norms sustain cooperation in the global economy underlies even work on individ-
ual organizations today.
While research on international regimes represented a major step forward in the
analysis of international institutions, it was subject to criticism from a number
of perspectives. Friedrich Kratochwil and John Ruggie ( 1986 ) recognized the
contributions of regime analysis, but worried that it was moving too far from
the analysis of speciWc IOs, thus missing some important internal organizational
dynamics. Stephan Haggard and Beth Simmons ( 1987 ) surveyed a number of
weaknesses of regime analysis from the perspective of those undertaking positive
empirical research on regimes. Because the concept of regimes was broadly deWned
and regimes diYcult to observe independent of their eVects, much eVort went into
determining whether or not regimes actually existed in various issue-areas, and
whether changes in patterns of behavior reXected changeswithinregimes orof
regimes. It is not clear that these descriptive debates added a great deal to our
understanding of the causes and consequences of institutions in the international
environment.
Other major weaknesses of the literature included its state-centric focus and
neglect of domestic politics. Giulio Gallarotti ( 1991 ) argued that IOs systematically
failed in their attempts to manage diYcult problems in international relations. The
inability of IOs to resolve serious conXict, in his analysis, reXected not just random
mistakes, but a systematic pattern of failure. IOs could even have perverse eVects,
exacerbating conXict rather than mitigating it. For these reasons, Gallarotti argued
against relying too heavily on formal IOs to manage international relations. Oran
Young ( 1991 ) criticized the regimes literature for neglecting the role of political
leadership. Many of these criticisms have been echoed in recent years in the analysis
of IEIs.
One of the most telling critiques of the regimes literature came, perhaps para-
doxically, from the editor of the Regimes volume, Stephen Krasner ( 1991 ).
He charged that the work on regimes was too focused on market failures: Instances
where all could potentially beneWt from mutual cooperation, but where collective-
action problems such as high transaction costs prohibited states from reaching
the ‘‘Pareto frontier.’’ In his survey of eVorts to cooperate in theWeld of commu-
nication, he found that states had little trouble reaching the Pareto frontier. It was
relatively easy for them to identify the set of bargains from which it would be
impossible to make all better oV. Instead, they found themselves trapped by
distributional conXict, having to choose among bargains that beneWted some
while harming others. Thus the most signiWcant problem plaguing eVorts at
international cooperation was not providing a good contractual environment to
overcome transaction-costs problems such as informational limitations, but
a coordination problem in which states disagreed over which of multiple
Pareto-eYcient equilibria they preferred. Krasner’s insight has led to a revision of
early work on regimes, which claimed that coordination problems would be
international economic institutions 657