Hostname: page-component-5cf477f64f-mgq6s Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-04-06T00:13:51.863Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

International Bureaucrats and the Formation of Intergovernmental Organizations: Institutional Design Discretion Sweetens the Pot

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 January 2014

Tana Johnson  and
Johannes Urpelainen
Tana Johnson
Affiliation:
Duke University, Durham, North Carolina. E-mail: [email protected]
Johannes Urpelainen
Affiliation:
Columbia University, New York. E-mail: [email protected]
Get access

Abstract

Bureaucrats working in international intergovernmental organizations (IGOs) regularly help states design new IGOs. Sometimes international bureaucrats possess limited discretion in institutional design; sometimes, they enjoy broad discretion. In fact, they gain discretion even when they openly oppose state preferences. This contravenes conventional thinking about delegation: discretion should decrease as preference divergence between states and international bureaucrats increases. We develop a principal-agent theory of how much discretion states grant to international bureaucrats in the design of new IGOs. This is novel: while principal-agent theories of international delegation are common, scholars have not analyzed principal-agent relationships in the creation of new IGOs. We argue that even an international bureaucracy that disagrees with states' design preferences may enjoy substantial design leeway, because of states' need for bureaucratic expertise. In developing this argument, we employ a formal principal-agent model, case studies, and an original data set.

