Toward a New Theory of Institutional Change

2008 ◽  
Vol 60 (2) ◽  
pp. 281-314 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kurt Weyland
Keyword(s):  
Institutional Change ◽  
Rational Choice ◽  
Welfare States ◽  
Supply Side ◽  
Political Regimes ◽  
New Approach ◽  
The Core ◽  
Developmental States ◽  
Rational Learning ◽  
Rational Choice Institutionalism

Going beyond historical and rational choice institutionalism, this article elaborates the core of a new theory that can account for the discontinuous, disproportionate, and frequently wave like-nature of institutional change. Cognitive-psychological findings on shifts in actors' propensity for assuming risk help explain why periods of institutional stasis can be followed by dramatic breakthroughs as actors eventually respond to a growing problem load with efforts at bold transformation. And insights on boundedly rational learning explain why solutions to these problems often occur as emulation of other countries' innovations and experiences. The new approach, which elucidates both the demand and the supply side of institutional change, is illustrated through an analysis of the transformation of developmental states, welfare states, and political regimes.

Conclusion: social policy in an era of competition

2017 ◽  
pp. 203-212
Author(s):  
Dan Horsfall ◽  
John Hudson
Keyword(s):  
Social Policy ◽  
Welfare State ◽  
Empirical Analysis ◽  
Welfare States ◽  
Future Research ◽  
The Core ◽  
Competition State ◽  
State Welfare ◽  
Policy Analysts

This concluding chapter highlights key arguments from across the book in order to set out an integrated agenda for future research. Theoretically rooted analyses must be at the core of such an agenda. The inter-pollination/cross-fertilisation of ideas from many disciplines is important in developing an understanding of the complex and multi-faceted ways in which competition is influencing welfare states. However, while theory is central to this agenda, it must also be rooted in detailed empirical analysis. In looking to transcend the competition state/welfare state dichotomy, this interplay between theory and evidence is key, and where theoretically rooted social policy analysts can add particular value to current debates.

scholarly journals Gravitational differentiation in the regimes from stokes settling to Rayleigh–Raylor flows

2019 ◽  
pp. 15-30
Author(s):  
V. P. Trubitsyn
Keyword(s):  
Viscous Fluid ◽  
Interacting Particles ◽  
Small Particles ◽  
Continuous Transition ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Earth's Core ◽  
The Core ◽  
The Earth ◽  
Large Particles ◽  
Two Component

The Earth’s core was formed under gravitational differentiation in the course of the separation of iron and silicates. Most of the iron has gone into the core as early as when the Earth was growing. However, iron continued to precipitate even during the subsequent partial solidification which developed from the bottom upwards. At the different stages and in the different layers of the mantle, iron was deposited in different regimes. In this paper, the mechanisms of the deposition of a cloud of heavy interacting particles (or drops) in a viscous fluid are considered. A new approach suitable for analytical and numerical tracing the changes in the structure of the flows in a two-component suspension under continuous transition from the Stokessettling (for the case of a cloud of large particles) to the Rayleigh–Taylor flows and heavy diapirs (for the case of a cloud of small particles) is suggested. It is numerically and analytically shown that the both regimes are the different limiting cases of the sedimentation convection in suspensions.

Ethics

2021 ◽  
pp. 22-38
Author(s):  
Stuart White
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Final Section ◽  
Basic Needs ◽  
Political Context ◽  
Welfare States ◽  
The Core ◽  
National Welfare ◽  
Normative Issues ◽  
The Welfare State

This chapter seeks to clarify some of the core ethical arguments surrounding welfare states. The analysis focuses on three key values. First, we will consider the concept of need. What are basic needs? How do we conceptualize and measure them? Do citizens have rights to what they need? Second, we focus on principles of equality and, third, we look at arguments surrounding the implications of the welfare state for liberty. A final section concludes by noting some normative issues moving increasingly to the forefront of debate. A changing global political context raises new issues about the international salience of these issues, questions which national welfare states have found it difficult to address.

