Recent igcc items

Foreign Policy Co-optation: Managing Right-Wing Challengers Through Migration

Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 +0000

The electoral rise of right-wing populism has reshaped domestic political competition across Western democracies. Democratic governments have simultaneously developed bilateral arrangements to control migration, often involving authoritarian partners with questionable legal and human rights practices. In this paper, I present a novel dataset on the emergence of these agreements across five continents and over the last thirty years. I then develop a theory of foreign policy co-optation that explains when and why governments appropriate flexible foreign policy instruments central to the narrative of the opposition to reduce their electoral threat. I show that bilateral security Cooperation Arrangements on Migration (CAMs) are most likely to emerge when incumbent governments are challenged by right-wing populist parties, especially from left-of-center governments. The findings suggest that right-wing populist pressure paradoxically enables executives to manage electoral...

Legitimacy in Peacekeeping: Civilian Support Hinges on Peacekeeper Behavior, Not Outcomes

Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Legitimacy in Peacekeeping: Civilian Support Hinges on Peacekeeper Behavior, Not Outcomes

Labor Unions Are Not the “Bulwark of Democracy”

Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 +0000

In the face of contemporary democratic backsliding, are labor unions the “bulwark of democracy” that some have claimed? We decompose this into two analytically distinct phases: prevention and resistance. We argue that unions’ traditional structural, associational, and social power has declined to the point where their preventive influence is quite weak. As structural and associational power has declined, institutional power is vulnerable, even where union membership remains high. Empirically, we show that union density and coverage are uncorrelated with antidemocratic party vote shares across the OECD. In looking at resistance, we examine 11 episodes of twenty-first century democratic backsliding. In none of those cases were existing labor unions key players in resisting democratic erosion. In some instances, major unions were willing to capitulate to or even collaborate with increasingly undemocratic governments. Unions are not currently a reliable bulwark against backsliding,...

Information Control in Autocracies: A Review Essay

Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 +0000

The study of information control has matured into a crucial subfield at the intersection of political science, communication, and computational social science. The literature has made important strides in theorizing information control and has increasingly relied on diverse methodological approaches, including experiments, text-as-data methods, and the analysis of large-scale digital trace data, often supported by advances in machine learning and AI. We now understand that censorship, propaganda, surveillance, and repression should be seen as producing integrated systems of control that should be studied as such. Despite this progress, there are open questions. The field has yet to reach a definitive understanding of the long-term effects of information control—on public opinion, those who produce information, or overall regime stability. We also need to understand why certain individuals or groups are more resistant to state narratives—and how alternative sources of information...

Nuclear Power: Rebuilding Trust in an Audit Agenda

Fri, 3 Apr 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Nuclear Power: Rebuilding Trust in an Audit Agenda

Capabilities, Costs, and Constraints: A Realist Reassessment of China’s Rise in East Asia

Tue, 16 Dec 2025 00:00:00 +0000

China’s rise is widely viewed as a destabilizing force in East Asia, prompting concerns of heightened military competition or even an arms race. This paper challenges such assumptions by reexamining traditional security threats through the lens of realist theory. Drawing on offensive and defensive realism, it argues that China’s capabilities and revisionist intentions—while significant—do not warrant the level of alarm often portrayed. Regional capability balances, geographic buffers, and the high costs of territorial aggression constrain China’s ability to project traditional military power. Moreover, China’s increasing reliance on gray-zone tactics and geoeconomic tools suggests a strategic shift away from direct military confrontation. Empirical analysis reveals that East Asian states’ military responses remain moderate, especially when compared globally. Taken together, this study offers a more calibrated understanding of East Asia’s evolving security landscape.

