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Why Comply? Constructivism, Social Norms and the Study of
International Institutions*
Jeffrey T. Checkel**
ARENA
Abstract
Constructivists need a theory of social choice. While
these scholars have been good at exploring the
macro-foundations of politics and state behavior --
rules, norms, culture, political discourse -- less
attention has been paid to underlying causal mechanisms
of choice, that is, how agents take action within these
structures. The result has been a micro-, process-,
decisionmaking- gap in all too many studies. I address
this lacuna, specifically asking why actors abide
by the norms embedded in regimes and international
institutions. To date, scholars have proposed two,
competing answers to this compliance puzzle. On the one
hand, regime theorists and students of international
bargaining emphasize instrumental motives and material
factors, while neglecting the social and interaction
contexts of compliance; on the other, constructivists
stress the role of social structures in compliance
decisions, while failing to develop a robust and
multi-faceted theory of agency. Both schools might thus
benefit from greater dialogue; to this end, I suggest how
a focus on argumentative persuasion and social learning
not only theorizes the agency/interaction nexus in a more
meaningful manner, but also broadens, empirically, our
understanding of why social actors comply. These insights
are illustrated by exploring why state agents comply with
norms promoted by the European human rights regime
Introduction
Constructivists need a theory of social choice.
While these scholars have been good at theorizing and
exploring the macro-foundations of politics and state
behavior -- rules, roles, norms, culture, political
discourse -- less attention has been paid to underlying
causal mechanisms of choice, that is, how agents take
action within these structures. The result has been a
micro-, process-, decisionmaking- gap in all too many
studies. [1]
Below, I address this lacuna, asking why actors
abide by the norms embedded in regimes and international
institutions. To date, scholars have proposed two,
largely competing answers to this compliance puzzle. On
the one hand, regime theorists and students of
international bargaining emphasize material factors and
instrumental motives, while neglecting the social and
interaction contexts of compliance; on the other,
constructivists stress the role of social structures in
compliance decisions, while failing to develop a robust
and multi-faceted theory of agency. Both schools might
thus benefit from greater dialogue.
To this end, my core argument is synthetic, seeking
better to specify “switching points” for when
compliance with norms is better explained by rationalist
or constructivist toolkits. I argue that it is not the
causal weight accorded social structures that
distinguishes these approaches, but the underlying choice
mechanisms they posit: cost/benefit calculations for
rationalists and learning/socialization
for constructivists. From an empirical perspective,
however, it is absurd to portray these in
“either/or” terms; each captures and explains
important elements of the compliance process. Greater
attention to institutional and historical variables will
help scholars disentangle these mechanisms -- rendering
them more complementary than competing. [2]
The analysis proceeds in the following manner. I begin
by briefly reviewing both the regime/bargaining and
constructivist literatures, focusing on the causal
mechanisms each adduces for explaining norm compliance.
Regime and bargaining theorists, and, more surprisingly,
constructivists have been largely silent on how social
interaction may influence compliance decisions. In the
second and third sections, I address this gap, advancing
hypotheses on the roles of social learning and persuasion
in compliance, and exploring the methodological
challenges involved in measuring them. These hypotheses
help theorize the agency/interaction nexus in a more
meaningful manner, thus broadening our understanding of
why social actors comply. In keeping with my synthetic
approach, the paper’s empirical sections then
provide evidence of both rationalist and constructivist
compliance mechanisms at work in three quite different
institutional settings: Strasbourg (supra-national norm
creation/compliance), Germany (national norm compliance
in an “old” pluralist democracy) and Ukraine
(national norm compliance in a “new” transition
state). The conclusion suggests how my analysis advances
the constructivist research agenda, highlights the
importance of institutional factors in compliance
studies, and argues for greater attention to the
development of scope conditions in the debate between
rationalists and social constructivists.
Before proceeding, three caveats are
in order. First, the constructivism favored in this essay
belongs to what has been called its modernist branch.
These scholars combine an ontological stance critical of
methodological individualism with a loosely causal
epistemology; analytically, they have focused on the role
of norms in social life, demonstrating they matter in a
constitutive, interest-shaping way not captured by
rationalist arguments. Given my empirically informed
hunch that compliance sometimes involves such interest
redefinition, this more recent work should prove useful. [3]
Second, my analytic focus here and dependent variable
is “compliance” -- to what extent agents act in
accordance with, and fulfilment of the prescriptions
contained in international rules and norms -- and not
“socialization.” While the latter term has been
favored in recent studies by constructivists, it is
problematic in one important respect: Students of
political socialization typically emphasize its endpoint,
that is, the internalization of values and norms. Such an
emphasis leads one too readily to bracket the intervening
processes of social interaction through which
agents reach such an end state. In contrast, compliance
research focuses centrally on such processes: coercion
and sanctions, cost/benefit calculations and persuasion,
among others. Consistent with these differences in
analytic emphasis are temporal ones: Constructivist
studies of socialization often encompass many years or
even decades, while regime compliance research is
typically more temporally limited. [4]
When studying compliance -- and to minimize reliance
on correlational arguments -- I consider not only the
observable degree of it among particular agents, but also
explore the (changing) motives and attitudes that lead
them to act in accordance with normative prescriptions.
Put differently, speech and language, in contrast to much
mainstream compliance research, will play central roles
in my analysis. [5]
Third, the essay’s main focus is theoretical and
methodological, and not empirical. The concern is how one
could develop, and apply to studies of compliance,
constructivist insights on mechanisms of social choice.
Empirically, I seek only to establish the plausibility of
such propositions, and do so in three ways: (1) by
drawing upon arguments and evidence from existing
studies; (2) by reference to my own work in progress; and
(3) where appropriate, by conducting counterfactual
analysis.
Why Do Social Actors Comply?
My purpose in the following two sub-sections is not to
provide a detailed review and classification of the
regime/bargaining or constructivist literatures; several
excellent surveys are available for that purpose.
Instead, the focus is the underlying assumptions and
theories of choice upon which these scholars build
explanations of compliance. [6]
Regime Theory, International Bargaining and
Compliance. Much like the broader subfield
(international relations theory) and discipline
(political science) to which they belong, regime scholars
privilege an asocial methodological individualism and
consequentialist choice mechanisms in their studies.
While analysts may employ differing labels --
neo-utilitarian, contractualist, interest-based, etc
-- to describe the process through which actors comply
with regime injunctions, a common set of assumptions
unites them. For one, compliance is a game of altering
strategies and behavior (which, admittedly, is sometimes
all important); in a fundamental sense, then, agents
leave a regime (or its institutional home) as they
entered it. The underlying ontology is thus decidedly
individualist.
Moreover, integrated with this
ontology is a view of the choice mechanism behind
compliance decisions as an exercise in cost/benefit
calculation -- be it in response to putative regime
benefits or the threat of sanctions. Not surprisingly,
these biases lead many scholars to bracket or downplay
the role of language and communication (at least in
meaningful ways that go beyond notions of “cheap
talk”) and to erect a black box around the
interaction context from which decisions to comply
emerge. [7]
It is true that much of the international bargaining
literature, which partly overlaps with the regime work,
has always accorded a central role to
“interaction.” However, for the most part, the
interaction that leads to compliance is again understood
as strategic exchange among egoistic, self-interested
actors. Materialism, in the form of power resources, also
typically looms large in such analyses: Faced with
(material) brute facts, bargaining agents make choices --
decide whether or not to comply -- on the basis of
cost/benefit calculations. No one would deny that such
research captures an important part of empirical reality,
especially if one examines, as many analysts do, coercive
international bargaining. [8]
For sure, there has always been a lively dissenting
view to these dominant perspectives within both the
regime and bargaining literatures. On the former,
starting with Ernie Haas’s early work on
international organization, a smaller group of regime
compliance scholars -- often called
“cognitivists” -- has been concerned with what
constructivists would term the mutually constitutive and
non-strategic bases of social interaction. Allusions to
learning, internalization and persuasion -- buzzwords to
which any constructivist could subscribe -- as the
dynamics producing compliance are
strong in this research. Indeed, Haas and his students
(Ruggie, Adler) have consistently argued that agents do
not only and always power; they also puzzle. As a result,
the strategies and, perhaps, underlying preferences of
these agents are in flux; they are thus open to learning.
Put differently, compliance occurs through
interest/identity redefinition. [9]
In the bargaining literature, recent work has begun to
stress that compliance decisions of agents cannot be
fully understood without consideration of background
social context and contemporaneous -- during the
negotiations themselves -- social interaction. This trend
within IR intersects with a long-running tradition among
scholars of the European Union (EU), many of whom
emphasize the non-strategic and socially constructed
bases of compliance, be it in Brussels or at the national
level. [10]
These are valid arguments, and seem to capture an
important part of the reality of compliance dynamics --
internationally or within Europe. However, they have most
often been advanced as a heuristic
claim, with key terms consequently underspecified. This
means that tough issues of empirical operationalization
(how would I know learning when I saw it) and the
development of scope/boundary conditions (when, under
what conditions will persuasion be central for explaining
compliance, etc) have for the most part been
avoided. [11]
In sum, rationalist regime compliance and bargaining
scholars possess vigorous research programs that have
yielded cumulable insights on compliance dynamics.
Unfortunately, their explanatory reach is limited by a
restrictive set of ontological assumptions. A second set
of regime and bargaining analysts relaxes these
assumptions, but has failed to generate robust empirical
findings of its own. Overall, then, among students of
regime compliance and bargaining, there is a dominant
answer to the question of why social actors comply:
strategic calculation.
Constructivism and Compliance. Early empirical
research by constructivists did not explicitly ask why
actors comply with social norms. Instead, their focus was
often later stages of compliance, where internalization
(full socialization) had almost occurred; this led many
scholars to bracket the processes through which this end
state was reached. At this late stage, however,
compliance is not an issue of choice in any meaningful
sense; agent behavior is rule governed
and driven by certain logics of appropriateness. The
result was a somewhat static portrayal of social
interaction, coupled to correlational and structural
arguments built on “as if” assumptions at the
level of agents. [12]
More recent constructivist studies rectify these
problems by placing greater emphasis on both process and
agency. In fact, these scholars have identified two
causal mechanisms through which social actors come to
comply with normative prescriptions: social
protest/mobilization and social learning. The
protest/mobilization mechanism comes in two variants. A
first argues that domestic actors such as NGOs, trade
unions or the like exploit international norms to
generate pressures for compliance on state
decisionmakers, and do so in relative isolation from broader transnational ties. Here,
empirical examples are typically drawn from the
industrialized West, with the argument apparently being
that these well established and, in some cases,
militarily powerful states are less susceptible to
transnational pressures. [13]
Recently, a more sophisticated variant of the protest
dynamic has been elaborated. In this case, non-state
actors and policy networks, at both the national and
transnational level, are united in their support for
norms; they then mobilize and coerce decisionmakers to
comply with them. The norms themselves, however, are
often not internalized by elites. The activities of
Greenpeace exemplify this political pressure mechanism. [14]
At the agent/micro-level, how does this protest
dynamic explain compliance? For elites, the answer seems
clear: Norms are simply a behavioral constraint and not
internalized. Their compliance is easily explained by
standard rationalist models, which view social structures
in this behavioral, constraining sense. At the
grass-roots, activist, NGO-level, systematic explanations
for compliance are much less clear. In some cases, norms
seem genuinely to constitute these agents in the sense
meant by constructivists, providing actors with new understandings of interest/identity.
However, in many other instances, norms produce
compliance in ways better captured by rationalist
arguments -- for example, by creating focal points in the
domestic arena, or simply being used instrumentally by
agents (NGOs, say) to advance given interests. [15]
The implicit methodological individualism and
consequentialist theory of choice that underlay many of
these constructivist mobilization/protest accounts
suggest linkages to the rationalist regime compliance and
bargaining literatures. While not using the same
terminology, constructivists have thus documented how
compliance -- especially at the elite level -- is a game
of cost/benefit analysis, with the diffusion of new
social norms changing such calculations. Put differently,
these scholars, like many regime and bargaining
theorists, emphasize the role of sanctioning in promoting
compliance. For sure, the sanctioning force (a social
norm) and the mechanism (NGO shaming, say) are different,
but the behavioral logics and choice mechanisms appear
quite similar; one might thus call it “social
sanctioning.”
