wondered how feminism could have been forgotten. In this article, I explore the idea of ‘forgetting feminism’ through a further question, namely, ‘Is sexism (still) at work in international relations [IR]?’ This involves a perusal of the work of sexual politics and sexism, IR’s putative ‘failure to love’ and a personal, relational detour into the life, work and career of Lily Ling—corporeally suddenly absent but remaining a vital part of the work in which we are all engaged.     

Outside and inside competition for international organizations—from analysis to innovations

The analysis of the competitive environment of international organizations has been neglected in scholarly research. Both the external and the internal type of competition in international organizations are rather weak and their performance is far from ideal. To strengthen both types of competition, several tentative proposals are advanced. They range from the introduction of an international competition agency, competition rules, a monitoring institute, voucher systems, matching contributions, popular participation rights by citizens to the use of prediction markets and institutionalized devil’s advocates. These proposals are put forward to stimulate discussion and to advance new ideas about the design of international organizations.

Measuring international conflict: Developing cross‐country time‐series data

This paper develops a new time series of conflict data from 1948 to the present through statistical estimation of a pooled time‐series of the two most frequently used dyadic events data sets: Conflict and Cooperation Data Bank (COPDAB) (1948–1978) and World Events Interaction Survey (WEIS) (1966‐present). The resulting data series is the longest possible time‐series annual data of dyadic interaction based on daily events. The paper also provides an example of performing a Vector Autoregression (VAR) analysis of conflict and trade in a three‐country setting, utilizing the integrated data. Compared to the COPDAB and WEIS data, the integrated data have a large degree of variation and produce forecasting results that are more complex than those from the COPDAB and WEIS separately.     

There’s no place like home: Explaining international NGO advocacy

INGO advocacy can range from cooperative to confrontational, and these tactical choices can have important repercussions for the overall success of the organization??s policy work, yet little attention has been paid to this variation. We contend that INGO advocacy strategies are shaped by the organization??s national origin. Drawing on insights from sociology and political science, we argue that there is substantial variation among wealthy industrialized democracies in the availability and structure of material resources as well as the domestic institutional environment surrounding INGO work. Together, these national-level factors shape INGOs?? choice of the level of confrontation or conciliation that they adopt in their advocacy. We first demonstrate the importance of INGO national origin using new data on the confrontational advocacy strategies of over 3000 non-governmental organizations from OECD countries that are international in focus. We then explore the relationship between national origin and INGO practice through comparative case studies of INGO umbrella organizations in the relief and development sector. Throughout, we focus on four countries in particular: the United States, Britain, France, and Japan. These countries differ significantly in terms of the material resources and institutional environments faced by INGOs and thus allow us to understand whether and how these factors influence INGO advocacy choices. These systematic differences in INGO strategies have important ramifications for understanding national and global advocacy by INGOs and demonstrate an enduring role of the state in shaping the behavior of non-state actors.     

How do international development agencies approach peacebuilding in a sub-national conflict?

International development agencies often promote approaches that link aid and peacebuilding. However, the gap between what agencies say and what they actually do is demonstrated by the mixed response to subnational conflict in Thailand's Far South between 2007 and 2012. Over this period, numerous agencies demonstrated little interest in addressing the conflict. Some agencies did over time try to support peacebuilding, although domestic government resistance and practical barriers generated obstacles. Conflict guidelines and toolkits were rarely used, while only a few agencies implemented the context-driven and knowledge-based approaches to local partnerships that peace promotion in a complex and politically sensitive environment demands.

Comment les agences de développement internationales abordent-elles la construction de la paix lors d'un conflit infranational ?

Les agences de développement internationales promeuvent souvent des approches qui relient l'aide et la construction de la paix. Cependant, le fossé entre les dires des agences et leurs actions est démontré par la riposte peu constante au conflit infranational dans l'extrême sud thaïlandais entre 2007 et 2012. Durant cette période, de nombreuses agences n'ont guère fait preuve d'intérêt concernant la résolution du conflit. Certaines agences, au fil du temps, ont tenté de soutenir la construction de la paix, mais la résistance gouvernementale au sein même du pays et les barrières d'ordre pratique ont engendré des obstacles. Les lignes directrices et les trousses à outils pour remédier aux conflits ont été rarement utilisés, et rares ont été les agences qui ont mis en ?uvre les approches impulsées par les contextes et basées sur les connaissances concernant les partenariats locaux que requiert la promotion de la paix dans un environnement complexe et politiquement sensible.

¿De qué manera las agencias de desarrollo internacionales abordan la construcción de paz en un conflicto subnacional?

Frecuentemente, las agencias de desarrollo internacionales promueven enfoques que vinculan la ayuda con la construcción de paz. Sin embargo, la brecha entre lo que dicen las agencias y lo que en realidad hacen queda demostrada por la respuesta matizada ante el conflicto subnacional que tuvo lugar en el Extremo Sur de Tailandia entre 2007 y 2012. Durante este periodo, numerosas agencias demostraron poco interés en abordar el conflicto. A pesar de los obstáculos que representaron la resistencia del gobierno nacional y las barreras prácticas, con el transcurso del tiempo algunas agencias intentaron apoyar la construcción de paz. Sin embargo, en pocas ocasiones usaron las normas y los manuales existentes en torno a conflictos. Sólo unas pocas agencias implementaron los enfoques basados en el contexto y en el conocimiento para crear alianzas locales, las cuales resultan imprescindibles para promover la paz en un entorno complejo y políticamente sensible.

Como as agências internacionais de desenvolvimento abordam a construção da paz em um conflito subnacional?

As agências internacionais de desenvolvimento frequentemente promovem abordagens que fazem a conexão entre ajuda e construção da paz. Porém, a variação entre o que as agências afirmam e o que elas realmente fazem é demonstrada pela resposta mesclada a um conflito subnacional no extremo sul da Tailândia entre 2007 e 2012. Durante esse período, várias agências demonstraram pouco interesse em abordar o conflito. Algumas agências realmente tentaram, no decorrer do tempo, apoiar a construção da paz, embora a resistência do governo local e barreiras práticas geraram obstáculos. Orientações e kits de ferramentas sobre o conflito foram raramente utilizados, enquanto que apenas algumas poucas agências implementaram abordagens direcionadas ao conflito e baseadas no conhecimento de parcerias locais que a promoção da paz demanda em um ambiente complexo e politicamente delicado.     

Vulnerability without capabilities? Small state strategy and the international counter-piracy agenda

Today, small European states regularly need to go out of area and out of tried and tested institutional settings to defend their security interests. How do small European states meet this challenge most effectively? This analysis suggests that small states can influence multilateral decisions on international security by combining norm entrepreneurship with lobbying and taking on the role as an “honest broker”. However, economic capacity, an effective state administration, and interests compatible with the agendas of the great powers are key to success. Based on a comprehensive empirical material including 19 elite interviews as well as official documents and other written material, we process trace how one small European state, Denmark, influenced the development of international counter-piracy cooperation and the development of an international counter-piracy strategy for the Gulf of Aden and off the Horn of Africa and discuss which lessons the Danish case may hold for other small states.