Regaining U.S. Nuclear Energy Leadership

Fri, 5 Dec 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Regaining U.S. Nuclear Energy Leadership

How to Write an Academic Article in Political Science

Fri, 5 Dec 2025 00:00:00 +0000

How to Write an Academic Article in Political Science

Studying Economic Black Holes: Lessons from North Korea

Wed, 19 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Some economies are “black holes” where reliable data is scarce due to government control, low capacity, or conflict. Despite these challenges, researchers have found ways to gather useful information. This paper draws on the literature on North Korea to review six key methods: satellite imagery, reports from aid agencies, trade data, prices, refugee surveys, and official documents. These sources are imperfect, and require close attention to research design and measurement error. Nonetheless, they demonstrate that it is possible to extract information from economic black holes and to draw meaningful insights about them.

China’s Competitive Model for Strategic Science, Technology, and Innovation Development

Wed, 19 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000

China’s Competitive Model for Strategic Science, Technology, and Innovation Development

The Endurance and Erosion of Support for Mano Dura: Electoral Evidence from the War on Drugs in the Philippines

Wed, 19 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Why does public support for mano dura policies, once implemented, either sustain or erode? This study examines the Philippine war on drugs. Using municipal-level vote shares from the 2019 elections—three years into Rodrigo Duterte’s presidency—we measure support for mano dura by analyzing votes for senatorial candidates who backed or opposed the drug war. Pairing this data with municipal-level crime and violence reports from Armed Conflict Location & Event Data project (ACLED) and police blotters, we construct a panel of candidate-municipality observations and employ fixed effects for candidates and municipalities to identify the effects of targeted crimes and state violence on public support. We find that increases in targeted crimes, particularly drug-related offenses, bolster public support for mano dura, while state violence, especially by police, erodes it. These findings reveal a fragile balance between public safety concerns and the costs...

Backsliding and Democratic Resilience: Prevention, Resistance, and Recovery

Tue, 4 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Global democracy faces escalating threats, both among long-standing and newer “third wave” democratic systems. The extent and causes of democratic backsliding have been subjects of considerable analysis and debate. However, there is still relatively limited discussion of the conditions in which democracy might be resilient to such challenges. This paper addresses this analytical gap by examining four crucial dimensions of democratic resilience: factors that help insulate democracy from backsliding; whether there are ways to respond to illiberal leaders; what factors contribute to democratic resilience if such a leader does gain power; and whether democracies can “bounce back” after authoritarians have been ousted from power.

Anonymous Online Survey Detection (and Journalist Verification) of Political Violence, Social Unrest, and Human Rights Violations: Results from Bangladesh and Pakistan

Tue, 21 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Multiple large bodies of scholarship engage with questions directly concerned with political violence, social unrest, and human rights abuses. Yet, efforts to collect data on these variables are fraught with challenges, and many extant empirical findings rely on data (particularly news report based events) suspected of or known to be biased in aggregate. We explore the use of anonymous, online surveying to detect otherwise unobserved activity. We run anonymous, online surveys in Bangladesh and Pakistan in the run up to, during and in the period following recent contentious 2024 elections in both countries and, separately, in the immediate aftermath of Bangladesh’s 2024 Student–People’s Uprising and expulsion of then-Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. To assess the efficacy of the surveys, we partnered with professional journalists working on both countries to verify the authenticity of reported incidents. Results confirm their effectiveness in uncovering many instances of political...

The Backsliding Bloc? Selective Contestation and Alliance Realignment in the Liberal International Order

Thu, 11 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0000

How do democratic backsliders—states that retain aspects of democracy yet have become increasingly illiberal—behave in international institutions? Pressured between needing to preserve democratic legitimacy while minimizing external scrutiny of domestic illiberalism, these states engage in selective contestation: they continue to endorse the liberal international order (LIO), while systematically opposing its more intrusive institutions, particularly those promoting human rights and democratization. Using original data on voting and sponsorship patterns in the United Nations (UN) Human Rights Council (2006–23), we find backsliders align with autocracies, and against advanced Western democracies, on particularly sensitive and intrusive issues. These dynamics are confirmed by voting patterns in the UN General Assembly (UNGA). Text analysis of Universal Periodic Review reports reveals that backsliders’ rhetoric is converging to that of other backsliders and autocracies over time....

