AView from the Top: International Politics, Norms and the Worldwide Growth

This article provides a ‘‘top-down’ ’ explanation for the rapid growth of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in the postwar period, focusing on two aspects of political globalization. First, I argue that international political opportunities in the form of funding and political access have expanded enormously in the postwar period and provided a structural environment highly conducive to NGO growth. Secondly, I present a norm-based argument and trace the rise of a pro-NGO norm in the 1980s and 1990s among donor states and intergovernmental organiza-tions (IGOs), which has actively promoted the spread of NGOs to non-Western countries. The article ends with a brief discussion of the symbiotic relationship among NGOs, IGOs, and states promoting in-ternational cooperation. Nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) have proliferated in number and become increasingly influential players in world politics in the past three decades.1 With the rise in number and activeness of these new non-state actors in recent years, there i