Search results

AbstractWhile scholars have argued that membership in Regional Organizations (ROs) can increase the likelihood of democratization, we see many autocratic regimes surviving in power albeit being members of several ROs. This article argues that this is the case because these regimes are often members in "Clubs of Autocrats" that supply material and ideational resources to strengthen domestic survival politics and shield members from external interference during moments of political turmoil. The argument is supported by survival analysis testing the effect of membership in autocratic ROs on regime survival between 1946 to 2010. It finds that membership in ROs composed of more autocratic member states does in fact raise the likelihood of regime survival by protecting incumbents against democratic challenges such as civil unrest or political dissent. However, autocratic RO membership does not help to prevent regime breakdown due to autocratic challenges like military coups, potentially because these types of threats are less likely to diffuse to other member states. The article thereby adds to our understanding of the limits of democratization and potential reverse effects of international cooperation, and contributes to the literature addressing interdependences of international and domestic politics in autocratic regimes.

The international dimension of authoritarian resilience is receiving increased attention by scholars of comparative politics and international relations alike. Research suggests that autocratic states exploit regionalism to boost domestic regime security. This article explains how membership in regional organizations can help to strengthen survival chances of autocratic incumbent elites. It argues that membership provides additional material, informational, and ideational resources to autocratic incumbents that can be used to boost domestic survival strategies vis-a-vis internal and external challengers. The article provides qualitative case-based evidence to show how autocratic incumbents in Zimbabwe, China, and Bahrain have benefited from the involvement of regional organizations during moments of political instability to strengthen legitimation, repression, co-optation, and international appeasement strategies. The article thereby provides the first encompassing explanation linking regionalism and authoritarian survival politics that is applicable across regions and different types of authoritarian regimes.

The Arab Spring marks a puzzling shift in the sanction politics of the Arab League: for the first time, the Arab League suspended member states for matters of internal affairs by majority vote. This article argues that survival politics can explain the changing sanction politics of the Arab League. To re-legitimize rule during this unprecedented moment, member states selectively supported some protest movements to signal their understanding of public demands for change without committing to domestic reform. Contrasting case studies of the Arab League's suspension of Libya and Syria and its simultaneous support for military intervention against protestors in Bahrain illustrate how concerns for regime legitimation and a short-lived alliance between Saudi Arabia and Qatar contributed to the sanctioning decisions. The Arab League can thus be considered a case of negative democracy protection, where regional sanctions are employed to selectively preserve authoritarian rule.

Civil society is either considered as a motor of democratization or stabilizer of authoritarian rule. This dichotomy is partly due to the dominance of domains-based definitions of the concept that reduce civil society to a small range of formally organized, independent and democratically oriented NGOs. Additionally, research often treats civil society as a 'black box' without differentiating between potential variations in impact of different types of civil society actors on existing regime structures. In this thesis, I present an alternative conceptualization of civil society based on the interactions of societal actors to arrive at a more inclusive understanding of the term which is more suited for analysis in non-democratic settings. The operationalization of the action-based approach I develop allows for an empirical assessment of a large range of societal activities that can accordingly be categorized from little to very civil society-like depending on their specific modes of interactions within four dimensions. I employ this operationalization in a qualitative case study including different actors in the authoritarian monarchy of Jordan which suggests that Jordanian societal actors mostly exhibit tolerant and democratically oriented modes of interaction and do not reproduce authoritarian patterns. However, even democratically oriented actors do not necessarily take on an oppositional positions vis-à-vis the authoritarian regime. Thus, the Jordanian civil society might not feature a high potential to challenge existing power structures in the country. ; Zivilgesellschaft wird entweder als förderlich für Demokratisierung oder als Stabilisator autoritärer Herrschaftsstrukturen gesehen. Dies ist zum Einen das Resultat der Dominanz bereichslogischer Definitionen des Konzepts, welche Zivilgesellschaft auf ein schmales Spektrum formal organisierter, unabhängiger und demokratisch orientierter NGOs von Bürgern reduziert. Zum Anderen wird Zivilgesellschaft in der Forschung meist als 'black box' behandelt, ohne Differenzierung zwischen der potenziellen Wirkungsweise verschiedener Arten von gesellschaftlichen Akteuren vorzunehmen. Diese Arbeit stellt eine alternative Konzeptualisierung von Zivilgesellschaft als Interaktion gesellschaftlicher Akteure vor, um ein inklusiveres Verständnis zu ermöglichen. Die erarbeitete Operationalisierung dieses Ansatzes erlaubt die empirische Untersuchung einer großen Bandbreite an gesellschaftlichen Aktivitäten, welche je nach Interaktionsmuster innerhalb von vier Dimensionen eine sehr hohe bis sehr niedrige Eignung zum zivilgesellschaftlichen Handeln aufweisen können. Eine Fallstudie verschiedener Akteure im autoritären Regime Jordanien lässt annehmen, dass gesellschaftliche Akteure dort ein dominant tolerantes, demokratisches Interaktionsmuster aufweisen und nicht autoritäre Interaktionsmuster reproduzieren. Dennoch steht eine demokratische Gesinnung der Akteure nicht automatisch in Zusammenhang mit einer oppositionellen Position gegenüber dem autoritären Staat. Das Potenzial der Zivilgesellschaft zur politischen Herausforderung der bestehenden Herrschaftsstrukturen scheint somit gering.

