Chronic Instability and the Limits of Path Dependence

2015 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 976-991 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Bernhard
Keyword(s):  
Federal Republic ◽  
Path Dependence ◽  
Historical Analysis ◽  
Historical Institutionalism ◽  
External Shocks ◽  
Chronic Instability ◽  
Rapid Succession ◽  
Critical Junctures ◽  
Comparative Historical Analysis ◽  
Lock In

Historical institutionalism challenged older forms of comparative historical analysis by moving away from purely structural explanations of historical outcomes. Instead it posited that there were critical junctures in which actors chose between institutional alternatives, which in turn led to path dependence. I examine a phenomenon neglected both by historical institutionalism and older forms of historical analysis—chronic instability. Instead of institutional lock-in, some junctures lead to periods of instability in which a series of regimes replace each other in rapid succession. Three different causal mechanisms that routinely contribute to chronic instability—external shocks, changing configurations of actors, and disjuncture between the logic of change and mechanisms of reproduction—are explored in depth. The plausibility of the theory is illustrated by an examination of regime instability in Germany from the collapse of the Empire in 1918 through the founding of the Federal Republic in 1949.

Path Dependence

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michelle Hegmon
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Path Dependence ◽  
General Level ◽  
Historical Contingency ◽  
Difficult Decision ◽  
Critical Junctures ◽  
Potential Applications ◽  
Path Dependent ◽  
Historical Sequences ◽  
Lock In

Path dependence concepts, thus far, have seen little application in archaeology, but they have great potential. At a general level, these concepts provide tools for theorizing historical sequences, such as patterns of settlement on a landscape and divergent historical traditions. Potential applications include issues of historical contingency in the late Rio Grande, settlement in the Mesa Verde region, and divergent trajectories in the post-Chaco period. Specific concepts from path dependence theory, including lock-in and critical junctures, are illustrated by an analysis of the growth of Hohokam irrigation, which exhibited a path-dependent trajectory. As archaeological study of path dependence builds awareness of the importance of decision-making on the future, it contributes to difficult decision-making in today’s world.

Historical Institutionalism

2020 ◽  
pp. 185-207
Author(s):  
Andrew R. Hom
Keyword(s):  
Path Dependence ◽  
International Institutions ◽  
International Order ◽  
Historical Institutionalism ◽  
Legacy Effects ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Problem Of Time ◽  
Critical Junctures ◽  
Realistic View ◽  
Baseline Assumption

Chapter seven covers historical institutionalism (HI), a new approach to international institutions that embraces overtly temporal themes like sequence, path dependence, critical junctures, legacy effects, and the importance of “founding moments.” While historical institutionalists make great strides in setting institutions in motion, this chapter argues that they remain trapped by the problem of Time tradition and moreover that timing theory can help them escape. After summarizing the rise of HI against sociological and especially rationalist treatments, it uses HI accounts of institutions of the “liberal international order” to clarify the role and status of “history” in HI, to show how HI recapitulates and narratively confronts the problem of Time, and to argue that historical institutionalists unintentionally position themselves as horologists who explain institutional faults without challenging the rationalist baseline assumption that institutions should work like near-perfect cooperation mechanisms. This depoliticizes HI and hamstrings its efforts to develop a distinctive theory of institutions. However, timing theory can help by recasting institutions as collective timing projects and by embracing a more realistic view of international-institutional possibility. In turn, HI can push several concepts and insights of timing theory further, opening the possibility not only of a more thoroughly temporal account of institutions but an institutionalist perspective on timing.

Historical Sociology

2011 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yvonne Åberg
Keyword(s):  
Network Analysis ◽  
Social Science ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Historical Analysis ◽  
Historical Sociology ◽  
Historical Institutionalism ◽  
Meso Level ◽  
Comparative Historical Analysis ◽  
Analytical Sociology ◽  
Historical Social Science

This article examines the different methods employed in historical sociology through which historical macro social outcomes are investigated — comparative, institutional, relational, and cultural — as well as the enduring tension revealed by the meso-level structures that often shape outcomes. It begins with a discussion of two major categories of historical sociology: comparative historical analysis, characterized by historical sociologists and political scientists who seek an explanation for large-scale processes, and the focus on institutionalism and networks in historical studies. It then presents examples of work in historical social science that have come closest to the requirements of analytical sociology. It also considers ways of bringing historical institutionalism and network analysis together and argues that an emphasis on analytic historical sociology can help specify the causality behind processes that have not been clearly interpreted or have been misinterpreted in historical, sociological, and culturally oriented studies.

