Evolution Of Global Governance Research Articles

Institutional overlap and the survival of intergovernmental organisations

A burgeoning literature emphasises the role of favourable external conditions and institutional design as key drivers of the survival of intergovernmental organisations. This article focuses on institutional overlap as a hitherto overlooked determinant of IGO survival. Studies on institutional complexity posit that overlap – the extent to which organisations perform similar tasks to address similar problems for some common members – may decrease the survivability of IGOs due to rule conflicts, institutional paralysis, and competitive pressures for limited resources. Contrary to this perspective, this article argues that greater overlap increases the likelihood of IGO survival for two reasons. First, similar IGOs will survive as member states use them to pursue forum-shopping strategies. Second, overlap enables IGO secretariats to draw on networks of support from other IGOs, rendering organisations that densely overlap with others more resilient. To test these propositions, the article combines data on institutional overlap in global governance and the survival of the 534 IGOs contained in the Correlates of War IGO dataset. Non-linear regression analysis finds that where organisations overlap more with existing organisations in terms of governance tasks and issue areas, the likelihood of IGO survival increases. Further analysis suggests that this result is driven by the forum-shopping strategies of powerful member states. Given that contemporary world politics is governed by an increasingly dense network of IGOs, these results hold important implications for the study of IGO survivability and the evolution of global governance more broadly.

Global Development Governance 2.0: Fractured accountabilities in a divided governance complex

AbstractThe proliferation of state and non‐state actors, along with increasing institutional complexity, has led to a qualitative shift in Global Development Governance (GDG) towards what we term ‘GDG 2.0’. Realising accountability in this context presents challenges due to growing actor diversity, institutional plurality and a lack of formalised accountability structures. Building on the introduction to this special section, we explore the potential of ‘forward‐looking’ approaches to accountability, notably collective deliberation, learning and competition. Despite the importance of these mechanisms for GDG processes, conceptualising them as accountability tools may have limited gains and indeed reinforce the preferences of established actors, dilute useful monitoring approaches and divert attention from longstanding agendas. We argue that prioritising enabling environments for more circumscribed ‘backward‐looking’ accountability—with a focus on standard‐setting and monitoring—may be more feasible and effective towards holding decision‐makers to account within the GDG 2.0 context.

Driving Factors of Carbon Emissions in G20 Countries: A Weighted Average Structural Decomposition Approach.

As a major part of global development governance, G20 countries account for 80% of global carbon emissions. In order to achieve the goal of "carbon neutrality" proposed by the United Nations, it is important to compare and analyze the drivers of carbon emissions in G20 countries and provide recommendations for their carbon emission reduction. Based on the data of 17 G20 countries in the EORA database, this paper compares the drivers of carbon emissions of each country from 1990-2021 using weighted average structural decomposition and K-mean model. This paper focuses on four drivers, including carbon emission intensity, final demand structure, export structure, and production structure. Carbon emission intensity and final demand structure are the main factors of carbon emission reduction, and the other two factors have little influence. Among the G20 countries, the UK is in the first category because it does the best job on the four factors of carbon emissions, yet Italy is in the last category because it does not take full advantage of the four factors. Therefore, improving supply energy efficiency and adjusting demand, export, and industrial structure have become important tools for countries to transform and achieve carbon neutrality.

Assessment of the effects of targeted poverty alleviation policy on differently poverty‐stricken households: A multi‐propensity score weighting model

AbstractEliminating poverty is a multifaceted global challenge and a focal point of global development governance. With the implementation of targeted poverty alleviation (TPA), China's poverty alleviation efforts have had significant achievements. This study provides a new perspective by classifying poverty‐stricken households based on poverty root causes at the household level, a multi‐propensity score weighting model based on counterfactual inference is employed to examine the poverty reduction effect and policy precision on six non‐equivalent poverty‐stricken household groups in a Chinese county. The results reveal that the poverty reduction effects differed among poverty‐stricken households with different root causes of poverty. Specifically, households impoverished due to disability have the lowest income of the six groups. The assistance policy effects also vary significantly and are found to be poorly suited to poverty‐stricken households a lack of labor force and funds. A robustness test confirms this conclusion and a more nuanced analysis reveals that these differences are reflected in the wage and transfer incomes. Therefore, to ensure the stability of poverty reduction and the sustainability of income for poverty‐stricken households, relevant associated aid policies need to place different emphases based on their household characteristics.