The Rational World of Defense Intellectuals Revisited

Thu, 4 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0000

The Rational World of Defense Intellectuals Revisited

Trump’s Trade War: A Primer

Mon, 18 Aug 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Trump’s Trade War: A Primer

Using Distributional Politics to Understand Global Progress on Ecosystem Conservation

Tue, 8 Jul 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Using Distributional Politics to Understand Global Progress on Ecosystem Conservation

Planning Your Career in Peacemaking

Thu, 3 Jul 2025 00:00:00 +0000

From the introduction:

For over ten years now, I have been working in the Career Services Center of the University of California, Santa Cruz. My duties include attempting to give advice and practical help to a growing number of students who come to me with this problem: "Just how do I apply my own commitment to peace, my classroom knowledge, my desire to contribute to peacemaking, to the realities of the working world? In a word, "How can I work for peace, and make a living at it?" Gradually I have taken upon myself the task of trying to answer this most challenging question. I began by gathering information on a number of organizations that are working to create conditions and mechanisms, at the international level, for reducing conflicts, solving problems, and developing understanding. I was encouraged by the fact that there already exists a number of helpful publications in this area. Following this, in this pamphlet, I have tried to define specific fields of a peacemaking...

SDI, The Federal Republic of Germany, and NATO: Political, Economic, and Strategic Implications

Thu, 3 Jul 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Initial European reactions to President Reagan's Strategic DefenseInitiative (SDI) speech were a mixture of disbelief and irritation. European military-strategic concerns are several and are presented in the paper in five separate butoverlapping sections: 1) questions about coupling, the credibility of theAmerican nuclear guarantee and effects on NATO strategy and doctrine; 2) concerns about strategic instabilities and the arms race; 3) worries about the future of arms control and the ABM Treaty; 4) speculation about the impact on the French and British nuclear forces and alliance cohesion; and 5) anxieties over the enormous costs involved.

In the West, Rival Networks are Contesting the Meaning of Liberalism

Tue, 1 Jul 2025 00:00:00 +0000

In the West, Rival Networks are Contesting the Meaning of Liberalism

The International Political Economy of the Regulation of Digital Technology

Tue, 1 Jul 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Digital technology is seeping into every corner of society. As the pace of technological change accelerates over the next decade, digitalization is poised to impose profound changes on the international political economy. A new digital regime is evolving to govern these effects, although it is uncertain how this regime will develop amid tectonic shifts in governing establishments, world geopolitics, and the scope of economic globalization. A broad array of interests are contesting how digital governance will play out across the globe, from digital businesses big and small to politicians balancing security and economic growth objectives. Uncertainty predominates, but looking at previous historical instances where new technology demanded cross-border governance can reveal clues as to how a digital regime can take shape in a more sovereignty-oriented world.

This report explores the digital order that underlies transnational tensions over regulating digital technologies,...

Democracy, Autocracy, and the Design of International Organizations

Tue, 1 Jul 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Extensive research expects systematic differences in the design of international organizations (IOs) based on the regime composition of their memberships. Yet so far, empirical analyses have found limited support for this expectation. This article resolves this puzzle by providing a new understanding of how the regime composition of IOs shapes their institutional design. Theoretically, it argues that this relationship is moderated by a critical but overlooked factor: the governance purpose of IOs, as expressed in the distinction between general-purpose and task-specific organizations. Empirically, it provides a comprehensive analysis of how changes in regime composition have affected institutional design in 40 IOs from 1950-2019. The findings show that the regime composition of IOs indeed is related to their institutional design, but only in general-purpose organizations, which present democracies and autocracies with more divergent design incentives than task-specific organizations....

In-Group Punishment in International Relations: U.S. Reactions to the Founding of China’s AIIB

Wed, 25 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

We examine, in the context of international relations, the hypothesis from social psychology that punishment for defiance is more likely for in-group than out-group members. The United States publicly opposed the founding of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) and pressured countries not to join the Chinese-led institution. Nevertheless, 57 countries became founding members of this new development bank, which is viewed as a potential competitor of the U.S.-led World Bank. To test whether the United States punished in-group rather than out-group countries for their defiance, we consider a unique dataset on the voting behavior of the World Bank’s U.S. executive director on new project proposals. We find that the United States is more likely to oppose or abstain from supporting new projects only for AIIB founding members that are closer to the United States, with no punishment for the more distant founders. Considering that almost all proposals are approved regardless...

