Delegation Under Contestation: Ideological (Mis)Alignment, and International Authority

Does ideological consensus among governments precede delegation to international organisations, or can expanding international authority itself generate consensus over time? As the pooling, delegation, and scope of authority of international organisations have expanded over time (Hooghe et al. 2017; Zürn et al. 2021), concerns have grown regarding the domestic political consequences of global governance. During a prolonged period characterised by a perceived global liberal consensus, international and regional organisations were widely seen as promoting liberal economic and social policy agendas. These policies often entail redistributive consequences and have been associated with rising inequality within and across countries. The liberal orientation of global governance has largely reflected the preferences of executives in a limited number of powerful states and has been legitimised through technocratic expertise, while the domestic impact has been particularly pronounced in states with limited influence over international decision-making (Börzel and Zürn 2021). Research on economic globalisation demonstrates that increasing international integration constrains parties’ freedom of manoeuvre in policymaking and reduces responsiveness to public opinion (Hellwig 2016). More recent research on crisis responses highlights how the global financial crisis, the Covid-19 pandemic, and the European migration issue have further deepened international authority and intensified domestic contestation over global governance (Börzel and Zürn 2021). At the same time, ideological alignment around global governance has weakened. The previously dominant liberal order is increasingly contested by the rise of authoritarian populism and nationalist sentiment, signalling growing opposition to regional integration and globalisation (Copelovitch and Pevehouse 2019; Pevehouse 2020). From a principal–agent framework, principals seek to prevent policy drift by limiting the autonomy of agents, particularly where divergent policy preferences exist between principals and agents or among multiple principals (Franchino 2007). Preference divergence and asymmetric power relations among principals increase the risk of policy drift and shape the extent of delegation. Existing accounts often assume that delegation in global governance reflects prior ideological consensus among participating governments, grounded in the belief that cooperation and policy harmonisation are more effective than unilateral action. Under this assumption, international negotiations are expected to take place under conditions of broad-based agreement, implying that delegation should occur primarily in policy areas characterised by ideological alignment. This paper advances the literature by examining the directionality of the relationship between consensus and delegation. It investigates not only whether pre-existing ideological consensus facilitates delegation, but also whether increased pooling, delegation, and expansion of policy scope to international and regional institutions can themselves generate consensus among governments. The study further examines the conditions under which ideological misalignment constrains or reverses delegation, and whether these dynamics vary across time periods. The argument is tested using newly compiled datasets on international authority combined with information on government policy positions.