Alasdair Young
Associate Dean for Faculty Development, Professor and Neal Family Chair
- Ivan Allen Dean's Office
- Center for International Strategy, Technology, and Policy
- Sam Nunn School of International Affairs
Overview
Alasdair Young is Professor and Neal Family Chair in the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs. He is Interim Associate Dean for Faculty Development for the Ivan Allen College of Liberal Arts. He co-directs the Center for European and Transatlantic Studies, and directs the Center for International Strategy, Technology, and Policy. He held a Jean Monnet Chair (2012-15) and received the Ivan Allen College’s Distinguished Researcher Award in 2015. Beyond Georgia Tech, he was co-editor of JCMS: Journal of Common Market Studies (2017-22) and was chair of the European Union Studies Association (USA) (2015-17). Before joining Georgia Tech in 2011 he taught at the University of Glasgow in the UK for 10 years. Prior to that he held research posts at the European University Institute in Florence, Italy, and the University of Sussex, outside Brighton in the UK.
Alasdair has written five books, including Supplying Compliance with Trade Rules: Explaining the EU’s Responses to Adverse WTO Rulings (Oxford University Press, 2021). He has edited 17 other volumes, including a special issue of the Journal of European Integration on "Governing the Digital Economy" (46/7) and the 9th edition of Policy-Making in the European Union with Mark Pollack and Helen Wallace (Oxford University Press 2025). He has published more than a score of refereed journal articles -- including in Global Environmental Politics, the Journal of Common Market Studies, the Journal of European Integration, the Journal of European Public Policy, the Review of International Political Economy, and World Politics -- and written more than 40 book chapters. He has performed consultancy work for the US and UK governments and for the European Commission.
- DPhil, University of Sussex
- MIA, Columbia University
- BA, University of Pennsylvania
Interests
- International Trade
Focuses:
- Europe
- Europe - United Kingdom
- United States
- Environment
- Globalization and Localization
- International Trade and Investment
- Regulation
Courses
- INTA-2001: Careers In Intl Affairs
- INTA-2221: Politics of the EU
- INTA-3044: Global Politics of Tech
- INTA-3223: Transatlantic Relations
- INTA-3301: Int'l Political Econ
- INTA-4500: INTA Pro-Seminar
- INTA-4740: Sem-Political Economy
- INTA-4803: Special Topics
- INTA-6302: Intl Political Economy
- INTA-6306: Globalization
- INTA-8803: Special Topics
Publications
Selected Publications
Books
- Supplying Compliance with Trade Rules: Explaining the EU's Responses to Adverse WTO Rulings
Date: 2021
- Policy-Making in the European Union, 8th edition
Date: November 2020
Policy-Making in the European Union explores the link between the modes and mechanisms of EU policy-making and its implementation at the national level. From defining the processes, institutions, and modes through which policy-making operates, the text moves on to situate individual policies within these modes, detail their content, and analyse how they are implemented, navigating policy in all its complexities. The first part of the text examines processes, institutions, and the theoretical and analytical underpinnings of policy-making, while the second part considers a wide range of policy areas, from economics to the environment, and security to the single market. Throughout the text, theoretical approaches sit side by side with the reality of key events in the EU, including Brexit and the politicization of EU policy-making, focusing on what determines how policies are made and implemented. This includes major developments such as UK’s withdrawal from the EU, the creation of the Next Generation EU’s Recovery and Resilience Facility, and agreement of the Multiannual Financial Framework (2021-27). The concluding chapter considers trends in EU policy-making and the challenges facing the EU.
