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Presentata sin dalla sua campagna elettorale del 2016, la visione dell’ordine internazionale del repubblicano Donald Trump incorpora in un medesimo coacervo di intenti realismo politico, nazionalismo e unilateralismo. Sottesa alla concezione trumpiana della politica estera vi era l’idea che fosse nell’interesse degli Stati Uniti abbandonare l’internazionalismo e il multilateralismo della precedente amministrazione e adottare un corso di azione dogmaticamente aderente alle priorità nazionali. Adottando una prospettiva storica, la prima parte di questo capitolo analizza lo scarto tra retorica e contenuti di specifiche posizioni adottate dal presidente Trump, discutendo continuità e discontinuità nella sua politica estera ed approfondendo il tema delle matrici politiche del dell’unilateralismo alla base del nazionalismo economico della sua amministrazione. Successivamente il capitolo si concentra su obbiettivi, costi ed esiti della politica commerciale dell’amministrazione Trump, analizzando poi, sulla scorta di alcuni concetti-chiave dell’International Political Economy (IPE), le principali determinanti e caratteristiche del protezionismo trumpiano. Mettendo a confronto tali caratteristiche con quelle di precedenti ondate di chiusura commerciale nella storia degli Stati Uniti tra il secondo dopoguerra ed oggi, il capitolo prende in esame la rilevanza degli incentivi sistemici, relazionali e domestici alla protezione commerciale. La securitizzazione mercantilista degli scambi economici compiuta da Trump, e l’utilizzo sistematico della diplomazia commerciale come arma di politica estera, il capitolo sostiene, suggeriscono la singolarità del protezionismo trumpiano ma conducono ad una riflessione che va oltre la dicotomia continuità-rottura. Più in particolare, il capitolo discute la portata delle scelte commerciali dell’Amministrazione Trump, analizzandone le ricadute a livello bilaterale, regionale e sistemico. Il capitolo proietta infine le eredità del mercantilismo trumpiano in chiave futura, alla luce della piattaforma liberale e democratica del nuovo presidente Biden, per avanzare ipotesi sugli impatti di tale cambiamento sul sistema di governance delle relazioni economiche globali

The EU and its member states are collectively the most generous donor worldwide, while the World Bank is the most important multilateral institution in development lending. Both institutions have become crucial players in the shaping of development promotion multilaterally, cooperating towards reaching the MDG. Notwithstanding the fact the EU-cum-MS are the main contributor to the Bank, very little research has explored the EU-WB cooperation in the policymaking of development. An investigation on the nature, evolution and impact of the interaction between these two actors in development polices, The EU, the World Bank and the Policymaking of Aid is intended as a first step towards filling such gap. The two institutions, a political union and a development bank, are formally independent from one another, pursuing distinct objectives which may occasionally fall in the same remit. Their memberships are partially overlapping, but neither institution has a legal standing in the other’s governing bodies. Coordination between EU Executive Directors at the WB Executive Board has increased across time, but no consensus has been reached on compacting existing seats into fewer EU-homogenous constituencies yet. The book traces the roots of such an improved coordination, delving into the dynamics of informal bargaining at the World Bank’s Board, and exploring the extent to which these practices have so far been relied on as a substitute for an enhanced role of the Union at the World Bank’s Board. The book argues that coordination and cooperation between them have grown in substance to a level that makes it imperative to explore their shape, determinants and implications, under both theoretical and policy lenses. Empirical references, based on a Survey, in depth interviews and field work, are by and large a recurrent feature of the volume, an ineludible task for a virtually untouched subject. The analysis is nonetheless explicitly set to serve three main theoretical goals. First, the book originally conceptualizes the EU-WB set of accountability ties as a hybrid form of delegation, pointing to the need of fertilizing PA models with insights from implementation and business literatures, to endogeneize the behavior of ‘external stakeholders’ in the explanation of inter-organizational dynamics. Second, through an investigation on the EU-World Bank relations and policies over the course of two decades (1990-2010), the book advances new hypotheses to understand key dynamics at work in the interaction between two partially overlapping multilateral systems, thus contributing to the literature on ‘intersecting multilateralisms’. To this effect, it incorporates and critically reviews insights from the IR institutionalist and constructivist literatures. Far from disclaiming the relevance of institutional analyses of inter-organizational cooperation, the results of the investigation on the EU-World Bank cooperation point to the importance of a constant dialogue between the constructivist and rational choice approaches in the IR literature, by specifying the conditions under which either approach is most effective to analyze IOs interactions across time and space. Third, the book unpacks multilateral performance through an innovative framework, which conceptualizes both the EU’s performance at the Bank and with the Bank in the field, in three major areas, Europe and Central Asia, Middle East and North Africa and Sub-Saharan Africa.

