The Asian Development Bank (adb) is engaged in development projects throughout the Greater Mekong... more The Asian Development Bank (adb) is engaged in development projects throughout the Greater Mekong Subregion, although for most of the past two decades it has boycotted Myanmar (Burma) because of donor government sanctions. Despite being criticised for its neoliberal focus and its lack of transparency and accountability, the adb’s operations compare favourably to those of the Myanmar government and many transnational corporations constructing and financing projects there. This article engages with the concept of risk, which increasingly frames how development in fragile states like Myanmar is understood, to critically analyse the adb’s nascent re-engagement in Myanmar according to the risks this poses for five constituencies: the adb itself; donor states; the Myanmar government and military; private capital; and marginalised communities. While deeper engagement in Myanmar poses different risks for each group, critical analysis suggests that the adb must increase the genuine participation of civil society actors in its activities to address the most significant risks of all, those facing marginalised communities.
International relations scholarship recognizes the important role that non-state actors play in a... more International relations scholarship recognizes the important role that non-state actors play in areas such as human rights, the environment, poverty, and development. Constructivism has proved a welcome lens through which to view the actions and ideas of non-state actors, ...
Created to facilitate the transition of economies of Central and Eastern Europe towards democracy... more Created to facilitate the transition of economies of Central and Eastern Europe towards democracy and the free market, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) is a regional institution in the development finance regime complex. This article examines how the EBRD’s independent accountability mechanism (IAM) emerged and changed to demonstrate how policy norms filter through regime complexes. This is important because new ideas can change behavioural expectations and institutional practices across a complex. Tracing where the idea originated from and how it took hold is therefore central to understanding member state interests, the EBRD’s response considering its organisational preferences, and how the policy norm solidified through inter‐institutional learning. This deepens our understanding of the development finance regime complex in two ways: first, it, shows how ideas can filter through to seemingly independent institutions via member states, bureaucrats, and s...
ABSTRACT We outline the main concerns for grappling with increasing environmental disasters in th... more ABSTRACT We outline the main concerns for grappling with increasing environmental disasters in this Symposium. Our focus is threefold: first, to theoretically investigate what constitutes an environmental disaster and identify the parameters for political responses through the discourse in high level multilateral fora; through the construction of the sovereign state system; and through the promotion of ignorance. Second, we aim to identify contemporary practices of the state that exacerbate the impact of, and responses to, environmental disasters. We show how states promote extractivism based on limited understandings of nature drawn from Western political liberal philosophy. Finally, we highlight the strengths and weaknesses in political and institutional responses at the local level to such disasters by state and non-state actors. This shows how both slow and fast violence of environmental disasters affects communities, but also how vulnerable subjects are predicated on pre-existing capabilities.
... MANUELA MOSCHELLA is Post-Doctoral Fellow in the Faculty of Sociology at the University of Tr... more ... MANUELA MOSCHELLA is Post-Doctoral Fellow in the Faculty of Sociology at the University of Trento. ... Antje thanks her interviewees in the Bank and the Fund, in particular Michael Cernea and Jitendra G. Borpujari. Funding was provided by the BritishAcademy. ...
Abstract In the 1990s Multilateral Development Banks created accountability mechanisms (AMs) that... more Abstract In the 1990s Multilateral Development Banks created accountability mechanisms (AMs) that allowed people affected by development projects redress. Currently undertheorized, this paper examines how and why the Asian Development Bank (ADB) created an AM, and whether the AM serves its purpose to hold the ADB to account and to provide ‘fair hearing of the views of the affected group’. This article argues that the ADB created a new AM because of institutional isomorphism, borrowing the idea of the AM from the World Bank as a result of coercive and mimetic isomorphic processes. Further, that the ADB introduced a mechanism ill-suited to the pre-existing (old) organizational culture of the ADB, which is based on consensus and hierarchical rule-following in the context of ADB operations to further economic growth while upholding state sovereignty. Despite its restructure and recent review, the mechanism's weakness was revealed through a stand-off between China and the AM over an investigation begun in 2009 (creating something ‘blue’). The paper concludes that the AM's ability to serve its purpose will remain hampered as long as ADB maintains consensus around economic growth and state sovereignty over providing recourse to affected people.
Who better to comment on the current state of international development than practitioners from t... more Who better to comment on the current state of international development than practitioners from the coalface? The two volumes analyzed here represent accounts by former World Bank staff with extens...
American Political Science Association Annual Meeting, 2012
Significant increases in direct private investment in developing countries in recent decades have... more Significant increases in direct private investment in developing countries in recent decades have also led to increased interest in political risk insurance. Of importance to transnational advocacy networks are the environmental and social impacts of guaranteeing loans for ...
Proceedings of the 47th annual meeting of the …, 2011
Sustainable finance is a burgeoning area of international relations that cross-sects trends towar... more Sustainable finance is a burgeoning area of international relations that cross-sects trends towards financial liberalization and global environmental governance. This article seeks to examine the role of the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) in the emergence of ...
The Asian Development Bank (adb) is engaged in development projects throughout the Greater Mekong... more The Asian Development Bank (adb) is engaged in development projects throughout the Greater Mekong Subregion, although for most of the past two decades it has boycotted Myanmar (Burma) because of donor government sanctions. Despite being criticised for its neoliberal focus and its lack of transparency and accountability, the adb’s operations compare favourably to those of the Myanmar government and many transnational corporations constructing and financing projects there. This article engages with the concept of risk, which increasingly frames how development in fragile states like Myanmar is understood, to critically analyse the adb’s nascent re-engagement in Myanmar according to the risks this poses for five constituencies: the adb itself; donor states; the Myanmar government and military; private capital; and marginalised communities. While deeper engagement in Myanmar poses different risks for each group, critical analysis suggests that the adb must increase the genuine participation of civil society actors in its activities to address the most significant risks of all, those facing marginalised communities.