- The New Politics of Trade: Lessons from TTIP
Date: 2017
- Parochial Global Europe: 21st Century Trade Politics
Date: 2014
Journal Articles
- Governing the digital economy: transatlantic accommodation and cooperation
In: Journal of European Integration [Peer Reviewed]
Date: October 2024
- Triumph in taxing times? Linked transatlantic two-level games and the taxation of the digital economy
In: Journal of European Integration [Peer Reviewed]
Date: October 2024
- Two Wrongs Make a Right? The Politicization of Trade Policy and European Trade Strategy
In: Journal of European Public Policy, 26/12 [Peer Reviewed]
Date: December 2019
- Where’s the demand? Explaining the EU’s surprisingly constructive response to adverse WTO rulings
In: Journal of European Integration, 41/1 [Peer Reviewed]
Date: January 2019
- Not your parents’ trade politics: The Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership negotiations
In: Review of International Political Economy [Peer Reviewed]
Date: 2016
- Europe's Influence on Foreign Rules: Conditions, Context and Comparison
In: Journal of European Public Policy [Peer Reviewed]
Date: 2015
- Liberalizing trade, not exporting rules: the limits to regulatory co-ordination in the EU's ‘new generation’ preferential trade agreements
In: Journal of European Public Policy [Peer Reviewed]
Date: 2015
© 2015 Taylor & Francis.The European Union (EU) is considered both an influential global regulator and a trade power. There is thus a common, if rather casual, assumption that the EU exports its regulations through preferential trade agreements (PTAs). Based on a close textual analysis of four early ‘new generation’ PTAs – those with Canada, Central America, Singapore and South Korea – and the Commission's opening position in the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership negotiations, this contribution challenges that assumption. Across a broad spectrum of regulatory issues there has been very limited regulatory co-ordination. Moreover, where it has occurred, it has focused on establishing the equivalence of different rules or on convergence based on international, not European, standards. This contribution thus demonstrates that the EU has not exported its regulations through ‘new generation’ PTAs. Moreover, it contends that the EU has not really tried to. It speculates that the EU has not sought to export aggressively its rules through new generation PTAs because of concern that opposition to regulatory change in its partners would jeopardize agreements that would benefit European firms.
All Publications
Books
- Supplying Compliance with Trade Rules: Explaining the EU's Responses to Adverse WTO Rulings
Date: 2021
- Policy-Making in the European Union, 8th edition
Date: November 2020
Policy-Making in the European Union explores the link between the modes and mechanisms of EU policy-making and its implementation at the national level. From defining the processes, institutions, and modes through which policy-making operates, the text moves on to situate individual policies within these modes, detail their content, and analyse how they are implemented, navigating policy in all its complexities. The first part of the text examines processes, institutions, and the theoretical and analytical underpinnings of policy-making, while the second part considers a wide range of policy areas, from economics to the environment, and security to the single market. Throughout the text, theoretical approaches sit side by side with the reality of key events in the EU, including Brexit and the politicization of EU policy-making, focusing on what determines how policies are made and implemented. This includes major developments such as UK’s withdrawal from the EU, the creation of the Next Generation EU’s Recovery and Resilience Facility, and agreement of the Multiannual Financial Framework (2021-27). The concluding chapter considers trends in EU policy-making and the challenges facing the EU.
- Foreign Policy of the European Union
Date: 2017
- The European Union at an Inflection Point: (Dis)integrating or the New Normal?
Date: 2017
- The New Politics of Trade: Lessons from TTIP
Date: 2017
- Triangular Diplomacy among the European Union, the United States and the Russian Federation: Responses to Crisis in Ukraine
Date: 2017
- Policy-Making in the European Union, 7th edn
Date: 2015
- Parochial Global Europe: 21st Century Trade Politics
Date: 2014
- Policy-making in the European Union
Date: 2010
A wide range of crucial and illustrative policies are then explored in detail by subject experts. This volume includes new chapters on ways of analyzing the EU's policy process and on energy policy.