A Cognitive Approach to the Mechanism of Intelligence

2011 ◽  
pp. 18-35
Author(s):  
Yi X. Zhong
Keyword(s):  
Intelligent Systems ◽  
Simulation Approach ◽  
Cognitive Approach ◽  
New Approach ◽  
The Core ◽  
Behavior Simulation ◽  
Structural Simulation ◽  
Functional Simulation ◽  
Made In

An attempt was made in the article to propose a new approach to the intelligence research, namely the cognitive approach that tries to explore in depth the core mechanism of intelligence formation of intelligent systems from the cognitive viewpoint. It is discovered, as result, that the mechanism of intelligence formation in general case is implemented by a sequence of transformations conversing the information to knowledge and further to intelligence (i.e., the intelligent strategy, the embodiment of intelligence in a narrower sense). It is also discovered that the three major approaches to AI that exist, the structural simulation approach, the functional simulation approach, and the behavior simulation approach, can all be harmoniously unified within the framework of the cognitive approach. These two discoveries, as well as the related background, will be reported here in the article.

scholarly journals Evolutionary institutionalism

2016 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
pp. 48-60 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kai Fürstenberg
Keyword(s):  
Rational Choice ◽  
Political Behavior ◽  
Behavioral Genetics ◽  
Ecological Stability ◽  
Institutional Stability ◽  
The Third ◽  
Ecosystem Effects ◽  
Choice Analysis ◽  
Rational Choice Institutionalism ◽  
Agency And Structure

Background. Institutions are hard to define and hard to study. Long prominent in political science have been two theories: Rational Choice Institutionalism (RCI) and Historical Institutionalism (HI). Arising from the life sciences is now a third: Evolutionary Institutionalism (EI). Comparative strengths and weaknesses of these three theories warrant review, and the value-to-be-added by expanding the third beyond Darwinian evolutionary theory deserves consideration.Question.Should evolutionary institutionalism expand to accommodate new understanding in ecology, such as might apply to the emergence of stability, and in genetics, such as might apply to political behavior?Methods.Core arguments are reviewed for each theory with more detailed exposition of the third, EI. Particular attention is paid to EI’s gene-institution analogy; to variation, selection, and retention of institutional traits; to endogeneity and exogeneity; to agency and structure; and to ecosystem effects, institutional stability, and empirical limitations in behavioral genetics.Findings.RCI, HI, and EI are distinct but complementary.Conclusions. Institutional change, while amenable to rational-choice analysis and, retrospectively, to critical-juncture and path-dependency analysis, is also, and importantly, ecological. Stability, like change, is an emergent property of institutions, which tend to stabilize after change in a manner analogous to allopatric speciation. EI is more than metaphorically biological in that institutional behaviors are driven by human behaviors whose evolution long preceded the appearance of institutions themselves.

scholarly journals Rational Choice Theory in Comparative Sociology

2015 ◽  
Vol 14 (4) ◽  
pp. 587-608
Author(s):  
Hanno Scholtz
Keyword(s):  
Rational Choice ◽  
Social Stratification ◽  
Comparative Research ◽  
Rational Choice Theory ◽  
Choice Theory ◽  
Social Capital Theory ◽  
Welfare States ◽  
Data Sets ◽  
Social Phenomena ◽  
Capital Theory

Among schools of thought in comparative research, Rational Choice Theory (rct) is both the most systematic and the most contested. rct lacks a “classical” foundation but offers a clear internal theory structure. The rationality assumption contains an unquestioned heuristic aspect, although the determinants of choice (especially preferences) lack a universally accepted solution. The choice aspect addresses the understanding of social phenomena as the result of individual actions seen in light of the possible alternatives. This view unifies scholars in the Rational Choice tradition and leads to the macro-micro-macro-scheme. Micro-oriented comparative research has flourished through the availability of multi-level data sets in fields such as social capital theory, social stratification and mobility, including educational attainment or the inclusion of migrants, family studies, criminology, and labor markets. Institutional rct-based comparative research has addressed welfare states, religion, and general questions. In both aspects, rct leaves room for further productivity in comparative research.

