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Every year, states negotiate, conclude, sign, and give effect to hundreds of new international agreements. Koremenos argues that the detailed design provisions of such agreements matter for phenomena that scholars, policymakers, and the public care about: when and how international cooperation occurs and is maintained. Theoretically, Koremenos develops hypotheses regarding how cooperation problems like incentives to cheat can be confronted and moderated through law's detailed design provisions. Empirically, she exploits her data set composed of a random sample of international agreements in economics, the environment, human rights and security. Her theory and testing lead to a consequential discovery: considering the vagaries of international politics, international cooperation looks more law-like than anarchical, with the detailed provisions of international law chosen in ways that increase the prospects and robustness of cooperation. This nuanced and sophisticated 'continent of international law' can speak to scholars in any discipline where institutions, and thus institutional design, matter

AbstractTo understand leadership in international governance, I begin at the structural level with state actors. A simple framework that relies on state interests and material power can shed light on why powerful states take on leadership roles in some negotiations (e.g. arms control) but not in others (e.g. human rights). States attempting to cooperate to realize joint interests or solve problems often face a set of common and persistent obstacles. These obstacles, which I call 'cooperation problems', can make otherwise beneficial cooperation difficult to achieve. I argue that the particular combination of underlying cooperation problems present in an issue affects a powerful state's desire to take on a leadership position with respect to the incidence of international cooperation – that is, agenda setting by putting forth the first draft of an international agreement addressing the issue and remaining in control of subsequent drafts. Because, from a policy point of view, the most interesting cases are those that involve distribution problems, I focus on the following two combinations of problems: distribution with coordination and distribution without coordination. I use the examples of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, the Antarctic Treaty, the Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination and the Convention Against Torture to illustrate the theoretical discussion.

This article introduces the Continent of International Law (COIL) research project on international agreement design. COIL stems from the conviction that the International Organization subfield's focus on the couple hundred international organizations with physical headquarters had to be broadened to include the tens of thousands extant international agreements, that is, international law. Each piece of international law can and should be studied as an institution. Together, this set of institutions, which truly is a "continent," is theoretically very interesting and empirically very diversified. COIL's basic theoretical premise is that international agreement design and comparison across agreements begins by understanding the underlying cooperation problem(s) the agreements are trying to solve. COIL identifies 12 distinct and recurrent cooperation problems, which may occur alone or in combinations. The data collection features a random sample of international agreements conditional on the issue areas of economics, environment, human rights, and security. The first large-n, systematic operationalization of the cooperation problems underlying real international agreements is highlighted, and descriptive statistics are presented -- some of which challenge conventional wisdom. For instance, enforcement problems (Prisoner's Dilemma-like situations) are important, but far from universal, with 30% of the agreements characterized by that underlying problem. The numerous and diverse COIL variables allow for a multi-dimensional operationalization of the difficult-to-measure concept of the "incomplete contract." Hypotheses from contract theory are tested, confirming the appropriateness of the new measure, the weakness of measures based on number of pages, and most significant, the rationality and efficiency of the continent of international law. [Reprinted by permission of Sage Publications Inc., copyright holder.]

This article introduces the Continent of International Law (COIL) research project on international agreement design. COIL stems from the conviction that the International Organization subfield's focus on the couple hundred international organizations with physical headquarters had to be broadened to include the tens of thousands extant international agreements, that is, international law. Each piece of international law can and should be studied as an institution. Together, this set of institutions, which truly is a "continent," is theoretically very interesting and empirically very diversified. COIL's basic theoretical premise is that international agreement design and comparison across agreements begins by understanding the underlying cooperation problem(s) the agreements are trying to solve. COIL identifies 12 distinct and recurrent cooperation problems, which may occur alone or in combinations. The data collection features a random sample of international agreements conditional on the issue areas of economics, environment, human rights, and security. The first large-n, systematic operationalization of the cooperation problems underlying real international agreements is highlighted, and descriptive statistics are presented – some of which challenge conventional wisdom. For instance, enforcement problems (Prisoner's Dilemma-like situations) are important, but far from universal, with 30% of the agreements characterized by that underlying problem. The numerous and diverse COIL variables allow for a multi-dimensional operationalization of the difficult-to-measure concept of the "incomplete contract." Hypotheses from contract theory are tested, confirming the appropriateness of the new measure, the weakness of measures based on number of pages, and most significant, the rationality and efficiency of the continent of international law.

International cooperation is plagued by uncertainty. Although states negotiate the best agreements possible using available information, unpredictable things happen after agreements are signed that are beyond states' control. States may not even commit themselves to an agreement if they anticipate that circumstances will alter their expected benefits. Duration provisions can insure states in this context. Specifically, the use of finite duration depends positively on the degree of uncertainty and states' relative risk aversion and negatively on the cost. These formally derived hypotheses strongly survive a test with data on a random sample of agreements across all four of the major issue areas in international relations. Not only do the results, highlighting evidence on multiple kinds of flexibility provisions, strongly suggest that the design of international agreements is systematic and sophisticated; but also they call attention to common ground among various subfields of political science and law.

Wie können Nationalstaaten Vereinbarung treffen und einhalten, wenn sie unsicher über die Folgen der Verträge und internationaler Kooperationen sind? Hier müssen sie sich auf die Möglichkeiten flexibler Handlungsmöglichkeiten und Interpretationen verlassen können. Die Bereitschaft der Staaten, sich an eher unbestimmte Verträge zu halten ist, größer, haben sie doch hier weitere Handlungsspielräume. Am Beispiel des Vertrages über die Nichtverbreitung von Kernwaffen wird dieser Prozess dargestellt (SWP-Fnk)

How can states credibly make and keep agreements when they are uncertain about the distributional implications of their cooperation? They can do so by incorporating the proper degree of flexibility into their agreements. I develop a formal model in which an agreement characterized by uncertainty may be renegotiated to incorporate new information. The uncertainty is related to the division of gains under the agreement, with the parties resolving this uncertainty over time as they gain experience with the agreement. The greater the agreement uncertainty, the more likely states will want to limit the duration of the agreement and incorporate renegotiation. Working against renegotiation is noise—that is, variation in outcomes not resulting from the agreement. The greater the noise, the more difficult it is to learn how an agreement is actually working; hence, incorporating limited duration and renegotiation provisions becomes less valuable. In a detailed case study, I demonstrate that the form of uncertainty in my model corresponds to that experienced by the parties to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, who adopted the solution my model predicts.