When Do States Comply with International Treaties? - Oxford Academic

International Studies Quarterly (2007) 51, 877–900

When Do States Comply with International Treaties? Policies on Violence against Women in Post-Communist Countries Olga Avdeyeva University of Louisville There is growing evidence that states’ formal ratification of international human rights treaties does not generate changes in states’ domestic human rights practice. This article proposes to investigate a gap between states’ formal commitments to international laws and their domestic practice by careful differentiation of mechanisms of social influence: coercion, persuasion, and acculturation. It is argued that each mechanism has profound implications for rates of ratification of international treaties and the scope of implementation. Two arguments drive the discussion. First, states often ratify international treaties in response to perceived or real social pressures to formally assimilate with other states in the global arena. Thus, they do not have intentions or capacities to implement them. Second, ratification of human rights agreements makes states vulnerable to social pressures of monitoring bodies, which generates different levels of policy compliance. I explore the empirical merits of this approach on the analysis of government compliance with the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women provisions on violence against women in 26 post-Communist countries of Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

The goal of this article is to assess the impact of international human rights law promoted by international governmental organizations (IGOs), most importantly the United Nations, on national gender policies in post-Communist countries. In recent years, scholars of international relations note a remarkable diffusion of similar policies, including gender equality policies, across widely differing nationstates. This phenomenon is, in part, attributed to global economic integration, which pushes states to look for optimal policy solutions in order to facilitate eco1 nomic cooperation (Keohane 1984; Esping-Andersen 1996; Scharpf 1998, 1999). Others argue that increased transnational communication between international nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), national governments, and domestic NGOs advances similar policies around the globe (Risse Kappen 1995; Finnemore 1996; Keck and Sikkink 1997). Scholars of sociological perspective argue that the expansion of human rights policies across varying states, including repressive states, is propelled by a strengthening international human rights regime. As a number of states ratifying human rights treaties grows, the regime itself becomes stronger and more legitimate, which pushes other states to join it (Hafner-Burton and Tsutsui 2005). Yet, a formal ratification of international human rights treaties does not always generate changes in states’ human rights practices. Governments continue to 2007 International Studies Association. Published by Blackwell Publishing, 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA , and 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ , UK .

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violate human rights after they have become parties to international human rights agreements. In this article, I draw scholars’ attention to this persisting gap between the states’ proclivity to join an international human rights regime and improve their domestic human rights practices. Theoretically, I propose to consider this dilemma from the sociological perspective drawing on the insights of world society approach. Two analytical arguments drive my discussion: (1) States are social actors, who respond to imagined or real social pressures to formally assimilate with other states in their reference group. Specifically, in the context of expanding the human rights regime, states ratify international agreements, because they view ratification as an appropriate behavior for states in their reference group. An act of ratification, therefore, is viewed as a signal to others that the state is not a deviant actor (Hafner-Burton and Tsutsui 2005). This argument explains why states often ratify international treaties without intentions or capacities to enforce them. (2) Ratification of human rights treaties, however, makes states vulnerable to social pressures from monitoring bodies: IGOs, international and domestic NGOs, and domestic social groups. Their strategies to influence states’ behavior can take different forms: coercion, persuasion, social punishment, and social reward, to name a few. In this article, I emphasize the complexity of these pressures and demonstrate how strategies that challenge the states’ social status on both international and domestic levels become paths for promoting states’ compliance with international human rights treaties. I evaluate the theoretical usefulness of these arguments on the example of government’s compliance with the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) and the Beijing Platform for Action provisions on violence against women in 25 post-Communist states in addition to Kosovo, a territory under the UN protectorate. Policy implementation is assessed along three sets of criteria: establishment of government offices to combat violence against women, adoption of a separate law on violence against women, and implementation of several policy components (police training, judiciary training, government-sponsored shelters, government-sponsored awareness-raising campaigns, and cooperation with NGOs). The analysis reveals a critically low government compliance with international treaty recommendations in the region overall; however, several states managed to reach remarkable levels of enforcement of some aspects of the policy. The analysis of these cases reveals that the use of coercion and persuasion explains policy enforcement in some countries; however, in most cases, governments changed their behavior and started to enforce policies under social pressures, posed by external or internal actors. In this article, I demonstrate that in those countries where NGOs posed substantial threats to states’ perceived legitimacy, governments initiated the enforcement of these policies. First, I discuss different mechanisms of social influence on states: coercion, persuasion, and acculturation. Then, I give a brief overview of the UN efforts to promote and enforce policies on violence against women in national legislations around the world. After presenting the research framework of this project, I analyze data on the implementation of policies on violence against women in 25 post-Communist states of Eastern Europe and Central Asia in addition to Kosovo and explore possible reasons for policy failure and success. Mechanisms of Social Influence The question of how international law affects state behavior has been at the center of recent research in international relations. The answers that the scholarship generated reflect much broader questions about how states behave and under what conditions their behavior changes. Dominant approaches in international relations suggest that there are two mechanisms whereby states and international

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institutions can influence the behavior of other states: coercion and persuasion. Although these approaches provide an indispensable framework for analysis of state behavior, this framework is underspecified and incomplete as it fails to account for the complexity of the social environment in which states act. As a result, theoretical explanations that consider coercion and persuasion the main mechanisms for influencing the behavior of states fall short in answering the question: why do states sign international treaties if they do not have intentions and capacities to enforce them? Indeed, growing scholarly evidence suggests that states ratify international treaties in the absence of coercion or persuasion, as well as in the absence of clear material benefits that can arise from the participation in treaties (Hathaway 2002; Goodman and Jinks 2003; Tsutsui and Wotipka 2004; Hafner-Burton and Tsutsui 2005). In this article, I draw scholars’ attention to a more complete conceptual framework by identifying a third mechanism by which international law affects state behavior: acculturation. Goodman and Jinks (2004:2) define acculturation as ‘‘the general process by which actors adopt the beliefs and behavioral patterns of the surrounding culture.’’ This mechanism induces states to change their behavior in response to perceived or real social pressures, to assimilate and conform to other states. In the specification of this mechanism, scholars import important theoretical arguments from social psychology that suggest that actors’ 2 behavior is influenced by their environment (Aronson, Wilson, and Akert 2002). Acculturation entails a number of socialization processes by which social context pressures actors to conformity, including mimicry, social approval, and social punishment, and the role of social and cognitive costs and benefits (discomfort and dissonance). In this section of the article, I will discuss three mechanisms by which states as a group, international organizations, and international law influence the behavior of individual states, inducing changes in formal behavior and actual practice. These mechanisms of social influence are coercion, persuasion, and acculturation. I emphasize the conceptual core of each mechanism and outline how each is distinctive from others in important ways. This discussion is informed by the consideration of how distinctive schools of thought and research programs determined conceptual boundaries of these mechanisms, which created important implications for this analysis. My task here is not to undermine the significance of different mechanisms of social influence of state behavior; volumes of empirical research demonstrate their contribution to our understanding of how and why states behave. Rather, I call for more careful differentiation of these mechanisms, including their understanding of a behavioral logic that drives states’ action and the strategies of influence that these approaches advocate and employ to induce behavioral changes. This differentiation is profoundly important for answering questions about why and how states ratify international laws and change their domestic practices. Each mechanism, I argue, has distinct implications for explaining the rates and patterns of ratification of international law, especially human rights law, and the degree of compliance with it. Coercion

The first mechanism of social influence is coercion, by which states and international organizations pressure states to change their behavior by imposing costs for nonconformal behavior and extending benefits for conformity through material rewards and punishments. Under the logic of coercion, states change the behavior of other states not by altering their normative positions, but by changing their cost-benefit calculations. Thus, compliance with international treaties occurs if states perceive that it is in their material interest.

