WiSe 2019/2020

Universität Bremen
FB 8 | Institut für Politikwissenschaft
BA Politikwissenschaft

Dennis Redeker
Research Center on Inequality and Social Policy (SOCIUM)
Bremen International Graduate School of Social Sciences (BIGSSS)
Mary-Somerville-Str. 7, Room 7.4490

Contact: redeker@uni-bremen.de
Office Hours: Tuesdays, 11:00-12:00 and 14:00-15:00

Researching International NGOs

Thursday, 05 December 2019, 14:00-16:00 (location: UNICOM 7, Room 7.2210, Mary-Somerville-Str. 7)

Thursday, 12 December 2019, 14:00-16:00 (location: UNICOM 7, Room 7.2210, Mary-Somerville-Str. 7)
Thursday, 23 January 2020, 8:00-18:00 (approximately) (location: Hamburg – including return trip)
Thursday, 30 January 2020, 14:00-16:00 (location: UNICOM 7, Room 7.2210, Mary-Somerville-Str. 7)

Content

Defining what an international NGO is and is not can be a difficult task that requires us to think from both
a juridical perspective – looking at the (lack of) international rules about how define such an organization –
and from a sociological perspective i.e. viewing INGOs in the light of what they actually do in world
politics and how they do it (Martens 2002). What we do know is that the number of INGOs has sharply
increased in the second half of the twentieth century. Today, INGOs are considered important actors in
world politics by policy-makers and researchers alike. Their importance stems from their ability to go
beyond the “notional [democratic] accountability chain” (Scholte 2004: 211) that connects citizens via
their nation states to global governance organizations such as the World Bank or the UNESCO. INGOs are
able to engage global governance organizations, governments and multinational corporations by way of
public or private persuasion, public discrediting (e.g. via the media), publicly envisioning how things
should be (thereby affecting public discourse) and by mobilizing civil society to raise an issue’s profile.

Though, there is also critique levied at internationally operating NGOs. Some accuse INGOs of a neo-
colonial form of governance, continuing European colonial empires. Others argue that the problem with
INGOs is that they are unelected and hardly accountable to anyone but their source of funding. In addition,
there is an entire range of countries that objects to foreign-funded NGOs including China, Russia, Egypt
and Ethiopia as illegitimate sources of influence on domestic politics. They often label those NGOs as
“foreign agent” and/or restrict their access and their ability to gain visas for international staff. INGOs have
taken some of the critique seriously and started to reform their practices, particularly to prove that they are
accountability to the societies that they work in. Many of the larger, well-known INGOs are still in essence
from countries of the OECD, even if they operate elsewhere. Actually, quite a number of INGOs are
located in Germany, even as close as Hamburg.

This compact class is tailored around a one-day field trip to the city of Hamburg, where you will have the
opportunity to discuss with and interview representatives of international non-governmental organizations
(INGOs). The goal is to get a deeper and much more practical understanding of the role that INGOs play in
world politics, and to explore the employment opportunities in this sector. The class consists of an
introductory session, followed by a session that will be used to prepare the field trip and the interviews.
Thereafter, we will spend an entire day in Hamburg, with time to visit at least two INGOs. The class
concludes with a session to reflect on the interactions with INGO representatives and to discuss what we
have learned.

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Intended Learning Outcomes

• Understand essential recent empirical and theoretical trends relating to INGOs.

• Be able to formulate theoretically and/or empirically founded questions posed to an INGO.
• Gain knowledge about the work of Hamburg-based INGOs, the international context of their
work, the mechanics behind international campaigns and the challenges INGOs face.
• Better understand the day-to-day work of workers in INGOs and the advantages and
disadvantages of such a career.

Assessment

You can earn 2 CP by successfully completing the class. Successful completion requires you to do two
things: hand in a reasoned question prior to our fieldtrip and create a research report after the fieldtrip.

The first exercise you must complete in order to pass the class is to come up with one, two or three
reasoned questions for one or both of the two INGOs we will be talking to in Hamburg. A “reasoned”
question in this case is one that is based on a theoretical concept or empirical study to be found in the
literature on INGOs. In this syllabus you can find a number of useful papers and books that can help you
come up with such a question. Obviously, there are many other academic sources that you could consult
for this. The question(s) is/are due on 9 January, two weeks before our trip to Hamburg. Please submit the
question(s) and an accompanying text of 200 to 400 words in which you justify the choice of questions by
relating it to the academic literature you used. This exercise is not graded but required to pass the class.

The second exercise to be completed in order to pass the class is a research report that deals with fieldtrip
and our interviews with the INGOs. There are two kinds of reports that are possible, and you decide which
of those you are interested in writing:

• A research report on the interviews including answers to three elements:

1) Summarize what the interviewees said concerning one specific topic during the
conversation (including in their introductory remarks, if applicable).
2) Relate that part of the remarks/interview to any number of texts from the academic literature
(at least three scholarly texts referenced).
3) Reflect on how you perceived the interview and how it relates to the expectations you had
before.

• A research report on one of campaigns that one the INGOs described in the interviews. Please
include these three elements in the report:
1) Summarize what the interviewees said concerning the organization’s campaigns during the
conversation (including in their introductory remarks, if applicable).
2) Based on additional research, compare that campaign to a similar campaign by another
INGO or another campaign by the same INGO and consider: the effectiveness of each
campaign, the scope of the campaigns, whether there are elements which you would have
done differently. Please base your analysis on any number of texts from the academic
literature (at least two scholarly texts referenced).
3) Reflect on how you perceived the interview and how it relates to the expectations you had
before.

The research report should have a length of 2,500 words (+/- 10%), written in English, require correct
citations and should be spell-checked. For questions of how to cite the literature you should consult the
Study Guide1. Please also consult the Study Guide for more information on formatting requirements and
general writing guidelines. The research report will be graded and counts for 100% of the final grade. The
report must be submitted by 31 March 2020.