- The European Union and the New Trade Politics
Date: 2007
- Extending European Cooperation: The European Union and the ‘New’ International Trade Agenda
Date: 2002
- Regulatory Politics in the Enlarging European Union: Weighing Civic and Producer Interests
Date: 2002
- Participation and Policy-Making in the European Union
Date: 1997
Journal Articles
- Governing the digital economy: transatlantic accommodation and cooperation
In: Journal of European Integration [Peer Reviewed]
Date: October 2024
- Triumph in taxing times? Linked transatlantic two-level games and the taxation of the digital economy
In: Journal of European Integration [Peer Reviewed]
Date: October 2024
- Two Wrongs Make a Right? The Politicization of Trade Policy and European Trade Strategy
In: Journal of European Public Policy, 26/12 [Peer Reviewed]
Date: December 2019
- Where’s the demand? Explaining the EU’s surprisingly constructive response to adverse WTO rulings
In: Journal of European Integration, 41/1 [Peer Reviewed]
Date: January 2019
- Intergovernmental Policy Makes Transnational Politics? The Unusually Transnational Politics of TTIP
In: Cambridge Review of International Affairs [Peer Reviewed]
Date: April 2018
- The Politics of Deep Integration
In: Cambridge Review of International Affairs
Date: April 2018
- European Trade Policy in Interesting Times
In: Journal of European Integration [Peer Reviewed]
Date: December 2017
- “European Trade Policy in Interesting Times"
In: Journal of European Integration [Peer Reviewed]
Date: November 2017
- An inflection point in EU studies?
In: Journal of European Public Policy, 23/8
Date: June 2016
- Not your parents’ trade politics: The Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership negotiations
In: Review of International Political Economy [Peer Reviewed]
Date: 2016
- Europe's Influence on Foreign Rules: Conditions, Context and Comparison
In: Journal of European Public Policy [Peer Reviewed]
Date: 2015
- Liberalizing trade, not exporting rules: the limits to regulatory co-ordination in the EU's ‘new generation’ preferential trade agreements
In: Journal of European Public Policy [Peer Reviewed]
Date: 2015
© 2015 Taylor & Francis.The European Union (EU) is considered both an influential global regulator and a trade power. There is thus a common, if rather casual, assumption that the EU exports its regulations through preferential trade agreements (PTAs). Based on a close textual analysis of four early ‘new generation’ PTAs – those with Canada, Central America, Singapore and South Korea – and the Commission's opening position in the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership negotiations, this contribution challenges that assumption. Across a broad spectrum of regulatory issues there has been very limited regulatory co-ordination. Moreover, where it has occurred, it has focused on establishing the equivalence of different rules or on convergence based on international, not European, standards. This contribution thus demonstrates that the EU has not exported its regulations through ‘new generation’ PTAs. Moreover, it contends that the EU has not really tried to. It speculates that the EU has not sought to export aggressively its rules through new generation PTAs because of concern that opposition to regulatory change in its partners would jeopardize agreements that would benefit European firms.
- Europe as a global regulator? The limits of EU influence in international food safety standards
In: Journal of European Public Policy [Peer Reviewed]
Date: June 2014
The European Union (EU) is often depicted as global regulatory power. This contribution contends that this depiction, while not unfounded, is misleading. It aims to clarify under what conditions the EU converts its regulatory capability into influence. Specifically, it seeks to resolve the puzzle of the EU's poor performance in the setting of global food safety standards within the Codex Alimentarius Commission. The argument is deceptively simple. The EU's limited influence is due to it being a preference outlier. In a context where standards can be agreed by voting, the stringency of the EU's regulations, rather than being a source of influence, is a liability. This extreme case demonstrates that the EU's ability to exercise international influence is affected by the constellation of preferences and the distribution of power. This contribution, therefore, contributes to the emerging literature that contends that the EU's international effectiveness can be understood only with explicit reference to the international context within which it is operating. © 2014 Taylor & Francis.