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Coercive mechanisms for the enforcement of international human rights laws are emphasized by scholars of the realist and neoliberal tradition who contend that the material distribution of power among states determines the state behavior. Realists view international law as a mere window dressing that serves as a shield for powerful liberal states to promote and protect their interests in the international arena (Waltz 1979). Scholars of neoliberal perspective are more optimistic about the functional purposes of international agreements. They argue that international law provides coordinative mechanisms and fosters cooperation between the states. States as rational and self-interested actors establish international agreements to overcome various dilemmas of collective action to further international cooperation from which they derive material benefits (Keohane 1984; Downs, Rocke, and Barsoom 1996). This line of argument suggests that states would ratify and comply with only those international agreements that they find beneficial; in case of international human rights treaties, they would join only those treaties that require modest changes in their behavior and practices (Downs et al. 1996). Empirical evidence, however, suggests that repressive governments ratify international human rights treaties and continue 3 their repressive practices (Hafner-Burton and Tsutsui 2005). Coercion as a mechanism of social influence does not explain several other dilemmas that arise in the analysis of states’ ratification and implementation of international human rights treaties. First, states do not have to sign international treaties to promote and protect human rights on their own territories, because this effort does not pose any substantial coordination problems. Second, states have no clear and direct interest in promoting human rights treaties abroad, especially as it can imply substantial enforcement costs (Goodman and Jinks 2004). Although, there are examples of states using coercion to bring recalcitrant states to compliance, for example, the U.S. denies foreign assistance to states which systematically violate internationally recognized human rights, coercive mechanisms do not explain why a growing number of states ratify international human rights treaties. Thus, coercion explains how states are forced into compliance with international treaties; it does not explain why states ratify treaties that they do not have capacities or interest to enforce. Persuasion

The second mechanism of social influence is persuasion, described as an active strategic debate that challenges normative assumptions of the participants (Keck 4,5 and Sikkink 1997; Finnemore and Sikkink 1998; Risse 2000). The rich literature on the role of persuasion in international relations offers multiple accounts of how persuasion takes place. Some scholars view international law as a channel for new norms that trigger normative and behavioral changes in states (Finnemore 1996; Checkel 1998). When a state signs and ratifies an international treaty, it receives new prescriptions for its domestic policies. This line of argument suggests that international law influences state behavior through processes of learning, which implies active acceptance of new normative prescriptions. Persuasion is not a manipulative strategy that imposes new incentives for actors to induce changes in their behavior; rather it is a process of active debate and deliberation of ideas by which actors are being convinced of the appropriateness and validity of new norms, which leads to change in their behavior. Another strategy of persuasion is a process of social teaching, which involves the introduction of new information in an intense process of cognition, reflection, and argument, that leads to actors’ acceptance of new norms. The purpose of the persuasion mechanism, therefore, is to convince actors to discard previously held views by providing information that discredits them (Goodman and Jinks 2004). Although the abundance of empirical evidence demonstrates how

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persuasion strategies work in changing state behavior when they are being strategically employed (Iwasawa 1986; Risse Kappen 1995; Keck and Sikkink 1997; Checkel 1999; Clark 2001), this approach does not provide explanations to why states adopt and implement international human rights treaties in the absence of these strategies. Specifically, these accounts do not explain why states ratify treaties that they do not normatively accept. Persuasion as the main mechanism of social change is recognized in constructivist scholarship, which emphasizes the importance of norms, views, and beliefs for determining state behavior, as opposed to realist and neoliberal tradition that emphasizes states’ material considerations. Although these two scholarships debate the essential principles of how preferences are formed and under what conditions preferences change, recent research in both traditions tends to recognize the importance of both mechanisms, coercion and persuasion, for the enforcement of international law on the domestic level. For instance, transnational activist organizations use international norms to persuade domestic groups to coerce governments to stop repressive practices (Keck and Sikkink 1997). Similarly, Schoppa (1999) suggests that coercive practices are more successful in bringing states to compliance when they concur with widely shared norms. Acculturation

A growing interdisciplinary field introduces another mechanism of social influence—acculturation, which describes a process whereby actors respond to social and cultural pressures of a surrounding environment to formally assimilate 6 other actors in a group (Meyer and Rowan 1977; Scott and Meyer 1994; Meyer, Boli, Thomas, and Ramirez 1997; Goodman and Jinks 2004). At the core of acculturation is the idea that states as social actors are driven to form associational ties with other states. This drive is cognitive; it refers to the socio-psychological status of the state described by the state self-perception and the way it is perceived by other states in a group. These perceptions generate imagined and real social pressures imposed by a group or self-imposed to conform. These pressures take form as socio-psychological costs associated with nonconformity (cognitive dissonance, discomfort, and exclusion) and socio-psychological benefits associated with conformity (social inclusion, social approval, comfort, membership, and high social status) (Goodman and Jinks 2004). States impose pressures to conform on themselves trying to mimic other states and formally embrace their positions, norms, and beliefs. Formal acceptance of other states’ actions and beliefs is a ubiquitous strategy to signal to other states that the state shares these beliefs and norms and, thus, it is not a deviant actor (Hafner-Burton and Tsutsui 2005). Other states can bring deviant actors to conformity by punishing them. Punishing strategies can include shaming, shunning, and exclusion. The drive to conform is a very powerful form of social influence. It is well documented that actors can conform to groups’ pressures even if they strongly disagree with the group’s actions or norms or do not find them as pertinent or useful to them. Acculturation is different from persuasion in several important ways. First, it does not require active debate and deliberation; second, it does not involve evaluation of the content; finally it requires neither the acceptance of promoted norms nor change in states’ behavior. That is why acculturation permits behavioral deviation from a norm in question. Acculturation differs from coercion because it views social costs and benefits as mechanisms of social influence, as opposed to material rewards and punishments. Some critics may argue that states can justify social costs by material costs, which can be true in some cases, but not in all cases.

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Thus, acculturation is driven by cognitive pressures to adopt socially legitimated beliefs, ideas, and behaviors. As these norms and actions are often imposed on actors, actors do not accept them and do not act upon them. This consideration explains why states choose to ratify international human rights treaties, even if they do not intend to enforce them. Acculturation also explains why states become vulnerable to pressures from monitoring bodies after they ratify a treaty. By ratifying a treaty states acquire a new social status associated with their formal recognition of norms included in the treaty; if socially sanctioned, they will try to bring their behavior in congruence with their formal commitments to avoid socio-psychological dissonance. That is why pressures from monitoring bodies, be they persuasion, coercion, or social sanctions, such as shaming, shunning, and exclusion can be very effective strategies to bring states to compliance with their formal commitments after the ratification of the treaty. Thus, acculturation, or states’ vulnerability to social pressures from the surrounding environment, is an important mechanism of social influence that reinforces the effectiveness and sometimes even makes possible the employment of other forms of influence. Expected Effectiveness of Mechanisms for Inducing Compliance

The differentiation of mechanisms of social influence is profoundly important for answering questions about why and how states change their domestic practices. Each mechanism, I expect, has distinct implications for the degree of compliance, durability of compliance, and possibility of reversing compliance. In this section, I review these expectations for each mechanism. Coercion: I expect that the employment of material sanctions and incentives will induce high rates of states’ compliance with international law. Other forms of coercion, for instance external imposition of institutions in the UN protectorate states like Kosovo, are also likely to bring states to high levels of compliance with international law. However, as these policies are externally imposed on states, which do not otherwise deem them useful or responding to their needs, there is a high possibility of reversing compliance once coercive pressures are lifted. Thus, expected durability of compliance is low. Persuasion: It is an effective strategy to bring states to compliance if states are open to persuasion and accept promoted norms. If persuasion is not successful, we can expect partial ⁄ low compliance; chances for policy reversal are high. If actors actively accept norms, we can expect comprehensive compliance and low chances for the enforcement reversal. Norms’ acceptance, indeed, ensures durable and comprehensive compliance with international law. Acculturation: It does not generate compliance; it leads to conformity, which can result in zero implementation, low implementation, or partial implementation of international law at the domestic level. As acculturation is imposed by other states or the state itself, it does not always lead to normative acceptance of promoted laws; thus, when social pressures are lifted, states can fall back to noncompliance and nonconformity. The following empirical analysis of states’ compliance with the CEDAW and the Beijing Platform for Action provisions on domestic violence will evaluate the usefulness of these expectations.

