Refining domestic politics theories of IPE: A societal approach to governmental preferences

Abstract

Domestic politics theories of international political economy and the recent disruptions in international cooperation and trade apparently induced by domestic discontent have shown the crucial role domestic forces play in influencing governmental preferences. This article contributes to this theoretical school, first, by assessing seminal works on the ideational, material, and institutional dimensions of domestic politics, and second, by conceptualising the ‘societal approach’ to fill a major gap in domestic politics theorising. The societal approach asks under which conditions value-based societal ideas, domestic institutions, and material interests matter in shaping governmental preferences. When do ideas prevail over interests and vice versa? How do they interact with each other and with domestic institutions? The societal approach includes all three domestic variables as potential driving forces for governmental preferences and conceives them both as individual and as interacting forces. Most importantly, it complements domestic politics theories by proposing hypotheses on the conditions for the influence of each variable on governmental preferences. The article brings together previously conceived parts of the societal approach and considerably expands it.

Reforming the Institutions of Eurozone Governance

“…Van Loon (2021) applies a societal approach to governmental preference formation inspired by Schirm (2018Schirm ( , 2020 to examine the Economic and Monetary Union's impact of issue salience and actor plurality, subsequently triggering material and ideational considerations on government preferences towards the Financial Transaction Tax introduction. By analysing the German, French and Irish cases of domestic preference formation, she argues that the lack of consensus on the European level was shaped by governments' responsiveness towards both societal dynamics and material interests within the domestic societies of these member states.…”

Political contestation and domestic politics in EU financial regulation

“…It provides an answer to the research question: which of these domestic actors were more prevalent in shaping the German government's preference formation during the European FTT debate? A comprehensive account of the German government's responsiveness is provided by applying the societal approach to governmental preference formation (Schirm 2011(Schirm , 2013(Schirm , 2018(Schirm , 2020. is has been considerably conducive in directing attention to the role of two explanatory variables, domestic interests and ideas, in shaping the divergent positions of governments in the global financial and Euro crises.…”

Scrutiny or Complacency? Banking Union in the Bundestag and the Assemblée Nationale

“…The question about the extent to which the debates reflect ideas and economic interests will draw upon the societal approach as used by Schirm (2011Schirm ( , 2020 and Van Loon (2021). Schirm (2011Schirm ( , 2020 defines ideas as values held by the public. Material interests are determined by the relative weight of economic sectors.…”