Research

Our research team focuses on how international institutions and law promote international cooperation from both a theoretical and an empirical perspective. We investigate issues related to multilateralism, treaty making, and preferential trade. A significant part of our work addresses the broad impact of international cooperation through multilateral treaties. Our current research efforts concentrate on the following research topics: 1) dispute settlement under preferential trade agreements, 2) concepts and measurement of power in IR, and 3) new modes of cooperation.                                                                                                                                            

Dispute Settlement under Preferential Trade Agreements     

This project addresses the procedures and practices of dispute settlement among trading parties. It explores how the institutional design of trade agreements affects the occurrence, escalation, and resolution of disputes. While we have substantial insights into how trade disputes arise and are settled under the World Trade Organization (WTO) umbrella, we know much less about how trade disputes are handled outside the multilateral framework – in bilateral, plurilateral, or regional trade agreements. We are currently compiling a data set on the occurrence of disputes outside of the WTO system, their settlement practices, and levels of escalation.

Concepts and Measurement of Power in International Relations 

Power is a central though contested concept in global political economy, and a recurrent theme in our research. To this end, we explore the variety of power concepts and measurements used by contemporary international relations scholars. While there have been significant conceptual advances in theorizing power, these have not been sufficiently reflected in empirical work which remains mired in conventional uses of military and economic indicators of power. This project takes advantage of theoretical progress to develop a broader empirically-oriented analysis of different concepts of power. Combining traditional content analysis with computational text analysis, we investigate evolving approaches to power in six major international relations journals over time. Our goal is to promote cross-fertilization among existing approaches and to develop proposals for improving the use of power in empirically oriented international policy analysis.
​[Book manuscript in preparation]

New Modes of Cooperation: From Multilaterialism to Multistakeholderism (and back)

The increasing complexity of the global order has important implications for the forms of governance. This project explores recent shift in the modes of global governance from traditional legalized inter-state multilateralism to more informal, and indirect arrangements, often involving non-state actors and unconventional channels of policy making. Since these alternative modes have different advantages and limitations, they are each more or less suitable under different circumstances. The goal of this project is to: i) develop a comprehensive typology of these modes, ii) explain their operation and interaction in managing cooperation in contemporary world politics, and iii) identify which alternative governance approaches can be used most effectively to regulate different aspects of global political economy.