The Defense of Judicial Independence: A Global Imperative

Wed, 4 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

The Defense of Judicial Independence: A Global Imperative

We Need a Global Climate Observatory

Mon, 21 Apr 2025 00:00:00 +0000

We Need a Global Climate Observatory

International Financial Institutions and the Promotion of Autocratic Resilience

Wed, 9 Apr 2025 00:00:00 +0000

International financial institutions (IFIs) are often perceived as engines of economic and political liberalization. Yet, despite their outsized influence in shaping the development trajectories of recipient nations, the lending strategies of IFIs dominated by authoritarian regimes remain underexplored. We argue that autocratic IFIs are not merely neutral economic actors; rather, they strategically allocate aid to reinforce authoritarian resilience. Our analysis reveals that these institutions disproportionately channel funds to authoritarian governments confronting acute domestic or international challenges to their rule, such as coup risk, political conflict, or democratic mobilization. We introduce a comprehensive, original dataset tracking the lending behavior of 20 autocratic IFIs across 143 recipient countries from 1967–2021. Our findings uncover a striking pattern: aid flows from autocratic IFIs increase precisely when authoritarian regimes are most vulnerable. By situating...

Climate Policy, Political Parties, and the Quality of Democracy

Wed, 9 Apr 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Climate Policy, Political Parties, and the Quality of Democracy

Understanding the Connection between Democracy and Climate Change

Tue, 8 Apr 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Understanding the Connection between Democracy and Climate Change

Timing is Everything: A New Way to Estimate Strategic Behavior

Wed, 2 Apr 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Many applied economic studies aim to estimate strategic behavior through reaction curves. Examples include two-sided conflicts, or economic trade wars, and algorithmic pricing between firms. Analysis is usually performed at a prespecified time interval, such as days, weeks, months, or years, using a vector autoregression (VAR). Yet sides may respond within a day to one action, but wait a month after another. If data is recorded in arbitrary time intervals, then the researcher may mistake waiting to act for inaction. We analytically show that VAR analyses do not recover true reaction curves if the timing of reaction is not accurately recorded. This misspecification can cause the sign of the VAR coeﬀicient to reverse and misspecified standard errors leading to erroneous inference. We discuss an alternative structural approach rooted in game theory to estimate reaction curves and investigate its usefulness in a Monte Carlo simulation.

Green Backlash and Its Consequences for Democracy and Policy

Mon, 31 Mar 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Green Backlash and Its Consequences for Democracy and Policy

Green Backlash and Climate Change Policies

Mon, 31 Mar 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Green Backlash and Climate Change Policies

Green Backlash and Democracy

Tue, 25 Mar 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Green Backlash and Democracy

Green Backlash and Fossil Societies

Tue, 25 Mar 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Green Backlash and Fossil Societies

East and West in International Relations Theory

Fri, 21 Mar 2025 00:00:00 +0000

East and West in International Relations Theory

Paradigm Shift: War as a Failure of Bargaining

Wed, 19 Feb 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Paradigm Shift: War as a Failure of Bargaining

Climate Change, Political Conflict, and Democratic Resilience

Mon, 2 Dec 2024 00:00:00 +0000

The world is experiencing the increasingly destabilizing effects of climate change, but we currently know little about its effects on the quality of democracy. We argue that compounding climate shocks create conditions under which democratic resilience diminishes. The accelerated frequency and severity of climate-induced natural disasters and weather shocks, and their devastating economic and social consequences, have increased the likelihood and frequency of civil and political unrest, especially in contexts where climate-induced disasters compound and the government is unable to address citizen grievances. The necessity to respond to more frequent civil unrest and political instability increases the likelihood that governments rely on repressive measures that reduce democratic resilience. To test this argument, we explore whether compounded experiences with climate shocks increase the likelihood of a country experiencing a decline in democratic resilience. We find that the compounded...

