Compliance without coercion: Effects of reporting on international labor rights
| Published date | 01 May 2021 |
| Date | 01 May 2021 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0022343320910254 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Compliance without coercion: Effects of
reporting on international labor rights
Faradj Koliev
Thomas Sommerer
Jonas Tallberg
Department of Political Science, Stockholm University
Abstract
While a dominant position in research on compliance holds that enforcement is necessary for states to abide by their
international commitments, many international organizations (IOs) do not have recourse to such coercive means.
This article offers the first systematic analysis of one prominent alternative to material coercion: compliance reporting
by IOs. It develops an argument for why reporting by IOs should lead states to correct non-compliant behavior, and
when those effects should be particularly strong. It tests this argument in the context of the International Labour
Organization (ILO), which offers a unique setting for evaluating the impact of reporting in the absence of coercion.
The principal findings are threefold. First, reporting has significant and durable effects on state respect for labor
rights. Second, reporting affects compliance both immediately and when repeated over longer periods of time. Third,
reporting has stronger effects on improvements in labor rights when target states are democratic and resourceful, and
have a stronger presence of labor NGOs. By contrast, it does not matter to reporting’s effect whether states are highly
economically dependent on the outside world or whether reporting is coupled with active shaming of non-compliant
states. Taken together, our results suggest that existing research has not fully appreciated the potential of monitoring
systems based on reporting to generate compliance with international rules. While hard enforcement may still be
important, especially in areas where incentives to renege are strong, the findings of this article suggest that it is not the
exclusive path to compliance.
Keywords
compliance, human rights, international cooperation, international labour organization, international organizations,
labor rights
A dominant argument in research on compliance holds
that material coercion is necessary for states to abide by
their international commitments (Simmons, 2012;
Thompson, 2013). Unless states face a credible threat
of interstate enforcement, they will violate international
rules when it is in their interest to do so (Downs, Rocke
& Barsoom, 1996; Goldsmith & Posner, 2005). When
compliance results without material coercion, it is either
because interests coincide or because required adjust-
ments are shallow. This argument in many ways presents
a baseline expectation for research on compliance. As
Simmons (2012: 367) puts it: ‘[T]he coercion
hypothesis dominates the international relations litera-
ture largely by default.’
In this article, we assess the effects of an alternative to
material coercion: reporting on state compliance by
international organizations (IOs). Reporting occurs
when IOs engage in regular and public reviews of the
compliance record of member states (Kelley & Sim-
mons, 2019). Such reporting is often an integral part
of IOs’ systems for monitoring compliance, sometimes
Corresponding author:
faradj.koliev@statsvet.su.se
Journal of Peace Research
2021, Vol. 58(3) 494–509
ªThe Author(s) 2020
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DOI: 10.1177/0022343320910254
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referred to as information systems (Dai, 2002) or review
institutions (Raustiala, 2001). By collecting and present-
ing information on compliance, IOs attempt to deter
states from violations and nudge them into compliance
if infringements nevertheless occur. Sometimes, report-
ing is linked to threats of material coercion, if states are
found guilty of violating international rules. Such is the
case in the World Trade Organization (WTO), where
exposure as violator gives other states the legal right to
retaliate. However, in many IOs, such as the Interna-
tional Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), International
Labour Organization (ILO), and Organisation for Eco-
nomic Co-operation and Development (OECD),
reporting operates on its own. Reporting is also a corner-
stone of the Sustainable Development Goals of the
United Nations (UN) and the Paris Agreement on cli-
mate change. This raises important questions about the
effects of reporting on state behavior. Does reporting
affect compliance with international rules or is it a tooth-
less institutional practice? How do the effects of report-
ing compare to those of other factors shaping state
compliance? What are the conditions under which
reporting has stronger or weaker effects?
In this article, we offer a systematic analysis of
reporting’s effects on state compliance. Theoretically,
we suggest that reporting may mobilize pressures against
non-complying states through pathways in elite, domes-
tic, and transnational politics (Kelley & Simmons,
2015). We assume that state leaders may be responsive
to such pressures because of both instrumental concerns
with reputation (Keohane, 1984; Guzman, 2008) and
social concerns with status and identity (Johnston, 2001;
Goodman & Jinks, 2013). Against this backdrop, we
develop hypotheses about conditions of target countries
and the reporting process that may shape the effects of
reporting on compliance. Empirically, we focus on the
ILO, which presents an ideal organizational context for
testing these hypotheses. The ILO has for many decades
engaged in regular and public reporting on member state
compliance with international labor standards (Weis-
band, 2000; Koliev & Lebovic, 2018). This reporting
is not linked to a threat of enforcement, making it pos-
sible to isolate its effects on states’ correction of behavior
once identified as violators of ILO conventions. In addi-
tion, the case of the ILO offers a rare opportunity to
evaluate if the effects of compliance reporting vary
depending on characteristics of the target countries and
characteristics of the reporting process. Specifically, the
article analyzes behavioral adjustments of states to com-
pliance reporting in the ILO over the time period 1989
to 2011, based on a novel dataset.
Our central findings are threefold. First, reporting by
the ILO has positive and durable effects on state respect
for international labor standards, especially when target-
ing severe restrictions in labor rights. Second, reporting
has fairly immediate effects on state behavior, but can
also lead to improvements when repeated over longer
periods of time. Third, reporting has stronger effects
on improvements in labor rights when the target states
are democratic, resourceful, and have a strong presence
of labor NGOs. By contrast, it does not matter to report-
ing’s effect whether states are highly economically depen-
dent on the outside world or whether reporting is
coupled with active shaming of non-compliant states.
Robustness tests demonstrate that these positive findings
on the effects of reporting are not the result of ILO
selection strategies or secular trends in targeted countries.
In establishing independent effects of reporting, we
join other scholarship that questions the idea of material
coercion as a panacea for compliance problems. Other
scholars have pointed to the role of persuasion (Risse &
Ropp, 2013), socialization (Johnston, 2001), accultura-
tion (Goodman & Jinks, 2013), capacity building
(Jacobson & Weiss, 1998), rule interpretation (Chayes
& Chayes, 1998), domestic audience costs (Dai, 2007),
and civil society mobilization (Simmons, 2009). Our
findings suggest that IO reporting, too, is consequential
for compliance. While hard enforcement may still be
important, especially in areas where incentives to renege
are strong, it is not the exclusive path to compliance.
The argument
Our argument consists of a general expectation that IO
reporting may positively affect state compliance, as well
as specific expectations about the conditions under
which such effects are likely to be stronger or weaker.
As a first step, we lay out the logic behind the general
expectation. We start from the assumption that report-
ing may induce compliance by activating both instru-
mental and social concerns on behalf of states. These
micro-mechanisms are analytically distinct, but empiri-
cally complementary, in guiding actor behavior (March
& Olsen, 2008; Goodman & Jinks, 2013).
The first mechanism, grounded in rational choice,
privileges the reputational consequences of being
exposed as a violator. It suggests that states care about
and adjust to public exposure of non-compliance,
because they are concerned with their reputations as
reliable partners in international cooperation (Keohane,
1984; Tomz, 2007; Guzman, 2008). If states are
exposed as violators, other states and non-state actors are
Koliev et al. 495
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