- The value of pointillism? Integrating trade and development and the European Union as a global actor
In: Contemporary Politics
Date: January 2014
- 'We care about you, but ... ': the politics of EU trade policy and development
In: CAMBRIDGE REVIEW OF INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS [Peer Reviewed]
Date: September 2013
- ‘Agriculture Could Prove Undoing of EU-US Trade Deal,’
In: Oxford Analytica
Date: February 2013
- The Rise (and Fall?) of the EU's Performance in the Multilateral Trading System
In: Journal of European Integration [Peer Reviewed]
Date: November 2011
The multilateral trading system represents an excellent case for analyzing the factors influencing the EU's performance in international institutions, because of the marked changes that have taken place both in the EU and in the multilateral trading system over the past six decades. Moreover, trade is the international policy arena in which the EU has greatest power resources and greatest institutional capacity. Perhaps not surprisingly, therefore, the EU has long performed well in the multilateral trading system. The article, however, argues that internal changes in the late 1980s and early 1990s enabled the EU to advance a more ambitious agenda in the multilateral trading system. The enhanced ambition translated temporarily into enhanced performance within the multilateral trading system, but this was short-lived as the emergence of new trading powers hostile to the EU's agenda in the late 1990s resulted in the erosion of its ambitious agenda in the Doha Development Round. © 2011 Copyright Taylor and Francis Group, LLC. - 'Of Executive Preferences and Societal Constraints: The Domestic Politics of the Transatlantic GMO Dispute
In: Review of International Political Economy [Peer Reviewed]
Date: 2011
- ‘Perspectives on the Changing Global Distribution of Power: Concepts and Context,’
In: POLITICS
Date: 2010
- ‘Complying with Unwelcome Rules? Developing Countries and the TRIPs Agreement,’
In: Indian Journal of International Law [Peer Reviewed]
Date: 2009
- ‘Confounding Conventional Wisdom: Political not Principled Differences in the Transatlantic Regulatory Relationship,’
In: The British Journal of Politics and International Relations [Peer Reviewed]
Date: 2009
- ‘Editorial: The EU in 2007: Development without Drama, Progress without Passion,’
In: JCMS Annual Review of the European Union 2007
Date: 2008
- Trade Politics Ain’t What It Used to Be: The European Union in the Doha Round,
In: Journal of Common Market Studies [Peer Reviewed]
Date: 2007
- ‘Editorial: 2006 A Quiet Year?’
In: JCMS Annual Review of the European Union in 2006
Date: 2007
- ‘Editorial: Crisis, What Crisis? Continuity and Normality in the EU in 2005’
In: The JCMS Annual Review of the European Union in 2005
Date: 2006
- ‘The EU and the New Trade Politics,’
In: Journal of European Public Policy [Peer Reviewed]
Date: 2006
- ‘Picking the Wrong Fight: Why Attacks on the World Trade Organization Pose the Real Threat to Environmental and Public Health Protection,
In: Global Environmental Politics [Peer Reviewed]
Date: 2005
- ‘The Incidental Fortress: The Single European Market and World Trade’
In: Journal of Common Market Studies [Peer Reviewed]
Date: June 2004
- ‘Political Transfer and “Trading Up”: Transatlantic Trade in Genetically Modified Food and US Politics,’
In: World Politics [Peer Reviewed]
Date: 2003
- ‘The Adaptation of European Foreign Economic Policy: From Rome to Seattle,’ Jour
In: Journal of Common Market Studies [Peer Reviewed]
Date: March 2000
Chapters
- The European Policy Process in Comparative Perspective
In: H. Wallace, M. A. Pollack, C. Roeder-Rynning and A. R. Young (eds), Policy-Making in the European Union, 8th edition
Date: November 2020
- The Single Market: Central to Brexit
In: H. Wallace, M. A. Pollack, C. Roeder-Rynning and A. R. Young (eds), Policy-Making in the European Union, 8th edition
Date: November 2020
- The Stability of EU Policy-Making in a Turbulent World
In: H. Wallace, M. A. Pollack, C. Roeder-Rynning and A. R. Young (eds), Policy-Making in the European Union, 8th edition
Date: November 2020
- Trade Policy: Making Policy in Turbulent Times
In: H. Wallace, M. A. Pollack, C. Roeder-Rynning and A. R. Young (eds), Policy-Making in the European Union, 8th edition
Date: November 2020
- National Aims and Adaptation: Lessons from the Market
In: Foreign Policies of EU Member States: Continuity and Europeanisation [Peer Reviewed]
Date: June 2017
- Trade
In: Sage Handbook of European Foreign Policy
Date: July 2015
- An Overview
In: Policy-Making in the European Union, 7th edn
Date: 2015
- Policy-Making in a Time of Crisis: Trends and Challenges
In: Policy-Making in the European Union, 7th edn
Date: 2015
- The European Policy Process in Comparative Perspective
In: Policy-Making in the European Union, 7th edn
Date: 2015
- The Single Market: From Stagnation to Renewal?