Selling Violent Extremism

Mon, 2 Dec 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Why do people join domestic violent extremist organizations? This paper examines an understudied reason: organizational outreach. I study how the inflow of new members to the Oath Keepers, America’s largest paramilitary organization, is affected when the group’s leadership employs three tactics: showcasing their ideological zeal through armed standoffs with the government, membership discounts, and sports sponsorships. Using a variant of the synthetic control method, I find that standoffs increase new memberships by 150 percent, discounts increase new memberships by over 60 percent, and sports sponsorships decrease new memberships. Membership is less responsive in counties with higher income inequality, but is more responsive in politically conservative counties. The findings provide new insights into ways extremist groups attract potential recruits.

The Weaponization of Information Technologies and Democratic Resilience

Mon, 4 Nov 2024 00:00:00 +0000

The rapid spread of information and communication technologies across and within borders has been an important feature of the contemporary era, with the Internet at its core. Until recently, the widespread belief was that the Internet would be beneficial for the spread and resilience of democracy. This common wisdom has become increasingly contested, as political actors in democracies and autocracies alike have learned to use the Internet to maneuver information to enhance government popularity and suppress or delegitimate the opposition. We argue that open information access can be weaponized to reduce democratic resilience when duly elected leaders with anti-pluralist aspirations harness them to increase political polarization. We test the empirical implications of our theory with a mixed-methods approach that combines a large-N quantitative comparative analysis of democratic backsliding in 97 democracies after the Cold War with a typical case study of democratic resilience...

Huawei is Quietly Dominating China's Semiconductor Supply Chain

Fri, 4 Oct 2024 00:00:00 +0000

In this policy brief, Antonia Hmaidi, Senior Analyst in the Science, Technology and Innovation Program at MERICS, analyzes Huawei, a company that is emerging as the leader of China’s national team in semiconductors, dominating chip manufacturing and seeking to integrate the country’s entire supply chain. Its ambitions stem from both its placement on the U.S. Entity List and strong government support at the national and local level. Internationally, Huawei is coy about these ambitions, hiding its supply chain involvement and often operating under a different company’s name. Meanwhile, Huawei’s experience is also encouraging other Chinese technology companies to support China’s quest for chip self-sufficiency, developing new hardware and software for that purpose. The clandestine nature of Huawei’s involvement—it is not known who serves what role in semiconductor production—makes it more difficult for Western companies and governments to assess China’s progress in technology, vet...

Be My Friendly Reviewers: How China Shapes its UN Human Rights Reviews

Fri, 4 Oct 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Authoritarian states are often vulnerable to naming and shaming for their human rights abuses. This paper shows that China uses its economic clout to influence United Nations (UN) member states overseeing its human rights reviews, shielding itself from severe criticisms within the UN system. I argue that paying for lenient reviews is possible, but its effectiveness depends on the extent to which reviewing states prioritize economic benefits over normative principles. Using text-based coding of over 90,000 UN Universal Periodic Review reports, I demonstrate that countries with strong economic ties to China through Chinese overseas development projects tend to offer more lenient reviews of China’s human rights record. This effect, however, is conditional: it is pronounced in “middle” countries whose stance on human rights norms is neither too aligned with nor too distant from China's. Another “distant” group, which is furthest from China’s human rights vision, is resistant to providing...

Campaign Promises, Political Ambiguity, and Globalization

Fri, 4 Oct 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Promissory representation is the idea that a significant part of representation consists of parties making promises to voters during election campaigns and keeping those promises if they hold enough power to do so after elections. In countries that are highly exposed to globalization, governing parties face significant challenges to fulfilling the promises they made to voters. At the same time, voters punish governing parties that fail to keep their campaign promises. This presents parties with the dilemma that while voters expect them to make ambitious promises during election campaigns, their capacity to deliver on those promises is undermined by the constraints of globalization. In response to this dilemma, parties rely on strategic ambiguity to avoid retrospective sanctioning by voters in future elections. Ambiguous campaign statements are reconcilable with a broad range of subsequent government policies and are therefore unlikely to be perceived as broken promises by voters....

