When the International Energy Agency (IEA) was established out of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in 1974, Australia was not among its founding members. Indeed, it was opposed to its formation and even contemplated voting in the OECD to block its establishment. A single negative vote under the "mutual agreement" rule would have done so. This paper, based on archival research, explores the reasons for this course of action and shows that the decision was linked to the resource nationalism at the time of Minister Rex Connor and his fear that supporting it might jeopardise his attempts to raise non-equity finance in the Middle East. This article shows that this previously unanalysed decision was connected to what became known as the "Loans Affair" that brought about Connor's demise and contributed to the downfall of the Whitlam Government.

In the last decade, the OECD has undergone a period of transformation under the leadership of Secretary-General Angel Gurría and his senior management – a transformation that has revitalised the organisation's operations and outputs. Now celebrating its 60th anniversary, the OECD provides an increasingly valuable resource for its members and partners worldwide. This, the only book to cover the last ten years of the OECD's work, focuses on the policy-related advice, evidence-based global standards, trusted statistics and analysis, and support for policy reform that it has developed. The book commences with a brief history of the OECD and its key decision processes and then examines the impact of its leadership in driving a wide range of achievements and in securing an expanding, increasingly global role. It focuses on the organisation's green agenda and the move to measure living conditions in a more detailed fashion, rather than relying largely on GDP, and on the inclusive growth project that aims at making markets work for all. It discusses the OECD's remarkably influential work in education, including PISA and PIAAC, and demonstrates the capacity of the OECD to embrace new areas of work – the importance of innovation and the digital economy in driving economic growth. Based on access to a wide range of documents and extensive interviews with senior officials and members, this comprehensive book also sheds light on the OECD's partnership with the G20 in the push for stronger international co-operation and transparency in tax matters as well their Inclusive Framework on Base Erosion and Profit shifting (BEPS), aimed at tackling tax avoidance. The OECD's strategic response to the COVID-19 pandemic and the drive to develop 'Smart Data' are also covered.

This book provides a unique examination of how a middle power uses international organisations to achieve greater global influence. The authors focus on the OECD, ‘the rich man’s club’ of most of the world’s wealthiest nations. It demonstrates how the decision by Australia to apply for membership was a long drawn out process, delayed by political factors. Eventually agreement was reached with assurances that membership would provide access to valuable and timely policy-related information, especially in relation to international trade and finance. In addition, membership would potentially increase influence by providing greater access to its powerful member states at an earlier stage in their policy discussions and agreements.

In 2016 Korea celebrates 20 years or membership in the OECD. In the early 1980s, following a period of remarkably successful economic growth, it commenced a programme of financial liberalisation and then, from 1993, more general economic and regulatory reform. There were three major reasons for the change in approach. The first was the increasing international influence of the market and the second was growing international and domestic pressure for Korea to remove trade restrictions, increasingly important as the Uruguay Round negotiations led to the establishment of the WTO. A third reason was pressure from increasingly powerful industrial groups chaebols for liberalisation, especially as regards lifting the ceiling on their ownership of bank shares, greater freedom in foreign borrowing and raising the aggregate credit ceiling.

Research Highlights and AbstractThis article Highlights how G20 endorsement' promotes and enhances the legitimacy of specialist technical agencies and organisations Provides a case study highlighting the impact of G20 endorsement on the OECD's international tax transparency agenda Develops a mid-level theory of G20 endorsement in order to analyse this emerging form of authority in global governanceThe G20 Leaders' Forum has been touted as The world's premier forum for promoting global cooperation', yet beyond this rhetoric the track record of the G20 is varied leading critics to claim sit is little more than a toothless talkshop'. We argue that such sweeping generalisations are difficult to sustain in the light of evidence from some issue arenas in which the G20 has been active. This article draws on the extant literature on the Gs' and network governance in an attempt to theorise and explain the G20's endorsement function, or its capacity to promote and legitimise the work of specialised organisations and networks. We build on the extant literature using a semi-inductive method focusing on the G20's endorsement of the OECD's international tax transparency agenda to develop a mid-level framework for analysing this important source of authority in global governance.

In weighing Britain's decision to seek membership of the European Economic Community Australian scholars have focussed attention on its adverse impact on Anglo-Australian and EU-Australian relations, and the emphasis that Australia thereafter placed upon economic relations with Asia. This article identifies a consequence of Britain's decision which has largely escaped attention: the part it played in stimulating Australia's successful 1969 application for membership of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development. Although Australia's interest in the increased access to West European decision-makers that the OECD would provide dates to the latter 1940s and 1950s, the British application for membership of the EEC added particular weight to those arguing that Australia should seek OECD membership. It led to an extension of Australian activities in Western Europe which was not extinguished by the growing emphasis on relations with the Asian region.

