A Matter of Style

Singing Together or Apart? Comparing Policy Agenda Dynamics within International Organizations

“…The WHO has not -with the exemption of its authority in the governance of emergencies (Hanrieder and Kreuder-Sonnen 2014;Hanrieder 2015) -received much authority from its member states. In addition, the WHO's administration generally takes a more reactive stance when it comes to the identification of new health issues (Bayerlein et al 2020). From this perspective, it is not surprising that the WHO is the organization with the highest degree of agenda congruence (0.30) within our sample.…”

“…It might make a difference whether the administration has developed internal procedures guided towards the identification of new policy problems and issues or whether it routinely fulfils a more reactive and instrumental role in the agenda-setting process and the policydrafting period. As shown by recent studies, IPAs display remarkable variation in such routine patterns (Knill et al 2019;Bayerlein et al 2020). Where an IPA displays an entrepreneurial working spirit in identifying new policy issues, and hence actively and regularly works towards shaping the IO's agenda, we should consequently expect it to diverge from member state issue priorities more often.…”

“…Yet administrative behaviour cannot be fully preconditioned. In other words, in reality, administrations may not always make use of their possibilities even when they have sufficient room for manoeuvre (Cortell and Peterson 2006;Knill et al 2019;Bayerlein et al 2020;Heinzel et al 2020) -just as they will also find ways to leave their mark on the policy process when being kept on a short leash (Epstein and O'Halloran 1994;Maggetti and Verhoest 2014). The assumption of default preference divergence is thus just as debatable as assuming complete convergence where administrative capacities or member state control are lacking.…”

“…Moreover, the IPAs under study differ in their organizational routines with regard to the initiation of new policies. According to Bayerlein et al (2020), both the ILO and the WHO administrations display a "servant" orientation in responding to initiatives of their member states rather than proactively initiating policies on their own. In the UNEP, by contrast, the administration cultivates working routines that promote the emergence of policy issues from within the bureaucracy.…”

“…Although the administration possesses quite high levels of formal authority, informal routines display a reactive rather than pro-active pattern when it comes to the emergence of new policy issues from within the administration. Typically, the ILO administration reacts to things; the administration has developed and acquired only limited means to influence which issues are prioritized or what shape the discussion will take (Knill et al 2019;Bayerlein et al 2020). Taken together, this results in some discretion that is, however, not really used by the administration in practice.…”