To map relevant themes, problems and approaches to the study of system-wide economic turning points, this chapter adopts a backwards timeline, first discussing how the main political actors have responded to the crisis of 2007-2008. Attention is particularly placed on actors, sectors, behaviour and policies (who, what), across governance levels (where, domestic-supra-international), causal mechanism (why) and time (when). The focus is then moved to outcomes and, particularly, logics that have informed political responses at the international level. Elaborating on the link between the (relative degree of) global coordination and post-crisis systemic persistence, the chapter critically reviews the main IPE, CPE and economic academic contributions on the topic, raising the issue of crisis’ endogeneity, on both epistemological and policy grounds. Building on the conceptualization of crises as endogenous variables, the analysis is then moved back in time to the micro- and macro-foundational paths that those literatures have elaborated upon to explain the origins of the 2007-08 crisis and its subsequent developments, during the Great recession. Connecting political causes and responses, the chapter deepens the focus on short and long run priors, first, and political actions-outcomes, then, in two selected cases in US policy (the anti-cyclical response of the US administrations in several macroeconomic and financial policies, respectively, between 2008 and 2013) . The two short probes are used to shed light on the relative goodness of ‘boom-bust’ models advanced in economic, IPE and CPE literatures to study responses to global crises. Discussing the post-crisis missing run against the US dollar, a notable case of non-response to the recent global shock, the analysis further problematizes the exceptionality narrative. Country and region-specific factors (Eurozone weakness, strategic and security priorities of major Emerging Market Economies- hereinafter EMEs), as well as system-wide dynamics (network and node properties of US, European and EMEs financial markets) have concurred to explain the enduring centrality of the US dollar, strengthening the case for methodological pluralism and inter-disciplinary approaches to the study of global crises. To conclude, the chapter indicates where cross-fertilization may bring further progress in the study of coordinated responses to the 2008 crisis.

The idea that constitutional liberal democracies (republics, in the words of Immanuel Kant) share a special brand that defines their foreign policies from those of other polities had been elaborated first in the liberal tradition in the 18th century. Since the 1980s the relationship between liberal-democracies and actual or potential violent conflict has then taken centre stage in IR debates thanks to Michael Doyle’s seminal recovery of Kant’s On Perpetual Peace [Doyle 1983a; 1983b]. In 2001, the two-part essay by Doyle has received major empirical support and insightful theoretical refinements by Bruce Russett and John Oneal’s Triangulating Peace: Democracy, Interdependence and International Organi¬zations. Grounded in these peculiar readings of Kant’s Perpetual Peace, the idea that liberal-democracies engage in violent conflict with each other less than any other type of partners do, has spurred one among the most fruitful research programs in the IR discipline [Maliniak et al. 2007, 29]. Unpacking the theoretical roots of the three ways to Kantian peace and of their derivative triangulations, through an informed reconstruction of Doyle’s two articles and Russett and Oneal seminal book, the chapter engages with key debates on the relevance of alternative explanations of both dyadic and systemic peace since the end of the Cold war. In light of the reversal in democratization trends, civilizational clashes and enhanced economic globalization, the chapter discusses the significance of contract intensity, interest similarity and ideational arguments to the explanation of bilateral and systemic conflict. Based on the evidence provided in recent contributions from the neo-Kantian and realist camps, the chapter argues in favour of an enduring relevance of the liberal variety of democratic polities to enhance the chances for international peace.

The third wave of globalization, since the mid-seventies, and, particularly, the global crisis of 2008, along with its warning signals through the Asian crisis ten years before, represent key watersheds in the global political economy. New intellectual stimuli have emerged, that led to re-think the role of the state in its relation to global crises, and to explore that of other non-state actors. Refecting on those developments, IR and IPE scholarships have suggested the existence of a gap in the understanding of how domestic, transnational and systemic forces operate in the genesis of major international political-economic outcomes. The acknowledgement of such gap has prompted some particularly harsh judgement on pre-crisis IPE research. On the other hand, it has also led innovative IPE research to widen the scope of the agent-structure debate, to theorize about the different modalities through which domestic and systemic determinants interact at the creation of relevant international outcomes. In this chapter I engage directly with that theme, tracing the origins and early developments of IPE as an academic inter-discipline, to argue about its theoretical potential on both the political-economic and domestic-systemic analytical dimensions. Looking at the redefinition of political spaces in the global age, the chapter then discusses implications for IPE scholarship, with respect to research on the role of non-state actors. Against the background of the millennium turn, the evolution of IPE as a discipline is then surveyed, and insights provided relative to the debates on the potential of the ‘new’ vs ‘old’ and current IPE (Keohane 2009). A case is made to support the importance of a pluralist stance regarding the conceptual possibilities offered by IPE studies on agent-structure issues, with particular reference to research on the global crisis and responses to it, as analysed by the different chapters in this book. Meeting recent calls for a more problem-oriented and pragmatic IPE (Johnson et al. 2013), the concluding section focuses on the non-prescriptive approach of the research conducted for this book and advances a few policy implications that can be drawn from its key findings.

The interplay between politics and the economy in times of crisis and change is one of the most challenging dynamics of our time. While relevant per se, political economy has become pervasive in the new global context, taking centre stage in academic and policy debates. Whether the focus is on the Great recession or the EU regulation and enlargement processes, the timing and quality of political responses to the crisis has been powerfully influenced by the interaction between political-economic actors and institutions. Questioning the exogenous interpretation of crisis and change, the contributions to this volume offer new explanations for the responses of nation-states to one of the most pressing challenges of globalized capitalism. In The political economy of crisis and change in the new global context the authors explore the frontiers of the interaction between politics and markets towards the understanding of the 2008 crisis and responses to it. They do so from both Comparative (CPE) and International Political Economy (IPE) perspectives. A reference for scholars in CPE, IPE, International relations and Political science, the book will be of value to both academic and non-academic readers that have an interest in the political economy of crisis and change in the USA, the European Union and the MENA region.

This chapter investigates the main dimensions of the performance of the European Union (EU) in the World Bank’s Executive Board, focusing specifically on the institutional and policy levels, and suggesting potential approaches to explain the EU’s field performance in World Bank–coordinated and multi-donor projects. Based on a set of different empirical sources (interviews; documentary surveys on EU, World Bank, and third-party documents), the article identifies the main determinants of the variation in the EU’s performance, and provides inputs towards an overall explanatory framework of the Union’s achievements at the World Bank.