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Selection of Cases and Policy To test the utility of proposed differentiation between three mechanisms of social influence (coercion, persuasion, and acculturation) for explaining compliance of national states with international human rights law, this study examines two processes: (1) ratification of the CEDAW and the Beijing Platform of Action and (2) the enforcement of policies on violence against women in 25 post-Communist countries in addition to Kosovo. Several reasons drive the selection of cases for this analysis. First, the resemblance of background conditions of these countries determined by their common Communist past, which impacted their political, social, and economic development in important ways, allows me to refer to this group of countries as a set of ‘‘most similar cases’’ (Mackie and Marsh 1997). As a Communist legacy, these countries preserved highly centralized governmental structures, which do not grant a lot of authority to regional governments, even in cases of large federal states like Russia. These countries also experienced similar political and economic crises, raising rates of unemployment, and a massive reform of a socialist welfare state. Economic instability could potentially impact their capacity to ratify and enforce international human rights treaties. All of the countries became parties to the CEDAW and the Beijing Platform for Action around the same time. Although most of these countries did not enforce policies on violence against women, we still see some variation in the degree of government compliance with this UN provision, which is instrumental for the purpose of this investigation. Second, the selected cases demonstrate their usefulness for the analysis of different mechanisms of social influence, because different strategies were employed to induce governments’ compliance with the CEDAW provisions in some countries. This fact is very important as it allows us to differentiate these mechanisms, demonstrate their empirical realization, and evaluate their effectiveness for inducing states’ compliance with international treaties. Third, a pattern of states’ ratification and noncompliance with international treaties in selected post-Communist countries resembles a general trend of decoupling between states’ formal commitments and policy practice in many other countries around the globe. Thus, findings of this study could be of potential interest to scholars with another regional focus. Moreover, this study calls for theoretical refinement that could be useful in addressing the problem of divergent predictions made by competing theories (Van Evera 1997), in this case rationalist and constructivist theories. Rationalist theories predict ratification and compliance with international treaties, if this generates material benefits for the states, or if the state is coerced to do so by other states or international organizations. Constructivist theories predict ratification and compliance with international treaties if governments are persuaded to embrace the normative value of this law. These theories do not explain the states’ actions in the absence of coercion, persuasion, or clear material benefits. The sociological explanations employed in this study add to this scholarship and strengthen our understanding of states’ actions vis-a-vis international treaties. A case of violence against women as an area of international law selected in this study is constituted by several important conceptual components that might have different implications for the generalizability of findings. First, it is a gendered policy issue. A gendered component suggests that countries with a strong patriarchal tradition will have poor compliance with international law on violence against women, which is confirmed in this study on cases like Tajikistan and Turkmenistan that score very poorly on the levels of policy enforcement. On the other hand, we see cases like Kosovo, in which strong patriarchal traditions are overridden by international imposition of institutions and policies to combat violence against women, which makes this case very interesting for analysis.

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This policy area also contains a strong human rights component, which suggests that material motivations do not explain why countries ratify and implement these laws. On one hand, for violating countries, the enforcement of policies on violence against women can be costly, because it requires state investments in police training, shelters, and social and medical assistance. On the other hand, the enforcement of violence against women does not generate direct material benefits as the UN does not provide any material rewards for best practices. In general, states’ compliance with UN regulations on violence against women resembles other areas of human rights international law promoted by international organizations. Thus, potentially, this study can be of interest to scholars concentrating on other areas of human rights. UN Efforts to Promote Policies on Violence Against Women Policy Provisions

The Fourth World Conference on Women’s Platform for Action (Beijing 1995) contains a comprehensive set of measures to combat violence against women on local, national, and international levels. It establishes three strategic objectives to address this problem globally: (1) take integrated measures to eliminate violence against women; (2) study the causes and the consequences of violence against women and the effectiveness of preventive measures; and (3) eliminate trafficking in women and assist victims of violence due to prostitution and trafficking (Commission on the Status of Women 1995). According to this document, national governments assume the primary responsibility for developing and implementing national policy against domestic violence. A broad set of measures refers to the strengthening and expanding of domestic legislation, including penal, civil, labor, and administrative codes, in order to punish the perpetrators and redress the wrongs done to women. It recommends addressing cases of violence against women in a separate penal code or national law. The Platform for Action requires governments to create, develop, and fund training programs on violence against women for judicial, legal, police, medical, and immigration services personnel, which will introduce the objectives of the Platform for Action to these public servants. It also states that these public servants must be trained how to avoid the abuse of power that leads to violence. A set of legislative measures must be introduced to punish police, security forces, and other agents of the state who engage in acts of violence against women. An integrated approach to eliminating and preventing violence against women includes provisions for victims and potential victims: governments are encouraged to develop training programs designed to prevent the occurrence of violence, and to establish rehabilitation and counseling services for victims of violence. National governments, local governments, and community organizations are also required to provide well-funded shelters and relief support for women and girls. Awareness-raising campaigns must advertise information about help available to victims. This information must be published and broadcasted in several languages to reach women of different cultures, including minorities and refugees. Special provisions encourage research of causes and consequences of violence against women and promote media participation in the examination of gender stereotypes. Governments are required to support women’s NGOs in order to mobilize community resources for activities related to the elimination of violence against women. Local NGOs are recognized to be important actors in implementing governmental and UN policies on violence against women.

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At the national level the work of all units is coordinated by the state office on combating violence against women. Governments have to ensure that this office collaborates with a broad range of other institutional actors, such as legislative bodies, academic and research institutions, international NGOs, and local women’s NGOs. Governments are required to cooperate with the Special Rapporteur of the Commission on Human Rights on violence against women and furnish all information requested by her. This 22 page document defines various forms of violence against women, outlines measures to combat it at the local, national, and international scale. It also describes institutional arrangements that facilitate the enforcement of these measures and provides a list of financial responsibilities for all actors. As the first step in implementing the provisions of the Platform for Action, governments had to submit National Plans of Action by the end of 1996. Governments must also submit periodic reports on the implementation of their National Plans of Action. The UN recommends that all areas of concern discussed in the Platform for Action must be addressed in national plans; however, governments are free to decide which critical areas they can focus on when designing national plans. Due to this option, national plans in several analyzed countries did not mention violence against women as an area of concern; thus, they did not adopt strategic measures to combat it on a national and local scale. These countries are: Albania, Estonia, Georgia, and Turkmenistan. The Bosnian Plan of Action focuses specifically on policies against trafficking in women; questions of violence against women are not mentioned otherwise. UN Strategies