The BRI: A new development cooperation paradigm in the making? Unpacking China’s infrastructure cooperation along the Maritime Silk Road

This special issue aspires to contribute to the nascent literature on the developmental impact of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and its implications for global development governance. It is our contention that the BRI offers a unique window for a better understanding of China’s dual role as a development agent and a development-norms shaper. This introductory essay attempts to systematize theoretical insights drawn from in-depth empirical research along key nodes of the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road (MSR), one key dimension of the BRI.This special issue provides valuable insights into BRI implementation on recipient countries by examining key infrastructure projects with the aim of uncovering the complexity of the variables determining BRI dynamics and outcomes. The contributions highlight the versatility and the fragmentation of the BRI as a cooperation platform, and the variegated nature of engagement patterns and outcomes on the ground. The findings of this collection of studies suggest that these variations are ultimately a function of the complex interaction between institutional contexts and agents from both sides (China and host countries), and that the quality and sustainability of such interplay has a significant bearing on developmental outcomes. Moreover, as with traditional donors, inconsistencies between the official rhetoric and the actual implementation dynamics and developmental outcomes may subsequently undermine China’s legitimacy as a development ‘norm-maker’ and cooperation partner. Overall, our findings question the exceptionalism of China’s development cooperation approach and hence the prospects for the emergence of an alternative and more effective development paradigm appear slim at this juncture.

Development co‐operation by European regions: Introducing the subnational donor governance dataset

SummaryMotivationInterest in the international development co‐operation activities of subnational governments like Catalonia, Flanders, and Scotland has grown in recent years. Beyond these well‐known cases, however, we currently lack systematic evidence on the scope of the phenomenon.PurposeThis article introduces a new dataset of 195 European regions to provide systematic information on which regions engage in international development co‐operation. The dataset includes information on institutional structures and governance modalities, aid motivations, aid modalities, and aid policies.Methods and approachTo demonstrate the utility of our dataset, we provide descriptive insights into the phenomenon of subnational development co‐operation while at the same time suggesting questions for future research that can be addressed with the help of the dataset.FindingsWe find that subnational development co‐operation extends far beyond some well‐cited cases, given that around 70 regions have some institutional structure for development co‐operation. With relatively small budgets, regional aid delivery primarily relies on non‐governmental organizations (NGOs) and supports a variety of purposes in the sustainable development agenda, including human rights, environmental affairs, fair trade, sustainable consumption, and development education at home.Policy implicationsBeing the first of its kind, the dataset advances our understanding of subnational governments as autonomous providers of development aid and their potential role in helping advance the Sustainable Development Goals in the multi‐level global development governance architecture.

The domestic sources of sub-state foreign policymaking: determinants of subnational development cooperation across European regions

ABSTRACT Subnational governments have come to challenge the foreign policymaking monopoly of national governments. An increasingly salient area of sub-state foreign policymaking is international development cooperation, but systematic knowledge about the drivers of such activities is limited. We argue that subnational governments develop capacities for international development cooperation for domestic region-building purposes, geared toward advancing political claims for regional autonomy that can take institutional, political, and cultural representations. To test this argument, we construct a new dataset of 195 politically relevant European regions which maps the autonomous engagement of regions in international development cooperation. Large-N regression analysis establishes that regions are significantly more likely to be engaged in international development cooperation where they have greater constitutional autonomy, cultural-linguistic distinctiveness, and a regionally-based party to advance the regional agenda. These results have important implications for our understanding of sub-state foreign policy actors and their role in the global governance of development.

A Decade Since Busan: Towards Legitimacy or a ‘New Tyranny’ of Global Development Partnership?