Related to these last points, constructivist work on
the social mobilization/compliance dynamic contains a
three-fold bias against the state and state
decisionmakers. Normatively, elite policymakers are
portrayed as bad; empirically, they are viewed as passive
and reactive; ontologically, they are too often viewed
solely as calculating agents. Consider the recent Risse,
Ropp and Sikkink volume that explores the connection
between international human rights norms and patterns of
domestic compliance. Their starting point is the
“boomerang” model elaborated by Keck and
Sikkink, whereby recalcitrant state elites are caught in
a vise of transnational and domestic social mobilization.
Here, the preferences of elites do not change at early
stages; rather, compliance occurs through changes in
behaviors and strategies only. Temporally expanding the
model, Risse, et al, argue that at later points in
the process (perhaps five years to a decade), elites
become less reactive and, indeed, may comply because they
have internalized new preferences.
While, analytically, this is an important step forward,
it is unclear why state decisionmakers get to play this
(more intelligent) role only after an initial
“softening up” by networks and activists. [16]
Why these biases? A particular
theoretical/disciplinary move by modernist
constructivists and their subsequent choice of issue area
seem key. On the former, recent years have seen an
exciting fusion of two literatures: studies on the
diffusion of global norms by constructivists; and work on
social movements that sits at the intersection of
sociology and political science. This synthesis allowed
constructivists to explain better the mobilization
dynamics they saw norms (and other social constructs)
generating in various settings; more important, thanks to
the strong emphasis on agency in the social movements
literature (SML), it promoted a greater theoretical
balance between structure and agency in their accounts. [17]
This inter-disciplinary exchange had costs, however.
First, constructivists have ended up incorporating in
their accounts the individualist ontologies and
consequentialist choice mechanisms that play central
roles in SML. My claim is not that these scholars now
portray agents as only pursuing material interests.
(Although, this may be true in some cases.) Rather, I am suggesting that much of the
behavioral logic in recent constructivist/SML work is
consistent with so-called “thin” rationalism,
where the goals pursued may be non-material (normative
values, say), but the underlying choice mechanism is
consequentialist -- means-ends -- in nature. [18]
This characterization, it should be noted, is
apparently shared and endorsed by several prominent
constructivist theorists, who now speak of
“strategic social construction.” Here, agents
make detailed means-ends calculations, maximize utility,
and -- reflecting their own normative commitments -- seek
to change the utility of others. By itself, this is
absolutely no problem; however, it has made less clear
what is the constructivist value added in such
individualist-consequentialist compliance accounts.
Indeed, the modernist constructivism of interest here is
distinguished not so much by its epistemological stance,
which is a pluralistic mixture of positivist and
interpretative approaches, but by its ontology -- mutual
constitution. Consequential choice mechanisms may be
consistent with this ontology, but it is hard to
reconcile it with individualism. [19]
Second, research on social movements -- as the name
implies -- is strongly and, indeed, normatively biased
against granting causal primacy to statist variables. It
is a deeply “bottom-up” view of politics, where
state institutions or discourses among bureaucratic
elites, say, are accorded a secondary
role. Hence, one has the already noted tendency for much
of the newer constructivist/SML work to portray the state
and its decisionmakers as passive reactants to movement
pressure, instead of active agenda setters in their own
right. [20]
Third, SML assumes that social meanings (norms, say),
and compliance with them, are the product of struggle and
contestation -- a premise clearly endorsed in the new
constructivist/SML literature. Social construction, in
other words, does most decisively not occur
through “diffuse social learning processes.”
This claim is not so much wrong as incomplete. Indeed,
one prominent movement theorist has recently argued --
contra to much previous SML writing -- that social
psychology and the study of “interpersonal
interactions” should be exploited to broaden our
understanding of how meaning is socially constructed. [21]
Reinforcing the above biases is another related to
issue area, with much of the recent constructivist/SML
work examining international human rights. For two
reasons, however, it will be difficult to generalize from
arguments about compliance and socialization in this
policy domain. For one, international human rights norms,
and the institutions and transnational social movements
that promote them, are increasingly institutionalized and
robust. In this area, it thus makes sense to give less
causal weight to domestic agency and other national-level
factors -- as much of the new literature does. Moreover,
many of these human-rights studies focus -- not surprisingly -- on rogue or authoritarian
states. Such polities and their elites are eminently
status-quo oriented, wanting to maintain the current
(repressive) state of affairs; the initial agenda setting
and mobilization comes from below, as recent work has
vividly documented. Yet, in many other issue areas, the
state and its elites may well take the lead in the
political process. [22]
Whatever my criticisms, the fact remains that the two
variants of the mobilization/protest mechanism have
received more attention in constructivist studies of
norm-driven compliance. In part, this is understandable.
The shaming activities of Amnesty International, say, are
very much in the public and scholarly eye, and
undoubtedly play a major role in spurring compliance.
Yet, the danger in overemphasizing this particular
mechanism is not only empirical (neglecting other
possible compliance dynamics at the national level), but
ontological. It misses -- just as does much of the regime
compliance and bargaining literatures -- the obvious fact
that political/state agents do not simply or always
calculate how to advance given interests; in many cases,
they seek to discover those interests in the first place,
and do so prior to social mobilization.
The broader constructivist literature points to just
such a dynamic, however, in what I call a social learning
mechanism. Here, it is not political pressure but
learning that leads to agent compliance with normative
prescriptions. This process appears to be based on
notions of complex learning drawn from cognitive and
social psychology, where individuals, when exposed
to the prescriptions embodied in norms, adopt new
interests. I say “appears” because scholars
have remained vague on the precise cognitive model
underlying this type of compliance. At this point,
constructivist work on compliance thus intersects with
the studies by cognitive regime theorists, Europeanists
and the newer bargaining research mentioned earlier. [23]
Taking Social Interaction Seriously: Persuasion, Learning
and Compliance
Building on the intersection of these various
literatures, I seek to specify better the arguments on
learning that are common to them. My starting point is
that while these scholars have made powerful heuristic
cases for its importance, there has been insufficient
attention to operationalizing the concept in a manner
amenable to systematic empirical testing. Moreover, a
learning thesis by itself -- especially if it draws only
upon cognitive psychology, where all the action is
“between the earlobes” -- is inadequate for
explaining social interaction and choice; this
leads me to explore argumentative persuasion as a means
of modelling this missing social dimension. Along the
way, I am attentive to the political and institutional
variables that are often neglected in analyses of this
type.
To begin, what does it mean for an agent to learn? In
a very fundamental sense, rationalists and social
constructivists answer this question differently. While
it is true that rational choice analysis has come to
accord a role of sorts to learning, such work falls short
of fully capturing the multiple ways it is causally
important in social life. In particular, because of their
adherence to methodological individualism, rationalists
cannot model the interaction context during which agent interests may change. Indeed, when
prominent scholars working in this tradition talk of
“social interactions,” they are neither
“social” or “interactions” in any
meaningful sense. Instead, in a manner that is rather
puzzling, “interactions” are collapsed into the
utility functions of discrete agents. [24]
A direct consequence of such a stance is to portray
learning in highly individualist terms. For example, some
rationalists talk of Bayesian updating, where, after
each discrete interaction, actors update their strategies
and -- perhaps -- preferences. Others discuss another
type of updating, where agents come to learn new
“probability distributions.” Using different
language to make the same point, many rational choice
scholars emphasize so-called simple learning, where
agents acquire new information as a result of
interaction. At a later point (that is, after the
interaction), this information may be used to alter
strategies, but not preferences, which are given. Not
surprisingly, all this rationalist theorizing reduces
communication and language, which are central to any
process of social learning, to the “cheap
talk” of agents with fixed identities and interests.
The result is to bracket the interaction context through
which agent interests and identities may change. [25]
Specifically, the constructivist
value added should be to explore complex social learning,
which involves a process whereby agent interests and
identities are shaped through and during interaction. So
defined, social learning involves a break with strict
forms of methodological individualism; it thus differs
significantly from the rationalist work surveyed above. [26]
Consider small group settings. Empirically, it is
clear there are times when agents acquire new preferences
through interaction in such social contexts. This is not
to deny periods of strategic exchange, where
self-interested actors seek to maximize utility; yet, to
emphasize the latter dynamic to the near exclusion of the
former is an odd distortion of social reality. Now, the
perhaps appropriate response is “so what?”
Intuitively, it can be appreciated that social learning
takes place at certain times, but how can one
conceptualize and empirically explore whether and when it
occurs? Luckily, there is a growing literature --
theoretical/experimental research by cognitive and social
psychologists, work by organizational theorists,
applications by constructivists and students of epistemic
communities -- that performs precisely this
theoretical/empirical combination. More specifically,
this research suggests four hypotheses on when social
learning occurs.
H#1 Social learning is more likely in groups
where individuals share common professional backgrounds
-- for example, where all/most group members are lawyers.
H#2 Social learning is more likely where the
group feels itself in a crisis or is faced with clear and
incontrovertible evidence of policy failure.
H#3 Social learning is more likely where a
group meets repeatedly and there is high density of
interaction among participants.
H#4 Social learning
is more likely when a group is insulated from direct
political pressure and exposure. [27]
Clearly, these hypotheses require further elaboration.
For example, can a crisis situation be specified a
priori, and not in a post-hoc fashion as is
typically done? When is the density of interaction among
group participants sufficiently high for a switch to
occur from strategic exchange to interactive learning? If
the group has formal voting procedures, do different
rules -- unanimity, majority or, in the EU context,
“qualified majority” -- affect the likelihood
of learning? These are difficult issues, but they are
only being raised because a first round of
theoretical/empirical literature exists. [28]
The deductions also point to a powerful role for
communication. Indeed, implicit above are underlying
mechanisms of persuasion and argumentation, on which the
social learning literature has been largely silent. These
scholars often hint at such processes -- where
communication and language allow agents to learn new
interests/identities -- but fail to theorize them. This lacuna
arose because much research, especially that by cognitive
psychologists and organizational theorists, failed to
explore social interaction; instead, the focus was
often “artificial
interactions” where no “face-to-face”
meetings occur. Put differently, these literatures, with
their reliance on notions of bounded rationality and
heuristic cuing, are still individualist in nature. [29]
Not surprisingly, constructivists, drawing upon these
literatures, have fallen into the same individualist
trap. Finnemore’s excellent study, for example, is
all about learning, but it is of a type that is asocial
and devoid of interaction. UNESCO bureaucrats, in one of
her cases, come and “teach” national civil
servants; however, this occurs through no documented
process of social interaction. Instead, these domestic
agents listen, something goes on between the earlobes,
and their values subsequently change. [30]
To explore these neglected mechanisms of social
interaction, constructivists should exploit a rich
literature in social psychology, political socialization
and communications research on persuasion/argumentation.
While this work is as varied as most, it can usefully be
categorized along two dimensions: types and settings of
persuasion. Regarding types, there is a fundamental
distinction between manipulative and argumentative
persuasion. The former, which is of less concern here, is
largely asocial and lacking in interaction, often
concerned with political elites manipulating mass publics
(through, say, campaign advertising), and has a long
tradition -- extending back to some of Riker’s work
on political manipulation. In contrast, argumentative
persuasion is, for most analysts, a social process of
interaction that involves changing attitudes about cause
and effect in the absence of overt coercion; it is thus a
mechanism through which social learning may occur,
leading to interest redefinition and identity
change. More formally, persuasion of this sort “is
an activity or process in which a communicator attempts
to induce a change in the belief, attitude or behavior of
another person ... through the transmission of a message
in a context in which the persuadee has some degree of
free choice.” [31]
As for settings, researchers have emphasized three:
interpersonal, persuasion and mass media. These scale by
the number of actors involved: interpersonal may be a
“one on one” situation or small group;
persuasion settings are larger, say a speech maker and
his/her audience; mass media settings
are the largest, involving messages conveyed over TV,
radio, etc. Studies of persuasion and, especially,
interpersonal settings typically emphasize argumentative
persuasion, while those involving mass media not
surprisingly key on the manipulative sort. [32]
The persuasion literature is not without its own
theoretical, methodological failings. In particular, two
are worth highlighting. First, much of this work, owing
to its disciplinary roots in social psychology, proceeds
via inductive theorizing. One result has been a failure
to develop middle-range theory specifying scope
conditions (when, under what conditions is argumentative
persuasion more likely to work, etc). Below, I
advance five such conditions; however, given the
inductive approach, diversity and occasional
contradictions within the literature, these should be
viewed as preliminary. [33]
Second, many persuasion researchers,
again due to their disciplinary background, have
emphasized experimental or survey methods. Too often,
this has led them to bracket the social interaction
context through which persuasion occurs. More recently,
several scholars have called for a broader range of
methods, including various qualitative techniques that
allow one to explore persuasion taking place in
“authentic settings.” My own efforts seek to
build upon these latter calls. [34]
These caveats aside, the literature allows one to
advance five propositions on when agents should be
especially open to argumentative persuasion.