The efforts of the United Nations to protect the rights of individuals and groups can take the form of direct or indirect action. Direct action involves activities within states in order to protect the rights of individuals through preventive or protective measures, for instance, a humanitarian intervention (Ofuatey-Kodjoe 2004). Direct actions are quite rare; there have been no cases of the UN direct intervention in order to protect women’s rights. The UN direct actions to combat gender violence are possible only in those situations, when it acts in the territories under the UN protectorate, such as Kosovo. In other cases, the UN actions take the form of indirect influence; that is, the UN depends on the states to honor their obligations incurred under several standard-setting treaties, such as the CEDAW and the Beijing Platform for Action. Indirect influence by the UN mainly involves interaction between multiple governmental and nongovernmental actors who exchange information about women’s rights and women’s issues. One of the strategies employed to encourage such interactions is to organize international conferences and meetings. The UN International Women’s Decade started a new era in international women’s activism: the four UN women’s conferences hosted thousands of participants in Mexico City (1975), Copenhagen (1980), and Nairobi (1985). It continued in Beijing in 1995. The Beijing Conference was the largest ever event devoted to 7 women’s rights (United Nations Development Fund for Women 1995; West 8 1999). These conferences invited governmental officials and activists from national, regional, and international NGOs to participate in a dialog on women’s rights and discrimination against women. As a result of discussions, representatives of national governments are invited to sign and ensure the implementation of the Platform for Action in their home countries. Within 1 year, government-signatories of this document are required to develop and ratify National Plans of Action as the first step in implementing the UN Platform for Action. The Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) monitors the implementation of national plans of action by various means:

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analyzing national reports, sending out questionnaires to national governments, collecting extensive empirical data, and analyzing changes in domestic legislations (Division for the Advancement of Women 1998). To facilitate national reporting, the UN CSW sent out the Questionnaire to the Governments on Implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action in October 1998. The questionnaire addresses the issue of violence against women under the section Critical Areas of Concern. Included questions are broad and inadequate in capturing the complexity of the objectives set by the Platform for Action: (1) Examples of successful policies, programs, and projects to implement the critical areas of concern of the Beijing Platform for Action (indicate any targets and strategies set and related achievements); (2) Examples of obstacles ⁄ lessons learned; and (3) Commitment to further action ⁄ new initiatives (Division for the Advancement of Women 1998:5). Monitoring instruments used by the CSW are limited in scope. The CSW enforcement capacity is weak: it does not impose any conditional requirements on states to enforce compliance. Rather, the governments are expected to comply and implement the UN provisions on a voluntary basis. Analysis of policies on violence against women in post-Communist countries demonstrates that governments of most countries were not successful in bringing their legislation and policies in line with the UN requirements; however, several countries were able to enforce some of the policy components. The next section will present and investigate this empirical data. Research Considerations The goal of this article is to assess to what degree national governments in 26 post-Communist countries have implemented the provisions of the Beijing Platform for Action on violence against women. The term ‘‘violence against women’’ means ‘‘any act of gender-based violence that results in, or is likely to result in, physical, sexual, or psychological harm or suffering to women, including threats of such acts, coercion or arbitrary deprivation of liberty, whether occurring in public or private life’’ (Commission on the Status of Women 1995). Accordingly, the term covers violent actions against women occurring in the family, in the community in general, and perpetrated by the state. Violence against women encompasses wife battering, sexual abuse of female children in the household, dowry-related violence, marital rape, female genital mutilation, and other traditional practices harmful to women, and nonspousal violence. In this project, I do not focus on governmental policies against trafficking in women. Policy implementation is assessed along three sets of criteria: institutional supervision, legislation change, and the implementation of several policy components. Institutional supervision involves the establishment of a state office to coordinate the implementation of policies on violence against women. The status of these offices can vary and they can be located within different structures of the state apparatus. Usually these offices will be established within the Ministries of Interior; however, they also can be part of human rights and Ombudsman offices (Table 1). The status of legislation on domestic violence describes changes in national legislation on domestic violence. The analysis will specify if law on domestic violence is adopted, pending, or not adopted (Table 2). In some countries, the governments made several amendments to existing penal codes in order to strengthen states’ provisions against domestic violence, although the CEDAW recommendations suggested a separate law. I treat a separate law as an adequate change and a changed existing penal code as a marginal legislative accommodation of policies against domestic violence.

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Olga Avdeyeva TABLE 1. Institutional Changes Established Government Institution to Coordinate Policies Against VAW Czech Republic: inter-ministerial working group for healthcare, social, legal, and police coordination (2001) Poland: The State Agency for Solving Alcoholic Problems (1998) Kosovo: Regional Domestic Violence Coordinators (within the UNMIK Special Victims Unit); The Victims’ Advocacy and Assistance Unit within the Department of Justice Romania: Center for Family Consulting and Information (1996)

No Institution Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bulgaria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Estonia, Georgia, Hungary, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Russia, Serbia and Montenegro, Slovenia, and Slovakia

Sources: Minnesota Advocates for Human Rights 2006, Coomaraswamy 2003; International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights 2000.

TABLE 2. Countries that Adopted, Drafted, or Did Not Adopt Law on Domestic Violence Adopted Drafted Not Adopted

Amendments to legislation

Croatia, Kyrgyzstan, Romania, Ukraine, and Poland Kazakhstan and Hungary* Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Estonia, Georgia, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Russian Federation, Serbia and Montenegro, Slovakia, and Slovenia Azerbaijan, the Czech Republic, Georgia, Kosovo, Serbia and Montenegro, Slovakia, and Slovenia

*In Hungary, a government program was drafted in 2001. It does not have the status of the law. Sources: Minnesota Advocates for Human Rights 2006, Coomaraswamy 2003; International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights 2000.

The implementation of several other policy components—police training, judicial training, public officers training, government-sponsored awareness raising campaigns against domestic violence, and support of NGOs—is assessed along the following criteria: no provisions (no), minimal, some, adequate provisions (yes) (Table 3). All of these policy components are discussed in the Beijing Platform for Action and recommended for implementation by national governments. Other scholars referred to these aspects of policies in their assessment of national policies on domestic violence as well (Bunch 1992; Elman 1996; Clarke 1997; Weldon 2002). The study employs an explorative analysis. Individual data elements measuring each of the three analytical concepts are compared across 25 post-Communist countries and Kosovo. This analysis takes into consideration only government actions aimed at strengthening domestic policies against violence. Efforts of local, national, and international NGOs to help victims of violence, raise public awareness, train the police, public offices, and judges are excluded from this research project. The study uses several data sources. Data on institutional and legislative changes is adopted from Stop Violence against Women: A Project by Minnesota Advocates for Human Rights by Minnesota Advocates for Human Rights (2006), True and Mintrom (2001), International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights (2000) and Women 2000. Information on the implementation of policies on violence against women uses data collected from personal interviews with country

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When Do States Comply With International Treaties? TABLE 3. Governmental Measures to Combat Domestic Violence against Women

Country

Government Police Judicial Training of Public awareness Government support shelters training training officers campaigns of NGOs

Czech Republic Kosovo Poland Croatia Russia Slovenia Albania Armenia Azerbaijan Belarus Bosnia and Herzegovina Bulgaria Estonia Georgia Hungary Kazakhstan Kyrgyzstan Latvia Lithuania Moldova Romania Serbia and Montenegro Slovakia Tajikistan Turkmenistan Uzbekistan

107 Several 10 No 55 Several 1 No No 3 No No No No No 1 No No Minimal 1 1 No No No No No

Yes Yes Yes Minimal No Yes No No No No Some No Some No Some No No No Some No No Minimal Some No No No

Minimal No No Minimal No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No No

Some Some Some Minimal Minimal Some No No No No No No Some No Some Minimal No No No No No No No No No No

Yes Yes Some Yes Some Yes No No Some Some No No No No No Some No No No Minimal Minimal No No No No No

Yes Some Some Some Some Some Some No No Some Some Minimal No No Some Minimal No No Some Minimal Minimal Minimal Some No No No

