Regime Effectiveness, Joint Implementation, and Climate Change Policy

Abstract

Perhaps the most enduring question in the study of international politics is: What are the conditions for establishment of cooperation? In an attempt to answer this question, the international relations literature has traditionally taken two approaches: the realist approach and the liberal approach. However, during the last three decades, scholars have departed from this traditional differentiation and have studied international politics through the international political economy (IPE) approach, which points to “the reciprocal and dynamic interaction in the pursuit of wealth and the pursuit of power.”2 In opposition to the realist school’s concept of “security,” the IPE approach draws on the concept of “interdependence,” which argues that there is no hierarchy among issues on the international agenda. Instead, agenda setting and issue linkage become important parts of international relations; and, more importantly, military force is irrelevant to the solution of many important international problems. For the international political economy, the crucial relations are those between societal forces (“transnational relations”).