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Institution Building (institution + building)
Selected AbstractsGlobal Regime Formation or Complex Institution Building?INTERNATIONAL STUDIES QUARTERLY, Issue 2 2006The Principled Content of International River Agreements This paper analyzes the principled content of 62 international river agreements for the period 1980,2000. We ask two questions: whether governments are converging on common principles for governing shared river basins and whether the effort to create a global normative framework for shared rivers has shaped the principled content of basin-level international accords. The data reveal a complex process of normative development. A few core principles emanating from global legal efforts have shown significant growth, diffusion and deepening at the basin-specific level. Others are common in basin agreements but show no diffusion or deepening. Still others are weakly represented in the data. If joint articulation of common principles is necessary for regime formation, then there is only weak evidence for a global rivers regime. But the data also reveal normative developments not captured by a regime-theoretic lens: a backlash reinforcing sovereign rights, the emergence of two seemingly conflicting clusters of principles, and an ambiguous relationship between some principles typically thought to be mutually reinforcing. The results show the need to treat principled content as an important dependent variable in the study of cooperation and to view institution building as a dynamic, multi-dimensional and multi-level process. [source] Competitive Institution Building: The PT and Participatory Budgeting in Rio Grande do SulLATIN AMERICAN POLITICS AND SOCIETY, Issue 3 2006Benjamin Goldfrank ABSTRACT In the late 1990s, the Workers' Party (PT) government of the Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul introduced participatory budgeting, a process in which citizens establish annual investment priorities in public assemblies. This innovation was one of several attempts by incumbent parties to structure political conflict using budget institutions. The character of participatory budgeting is most evident in its policymaking processes and policy outcomes. The process circumvented legislative arenas where opponents held a majority, privileged participation by the PT's voter base, and reached into opposition strongholds. The outcomes favored the interests of potential supporters among poor and middle-class voters. The political project proved vulnerable to its own raised expectations: it failed to sustain the image of clean government; brought tax increases along with fiscal insecurity; and left unfulfilled the participants' expectations for targeted investments. This article highlights the role of participatory budgeting, indeed all budgeting, in partisan actors' institutional choices. [source] Social, Economic and Demographic Consequences of Migration on KeralaINTERNATIONAL MIGRATION, Issue 2 2001K.C. Zachariah Migration has been the single most dynamic factor in the otherwise dreary development scenario of Kerala during the last quarter of the last century. It has contributed more to poverty alleviation and reduction in unemployment in Kerala than any other factor. As a result of migration, the proportion of the population below the poverty line has declined by 12 per cent. The number of unemployed persons , estimated to be only about 13 lakhs in 1998 compared with 37 lakhs reported by the Kerala Employment Exchanges , has declined by over 30 per cent. Migration has caused nearly a million married women in Kerala to live away from their husbands. Most of these so-called "Gulf wives" experienced extreme loneliness to begin with, and were burdened with added family responsibilities to which they had not been accustomed when their husbands were with them. But over a period, and with a helping hand from abroad over the ISD, most came out of their early gloom. Their gain in autonomy, status, management skills and experience in dealing with the world outside their homes were developed the hard way and would remain with them for the rest of their lives for the benefit of their families and society. In the long run, the transformation of these million women will have contributed more to the development of Kerala society than all the temporary euphoria created by remittances and modern gadgetry. Kerala is dependent on migration for employment, subsistence, housing, household amenities, institution building, and many other developmental activities. The danger is that migration could cease, as shown by the Kuwait war of 1993, and repercussions could be disastrous for the State. Understanding migration trends and instituting policies to maintain the flow of migration is more important today than at any time in the past. Kerala workers seem to be losing out in international competition for jobs in the Gulf market. Corrective policies are needed urgently to raise their competitive edge over workers in competing countries in South and South-East Asia. Like any other industry, migration from Kerala needs periodic technological upgrading of workers. Otherwise, there is a danger that the State might lose the Gulf market permanently. The crux of the problem is Kerala workers' inability to compete with expatriates from other South and South-East Asian countries. The solution lies in equipping workers with better general education and job training. This study suggests a twofold approach. In the short run, the need is to improve the job skills of prospective emigrant workers. This could be achieved through ad hoc training programmes focussed on the job market in Gulf countries. In the long run, the need is to restructure the educational system, taking into consideration the future demand of workers not only in Kerala but also in potential destination countries all over the world, including the US and other developed countries. Kerala emigrants need not always be construction workers in the Gulf countries; they could also be software engineers in developed countries. [source] Powering, Puzzling, or Persuading?INTERNATIONAL STUDIES QUARTERLY, Issue 4 2007The Mechanisms of Building Institutional Orders This article offers an agent-centered constructivist analysis of institution building; that of the "first" New Deal of the National Recovery Administration. It argues that in moments of uncertainty generated by the failure of existing institutions, institutional choice becomes underdetermined by structure and open to attempts at creative and underdetermined inter-elite persuasion. What matters in such moments are the locally generated "crisis-defining" ideas at hand rather than simply the ostensible material positions of the actors in question. How this process took place in the U.S. is compared with both similar historical cases and alternative materialist models. An alternative model is developed, and in conclusion it is suggested why periods of deflation may be particularly open to inter-elite attempts at persuasion. [source] Global