This article looks at the literature on the microfoundations of the global political space. It compares how selected insights from the public policy, International Relations and International Political Economy (hereinafter IR and IPE) IR-IPE literatures, respectively, fare in explaining the creation of the Africa Infrastructure Trust Fund (ITF), the first blending facility to finance development under EU leadership. Based on previous research on the peculiar set of accountabilities between the EU and the World Bank, the analysis points to the conditional relevance of EU-, relational (interorganizational) and systemic factors in the explanation of the ITF launch. It concludes that meaningful research on delegation between global governors should aim at further cross-fertilizing IR-IPE and public policy literatures and that, ultimately, eclecticism holds the highest potential to improve the understanding of aid policymaking in a global setting.

The EU is collectively the largest donor to the World Bank, itself the prime multilateral development agency in the world. Yet, only EU MS are shareholders to the World Bank, and have seats at its Board. The Union is not a member and does not even have an observer status. The absence of legal standing may be the most evident reason why very little has been written on the EU’s role at the World Bank. Ambivalence in World Bank staff about the EU’s competence concerning development policies is, justifiably, patent (Baroncelli, 2009). Conversely, within the broader literature on the EU in multilateral institutions (Latikaainen and Smith, 2006; Jørgensen, 2009) a small but growing body of studies has focused on the role of the EU in the International Monetary Fund (IMF), where the EU has an observer status (Bini Smaghi, 2004 and 2009; Truman, 2006), plausibly favoured by the puzzle of a single currency union with multiple external representatives in monetary affairs. While some authors have analyzed the Bank jointly with the IMF (Woods and Lombardi, 2006; Faini and Grilli, 2004, 1), very few contributions have focused exclusively on the role of the EU at the Bank (Baroncelli, fortchoming). This contribution argues that there are in fact several reasons to take a closer look at what the EU does at the World Bank and with the World Bank, why it does it and, especially, how and how well it does it. First, the sheer weight of resources devoted by the EU to promote development and eradicate poverty, both bilaterally and through the World Bank, has grown remarkably since the late 1990s. Second, at around 33 per cent over total voting at the Bank’s Executive Board, the combined votes that EU member states can mobilize through the World Bank’s constituency system far outweighs either the weight of the US quota or the 15 per cent required to form a blocking minority. Third, progress has occurred since 2003, when an informal consultation group (Eurogroup) was set up to coordinate the position of EU EDs at the Board on matters of joint European interest. In spite of the upgraded status of the EU at the UNGA, there does not seem indication of similar developments at the World Bank. What are the main reasons behind such gap between devoted resources and delegated authority? How has informal coordination served as a substitute for an enhanced role of the Union at the World Bank’s Board so far? How has their cooperation proceeded on the ground, in the light of the relevant changes that have occurred in development policymaking since the launching of the MDGs in 2000? This chapter looks at these issues under both theoretical and policy lenses. In line with recent IR studies on organizational change, it is argued that both institutionalist and constructivist literatures have much to contribute to answer such questions, and that their inputs into delegation and role theory, respectively, can provide useful tools to analyze and conceptualize the overall set of relations between the Union and the Bank. Furthermore, based on new empirical evidence, this chapter contends that neither of the two approaches can fully account for the multiple processes that result from the interaction between the EU and World Bank systems, respectively. Inputs from multilevel governance and development literatures are then factored in towards a better understanding of the cooperation between the EU and the World Bank, as a case of interaction between large multilateral organizations with overlapping memberships.

Capitolo introduttivo alla curatela, suddiviso in quattro sezioni: - Gramsci, le Relazioni internazionali e la Storia - Il recupero del pensiero gramsciano negli studi di International Political Economy (Ipe) -Ipe neogramsciana, rapporto interno-esterno e ruolo dei paesi in via di sviluppo -Idee, potere e mutamento: i limiti dell'ortodossia coxiana e l'invito alla 'cross-fertilization' Dalla Prefazione al libro (G. Schirru): 'L'ampia e documentata introduzione di Mario Del Pero ed Eugenia Baroncelli, assieme ai riferimenti bibliografici contenuti nei singoli saggi, possono offrire al lettore gli strumenti per approfondire singoli aspetti della letteratura scientifica, o settori di analisi che sono rimasti maggiormente in ombra nelle nostre scelte.'

Questo capitolo ripercorre sinteticamente l’evoluzione della struttura, del mandato e della mission della Banca Mondiale, dalle origini ad oggi, approfondendone le principali ricadute di policy tramite le lenti concettuali fornite dagli approcci neo-istituzionalista e costruttivista. Sulla scorta di questa disamina, le conclusioni discutono le implicazioni future del cammino fin qui compiuto dalla Banca e dai suoi membri, con particolare riferimento ai temi della riforma della sua governance interna e della efficacia della sua azione sulle dinamiche di sviluppo degli stati partner.

The piece offers a thought-through Review of the book Politica in Italia. I fatti dell’anno e le interpretazioni. Edizione 2012, edited by Anna Bosco and Duncan McDonnell, Bologna, il Mulino, 2012, 360 pp., €27 (paperback), ISBN 978-8-81-524014-9. Informed by recent political developments, the Review argues that the Book has intercepted the main trends at play in Italian politics since 2011, while casting doubts on some conclusions advanced there on the ‘game-changing’ role played by selected top political players (most notably the Prime Minister).