International relations scholarship recognizes the important role that non-state actors play in a... more International relations scholarship recognizes the important role that non-state actors play in areas such as human rights, the environment, poverty, and development. Constructivism has proved a welcome lens through which to view the actions and ideas of non-state actors, ...
Created to facilitate the transition of economies of Central and Eastern Europe towards democracy... more Created to facilitate the transition of economies of Central and Eastern Europe towards democracy and the free market, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) is a regional institution in the development finance regime complex. This article examines how the EBRD’s independent accountability mechanism (IAM) emerged and changed to demonstrate how policy norms filter through regime complexes. This is important because new ideas can change behavioural expectations and institutional practices across a complex. Tracing where the idea originated from and how it took hold is therefore central to understanding member state interests, the EBRD’s response considering its organisational preferences, and how the policy norm solidified through inter‐institutional learning. This deepens our understanding of the development finance regime complex in two ways: first, it, shows how ideas can filter through to seemingly independent institutions via member states, bureaucrats, and s...
ABSTRACT We outline the main concerns for grappling with increasing environmental disasters in th... more ABSTRACT We outline the main concerns for grappling with increasing environmental disasters in this Symposium. Our focus is threefold: first, to theoretically investigate what constitutes an environmental disaster and identify the parameters for political responses through the discourse in high level multilateral fora; through the construction of the sovereign state system; and through the promotion of ignorance. Second, we aim to identify contemporary practices of the state that exacerbate the impact of, and responses to, environmental disasters. We show how states promote extractivism based on limited understandings of nature drawn from Western political liberal philosophy. Finally, we highlight the strengths and weaknesses in political and institutional responses at the local level to such disasters by state and non-state actors. This shows how both slow and fast violence of environmental disasters affects communities, but also how vulnerable subjects are predicated on pre-existing capabilities.
... MANUELA MOSCHELLA is Post-Doctoral Fellow in the Faculty of Sociology at the University of Tr... more ... MANUELA MOSCHELLA is Post-Doctoral Fellow in the Faculty of Sociology at the University of Trento. ... Antje thanks her interviewees in the Bank and the Fund, in particular Michael Cernea and Jitendra G. Borpujari. Funding was provided by the BritishAcademy. ...
Abstract In the 1990s Multilateral Development Banks created accountability mechanisms (AMs) that... more Abstract In the 1990s Multilateral Development Banks created accountability mechanisms (AMs) that allowed people affected by development projects redress. Currently undertheorized, this paper examines how and why the Asian Development Bank (ADB) created an AM, and whether the AM serves its purpose to hold the ADB to account and to provide ‘fair hearing of the views of the affected group’. This article argues that the ADB created a new AM because of institutional isomorphism, borrowing the idea of the AM from the World Bank as a result of coercive and mimetic isomorphic processes. Further, that the ADB introduced a mechanism ill-suited to the pre-existing (old) organizational culture of the ADB, which is based on consensus and hierarchical rule-following in the context of ADB operations to further economic growth while upholding state sovereignty. Despite its restructure and recent review, the mechanism's weakness was revealed through a stand-off between China and the AM over an investigation begun in 2009 (creating something ‘blue’). The paper concludes that the AM's ability to serve its purpose will remain hampered as long as ADB maintains consensus around economic growth and state sovereignty over providing recourse to affected people.
Who better to comment on the current state of international development than practitioners from t... more Who better to comment on the current state of international development than practitioners from the coalface? The two volumes analyzed here represent accounts by former World Bank staff with extens...
American Political Science Association Annual Meeting, 2012
Significant increases in direct private investment in developing countries in recent decades have... more Significant increases in direct private investment in developing countries in recent decades have also led to increased interest in political risk insurance. Of importance to transnational advocacy networks are the environmental and social impacts of guaranteeing loans for ...
Proceedings of the 47th annual meeting of the …, 2011
Sustainable finance is a burgeoning area of international relations that cross-sects trends towar... more Sustainable finance is a burgeoning area of international relations that cross-sects trends towards financial liberalization and global environmental governance. This article seeks to examine the role of the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) in the emergence of ...
ABSTRACT Constructivists trace how ideas change state and non-state actor identities as a result ... more ABSTRACT Constructivists trace how ideas change state and non-state actor identities as a result of socialisation. Rationalists too use the concept of socialisation to explain change in actors’ behaviour. Studies of socialisation examine change through the states’ spreading ideas through pathways such as elite learning and upwards mobilisation from the masses as well as micro-processes of persuasion, social influence and coercion. This article analyses the literature on socialisation to make three claims: one, that contrary to its sociological origin the use of socialisation seems to focus primarily on change in international relations rather than stasis; two, that the focus on capturing change has zeroed in on the cause and extent of change, crossing but also reproducing the constructivist–rationalist divide; and finally, that the concentration of ‘socialisation studies’ on policy fields such as human rights may actually reflect not (only) a scholarly research bias but rather continuity and stasis of the liberal international order.
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Journal Articles by Susan Park
Papers by Susan Park