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AbstractWhy states comply with international law has long been at the forefront of international law and international relations scholarship. The compliance discussion has largely focused on negative incentives. We argue that there is another, undertheorized mechanism: rewarding. We provide a typology and illustrations of how rewards can be applied. Furthermore, we explore the rationale, potential, and limitations of rewarding, drawing on rationalist and psychological approaches. Both approaches provide ample justifications for making greater use of rewarding in international law.

Abstract
Public international law scholarship opens evermore to social science theories and methodologies, but the implications of cognitive research and behavioural economics have not been systematically explored, even though they have been successfully applied to domestic legal issues and are increasingly used in public policy and regulation. In this symposium, we aim to fill two research gaps: first, international law and economics and international political economy rarely use behavioural insights, while behavioural law and economics lacks international dimensions, and, second, international political psychology sidesteps the importance of international norms. This introduction surveys the main psychological angles employed in the articles of the symposium as well as the difficulties envisioned in this research agenda of applying psychology to international law and using experiments for the study of international law. These difficulties notwithstanding, behavioural studies have generated many insights that have the potential to greatly enrich our understanding of international law.

ABSTRACT
The classic political economy of trade models state behavior on the international plane by reference to the formation of domestic interests. Voters, interest groups, and politicians are rational actors in this model, pursuing their economic preferences without cognitive or motivational distortions. This article questions the sufficiency of the rational choice model in the formation of contemporary trade policy. Starting from the classic political economy story, this article explores real-world deviations from rationally expected outcomes by drawing on cognitive psychology. Using both theoretical and empirical analysis, we seek to identify key distortions that can better explain voter and politician behavior in the current trade wars. We begin with loss aversion in that individuals have asymmetrical attitudes towards gains and losses. Rising inequality within the rich world amounts to a perceived relative loss particularly for middle-class citizens. Combined with the absolute rise of equality between countries, this can trigger a double loss frame—both as an individual loss and a national loss—that can profoundly shape anti-trade preferences in certain countries. Framing trade as a security threat also invokes powerful hawkish biases. Lastly, the availability bias can be provoked by social media mechanisms making people tend to focus on particular risks and overweight their import.

Critical Infrastructure (CI) provision is characterized by privatization of CI providers, transnational risks and a changing role of the state. We describe two paradigmatic systems of state liability with a view to CI liability, namely Germany as a fault system and Switzerland as a strict liability system. Both are unsatisfactory and not well adapted to the modern realities and exigencies of allocation of risks and liability in CI and show flaws from a functional, incentive-based perspective. Therefore, we make suggestions how those systems may be ameliorated, suggesting organizational, design and supervisory liability reforms.

Framing is pervasive in public international law. International legal norms (incl. soft law) and international politics both inevitably frame how international actors perceive a given problem. Although framing has been an object of study for a long time - be it in domestic or international politics - it has not been systematically explored in the context of social cognition and knowledge production processes in public international law. We aim to close this gap by examining the implications of framing effects for preference and belief formation in specific settings in public international law. By looking at issue framing in addition to equivalency framing (which includes most well-known gain-loss framing effects), we broaden the scope of framing effects as traditionally studied in behavioral law and economics by also including findings from research in political communication. In the first part of this chapter, we provide an overview of the experimental evidence of both types of framing, show how it has already been incorporated into neighboring disciplines to public international law, and untangle the difference between preference reversals and a change in beliefs. In the second part, we identify typical situations in public international law where framing effects play an important role in social cognition and knowledge production processes. Without claiming to be exhaustive, we focus on international negotiations, international adjudication, global performance indicators, and norm framing.

The classic political economy of trade models state behavior on the international plane by reference to the formation of domestic interests. Voters, interest groups and politicians are rational actors in this model, pursuing their economic preferences without cognitive or motivational distortions. This article questions the sufficiency of the rational choice model in the formation of contemporary trade policy. Starting from the classic political economy story, this article explores real world deviations from rationally expected outcomes by drawing on cognitive psychology. Using both theoretical and empirical analysis, we seek to identify key distortions that can better explain voter and politician behavior in the current trade wars. We begin with loss aversion in that individuals have asymmetrical attitudes towards gains and losses. Rising inequality within the rich world amounts to a perceived relative loss particularly for middle-class citizens. Combined with the absolute rise of equality between countries, this can trigger a double loss frame – both as an individual loss and a national loss – that can profoundly shape anti-trade preferences in certain countries. Framing trade as a security threat also invokes powerful hawkish biases. Lastly, the availability bias can be provoked by social media mechanisms making people tend to focus on particular risks and overweight their import.

Published: 27 December 2019 ; The classic political economy of trade models state behavior on the international plane by reference to the formation of domestic interests. Voters, interest groups, and politicians are rational actors in this model, pursuing their economic preferences without cognitive or motivational distortions. This article questions the sufficiency of the rational choice model in the formation of contemporary trade policy. Starting from the classic political economy story, this article explores real-world deviations from rationally expected outcomes by drawing on cognitive psychology. Using both theoretical and empirical analysis, we seek to identify key distortions that can better explain voter and politician behavior in the current trade wars. We begin with loss aversion in that individuals have asymmetrical attitudes towards gains and losses. Rising inequality within the rich world amounts to a perceived relative loss particularly for middle-class citizens. Combined with the absolute rise of equality between countries, this can trigger a double loss frame—both as an individual loss and a national loss—that can profoundly shape anti-trade preferences in certain countries. Framing trade as a security threat also invokes powerful hawkish biases. Lastly, the availability bias can be provoked by social media mechanisms making people tend to focus on particular risks and overweight their import.