Since partition in 1947, when they both gained their independence from Great Britain, India and Pakistan have become sovereign states along opposite sides of a militarized border. In this book Eugenia Baroncelli traces the evolving connection between inter-state violence and trade in Pakistan-India relations. Based on a gravity model of international trade, the book discusses the impact of war on bilateral trade from 1948 to 2000. Ongoing militarized disputes have significantly reduced Pakistan-India trade, leading to a fourfold decrease in expected flows in war years. Trade diplomacy through regional preferences has however engendered some optimism on the future relations between the two countries, as indicated by the trade gains that can be expected from the implementation of SAFTA (South Asian Free Trade Area). Nonetheless, trade gains from preferences are more contained compared to trade gains from shifting to a peaceful environment. Moreover, trade gains appear endogenous to security relations, so that their realization is conditional upon reduced tension in high level diplomacy between the two countries. While the potential of trade dividend from peace is great, so are the challenges that still stand in the way of Pakistan and India’s peace building through commercial diplomacy.

Intimamente connaturato alla gestione del potere organizzato sopra una collettività ed un territorio, il tema della produzione della ricchezza ha costituito uno dei principali nodi analitici della riflessione del pensiero economico classico e pre-classico. La questione ha assunto importanza ulteriore all’indomani della prima Rivoluzione industriale per i maggiori stati del sistema internazionale più di due secoli fa. Tuttavia, è solo dopo la fine del secondo conflitto mondiale che il tema, poi declinato nei termini di «sviluppo economico», viene recepito dagli stati vincitori come priorità politica da estendere anche ai paesi «sottosviluppati», ed eguagliato, in termini operativi, alla promozione della crescita del reddito pro-capite. Nata nel 1946, sulla base di quanto deciso dalle potenze vincitrici mediante gli Accordi di Bretton Woods, la Banca Internazionale per la Ricostruzione e lo Sviluppo è oggi, assieme alle altre istituzioni del World Bank Group, la principale organizzazione internazionale preposta al sostegno della ricostruzione post-bellica e dello sviluppo economico degli stati membri. Molti sono i cambiamenti occorsi entro il sistema internazionale da allora, sia sotto il profilo economico che politico. A maggiori opportunità di finanziamento per i paesi in via di sviluppo, si è accompagnata una crescente instabilità dei mercati e volatilità delle valute. La fine del bipolarismo ha poi aperto nuove opportunità per molti paesi precedentemente esclusi dalla rete degli scambi globale, portando in primo piano il problema degli effetti reciproci tra transizione politica e transizione economica in un contesto diverso rispetto a quello delle esperienze post-coloniali. Infine, la crisi asiatica di fine anni Novanta, e la contemporanea crisi globale hanno drammaticamente evidenziato i limiti della attuale architettura finanziaria internazionale. Per rispondere alle sfide implicate da tali mutamenti, la Banca ampliato il proprio mandato fino ad includere la promozione dello sviluppo ecologicamente sostenibile, la lotta alla povertà e il sostegno ad una buona governance nei paesi partner. Con molta difficoltà essa sta poi cercando di riformare la propria governance interna, riequilibrando in senso maggiormente egualitario l’attuale sistema di voto ponderato, allo scopo di aumentare la voice dei paesi in transizione ed in via di sviluppo. Unito alla struttura decisionale per constituencies che ne caratterizza gli organi principali, tale sistema configura infatti in senso fortemente asimmetrico la struttura interna della Banca. Questo contributo discute il ruolo che la Banca ha giocato nella sua missione di sostegno alla causa dello sviluppo, ricostruendone le principali tappe evolutive, e proiettandone le funzioni nel contesto dei futuri rapporti economici globali. In particolare, viene indagata la rispondenza di specifiche revisioni della mission della Banca alle esigenze dei paesi in via di sviluppo, valutando poi le implicazioni della riforma dell’attuale meccanismo di voto, anche alla luce della crisi globale in atto e dei riequilibri nei ruoli dei maggiori stati entro l’economia globale. Infine, il capitolo discute il ruolo della Banca nella gestione degli effetti di composizione relativi alla presenza di nuovi donatori nel mercato delle politiche per lo sviluppo, con particolare riferimento al caso della Cina. Soffermandosi sul tema del coordinamento tra «vecchi» e «nuovi» donatori, il contributo esamina la ridefinizione del ruolo della Banca a seguito dell’ampliamento dell’Unione Europea, e della assunzione di un ruolo maggiormente strategico da parte di quest’ultima nella definizione e implementazione dei suoi programmi di sviluppo. Tracciando una mappa sintetica delle sfide ad oggi aperte, il contributo evidenzia infine le opportunità esistenti in tema di promozione dello sviluppo in generale, e relativamente allo spazio di azione ed al potenziale della Banca in particolare.

