Chapter 2: The Neoliberal Institutionalist Theory
2.2 International Institutions and their impact on states behavior
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information about a disputed issue. Hence the flow of unbiased information is increased. IOs provide also binding procedures that have sophisticated administrative and intelligence gathering capabilities. Moreover, IOs decrease commitment problems in the conflict resolution process. They actually show a higher number of settlements as well as a higher rate of compliance. Therefore it is evident that IOs offer greater legitimacy as third party mediator (Pevehouse 2002). They are helpful in mitigating security dilemma as they provide a source for monitoring and enforcement capabilities. According to Abbott and Snidal (1998), they are
“tying aid decisions to compliance” and they raise the cost of non-compliance. (Abbott, and Duncan Snidal 1998)
International Organizations have also a passive involvement. IOs raise the interaction opportunities and decrease uncertainty, align member states preferences, encourage empathy, teach reciprocity and improve recognition abilities (Axelrod 1984). They promote long term thinking process. Lastly, Mitchell (2006) exposes that IOs are better equipped than any other third-party conflict managers “to reduce the deleterious effect of private information, commitment problem, and reputation cost in the bargaining process.” She claims that the International Community should focus more on promoting IOs membership and empowering these institutions. This is a virtuous circle that will reduce conflicts.
2.2 International Institutions and their impact on states behavior
They affect states behavior because they facilitate the maximization of states gains.
Institutions promote “persistent and connected set of rules (formal and informal). They prescribe behavioral role and constrain activity and shape expectations.
Sara Mitchell (2006) in her research paper “Cooperation in World Politics: The Constraining and Constitutive Effects of International Organizations”, explores the constraining effects of International Organization. She explains that realist and
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institutionalists treat states preferences as fixed but that IOs help to organize relationship in mutually beneficial ways. To fulfill their duty as Information provider, IOs manage and provide contracts, conventions and agreement. This generates patterns of transaction costs. In fact, the cost of reneging on commitment is increased. On the contrary, the costs of operating within these frameworks are reduced (Keohane 1984). Moreover, Ronald Mitchell (1994) highlights that “other forces such as transparency, reciprocity accountability and regime mindedness” are actually imposing significant constrains on international behavior under the right conditions. (Mitchell 1994).
Compliance Mechanism
In his book “International Institutions and National Policies”, Xinyuan Dai (2007) explores how International Institutions can successfully monitor arrangements. He explains that national compliance reflects the political leverage and monitoring ability of domestic constituencies. Compliance can be defined as the degree to which the explicit treaty provision is achieved by a participating country. (Dai 2007)
He highlights how compliance works domestically. In fact, state interests and resource constraints design monitoring arrangement in predictable ways. There are two factors; first the interest between victims of non-compliance and their states; second the presence or absence of these victims as low-cost monitors. The question of whether states have the incentives for protecting the potential victim of non-compliance is important. The interest of the victim and the state should be aligned to comply and shape how states design monitoring arrangements.
However, this could be different according to the regimes. He states that resources and capabilities influence the extent to which states can overcome collective action problems in devising potentially, costly, and centralized monitoring agreement. Powerful states can design strong institutions if they have a strong interest in it; it also allows states to spend resources on
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monitoring. Overall, state compliance is linked with the perception of the cost of non-compliance.
To respond to the realist challenge, scholars of the Liberal Institutionalist Theory demonstrate the direct effect of International Institutions on state behavior. Indeed, there is a significant domestic leverage from the victim of non-compliance on the government. The leverage is about national leaders that want to stay in office therefore leading policies that support constituents. As a result, competing constituencies (interest groups) influence government’s compliance decision (Ibid, 2007).
In addition, when states comply it reinforces tendency of other states to comply (Duffield 1992). As such states will go further into cooperation and International Institutions offer legitimacy to agreements. Government reputation can be at stake if they do not comply or cheat. IOs help government to assess others reputation. “It imposes significant constraint on international behavior under the right conditions” (Mitchell, 1994, p.429).
Conditions for IOs to be successful
International Organizations that want to promote dispute resolution should have significant resources as well as a strong diplomatic leverage on country members. However, few institutions succeed in forcing country members to comply. The sovereignty of the Institution itself can be put into question. If International Institutions members meet infrequently and that there is no permanent secretariat, it increases the transaction cost of cooperation and there is no repeat interaction. Therefore, only strong institutions are able to succeed. It also depends on the Institutionalization scale. If an IO is highly institutionalized it influences state behavior (Megan 2009, p. 149).
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Moreover, scholars think that democracies best promote peace settlement since they have stronger norms of peaceful resolution and third-party conflict management. Hence the regime type seems to play a role in dispute settlement within IOs frameworks. They have higher chances to comply.
Weak International Institutions still have an impact on state compliance. Indeed, they are facilitators rather than creators of domestic pro-compliance mechanism. IOs can contribute to “strengthening pro-compliance constituencies hence shift domestic power balance. Therefore even weak institutions can have a certain impact on state behavior”. (Dai 2007)