Note on Operationalization: No, no government action; Minimal, government recognized the problem and allocated some resources for policy implementation (one time action in a limited geographic area) and no systematic action; Some, government recognized the problem and allocated some resources for policy implementation (the action occurred several times or in a broader geographic area); Yes, government allocated resources for systematic action 28 (to be repeated over time) nationwide. Sources: Minnesota Advocates for Human Rights 2006, Johnson 2006; Coomaraswamy 2003; International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights 2000.

policy experts (in Poland, cial Rapporteur on Violence reports, and responses of Implementation of the Beijing

Russia, and the Czech Republic), the Report of the Speagainst Women, Its Causes and Consequences, national national governments to the UN Questionnaire on the Platform for Action. Analysis Institutional Supervision

In response to the UN calls to combat violence against women, states are recommended to organize state offices to coordinate the implementation of this policy between various state actors, including police, social workers, doctors, and judicial bodies. Such offices can be established within the relevant institutional structures, for example, the Ministry of Interior, Ombudsman office, or the Ministry of Social Affairs. Table 1 presents data on how post-Communist states responded to these calls. From 25 analyzed countries and one territory under the UN protectorate, only four countries established offices that deal with violence against women and assume responsibility for this policy enforcement. Romanian government organized this office in 1996 immediately after the Beijing conference. The Center

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for Family Counseling and Information is an advisory office within the Ministry of Labor and Social Solidarity. The responsibilities of this office include the monitoring and analysis of national legislation on violence against women and the development of government policy to effectively address this issue. This center also oversees the work of one government shelter for the victims of violence—the Pilot Center for Women and Children Protection against Violence (Coomaraswamy 2003). In general, the Romanian office established to oversee the implementation of policies on violence against women is a marginalized institution with limited capacities. It does not have legislative powers, it functions only as an advisory body; so far this office has not succeeded in passing substantive changes to Romanian legislation to address violence against women. For instance, new Romanian law on violence against women did not change complicated criminal procedures; specifically, procedures for punishing perpetrators of violence against intimate partners are not well elaborated, which discourages victims from pressing charges. The criminal process for rape punishment is even more discouraging: in order to press charges victims of rape should provide medical certificates and witnesses. Moreover, a rapist can avoid punishment if he marries a victim. These gross violations of human rights embedded in a new law on violence against women demonstrate the ineffectiveness of the Romanian office on violence against women in pressing the government to change domestic penal code and procedures. Poland delegated responsibility for the supervision of policies on violence against women to the State Agency for Solving Alcoholic Problems in 1998. This office assumes quite diverse responsibilities and powers within the Polish institutional structures. It has a generous budget that it allocates in programs to combat alcoholism. Violence against women is generally recognized as a problem arising in families suffering from alcohol abuse. Overall, the Polish take on violence against women is limited to family violence, which undermines the basis for gender-related violence envisioned in the CEDAW and the Beijing Platform for Action provisions. Thus, although the Polish state institution that supervises these policies is granted necessary powers, powers of coordination and enforcement, the policy is only partially enforced. The Czech Republic organized an inter-ministerial working group that allows cooperation between various ministries in the enforcement of policies targeted to combat violence against women. The secretary of the gender focal point in the Ministry of Interior assumes primary responsibility for coordinating, developing, and enforcing policies against violence. Twelve people from various government institutions are members of this working group; we can argue that their collective effort was quite successful as it ensures collaboration of the police, social workers, and prison guards to address violence against women. The example of Kosovo is quite exceptional, because it is a territory under United Nations protection. Government officials are bound to abide by provisions of international human rights law and conventions by the United Nations Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) regulation 1999 ⁄ 1924. Violence against women and rape are illegal under UNMIKs regulation on applicable criminal law, although marital rape is not a criminal act. The Kosovo Department of Justice assumes primary responsibility for the enforcement of human rights laws. Besides, the UNMIK Police Force has adopted Domestic Violence Policy and Procedures and established Regional Domestic Violence Coordinators within the UNMIK Special Victims’ Unit. In addition, the Department of Justice has established a specialized unit, the Victims’ Advocacy and Assistance Unit, to support and assist victims of crime. Kosovo’s institutional changes to address violence against women are the most comprehensive and solid response to the UN calls to address violence against women.

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Analysis of state institutions that assumed the responsibility of coordinating government policy on violence against women suggests that these institutions are granted different authority, which explains their capacity or incapacity to influence policy making and the policy enforcement process. In general, very few countries in the region established individual institutions to enforce this policy. Legislative Changes

Since 1995, several post-Communist countries of Eastern Europe and Central Asia have adopted laws against domestic violence. Croatia provides one example of a comprehensive legislative change in the region. The government proposed a comprehensive program to develop a set of measures to combat violence against women, especially within the family. In 1999, the Ministry of Justice was charged with the responsibility of expanding the national Penal Code to explicitly address the problem of domestic violence (Government of Croatia 2000). In July 1999, a group of women parliamentarians submitted a proposal for the Amendment of the Penal Code. In particular, it addressed the amendment to Article 102, Paragraph 2, that provided for the initiation of criminal proceedings for the infliction of serious bodily injury, including injury inflicted in the case of negligence or passion, if a perpetrator lives in marital or common-law relationship with a victim, or if the perpetrator is a direct blood relative, brother or sister, adoptive mother or adoptive father. The amendment was supported by the Government Commission on Domestic Violence and recommended these changes be adopted in the Penal Code. In addition, the Ministry of Interior Affairs, the Ministry of Justice, the Ministry of Health, and the Ministry of Social Welfare received a governmental order to develop programs on eliminating and combating violence against women. The Ministry of Finance was charged with the task of allocating suitable funds from the government budget for activities involving the elimination of violence against women in accordance with recommendations made by other ministries (Government of Croatia 2000). In this cooperative action, the Croatian government adopted the Law against Domestic Violence in 2000. According to this law, police and medical doctors can initiate cases against perpetrators of violence in the family. Perpetrators are eligible for free psychiatric counseling. The law does not provide for the removal of the offender from the shared household. The Kyrgyz Law on Social and Legal Protection against Domestic Violence also applies to family members and relatives who reside with, and experience physical, psychological, or other harm, from an abusive family member (Article 5). Article 1 of the Kyrgyz law provides definitions for domestic violence, physical domestic violence, psychological abuse, and sexual domestic violence. In addition, Articles 23 and 24 address temporary restraining orders and Article 25 and 10 27 provide for protective court orders (Government of Kyrgyz Republic 2003). Romania adopted the Law against Domestic Violence in May 2003. In addition to definitions and clarification of punishment procedures, this law specifies the role and responsibilities of social workers, police, and medical personnel in preventing cases of domestic violence. However, legal changes are not satisfactory for several reasons. First, the new law does not address marital rape. Second, it does not change a complicated criminal process which prevents victims from pressing charges. Finally, the law provides for ‘‘reparatory marriage,’’ which eliminates criminal liability of a rapist in case a victim consents to marry him [Article 197 (5)]. Several countries did not adopt a separate legislation on domestic violence, but instead amended their national Penal Codes to specifically address this issue (See Table 2).

