TY - JOUR
T1 - Are international organisations in decline? An absolute and relative perspective on institutional change
AU - Debre, Maria
AU - Dijkstra, Hylke
N1 - Funding Information:
This article is part of a project that has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (grant agreement No. 802568).
Funding Information:
We thank the editor and reviewers of Global Policy for their excellent supportive comments on our manuscript. The article was previously presented at the PCE colloquium in Maastricht on 27 January 2021, ISA Annual Convention in 2021, ECPR Joint Sessions in 2021, and ISA Research Workshop on ‘The Performance of Global Governance Institutions’, 24–25 March 2022. We thank the participants for their feedback. We would also like to thank Laura von Allwörden, Farsan Ghassim, Leonard Schuette and Giuseppe Zaccaria for substantive comments.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 The Authors. Global Policy published by Durham University and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
PY - 2023/2
Y1 - 2023/2
N2 - Many international organisations (IOs) are currently challenged, yet are they also in decline? Despite much debate on the crisis of liberal international order, contestation, loss of legitimacy, gridlock, pathologies and exiting member states, there is little research on IO decline. This article seeks to clarify this concept and argues that decline can be considered in absolute and relative terms. Absolute decline involves a decrease in the number of IOs and their authority, membership and output, whereas relative decline concerns a decrease in the centrality of IOs in international relations. Reviewing a wide range of indicators, this article argues that, whereas there is limited decline in absolute terms since 1945, there may well be important decline in relative terms. Relative decline is more difficult to measure, but to probe its significance this article presents data from speeches during the United Nations General Assembly General Debate. It shows that IOs were most often mentioned in 1996 and that there has been a decline since. These findings indicate that, whereas IOs might survive as institutions, they are decreasingly central to international relations.
AB - Many international organisations (IOs) are currently challenged, yet are they also in decline? Despite much debate on the crisis of liberal international order, contestation, loss of legitimacy, gridlock, pathologies and exiting member states, there is little research on IO decline. This article seeks to clarify this concept and argues that decline can be considered in absolute and relative terms. Absolute decline involves a decrease in the number of IOs and their authority, membership and output, whereas relative decline concerns a decrease in the centrality of IOs in international relations. Reviewing a wide range of indicators, this article argues that, whereas there is limited decline in absolute terms since 1945, there may well be important decline in relative terms. Relative decline is more difficult to measure, but to probe its significance this article presents data from speeches during the United Nations General Assembly General Debate. It shows that IOs were most often mentioned in 1996 and that there has been a decline since. These findings indicate that, whereas IOs might survive as institutions, they are decreasingly central to international relations.
U2 - 10.1111/1758-5899.13170
DO - 10.1111/1758-5899.13170
M3 - Article
SN - 1758-5880
VL - 14
SP - 16
EP - 30
JO - Global Policy
JF - Global Policy
IS - 1
ER -