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Outline for today’s class

Outline for today’s class. Negotiation theory & practice Why states take the positions they do. Role of NGOs in international environmental treaties. How to evaluate a theory.

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Outline for today’s class

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  1. Outline for today’s class • Negotiation theory & practice • Why states take the positions they do. • Role of NGOs in international environmental treaties

  2. How to evaluate a theory • Step 1: Get a theory from prior scholars about the thing you are interested in and try to “map it” in a simple enough way that you understand it • Step 2: Figure out what that theory leads you to expect about a particular case, i.e., make theory-based predictions about the case before you study it • Step 3: See if the case turns out the way you expect or not. If it does, you have a good paper about how the case supports the theory. If it does not, you have a good paper about how the case does not support the theory.

  3. Start at minute 19:10

  4. Negotiation Theory • Sprinz and Vaahtoranta • Positions states take in negotiations (the DV) are determined by two IVs: the costs states face to take action to protect the environment (abatement costs) and the benefits they receive if the environment is protected (ecological vulnerability) • Betsill and Corell show: • Need to clarify research question – WHAT is influence? • Evidence of NGO influence • Use of process tracing AND counterfactuals • Building on work of prior others

  5. Why States Take Positions They Do in Int’l Negotiations Sprinz and Vaahtoranta, 1994.

  6. NGO influence in negotiations (Betsill and Corell, 2007) • Distinction of power vs. influence • Power as resources vs. power as influence over outcomes • Definition of NGO influence based in counterfactuals • “Influence occurs when one actor intentionally communicates to another so as to alter the latter’s behavior from what would have occurred otherwise" (Betsill and Corell, 2007, 31).

  7. NGO elements • Activities • Access • Resources: financial; informational • Focus of NGOs on process or outcome • Notice elements of process tracing

  8. Potential influences of NGOs • Agenda setting -- what gets talked about; drawing attention to an issue. • Issue framing -- how it gets talked about: biosafety can be framed as health or trade issue (B&C, 36) • Positions of key states • Procedural issues -- how decisions to be made in the future • Substantive issues -- actual decisions in the agreement text

  9. Factors that condition NGO influence • NGO coordination • Rules of access, • Stage of the negotiations • Political stakes • Institutional overlap • Competition from other NGOs • Alliances with key states • Level of contention (B&C, 2007, ch. 2).

  10. Why do negotiations succeed? • Type of problem • Structural and contextual factors • Concern about the issue and costs • Scientific influence • Actors involved • Institutional design factors

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