In 2011, the Busan Forum on Development Effectiveness announced the creation of the Global Partnership for Effective Development Cooperation (GPEDC). The GPEDC promised to replace the old donor–recipient dynamic in international development with ‘an equator-less landscape of multistakeholder global partnership’ (Eyben & Savage, 2013). Multistakeholder partnerships (MSPs) have since become the global governance modality of choice for the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Advocates maintain that MSPs provide more legitimate and effective governance than interstate multilateralism. But critics contend that MSPs co-opt subaltern voices and reinscribe power asymmetries: MSPs may, thus, constitute a ‘New Tyranny’ within global development governance (Cooke & Kothari, 2001). Drawing on extensive empirical research, this article examines the extent to which the GPEDC provides more legitimate governance or effects akin to a ‘New Tyranny’. Against dichotomous portrayals of MSPs as either inherently ‘legitimate’ or ‘tyrannical’, the article finds that MSPs such as the GPEDC constitute spaces wherein normative principles of world order are negotiated. Nevertheless, the article finds that we are no closer to a global development partnership than we were at Busan.

Looking Beyong SDGS and The Challenge of Excrutiating Poverty in Africa: The Case for A New Global Development Framework

The study critically examines African excruciating poverty situation and the challenge of a new global development framework in view of the apparent failures of SDGs agenda in Africa and other developing countries. It articulates alternative approach towards legitimate global development governance. It concludes by proposing a new Global Development Regulatory Organization (GDRO) to address core-development challenge in international context. The study also identifies the institutional framework, functions and approaches to the new Global Development Regulatory Organization (GDRO) agenda.

China’s BRI developmental agency in its own words: A content analysis of key policy documents

Since its announcement in 2013, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) has inspired an ever-growing stream of literature cutting across several disciplines, with highest concentration of studies in the social sciences. Unsurprisingly a great deal of these studies are concerned with the rationale behind this massive undertaking and its potential impact in the current world order. Here a clear rift is apparent between those who think of it as a tool serving China’s geopolitical interests and rise at the world stage, and those who see it as a more nebulous and fragmented undertaking driven by domestic economic and political pressures. A similar concern is reflected in a smaller body of literature that looks at the BRI from a development angle, the dominant inquiry line revolving around its likely impact in global development governance and the underlying neoliberal cooperation norms and practices. Here too there is a clear divide between those who see China’s increasing development agency as a positive complement and those who perceive it in a direct collision course with the neoliberal aid paradigm. This dichotomy of interpretations project two contrasting images of China’s development agency that are often difficult to reconcile. This study contributes to this body of literature by providing a profile of China’s development agency according to its own words. Since 2015 a raft of BRI policy documents have been published by Beijing to fill the initial void and regain control over the narrative. Through a content analysis of key policy papers and speeches, we attempt to uncover what are the initiative’s aims, governance mechanisms, normative under pinnings, and targeted areas as per the official discourse. In doing so we hope to bring more clarity as to the nature of China developmental agency. Based on our findings we argue that much like its domestic development model, China’s development cooperation approach is pragmatically hybrid with the rhetoric showing clear signs of convergence but also divergence with the dominant paradigm. The evolving discourse suggests a highly fluid approach and thus a work in constant progress, which progression hinges upon reactive and cumulative adjustments to feedback as the initiative is rolled out.

Human capital, risk and the World Bank’s reintermediation in global development

This article examines an attempt to reconstitute global development governance in a context of growing influence for private finance. We focus on the World Bank’s Human Capital Project (HCP) and Human Capital Index (HCI), which have stated aims of promoting economic growth and accelerating progress towards achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals. Informed by a review of publicly available World Bank materials, we argue that, through its HCP and HCI, the World Bank is responding to its own institutional sidelining in development financing and governance with a strategy of reintermediation. Its leaders have pursued a system of governance in which the World Bank creates and instrumentalises knowledge on human capital – an asset to be accumulated through judicious investments in markets for self-betterment. Through its HCI the World Bank has expanded its global benchmarking practices, encompassing new domains and quantified predictions of future productivity, in the hope of shaping domestic policy processes. Its leaders propose to use HCI scores to signal risk to investors and political leaders, triggering political shocks that will spur policy reform. Crucially, these efforts seek to reassert the World Bank’s epistemic authority and financing clout as the influence of its own lending wanes. Supplemental data for this article is available online at https://doi.org/10.1080/01436597.2021.1953980 .

