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Characterized by their ability to impact the world order without having superpower status, middle powers contribute significantly to maintaining global stability and fostering notable advancements. The notion of middle powers is longstanding in international relations, with its roots traceable in the writings of the Italian 16th century thinker Giovanni Botero. The literature concerning middle powers is full of debates and considerations about their definitions, characteristics, and objectives. Turkiye and Brazil have been chosen as primary subjects of this study to exemplify the growing role of middle powers as mediators due to their involvement in international negotiations. Keywords: Middle Powers; Great Powers; the Grain Deal; JCPOA; diplomatic negotiations; mediation., The recent developments in the Ukraine and Gaza conflicts have highlighted the growing significance of middle powers. Middle powers are regarded as states that lack superpower status but possess enough [...]

Global goals play a catalyzing role in orienting efforts to address climate change. Yet, the negotiation of the main goal in climate governance is understudied. This article aims to fill this gap by examining the negotiation, adoption, and refinement of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change’s (unfccc) Long-Term Global Goal (ltgg), from the late 1970s to date. I gather insights from semi-structured interviews with climate governance experts, the scientific literature, and official documentation to highlight the developments that shaped the ltgg over time. The study shows that agential, ideational, normative, structural, and contextual factors co-interacted in negotiating, adopting, and refining the ltgg. Drawing lessons from the ltgg experience, the manuscript contributes to knowledge on the politics of global goals, international negotiations, climate governance, and, more broadly, international relations, diplomacy, and global environmental politics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What explains major shifts in international tax cooperation? Existing literature emphasises either the centrality of the United States for successful reform or the power of multinational corporations to exert downward pressure on global tax rates. Nonetheless, in 2021 members of the OECD Inclusive Framework (IF) agreed to tax some of the largest multinational companies based on their market activities rather than physical presence – a fundamental change to the international taxation regime that the U.S. government and U.S. multinational corporations (MNCs) had long opposed. We argue that the spread of digital value chains has exposed the activities of MNCs to greater regulatory activity, allowing governments to use unilateral regulatory action as leverage in international negotiations. By shifting the reversion point – the status quo absent an international agreement – governments were collectively able to transform an agreement. We demonstrate our argument by examining how the implementation of national digital services taxes (DSTs) affected the OECD IF negotiations. Drawing on interviews with key stakeholders and primary sources, we show that the adoption of DSTs, including in France and India, and the threat of additional proliferation of DSTs, pushed the United States to drop its longstanding opposition to parts of the IF process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on empirical fieldwork, this article analyzes the negotiation of a Framework of Engagement with Non-State Actors (FENSA) at the World Health Organization (WHO) between 2011 and 2016. The study examines the long and difficult negotiation process, which shifts from a mere adaptation of guidelines by the WHO Secretariat to an intergovernmental negotiation led by a core group of Member States. This negotiation process cannot simply be explained by traditional dialogues among delegations and hierarchical relationships within international organizations. Other factors played important roles in the process as well – the high political stakes of the issue, non-traditional coalition games, heterogeneity among the actors, and the WHO Secretariat's role as a negotiating party – all advocating for the development of a triangular, multi-voice negotiation model within international organizations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A new legally binding agreement for the conservation and sustainable use of marine biodiversity beyond national jurisdiction (BBNJ) was adopted by consensus on 19th June, 2023. Setting new regulations and filling regulatory gaps of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea are expected to be informed by "best available science". It is critical to understand how science entered the negotiations, which defined the global scientific knowledge base of decision-makers. This paper presents various pathways over which scientific input entered the BBNJ negotiations, using empirical data, collected through collaborative event ethnography, including participant observation and semi-structured interviews at the BBNJ negotiation site. Results show that scientific input in the BBNJ negotiations was not systematic and transparent but dependent on (a) available national scientific capacity, (b) financial resources, (c) established contacts and (d) active involvement of actors. Results of the study call for formalised science-policy interfaces, initiated by the UN Secretariat to guarantee a global knowledge base for decision-making. Keywords: international negotiations; United Nations; marine biodiversity; BBNJ; ocean protection; science-policy interfaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The negotiations for a new instrument for the conservation and sustainable use of high-seas marine biodiversity (marine biodiversity beyond national jurisdiction; BBNJ) finally concluded after difficult negotiations. The BBNJ negotiations had to address a