IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/zbw/cegedp/94.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

On commitment levels and compliance mechanisms: Determinants of participation in global environmental agreements

Author

Listed:
  • Bernauer, Thomas
  • Kalbhenn, Anna
  • Koubi, Vally
  • Ruoff, Gabi

Abstract

We argue that participation in international agreements is influenced by their design characteristics, notably commitment levels, measured by the specificity of obligations, and compliance mechanisms, measured by monitoring, enforcement, assistance, and dispute settlement provisions in treaties. We submit that specific obligations as well as monitoring and enforcement have a negative, and assistance and dispute settlement a positive effect on participation. These arguments are tested on a new dataset that includes information on ratifications of more than 200 global environmental agreements in 1950-2006. We find that specific obligations, assistance, and dispute settlement have the expected effects. Surprisingly, our results show that the presence (or absence) of monitoring and enforcement has no effect on participation. The latter finding suggests that monitoring and enforcement through mechanisms operating outside of treaties rather than through treaty obligations themselves are likely to play a significant role.

Suggested Citation

  • Bernauer, Thomas & Kalbhenn, Anna & Koubi, Vally & Ruoff, Gabi, 2010. "On commitment levels and compliance mechanisms: Determinants of participation in global environmental agreements," University of Göttingen Working Papers in Economics 94, University of Goettingen, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:cegedp:94
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/41581/1/622413473.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Kurt J. Beron & James C. Murdoch & Wim P. M. Vijverberg, 2003. "Why Cooperate? Public Goods, Economic Power, and the Montreal Protocol," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 85(2), pages 286-297, May.
    2. Fearon, James D., 1998. "Bargaining, Enforcement, and International Cooperation," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 52(2), pages 269-305, April.
    3. J. Timmons Roberts & Bradley C. Parks & Alexis A. Vásquez, 2004. "Who Ratifies Environmental Treaties and Why? Institutionalism, Structuralism and Participation by 192 Nations in 22 Treaties," Global Environmental Politics, MIT Press, vol. 4(3), pages 22-64, August.
    4. Oona A. Hathaway, 2007. "Why Do Countries Commit to Human Rights Treaties?," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 51(4), pages 588-621, August.
    5. Smith, James McCall, 2000. "The Politics of Dispute Settlement Design: Explaining Legalism in Regional Trade Pacts," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 54(1), pages 137-180, January.
    6. Simmons, Beth A., 2000. "International Law and State Behavior: Commitment and Compliance in International Monetary Affairs," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 94(4), pages 819-835, December.
    7. Abbott, Kenneth W. & Keohane, Robert O. & Moravcsik, Andrew & Slaughter, Anne-Marie & Snidal, Duncan, 2000. "The Concept of Legalization," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 54(3), pages 401-419, July.
    8. Rosendorff, B. Peter & Milner, Helen V., 2001. "The Optimal Design of International Trade Institutions: Uncertainty and Escape," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 55(4), pages 829-857, October.
    9. Fredriksson, Per G & Gaston, Noel, 2000. "Ratification of the 1992 Climate Change Convention: What Determines Legislative Delay?," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 104(3-4), pages 345-368, September.
    10. Goldstein, Judith & Martin, Lisa L., 2000. "Legalization, Trade Liberalization, and Domestic Politics: A Cautionary Note," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 54(3), pages 603-632, July.
    11. Koremenos, Barbara, 2001. "Loosening the Ties that Bind: A Learning Model of Agreement Flexibility," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 55(2), pages 289-325, April.
    12. Congleton, Roger D, 1992. "Political Institutions and Pollution Control," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 74(3), pages 412-421, August.
    13. Mitchell, Ronald B., 1994. "Regime design matters: intentional oil pollution and treaty compliance," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 48(3), pages 425-458, July.
    14. Iida, Keisuke, 1996. "Involuntary Defection in Two-Level Games," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 89(3-4), pages 283-303, December.
    15. Schneider, Gerald & Cederman, Lars-Erik, 1994. "The change of tide in political cooperation: a limited information model of European integration," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 48(4), pages 633-662, October.
    16. Downs, George W. & Rocke, David M. & Barsoom, Peter N., 1996. "Is the good news about compliance good news about cooperation?," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 50(3), pages 379-406, July.
    17. Abbott, Kenneth W. & Snidal, Duncan, 2000. "Hard and Soft Law in International Governance," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 54(3), pages 421-456, July.
    18. Guzman, Andrew T, 2002. "The Cost of Credibility: Explaining Resistance to Interstate Dispute Resolution Mechanisms," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 31(2), pages 303-326, June.
