The new institutionalism and international relations: A step forward

The behavioral revolution of the 1960s which engulfed the social sciences, and particularly Political Science and Sociology, led to a large-scale disinterest in the study and structure of institutions. The 1980s saw a new movement emerge upon the social sciences, which stressed the centrality of institutional analysis in the study of politics and society and resurrected the study of institutions as key variables. Dubbed the New Institutionalism, this movement would have profound effects on the direction of research in Political Science and Sociology. Unfortunately, the New Institutionalist movement has been largely ignored by International Relations theorists and practitioners, even though it has generated both a useful toolkit of methods, and a rich source of findings that could be of much use to International Relations theory.