No abstract

Over the past forty-five years, bilateral investment treaties~BITs! have become the most important international legal mechanism for the encouragement and governance of foreign direct investment+ The proliferation of BITs during the past two decades in particular has been phenomenal+ These intergovernmental treaties typically grant extensive rights to foreign investors, including protection of contractual rights and the right to international arbitration in the event of an investment dispute+ How can we explain the widespread adoption of BITs? We argue that the spread of BITs is driven by international competition among potential host countries-typically developing countries-for foreign direct investment+ We propose a set of hypotheses that derive from such an explanation and develop a set of empirical tests that rely on network measures of economic competition as well as more indirect evidence of competitive pressures on the host to sign BITs+ The evidence suggests that potential hosts are more likely to sign BITs when their competitors have done so+ We find some evidence that coercion and learning play a role, but less support for cultural explanations based on emulation+ Our main finding is that the diffusion of BITs is associated with competitive economic pressures among developing countries to capture a share of foreign investment+ We are agnostic at this point about the benefits of this competition for development+ The global market for productive capital is more integrated than ever before+ The growth of foreign direct investment~FDI! is a clear example+ According to World Bank data, gross FDI as a percentage of total world production increased sevenfold from 1+2 percent to 8+9 percent between 1970 and 2000+ Though such investments tend to be highly skewed across jurisdictions-developed countries account For useful comments on earlier drafts of this article, we thank Bill Bernhard, Bear Braumoeller,

This article makes a conceptual and theoretical contribution to the study of diffusion. The authors suggest that the concept of diffusion be reserved for processes (not outcomes) characterized by a certain uncoordinated interdependence. Theoretically, the authors identify the principal sources of clustered policy reforms. They then clarify the characteristics specific to diffusion mechanisms and introduce a categorization of such processes. In particular, they make a distinction between two types of diffusion: adaptation and learning. They argue that this categorization adds conceptual clarity and distinguishes mechanisms with distinct substantive consequences.

One view in the study of intergroup conflict is that pride implies prejudice. However, an increasing number of scholars have come to view in-group pride more benignly, suggesting that such pride can be accompanied by a full range of feelings toward the out-group. In this article, we focus on a substantively interesting case of in-group/out-group attitudes-national pride and hostility toward immigrants. We explore the relationship in two fundamental ways: first by examining the prejudice associated with various dimensions of pride, and second by embedding these relationships in a comprehensive model of prejudice. We find that national pride is most validly measured with two dimensions-patriotism and nationalism-two dimensions that have very different relationships with prejudice. While nationalists have a strong predilection for hostility toward immigrants, patriots show no more prejudice than does the average citizen.

Constitutions are supposed to provide an enduring structure for politics. Yet only half live more than nine years. Why is it that some constitutions endure while others do not? In The Endurance of National Constitutions Zachary Elkins, Tom Ginsburg and James Melton examine the causes of constitutional endurance from an institutional perspective. Supported by an original set of cross-national historical data, theirs is the first comprehensive study of constitutional mortality. They show that whereas constitutions are imperilled by social and political crises, certain aspects of a constitution's design can lower the risk of death substantially. Thus, to the extent that endurance is desirable - a question that the authors also subject to scrutiny - the decisions of founders take on added importance.