Meeting # 2: Institutionalist Theory II.

Questions for Discussion

  1. Today’s readings focus on debates, questions, and puzzles arising within the context of institutionalist theory, i.e., given that we accept the principles and logic explained last week. What are those debates & puzzles, stated succinctly?
  2. The institutionalist theory described last week could be said to suffer from one of the same limitations as the first generation of formal models of the U.S. Congress, at least as characterized by Shepsle and Weingast (7-8): namely, its inattention to the actual details of international institutions in practice. The Congressional scholars’s first attempts at models ignored critical features of Congress like the committee system, parties, norms of deference and reciprocity, etc. What features of international institutions, if any, have we so far ignored in an analogous fashion?
  3. More broadly, what parallels do you see between Congressional institutions and international ones, or between the political setting facing legislators and that facing states?
  4. See if you can apply the theories of Congressional institutions, i.e., Weingast & Marshall’s, Krehbiel’s, Cox and McCubbins’s, or Kiewiet and McCubbins’s, to international institutions. What insights can you generate this way?
  5. Why are some international agreements informal? Conversely, why do countries ever embody their agreements in legal, official, or public form? Do you agree with Lipson’s answer?
  6. Compare and contrast informal versus formal international agreements in their effect on states’ policy choices. What are the implications of Lipson’s argument?
  7. Why are some international institutions private (i.e., NGOs) and others public (i.e., formal international organizations)? Why are there any public institutions at all – why not just rely purely on private NGOs to facilitate international cooperation? What differential effects can be traced to the public-private distinction? What answer does Rodrik’s evidence from multilateral financial institutions support? Do you think his argument generalizes to other international institutions? How consistent is this with Keohane’s brand of institutionalism?
  8. How do institutions come about according to these institutionalist arguments today? How do they change or evolve? Critique and discuss.