Institutions and ‘New Institutionalism’

The aim of this chapter is to examine: Institutions as the ‘structures of government’ that vary across policymaking systems.How we define institutions and institutionalism.Key variants of new institutionalism — historical, rational choice, normative, sociological, and constructivist.Is there more to unite than divide the new institutionalisms? For example, we consider the debate between ‘empirical’ and ‘network’ institutionalism and consider the argument that common policy styles can be found in most political systems despite their institutional differences.