Taking ideas and discourse seriously: explaining change through discursive institutionalism as the fourth ‘new institutionalism’

Abstract

All three of the traditionally recognized new institutionalisms-rational choice, historical, and sociological-have increasingly sought to 'endogenize' change, which has often meant a turn to ideas and discourse. This article shows that the approaches of scholars coming out of each of these three institutionalist traditions who take ideas and discourse seriously can best be classified as part of a fourth 'new institutionalism'-discursive institutionalism (DI)-which is concerned with both the substantive content of ideas and the interactive processes of discourse in institutional context. It argues that this newest of the 'new institutionalisms' has the greatest potential for providing insights into the dynamics of institutional change by explaining the actual preferences, strategies, and normative orientations of actors. The article identifies the wide range of approaches that fit this analytic framework, illustrating the ways in which scholars of DI have gone beyond the limits of the traditional institutionalisms on questions of interests and uncertainty, critical junctures and incremental change, norms and culture. It defines institutions dynamically-in contrast to the older neoinstitutionalisms' more static external rule-following structures of incentives, pathdependencies, and cultural framing-as structures and constructs of meaning internal to agents whose 'background ideational abilities' enable them to create (and maintain) institutions while their 'foreground discursive abilities' enable them to communicate critically about them, to change (or maintain) them. But the article also points to areas for improvement in DI, including the theoretical analysis of processes of ideational change, the use of the older neo-institutionalisms for background information, and the incorporation of the power of interests and position into accounts of the power of ideas and discourse.

Programa Fome Zero e o paradigma da segurança alimentar: ascensão e queda de uma coalizão?

“…Nas últimas décadas, um número crescente de estudos tem procurado entender o processo de formulação de políticas públicas sob a perspectiva das ideias (Heclo 1974;Hall 1993;Campbell 1998;Sabatier & Jenkins-Smith 1993;Jobert & Muller 1987;Surel 1998;Schmidt 2010). Neste artigo nos baseamos na relação entre ideias e interesses, buscando analisar mais detidamente os grupos que carregam ideias ou paradigmas particulares, que circulam oriundos de think tanks a locus governamentais.…”

The role of forests in climate change mitigation : a discursive-institutional analysis of REDD+ MRV

“…This discursive institutionalist approach is mostly advanced by Vivien Schmidt (Schmidt, 2001(Schmidt, , 2002(Schmidt, , 2008Schmidt, 2010). Its basic tenet is that (new) ideas, and the discourses through which they are generated and exchanged during policymaking and public deliberation, may undermine or reinforce existing institutions, and thereby cause institutional change or stagnation (Arts and Buizer, 2009;Schmidt, 2008).…”

“…In general, DI as advanced by Vivien Schmidt (Schmidt, 2008;Schmidt, 2010) conceptualizes discourse in two ways: (1) as the shared and at the same time contested ideas about policymaking;…”

“…For Schmidt, the interactive part of discourse comes in two forms: communicative and coordinative discourse (Schmidt, 2008;Schmidt, 2010). The latter involves discussions and policy construction among policy actors, whether at the national or international level.…”

“…thinking and speaking. Being 'sentient', these agents are conceived to possess both 'background ideational abilities' and 'foreground discursive abilities', which respectively enable them to re-think and generate new ideas about the institutions within which they act, and to communicate and deliberate their ideas about these institutions in critical ways (Schmidt, 2010). Schmidt (2008) conceives of 'background ideational abilities' as actors' internal capacity to create and maintain institutions and as comprising human capacities, dispositions, and knowhow.…”