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In general, the amendments increased the punishment for rape and severe cruelty (Azerbaijan, Czech Republic), addressed marital rape (Georgia, Hungary, Serbia and Montenegro, Slovenia), violence against children (Slovakia), and dependent family members (Georgia). In Slovakia, the requirement to file consent forms to continue the investigating process on different stages of the investigation was removed. In other countries no law on domestic violence was written. In Russia, over 40 drafts of the law were rejected by the State Duma. Only five countries addressed domestic violence in a separate domestic legislation. Changes in legislation in other countries are quite marginal, as they do not establish protective measures for victims, do not provide for the removal of the offender from a shared household, do not eliminate humiliating procedures of proof (for instance, in Serbia it is necessary to prove resistance during the entire episode of rape in order to prove rape and prosecute the perpetrator). In other countries, like Kyrgyzstan, where the law against domestic violence is adopted, it does not function due to lack of funding and inadequate training of police, public officials, and social workers (Coomaraswamy 2003). Policy Changes

Analysis of the implementation of specific policy aspects in 25 countries demonstrates a critically low compliance with the UN provisions on violence against women. The post-Communist region remains a zone of serious concern in terms of gender justice and safety of women and girls. All across the region the governments make minimal, if any, steps in securing the well-being of women. Out of 25 countries and Kosovo, 16 do not provide any shelters to victims of violence (see Table 3). In those countries where governments provide some support to victims of violence, the shelters and centers for psychological and medical help are run by NGOs. The governments provide minimal funding to these organizations in Romania, Poland, and Lithuania. In Kazakhstan and Moldova, the governments organized one shelter sponsored from governmental funds. In both countries, however, these centers were transferred to the supervision of NGOs. In three countries—Slovenia, Czech Republic, and Russia—the governments provide funds to many shelters on a systematic basis. The government in the Czech Republic succeeded in expanding the network of shelters for women victims of violence to 107 centers in 2004, the goal stated in the government document on gender equality Priorities and Procedures of the Government in Promoting the Equality of Men and Women (Gender Equality Unit 2000). In 17 countries, the governments did not organize any training courses for police to improve their efficiency in combating violence against women. In seven countries, governments, together with international organizations, most notably 11 the UNDP and the OBCE, organized training seminars for police. In Poland, a well-known program ‘‘Blue Card’’ provided good training and technical support to police officers (International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights 2000). In Bosnia, Estonia, Hungary, and Slovenia, the police training was much more modest. The examples of adequate actions in this category of analysis are Kosovo and the Czech Republic. Overall, police officers are reluctant to interfere in cases of domestic violence all across the region. The issue is stigmatized by the public in general, which is why cases of domestic violence and rape are largely underreported. For instance, according to the Ministry of Interior study, in Kazakhstan 52% of surveyed women reported domestic abuse; however only 30% of them filed complaints to 12 police (The U.S. Department of State 2004). According to the same report, 89% of Kyrgyz women experience physical or psychological abuse from their relatives; only 25% of them reported them to the police. Judicial training is a critical area

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of noncompliance all across the region. Only in the Czech Republic was there some training for judges that concerned cases of domestic violence (Coomaraswamy 2003). Thirteen countries took no steps to train public officers; other countries conducted some training. Croatia and the Czech Republic (since 2001) succeeded in organizing systematic campaigns to raise public awareness about domestic violence. In 1999, the Croatian government initiated public campaigns against domestic violence in cooperation with Interpol. Government offices distributed informational material about abuse and sexual exploitation. A special government commission sponsored the campaign The War Against Violence Day on national television and radio (Government of Croatia 2000). In Azerbaijan, the government, in collaboration 13 with the UNDP and the OECD, conducted a TV campaign entitled 16 Day Activity against Violence against Women in the Caucuses. In Hungary, the government created hotlines for legal services to victims of violence. They also issued a manual on national and European legislation regulating women’s rights, including a guide on domestic violence, and published a book, Aggression at School, which became the first educational text on violence to be studied in schools and distributed among children (UNIFEM and the Minnesota Advocates for Human Rights 2006). In other countries, public awareness campaigns were largely supported and funded by NGOs. Analysis of the implementation of critical policy components reveals low compliance with the Beijing Platform for Action. Less developed countries of the region like Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan, as well as two Baltic states, Latvia and Lithuania, score the lowest in the assessment of policy enforcement. Examples of adequate policy implementation, like Croatia, the Czech Republic, Kosovo, and Slovenia, are rare. But even in these countries policy enforcement is not even: rural women do not have adequate access to governmental provisions and assistance against gender violence. Those minimal governmental provisions like public campaigns and police training are concentrated in large cities; it is virtually absent in rural areas. The post-Communist region in general remains apathetic to gender violence. Discussion Analysis of development and implementation of policy on violence against women in 25 post-Communist countries and one territory under the UN protectorate demonstrates low efforts of governments to bring their domestic practice in accordance with the prescriptions of international treaties. Although all governments ratified the CEDAW and the Beijing Platform for Action and initiated the development of National Action Plans, only a few countries made concerted efforts to enforce policies to combat violence against women in a systematic manner. Thus, we find a high degree of decoupling between government formal commitments to international treaties (ratification of the CEDAW and the Beijing Platform for Action) and their commitment to enforce their provisions. Several arguments can be considered to explain this decoupling. First, there is a short period between the treaty’s ratification and the point of policy analysis; thus, states were not ready to enforce these provisions. This point is not valid, because some countries signed the CEDAW in the early 1980s; others (most of the former Soviet Union Republics), signed the CEDAW in the early 1990s, which means these countries have had approximately 20 and 10 years to implement these policies, respectively. All countries signed the Beijing Platform for Action in 1995, which gives about 9 years to comply with this treaty. The second point of criticism may argue that post-Communist countries went through a difficult political, economic, and social transition followed by economic crises, which created enormous financial burdens on post-Communist governments and,

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therefore, precluded the enforcement of these policies. This point is well taken; indeed the data in my analysis demonstrates that poorer states fail to take any action to respond to these policies (Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Georgia, Moldova, Albania, Armenia, and Azerbaijan). At the same time, we see that economically developed countries like Hungary, Slovakia, Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuania did not succeed in enforcing policies on violence against women in a systematic and comprehensive manner. A similar response can be offered in response to arguments about the level of democracy in the countries: the Russian government, which becomes increasingly authoritative, sponsors shelters across the country, whereas the more democratic Latvian, Estonian, and Lithuanian governments do not follow suit. These arguments do not explain why states ratify international laws and why they do not comply with them. But the evidence is clear: countries ratified the CEDAW and the Beijing Platform for Action without definite intentions and even capacities to enforce all provisions specified in these treaties. Of course, the nature of the UN treaties with a loose framework of enforcement and weak monitoring capacities, which are unable to coerce states into compliance, explains ubiquitous noncompliance. The question then is: why states knowing that these treaties are not going to work even bother to ratify them? This question brings us to the explanations advanced by sociological neoinstitutionalism that views states as social actors driven by a desire to conform with social pressures, be a member of a large group of states which they deem legitimate, and behave appropriately, especially if it does not involve any substantial costs. This is exactly what the UN treaties provide: a membership in a large group of states and no obligations to comply. Thus, the process of acculturation discussed in Section 2 of this article is highly relevant for understanding and explaining why 25 post-Communist states in addition to Kosovo ratified the CEDAW and the Beijing Platform for Action. The second question we have to answer is: why do some states start enforcing at least some policy provisions and others fail to make any efforts to comply? As I reviewed above, time, level of economic development, and level of democratization does not explain the degree of government compliance. To answer this question, it is necessary that we take a closer look at countries that succeeded in enforcing at least some policy aspects. In the following discussion, I analyze which mechanisms of social influence—coercion, persuasion, and acculturation—were employed and how. I also evaluate an expected persistence of states’ action: whether countries are likely to pursue durable enforcement or reverse policy implementation. Coercion

Kosovo is an example of a country where policies on violence against women as well as institutions to enforce these policies were externally imposed by the UNMIK. The level of legislative and institutional changes undertaken by government and the UN Mission are quite impressive. There are three different units in various structures of the government that oversee and implement policies on violence against women. The government program to combat violence focused on three critical areas out of six outlined in this study: police training, support to victims (including shelters), and public campaigns to raise awareness about gender violence (Coomaraswamy 2003). This example brings us to the conclusion that in Kosovo coercive strategies generated comprehensive policy changes and enforcement. Many scholars and experts view coercive strategies as an effective way for ensuring states’ compliance with international treaties. For instance, Helfer and Slaughter (1997) propose to change the status and institutional capacities of treaty bodies to resemble and act like courts. Goldsmith and Krasner (2003)