Transnational Multistakeholder Partnerships as Vessels to Finance Development: Navigating the Accountability Waters

AbstractPartnerships have long been presented as transformative and effective mechanisms to overcome challenges linked to the global governance of development. The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and SDG 17 call for intensified involvement and engagement of partnerships in sustainable development, formalizing a role specifically for multi‐stakeholder partnerships (MSPs). In this context, transnational MSPs that enmesh public and private to finance development, continue to flourish as a hybrid model of governance. This paper seeks to critically assess the accountability issues linked to channelling development financing through transnational MSPs using an accountability matrix, based on responsibility, answerability and enforceability, applicable to the system‐level development cooperation/aid frameworks as well as to MSPs. The article then evaluates the accountability challenges and shortcomings arising from MSPs as development financing actors resulting in diffused responsibility, limited answerability and weak enforceability. Finally, the article outlines a research agenda and Policy recommendations to improve the accountability of MSPs when they finance development.

Global development governance in the ‘interregnum’

Global governance is widely perceived to be ‘gridlocked’, ‘unravelling’, and ‘unfit for purpose’. The legitimacy of old institutions is breaking down, yet new institutions struggle to establish themselves as viable alternatives. Though overlooked, global development governance is no exception. Heterogeneous development actors, approaches, and understandings increasingly characterize the field. However, attempts to create a common platform have foundered. This article contributes to a growing body of literature that depicts world order as a Gramscian ‘interregnum’ to account for the crisis facing global development. Its primary contribution lies in the examination of the Global Partnership for Effective Development Cooperation as a vantage point to explore the politics, dynamics and struggles over the means and ends of ‘development’ in the current conjuncture. Here, competing projects vie for influence, yet none command the support necessary to supplant the ‘old' order. Although this article finds that the condition of ‘interregnum’ will likely persist, it also explores what transformative elements of a possible future exist within present practices.

Kerja Sama G20 dalam Pemulihan Ekonomi Global dari COVID-19

This study reveals the institutional performance of the G20 in order to help global economy recovery because of COVID-19. This study uses qualitative methods, providing in-depth descriptions through internet-based research as data-based techniques. This study indicates that G20 has proven its performance in carrying out a multilateral cooperation system through collective responses, which contain six dimensions, namely yaitu domestic political management; deliberation; direction setting; decision making; and development of global governance. G20's coordination creates a global network that includes interactions between international institutions, namely the IMF, WTO, and World Bank, as well as regional organizations and informal partnerships in the arena of international cooperation.

Missing in Action: The Global Strategy to Reduce the Harmful Use of Alcohol and the WTO

This article addresses the question of how the World Health Organization (WHO) Global Strategy to Reduce the Harmful Use of Alcohol (Global Strategy) and its Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) have been used in the context of discussions about alcohol and tobacco measures, respectively, in the World Trade Organization (WTO) Committee on Technical Barriers to Trade. The article finds considerable differences not only in the extent to which the FCTC is used compared to the Global Strategy , but also in the ways in which the two global health instruments have been used in the WTO context. The article proffers three key reasons for these differences: the legal status of the instrument; the content of the instrument in terms of whether it contains guidance as to the use of detailed, evidence-based measures; and the role and legitimacy that the instrument accords to the relevant industry interests. The article considers how the insights from the research can inform the developments in global governance of alcohol that are underway in WHO policy. It also positions its findings in terms of the wider international law debates about hard law versus soft law, and whether different types of international regulatory instruments and the legal status of these instruments impact their effectiveness in supporting domestic public health measures.

China and Japan in Pursuit of Infrastructure Investment Leadership in Asia

Abstract Powerful states often use tools of economic statecraft, such as foreign aid and other financial policy instruments, in a bid to “purchase” influence as well as establish regional leadership among their neighbors. How and why do these states undertake similar economic statecraft strategies and policies? The article examines the evolution of infrastructure financing policy of China and Japan and identifies the ever changing and, yet at the same time, mirroring interaction between the two countries’ development finance practices. We argue that emulation and competition have led to the process of policy diffusion between these two countries. The competition between these two foreign aid leaders in East Asia especially after China’s Belt and Road Initiative has shaped the region’s infrastructure development dynamics as they strive to move the equilibrium outcome to their advantage. Such equilibrium through the policy diffusion process has important implications on global development governance.