Weathering the Storm? The Third Wave of Autocratization and International Organization Membership

Wed, 14 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Democratization scholars are currently debating if we are indeed witnessing a third wave of autocratization. While this has led to an extensive debate about the future of the liberal international order, we still know relatively little about the consequences of autocratization for international organizations (IOs). In this article, we explore to what extent autocratization has led to changes in the composition of IO membership. We propose three different ways of conceptualizing autocratization of IO membership. We argue that we should move away from a dichotomous understanding of regime type and regime change, but rather focus on composition of sub-regime types to understand current developments. We build on updated membership data for 73 IOs through 2020 to map membership configurations based on the V-Dem Electoral Democracy Index. Contrary to current debates on the crisis of the liberal order, we find that many IOs are not (yet) affected by broad autocratization of their membership...

Domestic Incentives and the Internalization of Chineses Manufacturing in the Wind, Electric Vehicle, and Battery Industries

Wed, 14 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Chinese firms are leading players in the production of clean energy technologies and appear set to expand further. This paper analyzes trends in Chinese clean tech manufacturing including internationalization, and the outlook for manufacturing facilities outside of China in the clean energy technology industry, including EVs, batteries, and wind turbines. Among the main findings: Chinese clean energy technology companies have been relatively quick to expand their foreign market share but production outside of China is still lagging. Europe is likely to be the preferred destination for Chinese battery, EV, and wind companies but current investments are limited to the battery industry. The production of different technologies is subject to different sets of incentives including cost and political considerations that will determine how quickly companies will internationalize production. Overall, the diversification of production would bolster the resilience of supply chains and economic...

The Environmental Policies of Populist Radical Right Governments

Wed, 14 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

What are the consequences of electing populist leaders? This question is of continued importance as populist leaders challenge elections and impact politics across the world. While the consequences of populist electoral victories on democratic processes have been widely examined, other arenas are still being explored. The environmental policies of populist leaders are particularly important as climate change affects an increasing number of people on a global level. In this paper I show how populist radical right leaders respond to this global crisis by doubling down on economic nationalism and prioritizing national goals of development and claiming that fighting climate change is a Western imposition on domestic politics. I use a mixed methods approach that employs the most complete global data on populist leaders and their environmental stances as well as the case study of Hungary to show how populism doubles down on economic nationalism in the environmental arena.

Extraction, Contestation, and Conservation: Natural Resource Dependence and Protected Area Designation

Wed, 14 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Biodiversity decline and ecosystem loss are among the gravest transnational crises facing the planet, with deep implications for climate change. What determines how different countries choose to protect nature? Previous work has argued that economic dependence on natural resources undermines green policies. I instead argue that resource dependence can lead to mobilization in favor of protection. Citizens experience the negative consequences of environmental degradation and ecosystem loss firsthand, and domestic and international green groups take notice. Although mobilization can occur across regimes, in democracies these groups more effectively advocate for protection once mobilized, helping to stem biodiversity loss. The adverse effects of resource dependence, therefore, mainly apply to less democratic countries, where extractive interests are most able to steer policymaking and mobilization is less likely to succeed. To test this argument, I employ a mixed-methods research...

International Clientelistic Networks and International Fora: The Case of Venezuela at the United Nationals General Assembly (1999–2015)

Tue, 13 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

In this article, we analyze how Venezuela under Hugo Chávez engaged in international clientelism—the exchange of material benefits for political support—to garner political support from several Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) countries at the United Nations. The instruments for dispensing this patronage were two regional organizations spearheaded by Venezuela—the Bolivarian Alternative for Our American People (ALBA) and PetroCaribe—which provided material support to smaller countries through the sale of oil at preferential prices. We claim that the reach of Caracas’ diplomatic strategy is broader and deeper than that of simple vote-buying tactics as it involved the promotion of structural rather than contingent ties, shielding Venezuela against unfavorable moves in international fora. An empirical test using data for all LAC countries for the years 1999–2015 confirms that clientelistic linkages produced political support for Venezuela at the United Nations General Assembly,...