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emphasize the importance of economic and military power in promoting human rights around the globe; they argue that the International Criminal Court cannot accomplish its goals without the support of the U.S. military forces. Other scholars are more skeptical about the use of coercive strategies, because they externally impose compliance rather than encourage internal motivation to comply. Thus, they argue, compliance can reverse as soon as coercive pressures are lifted (Goodman and Jinks 2004). Coercion can also generate the incentive for the states to conceal violations or important information from the monitoring bodies (Strang and Meyer 1993; Mitchell 1997). As policies and institutions on violence against women in Kosovo are imposed externally by the UN Mission, we can only speculate about their development and existence after the UNMIK is finished. These policies can be dismantled or weakened after Kosovo will rejoin Serbia and Montenegro, countries that do not comply with the CEDAW provisions on violence against women in spite of a very strong autonomous women’s movement (Coomaraswamy 2003). Persuasion

The Czech Republic represents an example of comprehensive policy enforcement due to acceptance and internalization of a norm, using the language of constructivist scholars. Analysis of policy enforcement in the Czech Republic suggests that this country reaches high levels of compliance with the CEDAW provisions on violence against women. The government supports 107 shelters across the country (for a state of 10 million people this number is quite impressive), it established a nationwide program on police training; in 2001, it launched a systematic campaign to raise public awareness about violence against women and services available to victims; and it started the first judicial training program in the region. Policy enforcement in this area is coordinated by the Ministry of Interior and the gender focal point within this Ministry. Moreover, the Minister of Interior supports this policy personally. Under his supervision, the gender focal point received broad responsibilities of coordinating the implementation of policies with other ministries. Besides, the Ministry runs a twinning program on police training with British and Danish experts; it developed a program to combat violence against female inmates, and it sponsored important legislative changes to better counteract violence. Geraldina Palovcˇikova, the secretary of the gender focal point at the Ministry of Interior, states that the Minister’s personal support of these policies plays a crucial role in the development of policies and the scope of implementation (personal interview, Palovcˇikova 2005). As it turns out, the Minister’s wife works for one of the women’s NGOs in Prague. Ms. Palovcˇikova attributes to this fact the Minister’s understanding of the problem, his personal trust in NGOs, and his desire to support a comprehensive program to combat violence against women. Although I do not describe how exactly persuasion took place, I evaluate this case by the result—active acceptance of a norm, which generated change in behavior. Personal acceptance of violence against women as an important policy issue by a high-level official explains why the Czech Republic reached high levels of policy enforcement in the absence of coercion or strong incentives to promote these policies. Thus, active involvement and acceptance of norms included in international treaties facilitates the enforcement of treaty provisions by domestic governments. We can expect that the policy course in the Czech Republic is unlikely to be reversed with time for several reasons: (1) it was initiated from the inside; not imposed by outside pressures; (2) the policy will find other supporters within the government; and (3) costs of reversal will be higher with time (Pierson 2000). Persuasion that leads to acceptance of norms promoted by international treaties, thus, is an effective mechanism for ensuring policy

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implementation. Effective persuasion, though, is hard to achieve as it requires (1) the treaty bodies to engage in a systematic discussion about controversial practices, and (2) transnational organizations to have opportunities to engage governments in meaningful communication (Goodman and Jinks 2004). These goals are not always easily attainable. Acculturation

Under the acculturation approach, promotion of models of desirable practice and social punishment of ‘‘bad actors’’ induce changes in states’ behavior. Scholars of this approach suggest that international and domestic organizations should engage in several activities: monitor compliance and promote self-reporting by states, encourage international consultancy, publish best practices, and expose wrongdoing (Goodman and Jinks 2004). It is believed that social pressures, externally or self-imposed, become vehicles for enforcing conformity, which with time will develop into compliance. Examples of several countries in my analysis, demonstrate how international and domestic NGOs created social pressures, which generated changes in states’ behavior. Women’s organizations in Slovenia and Croatia achieved remarkable influence on national governments by shaming the government for neglecting a widespread practice of violence against women. In both countries women’s organizations on violence against women appeared in the early 1980s (Bretherton 2000). Since then, they developed a nationwide network of women’s groups that systematically campaigned for policy change. As a result, the Slovenian government developed programs on police training, started to sponsor annual public awareness campaigns and several shelters for battered women (International Helsinki Fund 2000). The Croatian government supports annual public awareness campaigns, which is explained by the NGOs’ demands to address low public awareness, including stigmatization of victims of domestic violence and treatment of domestic violence as a private matter between partners (Coomaraswamy 2003). Poland and Russia are peculiar examples of how social pressures triggered government action on violence against women. In Poland, the government had to accommodate the demands of two ideologically competing groups of actors: the Catholic Church and conservative organizations with strong emphasis on family support and traditional gender roles and the UNDP program on violence against women supported by multiple Polish women’s NGOs. Both of these groups created substantial pressures on the government through lobbying, public shaming, and protests. The UNDP supported Polish NGOs working on domestic violence in 1996 initiating a nationwide program on violence against women. In 1998 under the sharp criticism and demands of conservative groups, the government changed the scope of the program and transferred it under the supervision of the State Agency for Solving Alcoholism Problems (Nowakowska 2000). The focus of the program is to address violence in families and alcohol abuse, which reflects the government’s attempt to accommodate the demands of both groups. The Russian government partially conforms to the CEDAW requirements: it supports 55 shelters for battered women across the country; and in 2006 the Ministry of the Interior launched a nationwide awareness campaign against domestic violence (Johnson 2006). These actions are motivated by two factors: the demands of local, national, and international NGOs to address rampant violence against women, on one hand, and a concerted effort of the government to reduce the influence of international NGOs on the Russian social and political environment, on the other hand. Under the pressures from international and national women’s organizations, the government started to recognize its responsibility for the lives of many women who had been victims of violence and

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supported a 2006 awareness campaign across the country. According to the UNICEF, in 1999 alone 14,000 women were murdered in cases of domestic violence 15 in Russia (United Nations Children’s Fund 1999). The increase in government financial support to the Russian-based nongovernmental sector is explained by another factor: the government’s desire to control the agenda of these organizations. In this effort, the government took several measures to reduce a number of international NGOs operating in Russia through establishing complex procedures for registration of foreign-based NGOs (Johnson 2006). To diminish a financial dependency of Russian-based NGOs on foreign sponsors, the government created several programs to support grassroots service-providing organizations, which included shelters for battered women. Thus, to a certain degree, in Russia the government actions on anti-violence programs are driven by the intentions to decrease the presence of international NGOs and reduce the visibility of government and their actions, which make external monitoring difficult and reduces the influence of the international community on Russian domestic politics. A Russian case, then, can be considered a case of negative conformity. What implications does acculturation have for compliance with international treaties and what are the chances for reversal of such policies? Acculturation does not generate compliance; it brings conformity with the demands of local or international social groups, in our case, the IGOs and NGOs. Acculturation does not generate conformity with all aspects of policy provisions: none of the countries pursued a comprehensive course of a policy change; governments implemented only those aspects of policy that could satisfy the demands of protesting social groups. As acculturation is not a strategic communication, like persuasion, the outcomes of this mechanism are hard to predict, as Polish and Russian cases demonstrate. If persuasion is a structured and controlled communication, which aims to convince actors to accept a certain norm of behavior and exercise it, acculturation is much harder to control as it takes a life of its own. Different social groups, as well as actors themselves, can impose various pressures that ultimately can have an effect on the form and degree of conformity; for instance, in Poland two competing social groups reshaped the content of the government policy on violence against women. Acculturation does not produce an immediate response: Governments respond only to those social pressures that create substantial threats to the states’ legitimacy. In this context, I conceptualize legitimacy as a state’s perception of itself and ⁄ or the perception of other states that the state’s actions are appropriate and congruent with its status in the national and international arenas. Thus, conformal behavior is generated by the drive to normalize the states’ status in the community of international and national actors. This does not require change in belief systems or behavior on the part of the states, which explains partial implementation of international treaties in analyzed cases. Although acculturation does not produce immediate full compliance, it relies on attainable strategies to foster it: Social rewards and punishments are imposed by many actors, including self-imposition by violating states. Strategies that widely rely on social control are monitoring, self-reporting, public criticism of noncomplying actors, and publishing best practices, which are already widely used in the international law practice. Changes in policies and policy implementation achieved due to acculturation are not likely to be easily reversed, if social pressures that produced these changes persist. Even in cases when the state attempts to reduce external monitoring and its vulnerability to external social pressures, like the Russian state, it is found to assume certain responsibilities for some aspects of the policy and policy implementation. Thus, social pressures are a powerful driving force for ratification of international human rights treaties and changing states’ behavior to conform to these

