Elizabeth Bloodgood analyzes how national regulations constitute
and empower NGOs in the democratic and economically advanced
member states of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and
Development (OECD). Though states in the OECD are relatively
similar, she finds considerable variation in NGO legal identities and
relationships with their home governments. All OECD governments
regulate NGOs, but only in Poland are they legally identified as “nongovernmental organizations.” Elsewhere, their legal identities range across
the rubrics of nonprofit organization, association, charity, civil society
organization, public benefit organization, and corporation. In addition
to variation between countries, national regulations may also change
over time as in the Japan case, or may vary within countries that have
federal systems as in the cases of the United States and Canada.
Several questions merit further investigation:16 Does the legal heterogeneity of NGO regulations across the OECD and over time indicate variation and change in norms, in the strategic rationality of
NGOs, or in the incentives they face with a consistent rationality? How
could this survey of national regulations be extended to states outside
the OECD in which the rule of law is less well established? To what
extent do countries learn from each other’s NGO regulations, either to
mimic or to counter another country? How can this large-n comparative data be used to suggest structured case studies that would compare
selected pairs of countries in more depth, including domestic politics
and societal partners?