Many international organizations (IOs) are currently under pressure and the demise of the liberal international order is the talk of town. We theorize that institutional characteristics help to explain why some IOs survive external pressures where others fail. We test this argument through a survival analysis of 150 IOs (1815–2014). We find that the only significant variable explaining the death of IOs is the size of the secretariat: IOs with large bureaucracies are good at coping with external pressures. In addition, IOs with diverging preferences among members and those that are less institutionalized are more likely to be replaced with successor organizations. We find that institutional flexibility included in the treaties does not have an effect on survival. This is surprising because the purpose of flexibility clauses is precisely to deal with external shocks. Finally, we also find that systemic and domestic factors do not explain IO failure. In conclusion, we should not write off the liberal international order all too quickly: large IOs with significant bureaucratic resources are here to stay.

AbstractMany international organisations (IOs) are currently challenged, yet are they also in decline? Despite much debate on the crisis of liberal international order, contestation, loss of legitimacy, gridlock, pathologies and exiting member states, there is little research on IO decline. This article seeks to clarify this concept and argues that decline can be considered in absolute and relative terms. Absolute decline involves a decrease in the number of IOs and their authority, membership and output, whereas relative decline concerns a decrease in the centrality of IOs in international relations. Reviewing a wide range of indicators, this article argues that, whereas there is limited decline in absolute terms since 1945, there may well be important decline in relative terms. Relative decline is more difficult to measure, but to probe its significance this article presents data from speeches during the United Nations General Assembly General Debate. It shows that IOs were most often mentioned in 1996 and that there has been a decline since. These findings indicate that, whereas IOs might survive as institutions, they are decreasingly central to international relations.

Abstract
Major international organizations (IOs) are heavily contested, but they are rarely dissolved. Scholars have focused on their longevity, making institutional arguments about replacement costs and institutional assets as well as IO agency to adapt and resist challenges. This article analyzes the limits of institutional stickiness by focusing on outlier cases. While major IOs are dissolved at considerably lower rates than minor IOs, the article nevertheless identifies twenty-one cases where major IOs have died since 1815. These are tough cases as they do not conform to our institutionalist expectations. To better understand these rare but important events, the article provides case illustrations from the League of Nations and International Refugee Organization, which were dissolved due to their perceived underperformance and a disappearing demand for cooperation. These cases show the limits of the institutional theories of IO stickiness: sometimes member states find high replacement costs justified or consider assets as sunk costs, and IOs may lack agency to strategically respond. This article refines theories of institutional stickiness and contributes to the institutional theory of the life and death of IOs.

AbstractThe liberal international order is being challenged and international organizations (IOs) are a main target of contestation. COVID‐19 seems to exacerbate the situation with many states pursuing domestic strategies at the expense of multilateral cooperation. At the same time, IOs have traditionally benefited from cross‐border crises. This article analyzes the policy responses of IOs to the exogenous COVID‐19 shock by asking why some IOs use this crisis as an opportunity to expand their scope and policy instruments? It provides a cross‐sectional analysis using original data on the responses of 75 IOs to COVID‐19 during the first wave between March and June 2020. It finds that the bureaucratic capacity of IOs is significant when it comes to using the crisis as an opportunity. It also finds some evidence that the number of COVID‐19 cases among the member states affects policy responses and that general purpose IOs have benefited more.

The liberal international order is being challenged and international organizations (IOs) are a main target of contestation. COVID-19 seems to exacerbate the situation with many states pursuing domestic strategies at the expense of multilateral cooperation. At the same time, IOs have traditionally benefited from cross-border crises. This article analyzes the policy responses of IOs to the exogenous COVID-19 shock by asking why some IOs use this crisis as an opportunity to expand their scope and policy instruments? It provides a cross-sectional analysis using original data on the responses of 75 IOs to COVID-19 during the first wave between March and June 2020. It finds that the bureaucratic capacity of IOs is significant when it comes to using the crisis as an opportunity. It also finds some evidence that the number of COVID-19 cases among the member states affects policy responses and that general purpose IOs have benefited more.

The liberal international order is being challenged and international organizations (IOs) are a main target of contestation. COVID‐19 seems to exacerbate the situation with many states pursuing domestic strategies at the expense of multilateral cooperation. At the same time, IOs have traditionally benefited from cross‐border crises. This article analyzes the policy responses of IOs to the exogenous COVID‐19 shock by asking why some IOs use this crisis as an opportunity to expand their scope and policy instruments? It provides a cross‐sectional analysis using original data on the responses of 75 IOs to COVID‐19 during the first wave between March and June 2020. It finds that the bureaucratic capacity of IOs is significant when it comes to using the crisis as an opportunity. It also finds some evidence that the number of COVID‐19 cases among the member states affects policy responses and that general purpose IOs have benefited more.

Many international organizations (IOs) are currently under pressure and the demise of the liberal international order is the talk of town. We theorize that institutional characteristics help to explain why some IOs survive external pressures where others fail. We test this argument through a survival analysis of 150 IOs (1815–2014). We find that the only significant variable explaining the death of IOs is the size of the secretariat: IOs with large bureaucracies are good at coping with external pressures. In addition, IOs with diverging preferences among members and those that are less institutionalized are more likely to be replaced with successor organizations. We find that institutional flexibility included in the treaties does not have an effect on survival. This is surprising because the purpose of flexibility clauses is precisely to deal with external shocks. Finally, we also find that systemic and domestic factors do not explain IO failure. In conclusion, we should not write off the liberal international order all too quickly: large IOs with significant bureaucratic resources are here to stay.