Nudging the Needle: Foreign Lobbies and U.S. Human Rights Ratings

Newspapers print alarming headlines when foreign governments hire U.S.-based lobbyists to promote their interests in Washington D.C. But does foreign lobbying systematically affect U.S. foreign policy? We provide an analysis of the influence of foreign lobbying on one important component of U.S. foreign policy: the evaluation of human rights practices abroad. U.S. human rights ratings can have a large impact on American foreign policy. They affect foreign aid, sanctions, and trade. Thus, we expect that many countries seek to tilt State Department Country Reports on Human Rights in their favor through information they provide to U.S.-based lobbyists. Our statistical analysis of these State Department reports and lobbying data from the Foreign Agent Registration Act between 1976-2012 shows that, holding other factors equal, more foreign lobbying leads to more favorable U.S. human rights reports—when compared to both previous reports and Amnesty International reports. Furthermore, our findings contribute to the growing literature on performance indicators like human rights ratings by highlighting the politics of how those ratings are generated

When Do Withdrawal Threats Achieve Reform in International Organizations?

International organizations often come under pressure when states desire their reform. Some states threaten to leave international organizations unless their reform demands are met. But how often is threatening to withdraw associated with states demanding institutional reform? And under what conditions do states’ withdrawal threats actually achieve institutional reform? We argue that withdrawal threats are more likely to result in institutional reform when they (1) are made by powerful states and (2) are limited reform demands rather than calls for broader reform. We examine whether threatening to exit institutions can be a catalyst for institutional reform using an original dataset of withdrawal threats from all international organizations and states since 1980 (N = 130). The analysis supports our argument that withdrawal threats are more likely to lead to reforms when their associated demands are made by powerful states and are limited in scope. Further, we find that less than half of exit threats are linked to reform demands: many states threaten to withdraw due to conflicts with another state or for face-saving purposes, without making reform requests. This contrasts with the conventional understanding that exit threats often represent a backlash against international organizations. Perhaps surprisingly, the dynamics of bargaining over reform suggest that some organizations may emerge more, rather than less, resilient after states threaten to withdraw. We conclude with policy implications for rethinking multilateralism

Tracking Leadership of UN Specialized Organizations: The Rise of China

The U.S. foreign policy apparatus has been increasingly concerned with the rise of Chinese influence in multilateral institutions over the past decade. The height of alarmism was reached over the summer of 2020 when Chinese officials held directorship positions of four of fifteen United Nations specialized organizations and were poised to earn a fifth. To test this hypothesis, our research tracks the nationality of leadership of all fifteen of the UN specialized organizations over time to examine whether this widely perceived Chinese ascendance is supported by the historical trends in leadership since the founding of the UN post-World War II. Our analysis confirms these anecdotal reports and finds that U.S. leadership of UN agencies has declined in recent years while China’s leadership is increasing rapidly. We offer insight into the scope of influence that states enjoy with increased leadership in multilateral specialized organizations and possible future effects of a China-dominated multilateral sphere. Keywords: China, United Nations, specialized organizations, multilateralism, U.S. foreign policy, soft power, global influenc

Replication Data for: Hello, Goodbye: When do States Withdraw from International Organizations?

Replication Data for: Hello, Goodbye: When do States Withdraw from International Organizations

Replication Data for: Credible Commitments? Explaining IGO Suspensions to Sanction Political Backsliding

Why do intergovernmental organizations (IGOs) that espouse democratic commitments suspend the membership of some states that backslide on those commitments, while leaving that of others intact? We argue that a combination of geopolitical factors and institutional rules help explain this inconsistent pattern. Remaining member states insulate geopolitically important states—particularly those with large endowments of oil resources—from suspension. Institutional factors, such as voting rules and the size of the IGO, create veto points that reduce suspensions. Using an original global data set of IGO suspensions and charter commitments from 1980 to 2010, we find strong support for our argument. We test a key assumption of existing scholarship that claims IGOs serve as credible-commitment devices for political reform and democratization. We show that once a state becomes an IGO member, it can often remain in the IGO even after violating its democratic commitments

Replication Data for: Credible Commitments? Explaining IGO Suspensions to Sanction Political Backsliding

Replication Data for: Credible Commitments? Explaining IGO Suspensions to Sanction Political Backslidin

The importance of rational institutionalism in the analysis of informal international institutions

Data de publicació electrònica: 15-07-2023The study of informal international institutions has advanced considerably over the past decade. Much of this work, including our own, has approached this phenomenon from the perspective of rationalist institutionalism. Yet, existing work has also been criticized from several conceptual, theoretical, and empirical angles. The recent special issue of International Politics on the “cascading dynamics” of informality by Cooper et al. (Int Politics, 2022, https://doi.org/10.1057/s41311-022-00399-4) offers an important example of such critiques. It builds on earlier work in the field, advancing our understanding of a number of processes and institutions, but also partly casts itself as a reaction to the approach we have adopted. We argue that key aspects of this critique are misguided and that Cooper et al. exaggerate the differences that divide us. Our aim in this article is to respond to their criticisms, clarify the key research issues at stake, emphasize the complementarities among approaches, and outline ways of moving forward