Il tema della transizione di regime è stato trattato mediante una pluralità di approcci, tanto dai filoni classici degli studi di politica comparata e sviluppo politico, quanto, più recentemente, dagli studi di relazioni internazionali ed international political economy. Molto si è scritto sulla «terza ondata» di democratizzazioni, iniziata alla metà degli anni settanta. Più recente è invece la riflessione sulla involuzione verso estremi non democratici che caratterizza da oltre un decennio un numero crescente di regimi. La debole tenuta di molti tra questi regressi ha addirittura fatto parlare di una «terza ondata di riflusso», suggerendo la necessità di ripensare criticamente i sentieri analitici sino ad ora battuti dagli studi sulla democratizzazione e sul consolidamento. Quali aspetti delle transizioni occorse durante gli anni settanta sono stati effettivamente spiegati dai modelli e dagli approcci classici, e quali invece, alla luce dei recenti sviluppi, suggeriscono che gli strumenti di indagine correnti potrebbero essere utilmente ridefiniti? Se la specificità storica di quegli anni è senz’altro una delle ragioni a favore di una lettura «dedicata», la cifra analitica della ricerca politologica indica le potenzialità insite nella sistematizzazione degli strumenti di indagine, anche su un passato relativamente recente. Effettuata sulle ipotesi principali avanzate in tema di transizione e consolidamento politico, la rielaborazione critica che segue si inserisce entro questo solco. Oltre a ripercorrere in maniera sintetica alcuni tra gli snodi fondamentali del pensiero comparatista e internazionalista sul tema della transizione democratica, questo capitolo fornisce nuovi spunti per la lettura delle svolte a ritroso subite dai percorsi di democratizzazione tra la fine del Ventesimo secolo e i giorni nostri. L’urgenza del momento rispetto a casi quali quello russo, pakistano, tailandese, nigeriano o venezuelano suggerisce la necessità di approfondire il ruolo delle cause della transizione nelle nuove democrazie. Una indagine su tale tendenza pare poi imprescindibile nell’ottica di una riflessione più ampia sul tema della stabilità democratica, anche rispetto ai casi di regimi maturi, per approfondire anche le opportunità di miglioramento della prassi democratica di lungo periodo. Il capitolo propone quindi una lettura critica delle ipotesi classiche sul ruolo dei fattori economici e culturali nei processi di transizione democratica, discutendo limiti e potenzialità di tali ipotesi per l’esplorazione di nuovi sentieri analitici. Ad essa affianca una riflessione sul rapporto tra fattori interni e fattori esterni nei processi di transizione, con riferimento al ruolo degli aiuti allo sviluppo nelle transizioni di regime. Applicando le considerazioni sul ruolo dei fattori culturali, economici ed esterni alle esperienze recenti di Pakistan, Nigeria, Russia, Venezuela e Tailandia, il capitolo propone quindi alcune ipotesi preliminari per una spiegazione «spessa» dei regressi autocratici. Come discusso nelle ultime due sezioni, le diverse combinazioni di queste tre variabili possono essere utilmente integrate alla luce della letteratura sui fattori di supporto alla stabilità e alla qualità della democrazia, dimostratisi recentemente elementi-chiave nella spiegazione della tenuta democratica e, ove assenti, delle ricadute autocratiche occorse nel passato quindicennio.

Bruce Russett e John Oneal: la teoria neokantiana della pace perpetua E.Baroncelli Triangulating Peace: Democracy, Interdependence and International Organizations, di Bruce Russett e John Oneal, esce nel 2001. In forma scorrevole, nonostante contenuti densi e numerosi riferimenti tecnici, Triangulating Peace ripercorre la pluriennale ricerca degli autori a supporto della teoria neokantiana secondo cui la democrazia, l’interdipendenza economica (commercio) e le organizzazioni internazionali hanno avuto un effetto pacificatore, sia indipendente che congiunto, sui rapporti interstatali nel periodo 1885-1992. L’osservazione empirica della pressoché totale assenza di guerre tra regimi democratici (c.d. pace separata o pace democratica) confermava la tesi secondo cui ‘l’autogoverno popolare’ era ‘lo strumento per sfuggire alle trappole dell’anarchia internazionale’ [Panebianco 1997, 55]. Richiamando il Kant del Progetto per la pace perpetua [1795], la scuola neokantiana delle Ri ha ipotizzato, provato empiricamente e, in buona misura, spiegato il legame positivo tra liberaldemocrazia condivisa (il repubblicanesimo kantiano) e pace. Il recupero tardivo è ascrivibile al fatto che ‘la maggior parte delle connessioni tra politica estera e relazioni internazionali era stata lasciata da parte dietro suggerimento di realisti quali Kenneth Waltz’ [Gartzke e Hewitt 2010, 116]. Tecniche di manipolazione dei dati ancora poco evolute, ed una base empirica ristretta hanno poi concorso ad un iniziale rigetto dell’ipotesi di una minore conflittualità nei rapporti tra democrazie. Le ragioni del successo di Triangulating Peace non vanno dunque ricercate nella novità delle argomentazioni. Ciò non toglie che i pregi dell’opera, in buona parte coincidenti con i motivi per cui essa è considerata a ragione un classico delle Ri, siano, tuttavia, molteplici e notevoli. Primo, il volume, ‘un magistrale tour de force’ [Ward 2002, 484], costituisce una summa delle ipotesi, verifiche empiriche e rielaborazioni teoriche della scuola neokantiana. Russett e Oneal elaborano congiuntamente le ipotesi-chiave di tre dei più importanti filoni della riflessione liberale sulla pace, riunendoli sotto l’egida ‘illustre’ del disegno kantiano, nel solco dell’analisi pionieristica compiuta da Michael Doyle: la ‘pace democratica’, la pace attraverso il commercio e la pace attraverso il diritto. Secondo, Triangulating peace indaga empiricamente molti dei collegamenti reciproci tra quei tre ordini di argomentazioni, proponendo un disegno complessivo di ragguardevole portata, secondo cui le tre ‘vie kantiane’ alla pace si rafforzerebbero vicendevolmente e sarebbero a loro volta rafforzate dal consolidamento di relazioni pacifiche tra gli stati. Terzo, Russett e Oneal confrontano direttamente le tre ipotesi kantiane tra di loro, valutandone la rilevanza anche rispetto alle principali ipotesi realiste, culturali e neomarxiste di spiegazione della guerra. L’altro filo conduttore del volume è il dialogo costante sia con filoni interni al liberalismo, ma esterni alla scuola neokantiana, sia con approcci non liberali allo studio delle Ri, al livello sia degli assunti originari che degli esiti. Il rigore analitico delle numerose verifiche statistiche, corroborato anche da una nutrita appendice, è infine un notevole punto di forza di Triangulating Peace, definito ‘il libro di gran lunga migliore e più interessante mai scritto nella tradizione quantitativa degli studi di politica internazionale’ [Weede 2001, 645].

