The Anatomy of Influence: decision making in international organizations by Robert W. Cox, Harold K. Jacobson et al. New Haven and London, Yale University Press, 1973. Pp. xiii+ 497. £6.50.

Abstract

The present book, which has been prepared under the auspices of the Committee on International Organisations of the U.S. Social Science Research Council, is essentially a collective effort by a group of American and British scholars. There are two methodological chapters which govern the systematic and common approach to how decisions are made in eight organisations, and a concluding synthesis. The organisations covered are the International Telecommunications Union (I.

Humanitarian organizational analysis and decision making

“…Their difference is both practically and theoretically grounded, and their collaboration in practice is of particular importance (Aall et al, 2000;Reimann, 2006;Steffek, 2013). International organizations are often closely guided by the policies of cabinets or chief executives (Keohane and Nye, 1974) and formation of these policies are a product of negotiations analyzed through a totally different perspective (Barnett and Finnemore, 1999;Cox and Jacobson, 1976;Peterson, 1995;Raftopoulos, 2005Raftopoulos, , 2001. Also, within international organizations there is often a considerable democratic deficit which shifts the dynamics into an entirely different path of inter-governmental negotiations; democracy is not transferable to the international realm thus weakening formal governance structures (Dahl, 1999;Nye and Donahue, 2000, p. 24).…”