H#5 Argumentative
persuasion is more likely to be effective when the
persuadee is in a novel and uncertain environment and
thus cognitively motivated to analyze new information. [35]
H#6 Argumentative persuasion is more likely to
be effective when the persuadee has few prior, ingrained
beliefs that are inconsistent with the persuader’s
message. (Put differently, agents with few
“cognitive priors” who are “novices”
will be more open to persuasion.) [36]
H#7 Argumentative persuasion is more likely to
be effective when the persuader is an authoritative
member of the in-group to which the persuadee belongs or
wants to belong. [37]
H#8 Argumentative persuasion is more likely to
be effective when the persuader does not lecture or
demand, but, instead, “acts out principles of
serious deliberative argument.” [38]
H#9 Argumentative persuasion is more likely to
be effective when the persuader-persuadee interaction
occurs in less politicized and more insulated settings. [39]
This focus on argumentative persuasion has several
benefits. First, it highlights and begins to
operationalize the obvious -- but neglected in both
mainstream and constructivist compliance analysis --
roles of communication and social interaction. Indeed,
two practitioner-scholars, both of whom have extensive
experience in the real world of compliance diplomacy, go
so far to call persuasion the “fundamental
instrument” and “principal engine” for
securing compliance. While this is surely overstated, it
does alert us to our impoverished analytic tool kit for
exploring its role. Second, this focus restores a sense
of agency to the social norms that may be central
to learning. Norms are not just something out there,
waiting to help actors learn; they are carried by
individuals and organizations (“the persuader”
in H#7, H#8) who actively seek, through deliberation and
argumentation, to promote learning. [40]
While the above deductions partly overlap with the
first set, further work is still needed -- for example,
how to specify “uncertain environments.” All
the same, both sets of hypotheses do elaborate scope
conditions (when, under what conditions persuasion and
learning are likely), which is precisely the promising
middle-range theoretical ground that still awaits
exploitation by both cognitive regime scholars and
constructivists. [41]
In sum, the value added of this micro-level
constructivist cut at compliance is to expand our
repertoire of answers to the question: Why do social
actors comply? In some cases, they do so by learning new
interests through processes of communication and
persuasion. The ontology and understanding of social
reality here is not individualist, but relational: I take
seriously the dynamics of social interaction. Moreover
and in contrast to recent constructivist work, the theory
of choice is not consequentialist, where agents make
careful means-ends calculations; instead,
they “decide” by deliberating, puzzling and
arguing. Finally, this approach is not method-driven: It
develops scope conditions recognizing that social
learning, persuasion and compliance with norms often do not
occur. In turn, this leaves plenty of analytic space for
rationalist arguments, as the cases below demonstrate. [42]
Methods: Measuring Persuasion/Learning
and Social Sanctioning
Recall that my empirical concern is to document the
processes and motivations through which agents come to
comply with norms. The basic method is process-tracing,
where one seeks “to investigate and explain the
decision process by which various initial conditions are
translated into outcomes [compliance, in this
case].” I operationalize the method through use of
four techniques. [43]
First, I interview participants in contemporary policy
debates, seeking to ascertain their awareness of emerging
European norms on membership and citizenship (my focus
here), and, more important, why -- or, indeed, whether --
they comply with the norms’ prescriptions. In all
instances, I utilize a similar interview protocol,
starting with the general: “How, if at all, does
German or Ukrainian identity relate to the country's
citizenship policies?” “Are you aware of
European-level work on such issues?” “If so,
how did you become aware of these norms -- media
coverage, network participation, professional
associations, personal contacts, etc?” These
were followed by more specific questions, for example:
“How do these norms affect your thinking about and
work on citizenship/membership?” “Do they
prompt you to rethink the issue, and, if so, why?”
“Do you see them as tools in political battles, and,
if so, in what ways?” “What role does
persuasion play?” “How would you characterize
your relation to the persuader: Were you equals? Were you
a supplicant?” “What kinds of arguments did you
find most convincing, and why?”
My questions were designed to tap an individual's
basic beliefs about citizenship/membership and what might
be motivating him/her to change them -- that is, why
he/she might be willing to comply with emerging European
norms. On the latter, I gave interviewees several
possibilities, including both their own cognitive
uncertainty as well as external social pressure. I also
suggested answers that addressed materialist incentives
(changing citizenship practice might allow more
immigrants to access a decreasing social-welfare pie), as
well as identity concerns (changing citizenship practice
would dilute the Germanness -- say -- of the country).
In designing and conducting the interviews, I paid
particular attention to both temporal and intersubjective
dimensions. On the former, whenever possible I have
sought to interview and then re-interview the same
individual at two different points in time (so-called
“panel samples”). This not only allowed for
establishing a degree of interviewer-interviewee rapport,
which is crucial for in-depth questioning such as mine;
it also enabled me to assess the validity of interviewee
accounts. (Were they consistent over time? If they
changed, then why?) Intersubjectively, I asked
interviewees “to step outside” their individual
thought processes and characterize their social
interaction context. Especially for those who had been in
one-on-one or small group settings, I suggested four
possible ways to portray the dynamics within them:
coercion, bargaining, emulation/imitation,
persuasion/arguing. Interviewees were then asked to rank
order the various possibilities, and to consider whether
their rankings changed over time. [44]
Second, as a supplement and check on interview data, I
carry out a content analysis of major media and
specialist publications (international law journals,
reports produced by the NGO community, for example). This
allowed for checking the beliefs and motivations of
particular individuals who were both interviewees and
participants in public debates.
Third, whenever necessary and
possible, I consult official documentary records. For
example, my first case below explores the supranational
process through which the Council of Europe (CE) has come
to promote revised European citizenship norms; this
included a number of confidential meetings in Strasbourg
of state representatives and CE bureaucrats. I therefore
sought and gained access to official summaries of those
sessions. [45]
Fourth, I model a key temporal dimension: the
evolution of domestic norms in my policy area
(citizenship and minority rights). Why this particular
focus? Given my interest in compliance driven by emerging
European norms, I thought it important also to ask what
might create barriers to it. My deductive hunch --
inspired by hypothesis #6 -- was that an important
barrier would be historically constructed domestic
identity norms, which could act as a filter hindering
agent learning from regional/systemic norms. Furthermore,
drawing upon historical institutionalist insights, I
argue that these norms gain particular staying power and
political influence when they become
institutionalized. Institutionalization is measured
through indicators that are both bureaucratic (norms
embedded in organizations) and legal (norms incorporated
into judicial codes, laws and constitutions). [46]
Together, these techniques allow for a degree of
triangulation when assessing the degree to which, and
through what mechanism(s), domestic agents comply with
new regional norms, thus increasing confidence in the
validity of my results. This use of process-tracing along
with a consideration of counterfactual explanations,
where appropriate, allow me to minimize reliance on
“as if” assumptions at the national/agent
level. I thus shrink the black box surrounding the social
interaction context. [47]
The last comment raises an important issue: At the end
of the day, how can I disentangle compliance driven by
persuasion and social learning from that occurring due to
calculating, self-interested strategic adaptation or to
passive, cognitively simplifying emulation/imitation? I
respond to this challenge in two ways. Methodologically,
the use of multiple, process-oriented techniques allows
me to carefully reconstruct accounts of actual agent
motivations; equally important, they introduce an element
of cross-checking. A strategically dissimulating agent
who was just “feeding me a line” about being
persuaded, for example, might be expected to offer
different motivations and justifications in other, more
private (closed meetings) or more public (media
appearances) contexts. Likewise, a cognitive miser,
imitating/emulating agent should consistently, across
contexts (interviews, media appearances) offer little
substantive argumentation or reasoning to explain his/her
act of compliance, for it was simply an economic way of
reducing ambiguity/uncertainty in the environment. [48]
A second response questions the role of assumptions in
theory building. The view informing my efforts is that,
to the extent possible, we should replace assumptions
with careful empirical analysis. As has recently been
argued:
the fact that we can construct an “as
if” story in any situation to reconcile behavior
to a self-interest explanation does not mean that
self interest should be our default position either,
unless we can establish that story is more compelling
as an account of actual motivations than that
offered by other theories.
For sure, the choice-theoretic
critique of those who study preference formation is a
well-taken and cautionary reminder of the difficulties
involved in the enterprise. However, criticism should not
be allowed to become dogma, especially if one’s
concern is to model and explain the social world as it
really works. [49]
* * *
In the three cases that follow, I look for evidence of
and reasons for compliance at various levels -- both
supranationally and domestically. For the latter, my
focus is intentionally broad and includes elite
decisionmakers, parliamentarians, trade unions, political
parties, NGOs and immigrant/minority groups, among
others.
The examples given below are just
that -- examples that seek to establish the plausibility
of my approach, and not fully elaborated case studies. I
draw upon -- and, in some cases, reassess -- my own
previously published work to document that norm-driven
compliance is both a process of cost/benefit sanctioning
and shaming (as rationalists would predict) and one of
persuasion and social learning (as constructivists would
argue). Methodologically, in terms of outcomes, the
following also suggests the crucial importance of
employing counterfactual analysis. [50]
Case I: Compliance via Bargaining and Arguing -- A Norm
is Born
For constructivists, is the process oriented,
micro-level focus outlined in the preceding sections a
feasible undertaking? Drawing upon my own work in
progress, I suggest the answer is “yes.” In a
larger project, I am studying the evolution of new
European citizenship norms; an important concern is to
explain, at the European level, whether and how new
understandings of citizenship are emerging -- that is,
the process through which new citizenship norms emerge
and why agents begin to comply with them. To date, my
focus has been on Strasbourg and the Council of Europe
(CE), for this has been where the more serious,
substantive work has occurred. When the
CE is trying to develop new policy, it often sets up
committees of experts under the Committee of Ministers,
the intergovernmental body that sits atop the
Council’s decisionmaking hierarchy. [51]
I have been examining the Committee of Experts on
Nationality, the group that was charged with revising
earlier European understandings of citizenship that dated
from the 1960s. My interest was to describe and explain
what occurred in this group as it met over a four year
period -- in particular, why it changed existing
understandings on dual citizenship to remove the strict
prohibition that had previously existed at the European
level. To address such issues, I did the following. Four
rounds of field work were conducted in Strasbourg; during
these trips, I interviewed various individuals who served
on the Committee -- members of the Council Secretariat
and experts. Then, I conducted interviews in several
member-state capitals, meeting with national
representatives to the committee of experts. Finally, as
a cross-check on interview data, more recently I was
granted partial access to the confidential meeting
summaries of the Committee.
This was a considerable amount of work, but the pay
off was high. Over time, particular individuals clearly
shifted from what they viewed as a strategic bargaining
game (for example, seeking side payments to advance given
interests) to a process where basic preferences were
rethought. This shift was particularly evident on the
question of dual citizenship, where a growing number of
committee members came to view the existing prohibition
as simply wrong. Instead, they agreed on a new
understanding that viewed multiple nationality in a more
positive light.
Processes of persuasion and learning were key in
explaining why individual members began to comply with
this emerging norm, and such dynamics were facilitated by
four factors. First, Committee members shared a largely
common educational and professional background, being
trained as lawyers who had for many years dealt with
issues of immigration and nationality (H#1). Second, the
group was meeting at a time when there was a growing
sense of policy failure: The number of dual nationals was
climbing rapidly despite the existing prohibition (H#2).
Third, the shift from a bargaining to an arguing game was
greatly facilitated by the committee’s insulation
from publicity and overt political pressure. Indeed, it
benefited from the public perception of Strasbourg as a
quiet backwater -- with the real action occurring in
Brussels (the EU’s provisions for a “European
citizenship”). This allowed it to meet and work out
revised understandings on citizenship prior to any overt
politicization of its work (H#4, H#9).
Fourth and perhaps most important, the Committee
contained three members who were both highly respected by
other group participants and renowned for their powers of
persuasion. Indeed, several different interviewees, with
no prodding, identified these same individuals as playing
central roles in “changing people’s minds”
-- not through arm twisting, but by the power of
arguments (H#8). That is, the Committee possessed
effective persuaders who were authoritative members of
the in-group (H#7). Consistent with my earlier
discussion, in these interviews I
suggested four possible ways to characterize dynamics
within the group: coercion, bargaining,
emulation/imitation, persuasion/arguing. Interviewees
were then asked to rank order them; persuasion/arguing
consistently came out on top. [52]
At the same time, it should be stressed that not all
committee members complied with the emerging norm or
learned new interests. Indeed, one national
representative held deeply ingrained beliefs that were
opposed to arguments favoring a relaxation of
prohibitions on dual citizenship.