Abstract This article compares the extent of policy transfer related to the accession processes of three international governmental organisations (IGOs), the European Union (EU), the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and the World Trade Organisation (WTO). It is argued that this is necessary as there is a tendency for studies of IGOs as agents of transfer to focus primarily upon the transfer that occurs after a state has acceded to membership, neglecting the extent of transfer that can take place during the accession process. The key findings are: one, policy transfer occurs during the accession process in all three organisations and, to varying extents, in all three stages of the accession process; two, the extent of transfer varies by accession stage and over time for all three organisations; three, the greatest extent of transfer occurs in the pre-accession and formal accession stages; four, the greater the degree of isomorphism between an applicant’s policies and institutions and those of the IGO, the less the extent of policy transfer in the accession process.

A typical image of the making and administration of policy suggests that it takes place on an incremental basis, involving public servants, their ministers and, to a more limited extent, a variety of interest groups. Yet, much policy making is based on similar policy developed in other jurisdictions and in the major international organizations such as the WTO and the OECD. In other words, significant aspects of nationally developed policies are copied from elsewhere in what is described as a process of policy transfer and learning. Hence, studies of policy transfer have pointed to a distinct limitation in most existing theoretical and empirical explanations as to how policy is made and implemented through their neglect of the role of policy transfer and learning. Moreover, policy transfer is not only a concern of academics, but a growing concern for governments. The latter are concerned to improve the performance of their policy and several have placed a greater, more systematic focus on policy transfer as a means to increasing performance. This book presents a variety of cases from differing national and international contexts that enable a valuable, comparative analysis that is absent from most literature currently available and that suggest a number of exciting research directions with implications for policy making, transference and implementation in the future.

International civil servants, while long neglected, have recently received renewed attention, focusing especially on the their capacity to influence outcomes in international organizations. Xu and Weller, writing in the context of the WTO, suggested that the capacity of the international civil service to achieve designated objectives is affected by both the formal institutional conditions of the organization and the informal opportunities they develop. The Xu and Weller findings raise the question as to whether their model holds in other international organizations, and in this article we explore these issues in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. We find that, while the significance of the factors they discuss is confirmed, the expertise of the Secretariat in the OECD is an important factor at the base of its influence, confirming a similar account of the World Bank.

Introduction (Peter Carroll and Richard Common) Part I: Degrees of Transfer and Their Determinants 1. When Policy Diffusion does not lead to Policy Transfer: Explaining Resistance to International Learning in Public Management Reform (Richard Common) 2. Policy Transfer and Local Government Performance Improvement Regimes (Sandra Nutley, James Downe, Steve Martin and Clive Grace) 3. Low Impact Development - The Transfer that was Not?: How the Federal Relationship in the Area of Environmental Protection Facilitates Innovation but Mitigates against Transfer (David P. Dolowitz) 4. Policy Transfer in New Democracies: Challenges for Public Administration (Riin Kruusenberg and Tiina Randma-Liiv) 5. Why can't you Lead a Horse to Water and make it Drink?: The Learning Oriented Transfer of Health Sector Decentralization Reforms and Bureaucratic Interests in Malawi (Richard I.C. Tambulasi) Part II: New Developments in Transfer and Learning 6. Sources of Transfer: The Case of Accession to International Organizations (Peter Carroll) 7. Borrowing from the Neighbours: Policy Transfer to Tackle Climate Change in the Australian Federation (Robyn Hollander) 8. "These are the People You Need to Talk to": The Role of Non-State Organizations in International Policy Transfer to Ireland's Official Languages Act (2003) (Clare Rigg, Muiris O Laoire and Vasiliki Georgiou) 9. Contested Policy Transfer: When Chile's 'Programa de Mejoramiento de la Gestion' Travelled to Mexico (Mauricio Dussauge-Laguna) Conclusions (Peter Carroll and Richard Common)

The article indicates that policy transfer has played an important role in the development of policy and legislation in Australia. Indeed, much of what is regarded as Australian policy is borrowed, usually in small part, but sometimes in its entirety, from elsewhere. One of the implications of this view is that Australian policy making processes are often, at least in part, dynamic, policy processes that draw upon a number of sources, both domestic and international. The focus of this article is upon the sources of transfer in the Australian context, both domestic and international, and how the sources drawn upon by Australian state and federal governments have changed over time. The article also indicates that on the evidence available the Australian experience with transfer can be divided into a number of phases. The first, from European colonisation to approximately the middle of the nineteenth century, the second from roughly the middle of the nineteenth century to federation at the beginning of the twentieth century, the third from the establishment of the Australian federation in 1901, to the Second World War, and the fourth phase, from the Second World War to the present.

The Country Party leader Jack McEwen said that Australia would join the OECD over my dead body and it did not do so until 1971, the year he retired from politics. Since then Australia has taken part in what is a complex network of networks linking over 40,000 senior public servants from many of the most influential states via some 200 committees spanning a wide range of policy areas. Yet Australian scholars have paid little attention to the OECD and to its effect upon Australia. Our essay is a first step in remedying this gap. Using both archival sources and interviews with public servants, we examine Australia's reasons for taking up OECD membership and assess its impact on policymaking since, the most obvious of which has been upon policy learning. We also ask about Australia's impact on the OECD.