This is a timely and sophisticated study of how three multilateral development banks have dealt with demands to incorporate a serious environmental agenda into their lending strategies for Central and Eastern Europe. Gutner shows how each institution's shareholder commitment to a green agenda interacts with the overall development strategies of that institution to affect is ability to implement successful environmental projects in recipient countries. This is an important study of some of the challenges international institutions face in responding to increasingly diverse demands from their expanding constituencies.
Steven Weber, Berkeley Roundtables on the International Economy, University of California, Berkeley
Why do multilateral development banks possessing broadly similar mandates and operating in the same region perform so differently in environmental terms? In a wide-ranging and insightful examination of this question, Tamar Gutner not only shows how shareholders pressure, design features, and recipient demand interact to influence bank behavior, but also sheds light on factors leading to inertia and innovation in international organizations more generally.
Oran R. Young, Director, Institute on International Environmental Governance, Dartmouth College
An accessible and enjoyable read. This study is empirically rich, based on extensive interview and documentary research.
Paul Nelson, Graduate School of Public and International Affairs, University of Pittsburgh
Gutner's careful comparative study increases our understanding of how to translate environmental commitments into effective environmental protection. Her book identifies the very different factors that affect the formulation of policy objectives, the institutionalization of supporting policy processes, and the attainment of desired policy outcomes.
MJ Peterson, Department of Political Science, University of Massachusetts, Amherst