Consistent with the above deductions (H#6), there is no
evidence this individual was persuaded to alter his basic
preferences. Instead, he consistently tried to steer
group meetings toward an intergovernmental bargaining
game, showing up with long lists of talking points that
made clear his and his government’s concerns --
especially on the question of multiple nationality. [53]
The point of this example is not to dismiss
rationalist accounts of compliance. Rather, it is to note
the value added of a middle-range constructivist
supplement to these more standard portrayals: It led me
to ask new questions and employ a different set of
research techniques. The result was to broaden our
understanding of how new European norms are constructed,
and how agents come to comply with their prescriptions
through processes of non-strategic interaction.
Whether or not one accepts these arguments, the basic
point remains. In making claims about social learning,
persuasion or arguing promoted by, or conducted within,
regimes and institutions, cognitive regime theorists and
constructivists must better theorize these dynamics. As
one scholar has correctly noted, “what is needed is
a decision-making theory which includes in its analysis
the ways in which preferences, beliefs and desires are
shaped by participation in the
decision-making process itself.” While offering no
such theory above, the analysis, by developing scope
conditions for when “participation ... in the
process” does indeed lead to preference change,
marks a start in this direction. [54]
Case II: Compliance via Social Sanctioning -- A Norm is
Contested
My German study highlights the importance of
institutional variables in explaining compliance
outcomes, the role of instrumental choice mechanisms
favored by rationalists in the social sanctioning dynamic
so often highlighted by constructivists, and,
methodologically, the importance of employing
counterfactual analysis. I treat each in turn. [55]
History and Institutions Matter. As discussed
in the preceding section, European norms on citizenship
and membership are evolving. They are moving in a more
inclusive direction, with emphasis on broadened
understandings of both citizenship and the rights of
national minorities; in particular, these CE norms
promote inclusion by facilitating dual citizenship. In
Germany, dual citizenship would promote the assimilation
of the large foreigner population. For many decades,
German law required immigrants and foreigners to give up
their original citizenship if they wished to seek it in
Germany; this was an obstacle to integration since many did not wish to sever all ties to their
homeland. The importance of dual citizenship for large
parts of the foreigner community has been so great that
they acquire it through illegal methods that contravene
German law. [56]
The lack of fit between these changing regional norms
and understandings of identity and citizenship held by
many Germans is significant. While there are clear
historical reasons why these understandings took hold in
Germany, the important point is that they became
reinforced over time and were institutionalized in
domestic laws and institutions. Legal and bureaucratic
indicators as well as textual analysis and interview data
all suggest the embedded nature of these domestic norms. [57]
To give one example: Through March 1999, the German
citizenship statute continued to be based on a “Law
on Imperial and State Citizenship” that dates from
1913, and an ethnic conception of identity was maintained
throughout the German legal system -- notably in Article
116 (1) of the Basic Law, the post-war German
constitution. Indeed, the ethnic core of the 1913
citizenship law is reproduced in the Basic Law via a
so-called “Nationalstaatsprinzip” (the Nation-State Principle), which makes very
clear that there is a material core (that is, blood ties)
connecting a citizen and his/her nation. As one analyst
has noted, this basic principle, despite minor
modifications over the years, “remains effective
until [the] present.” [58]
Why bother with this history and background? I do so
for a straightforward theoretical reason. Proposition #6
suggests that a key variable affecting whether agents
comply with regime norms via processes of persuasion and
social learning will be their cognitive priors and, more
generally, their broader normative environment. In
particular, for cases like the German one, where there is
a degree of mismatch between regional and
institutionalized domestic norms, one should
expect heightened levels of normative contestation and a
short-circuiting of social learning as agents find
themselves in multiple (domestic, regional) institutional
settings that evoke conflicting roles. Compliance via
sanctioning and cost/benefit analysis should thus be more
likely -- a finding strongly supported by my research to
date. [59]
Social Sanctions and Mobilization. Recent years
have witnessed an explosion of social protest and
mobilization on questions of citizenship and the
situation of foreigners in Germany, with key roles being
played by the liberal media, churches, trade unions,
grassroots citizens' initiatives, and the commissioners
for foreigners' affairs.
Here, I present two examples of such mobilization,
documenting the extent to which CE/European norms promote
it, and, at a micro-level, exploring how these norms
connect to domestic agents. To begin, the churches have
been one important social force helping to mobilize
pressure and peaceful protest. In recent years, the
governing bodies of the Protestant, Evangelical and
Catholic denominations have called for Germany to adopt
an immigration and integration policy for its resident
foreigners, including acceptance of dual citizenship and
a move to greater elements of jus
soli in German law. In Berlin, the Evangelical church
has produced flyers on dual citizenship; these make the
case for it by referring, among other factors, to
emerging European norms and recent work by the Council of
Europe. In the best corporatist tradition, the churches
have also sought to make their views known by
participating in conferences and policy networks on
issues of foreigners' rights. [60]
In a second example, one sees the broader public -- in
the form of a grassroots citizens' initiative -- playing
a key role. Seizing upon a policy window created by the
surge in anti-foreigner violence that accompanied German
unification, a group of activists based in Berlin
orchestrated, beginning in 1992, an initiative that was
specifically focused on the need for dual citizenship in
German law; it gathered over 1 million signatures from a
broad array of public figures. It was a textbook example
of how to mobilize public pressure on a specific policy
issue. The campaign coordinated its actions with other
social actors (specifically, the Evangelical
Church), collected signatures from prominent German
academics and public figures, and secured free publicity
for the initiative in the centrist-liberal German press (Der
Spiegel, Sueddeutsche Zeitung and Berliner
Zeitung, among others). [61]
Moreover, the existence of European understandings
favoring inclusive conceptions of citizenship played an
important role in the campaign. Signature collectors
pointed to the presence of such norms, and, more
generally, the initiative distributed an information
sheet noting that Germany's refusal to recognize multiple
nationality made it “an international
exception.” [62]
These examples confirm what much of the constructivist
literature has already documented: that regional/systemic
norms can promote national compliance by helping spark a
process of social sanctioning and mobilization. Yet,
exactly how, at the agent level, did this occur? That is,
why were social actors complying with normative
injunctions? My interviewing/fieldwork and document/media
analysis reveal a mixed picture. In the majority of cases
(trade unions, press, churches), these agents were using
CE norms to pursue given ends; they were an additional
tool that could be instrumentally used to generate
pressure on government policymakers, who then
engaged in cost/benefit calculations. Large parts of the
compliance dynamic, in other words, were consistent with
key elements of a more enlightened rational-choice
argument, where a consequentialist choice mechanism is
integrated with a social ontology that allows agents to
pursue non-material goals. [63]
A final point about the social sanctioning described
here is its apparent lack of effect. Throughout the
mid-1990s, German policymakers decided not to comply,
despite this pressure and mobilization. Minor changes to
citizenship and nationality laws were indeed enacted
during these years; however, on the key issue of dual
citizenship, stasis and lack of change prevailed.
Compliance Attained and Regional Norms Triumphant?
At this point, the knowledgeable reader may exclaim
“wait a minute”! Surely, this deadlocked state
of affairs changed dramatically after the September 1998
federal elections, when the CDU/CSU coalition was
replaced by a Social Democratic Party (SPD) - Green one.
Indeed, during the spring of 1999 the new government
legislated far-reaching changes to Germany’s
nationality laws. Among other
liberalizing provisions, these allow for dual
citizenship, albeit for a limited period, after which
immigrants must choose German nationality or that of
their “home” country. Interpreting these
changes drives home the importance and necessity of
systematically integrating both institutional and
counterfactual analysis into studies of compliance. [64]
Theoretically, recent events confirm the relevance of
my earlier discussion of cognitive priors and role
conflict (H#6), with historically constructed and
institutionalized ethnic conceptions of German identity
clashing with new, emergent and more civic
understandings. Indeed, the SPD/Green citizenship reform
proposals have both intensified this clash and revealed
its deeper normative dimension. The result has been a
wide-ranging debate in Germany unlike any -- with the
exception of those over the Holocaust -- seen in many
years. It is a heated, impassioned and very public
disagreement over what it means to be German. For sure,
much of the rhetoric is just that: Rhetoric employed
strategically in an ongoing political contest. The
compliance setting is thus not one of calm
deliberation, where agents/persuaders “act out
principles of serious deliberative argument” (H#8,
H#9).
In many other cases, however, behavior seems driven
not by politics and strategizing, but by more fundamental
identity conceptions -- to what Free Democratic Party
(FDP) general secretary Westerwelle has called
“immigration policies from the gut.” The
results of the Hesse state election in February 1999,
where the CDU/CSU scored an upset victory by exploiting
deep popular concern over dual citizenship and its impact
on German identity, vividly confirm the
importance of this normative dimension in the current
debate. As outgoing Hesse governor Hans Eichel noted, the
question of double citizenship “became so emotional
that it mobilized the opposition.” Put differently,
institutional analysis at this deepest, normative level
is essential for fully understanding why German social
actors comply -- or, more to the point, do not comply --
with the prescriptions embodied in new regional norms. [65]
This said, one must still ask: Are not the recent
changes compelling evidence of the power of norms to
promote compliance, especially through a process of
social sanctioning? After all, there is a striking
correlation between the content of the SPD/Green
proposals, on the one hand, and the prescriptions
embedded in emerging European norms and the reforms
earlier advocated by numerous groups/movements in
Germany, on the other. Yet, correlation is not causation,
and I am skeptical of any strong claims along these
lines. For one, the shift in policy also correlates with
a dramatic changeover at the elite level. SPD Chancellor
Schroeder is not simply a “third
way,” Blairite social democrat; equally important,
he signals the arrival in power of a truly post-war
generation of German politicians. And generational change
of this sort is often a key causal variable behind
radical policy shifts, especially at the
ideational/normative level highlighted here. [66]
Methodologically, however, it is important to ask the
counterfactual: Absent the development of new regional
norms and absent domestic social sanctioning, would
liberalizing changes to conceptions of citizenship in any
case be occurring in a modern industrial democracy such
as Germany? That is, would it look like compliance driven
by norms when in fact something else was at work? While
it is beyond the limits of the present paper to conduct a
thorough analysis of this sort, there are reasons to
expect the answer might be “yes.” For example,
it has been persuasively argued that
immigration/nationality policy in liberal states has an
in-built bias towards becoming more
expansionist and inclusive over time: It is dominated by
client politics, where small and often well-organized
employer, human-rights and ethnic groups work with state
officials outside public view to promote more inclusive
membership policies. While the sentiment of the general
public is typically anti-immigration, this interest is
diffuse; in contrast, the interests of immigrant advocacy
groups tend to be concentrated. Collective action
problems thus explain: (a) the public’s inability to
bring about more restrictive change; and (b) why the
preferences of the better organized liberal interest
groups tend to prevail. [67]
Indeed, the very process of exploring the
counterfactual helps me sharpen the argument. In
particular, I would reconcile the three causal strands
identified above -- social sanctioning spurred by
regional norms, generational turnover and client politics
-- in the following manner. For one, it
is very likely that the SPD election victory and
accompanying generational shift simply accelerated a
process of change that was already under way, due to the
mobilization dynamics sketched earlier. Moreover, the
“concentrated interests” of the advocacy groups
engaged in client politics were likely more
“mobilizeable” due to the existence of new
regional norms, and, in some cases, learned in the first
place via exposure to them. [68]
My more general point is that detailed process tracing
along with careful consideration of counterfactuals are
crucial components of any argument about norm-driven
compliance. Use of the two techniques not only allowed me
to uncover the dominant role of consequential choice
mechanisms in the compliance decisions of numerous social
actors (and the non-role of
deliberation/persuasion); their use also produced a more
nuanced argument regarding the influence of regional
norms. Analysis of this sort can thus help both
constructivists and cognitive regime theorists to delimit
more carefully the scope of their explanatory claims,
thus stimulating dialogue with theoretical opponents.
