Stephanie J. Rickard

Democratic Differences: Electoral Institutions and Compliance with GATT/WTO Agreements

A growing body of literature argues that democracies are more likely to comply with international agreements than authoritarian states. However, substantial variation exists in the compliance behaviour of democracies. How can this variation be explained? The same mechanism that links regime type to compliance, namely electoral competition, also explains variation in compliance among democracies. This is because the nature of electoral competition varies across democratic systems. An analysis of democratic GATT/WTO member countries from 1980 to 2003 reveals that governments elected via majoritarian electoral rules and/or single-member districts are more likely to violate GATT/WTO agreements than those elected via proportional electoral rules and/or multi-member districts.

Electoral Systems, Voters’ Interests and Geographic Dispersion

There is general agreement that democratic institutions shape politicians’ incentives to cater to certain constituencies, but which electoral system causes politicians to be most responsive to narrow interests is still debateable. Some argue that plurality electoral rules provide the greatest incentives for politicians to cater to the interests of a few; others say proportional systems prompt politicians to be relatively more prone to narrow interests. This study suggests that both positions can be correct under different conditions. Politicians competing in plurality systems privilege voters with a shared narrow interest when such voters are geographically concentrated, but when they are geographically diffuse, such voters have greater political influence in proportional electoral systems. Government spending on subsidies in fourteen developed countries provides empirical support for this argument.

Welfare versus Subsidies: Governmental Spending Decisions in an Era of Globalization

To what extent does globalization reduce the autonomy of national governments over spending decisions? Recent theories suggest that international trade puts pressure on governments to cut spending. Empirical studies find evidence of this with respect to social welfare spending in developing countries. However, existing studies leave open the possibility that trade has varied effects on different types of spending programs. Governments may cut spending on some programs, such as social welfare, in order to fund greater spending on other budget items. Using data on central government spending in 44 developing countries, trade is found to decrease spending on social welfare programs but increase spending on subsidies. The implication is that governments in developing countries have the capacity to offset the costs of globalization; however, they do so via subsidies rather than social welfare programs.

International Negotiations in the Shadow of National Elections

This study examines the role elections play in negotiations between states and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Although loans made by the IMF often require countries to introduce painful austerity measures that provoke a backlash from angry citizens, some governments are able to negotiate more favorable terms than others. Original data on the substantive content of IMF loans show that governments leverage imminent elections to obtain more lenient loan terms. Conditions that require labor market reforms in exchange for IMF financing are relatively less stringent in loans negotiated within six months before a pending democratic election, all else equal. The further away elections are from loan negotiations, the more stringent the labor conditions included in countries’ loan programs. Elections give governments leverage in their international negotiations and this leverage is effective even when states negotiate with unelected bureaucrats during times of economic crisis.

Compensating the Losers: An Examination of Congressional Votes on Trade Adjustment Assistance

Globalization intensifies political conflict between citizens whose circumstances improve from foreign trade and those whose lives deteriorate as a result of trade. To pacify these rival interests, governments may assist citizens who become unemployed due to trade. When and under what conditions will legislators fund such assistance programs? The current study addresses this question by examining Congressional roll call votes in the United States during a period of rapid economic integration (1980–2004). The analysis reveals that protrade legislators who represent relatively more exporters are more likely to vote for increased spending on Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) programs. Exporters and their elected representatives arguably support such expenditures to broaden the protrade coalition.

The Costs of Risk: Examining the Missing Link between Globalization and Social Spending

Globalization is often credited with the expansion of the welfare state and increased spending on social insurance programs. However, empirical evidence on the relationship between globalization and social welfare spending is mixed. One possible explanation for these mixed results might be country-specific factors that mediate the effect of globalization on social spending, such as key characteristics of a countrys labor market. Countries with fluid, flexible labor markets likely respond to globalization differently than countries with rigid, inflexible markets. At the micro level, workers who find it costly to adjust to market volatility will likely demand compensatory and insurance programs to offset the high costs of adjustment. Given this, the relationship between globalization and social insurance is likely to be more sharply positive among countries with relatively immobile labor. I test this argument using data on social expenditures in both developed and developing countries. The findings indicate that trade exposure increases social spending in countries where workers face high adjustment costs. When workers face low adjustment costs, trade exposure has a strong reductive effect on social spending. This reductive effect declines as adjustment costs increase.

Buying National: Democracy, Public Procurement, and International Trade

Many studies show that democracy promotes freer trade. However, because they typically focus on “at-the-border” barriers such as tariffs, we know little about democracy’s effects on “behind-the-border” barriers such as discrimination in government procurement. We address this question by asking how democracy affects governments’ incentives to discriminate against foreigners when buying goods and services. We argue that “buy national” policies have unclear costs and are harder to attack than policies that visibly interfere with consumers’ ability to buy foreign goods. This makes such provisions more attractive than tariffs to democratic leaders seeking reelection. We thus hypothesize that democracy leads to lower tariffs but to greater discrimination in public procurement. We support this hypothesis with an analysis of procurement and imports in 138 countries from 1990 to 2008. Our results imply that a full understanding of the democracy–trade policy relationship requires attention to increasingly prominent behind-the-border barriers to trade.

International Relations in Ireland: A Survey of Academics

In the most comprehensive survey of its kind in Ireland, this article analyses the growing field of international relations and international politics, examining what scholars working in universities in the Republic of Ireland think about international politics and what they are teaching the current generation of students. The article also provides for international comparisons with 10 other countries as the survey is part of a larger cross-national survey, led by academics at the college of William and Mary in Virginia, USA on teaching, research and international policy. The picture of Irish international relations that emerges from the first survey of Irish IR scholars is one of an internationally engaged community of scholars. Irish IR scholars themselves are very international; half come from countries other than Ireland and most speak at least one language other than English. This diversity within the Irish academy exposes students to varied global perspectives and helps them to better understand problems that are increasingly global in nature, such as environmental and health issues. Given this, the ‘internationalisation’ of Irelands IR community may be one of the fields greatest strengths and indeed the Irish academys comparative advantage. Perhaps because of this diversity, IR scholarship and teaching at Irish universities does not fall under any single hegemonic theoretical, methodological or ideological perspective. Instead, the field is characterised by vibrant theoretical and methodological debates drawing on scholarship and evidence from the United States, Western Europe and other countries and regions. Individual scholars in Ireland, however, do seem to be less likely to draw equally on rationalist and constructivist approaches in their work, more likely than their international colleagues to see their work exclusively in one approach, and much more likely than international colleagues to describe their work exclusively as rationalist.