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treaties, which potentially can generate compliance with international human rights agreements. This finding suggests that treaty ratification is not a mere symbolic act, although some states can view it as being symbolic and nonmeaningful. Treaty ratification provides states with a new social status associated with their formal commitments to the treaty. This new status makes states vulnerable to social pressures from monitoring organizations that can criticize them for noncompliance with their commitments. Hafner-Burton and Tsutsui (2005) called this phenomena ‘‘a paradox of empty promises,’’ discussing how empty commitments of states to international human rights treaties create avenues for international and national activists to put pressures on noncomplying states and foster compliance. A theoretical logic of sociological institutionalism suggests that states parties to international treaties can become responsive to social pressures, which push them to change their behavior and conform to their promises. Selfimposed or externally imposed social pressures create socio-psychological dissonance between states’ official statements and their actual behavior. States as social actors will try to resolve this dissonance by adjusting their behavior to their formal promises. Thus, acculturation is a mechanism of social influence that forces states to ratify international treaties and conform to their commitments upon the ratification, if they face substantial social pressures from internal or external social groups. Although acculturation has its weaknesses, which I reviewed above, the importance of this mechanism of social influence for the proliferation of human rights around the globe and for its potential to foster states’ compliance with international human rights treaties cannot be underestimated. To conclude, the empirical analysis demonstrates the usefulness of differentiation of three mechanisms of social influence. Each mechanism relies on different strategies and creates distinct implications for the scope of policy enforcement and its chances for reversal. Coercion implies high levels of compliance, but it suggests high chances for reversal when the coercive pressures are lifted. Coercion is hard to achieve, especially in the area of women’s rights. Persuasion, which leads to active policy acceptance by key actors, is the most effective strategy for achieving full compliance because it suggests comprehensive policy development and implementation. However, effective persuasion requires unfeasible resources and time; it is often not attainable on the global scale. Acculturation does not ensure comprehensive policy implementation, but it relies on mechanisms of social control, which makes these strategies to a certain degree self-enforcing. Acculturation also accounts for the process of diffusion of international human rights treaties around the globe, which other mechanisms fail to explain. Conclusion Examination of states’ ratification and implementation of international provisions on violence against women turns on theoretical claims about how states behave and under what conditions their behavior changes. Substantial empirical evidence suggests three distinctive mechanisms, by which states and institutions can influence the behavior of other states: coercion, persuasion, and acculturation. In this article, I unpack the components of each mechanism and evaluate their influence on the ratification and the degree of compliance with international treaties. Empirical evidence demonstrates that each strategy plays a distinctive, yet limited role in the processes of ratification and implementation of international treaties. Contemporary research on international law, however, is dominated by two strategies, coercion and persuasion; these mechanisms alone cannot explain the complexity of the states’ behavior. In this article, I argue that the sociological explanations are helpful in furthering our understanding of states’ behavior vis-a-vis international treaties on

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human rights. The sociological view of states as social actors who change their behavior in response to social pressures explains why states ratify international treaties, even if they do not have capacities or clear interest to implement them. These explanations also shed light on states’ behavior after the ratification of international treaties: new social status, which states acquire upon the ratification of international human rights treaties, makes them vulnerable to social pressures to comply with their formal commitments. This finding suggests that social pressures can be used strategically to foster states’ compliance with international requirements. This claim opens avenues for future research on how international organizations and human rights advocates can streamline their pressures on violating governments to bring them into compliance with international treaties on human rights. References Aronson, Elliot, Timothy D. Wilson, and Robin M. Akert. (2002) Social Psychology, 4th edition. New Jersey: Prentice Hall. Bretherton, Charlotte. (2000) Gender Mainstreaming and EU Enlargement: Swimming Against the Tide? Journal of European Public Policy 8(1): 60–81. Bunch, Charlotte. (1992) Violence Against Women: Addressing a Global Problem. New York: Ford Foundations’ Women’s Program Forum. Bunch, Charlotte. (1995) On Globalizing Gender Justice: Women of the World Unite. The Nation, 16 September 11: 230–235. Checkel, Jeffrey. (1998) The Constructivist Turn in International Relations Theory: A Review Essay. World Politics 50(2): 324–348. Checkel, Jeffrey. (1999) Norms, Institutions and National Identity in Contemporary Europe. International Studies Quarterly 43(1): 83–114. Clark, Ann Marie. (2001) Diplomacy of Conscience: Amnesty International and Changing Human Rights Norms. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Clark, Ann Marie, Elizabeth J. Friedman, and Kathryn Hochstetler. (1998) The Sovereign Limits of Global Civil Society: A Comparison of NGO Participation in UN World Conferences 17 on the Environment, Human Rights and Women. World Politics 51(1): 1–35. Clarke, Roberta. (1997) Combating Violence in the Caribbean. In Women Against Violence: Breaking the Silence: Reflecting on Experience in Latin America and the Caribbean, edited by Anna Maria Brasiliero. New York: UNIFEM. Commission on the Status of Women. (1995) The Fourth World Conference on Women Platform for Action. New York: CSW. Coomaraswamy, Radhika. (2003) Integration of the Human Rights of Women and the Gender Perspective: Violence Against Women. Report of the Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women, Its Causes and Consequences. New York: United Nations, Economic and Social Council. Division for the Advancement of Women. (1998) Questionnaire to Governments on Implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action. New York: DAW. Downs, George, David M. Rocke, and Peter Barsoom. (1996) Is the Good News about Compliance Good News for Cooperation? International Organization 50(3): 379–406. Elman, R. Amy. (1996) Sexual Subordination and State Intervention: Comparing Sweden and the United States. Providence ⁄ Oxford: Beghahn. Esping-Andersen, Gosta. (1996) After the Golden Age? Welfare State Dilemmas in a Global Economy. In Welfare States in Transition: National Adaptations in Global Economics, edited by Gosta Esping-Andersen. London: Sage. European Commission. (2002) Annual Report on Equal Opportunities for Women and Men in the European 18 Union in 2001. Brussels: European Commission. Finnemore, Martha. (1996) National Interests in International Society. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. Gender Equality Unit. (2000) Priorities and Procedure of the Government in Promoting the Equality of Men and Women. Prague: Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs. Goldsmith, Jack, and Stephen Krasner. (2003) The Limits of Idealism. Daedalus 132(1): 47–77. Goodman, Ryan, and Derek Jinks. (2003) Measuring the Effects of Human Rights Treaties. European Journal of International Law 14(1): 171–183.

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