Susan Strange: The Authority of Questioning (Eugenia Baroncelli) Susan Strange started her career as a journalist in the 1940s. When she passed away in 1998 she was already regarded as one of the main scholars in International relations (IR) and, particularly, International Political Economy (IPE), a field whose creation owes much to her intellectual and academic engagement. Advocates and critics have debated her work, often prompted by her innovative ideas and vibrant intertextual style. Looking at the distinctive traits of Strange’s research and personality, this chapter first goes through the main merits of her thought and academic engagement. Based on inputs from critical voices, it then discusses three aspects of her thought (‘theoretical scarcity’, ‘structural power’, and Strange’s attempt to bridge the gap between the study of politics and economics), arguing that these alleged drawbacks (which often stemmed from her explicit eclecticism) help to a large extent to articulate a distinct position in the academic debate between IPE Positivist and Critical-post positivist Schools. Finally, this contribution highlights those arguments and concepts which, innovative in the days when Strange first formulated them, have become key aspects of modern IPE scholarly research, and have proven her interpretation and anticipation of crucial dynamics across different governance levels. In spite of her staunch academic engagement, Strange constantly challenged the orthodox establishment. Her habit of questioning authority made her wary of attempts at categorizing thought and thinkers. However, it is precisely the resilience of those arguments and concepts, enduring yet flexible as they derived from the continuous questioning of facts and theories, which have made of Strange a master of IR and IPE studies, and an ineludible reference point for any serious research on global political-economic relations.

Investigated since the breakdown of the Soviet Union, the case of regime transition in Russia has attracted a constantly growing number of studies from comparative politics, international relations and international political economy literatures. This chapter looks at the evolution of the Russian political regime, from the years of the Soviet collapse (1987-1991) to recent times (2009). By taking stock of the studies in the transition literature, it highlights elements of conformity, as well as of idiosyncratic specificity, to situate the evolution of the Russian regime in the complex space of multidimensional typologies on institutional change and consolidation. While answering to key questions on the peculiarity of the ‘Russian hybridism’ (its definition, its origins and evolution), it also critically discusses the arguments behind the ‘incompleteness’ thesis, to ground an explanatory framework of the anti-democratic revirement that has occurred since 2000. Finally, it maintains that the future of Russia will crucially depend on three sets of interrelated factors: top-down political-economy determinants (that are both elite- and system-driven), the role of powerful external actors (namely the US and EU) and, ultimately, bottom-up inputs from Russian civil society.

Oggetto di studio in contributi provenienti da diversi filoni dell’analisi politologica sin dalla dissoluzione dell’Unione Sovietica, il tema della transizione di regime in Russia continua a richiamare l’attenzione delle riflessioni comparata, internazionalista e di IPE (International political economy). Ripercorrendo le principali tappe che hanno contrassegnato la storia della evoluzione del regime politico russo, dagli anni immediatamente precedenti il crollo sovietico (1987-1991) ad oggi, e prendendo le mosse dalle principali interpretazioni proposte in letteratura, questo contributo risponde ad alcune domande-chiave avanzate su questo particolare caso di regime ibrido. In primo luogo, mediante la costruzione di uno schema analitico multicausale, questo saggio propone una interpetazione analiticamente fondata ed al tempo stesso storicamente situata, sulla natura della transizione russa, discutendo criticamente le ragioni a sostegno della tesi della «incompletezza». In secondo luogo, esso avanza alcune ipotesi sulle cause della svolta anti-democratica consolidatasi a partire dal 2000. Infine, sulla base delle riflessioni compiute, esso suggerisce alcuni possibili scenari relativi alla evoluzione istituzionale del regime russo

Il volume indaga il tema delle cause non economiche del commercio tra stati, approfondendo il ruolo della democrazia, delle alleanze militari e degli accordi preferenziali a base regionale. L'applicazione di un modello gravitazionale ad un ampio campione di stati tra il 1960 ed il 2000, unitamente all'approfondimento sui casi dei rapporti tra India e Pakistan e, rispettivamente, Canada e Stati Uniti, segnala da un lato il persistente effetto depressivo del conflitto sugli scambi, dall'altro il ruolo fondamentale della condivisione democratica. L'indagine sul processo di regionalizzazione in sud Asia tramite il SAFTA, infine, apre la strada ad una riflessione sul ruolo della diplomazia commerciale nei conflitti tra stati.

With a total of more than 45 billions of Euros the European Union (EU) is by far the largest donor in the world. Since the launching of the EU Consensus on Development in 2005, in addition to its sheer weight in the provision of flows, the Union has also stressed its renewed support towards the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (Commission 2008). Furthermore, as estimated by OECD/DAC/Commission reported data, most of the the pledged aid increase (90%) in the context of the MDG-focused policies is expected to come from European countries (Commission 2008, 5). The emphasis put on aid effectiveness at the level of global negotiations has highlighted the need, at the EU level, to work towards increased policy coherence. Such an effort has then added a further dimension to the original prominence of scaling up in the global challenge towards the eradication of poverty. The redefinition in the making of the EU development policies that has ensued has entailed a search for horizontal coherence across different policy domains, prompting a drive towards increased policy consistency for the sake of both the EU’s internal cohesion and the effectiveness of its external action. The Union’s historical prominence in the area of trade, as well as its sustained effort to improve the quality of its action in migration, security and environmental fields warrant higher alert to the attainment of such coherence through the pursuit of development objectives. This chapter explores how the EU is viewed at present in one of the major international financial institutions in the world, as well as a key actor in the context of multilateral development policies: the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD), also popularly known as The World Bank (WB). Looking at perceptions on the EU’s external action in both trade and development fields appears of paramount importance. On the one side it returns the opinion of the major multilateral lender on the major donor in the field. On the other side, in the light of the search for policy coherence implied in the Union’s new drive towards development, it provides new elements to track the EU’s quoted effort in the reform of its overall external action (Commission 2008). Mirroring the EU’s power, foreign policy role and independency through the eyes of the World Bank becomes a crucial step to track the ‘relevant Other’s’ perceptual elements that have been at play in these developments, possibly providing elements for a constructive redefinition of the EU’s own role in world politics.

