Publications

@article{10.1057/s41295-019-00183-4,

title = {Contested EU Trade Governance: Transparency Conundrums in TTIP Negotiations},

author = {Eugénia C. Heldt},

url = {https://link.springer.com/article/10.1057/s41295-019-00183-4?utm_source=toc&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=toc_41295_18_2&utm_content=etoc_palgrave_20200403},

doi = {10.1057/s41295-019-00183-4},

year  = {2020},

date = {2020-01-02},

urldate = {2019-04-01},

journal = {Comparative European Politics},

volume = {18},

issue = {2},

pages = {215-232},

abstract = {During TTIP negotiations, the European Commission was severely criticized by civil society organizations and public opinion for its secrecy regarding negotiation strategies and priorities. The Commission responded by making some negotiating texts publicly available. This article explores the implications of increasing transparency in trade negotiations. Drawing on negotiation, politicization, and informal governance literature, it examines how the Commission’s choice for a partial transparency approach had three paradoxical effects on negotiations. First, greater transparency did not help the public perception of TTIP. Second, greater transparency increased the EU’s bargaining leverage but led to a low degree of negotiating discretion for the Commission. Finally, greater transparency transformed the nature of the negotiating process by making it more informal, allowing bargaining parties to act outside the public scrutiny. This contribution solves these transparency puzzles by showing that partial transparency is a double-edged sword. Whilst greater transparency has become an important legitimation strategy in EU trade governance, adopting a partial transparency approach fuelled public protest instead of muting it and led to the failure of the negotiations.},

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pubstate = {published},

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}

@article{nokey,

title = {Reforming International Organizations: How Partisanship and Ministerial Control Shape States Preferences towards the World Bank},

author = {Eugénia C. Heldt and Laura C. Mahrenbach},

url = {https://doi.org/10.1163/19426720-02604001},

doi = {10.1163/19426720-02604001},

year  = {2020},

date = {2020-01-01},

urldate = {2020-01-01},

journal = {Global Governance: A Review of Multilateralism and International Organizations},

volume = {26},

issue = {4},

pages = {601–627},

abstract = {Recent scholarship has highlighted the role of domestic pressures in determining state preferences toward the reform of international organizations (IO s). This article adds a new dimension by examining how partisanship and ministerial control affect state preferences toward IO empowerment. The article derives two expectations from the existing literature. First, partisan position will determine preferences toward IO empowerment. Second, when a government is constituted by multiple parties, the position of the party with the IO’s ministerial portfolio will determine the government’s position toward IO empowerment. The article illustrates this argument by examining the positions of four net donors (Germany, France, the United Kingdom, and the United States) and two net recipients (Brazil and India) during the World Bank’s reforms. By bringing domestic politics back in, this article complements existing studies on the politics of IO reform and weighs in on central debates in comparative politics and international political economy.},

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pubstate = {published},

tppubtype = {article}

}

@article{doi:10.1080/09692290.2019.1635513,

title = {Legacies and Innovations in Global Economic Governance since Bretton Woods},

author = {Orfeo Fioretos and Eugénia C. Heldt},

url = {https://doi.org/10.1080/09692290.2019.1635513},

doi = {10.1080/09692290.2019.1635513},

year  = {2019},

date = {2019-07-08},

urldate = {2019-01-01},

journal = {Review of International Political Economy},

volume = {26},

issue = {6},

pages = {1089–1111},

publisher = {Routledge},

abstract = {The international economic system that emerged after the 1944 Bretton Woods conference became the most durable international arrangement devoted to economic openness. Seventy-five years after the conference, however, global shifts in power, institutional gridlock, and populist backlash figure prominently in accounts predicting the system’s demise. This article examines the legacies of the Bretton Woods conference for structures and practices of global economic governance and innovations that emerged over time to adapt the system to new political and economic circumstances. It explores how and why the Bretton Woods system became a more variegated system over time with respect to four features of governance: membership, legalization, organizational focality, and market embeddedness. It identifies sources and effects of expanding membership in the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, the emergence of new formal and informal institutions, the challenges of a more fragmented institutional landscape, and shifts in the underlying principles of economic governance. Finally, the article discusses lessons from past crises in and reforms to the Bretton Woods system, and their implications for understanding recent challenges to global economic cooperation.},