Cyber Sovereignty: How China is Changing the Rules of Internet Freedom

Tue, 13 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

China is definitively not a status quo power in cyberspace. Less understood is how China is attempting to create change in the international order and which countries are responding to China’s appeals for reform. Drawing from studies of social movements, I develop an original theory explaining a rising power’s ability to attract support in the face of competition from the dominant power through framing the need for change. China’s strategy frames changes in Internet governance as improving a widely cherished value: the right to sovereignty. I conduct two tests of the efficacy of China’s cyber sovereignty frames in competition with liberal frames deployed by the U.S. In the first test, a regression analysis of votes for changes in the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) reveals that China’s frames mobilized statist countries and the G77. In the second test, I break down the vote for the renegotiated treaty and votes from specific debates to find that sovereignty frames...

Contesting the Anti-Coup Norm: ASEAN Responds to the 2021 Myanmar Coup

Tue, 13 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Since the end of the Cold War, democracies have sought to create a range of normative and international legal standards intended to reduce the frequency and legitimacy of coups. The rise of the anti-coup norm has led to the isolation and punishment of numerous coup-created governments, and evidence suggests it has helped reduce the frequency of coup attempts. However, the norm is contested, and coup leaders often find that the international condemnation they face is countered by quiet acquiescence or active support by international allies. This paper examines the politics of norm contestation around the anti-coup norm by considering the international response to the 2021 coup in Myanmar. It introduces the concept of “norm waverers” and illustrates how committed norm promoters and norm resisters often try to persuade norm waverers—in this case exemplified by ASEAN—to join their respective camps. International pressure induced ASEAN to make normative commitments. But these commitments...

Stabilizing Authoritarian Rule: The Role of International Organizations

Tue, 13 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Research has demonstrated how membership in democratic regional organizations can strengthen prospects for democracy. However, a significant number of regional organizations are dominated by autocratic members who have very different preferences: to limit democratic contagion and consolidate authoritarian rule against democratic challengers. We outline a menu of mechanisms through which regional organizations with authoritarian members might have pernicious effects on the prospects for democratic rule. We use cross-national quantitative analyses to demonstrate that membership in deeply authoritarian international organizations is associated with autocratization. We supplement the quantitative results with an analysis of 29 of the most authoritarian regional organizations and illustrative case studies. The multi-method approach strengthens inference by showing that authoritarian international organizations do in fact engage in behaviors inimical to democratic rule.

A Fox in the Henhouse: China, Normative Change, and the United Nations Human Rights Council

Tue, 13 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Decades of social science research on human rights norms has mapped the conditions under which states sign and ratify treaties, abide by their conditions, and promote or criticize human rights in other states. Some norms contained in the core human rights treaties, particularly civil and political rights, are seen by authoritarian states as politically threatening. Autocracies can parry human rights norms by deflecting their substance while simulating compliance. They can also contest them through existing international institutions and seek to change their content over time. This paper investigates China’s engagement in the United Nations Human Rights Council, focusing on both the content and practices of the PRC’s approach. In terms of content, it examines China’s proposed resolutions and voting record to determine the issues it prioritizes. In terms of practices, it identifies four modes China has used to pursue normative change: mobilizing like-minded countries, implied coercion,...

Techno-industrial Policy for New Infrastructure: China’s Approach to Promoting Artificial Intelligence as a General Purpose Technology

Tue, 13 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Scholars connect China’s technology policy to government interventions that target particular industrial sectors. But not all sectors are created equal. Relying on evidence from China’s Artificial Intelligence (AI) policies, this paper develops a framework for assessing China’s approach toward promoting a technological domain that permeates across many industrial sectors: general-purpose technologies. It shows that China’s AI strategy diverges from expectations derived from typical characterizations of China’s industrial policy, which stress an emphasis on self-sufficiency, support for a limited number of national champions, and the essential role of military investment and demand for progress in dual-use domains.

