Domestic Institutions and the Political Economy of International Agreements: A Survey and Hypotheses

Florian Kiesow Cortez ()
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Florian Kiesow Cortez: University of Hamburg

A chapter in The Political Economy of International Agreements, 2021, pp 9-35 from Springer

Abstract: Abstract Constitutional rules according to which political power is acquired and exercised have a systematic influence on the nature of the political game and thus on policy outcomes. The present paper explores whether systematic differences in foreign policy decisions follow from the different political accountability dynamics connected to alternative constitutional arrangements. The following hypotheses linking domestic institutions to foreign policy choices are proposed. First, the number of institutional and partisan veto players is likely to affect the incentives of governments to use international agreements as a signaling device to lend credibility to domestic reforms, but also as a tool to lock in these reforms. Second, electoral systems were found to influence the political decision to provide either public goods or benefits targeted at narrow groups. Politicians might find it useful to tie their hands through international agreements to thwart electoral pressures to please narrow groups. In brief, the focus lies on domestic political economy factors motivating governments to make use of international agreements.

Keywords: International agreements; Political institutions; Political economy; Credible commitment (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: F13 F53 N40 P16 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:intchp:978-3-030-85194-1_2

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DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-85194-1_2

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