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pubstate = {published},

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}

@article{GlobalDemocracyinDecline,

title = {Global Democracy in Decline?: How Rising Authoritarianism Limits Democratic Control over International Institutions},

author = {Eugénia C. Heldt and Henning Schmidtke},

url = {https://brill.com/view/journals/gg/25/2/article-p231_6.xml},

doi = {10.1163/19426720-02502005},

year  = {2019},

date = {2019-06-10},

urldate = {2019-01-01},

journal = {Global Governance: A Review of Multilateralism and International Organizations},

volume = {25},

issue = {2},

pages = {231 - 254},

publisher = {Brill | Nijhoff},

address = {Leiden, Niederlande},

abstract = {Over the past decade, rising authoritarian regimes have begun to challenge the liberal international order. This challenge is particularly pronounced in the field of multilateral development finance, where China and its coalition partners from Brazil, Russia, India, and South Africa have created two new multilateral development banks. This article argues that China and its partners have used the New Development Bank and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank to increase their power and to restrict democratic control mechanisms. By comparing formal mechanisms of democratic control in both organizations to the World Bank, this article shows that civil society access, transparency, and accountability are lower at the AIIB and NDB than they are at the World Bank.},

keywords = {},

pubstate = {published},

tppubtype = {article}

}

@article{10.1080/09692290.2019.1631205,

title = {Explaining Coherence in International Regime Complexes: How the World Bank Shapes the Field of Multilateral Development Finance},

author = {Eugénia C. Heldt and Henning Schmidtke},

url = {https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09692290.2019.1631205},

doi = {10.1080/09692290.2019.1631205},

year  = {2019},

date = {2019-01-01},

urldate = {2019-01-01},

journal = {Review of International Political Economy},

volume = {26},

issue = {6},

pages = {1160-1186},

abstract = {The landscape of multilateral development finance has changed dramatically in the past decades. At Bretton Woods, delegates envisioned the World Bank as the focal organization mobilizing financial support for national development strategies. Today, this issue area is populated by no less than 27 multilateral development banks including the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and the New Development Bank created under Chinese leadership. This paper shows that, despite this institutional proliferation, the development finance regime remains largely coherent and core governance features designed at Bretton Woods continue to shape the emerging regime complex. We develop a historical institutionalist argument for why newly created institutions are likely to imitate extant institutions. We suggest that states add new institutions not only in response to deficiencies in extant institutions but also to increase their control and reputation. We analyze three causal pathways – path-dependence, orchestration, and independent learning – that contribute to a coherent regime complex. We show that focal international organizations can use their position to prevent incoherence.},

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pubstate = {published},

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}

@article{10.1111/1758-5899.12643,

title = {Rising Powers in Global Economic Governance: Mapping the Flexibility‐Empowerment Nexus},

author = {Eugénia C. Heldt and Laura C. Mahrenbach},

doi = {https://doi.org/10.1111/1758-5899.12643},

year  = {2018},

date = {2018-01-01},

urldate = {2018-01-01},

journal = {Global Policy},

volume = {10},

issue = {1},

pages = {19-28},

abstract = {Given long-standing criticism of global economic institutions by rising powers, it is puzzling that these same governments supported the transfer of substantial resources and responsibilities to the IMF and the World Bank during recent reform negotiations. We argue rising powers’ support for international organization (IO) empowerment is linked to their concerns regarding an IO's flexibility. We introduce two types of flexibility as being most relevant for rising powers. These include governance flexibility – the extent to which rising powers may participate in IO decision-making – and issue flexibility – the extent to which rising power preferences are incorporated into IO policies and programs. We illustrate our argument by examining the preferences of the BIC states (Brazil, India and China) towards IMF and World Bank reforms between 2008 and 2012. Drawing on archival material with over 50 statements from BIC representatives, we find, first, that there were clear links between Bank and Fund governance flexibility and the BICs’ support for empowerment of these IOs, but that this was not true for issue flexibility. Second, we find evidence indicating the strategies of individual BIC governments differ within these IOs, suggesting a need to undertake more differentiated studies of rising powers’ IO activities.},

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pubstate = {published},

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@article{nokey,

title = {Lost in Internal Evaluation? Accountability and Insulation at the World Bank},

author = {Eugénia C. Heldt},

url = {https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13569775.2018.1455491},

doi = {10.1080/13569775.2018.1455491},

year  = {2018},

date = {2018-01-01},

urldate = {2018-01-01},

journal = {Contemporary Politics},

volume = {24},

issue = {5},

pages = {568-587},

abstract = {Over past decades, the World Bank has been criticized by scholars, policymakers, and civil society groups for being unaccountable and inefficient. Confronted with this wave of contestation, the Bank established several internal accountability mechanisms, including the Inspection Panel, the Independent Evaluation Group, and the Compliance Advisor/Ombudsman. Against this background, this article investigates how the proliferation of accountability mechanisms in a large and complex organization such as the World Bank reduces rather than enhances transparency and lines of accountability. I argue that the establishment of a myriad of accountability mechanisms has paradoxically made the Bank even more encapsulated and less accountable to the outside world. Unpacking the differential effects of external and internal accountability mechanisms makes this contribution of significant interest to scholars working on the accountability and performance of international organizations.},

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pubstate = {published},

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}