TY - JOUR A1 - Dörfler, Thomas A1 - Gehring, Thomas T1 - Analogy-based collective decision-making and incremental change in international organizations JF - European journal of international relations N2 - We examine how analogy-based collective decision-making of member states contributes to the endogenous emergence of informal rules and the incremental change of international organizations (IOs). Decision-making by analogy is an important characteristic of day-to-day decision-making in IOs. Relating current decisions to previous ones through analogies drives incremental change and simultaneously reinforces organizational resilience. Whereas the foreign policy analysis literature shows that analogies can be used as cognitive shortcuts in fuzzy and complex foreign policy situations, we focus on their use to overcome social ambiguity (indeterminacy) of coordination situations in IOs. Drawing on psychological conceptions, we develop two micro-level mechanisms that elucidate the effects of analogy-based collective decision-making in member-driven IOs. Analogy-based collective decisions emphasizing similarity between a current situation and previous ones follow an established problem schema and produce expansive and increasingly well-established informal rules. Collective decisions that are analogy-based but emphasize a crucial difference follow different problem schemas and trigger the emergence of additional informal rules that apply to new classes of cases. The result is an increasingly fine-grained web of distinct organizational solutions for a growing number of problems. Accordingly, an IO can increasingly facilitate collective decision-making and gains resilience. Empirically, we probe these propositions with a documentary analysis of decision-making in the Yugoslavia sanctions committee, established by the United Nations Security Council to deal with a stream of requests for exempting certain goods or services from the comprehensive economic embargo imposed on Yugoslavia in response to the War in the Balkans. Y1 - 2021 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1177/1354066120987889 SN - 1354-0661 SN - 1460-3713 VL - 27 IS - 3 SP - 753 EP - 778 PB - Sage CY - London ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Dörfler, Thomas A1 - Hosli, Madeleine O. T1 - Reforming the United Nations Security Council BT - proposals, strategies and preferences T2 - Routledge Handbook of International Organization Y1 - 2013 SN - 978-0-415-50143-9 U6 - https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203405345.ch28 SP - 377 EP - 390 PB - Routledge CY - London ER - TY - BOOK A1 - Dörfler, Thomas T1 - Security council sanctions governance BT - the power and limits of rules T3 - Routledge research on the United Nations ; 6 N2 - Little is known about how far-reaching decisions in UN Security Council sanctions committees are made. Developing a novel committee governance concept and using examples drawn from sanctions imposed on Iraq, Al-Qaida, Congo, Sudan and Iran, this book shows that Council members tend to follow the will of the powerful, whereas sanctions committee members often decide according to the rules. This is surprising since both Council and committees are staffed by the same member states. Offering a fascinating account of Security Council micro-politics and decision-making processes on sanctions, this rigorous comparative and theory-driven analysis treats the Council and its sanctions committees as distinguishable entities that may differ in decision practice despite having the same members. Drawing extensively on primary documents, diplomatic cables, well-informed press coverage, reports by close observers and extensive interviews with committee members, Council diplomats and sanctions experts, it contrasts with the conventional wisdom on decision-making within these bodies, which suggests that the powerful permanent members would not accept rule-based decisions against their interests. This book will be of interest to policy practitioners and scholars working in the broad field of international organizations and international relations theory as well as those specializing in sanctions, international law, the Security Council and counter-terrorism. Y1 - 2019 SN - 978-0-42944-232-2 SN - 978-1-138-33749-7 SN - 978-0-4298-0874-6 SN - 978-0-4298-0873-9 U6 - https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429442322 PB - Routledge CY - London ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Rothermel, Ann-Kathrin T1 - Gender in the United Nations’ agenda on Preventing and Countering Violent Extremism JF - International feminist journal of politics N2 - The United Nations (UN) policy agenda on Preventing and Countering Violent Extremism (P/CVE) promotes a “holistic” approach to counterterrorism, which includes elements traditionally found in security and development programs. Advocates of the agenda increasingly emphasize the importance of gender mainstreaming for counterterrorism goals. In this article, I scrutinize the merging of the goals of gender equality, security, and development into a global agenda for counterterrorism. A critical feminist discourse-analytical reading of gender representations in P/CVE shows how problematic imageries of women as victims, economic entrepreneurs, and peacemakers from both the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals and the Women, Peace and Security agenda are reproduced in core UN documents advocating for a “holistic” P/CVE approach. By highlighting the tensions that are produced by efforts to merge the different gender discourses across the UN’s security and development institutions, the article underlines the relevance of considering the particular position of P/CVE at the security–development nexus for further gender-sensitive analysis and policies of counterterrorism. KW - Counterterrorism KW - gender mainstreaming KW - security–development nexus KW - discourse KW - United Nations KW - feminism Y1 - 2020 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1080/14616742.2020.1827967 SN - 1461-6742 SN - 1468-4470 VL - 22 IS - 5 SP - 720 EP - 741 PB - Taylor & Francis CY - London ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Reiners, Nina T1 - Despite or Because of Contestation? BT - how water became a human right JF - Human Rights Quarterly N2 - Almost twenty years after its recognition in international human rights law, the human right to water continues to spark discussions about its scope and meaning. This article revisits the evolution and contestation of the right's first international legal framework, General Comment No. 15 from the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. The analysis highlights the contestation of economic and social rights as a universal phenomenon at multiple levels, but argues that these meaning-making practices can support their validation and recognition. Y1 - 2021 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1353/hrq.2021.0021 SN - 1085-794X SN - 0275-0392 VL - 43 IS - 2 SP - 329 EP - 343 PB - Johns Hopkins Univ. CY - New York ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Liese, Andrea Margit A1 - Reiners, Nina T1 - The Eye of the Beholder? BT - The Contestation of Values and International Law ; Comment on Tiyanjana Maluwa JF - The International Rule of Law: Rise or Decline? Y1 - 2019 SN - 0191879398 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198843603.003.0021 SP - 335 EP - 343 PB - Oxford University Press CY - Oxford ER - TY - THES A1 - Reiners, Nina T1 - Transnational lawmaking coalitions for human rights Y1 - 2017 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Seyfried, Markus A1 - Ansmann, Moritz T1 - Unfreezing higher education institutions? BT - understanding the introduction of quality management in teaching and learning in Germany JF - Higher Education N2 - Quality management (QM) in teaching and learning has strongly “infected” the higher education sector and spread around the world. It has almost everywhere become an integral part of higher education reforms. While existing research on QM mainly focuses on the national level from a macro-perspective, its introduction at the institutional level is only rarely analyzed. The present article addresses this research gap. Coming from the perspective of organization studies, it examines the factors that were crucial for the introduction of QM at higher education institutions in Germany. As the introduction of QM can be considered to be a process of organizational change, the article refers to Kurt Lewin’s seminal concept of “unfreezing” organizations as a theoretical starting point. Methodologically, a mixed methods approach is applied by combining qualitative data derived from interviews with institutional quality managers and quantitative data gathered from a nationwide survey. The results show that the introduction of QM is initiated by either internal or external processes. Furthermore, some institutions follow a rather voluntary approach of unfreezing, while others show modes of forced unfreezing. Consequently, the way how QM was introduced has important implications for its implementation. KW - Quality management KW - Organizational change KW - Higher education KW - Mixed methods Y1 - 2018 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1007/s10734-017-0185-2 SN - 0018-1560 SN - 1573-174X VL - 75 IS - 6 SP - 1061 EP - 1076 PB - Springer CY - Dordrecht ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Fuhr, Harald T1 - The rise of the Global South and the rise in carbon emissions JF - Third world quarterly N2 - Jointly with the Global North, the rise of the Global South has come at a high cost to the environment. Driven by its high energy intensity and the use of fossil fuels, the South has contributed a significant portion of global emissions during the last 30 years, and is now contributing some 63% of today's total GHG emissions (including land-use change and forestry). Similar to the Global North, the Global South's emissions are heavily concentrated: India and China alone account for some 60% and the top 10 countries for some 78% of the group's emissions, while some 120 countries account for only 22%. Without highlighting such differences, it makes little sense to use the term 'Global South'. Its members are affected differently, and contribute differently to global climate change. They neither share a common view, nor do they pursue joint interests when it comes to international climate negotiations. Instead, they are organised into more than a dozen subgroups of the global climate regime. There is no single climate strategy for the Global South, and climate action will differ enormously from country to country. Furthermore, just and equitable transitions may be particularly challenging for some countries. KW - Climate change KW - international development KW - energy KW - environmental policy KW - Global South KW - transition policy Y1 - 2021 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1080/01436597.2021.1954901 SN - 0143-6597 SN - 1360-2241 VL - 42 IS - 11 SP - 2724 EP - 2746 PB - Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group CY - Abingdon ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Kalczewiak, Mariusz T1 - Yiddish Buenos Aires and the struggle to leave the margins JF - East European Jewish affairs N2 - Yiddish culture developed in Argentina within the context of a self-perception that figured Buenos Aires as a marginal and peripheral locale on the global Yiddish map. Against this backdrop, Argentine Yiddish culturalists argued for the strengthening of local Yiddish culture with a goal of elevating Buenos Aires's status within the international hierarchies of Yiddish culture. Buenos Aires indeed emerged in the 1920s as a producer of Yiddish cultural contents, maintained networks of international cultural contacts with other Yiddish centers, financially supported Eastern European Yiddish establishments, and hoped that these contacts would allow for solving Buenos Aires reputation problems. The pre-World War II preoccupation with the status of Buenos Aires as a center of Yiddish culture provided a basis upon which post-Holocaust discourse of Argentine Jewish responsibility for the maintenance of Yiddish culture was constructed. KW - Argentina KW - Buenos Aires KW - marginality KW - peripherality KW - Yiddish culturalism Y1 - 2020 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1080/13501674.2020.1774275 SN - 1350-1674 SN - 1743-971X VL - 50 IS - 1-2 SP - 115 EP - 133 PB - Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group CY - Abingdon ER -