Irreconcilable Tensions? The EU’s Development Policy in an Era of Global Illiberalism.

There have always been tensions within the EU’s external development policy between ethical and self-interested approaches and also between universalist and realpolitik policies. The EU’s structural economic power and global neoliberal dominance have allowed these tensions to be subsumed within its external policies. A range of factors has contributed to the rise of illiberalism globally, leading to heightened geoeconomic rivalry while complex changes in global development governance facilitate the use of aid as an instrument of political and economic self-interest. The EU has reacted to this by re-framing its political approach and policies in an effort to rebalance values and interests. A new realism entered EU discourse and there is evidence of this being applied in specific instruments and policies analysed here. Blended finance instruments are ‘dual use’ in that they can be used for more flexible development policies but also to support EU businesses more directly. The proposal to combine nearly all of the previous aid and cooperation instruments into one single legal instrument will also give the EU unprecedented flexibility to use aid funds for various political purposes. These changes are part of a more complex iterative process in the case of the EU than for other international actors. Interests and values are being reconfigured rather than jettisoned in a ‘realist turn’. However, they still represent a significant adjustment for the EU in terms of aid priorities and modalities.

Transnational Actors and Transnational Governance in Global Environmental Politics

Transnational actors and transnational governance now form core elements of global environmental politics alongside intergovernmental diplomacy and institutions. This article explores how and under what conditions this transnationalism has arisen, as well as its implications for world politics. It considers what effects transnational actors and governance have had on political outcomes, their relation to states and intergovernmental institutions, and normative questions around their legitimacy and accountability. The critical role of transnational actors and institutions in environmental politics has made the field a laboratory for broader questions concerning the evolution of global governance in world politics more generally. As global environmental challenges continue to magnify and affect other spheres of political activity, understanding these dynamics will become increasingly important.

Redesigning the business of development: the case of the World Economic Forum and global risk management

Global risk management (GRM) has become a central organizing framework in global development governance, yet despite its ubiquity, it has received little attention. Relatedly, few scholars have explored the connection between GRM and what has become an influential private international organization, namely: the World Economic Forum (WEF). Contributing to this Special Issue on managerialism, we explore GRM as an emerging development paradigm linked tightly to the WEF. Drawing on a historical materialist lens, we examine how the WEF employs GRM to encourage the role of businesses in the sustainable development goals (SDG)s. We focus on SDG 11, safe, inclusive and resilient cities, or what the WEF refers to as well managed cities. We argue that GRM is as a dynamic, uneven and incomplete strategy that serves to consolidate and normalize the role of business as an active development agent, whilst depoliticizing the social and environmental disruptions tied to this arrangement. In pursuing this argument, we historically trace the rise of GRM within the wider backdrop of global political economy of development before exploring the mismanaged urbanization trope employed by the WEF in the global South, and its proposed managerial solutions embodied in GRM.

The global governance of international development: Documenting the rise of multi-stakeholder partnerships and identifying underlying theoretical explanations

The global governance of development increasingly relies on multi-stakeholder partnerships between states, intergovernmental organizations, and non-governmental organizations. This article takes on two tasks. The first is to describe quantitatively the institutional evolution of the multilateral development system over the past century. The second is to juxtapose four rational-institutionalist explanations for why states establish new organizations as transnational governance initiatives—functionalism, power-oriented theories, domestic politics, and contextual design. The empirical analysis probes these explanations using the new Transnational Public-Private Governance Initiatives in World Politics dataset, which combines several existing data sources to build the most comprehensive data on different forms of institutionalized cooperation in global governance. The results lend most support to the contextual design view, while also yielding support for other accounts. By employing Heckman selection models, the analysis addresses potential selection bias due to unobserved correlation between state choices to create a new organization and its design. A qualitative case study further validates measurement choices and causal mechanisms. These findings have implications for theories of institutional design and development practice, specifically regarding the role of intergovernmental organizations in an increasingly interconnected world.