This article introduces a mode of social action and interaction that has so far been largely overlooked in the U.S.-dominated international relations debate between rational choice and social constructivism that focuses mainly on the differences between instrumental rationality and norm-guided behavior. Drawing on insights from a theoretical debate within the Germanspeaking international relations community, I suggest that actors have a third mode of social action at their disposal: arguing and deliberating about the validity claims inherent in any communicative statement about identities, interests, and the state of the world. Arguing and truth-seeking behavior presuppose that actors no longer hold fixed interests during their communicative interaction but are open to persuasion, challenges, and counterchallenges geared toward reaching a reasoned consensus. The preconditions for argumentative rationality, particularly a “common lifeworld” and the mutual recognition of speakers as equals in a nonhierarchical relationship, are more common in international relations than is usually assumed. Arguing processes are more likely to occur the more actors are uncertain about their interests and even identities, the less they know about the situation in which they find themselves and the underlying “rules of the game,” and the more apparently irreconcilable differences prevent them from reaching an optimal rather than a merely satisfactory solution for a widely perceived problem (“problem solving”). Moreover, arguing is likely to increase the influence of the materially less powerful, be it small states or nonstate actors such as INGOs. I illustrate these claims empirically with two plausibility probes. The first concerns the East–West talks leading to a negotiated settlement of the Cold War in Europe and German unification within NATO. The second case focuses on the implementation of international human rights norms into domestic practices of Third World states.

Mercenary armies went out of style in the nineteenth century; it became common sense that armies should be staffed with citizens. I argue that even though realist explanations focusing on the fighting prowess of citizen armies and sociological explanations focusing on the fit between citizen armies and prevailing ideas can rationalize this change, they cannot explain it. I examine, instead, the politics behind the new reliance on citizen armies and argue that material and ideational turmoil provided important antecedent conditions for change. Beyond this, individual states were more likely to move toward citizen armies when they had been defeated militarily and when the ruling coalition was split or indifferent about the reforms tied to citizen armies. Finally, the apparent success of citizen armies in France and then Prussia made do mestic conditions for reform easier to obtain in other countries, reinforcing the likelihood that the solution would be replicated. I conclude that the interaction between domestic politics and path dependency provides a promising source of hypotheses for explaining the conditions under which new ways of war emerge and spread.

Scholars and policymakers generally assume that multilateral cooperation is a necessary condition for economic sanctions to be of any use. However, previous statistical tests of this assumption have shown that sanctions are more successful with lower levels of cooperation. This puzzle calls into question established theories of economic statecraft as well as theories of international cooperation. In this article I test possible explanations for the ineffectiveness of multilateral cooperation on sanctions events using James Fearon's (1998) breakdown of cooperation into bargaining and enforcement phases as a framework for discussion The empirical results show that when multilateral economic sanctions fail, their failure is due to enforcement, not bargaining problems Without the support of an international organization, cooperating states backslide from promises of cooperation Backsliding occurs because of domestic political pressures and uncertainty about the intentions of the other sanctioning countries; backsliding causes an initial burst of cooperative behavior to decay over time. Without institutional support, cooperation is worse than useless—it is counterproductive. This result suggests that international cooperation is a more fragile equilibrium than previously thought but undercuts realist arguments that international organizations are unimportant.

The member states of the European Union (EU) have transferred their sovereignty over trade policymaking to the supranational level. When entering into trade negotiations with third countries, they must first reach a common bargaining position among themselves and later defend that position with a “single voice” at the international table. How do the institutional rules, through which the fifteen different voices are aggregated into a single one, affect international outcomes? Differentiating between a “conservative” and a “reformist” negotiating context, I argue that voting rules and negotiating competence in the EU determine both the probability that the negotiating parties conclude an international agreement and the substantive outcome of the negotiations. The recent EU–U.S. trade negotiations on agriculture, public procurement, and open skies are all evidence that, for a given distribution of preferences, internal EU institutional mechanisms affect the outcomes of international trade agreements.

Dispute settlement mechanisms in international trade vary dramatically from one agreement to another. Some mechanisms are highly legalistic, with standing tribunals that resemble national courts in their powers and procedures. Others are diplomatic, requiring only that the disputing countries make a good-faith effort to resolve their differences through consultations. In this article I seek to account for the tremendous variation in institutional design across a set of more than sixty post-1957 regional trade pacts. In contrast to accounts that emphasize the transaction costs of collective action or the functional requirements of deep integration, I find that the level of legalism in each agreement is strongly related to the level of economic asymmetry, in interaction with the proposed depth of liberalization, among member countries.

International Organization seeks to publish the best and most innovative scholarly manuscripts available on international political and economic relations. A study that does not emphasize any international (or cross-border) phenomenon, for example, as a major cause or effect, falls outside the journal's domain. Additionally, IO features articles that contribute in some way to the improvement of general knowledge or empirical theory defined broadly. Although we may publish a manuscript designed to propose a solution to a current world problem, we prefer to publish those that also apply theoretical ideas and findings or address general questions debated in scholarly publications. The editors send every submission, except letters to the editor, to referees for comment before making a decision to publish.