regime complex of sectoral and regional organizations regulating different aspects of marine biodiversity and a political struggle about the epistemologies that ought to inform marine biodiversity governance, which is driven by limited, unequally distributed, and contested knowledge. However, to be implemented, the new BBNJ Agreement will have to be equipped with expert authority to be able to address these challenges and make competent statements about the state of high-seas marine biodiversity. We address a gap in empirical work on expert authority in the regime complex by analyzing state references to the expertise of different international organizations in the BBNJ negotiations. Combining collaborative event ethnography and social network analysis, we show that states strategically and politically refer to the expertise of international organizations, and we coin the term authority shopping to describe this behavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

International agreements are often understood to help governments make credible commitments to future policy by limiting their ability to renege on their promises. Renegotiations of agreements are accordingly viewed as a threat to cooperation, since renegotiations call past commitments into question. But we know little about the frequency or nature of treaty renegotiations. When are international agreements renegotiated, and what effect does renegotiation have on international cooperation? Do most renegotiations indeed aim to backtrack on past commitments? Using the topical context of the trade regime, I collect new data on international treaty revisions, covering 310 preferential trade agreements signed since the year 2000. Around a quarter of these agreements have been amended in some form, and the supermajority of amendments result not in scaled back agreements, but in deeper commitments. Survival analysis shows that 'like-minded' countries with a shared language and similar voting patterns at the UN General Assembly are most likely to revise their commitments. In contrast, I do not find evidence to support the view of PTA revisions as 'backsliding' on past commitments. The effects of revisions on trade cooperation support the more cooperative view of revisions. An error-correction model shows revisions are associated with a long-run increase in export volumes. Renegotiations are not breakdowns in international relations, but opportunities for governments to renew their commitment to cooperation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article broadens the understanding and empirical study of regime complexes by shifting the focus from the negotiation outcome to the processes of negotiating new international agreements. Although they are important to regime-complex formation and delimitation, the sites where states negotiate new agreements are rather neglected. We aim to enhance the methodological toolbox available to scholars studying global governance in two ways: (1) by demonstrating how dynamic relationships between states and international organisations (IOs) unfolding within the social space of international treaty negotiations contribute to regime-complex formation; and (2) how social network analysis (SNA) can help us to detect patterns in these relationships. Combining participant observation and collaborative event ethnography (CEE) with social network analysis, we present new empirical material illustrating how we delimited a regime complex and how IOs interact throughout the negotiation process. We applied our methodology to the case of marine-biodiversity governance and use observational data collected during three intergovernmental conferences (IGCs) (2018–19) on a new treaty for the conservation and sustainable use of marine biodiversity beyond national jurisdiction (BBNJ) for our analysis. We discuss the results in relation to our approach's strengths and weaknesses and implications for future research on regime complexity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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As is known, the Cyprus Peace Negotiation have been continuing for more than fifty years. For more than forty years, people in Cyprus have been spending a conflict-free and peaceful life. In this study, the fifty-year process of Cyprus Peace Negotiation will be summarized and explained at large within the framework of public policy analysis, analysis phases, policy preparation/implementation methods and the role of institutions in the process. The voting of the 2004 Annan Plan between the Turkish Cypriots and the Greek Cypriots during this process and the effect of the voting outcome on the negotiation process will be discussed. With the opening of the border gates that provided controlled passage to northern and southern Cyprus shortly before the Annan Plan was put to a vote, the effects of the new conditions created by the collective and free contact of two populations on the negotiation process and the future apprehension of Turkish Cypriots will be analysed. Since the study involved theoretical approaches, indirect research method was adopted as a method and domestic and foreign sources were scanned within this framework. In parallel with this method, content analysis technique was used. According to the findings, such multilateral conflicts Generals and 22 UN Special Representative behind, there is the danger of the means to turn into a goal. This possibility should not be ignored and the content of the talks and the subject of negotiation in question must be preoccupied on. It is also cumbersome to maintain the peace and the human duty to endure this hardship. It is only possible to conclude the negotiations by agreeing on the acceptance and ingestion of these facts, and perhaps by agreeing on a number of boundary regulations and similar requirements. This means that all parties agree that the actual situation is the best solution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]