Investigation on perceptual images of the EU at the World Bank

As a collective actor the EU currently provides the largest amount of aid to development. While financial institutions that operate in this policy field have grown in number and type, with varying outcomes in scope and impact, the World Bank is to date the major multilateral lending agency. In spite of the absence of an EU seat in the Bank’s Board, there is evidence that cooperation among EU EDs is already in place, less formal than in the sister institution of the Bank, the IMF, but, according to some, more effective relative to outcomes in decision making. At the policy level, instances of cooperation between the EU and the Bank have increased enormously in the past 15 years, notably in the cases of Europe and Central Asia since the early nineties, to be followed by MENA countries from 2000s and, last, by the prominent surge in cooperation to reduce poverty in Sub Saharan Africa. Based on empirical evidence from on-site and phone interviews, as well as on previous theoretical work on the EU’s foreign policy role at the World Bank, this paper will investigate the twin themes of consistency and effectiveness of the EU’s performance in the areas of action of the Bank, both at the decision-making and implementation levels. Last it will identify the main factors and causal mechanisms behind the variation in these outcomes, advancing elements towards an overall explanatory framework of the EU’s performance at the Bank, and of its impact on the policymaking of development.

L’importanza dell’Unione Europea (Ue) sulla scena internazionale rende indispensabile lo studio della dimensione esterna dei processi di policy europei. In questo studio viene definita “azione economica esterna” la formulazione ed esecuzione di azioni di politica estera dell’Ue nelle aree specifiche della politica commerciale comune, degli Accordi di associazione (Aa) e Accordi di partnership (Epa), e dell’aiuto allo sviluppo. I casi qui analizzati riguardano materie –e politiche- che, secondo il gergo comunitario scaturito dal Trattato sull’Unione europea [Tue 1993], sono comprese nel c.d. “primo pilastro” o “Pilastro Ce”. Le vicende dell’azione economica esterna qui ricostruite si riferiscono a politiche ricomprese a vario titolo entro le materie del commercio, trasporti, regime della concorrenza (commercio agricolo, servizi per il trasporto aereo, servizi per le telecomunicazioni di base, trade-related investments). Questo studio individua le condizioni alle quali l’agire degli Stati membri è avvenuto secondo modalità congiunte, rendendo possibile per l’Unione l’adozione di una linea esterna comune, e quando, invece, questi sono riusciti ad avanzare e difendere i propri interessi economici mediante alleanze strategiche minilaterali oppure in via unilaterale, in sede internazionale. Ad esclusione dei casi di azione esterna comune dovuti ad una originaria omogeneità delle preferenze degli Stati, appaiono importanti ai fini di questo studio i casi in cui, nonostante la presenza di tendenze di free-riding o minilaterali da parte degli Stati, l’Unione ha comunque potuto agire esternamente come attore unitario. La tesi qui sostenuta è che, verosimilmente ciò è accaduto per due ordini di ragioni. In primo luogo, si sono riscontrati casi di policy in cui l’azione comune si è data, nonostante la presenza di tendenze uni- e minilaterali degli Stati, a seguito di una sostanziale evoluzione istituzionale (hard e soft law), vuoi al livello comunitario, vuoi a quello delle istituzioni internazionali (in particolare entro il Gatt General agreeement on tariffs and trade-Wto World trade organization), vuoi, infine, ad entrambi i livelli, con effetti di influenza reciproca. In secondo luogo, l’analisi qui effettuata ha evidenziato casi in cui l’azione dell’Unione è stata stimolata dallo sviluppo e dalla circolazione di idee che hanno orientato le prassi di Stati, Consiglio, Commissione e Parlamento, socializzando i diversi stakeholders di riferimento (ai vari livelli subnazionale, nazionale, comunitario, transnazionale) in merito a specifici principi di policy.

Questo contributo ricostruisce criticamente il ruolo che l’evoluzione politica, economica e sociale del fenomeno integrativo europeo ha svolto relativamente agli studi di Relazioni internazionali (RI) e, particolarmente, di International political economy (IPE). Trattandosi di due discipline che nel sistema accademico italiano sono ricomprese entro la più ampia famiglia degli studi di Scienza politica, numerosi sono i riferimenti alle esperienze britannica e statunitense, e al dibattito sul ruolo dell’Unione Europea nella più ampia rete di relazioni politico-economiche internazionali. Riconoscendo il portato originale degli studi di policy analysis e di economia dell’integrazione ed economia delle istituzioni, questo contributo mette poi in luce alcuni aspetti del rapporto tra riflessione accademica ed evoluzione storica del fenomeno integrativo europeo, e conclude avanzando ipotesi sulle potenzialità dell’IPE nell’indagine sul ruolo internazionale dell’UE.

