ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses various analytical treatments of international organizations—by political scientists, by economists, and by political economists. Public choice might better be seen as cutting across the traditional approaches in both international relations and economics. Its basic premise of rational self-interested behavior is shared by the dominant paradigms in both political science and economics, although political scientists have embraced optimal policy assumption less enthusiastically than economists. Traditionally, the economists most interested in international organizations have been those working in the area of international economics. As a broad approach, public choice qualities and builds upon, rather than refutes, traditional optimal policy analysis. Formal models, which assume that economic self-interest is the only influence on behavior, constitute one extreme. An increasing number or political scientists working on international political economy issues have a good knowledge of and accept the usefulness of the basic principles of mainstream economics in making social policy decisions.
