The Embedded Duality of Structure and Harmonic Change in Intergovernmental Organization Networks

Abstract

We put forth an alternative explanation for how globalization is impacting the network of intergovernmental organizations (IGOs). Using Hierarchical Link Clustering (HLC) and a computational approach to yearly IGOs networks from 1971 to 2005, our analysis shows that globalization is making the structure of the world polity both more fractured and more cohesive. The mechanism for explaining this seemingly contradictory result lies in the behavior of IGOs, which depends largely on the organizations' geographic focus: regionally focused IGOs create more communities, thereby fracturing the world polity, while globally focused IGOs create relationships across communities, thereby bringing communities together and creating a core. Furthermore, the same mechanism creates a significant turnover in the set of global IGOs located at the core of the yearly networks. These findings are only partially consistent with the predominant, network-focused approaches to international relations and suggest that a more complex model is needed in order to study the network of IGOs.

Keywords: IGOs, networks, clustering