Causality and Time in Historical Institutionalism

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
James Mahoney ◽  
Khairunnisa Mohamedali ◽  
Christoph Nguyen
Keyword(s):  
Path Dependence ◽  
Historical Institutionalism ◽  
Gradual Change ◽  
Graphical Approach ◽  
Critical Junctures ◽  
Temporal Concepts

This chapter explores the dual concern with causality and time in historical-institutionalism using a graphical approach. Conceptualizing causes as filters, the chapter analyses three concepts that are central to this field: critical junctures, gradual change, and path dependence. The analysis makes explicit and formal the logic underlying studies that use these “causal-temporal” concepts. The chapter shows visually how causality and temporality are linked to one another in varying ways depending on the particular pattern of change. Through this unifying visual grammar, the chapter also outlines an approach that can accommodate and reconcile both models of critical junctures and gradual change. The chapter provides new tools for describing and understanding change in historical institutional analyses.

Historical Institutionalism in Political Science

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Orfeo Fioretos ◽  
Tulia G. Falleti ◽  
Adam Sheingate
Keyword(s):  
Political Science ◽  
Path Dependence ◽  
Institutional Analysis ◽  
Historical Institutionalism ◽  
Gradual Change ◽  
Potential Growth ◽  
Political Analysis ◽  
Critical Junctures ◽  
Temporal Concepts

Historical institutionalism has steadily expanded its empirical scope and refined its analytical toolbox since it crystallized as a tradition of political analysis during the “new institutionalisms” debate. This chapter details the origins and evolution of historical institutionalism, placing particular emphases on the temporal concepts that inform its analytical toolbox. It begins with a discussion of historical institutionalims’s evolving relationship with other varieties of institutional analysis, before debating temporal concepts such as critical junctures, path dependence, intercurrence, and modes of gradual change. A third section identifies analytical, methodological, and empirical areas of potential growth.

scholarly journals Historical Institutionalism and EU–Turkey Relations: Path Dependence and Critical Junctures in the Accession Process

2021 ◽  
pp. 83-106
Author(s):  
Gülay Icoz ◽  
Natalie Martin
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Path Dependence ◽  
Arab Spring ◽  
Historical Institutionalism ◽  
Eu Accession ◽  
Member States ◽  
Critical Junctures ◽  
Accession Process ◽  
The Arab Spring ◽  
Over Time

AbstractThis chapter employs the perspective of historical institutionalism to analyze and explain why Turkey’s EU accession process endures even though it has not significantly progressed since it began. It argues that its temporal approach, the concepts of critical junctures and path dependence help explain the processes of stasis and change inherent within it. The chapter starts with an outline of historical institutionalism and contextualizes its conceptual and theoretical value for the analysis of EU–Turkey relations, arguing that an underlying path dependence in the accession process is the result of security considerations. The chapter continues by identifying several critical junctures which have intervened, and both expedited and hampered the process. The opposition of member states, the Arab Spring, and authoritarian drift within Turkey are important factors in this context. On this basis, the analysis shows how progress achieved has typically been countered by opposition, often related to human rights concerns. As a result, the accession process has stagnated but has endured at the same time as security interests and human rights concerns have balanced each other over time.

Critical Junctures

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Giovanni Capoccia
Keyword(s):  
Historical Analysis ◽  
Institutional Development ◽  
Coalition Building ◽  
Institutional Formation ◽  
Critical Junctures ◽  
Comparative Historical Analysis ◽  
Path Dependent ◽  
Long Term Impact ◽  
Analytical Tools

In the analysis of path-dependent institutions, the concept of critical juncture refers to situations of uncertainty in which decisions of important actors are causally decisive for the selection of one path of institutional development over other possible paths. The chapter parses the potentialities and the limitations of the concept in comparative-historical analysis, and proposes analytical tools for the comparative analysis of the smaller-scale and temporally proximate causes that shape decision-making on institutional innovation during critical junctures. In particular, the chapter discusses several patterns of short-term politics of institutional formation --innovative coalition-building for reform; “out-of-winset” outcomes; ideational battles; and near-missed institutional change—that can have a long-term impact on the development of policies and institutions.

scholarly journals The Study of Critical Junctures: Theory, Narrative, and Counterfactuals in Historical Institutionalism

2007 ◽  
Vol 59 (3) ◽  
pp. 341-369 ◽  
Author(s):  
Giovanni Capoccia ◽  
R. Daniel Kelemen
Keyword(s):  
Path Dependence ◽  
Practical Importance ◽  
Historical Institutionalism ◽  
Counterfactual Reasoning ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Narrative Methods ◽  
Critical Junctures ◽  
Path Dependent ◽  
Dependent Processes ◽  
Causal Logic

The causal logic behind many arguments in historical institutionalism emphasizes the enduring impact of choices made during critical junctures in history. These choices close off alternative options and lead to the establishment of institutions that generate self-reinforcing path-dependent processes. Despite the theoretical and practical importance of critical junctures, however, analyses of path dependence often devote little attention to them. The article reconstructs the concept of critical junctures, delimits its range of application, and provides methodological guidance for its use in historical institutional analyses. Contingency is the key characteristic of critical junctures, and counterfactual reasoning and narrative methods are necessary to analyze contingent factors and their impact. Finally, the authors address specific issues relevant to both cross-sectional and longitudinal comparisons of critical junctures.

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