IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/revint/v9y2014i3p285-308.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Does participation in international organizations increase cooperation?

Author

Listed:
  • Erik Voeten

Abstract

Recent research asserts that public commitments to international institutions promote behavior that is consistent with institutional purposes. Evidence for this proposition is based almost entirely on studies that compare the behavior of states that have and have not ratified treaties. This paper evaluates instances in which some member states temporarily experience increased entanglement with an IO because they or their nationals serve in a position of authority. Unlike selection into IOs, selection into positions of authority is often governed by a common, observable, and partially exogenous process. I exploit exogenous exit, random assignment to different term lengths, and competitive elections in three contexts: the International Criminal Court (ICC), the UN Human Rights Commission (UNHRC), and the UN Security Council (UNSC). The evidence implicates that acquiring a position of authority can make states more willing to reject U.S. advances to sign non-surrender agreements, adopt domestic legislation that changes the penal code (ICC case), ratify legally binding treaties (UNHRC case), and contribute to peacekeeping missions (UNSC case). On the other hand, there is no evidence that UN institutions successfully select more cooperative states for positions of authority. Similar research designs can gainfully be employed to identify the causal effects of other forms of institutional participation. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media New York 2014

Suggested Citation

  • Erik Voeten, 2014. "Does participation in international organizations increase cooperation?," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 9(3), pages 285-308, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:revint:v:9:y:2014:i:3:p:285-308
    DOI: 10.1007/s11558-013-9176-y
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/s11558-013-9176-y
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11558-013-9176-y?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Dreher, Axel & Sturm, Jan-Egbert & Vreeland, James Raymond, 2009. "Development aid and international politics: Does membership on the UN Security Council influence World Bank decisions?," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(1), pages 1-18, January.
    2. Weigert, Kathleen Maas & Riggs, Robert E., 1969. "Africa and United Nations Elections: An Aggregate Data Analysis," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 23(1), pages 1-19, January.
    3. Kelley, Judith, 2007. "Who Keeps International Commitments and Why? The International Criminal Court and Bilateral Nonsurrender Agreements," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 101(3), pages 573-589, August.
    4. David S. Lee & Thomas Lemieux, 2009. "Regression Discontinuity Designs In Economics," Working Papers 1118, Princeton University, Department of Economics, Industrial Relations Section..
    5. David S. Lee & Thomas Lemieux, 2010. "Regression Discontinuity Designs in Economics," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 48(2), pages 281-355, June.
    6. Imbens, Guido W. & Lemieux, Thomas, 2008. "Regression discontinuity designs: A guide to practice," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 142(2), pages 615-635, February.
    7. Axel Dreher & Matthew Gould & Matthew Rablen & James Vreeland, 2014. "The determinants of election to the United Nations Security Council," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 158(1), pages 51-83, January.
    8. Dreher, Axel & Sturm, Jan-Egbert & Vreeland, James Raymond, 2009. "Global horse trading: IMF loans for votes in the United Nations Security Council," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 53(7), pages 742-757, October.
    9. Hooghe, Liesbet, 2005. "Several Roads Lead to International Norms, but Few Via International Socialization: A Case Study of the European Commission," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 59(4), pages 861-898, October.
    10. Anonymous, 1969. "I. United Nations," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 23(4), pages 971-989, October.
    11. Eggers, Andrew C. & Hainmueller, Jens, 2009. "MPs for Sale? Returns to Office in Postwar British Politics," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 103(4), pages 513-533, November.
    12. Hafner-Burton, Emilie M., 2008. "Sticks and Stones: Naming and Shaming the Human Rights Enforcement Problem," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 62(4), pages 689-716, October.
    13. Voeten, Erik, 2001. "Outside Options and the Logic of Security Council Action," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 95(4), pages 845-858, December.
    14. Ernst, Manfred, 1978. "Attitudes of diplomats at the United Nations: the effects of organizational participation on the evaluation of the organization," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 32(4), pages 1037-1044, October.
    15. Beyers, Jan, 2005. "Multiple Embeddedness and Socialization in Europe: The Case of Council Officials," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 59(4), pages 899-936, October.
    16. Simmons, Beth A. & Danner, Allison, 2010. "Credible Commitments and the International Criminal Court," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 64(2), pages 225-256, April.
    17. Dai, Xinyuan, 2005. "Why Comply? The Domestic Constituency Mechanism," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 59(2), pages 363-398, April.
    18. Elisabeth R Gerber & Daniel J Hopkins, 2011. "When Mayors Matter: Estimating the Impact of Mayoral Partisanship on City Policy," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 55(2), pages 326-339, April.
    19. Ilyana Kuziemko & Eric Werker, 2006. "How Much Is a Seat on the Security Council Worth? Foreign Aid and Bribery at the United Nations," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 114(5), pages 905-930, October.
    20. Lee, David S., 2008. "Randomized experiments from non-random selection in U.S. House elections," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 142(2), pages 675-697, February.
