Governance in a Global Economy: Political Authority in Transition

Extract

Governance in a Global Economy: Political Authority in Transition. Edited by Miles Kahler and David A. Lake. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2003. 472p. $70.00 cloth, $24.95 paper.

The social scientific study of “globalization” has not been especially productive. Varying and expansive definitions of the phenomenon are used, cause and effect tend to be confused, and positive and normative claims are sometimes mixed. In this volume, Miles Kahler and David A. Lake offer a tractable and fruitful approach to the study of globalization by defining the phenomenon narrowly—in terms of economic integration made possible by reduced barriers to exchange and capital mobility—and by adopting a “second image reversed” perspective. Globalization is the independent variable used to explain changes in governance policies and institutions at the national level. This coherent focus allows the individual contributions to speak to each other while building on landmark works, such as Ronald Rogowski's (1989) Commerce and Coalitions and Robert Keohane and Helen Milner's (1996) Internationalization and Domestic Politics.