Case III: Compliance via Persuasion/Learning -- A Norm
Teaches
In Ukraine, one is immediately struck by the small
role of social sanctioning as a mechanism of norm-driven
compliance; CE norms have mattered most at the
elite/state level, where the demand for new principles
and norms has been high. Now, perhaps this result is
skewed by the absence of a key variable: transnational
networks promoting normative change. However, nothing
could be further from the truth. Since 1989 and, in many
cases, long before, human-rights practices in post-Soviet
states -- including Ukraine -- have been targeted by a
wide range of actors: international organizations such as
the CE, OSCE and, more recently, the European
Union; numerous international NGOs; and wealthy
industrialized democracies who have crafted assistance
programs specifically designed to empower new social
actors in these transition polities. Thus, in principle,
the network was in place to spur compliance through a
process of social sanctioning and mobilization. [69]
However, the latter has not occurred. Instead, due
primarily to the efforts of a small number of individuals
and units within the state, Ukrainian discourse and law
on citizenship and rights issues have changed in ways
consistent with emerging CE norms on national membership.
In contrast to many other post-Soviet states, Ukraine has
moved to create a civic definition of citizenship.
This inclusive conception of national identity has helped
policymakers craft one of the more liberal
minority-rights regimes in the former Soviet area. A
decree and a law on national minorities that permit a
high degree of cultural autonomy have been promulgated.
In addition, civic conceptions of citizenship and
minority rights are explicitly embraced in the new
constitution adopted in June 1996. [70]
Compliance and Social Learning. Four factors
were key in promoting this process of compliance. First,
there was the establishment in June, 1993, of an
Interdepartmental Commission for Questions of Ukraine's
Admission to the Council of Europe. It was based at the
Foreign Ministry and headed by then First Deputy Foreign
Minister Boris Tarasyuk. The Commission came to play a
major role on citizenship and rights issues; within it,
Tarasyuk was a progressive force. Those who dealt with
him described a creative thinker who encouraged subordinates to seek out new ideas and
approaches. His own unclear preferences (H#5) led him to
use the Commission as a vehicle for soliciting a wide
range of advice on rights issues within Ukraine as well
as from the international community, as it met repeatedly
(H#3) over the course of two years. Key conditions were
thus in place for processes of persuasion and social
learning to play out. [71]
Second, the head of the Citizenship Division within
the Presidential Administration, turned out, largely by
chance, to be a liberal-minded former academic: Petro
Chaliy. Chaliy and those he gathered around him were very
open to regional norms and the prescriptions they
embodied. Their views mattered because in the top-heavy
Ukrainian state, the presidential administration -- even
more so than post-Soviet Russia -- plays a dominant role
in policymaking. [72]
According to Ukrainian participants in the work of
both Tarasyuk’s Commission and Chaliy’s
Division, Council of Europe expertise and the norms it
promotes were central to shaping nationality laws and
policies. Several components of the minorities law, for
example, are modelled on the Council's European
Convention on Human Rights. Process tracing of this sort
allows me to move beyond correlations and establish a
causal role for Council norms. More important, it reveals
the mechanism through which Ukrainian agents came to
comply with CE norms: learning. Tarasyuk and Chaliy are
examples of moral entrepreneurs -- individuals open to learning from new norms and willing to
promote them. Moreover, the promoters of these norms were
not NGOs utilizing a politics of social sanctioning, but
regional experts and Ukrainians engaged in a calm
dialogue, where exploration and arguing, and not
lecturing, were the rule (H#8). These experts were mainly
capable and committed staffers from the CE, that is,
“authoritative members of the in-group to which the
persuadee ... wants to belong” (H#7). [73]
Third, pre-existing institutional structure played a
central, causal role in promoting compliance via
persuasion and social learning. In particular, the
autonomous and insulated nature of Ukrainian state
institutions, which lessoned the amount of political
friction to which administrative elites were exposed,
gave agents like Tarasyuk and Chaliy the possibility of
learning new preferences on citizenship and minority
rights ((H#4, H#9). However, a crucial question is why
this possibility turned into a reality. What motivated
these agents to learn? One factor, readily admitted in
interviews was a simple combination of Western coercion
and Ukrainian strategic interest. Given its large and
unpredictable neighbour to the east (Russia), Ukraine had
a clear interest in joining “Euro-Atlantic
structures,” as Ukrainian policymakers never tire of
declaring. To join required membership in Western
Europe’s key institutions -- most notably, for my
purposes, the Council of Europe. Yet, this membership was
withheld for several years (1991-93), in a direct attempt
to coerce Ukraine into adopting and implementing CE
principles. Thus external (material) sanctions and
domestic cost/benefit calculations, as the rationalist
regime compliance literature would predict, were causally
important.
At the same time, this strategic adaptation argument
fails to capture important parts of the compliance story.
Much of the social learning occurred in 1993 and early
1994; it thus predates Kuchma's election as president in
July, 1994, when Ukraine made a strategic decision to
seek closer ties with various Western institutions.
Relatedly, the years 1993-94 saw an extensive debate in
Ukraine over the “neutrality option” -- seeking
a position independent of both West Europe
and Russia. At that point, there was thus no consensus on
a balancing strategy against Russia, which clearly would
have made it in Ukraine's self interest to instrumentally
adopt Council norms. Thus, it is empirically incorrect to
assert that instrumental/rationalist arguments alone are
adequate for explaining the outcome. [74]
Fourth, many of these Ukrainian agents were truly
novices, with few deeply ingrained cognitive priors on
matters of nationality and citizenship (H#6). Consider
Dr. Chaliy in the Presidential Administration. Before
taking this position, he was a researcher at the
Institute of State and Law of the Ukrainian Academy of
Sciences; his scholarly work focused on constitutional
law and local self-governance. Thus, like many other new
elites in post-communist states, Chaliy found himself in
an unfamiliar position, dealing with issues of first
principle: the fundamental normative guidelines for
Ukraine’s conception of membership. In fact,
testimony from those who observed him in various
meetings/workshops makes clear that persuasion and
argumentation, based on prescriptions embodied in
regional norms, promoted learning. [75]
A comparison with post-Soviet Russia is instructive.
For the latter, many “new” elites are holdovers
from the Soviet era, a fact explained by the massive size
of the Soviet/Russian apparatus. In
contrast, the USSR bequeathed Ukraine a vastly smaller
personnel inheritance, as most key decisions during the
Soviet period were taken in Moscow. Thus, in relative
terms, Ukraine was forced to recruit more outsiders for
positions such as Chaliy’s, which, in turn, has
increased the probability of compliance occurring through
dynamics of persuasion and social learning -- due to the
noviceness of these individuals. [76]
The (Non-) Role of Social Sanctioning. Moving
beyond the elite level, an important issue, from an
analytic perspective, is the absence in Ukraine of
compliance spurred by social sanctioning. As already
noted, Europe possesses a robust and large human-rights
network; thus, the necessary conditions for the
mobilization of transnational/domestic pressure -- the
“boomerang” -- would seem to be in place.
However, for three reasons such mobilization has failed.
First, the Ukrainian NGO community,
when compared to its Western, Asian or even Russian
counterparts, is extraordinarily young, with most NGOs
only 4-5 years old. One often encounters NGOs that are
basically one individual; moreover, even for genuine
NGOs, lack of experience and poor networking with
like-minded organizations have resulted in many false
starts and weakened their ability to mobilize public
pressure. Compounding these internal problems is the
poorly developed state of the Ukrainian press: Even when
NGOs do orchestrate pressure campaigns, the media, due to
inexperience, often fails to cover them. [77]
Second, NGOs in Ukraine are operating
in a fiscal and political environment that, to say the
least, is inhospitable. On the former, the taxation and
incorporation laws currently in effect make it virtually
impossible for NGOs to survive -- unless, that is, they
engage in commercial activities that consume valuable
time and energy. The political setting as well has
worsened in recent years, with many NGOs and activists
complaining of a growing gap that separates governmental
structures from civil society. The legislature (Rada), in
particular, reacts very negatively to any overt NGO
pressure campaigns. [78]
Third, Ukrainian NGOs have a strategic disincentive to
engage in social sanctioning activity. Why? With good
ties to individuals newly installed in state
institutions, it simply makes strategic sense to exploit,
instead, these personal contacts, seeking to exert
behind-the-scenes influence, via
persuasion and social learning. Unfortunately, this is an
unreliable mechanism through which to pursue norm-driven
compliance, given the rapid personnel turnover in so many
government departments. Indeed, NGOs were ecstatic when
Serhiy Holovaty, who is considered one of the founding
fathers of the Ukrainian civil-society/NGO movement, was
appointed Minister of Justice in September 1995; yet, he
was removed from this post less than two years later in a
government reshuffle. [79]
Correlation, Causation and Counterfactuals. In
sum, one has a clear correlation between CE norms and a
compliance process driven by persuasion and social
learning; this has led to important changes in Ukrainian
citizenship and minority rights policy. Furthermore,
process tracing confirms a significant causal role for
these regional norms. Nonetheless, to delimit more
clearly my explanatory claims it is essential to explore
the counterfactual. Specifically, would Ukrainian policy
on citizenship and membership be any different in the
absence of compliance with CE norms? That is, would it
look like compliance driven by norms when in fact
something else was at work? Given that over 25% of its
population consists of national minorities, could not
self interest alone explain the adoption of liberal
policies -- thus making “compliance” with CE
norms largely epiphenomenal? The weak answer is that,
yes, self interest explains why new policies were
considered in the first place, but that Council-sponsored
norms tell much about their content.
The strong answer begins by observing that a country's
objective interest in dealing with minority populations
is not always clear -- witness the differing ways in
which Croatia, Hungary and Latvia have dealt with
minorities within their borders. Compared to other
similarly situated countries with similar problems,
Ukraine has reacted with a much more liberal and
inclusive conception of minorities' place within the
state. This indicates a stronger role for norms in
shaping the very definition of interests.
None of this is to deny the role that strategic
calculation and consequentialist choice mechanisms have
played in the compliance dynamics discussed above. At the
same time, my results point to the clear limitation of
rationalist analyses of the CE/European-rights regime,
which argue that states comply with its norms as elites,
with fixed interests and in the face of societal
pressure, conduct careful cost/benefit calculations.
Something else is occurring at the agent level, with
elites complying because they have leaned new interests.
More generally, the Ukrainian case suggests that recent
constructivist studies of norm-driven compliance may have
over-emphasized, in causal terms, the role played by a
politics of social sanctioning at the expense of a
process of social learning. [80]
Involuntary Non-Compliance. If I stopped at
this point, Ukraine would appear as the great compliance
success story. However, more recent events paint a
different picture and suggest, again, the importance of
integrating institutional variables into studies of
compliance. Indeed, from the perspective of an outside
observer, the same agents who had learned new preferences
in the human-rights/citizenship area and had helped get
progressive laws on the books were
surprisingly unmotivated to insure that proper policy
machinery was in place to implement new human-rights
practices. However, they had few strategic incentives,
given the centralization of state structures and their
autonomy from key societal actors, to worry about such
matters. [81]
Not surprisingly then, as the 1990s progressed,
Ukraine went from being one of the Council of
Europe’s “star pupils” to something more
akin to a “problem child.” Problems arose in
the areas of citizenship (situation of Crimean Tartars),
minority rights (status of Russian language) and human
rights (serious difficulties in implementing penal
reform; continuing use of death penalty). The argument
here is not that Ukrainian policymakers had become bad or
“unlearned” their new preferences; rather,
incentives flowing from the institutional context led
them, unintentionally, to undercut Ukraine’s ability
to comply with CE prescriptions. As rationalists would correctly predict, the structure of
the game had logically led to the selection of certain --
flawed, in this case -- strategies. Put differently, the
institutional incentive structure inherited from Soviet
times generated unintended consequences, specifically,
inattention to implementation mechanisms; the result was
“involuntary non-compliance.” [82]
An example, taken specifically from the human-rights
area, is helpful here. An important step forward for
Ukraine (and most other post-Soviet states) has been
elimination of the death penalty. To some (Americans,
say), this may seem odd; however, in Europe a strong norm
against it exists. Indeed, a prerequisite of CE
membership is that states remove death penalty statutes
from their judicial codes. In Ukraine, this never
actually happened. Instead, several years ago, President
Kuchma did the logical thing: He issued a decree -- just
like in Soviet times -- announcing a
moratorium on executions. The necessary implementation
procedures -- changes to the Ukrainian judicial code, an
information campaign to convince a sceptical public why
the penalty should be banned, say -- were never fully
carried out. In fact, during 1996, Ukraine conducted 167
executions, which, worldwide, was second only to China.