From the oft-quoted ‘capabilities-expectation gap’ (Hill 1993; 1998) to the findings advanced in recent studies on the Others’ views of the EU’s role in foreign economic negotiations (Elgström 2006), it seems undisputable that the Union’s action in the area of external economic policy has attracted much scholarly attention, as a benchmark for comparison with the area of foreign and security policies, or as a contested field in its own right, providing at times clear evidence against fears of resurgent intergovernmental dynamics, only to be recalled in other instances as an area where fragmentation and free-riding dynamics are always an option. While the academic interest on the EU’s role in multilateral political and economic settings such as the UN, the WTO and the IMF has successfully grown from earlier investigations, insights on the dynamics between the Union and the World Bank in the area of development policies seem to be still a missing piece in the literature. The paper is therefore a first attempt to fill this gap . Part of a broader research project on the relations between the EU and the World Bank, it deepens the investigation on the EU foreign policy roles in the area of development, within the setting of multilateral lending at the World Bank. While still a work-in-progress, it is hoped that this research will help to further advance the knowledge of composite aspects of foreign policy role, performance and impact of the EU. The emphasis on both role conception and expectation, coupled with preliminary data on performance, suggests the possibility of testing and refinement of the existing analytical frameworks on the EU foreign policy.

Based on recent IPE contributions on three key themes in international politics (the relation between trade-technology and interstate conflicts, the link between multinationalization in production and world stability, and the political economy of democracy promotion in post-conflict countries), this essay calls the attention on the potential that IPE studies have for the analysis of complex processes (political and economic, with domestic, international and trans-national reach) across long time-spans. Empirical research on these topics has provided new ground to test and refine hypotheses from the three IPE orthodox Schools (Realism-Mercantilism, Liberalism and Marxism), pointing to the advantages of multivariate setups that treat both political and economic determinants of international outcomes as endogenous. Studies on the trade-war links have opened the way to analyses of how growth-inducing mechanisms in war economies may combine with the lasting effects of war-borne protectionist coalitions in producing differential outcomes, according to countries’ resource endowments and level of development. Hypotheses on the peace-inducing features of multinationalized production appear in need of revision, especially when applied to the context of North-South relations, in which traditional dynamics identified in the FDI literature do not seem to obtain. Last, scholars interested in the political economy of post-war reconstruction could fruitfully borrow from the comparative literature on transitions, the economic contributions on development and the IR research on conflict, to provide new theoretical tools for the analysis of democracy promotion in post-conflict states.

Historically, formal trade between Pakistan and India has been extraordinarily low—only about one percent of either country’s global trade. In large part, this reflects the fact that relations between the two countries have been tense for most of the last 50 years. This situation is rapidly changing, however. The signing of the South Asia Free Trade Area (SAFTA) agreement on January 6, 2004, represents an important turning-point in the relationship between Pakistan and India. This chapter provides a first approximation of changes in overall trade flows that might result from improved relations within the region. The chapter employs a gravity model, a standard analytical tool used by trade economists to estimate trade flows between countries based on factors such as countries’ income, proximity, shared institutions, trade agreements, and the like. Gravity models are widely used to assess whether subsets of countries trade more or less than what one would expect, based on the “normal” trade that takes place within a larger set of countries. In particular, the chapter focuses on two factors: the reduction of conflict between India and Pakistan, and the elimination of barriers to trade between South Asian countries. Pakistan–India conflict has had a significant negative impact on aggregate trade flows. Controlling for other variables, we estimate that trade between Pakistan and India would increase by 405 percent in the absence of conflict. We also estimate that Pakistan and India could further increase their bilateral trade by another 79 percent by entering into a preferential trade agreement (PTA) such as SAFTA. The paper recommends that policy makers from both sides “let geography work” and open the way to further dynamic gains by giving impetus to cooperation at a high political level, and by smoothing the tension in defense and security policies. It is our hope that the results of our analysis will add strength to this process and endow policy makers with yet another proof of the gains from peaceful proximity and trade.

Il volume presenta i risultati della ricerca dottorale condotta dall'autrice sul ruolo delle variabili politiche (sistemiche, quasi-sistemiche ed interne) nella genesi dei flussi commerciali bilaterali tra gli stati. Tramite la costruzione e applicazione di un originale modello gravitazionale su un dataset composito (37023 osservazioni, relative a 42 stati e 903 diadi per 41 anni, tra il 1960 ed il 2000) il lavoro stima l'impatto autonomo della presenza di alleanze militari, democrazia condivisa e membership condivisa in accordi commerciali preferenziali per ciascuna coppia di stati sui loro flussi commerciali bilaterali, discutendo criticamente, anche sulla scorta di approfondimenti qualitativi, il ruolo della politica nelle scelte commerciali nei contesti pre- e post-bipolari. The volume contains the results of the PhD research carried out by the Author on the impact of political variables (systemic, quasi-systemic, domestic) on inter-state bilateral trade flows. Through the setup and application of an original gravity model on a large-n dataset (37023 observations, 42 states, 903 dyads observed across 41 years, between 1960 and 2000), the study estimates the independent influence that military alliances, shared democracy and shared membership in PTAs had on bilateral trade flows in the period under investigation, respectively. The book critically discusses how these three political variables, integrated with specific case-studies, have impacted on states' trade policy choices in pre- and post-bipolar contexts.

This paper is a contribution to the policy debate on trade and investment integration in the three core Maghreb countries (Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia). An important element of such a debate is a clear understanding of the implications and benefits of further integration with regional, European and global markets, the potential adjustments that will arise and how these can best be mitigated