The research report and the reasoned question should be handed in via email (redeker@uni-bremen.de).
For the research report, please attach the “Copyright Declaration”. Please also consult the information
sheet concerning the use of anti-plagiarism software. Both documents can be found on Stud.IP.

1
You can find the current version on the Stud.IP page of this class, in the “files” folder.

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Office Hours

My office hours are on Tuesdays from 11:00 to 12:00 and from 14:00 to 15:00 (Mary-Somerville-Str. 7,
Room 7.4490). Please email me before you drop by to reduce waiting times.

Class schedule

Meeting 1: Introduction to “Researching International NGOs”, 5 December 2019

The purpose of the first meeting is present the content of the class and the ways in which successful
completion of the class can be achieved. We will talk about your expectations, too. In addition, there will
be a short introduction into a number of topics related to International NGOs.

Meeting 2: The Research Process and Qualitative Interviewing, 12 December 2019

During the second meeting, we will discuss how the research process works, including the differences
between inductive and deductive approaches to research. Additionally, we will talk about good practices in
qualitative interviewing, specifically the use of an interview guide. In the second half of the meeting, we
will discuss a text that deal with Greenpeace’s transnational campaign work.

Required Reading:

• Katz-Kimchi, M., & Manosevitch, I. (2015). Mobilizing Facebook users against Facebook's
energy policy: The case of Greenpeace unfriend coal campaign. Environmental Communication
9(2), 248-267. (20 pages)

Meeting 3: Fieldtrip to Hamburg, 23 January 2020

We will start our field trip with a train ride from Bremen to Hamburg Hbf (8:33-9:42, ME 82014) and visit
one INGO in the morning (Environmental Justice Foundation, Haus der Zukunft). After a lunch break, we
will visit the other INGO (Greenpeace, HafenCity) and will return to Bremen between 18:00 to 19:00
(likely on the train leaving Hamburg Hbf at 17:15).

Required Reading:

• Luxon, E. M., & Wong, W. H. (2017). Agenda-setting in Greenpeace and amnesty: the limits of
centralisation in international NGOs. Global Society 31(4), 479-509. (31 pages)
• Zelko, F. (2017). Scaling Greenpeace: From Local Activism to Global Governance. Historical
Social Research/Historische Sozialforschung 318-342. (25 pages)

Meeting 4: Reflections and Conclusions, 30 January 2020

The purpose of the fourth and last meeting is to reflect on the interviews held and presentations heard
during the field trip. We will discuss with a week distance what has been said and what to make out of it.
We will also critically assess how well our interview guide worked and what would make for a complete
research design (e.g. who else to talk to). Last but not least, we will talk about your ideas for your research
reports.

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Literature on International NGOs

A. Introductory literature and definitional issues:

• Davies, T. (2019). Introducing NGOs and International Relations. Routledge Handbook of NGOs
and International Relations. Routledge: New York.
• Martens, K. (2002). Mission impossible? Defining nongovernmental organizations. Voluntas:
International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations 13(3), 271-285.

B. Emergence of INGOs and growth of their numbers:

• Charnovitz, S. (1997). Two centuries of participation: NGOs and international governance.

Michigan Journal of International Law 18(2), 183-286.
• Turner, E. A. L. (2010), Why has the number of international non-governmental organizations
exploded since 1960?, Cliodynamics 1(1), 81–91.
• Seary, B. (1996). The early history: From the Congress of Vienna to the San Francisco
Conference. In: Willetts, P. (ed.), “The Conscience of the World”: The Influence of Non-
Governmental Organizations in the UN System. Hurst: London, 15–30.
• Boli, J., & Thomas, G. M. (1999). Constructing world culture: International nongovernmental
organizations since 1875. Stanford: Stanford University Press.

C. How INGOs influence world politics:

• Scholte, J. A. (2004). Civil society and democratically accountable global governance.

Government and Opposition 39(2), 211-233.
• Shawki, N. (2011). Organizational structure and strength and transnational campaign outcomes: a
comparison of two transnational advocacy networks. Global Networks 11(1), 97-117.
• Longhofer, W., Schofer, E., Miric, N., & Frank, D. J. (2016). NGOs, INGOs, and environmental
policy reform, 1970–2010. Social Forces 94(4), 1743-1768.
• Dupuy, K. E., Ron, J., & Prakash, A. (2015). Who survived? Ethiopia's regulatory crackdown on
foreign-funded NGOs. Review of International Political Economy 22(2),419-456.
• (see above) Boli, J., & Thomas, G. M. (1999). Constructing world culture: International
nongovernmental organizations since 1875. Stanford: Stanford University Press.

D. INGOs and accountability:

• Crack, A. M. (2013). INGO accountability deficits: The imperatives for further

reform. Globalizations, 10(2), 293-308.
• Deloffre, M. Z. (2016). Global accountability communities: NGO self-regulation in the
humanitarian sector. Review of International Studies, 42(4), 724-747.
• Scholte, J. A. (2011). Civil society and IMF accountability. Building Global Democracy 78-104.
• Redeker, D., & Martens, K. (2018). NGOs and accountability. In: A Kellow, H Murphy-Gregory
(eds.), Handbook of Research on NGOs. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar, 303-324

E. INGOs and their critics:

• Porter, G. (2003). NGOs and poverty reduction in a globalizing world: Perspectives from Ghana.
Progress in Development Studies 3(2), 131-145.
• Manji, F., & O'Coill, C. (2002). The missionary position: NGOs and development in Africa.
International Affairs 78(3), 567-583.
• Petras, J. (1999). NGOs: In the service of imperialism. Journal of Contemporary Asia 29(4), 429-
440.

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