Council officials in Strasbourg, to say the least, are
dismayed at this state of affairs, and, more recently,
have begun efforts to help Ukraine develop the necessary
legal and social implementation mechanisms. [83]
Conditionality and Compliance. The last comment
highlights an important issue: How the conditionality
policy of an international organization affects its
strategies to attain compliance. Many such organizations
(the EU, NATO or the World Trade Organization, say)
utilize a rather strict conditionality criterion: An
applicant must do x, y and z before attaining membership
status, that is, be in nearly full compliance with
fundamental regime norms. In contrast, the Council
of Europe has pursued a mixed policy: Once an applicant
like Ukraine is deemed to be on the way to full
compliance, membership is granted. Council officials are
very explicit on the logic here: The best way to attain
compliance with core norms is to bring applicant
countries into the institution as quickly as possible,
where they can then “persuade” and
“socialize” them. [84]
This policy becomes problematic, however, if new
members then become non-compliant. What strategies can be
employed to restore compliance? Many of the tools
stressed by the mainstream regime compliance literature
-- material sanctions, attempts to influence the
cost/benefit calculations of national officials, say --
would seem to be of little help. Furthermore, in the case
of the CE, countries like Ukraine know the institution
has been very reluctant to employ sanctions
of this sort, especially once a country has membership
status. Instead, Council officials have thus sought to
reinforce the social context of CE membership and have
done so through a new, non-public monitoring procedure
designed not to sanction, but persuade recalcitrant
members to move toward compliance. [85]
This procedure is quite new, but several features
suggest the utility of persuasion/social-learning
approaches for studying its impact on member states’
compliance records. For one, it is built around an
ongoing series of small, private seminars in Strasbourg
(H#3, H#4, H#9) that bring together CE bureaucrats,
experts and national officials. More important, the
central dynamic at these meetings is not finger pointing
and shaming, but persuasion and the power of arguments
(H#7, H#8). It is worth quoting at length one Council
document on how the seminars work.
There is thus both an individual and collective
recognition that certain situations are not
compatible with commitments entered into and that
these situations must be changed. This process of
recognition is facilitated by the fact that the
discussions take place in camera and that an
atmosphere of understanding and cooperation allows
Representatives of member States to become aware of
other member States’ opinions on certain aspects
of their national situation. They also discover that
other member States have had to face similar
problems. Exchange of experience can therefore take
place to identify ways of dealing with the situation.
In this process, “diplomatic
persuasion” is seen as playing a central role. [86]
Council officials claim the seminars have helped
persuade several member states to improve instances of
non-compliance. For example, Ukraine (and Russia) have
more recently promulgated new moratoriums on further use
of the death penalty. Obviously, such assertions need to
be verified through additional process tracing and
empirical analysis. Theoretically, however, the episode
again highlights constructivism’s value added for
studying compliance -- in particular, its stress on
regimes and international organizations as social
institutions, where language, persuasion and learning are
causally important. [87]
Conclusions
I conclude by addressing three issues: how this study
advances the constructivist research program; the
importance of integrating institutional factors into
compliance studies; and a need for greater attention to
the development of scope conditions in the
rationalist/constructivist debate.
Constructivism. The distinguishing feature of
the constructivism discussed in this essay is its
ontological stance of mutual constitution -- the
reproduction of social reality through the interaction of
agents and structures. While this is fine as a
meta-theoretical starting point, the devil has been in
the details: the practical application of this insight in
empirical research. Early work responded to this
challenge in a pragmatic and understandable way, adopting
a bracketing strategy where one holds agency constant,
while exploring its effects on structure (and then the
reverse). In reality, most work emphasized the structure
--> agent relation, which nonetheless was a major
advance given the individualist ontologies so prevalent
in mainstream IR theory. More recent
constructivist studies have restored greater balance to
the agent-structure problematic by drawing upon the work
of social movement theorists. However, this has come at
the cost of viewing social interaction in a truncated and
incomplete way -- for example, as “strategic social
construction.” The instrumental view of agency
embedded in such notions has erected a black box around
processes of social choice. [88]
This essay has supplemented such perspectives, by
theorizing interaction and choice as dynamic processes of
persuasion and learning where social construction is less
“strategic” than deliberative; in effect, I
have attempted to shrink this black box. While my
approach faces its own methodological and theoretical
challenges, two trends -- in two very different research communities -- suggest it is worth
pursuing. First, a number of constructivists who study
international institutions are moving in directions
similar to that sketched here, exploring, for example,
literatures on learning, persuasion, social influence and
Habermasian communicative rationality to better model
processes of social interaction. [89]
All these approaches are complementary and might
benefit from greater “cross-fertilization.” For
example, my deductions on persuasion may be useful to
German constructivists as they grapple with the difficult
task of operationalizing Habermasian notions of
communicative rationality. These scholars have argued
that Habermas’ theory of communicative action can
provide an alternative theory of interaction through
which agents discover their preferences. As a point of
(theoretical) departure, this is excellent; however, from
an empirical perspective, the challenge
is to apply these Habermasian insights in real world
settings. As many have noted, this problem is
particularly daunting given that Habermas provides little
sense of “the various social mechanisms that might
help us better to understand how social systems and
individuals’ actions mesh.” The persuasion
literature explored above may be one way of filling this
gap. [90]
Second and perhaps more surprisingly, researchers who
study international institutions from a rational choice
perspective are also calling for increased attention to
interaction and process. Indeed, in a recent
agenda-setting essay, prominent rationalists argued that
the study of international institutions faces two key
challenges -- specifying in a systematic manner the
mechanisms through which they have effects on states, and
unpacking the implicit and often underspecified models of
domestic politics employed in earlier research on them.
Likewise, a leading rational-choice
student of international regimes has identified the study
of “regime consequences” and the development of
bargaining theories that include elements of arguing as
key cutting-edge issues. This move by rationalists away
from bracketing “as if” assumptions to the
study of real world mechanisms and processes clearly
intersects with concerns embraced by a growing number of
constructivists as well. [91]
Institutional Analysis. My case studies suggest
three different ways in which institutions matter in the
compliance process. First, institutional legacies can
frustrate the well-intentioned plans of national agents
to comply. This involuntary defection dynamic was clearly
at work in my Ukrainian case. Second, the structure of
domestic institutions seems to be key in explaining
variance in the mechanisms through which compliance
occurs. Consider again the German and Ukrainian
cases: Ceteris paribus, the relatively insulated
nature of Ukrainian institutions increased the likelihood
that compliance would be attained via persuasion and
learning; likewise, pluralist German institutions made it
likely that social sanctioning would play a more
important role in the compliance process. [92]
Third, institutions were also causally important at a
deeper level. In particular, pre-existing norms were key
in affecting agent willingness to comply with the
injunctions of emerging European understandings. The
presence of such cognitive priors hindered compliance
(the one national representative in the Strasbourg case;
many elites in the German case), while their absence
promoted it through persuasion and learning (the
noviceness of so many agents in my Ukrainian study).
Consistent with the problem-driven focus of this
paper, I should note that these three institutional
effects are best captured and explained by differing
theoretical tool kits. The first -- involuntary defection
-- is one that rational-choice analysts have often
highlighted, while the third -- normative structures --
is best theorized through sociological and constructivist
approaches. The second, which is
essentially a domestic structures argument, sits somewhat
uneasily between rational choice and social
constructivist analyses. Thus, one important lesson to
draw from these findings is that researchers would do
well to cast their nets broadly when asking why social
actors comply. [93]
Scope Conditions. The sceptical response to the
foregoing is “fine, the real world may be
complicated, but such calls for synthesis are a
prescription for ’analytic mush’ and
’kitchen sink’ arguments, where everything
’matters’.” While this claim is
overstated, it does raise the central challenge for
approaches such as mine: the development of so-called
scope or boundary conditions. That is, when and under
what conditions are rationalist as opposed to
constructivist methods more appropriate for understanding
why social actors comply? To be fair, I have advanced a
number of such conditions in this essay: the second and
third institutional factors above and my earlier
discussion of persuasion and social learning (H#1 - H#9).
However, more work is required: To take just one
example, (material) power and capabilities are
underspecified in my analysis. Consider again the German
and Ukrainian studies, with the latter broadly a case of
compliance and the former an instance of non-compliance.
I attributed these outcomes to differing degrees of agent
noviceness and domestic institutional insulation; however, power differentials likely played
a role as well. Ukraine is a weak supplicant seeking to
join Europe, while Germany is the dominant
politico-economic power on that continent.
Methodologically, this suggests a way to sharpen my
propositions: Extend the analysis to a case where one has
novice agents who come from stronger, more powerful
states -- say, China or Russia. [94]
Despite such difficulties, there are two important
reasons for proceeding in a more synthetic direction.
First, analytic synthesis is essential if we are to
understand fully why social actors comply with norms. In
this essay, I have examined the European human rights
regime; a powerful argument has been
made that rational choice approaches are necessary and
sufficient for explaining why states comply with its
injunctions. Yet, my Ukrainian case indicates that
compliance at times occurs through dynamics that simply
cannot be captured through standard rationalist accounts.
Theoretical pluralism is thus necessary to explain this
empirical reality. [95]
Second, my stress on synthesis
intersects with a growing trend in IR theory, where there
is a pronounced move away from an “either/or”
orientation (either rational choice or constructivism) to
a “both/and” perspective. This shift is seen in
forums as diverse as the flagship journal of German IR,
regime analysis, the 50th anniversary issue of International
Organization and the work of prominent rationalists.
Theoretical opponents, in other words, are spending less
and less time hurtling meta-theoretical insults at each
other, and, more and more, conducting an empirically
informed dialogue, where tough issues of process,
operationalization and scope are addressed. [96]
Footnotes
* Prepared for delivery
at the 1999 Annual Meeting of the American Political
Science Association, Atlanta, Georgia, September 2-5,
1999. Copyright by the American Political Science
Association. An earlier version was presented at the ECPR
27th Joint Sessions of Workshops, Mannheim, Germany,
March 1999. For comments on previous drafts, I thank
Emanuel Adler, Mike Barnett, Iain Johnston, Peter
Katzenstein, Andy Moravcsik, Thomas Risse, Celeste
Wallander and Michael Zuern. Special thanks also to Johan
P. Olsen for helpful discussions on the issues raised
here. The financial support of the Norwegian Research
Council is gratefully acknowledged.
** ARENA/Universitetet i
Oslo, P.O. Box 1143 Blindern, 0317 Oslo, Norway. Tel:
(47) 22 85 56 97, Fax: (47) 22 85 78 32, E-mail: jeffrey.checkel@arena.uio.no,web:
http://www.sv.uio.no/arena/presentation/Checkel.htm
[1]. On
this gap, often referred to as constructivism’s
agency problem, see Moravcsik 1997, 539-40; Klotz and
Lynch 1998, 18-19; and Gurowitz 1999, 413-19.
[2]. One
recent review identifies the specification of such
switching points as a central challenge facing students
of norms. Finnemore and Sikkink 1998, 913.
[3].
“Methodological individualism” or simply
“individualism” refer to an agent-centered view
of social life, which asserts that all social phenomena
are explicable in ways that only involve individual
agents and their goals and actions; the starting point of
the analysis is actors with given properties. Katzenstein
1996 is a good introduction to the first generation
modernist constructivism. Post-structuralist and
discourse-theoretic constructivists would likely deny the
validity of this essay’s central focus -- mechanisms
of social choice. See Milliken 1999, 230-31, passim,
for example.
[4].
Compare Risse, Ropp and Sikkink 1999, with the studies
cited in Chayes and Chayes 1993. On socialization, see
Sigel 1965, 1; and Ikenberry and Kupchan 1990, 287-92.
Underdal 1998, 6, passim; and Joerges and Zuern
1999 are excellent definitional introductions to the
compliance literature.
[5].
Joerges and Zuern 1999, 9. My understanding of compliance
is thus closest to what scholars term “the integrity
of the law” and “managed compliance,” or
“social learning” perspectives. See Joerges and
Zuern 1999, 5-7; and Underdal 1998, 20-23, respectively.
[6].
Helpful surveys of the regime/regime-compliance
literature include Rittberger 1995; Chayes and Chayes
1995, chapter 1; and Zuern 1998. On bargaining, see
Joensson 1990, Introduction; and Zartman 1994, Part Two.
For constructivism, see Adler 1997; and Ruggie 1998b.
[7].
On these points, see the excellent discussion in Levy,
Young, Zuern 1995, 295, 304-306, 312-14. Also see
Hasenclever, Mayer, Rittberger 1996, 177-205; and
Underdal’s models “A” and “B”
for explaining compliance, in Underdal 1998, 7-20.
[8].
