Randall Stone

Professor of Political Science and Director of the Skalny Center for Polish & Central European Studies University of Rochester

  • Rochester NY

Stone is known for his studies on international political economy, international relations, and Russian and European politics.

Contact

University of Rochester

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Areas of Expertise

International Monetary Fund
International Economics
Multinational Corporations
International relations and finance
Russia and Eastern Europe

Social

Biography

Stone’s research focuses on international finance and international organizations. His books include “Controlling Institutions: International Organizations and the Global Economy” (Cambridge, 2011), for which he was awarded the International Studies Association’s Chadwick F. Alger Prize in 2012; “Lending Credibility: The International Monetary Fund and the Post-Communist Transition” (Princeton, 2002); and “Satellites and Commissars: Strategy and Conflict in the Politics of Soviet-Bloc Trade” (Princeton, 1996). Articles have appeared in the American Political Science Review, International Organization, Journal of Politics, British Journal of Political Science, International Studies Quarterly, the Journal of Conflict Resolution, Review of International Organizations, and Global Environmental Politics.

Has been awarded grants by the NSF, SSRC, NCEEER, and IREX, and was the last recipient of the Soviet Peace Prize (1991). Stone teaches courses in international relations, international and comparative political economy, international organization, and Russian and East European politics.

Stone has been cited by the New York Times, CNBC, PBS News, and Foreign Policy Magazine for his insight into current affairs in Ukraine and Crimea.

Education

Harvard University

Ph.D.

1993

Harvard University

BA

Government

1988

Affiliations

  • Skalny Center for Polish and Eastern European Studies
  • The Peter D. Watson Center for Conflict and Cooperation

Selected Media Appearances

Putin Warns of 'Full-Scale World War III' in Victory Speech

Newsweek  print

2024-03-18

"If he succeeds in Ukraine, he will probably seek to challenge U.S. NATO allies, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, whose membership in NATO he has always seen as a threat to Russia," Randall Stone, politics professor at the University of Rochester in New York state, told Newsweek. "He may even seek to dominate Poland, which he describes as a historical antagonist of Russia.

"The war has shifted Russian strategy and economic ties away from the West and towards China, Iran and India, so Putin can be expected to be more antagonistic to the West in the future," Stone said.

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Why have Navalny and others been killed?

USA Today  print

2024-03-01

Randall Stone, director of the Skalny Center for Polish and Central European Studies, says Putin's regime in vulnerable.

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Polish Film Festival Goes Virtual

FOX News Rochester  tv

2021-04-05

The Spring 2021 Polish Film Festival in Rochester begins this week. A different film will be available for streaming each day April 7-14.

Randy Stone, director of the Skalny Center for Polish and Central European Studies at the University of Rochester, joined us to run down the lineup of films.

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Selected Articles

“Plaintiffs by Proxy: A Firm-Level Approach to WTO Dispute Resolution”

The Review of International Organizations

Randy Stone and Jeheung Ryu

Lobbying by multinational business firms drives the agenda of international trade politics. We match Fortune Global 500 firms to WTO disputes in which they have a stake and to their political activities using public disclosure data. The quantitative evidence reveals traces of a principal-agent relationship between major MNCs and the US Trade Representative (USTR). Firms lobby and make political contributions to induce the USTR to lodge a WTO dispute, and once a dispute begins, firms increase their political activity in order to keep USTR on track. Lobbying is overwhelmingly patriotic—the side opposing the US position is barely represented—and we see little evidence of MNCs lobbying against domestic protectionism. When the United States is targeted in a dispute, lobbying by defendant-side firms substantially delays settlement, as the affected firms pressure the government to reject concessions. Lobbying on the complainant side does not delay dispute resolution, as complainant-side firms have mixed incentives, to resolve disputes quickly as well as to hold out for better terms.

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“Corporate Influence in World Bank Lending”

Journal of Politics

Randy Stone and Rabia Malik

2018-01-01

The World Bank withholds loan disbursements in order to build a reputation for enforcing conditionality, and multinational firms lobby for these funds to be released. Using data drawn from World Bank reports, we find evidence that participation by Fortune 500 multinational corporations as project contractors and investments by these firms are associated with disbursements that are unjustified by project performance.

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“Mixed Signals: IMF Lending and Capital Markets”

British Journal of Political Science

Randy Stone and Terrence Chapman, Songying Fang and Xin Li

2015-07-02

The effect of new International Monetary Fund (IMF) lending announcements on capital markets depends on the lender’s political motivations. There are conditions under which lending reduces the risk of a deepening crisis and the risk premium demanded by market actors. Yet the political interests that make lenders willing to lend may weaken the credibility of commitments to reform, and the act of accepting an agreement reveals unfavorable information about the state of the borrower’s economy. The net ‘catalytic’ effect on the price of private borrowing depends on whether these effects dominate the beneficial effects of the liquidity the loan provides. Decomposing the contradictory effects of crisis lending provides an explanation for the discrepant empirical findings in the literature about market reactions. This study tests the implications of the theory by examining how sovereign bond yields are affected by IMF program announcements, loan size, the scope of conditions attached to loans and measures of the geopolitical interests of the United States, a key IMF principal.

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