| We traditionally think of public goods---security, clean air, street lights---as the province of the state. However, beyond the nation-state, states are increasingly turning to private actors to help provide public goods. In some cases, states explicitly rely on private actors by delegating authority; in others, states implicitly accept their contributions by allowing them to exercise a more entrepreneurial mode of authority. In both situations, these actors enjoy private authority: they have the ability to make rules and set standards to which other relevant actors in world politics defer.;This dissertation asks two related questions. First, when and why does private authority emerge? Second, when private authority does emerge, what form does it take? To answer these questions, I conceptualize two different forms of private authority: delegated and entrepreneurial. This theoretical move is a key contribution to the study of private authority, allowing careful analysis of the full range of variation of private rulemaking. The dissertation presents two original data sets to document the growth and variation of each form of private authority. It also presents a causal theory to explain whether private authority emerges in an issue area, and conditional on its emergence, whether it takes the form of delegated or entrepreneurial authority. I argue that private authority arises when there is a demand for benefits by states or other actors, and there is a supply of existing private expertise. These benefits can come in several forms: reduced transaction costs, increased credibility of commitments, first-mover advantage, and improved reputation. In short, if states or other actors anticipate that benefits can be provided by private actors with expertise, private authority will emerge. Given a supply of and demand for private authority, its form depends on the preferences of key states and the existence of a focal institution. When powerful states are in agreement, and a strong focal institution exists, delegated private authority will arise; conversely, when powerful states have heterogeneous preferences and there is no focal institution, entrepreneurial private authority emerges. The dissertation probes the plausibility of the theory with two case studies drawn from the climate change regime. |