Exemplars of the rationalist bargaining literature
include Wagner 1988; and Fearon 1994. For critiques,
which note how this work systematically brackets both
social context and social interaction, see Risse 1998,
2-7; and Schoppa 1999, 311-12, 332-37.
[9].
See Ernst Haas 1990, chapter 2, passim; Adler
1997, 337-41; and Ruggie 1998b, 867-69, for example. Also
see Underdal’s model “C,” in Underdal
1998, 20-23; and Peter Haas 1992. In the comparative
literature, Heclo 1974, 305, passim, advances
similar arguments.
[10].
Within the IR bargaining/compliance literature, see
Chayes and Chayes 1993; Haas 1998, 30-33; and,
especially, Schoppa 1999, passim. Early
neo-functionalist work on the EU emphasized social
context and interaction, but was marred by serious
methodological and theoretical flaws. See Pollack 1998
for an excellent discussion. More recent efforts go some
way towards correcting these problems -- Joerges and
Neyer 1997a, b; Lewis 1998; Egeberg 1998; and Eriksen and
Fossum 2000, for example.
[11].
By “heuristic approach,” I mean a claim that is
intuitively or empirically plausible, but elaborated
insufficiently -- operationalization of key concepts,
causal relationship among posited variables -- to allow
for empirical testing and, possibly, generalization to
other contexts. On the methodological/theoretical
problems within these non-rationalist IR and bargaining
literatures, see Levy, Young, Zuern 1995, 306;
Hasenclever, Mayer, Rittberger 1996, 212-13; Underdal
1998, 22; and, for examples demonstrating the frustrating
disconnect between theory and empirical
operationalization, Ernst Haas 1990, 138-54; Adler 1991;
and Harald Mueller, “The Internalization of
Principles, Norms and Rules by Governments: The Case of
Security Regimes,” in Rittberger 1995, chapter 15. A
similar heuristic approach still dominates in the
non-rationalist EU compliance literature. See Checkel
1999c, 551, 556-57, for discussion.
[12].
Checkel 1998, 338-45. Also see Risse 1998, 5-7. Finnemore
1996 is a superb example of the strengths -- and
weaknesses -- of such structural arguments.
[13].
See Cortell and Davis 1996 (on the US); and Moravcsik
1995 (on West Europe), for example.
[14].
Klotz 1995a, b; Koh 1997, Part III, passim; Keck
and Sikkink 1998, passim; and Gurowitz 1999, for
example.
[15].
For evidence of norms constituting domestic societal
agents, see Wapner 1995. Compare this constitutive
dynamic with the rationalist accounts in Ron 1997; and
Gurowitz 1999, 415, 418, 424, passim.
[16].
Risse, Ropp and Sikkink 1999, chapter 1, passim;
see also Keck and Sikkink 1998, 3, 28-29.
[17].
One sees hints of this fusion in Klotz 1995a, b. However,
it becomes explicit only in more recent work -- for
example, Keck and Sikkink 1998, chapter 1; Klotz and
Lynch 1998, 22; and Risse, Ropp and Sikkink 1999, passim.
Special thanks to Mimi Keck, Sid Tarrow and Dan Thomas
for helpful discussions on SML.
[18].
On thin rationalism, see Green and Shapiro 1994, 17-19.
Regarding this characterization of SML, let me be clear.
While the literature has moved well beyond the once
dominant resource mobilization model, with its clear
rational choice micro-foundation, it is nonetheless
striking how much of SML either remains premised on
individualist ontologies and consequentialist choice
mechanisms, or is unclear when it attempts to go beyond
such assumptions -- for example, discussions of
strategic, calculating agents exploiting “political
opportunity structures,” of instrumentally-motivated
actors striving to create “collective action
frames,” of the cost/benefit calculations leading to
the construction of “cultural frames,” etc.
See McAdam 1982, chapters 2-3; Carol Mueller,
“Building Social Movement Theory,” in Morris
and Mueller 1992, 4-16, 22; William Gamson, “The
Social Psychology of Collective Action,” in Morris
and Mueller 1992, 54-67, 71-72; Bert Klandermans,
“The Social Construction of Protest and
Multiorganizational Fields,” in Morris and Mueller
1992, 79-81; David Snow and Robert Benford, “Master
Frames and Cycles of Protest,” in Morris and Mueller
1992, 136-51; Debra Friedman and Doug McAdam,
“Collective Identity and Activism,” in Morris
and Mueller 1992, 157-69; Aldon Morris, “Political
Consciousness and Collective Action,” in Morris and
Mueller 1992, 351, 369-72; Tarrow 1998, chapter 11, passim;
and Idem 1999.
[19].
To be fair, where to draw the line between individualist
and social ontologies is no easy task once we move beyond
meta-theoretical ideal types. All the same, to talk of
strategic actors seeking to change the utility of other
agents, and to do so without specifying an intervening
process of social interaction, strikes me as
individualist. On strategic social construction, see Keck
and Sikkink 1998, 4-5; and, especially, Finnemore and
Sikkink 1998, 910-11. For recent empirical work informed
by such a perspective, see Hawkins 1997, 407-409, passim;
the case studies in Keck and Sikkink 1998; and Barnett
1999, 15-16, passim. Also see
Schimmelfennig’s discussion of “rhetorical
action” -- the strategic/manipulative use of norms
and arguments by rational agents to modify collective
outcomes. Schimmlfennig 1999, 2, passim.
[20].
A recent review of the Keck and Sikkink volume makes a
similar point. Hawkins 1999, 121-22.
[21].
See, respectively, Mueller, in Morris and Mueller, 1992,
12-13; Sidney Tarrow, “Mentalities, Political
Cultures and Collective Action Frames,” in Morris
and Mueller, 1992, 175, 197; and Klandermans, in Morris
and Mueller, 1992, 100.
[22].
Indeed, Risse and his collaborators are explicit that
their multi-stage compliance/socialization model, which
accords analytic primacy to domestic and transnational
social actors at early stages, assumes
rogue/authoritarian states. Risse, Ropp, Sikkink 1999,
chapter ??.
[23].
On this social learning mechanism, see Soysal 1994;
Risse-Kappen 1995; Finnemore 1996; Adler and Barnett
1998, 41-45, chapter 4; and Price 1998, for example.
[24].
Among many others, see Becker 1996, chapters 8-9. Thanks
to Gerald Schneider and Bernard Steunenberg for
discussions on the points raised here and in the
following paragraphs.
[25].
Calvert 1995, 256-58, passim, for example.
Exemplars of rationalist studies of learning include
Sargent 1993, chapter 1, passim; Lupia and
McCubbins 1998, chapter 2, passim; and, within IR,
Farkas 1998, which represents one of the most
sophisticated and rigorous rational-choice efforts to
theorize learning to date. Helpful reviews of such work
include Michael Cohen and Lee Sproull,
“Introduction,” in Cohen and Sproull 1996; and
Farkas 1998, 22-32. Johnson 1993 provides an excellent
and balanced discussion of the theoretically incomplete
role accorded communication in such analyses. On simple
learning, also see Levy 1994.
[26].
Cohen and Sproull 1996, passim; and Farkas 1998,
32-40 survey the non-rationalist and social learning
literatures.
[27].
These hypotheses derive from a number of sources:
Zimbardo and Leippe 1991, 45-48; DiMaggio and Powell
1991, passim; Peter Haas 1990, 1992; Hall 1993;
Risse-Kappen 1996; Sim Sitkin, “Learning Through
Failure: The Strategy of Small Losses,” in Cohen and
Sproull 1996, chapter 23; and Checkel 1997a, chapters 1,
5. As proposition #4 should make clear, I do not
subscribe to “efficiency” notions of learning,
which would lead one to argue the opposite, namely, that
larger, less insulated groups, by offsetting various
individual biases, will lead to better, more optimal
policies. Farkas 1998, 39-40.
[28].
While students of the EU have begun to explore how a
greater use of qualified majority voting affects the
Union’s collective international negotiation
position, they have yet to consider whether such rules
affect internal bargaining dynamics among the member
states -- Jupille 1999, for example.
[29].
On the last point, see Farkas 1998, 35-36. For the
quotes, see Scott Cook and Dvora Yanow, “Culture and
Organizational Learning,” in Cohen and Sproull 1996,
440-53. Also see Herbert Simon, “Bounded Rationality
and Organizational Learning,” in Cohen and Sproull
1996, 177; and Barbara Levitt and James March,
“Organizational Learning,” in Cohen and Sproull
1996, 518.
[30].
Finnemore 1996, chapter 2, passim. The absence of
social interaction is due to Finnemore’s use of a
so-called “bracketing strategy,” a point to
which I return in the conclusions. Also see Price 1998,
617, 621-23, 627, 639, where the author improves upon
Finnemore by emphasizing social processes of persuasion
in the learning dynamic, but then fails to empirically
validate their importance.
[31].
Perloff 1993, 14. My analysis here and below draws upon
Riker 1986; Zimbardo and Leippe 1991, chapters 4-6;
Brody, Mutz and Sniderman 1996, chapters 1, 5-6; and
Lupia and McCubbins 1998, chapter 3. Work on manipulative
persuasion, with its individualism and emphasis on
calculating, strategic agency, has not surprisingly been
picked up by several rational-choice scholars -- for
example, Gibson 1998, 819, passim; and Moravcsik
1999, 272, 281.
[32].
On the last point, see Zimbardo and Leippe 1991, 21-30.
[33].
Zimbardo and Leippe 1991, 37; Brody, Mutz, Sniderman
1996, 8; and Cobb and Kuklinski 1997, 96. More recently,
two rational choice scholars have advanced a rigorous and
deductively sound set of scope conditions for persuasion.
However, this clarity comes at a steep price -- namely,
stripping all social context from the process of
persuasion, which is my central concern here. Lupia and
McCubbins 1998, chapters 1-3.
[34].
Joergensen, Kock, Roerbech 1998, 283. Also see Cobb and
Kuklinski 1997, 116; and Gibson 1998, 846.
[35].
Zimbardo and Leippe 1991, 225.
[36].
Support for this deduction seems particularly robust in
the persuasion literature; see Zimbardo and Leippe 1991,
144-53; Brody, Mutz, Sniderman 1996, 161-62; Gibson 1998,
833, 835; and Schoppa 1999, 309-10. Further theoretical
backing comes from work on role conflict in
cognitive/social psychology (Goffman 1974, chapter 10;
Stryker 1980; Barnett 1993), cultural matches in
sociology (Meyer and Strang 1993) and role/identity
perceptions in institutional theory (Egeberg 1998, 2-5).
[37].
Joergensen, Kock and Roerbech 1998, 287. Also see
Johnston 1998a, 16-25; Lupia and McCubbins 1998, 55; and
Schoppa 1999, 312-13.
[38].
Joergensen, Kock and Roerbech 1998, 297 (for quote); and
Brody, Mutz, Sniderman 1996, 154.
[39].
The logic here is straightforward: A more politicized,
less insulated and thus “noisy” setting makes
it less likely that the conditions laid out in
propositions #5 and, especially, #8 will be fulfilled,
thus decreasing the effectiveness of argumentative
persuasion. On these points, also see Frost and Makarov
1998, 776; and Pierson 1993, 617-18.
[40].
For the practitioner-scholar quotes, see Chayes and
Chayes 1995, 25-26.
[41].
Underdal 1998, 23; and Checkel 1998, respectively. To
better operationalize “uncertain environments,”
analysts may benefit by employing Zuern’s recent
(1998, 629-30) suggestion to distinguishing among
differing dimensions of uncertainty and contexts in which
it arises.
[42].
My arguments here thus dovetail with Hurd’s
excellent, problem-driven discussion of the multiple
processes through which compliance occurs. Hurd 1999,
401, passim. On constructivism’s relational
ontology, see Ruggie 1998a, 4.
[43].
George and McKeown 1985. Also see Wohlforth 1998, 658,
673-70; and McKeown 1999, 173-74, passim.
[44].
On the importance of panel samples in persuasion
research, also see Brody, Mutz, Sniderman 1996, 2.
[45].
On the legitimacy and feasibility of these first three
techniques, also see Hurd 1999, 382, 390-92; and Zuern
1997, 298-302, where he likewise argues for “using
documents” and “asking experts” when one
wants to establish agent interests independent of
behavior, a methodological challenge analogous to the one
faced here.
[46].
On institutionalization and the political influence of
norms and other ideational variables, see Longstreth
1992; Katzenstein 1993; and Goldstein 1993.
[47].
