Why are some international nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) more politically salient than others, and why are some NGOs better able to influence the norms of human rights? Internal Affairs shows how the organizational structures of human rights NGOs and their campaigns determine their influence on policy. Drawing on data from seven major international organizations—the International Committee of the Red Cross, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Médecins sans Frontières, Oxfam International, Anti-Slavery International, and the International League of Human Rights—Wendy H. Wong demonstrates that NGOs that choose to centralize agenda-setting and decentralize the implementation of that agenda are more successful in gaining traction in international politics.Challenging the conventional wisdom that the most successful NGOs are those that find the "right" cause or have the most resources, Wong shows that how NGOs make and implement decisions is critical to their effectiveness in influencing international norms about human rights. Building on the insights of network theory and organizational sociology, Wong traces how power works within NGOs and affects their external authority. The internal coherence of an organization, as reflected in its public statements and actions, goes a long way to assure its influence over the often tumultuous elements of the international human rights landscape.
Wendy H. Wong is Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Toronto and Director of the Trudeau Center for Peace, Conflict, and Justice at the Munk School of Global Affairs.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments ix
Abbreviations xiii
Introduction: Internal Affairs and External Influence 1
1 Salience in Human Rights 28
2 The Importance of Organizational Structure 53
3 Amnesty International: The NGO That Made Human Rights Important 84
4 Other Models of Advocating Change 115
5 Using Campaigns to Examine Organizational and Ideational Salience 149
Conclusion 186
Notes 205
References 215
Index 239
What People are Saying About This
R. Charli Carpenter
Scholars know not all advocacy organizations are equally influential: some are more central, more powerful, and more 'salient' within advocacy networks, affecting their power over the global agenda. But until now it's been less clear how NGO ‘superpowers’ come to occupy this status. In this path-breaking book, Wendy Wong provides an answer: transnational change agents make deliberate choices in terms of their organizational structure. She teases out how this affects their prominence as organizations within the wider advocacy networks and their subsequent influence at exporting specific ideas to the global community. This important work will enrich scholarship on NGOs, advocacy networks, and global agenda-setting and is a must-read by students and scholars of global civil society.
Stephen HopgoodSOAS
In this lucid and important analysis, Wendy Wong advances us well beyond standard accounts of norms into the world of organizational realities. By using a highly informative comparative lens, she challenges us to link the structure of international NGOs of various kinds to their political salience, illustrating with rich empirical examples how organizational dynamics impact on success and failure in the pursuit of human dignity.