Regime Formation or Complex Institution Building?INTERNATIONAL STUDIES QUARTERLY, Issue 2 2006The Principled Content of International River Agreements This paper analyzes the principled content of 62 international river agreements for the period 1980,2000. We ask two questions: whether governments are converging on common principles for governing shared river basins and whether the effort to create a global normative framework for shared rivers has shaped the principled content of basin-level international accords. The data reveal a complex process of normative development. A few core principles emanating from global legal efforts have shown significant growth, diffusion and deepening at the basin-specific level. Others are common in basin agreements but show no diffusion or deepening. Still others are weakly represented in the data. If joint articulation of common principles is necessary for regime formation, then there is only weak evidence for a global rivers regime. But the data also reveal normative developments not captured by a regime-theoretic lens: a backlash reinforcing sovereign rights, the emergence of two seemingly conflicting clusters of principles, and an ambiguous relationship between some principles typically thought to be mutually reinforcing. The results show the need to treat principled content as an important dependent variable in the study of cooperation and to view institution building as a dynamic, multi-dimensional and multi-level process. [source] Klimaschutz oder Interessenpolitik: Über einige ungewollte Resultate ökonomischer PolitikberatungPERSPEKTIVEN DER WIRTSCHAFTSPOLITIK, Issue 3 2005Georg Erdmann For the time being, the quantitative emission reductions defined in the National Allocation Plans (NAP) are still minor, but this outcome seems acceptable because institution building is of high priority during the first phase 2005,2007. Later, more ambitious emission reductions will follow. A closer look at the genesis of the NAP raises however some doubts about the future effectiveness of the new instrument. By analysing the CO2 allocation decisions in Germany the article shows that the greenhouse gas issue can today successfully be misused by politicians and interest groups towards achieving egoistic goals and it concludes that this did happen at the expense of the proclaimed environmental target. Due to the particular character of the greenhouse gas problem this diagnosis may hold as long as no socially and economically acceptable greenhouse gas abatement technologies have become available. [source] IDENTIFYING CAUSALITY IN PUBLIC INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE: THE ADAPTATION OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY FOR WALES TO THE EUROPEAN UNIONPUBLIC ADMINISTRATION, Issue 2 2008CAITRÍONA A. CARTER The aim of this article is to identify causes and effects of public institutional change. Analysis is centred on those endogenous, not exogenous, sources of political change that account for the institutional metamorphosis of the Welsh Assembly in its engagement with UK-EU processes since 1999. The central research question addressed is to explain a qualitative shift in the logic of action of Assembly engagement, resulting in the conduct of a territorially sensitive ,parliamentary' EU scrutiny, but within a model of executive devolution. To capture agency and change, and to engage with sociological institutionalist debates, the article develops analytical tools of ,framing' and ,operationalizing' institutions to study the interplay between informal and formal processes of institution building since devolution. In so doing, we place refined sociological conceptions of institutions at the heart of analyses of political discontinuity and theorization of public institutional change. [source] The Phenomenon of Collective Action: Modeling Institutions as Structures of CarePUBLIC ADMINISTRATION REVIEW, Issue 3 2008Raul Lejano This essay develops a theory of how institutions can work through the web of social relationships that exist in a place rather than through formal, bureaucratic lines of authority. In contrast to models that characterize institutions as organizational structures, roles, and patterns of exchange, this model depicts institutions as constituted primarily through the active working and reworking of relationships. Rather than adopt the network literature's focus on the overall pattern of relationships and exchanges carried out between policy actors, the author focuses directly on the nature of the relationships themselves and portrays the institution as the playing out of these relationships, employing Carol Gilligan's notion of care. The model of care is used to analyze the evolution, unraveling, and restoration of resource management systems on the Turtle Islands in Southeast Asia. The model provides lessons for institution building, especially for community-centered governance. [source] A co-operative training programme in the field of coastal and ocean managementAQUATIC CONSERVATION: MARINE AND FRESHWATER ECOSYSTEMS, Issue 4 2001Stella Maris VallejoArticle first published online: 24 JUL 200 Abstract 1.,One of the major challenges that countries and institutions will face in the years to come is the massive training of personnel in the broad spectrum of disciplines and cross-sectoral perspectives needed to successfully implement integrated coastal zone management (ICZM) initiatives. 2.,This paper discusses the needs and challenges faced by institutions involved in training. 3.,In particular, the TRAIN,SEA,COAST Programme is discussed as an existing mechanism that provides an effective support system for training, with the focus on institution building at the national and regional levels, and increased cost-effectiveness. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Dynamics of Japanese and Chinese Security Policies in East Asia and Implications for Regional StabilityASIAN POLITICS AND POLICY, Issue 3 2010Elena Atanassova-Cornelis This article examines the dynamics of Japanese and Chinese post,Cold War security policies in East Asia and assesses the implications for regional stability. To this end, the discussion explores elements in both countries' security policy behavior, and Sino-Japanese relations that have a stabilizing and/or destabilizing impact on the region. The article argues that, on the whole, Japanese and Chinese security policies have contributed to more stability than instability. Although the security dilemma between Japan (and the United States) and China may have become more pronounced, the balance of power currently maintained may be assessed in positive terms for the region. In addition, Sino-Japanese competition for influence has led to strengthening East Asian institution building and thereby fostered stability. While there is ground for cautious optimism regarding the future of Sino-Japanese cooperation, mutual strategic distrust between Tokyo and Beijing will underpin the security dilemma and their competitive policies in the region. [source] | |||||||||||||