    21. Peck, Richard, 1979. "Socialization of permanent representatives in the United Nations: some evidence," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 33(3), pages 365-390, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Dreher, Axel & Mikosch, Heiner & Voigt, Stefan, 2015. "Membership has its Privileges – The Effect of Membership in International Organizations on FDI," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 346-358.
    2. Andrew Bertoli & Allan Dafoe & Robert F. Trager, 2019. "Is There a War Party? Party Change, the Left–Right Divide, and International Conflict," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 63(4), pages 950-975, April.
    3. Christoph Mikulaschek, 2018. "Issue linkage across international organizations: Does European countries’ temporary membership in the UN Security Council increase their receipts from the EU budget?," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 13(4), pages 491-518, December.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Axel Dreher & Stephan Klasen & James Raymond Vreeland & Eric Werker, 2013. "The Costs of Favoritism: Is Politically Driven Aid Less Effective?," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 62(1), pages 157-191.
    2. Gutierrez, Emilio, 2015. "Fighting Crime with a Little Help from my Friends: Political Alignment, Inter-Jurisdictional Cooperation and Crime in Mexico," CEPR Discussion Papers 10769, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    3. Brian Lai & Vanessa A. Lefler, 2017. "Examining the role of region and elections on representation in the UN Security Council," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 12(4), pages 585-611, December.
    4. Anastasopoulos, Lefteris, 2016. "Estimating the gender penalty in House of Representative elections using a regression discontinuity design," MPRA Paper 71297, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Freier, Ronny, 2015. "The mayor's advantage: Causal evidence on incumbency effects in German mayoral elections," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 40(PA), pages 16-30.
    6. Emilio Depetris-Chauvin & Ruben Durante & Emilio Gutierrez, 2022. "Political Alignment and Inter-Jurisdictional Cooperation: Evidence from Crime in Mexico," Working Papers 178, Red Nacional de Investigadores en Economía (RedNIE).
    7. Ronny Freier, 2011. "Incumbency as the Major Advantage: The Electoral Advantage for Parties of Incumbent Mayors," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 1147, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    8. Ronny Freier & Christian Odendahl, 2012. "Do Absolute Majorities Spend Less?: Evidence from Germany," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 1239, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    9. Stephan Litschig, 2008. "Financing local development: Quasi-experimental evidence from municipalities in Brazil, 1980-1991," Economics Working Papers 1142, Department of Economics and Business, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, revised Jun 2012.
    10. Julia C. Morse & Bridget Coggins, 2024. "Your silence speaks volumes: Weak states and strategic absence in the UN General Assembly," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 19(3), pages 515-544, September.
    11. Axel Dreher & Matthew Gould & Matthew Rablen & James Vreeland, 2014. "The determinants of election to the United Nations Security Council," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 158(1), pages 51-83, January.
    12. Roberto Basile & Valerio Filoso, 2018. "The market value of political partisanship: Quasi‐experimental evidence from municipal elections," Papers in Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 97(S1), pages 193-209, March.
    13. Erasmus Kersting & Christopher Kilby, 2019. "The rise of supplemental lending at the World Bank," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 52(4), pages 1655-1698, November.
    14. Dreher, Axel & Lang, Valentin F. & Richert, Katharina, 2019. "The political economy of International Finance Corporation lending," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 140(C), pages 242-254.
    15. Kaisa Kotakorpi & Panu Poutvaara & Marko Tervio, 2013. "Returns to office in national and local politics," Discussion Papers 86, Aboa Centre for Economics.
    16. Axel Dreher & Jan-Egbert Sturm & James Raymond Vreeland, 2015. "Politics and IMF Conditionality," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 59(1), pages 120-148, February.
    17. Otávio Bartalotti, 2013. "Theory and Practice of Inference in Regression Discontinuity: A Fixed-Bandwidth Asymptotics Approach," Working Papers 1302, Tulane University, Department of Economics, revised Nov 2013.
    18. Bernhard Reinsberg, 2019. "Do Countries Use Foreign Aid to Buy Geopolitical Influence? Evidence from Donor Campaigns for Temporary UN Security Council Seats," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 7(2), pages 127-154.
    19. Raffaello Bronzini & Eleonora Iachini, 2014. "Are Incentives for R&D Effective? Evidence from a Regression Discontinuity Approach," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 6(4), pages 100-134, November.
    20. Mourifié, Ismael, 2015. "Sharp bounds on treatment effects in a binary triangular system," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 187(1), pages 74-81.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    International organizations; ICC; United Nations; UN Human Rights Council; UN Security Council; F53; F55; F60; K33; N40;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F53 - International Economics - - International Relations, National Security, and International Political Economy - - - International Agreements and Observance; International Organizations
    • F55 - International Economics - - International Relations, National Security, and International Political Economy - - - International Institutional Arrangements
    • F60 - International Economics - - Economic Impacts of Globalization - - - General
    • K33 - Law and Economics - - Other Substantive Areas of Law - - - International Law
    • N40 - Economic History - - Government, War, Law, International Relations, and Regulation - - - General, International, or Comparative

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:revint:v:9:y:2014:i:3:p:285-308. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.