The EDA Chokepoint Dilemma? Openness, Oligopolies, and China's Ecosystem

Tue, 13 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

One of the fiercest domains of U.S.-China technology rivalry centers around semiconductors, which enable advances in a range of strategic and essential sectors—from communications and computing, to healthcare, military systems, and transportation. For policymakers interested in stymying Chinese advances in semiconductors, the perfect chokepoint to exploit through export restrictions is a product that plays an indispensable role in the broader ecosystem and is controlled by very few companies with high market-entry barriers. This paper reviews experience with one such product: electronic design automation (EDA) tools. The author argues that the U.S. and allied governments can use EDA as a chokepoint to curb China’s chip design capabilities in the medium term, but that they should also strengthen incentives for the development and adoption of open-source EDA tools by the broader industry. Supporting the development of open-source EDA tools does not diminish their market dominance...

The Rise of Authoritarian Regional International Organizations

Tue, 13 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Over the last few decades, the number and influence of regional international organizations (RIOs) with powerful authoritarian members have been on the rise, helping stall democratization and preserve autocratic regimes. This paper, the first in an IGCC series on authoritarian international organizations, charts the growth of authoritarian RIOs since the end of World War II to present day and analyzes their pathways for influence, including through election monitoring, peacekeeping, and development assistance. It concludes by exploring the implications for U.S. foreign policy, including how the United States can build coalitions of its own; whether (or not) the United States should engage with certain authoritarian RIOs; and why the United States should be cautious when partnering with certain regional organizations.

China’s Evolving Fortress Economy

Fri, 9 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

China’s leadership, under Xi Jinping, has initiated a significant strategic shift toward a "fortress economy" designed to bolster national self-sufficiency and resilience against external shocks, and ultimately allow the nation to withstand “extreme situations” including protracted armed conflict. This paper provides a comprehensive analysis of the evolution of China’s fortress economy policy, tracing its roots from early warnings about international instability to its formalization in China’s 14^th Five-Year Plan and subsequent policy actions. By examining official speeches, policy documents, and strategic initiatives, the paper explains how the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is operationalizing this strategy through key domains such as food security, energy independence, and critical supply-chain resilience. The analysis highlights the CCP’s perception of an increasingly hostile international environment, prompting a paradigm shift that prioritizes national security...

Guangdong's New R&D Institutes: China's Regional Tool for Innovation and Technology Transfer

Fri, 9 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

In pursuit of technological development, China has created new organizations to promote innovation. In this brief, Marcus Conlé, an associate at the German Institute for Global and Area Studies (GIGA), examines New Research and Development Institutes (NRDIs), which are designed to foster knowledge transfer to industry. NRDIs were pioneered in Guangdong province in the 1990s, and have gained prominence in China’s national science, technology, and innovation policies since the 13th Five-Year Plan (2016-2020). NRDIs are defined by their market orientation and extremely flexible organizational form. They work by establishing “innovation platforms” with local governments and private knowledge actors to carry out research and development (R&D), commercialize scientific and technological achievements, incubate local technology industries, and cultivate high-end talent. NRDIs have been instrumental to regional development in Guangdong, and especially Shenzhen, where they have succeeded...

Defending The Global Human Rights System From Authoritarian Assault: How Democracies can Retake the Initiative

Fri, 19 Jul 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Authoritarian influence in multilateral institutions—particularly the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC)—is growing rapidly and poses a serious threat to democratic and human rights principles. Repressive governments have worked to undermine mechanisms that are meant to ensure accountability for rights abuses and to transform the United Nations (UN) its related bodies, and other international institutions into fora for mutual praise and exculpation. In this report, Rana Siu Inboden, a member of the IGCC network of scholars working on authoritarian regimes and international institutions, and a senior fellow with the Robert S. Strauss Center for International Security and Law at The University of Texas at Austin, unpacks what these threats mean and what can be done to stop them.

Contesting the Anti-Coup Norm: ASEAN Responds to the 2021 Myanmar Coup