Emerging research practice for impact in the CGIAR: The case of Index-Based Livestock Insurance (IBLI)

2019 ◽  
Vol 48 (3) ◽  
pp. 255-267 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rupsha Banerjee ◽  
Andrew Hall ◽  
Andrew Mude ◽  
Brenda Wandera ◽  
Jennifer Kelly
Keyword(s):  
Public Goods ◽  
Institutional Change ◽  
Institutional Setting ◽  
Research Practice ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Critical Part ◽  
International Public Goods ◽  
Interactive Nature ◽  
Innovation Processes

Under increased scrutiny by its funders, the CGIAR continues to search for ways of translating research excellence into innovation and developmental impact. Several approaches have been suggested that recognize the interactive nature of innovation. While these have been deemed useful, it is the deeper institutional change agenda that has been a bottleneck in the evolving ways of the CGIAR deploying science for impact. This article documents an example in the CGIAR where significant innovation appears to have taken place in research practice, and where the institutional setting of both the CGIAR center involved and its donors have adapted to accommodate this new approach. The case study presented is recent experiences at the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) of developing and facilitating the adoption of Index-Based Livestock Insurance (IBLI) in Kenya and Ethiopia. The approach of the IBLI program evolved as a form of research practice that expands the boundaries of legitimate research practices in the CGIAR: it maintained the essentials of international public goods, but also included activities engaging with innovation processes that led to tangible household impacts. While the development and use of this approach was not without its tensions both within ILRI and with donors funding the work, the approach proved highly successful and won acceptance and legitimacy. This suggests that organizations should encourage and support individual projects and teams to adapt, develop, and adopt different approaches in order to achieve impact. Accepting pluralistic narrative of success will be a critical part of this.

scholarly journals The constitutions of international organisations: How institutional design seeks to foster diplomatic deliberation

2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 571-604
Author(s):  
DIANA PANKE ◽  
FRANZISKA HOHLSTEIN ◽  
GURUR POLAT
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Rational Choice ◽  
Quantitative Methods ◽  
Institutional Design ◽  
International Organisations ◽  
Design Elements ◽  
Combination Of Theories ◽  
Rational Choice Institutionalism ◽  
High Politics

Abstract:Whether we look at constitutions of states or founding treaties of International Organisations (IO), it is striking that many rules on interaction between delegates create room for deliberation, whilst simultaneously limiting the time for discussion. While the latter speeds up decision making, it risks reducing its quality and legitimacy by hampering the exchange and contestation of information and ideas. How are these competing elements balanced in IOs? Do IOs differ in this respect, and if so, how and why? The article draws on a unique and novel dataset and assesses variation in the extent to which institutional design fosters or inhibits diplomatic deliberation in more than 110 diverse IOs. To this end, the article uses a combination of theories of functionalism, rational choice institutionalism and liberal approaches on variation, fit, and mismatch of deliberative institutional design within and across IOs. The hypotheses are analysed with quantitative methods. The article shows that diplomatic deliberative institutional design elements are the most pronounced when IOs are small in size, deal in high politics, and are regional in character.

Rational Choice and Community Power Structures

1995 ◽  
Vol 43 (2) ◽  
pp. 265-277 ◽  
Author(s):  
Keith Dowding ◽  
Patrick Dunleavy ◽  
Desmond King ◽  
Helen Margetts
Keyword(s):  
Rational Choice ◽  
Empirical Investigation ◽  
Regime Theory ◽  
Power Structures ◽  
Comprehensive Investigation ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Community Power ◽  
Urban Contexts ◽  
Complementary Techniques ◽  
Community Power Structures

The community power debate concluded with each side believing they had won. Political theorists have generalized power, making empirical investigation very difficult; urban scholars have turned their attention to more manageable empirical problems. Rational choice advances the debate, exposing the errors of all sides and facilitating a new approach which transcends structural versus individualist methods. By separating various aspects of power in urban contexts, complementary techniques such as network analysis in a bargaining framework, semi-structured interviewing and the use of text databases permits a comprehensive investigation of agenda-setting and the mobilization of bias. The paper demonstrates the utility of this approach by comparing it to ‘regime theory’, the latest paradigm of urban research.

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