On triangulation and norms, also see Raymond 1997,
219-222.
[48].
On emulation, often referred to as “mimetic
processes,” see DiMaggio and Powell 1991, 69-70.
[49].
For the quote, see Hurd 1999, 392 (emphasis in original).
Also see Johnston 1998a; and Wendt 1999, chapter ?, who
provide excellent critiques/discussions on the role of
“as if” assumptions and of the choice-theoretic
view on preference formation.
[50].
The Strasbourg case is fully documented in Checkel 1999a,
94-96; and Idem 1999c; the German case in Checkel
1999a, 96-107; and the Ukrainian study in Checkel 1999b.
[51].
My Strasbourg/CE field work was conducted in four rounds:
May 1994, June-July 1995, April 1997 and November 1998.
[52].
The persuaders were the Swiss, Italian and Austrian
representatives. See Interviews: Horst Schade, former
Secretary to the Committee, May 1994, June-July 1995,
November 1998; GianLuca Esposito, current Secretary to
the Committee, June-July 1995, April 1997, November 1998;
and Ambassador Ulrich Hack, Head, Permanent
Representation of Austria to the Council of Europe and
former Chair of the Committee, November 1998. Also see
Council of Europe 1993; and Idem 1994, which are
meeting summaries that broadly confirm the
interviewees’ accounts.
[53].
This individual was the German representative, whom I
interviewed on two separate occasions. Also see
Interviews, as in preceding note, for confirmation of my
account here.
[54].
Kerremans 1996, 221. Kerremans makes this observation
with respect to the EU; however, I would argue it holds
equally well for cognitive regime theory and
constructivism. Also see Zuern 1998, 630-32.
[55].
Field work for the German case was conducted in four
rounds: March 1995, June-August 1995, May 1996, August
1996 - January 1998.
[56].
Martina Keller, “Einbuergern, Ausbuergern,
Einbuergern,” Die Zeit, March 27, 1997.
[57].
For background, see Kanstroom 1993.
[58].
Kreuzer 1997, 2.
[59].
A number of empirical constructivist studies have also
documented the importance of domestic normative barriers
in the compliance process -- Adler 1987; Sikkink 1991;
and Klotz 1995b, chapter 7, for example.
[60].
See Jochen Buchsteiner, “Konzepte, die erst reifen
muessen,” Die Zeit, November 18, 1994;
Interview, Thomae-Venske, Commissioner for Foreigners'
Affairs, Evangelical Church of Berlin-Brandenburg, May
1996; and GermNews, January 7, 1999. For the
flyer, see “Handreichung zum Thema: Doppelte
Staatsbuergerschaft” (Berlin, 1995).
[61].
See “Unser Ziel: 1 Million Unterschriften fuer die
doppelte Staatsbuergerschaft” (Berlin, no date);
Interviews, Ismail Kosan, Member of the Berlin
Parliament, Buendnis 90/Die Gruenen Fraction, May 1996;
Andreas Schulze, Staff Member, Office of F.O. Wolf,
German Member of the European Parliament, Berlin, May
1996.
[62].
“Informationen zum deutschen Staatsbuergerrecht:
Doppelstaatsbuergerschaften” (Berlin, no date).
[63].
Checkel 1999a, 102-104, documents the constraining role
these norms played in the compliance decisions of many
German elite policymakers. My German study thus provides
strong confirming evidence for Moravcsik’s
rationalist explanation for state compliance with norms
of the European human rights regime. Moravcsik 1995.
[64].
On these changes, see Koalitionsvertrag 1998, Teil IX;
“No More Reforms of Citizenship Code for Now,” GermNews,
March 16, 1999; and Ralph Atkins, “Ambitious Plans
for Reform Run into Trouble,” Financial Times,
June 1, 1999. For overview and background, see
“Germany: Citizenship, Asylum,” Migration
News 5 (December 1998); “Der Kampf um die
Paesse,” Der Spiegel, January 11, 1999; and
“Deutsche und Auchdeutsche,” Die Zeit,
February 4, 1999.
[65].
“Opposition Parties Clash over Citizenship
Plans,” Financial Times, January 5, 1999;
and, for the Eichel quote, “Germany: Dual
Nationality Change,” Migration News 6 (March
1999). For other analyses that stress this deeper,
normative element in the debate, see “Kampagne gegen
Doppel-Staatsbuergerschaft: FDP laesst die Union
allein,” Sueddeutsche Zeitung, January 5/6,
1999; and John Schmid, “Germany Searches Soul with
Debate on Citizenship,” International Herald
Tribune, February 4, 1999. Given these
emotional/normative realities, it comes as no surprise
that, when the Bundestag eventually passed the revised
citizenship statute in May 1999, nearly 40% of its
deputies voted against or abstained. “Germany:
Option Model Approved,” Migration News 6
(June 1999).
[66].
Also see the Ukrainian case below. More generally on the
linkages between elite turnover and normative change, see
Stein 1994, 162-63, passim.
[67].
Freeman 1998, 101-104; and Joppke 1998. I thank Andy
Moravcsik, Fritz Scharpf and Rey Koslowski for discussion
on these points.
[68].
Gurowitz 1999, 416-417, comes to a similar conclusion,
giving greater analytic primacy to domestic factors over
systemic norms in her study of changing German
nationality/immigration policy.
[69].
Interviews, Directorate of Human Rights, Council of
Europe, April 1997, November 1998. Also see Mendelson
1998. My Ukrainian fieldwork was conducted in two rounds:
May 1994; June 1997.
[70].
Markus 1996a, 1996b; and “Ukraine: Founding
Father,” The Economist, July 6, 1996.
[71].
Interviews, Ukrainian Foreign Ministry, Kyiv, May 1994;
Political Directorate, Council of Europe, April 1997. In
April 1998, Tarasyuk was appointed to the post of Foreign
Minister.
[72].
Interviews, Petro Chaliy, Head, Citizenship Department,
Presidential Administration, Kyiv, June 1997; Valeriy
Hrebenyuk, Chief Advisor for International Law and
Organizations, Directorate of Foreign Policy,
Presidential Administration, Kyiv, June 1997. On the
statist nature of Ukrainian political institutions, see
Carlsen and Gorchinskaya 1998; and Burakovsky 1999.
[73].
Interviews, as in two preceding notes; and Halyna
Freeland, Counsel to the Chairman, Ukrainian Legal
Foundation, Kyiv, June 1997. On moral or norm
entrepreneurs, see Finnemore 1996; Florini 1996, 375; and
Finnemore and Sikkink 1998, 896-901.
[74].
Interview, Nikolay Kulinich, Ukrainian Institute of
International Relations, Kyiv, May 1994.
[75].
Interviews, as in notes 71-73. Chaliy thus appears
representative of the broader Ukrainian populace, where
surveys consistently reveal a similar lack of deeply held
views on nationality and ethnicity -- Korshak and Sych
1998, for example.
[76].
In aggregate terms, differing degrees of noviceness also
partly account for the variance in my German and
Ukrainian results. The former appears as an old and
established country when compared to Ukraine; put
differently, Germans are more likely to carry cognitive
priors that will impede persuasion/learning (H#6).
[77].
For the analysis here and below, see Interviews, Natalie
Belitser, Coordinator, Center for Pluralism, Pylyp Orlyk
Institute for Democracy, Kyiv, June 1997; Halyna Freeland
and Natalia Kravets, Counsel to the Chairman and
Executive Director, respectively, Ukrainian Legal
Foundation, Kyiv, June 1997; Olga Kornienko, Program
Coordinator, Ukrainian Center for Human Rights, Kyiv,
June 1997; Oleksandr Pavlichenko, Director, Center for
Information and Documentation of the Council of Europe in
Ukraine, Kyiv, June 1997; and Serhiy Holovatiy, Ukrainian
Minister of Justice, Kyiv, June 1997. On press passivity,
also see Carlsen and Gorchinskaya 1998.
[78].
Also see “Human Rights Organization Officially
Registered,” Kiev UNIAN, August 15, 1994, as
reported in FBIS-SOV-94-157, August 15, 1994,
which documents the prolonged efforts of one human rights
NGO simply to gain recognition from the Ukrainian state.
[79].
Chrystia Freeland, “Ukraine Justice Minister
Sacked,” Financial Times, August 22, 1997. My
analysis here intersects with that of Bob 1998, who has
also argued for more attention to the strategic
incentives of domestic NGOs as an important supplement to
the more standard constructivist account, where
transnational networks “reach down” and select
certain national NGOs as partners.
[80].
Risse, Ropp, Sikkink 1999, for example. See Moravcsik
1995 for the rational-choice argument.
[81].
Similar incentives were at work in the late Soviet era
and explain why Gorbachev and his allies failed to take
steps to prevent what came to pass once he left office:
the rapid demise of his liberal foreign policy. Checkel
1999b.
[82].
The logic here is similar to what two-level game
theorists call “involuntary defection,” where
the structure of domestic interests makes it rational for
a state agent to defect from an agreement he/she prefers;
in my case, it is the structure of domestic institutions
that leads to such an unwanted outcome. On the two-level
game logic, see Evans, Jacobson, Putnam 1993, 440-42; on
the institutional logic, see Cortell and Peterson 1999,
chapter 1. My comments on more recent developments in
Ukraine draw upon numerous interviews. See Note 77 above;
as well as Interviews, Council of Europe Secretariat,
April 1997, November 1998. For general overviews of the
deteriorating human rights situation in Kyiv, see
“Language Issue Could Haunt Kuchma During
Election,” Financial Times, May 25, 1999; and
Hyde 1999.
[83].
On Ukraine and the death penalty, see Interviews,
Oleksandr Pavlichenko, Director, Center for Information
and Documentation of the Council of Europe in Ukraine,
Kyiv, June 1997; Council of Europe Secretariat, April
1997; as well as “Keine Gnade fuer Moerder: Der
Europarat protestiert, doch die Ukraine exekutiert,”
Sueddeutsche Zeitung, June 21/22, 1998;
“Ukraine’s Membership in Council of
Europe’s Assembly Threatened,” RFE/RL
Newsline, January 29, 1999; and “Council of
Europe Delays Decision on Ukraine,” RFE/RL
Newsline, June 25, 1999.
[84].
The quoted words are employed regularly by CE officials.
See, Interviews, Council of Europe Secretariat, April
1997, November 1998.
[85].
On the following, see Interviews: Andrew Drzemczewski,
Head, and Markus Jaeger, Deputy Head, Secretary
General’s Monitoring Unit, Council of Europe
Secretariat, April 1997, November 1998. Also see Council
of Europe 1997; and, especially, Idem 1998.
[86].
Council of Europe 1998, 10, 11, 19-21 -- quotes at
pp.20-21. Also see Interviews, as in previous note.
[87].
Johnston 1998a. Thanks to Celeste Wallander of Harvard
University for spurring me to explore this
conditionality/compliance nexus. On Ukraine’s
moratorium, see “Kuchma Asks Parliament to Abolish
Death Penalty,” RFE/RL Newsline, December 21,
1998.
[88].
On the bracketing strategy, see Wendt 1987, 364-65.
[89].
See Price 1998 (social learning); Johnston 1998a, b
(persuasion, social influence); and Risse 1998 (arguing
and communicative rationality).
[90].
For the quote, see Axel Van Den Berg, “Is
Sociological Theory too Grand for Social
Mechanisms?,” in Hedstroem and Swedberg 1998, 212.
Risse 1998 provides an excellent summary of the German
IR/Habermas debate. This challenge of operationalization
is real: To date, all “empirical” applications
of Habermas of which I am aware are at best heuristic and
suggestive -- for example, Reus-Smit 1997, 564, 569-70, passim;
and Lewis 1998, 499, passim. Thanks to Michael
Zuern for discussion on these points.
[91].
See Martin and Simmons 1998, passim; and Zuern
1998, 630-42, respectively.
[92].
In Checkel 1999a, I elaborate this domestic structures
argument in greater detail.
[93].
The domestic structures literature is closely related to
historical institutionalism, and the latter is deeply
split between a rationalist (Paul Pierson, say) and
constructivist branch (Katzenstein).
[94].
Thanks to Mike Barnett, Iain Johnston and Johan P. Olsen
for discussions on these points.
[95].
See Moravcsik 1995; and Checkel 1997b, respectively.
[96].
See Risse 1998; Underdal 1998; the essays by
Katzenstein/Keohane/Krasner, Finnemore/Sikkink, Kahler
and March/Olsen, all in International Organization
52 (Autumn 1998); and Laitin 1998, respectively.
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