In: Policy-Making in the European Union, 7th edn
Date: 2015
- ‘Less Than You Might Think: The Impact of WTO Rules on EU Policies’
In: The Influence of International Institutions on the EU: When Multilateralism Hits Brussels [Peer Reviewed]
Date: 2012
- ‘Effective Multilateralism on Trial: EU Compliance with WTO Law,’
In: The EU’s Presence in International Organisations
Date: 2010
- ‘The Single Market: Deregulation, reregulation and integration,’
In: Policy-Making in the European Union, 6th edn
Date: 2010
- ‘Transatlantic Intransigence in the Doha Round: Domestic Politics and the Difficulty of Compromise’
In: Breaking Deadlocks in Multilateral Settings: An Interdisciplinary Perspective [Peer Reviewed]
Date: 2010
- External Economic Relations
In: European Politics
Date: 2007
- Trade and Transatlantic Relations
In: Making History: European Integration and Institutional Change at Fifty: The State of the European Union Volume 8
Date: 2007
- ‘Negotiating with Diminished Expectations: The European Union and the Doha Development Agenda,’
In: The WTO after Hong Kong: Progress in, and Prospects for, the Doha Development Agenda [Peer Reviewed]
Date: 2007
- ‘The Politics of Regulation and the Internal Market’
In: Handbook of European Union Politics
Date: 2007
- Protection or Protectionism? EU Food Safety Rules and the WTO’
In: What's the Beef? The Contested Governance of European Food Safety [Peer Reviewed]
Date: 2006
- ‘Punching Its Weight? The European Union’s Use of WTO Dispute Resolution’
In: The European Union’s Roles in International Politics: Concepts and Analysis [Peer Reviewed]
Date: 2006
- The European Policy Process in Comparative Perspective
In: Policy-Making in the European Union, 6th edn
Date: 2005
- The Single European Market: New Approach to Policy
In: Policy-Making in the European Union, 6th edn
Date: 2005
- ‘EU Interest Representation or US-Style Lobbying?’
In: The State of the European Union, Volume 7: With US or Against US? European Trends in American Perspective
Date: 2005
- ‘The Single Market: A New Approach to Policy’
In: Policy-Making in the European Union, 5th edn.
Date: 2005
- The EU and World Trade: Doha and Beyond
In: Developments in the European Union, 2nd edn.
Date: 2004
- ‘What Game? By Which Rules? Adaptation and Flexibility in the EU’s Foreign Economic Policy,’
In: Understanding the EU’s External Relations
Date: 2003
- Liberalizing and Reregulating Telecommunications in Europe: A Common Framework and Persistent Differences
In: Trade, Investment and Competition Policies in the Global Economy: The Case of the International Telecommunications Regime
Date: 2002
- ‘European Lessons for Multilateral Economic Integration: A Cautionary Tale,’
In: Globalization Under Threat: The Stability of Trade Policy and International Agreements
Date: 2001
- Regulatory Convergence Between the European Union and Central and Eastern Europe’
In: Towards Rival Regionalism? US and EU Regional Regulatory Regime Building
Date: 1998
- ‘European Consumer Groups: Multiple Levels of Governance and Multiple Logics of Collective Action’
In: Collective Action in the European Union: Interests and the New Politics of Associability [Peer Reviewed]
Date: 1998
- The Kaleidoscope of European Policy-Making: Shifting Patterns of Participation and Influence
In: Participation and Policy-Making in the European Union [Peer Reviewed]
Date: 1997
- ‘Consumers in the Single Market: Consumption without Representation?’
In: Participation and Policy-Making in the European Union [Peer Reviewed]
Date: 1997
- The Single Market: A New Approach to Policy’
In: Policy-Making in the European Union, 3rd edn.
Date: 1996
- ‘Ideas, Interests and Institutions: The Politics of Liberalisation in the EC's Road Haulage Industry’
In: The Evolution of Rules for a Single European Market, Part I: Industry and Finance
Date: 1995