    19. Lipson, Charles, 1991. "Why are some international agreements informal?," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 45(4), pages 495-538, October.
    20. Koremenos, Barbara, 2005. "Contracting around International Uncertainty," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 99(4), pages 549-565, November.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Natalia Escobar-Pemberthy & Maria Ivanova, 2020. "Implementation of Multilateral Environmental Agreements: Rationale and Design of the Environmental Conventions Index," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(17), pages 1-23, August.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. repec:got:cegedp:94 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Thomas Bernauer & Anna Kalbhenn & Vally Koubi & Gabriele Spilker, 2013. "Is there a “Depth versus Participation” dilemma in international cooperation?," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 8(4), pages 477-497, December.
    3. Tobias Böhmelt & Edita Butkutė, 2018. "The self-selection of democracies into treaty design: insights from international environmental agreements," International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 18(3), pages 351-367, June.
    4. Christopher Marcoux & Johannes Urpelainen, 2013. "Non-compliance by design: Moribund hard law in international institutions," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 8(2), pages 163-191, June.
    5. Steffen Mohrenberg & Vally Koubi & Thomas Bernauer, 2019. "Effects of funding mechanisms on participation in multilateral environmental agreements," International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 19(1), pages 1-18, February.
    6. Tobias Böhmelt & Gabriele Spilker, 2016. "The interaction of international institutions from a social network perspective," International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 16(1), pages 67-89, February.
    7. Tobias Böhmelt, 2022. "Environmental-agreement design and political ideology in democracies," International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 22(3), pages 507-525, September.
    8. Maximilian S. T. Wanner, 0. "The effectiveness of soft law in international environmental regimes: participation and compliance in the Hyogo Framework for Action," International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 0, pages 1-20.
    9. Maximilian S. T. Wanner, 2021. "The effectiveness of soft law in international environmental regimes: participation and compliance in the Hyogo Framework for Action," International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 21(1), pages 113-132, March.
    10. Jana von Stein, 2008. "The International Law and Politics of Climate Change," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 52(2), pages 243-268, April.
    11. Christopher Marcoux, 2009. "Institutional Flexibility in the Design of Multilateral Environmental Agreements," Conflict Management and Peace Science, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 26(2), pages 209-228, April.
    12. Sarah Al Doyaili & Leo Wangler, 2013. "International climate policy: does it matter? An empirical assessment," Journal of Environmental Economics and Policy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 2(3), pages 288-302, November.
    13. Fabio Franchino & Camilla Mariotto, 2021. "Noncompliance risk, asymmetric power and the design of enforcement of the European economic governance," European Union Politics, , vol. 22(4), pages 591-610, December.
    14. Catherine Z. Worsnop, 2017. "Domestic politics and the WHO’s International Health Regulations: Explaining the use of trade and travel barriers during disease outbreaks," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 12(3), pages 365-395, September.
    15. Johannes Urpelainen, 2011. "Early birds: Special interests and the strategic logic of international cooperation," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 6(2), pages 113-140, July.
    16. Inken Borzyskowski & Felicity Vabulas, 2019. "Hello, goodbye: When do states withdraw from international organizations?," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 14(2), pages 335-366, June.
    17. Michael Gilligan & Leslie Johns & B. Peter Rosendorff, 2010. "Strengthening International Courts and the Early Settlement of Disputes," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 54(1), pages 5-38, February.
    18. Yoram Z. Haftel & Alexander Thompson, 2018. "When do states renegotiate investment agreements? The impact of arbitration," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 13(1), pages 25-48, March.
    19. Adela Toscano-Valle & Antonio Sianes & Francisco Santos-Carrillo & Luis A. Fernández-Portillo, 2022. "Can the Rational Design of International Institutions Solve Cooperation Problems? Insights from a Systematic Literature Review," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(13), pages 1-22, June.
    20. Nathan Jensen, 2007. "International institutions and market expectations: Stock price responses to the WTO ruling on the 2002 U.S. steel tariffs," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 2(3), pages 261-280, September.
    21. Rana, Arslan Tariq & Kebewar, Mazen, 2014. "The Political Economy of FDI flows into Developing Countries: Does the depth of International Trade Agreements Matter?," EconStor Preprints 91501, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:zbw:cegedp:94. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cdgoede.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.