Type
Research Article
Information
International Organization , Volume 68 , Issue 1 , January 2014 , pp. 177 - 209
Copyright
Copyright © The IO Foundation 2014 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Abbott, Kenneth W., and Snidal, Duncan. 1998. Why States Act Through Formal International Organizations. Journal of Conflict Resolution 42 (1):3–32.Google Scholar
Barnett, Michael N., and Finnemore, Martha. 1999. The Politics, Power, and Pathologies of International Organization. International Organization 53 (4):699–732.Google Scholar
Barnett, Michael N., and Finnemore, Martha. 2004. Rules for the World: International Organizations in Global Politics. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Behrman, Greg. 2004. The Invisible People: How the US Has Slept Through the Global AIDS Pandemic, the Greatest Humanitarian Catastrophe of Our Time. New York: Free Press.Google Scholar
Berridge, Virginia. 1996. AIDS in the UK: The Making of Policy, 1981–1994. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Blackwell, Matthew, Iacus, Stefano, King, Gary, and Porro, Giuseppe. 2009. CEM: Coarsened Exact Matching in Stata. Stata Journal 9 (4):524–46.Google Scholar
Ember, Lois R. 1980. Caribbean Environmental Plan Taking Shape. Chemical and Engineering News 58 (15):15–17.Google Scholar
Epstein, David, and O'Halloran, Sharyn. 1996. Divided Government and the Design of Administrative Procedures: A Formal Model and Empirical Test. Journal of Politics 58 (2):373–97.Google Scholar
Haas, Peter M. 1989. Do Regimes Matter? Epistemic Communities and Mediterranean Pollution Control. International Organization 43 (3):377–403.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hawkins, Darren G., Lake, David A., Nielson, Daniel L., and Tierney, Michael J.. 2006. Delegation Under Anarchy: States, International Organizations, and Principal-Agent Theory. In Delegation and Agency in International Relations, edited by Hawkins, Darren G., Lake, David A., Nielson, Daniel L., and Tierney, Michael J., 3–39. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Hinrichsen, Don. 1990. Our Common Seas: Coasts in Crisis. London: Earthscan.Google Scholar
Hubbard, R. Glenn, and Weiner, Robert J.. 1986. Oil Supply Shocks and International Policy Coordination. European Economic Review 30 (1):91–106.Google Scholar
Hulm, Peter. 1983. The Regional Seas Program: What Fate for UNEP's Crown Jewels? Ambio 12 (1):2–13.Google Scholar
Hurewitz, J.C. 1976. The Middle East and the Industrial World. In Oil, the Arab-Israel Dispute, and the Industrial World: Horizons of Crisis, edited by Hurwitz, J.C., 1–6. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.Google Scholar
Iacus, Stefano, King, Gary, and Porro, Giuseppe. 2011. Multivariate Matching Methods That Are Monotonic Imbalance Bounding. Journal of the American Statistical Association 106 (493):345–61.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Iacus, Stefano, King, Gary, and Porro, Giuseppe. 2012. Causal Inference Without Balance Checking: Coarsened Exact Matching. Political Analysis 20 (1):1–24.Google Scholar
Johnson, Tana. 2013a. Institutional Design and Bureaucrats' Impact on Political Control. Journal of Politics 75 (1):183–97.Google Scholar
Johnson, Tana. 2013b. Looking Beyond States: Openings for International Bureaucrats to Enter the Institutional Design Process. Review of International Organizations 8 (4):499–519.Google Scholar
Johnson, Tana, and Urpelainen, Johannes. 2012. A Strategic Theory of Regime Integration and Separation. International Organization 66 (4):645–77.Google Scholar
Jupille, Joseph, and Snidal, Duncan. 2006. The Choice of International Institutions: Cooperation, Alternatives and Strategies. Working Paper. Boulder: University of Colorado at Boulder. Google Scholar
Keohane, Robert O. 1984. After Hegemony: Cooperation and Discord in the World Political Economy. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
King, Gary, Nielsen, Richard, Coberley, Carter, Pope, James E., and Wells, Aaron. 2011. Comparative Effectiveness of Matching Methods for Causal Inference. Unpublished manuscript, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. Google Scholar
Kohl, Wilfred L. 1976. The International Energy Agency: The Political Context. In Oil, the Arab-Israel Dispute, and the Industrial World: Horizons of Crisis, edited by Hurewitz, J.C., 246–52. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.Google Scholar
Koremenos, Barbara, Lipson, Charles, and Snidal, Duncan. 2001. The Rational Design of International Institutions. International Organization 55 (4):761–99.Google Scholar
Lantzke, Ulf. 1975. The OECD and Its International Energy Agency. Daedalus 104 (4):217–27.Google Scholar
Mansfield, Edward D. 1995. International Institutions and Economic Sanctions. World Politics 47 (4):575–605.Google Scholar
McKie, James W. 1975. The Oil Crisis in Perspective: The United States. Daedalus 104 (4):73–90.Google Scholar
Merson, Michael H., O'Malley, Jeffrey, Serwadda, David, and Apisuk, Chantawipa. 2008. The History and Challenge of HIV Prevention. Lancet 372 (9637):475–88.Google Scholar
Nielson, Daniel L., and Tierney, Michael J.. 2003. Delegation to International Organizations: Agency Theory and World Bank Environmental Reform. International Organization 57 (2):241–76.Google Scholar
Prodi, Romano, and Clo, Alberto. 1975. The Oil Crisis in Perspective: Europe. Daedalus 104 (4):91–112.Google Scholar
Scott, Richard. 1994. IEA: The First Twenty Years. Paris: OECD.Google Scholar
Shanks, Cheryl, Jacobson, Harold K., and Kaplan, Jeffrey H.. 1996. Inertia and Change in the Constellation of International Governmental Organizations, 1981–1992. International Organization 50 (4):593–627.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tolba, Mostafa K., and Rummel-Bulska, Iwona. 1998. Global Environmental Diplomacy: Negotiating Environmental Agreements for the World, 1973–1992. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
UNAIDS. 2008. UNAIDS: The First Ten Years. Geneva: Joint United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS.Google Scholar
Union of International Associations. 2007. Yearbook of International Organizations. Munich, Germany: KG Saur Verlag. Available at ⟨http://www.uia.be/⟩.Google Scholar
Supplementary material: File

Johnson and Urpelainen supplementary material

Supplementary Appendix

Download Johnson and Urpelainen supplementary material(File)
File 58.4 KB