State commitments and inhumane conventional weapons: An explanatory analysis of treaty ratification
| Published date | 01 September 2023 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/00108367221113459 |
| Author | Jan Karlas |
| Date | 01 September 2023 |
https://doi.org/10.1177/00108367221113459
Cooperation and Conflict
2023, Vol. 58(3) 335 –355
© The Author(s) 2022
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DOI: 10.1177/00108367221113459
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State commitments and
inhumane conventional
weapons: An explanatory
analysis of treaty ratification
Jan Karlas
Abstract
In the last 40 years, the international community has made considerable progress towards the
regulation of inhumane conventional weapons (ICWs) by adopting treaties that regulate or ban
these weapons. However, many states have still not joined these treaties or have joined them with
a considerable delay. These ratification decisions cannot be satisfactorily explained by the existing
literature on the origin of ICW treaties, which stress the role of global socialization processes. This
article offers a theoretical argument that explains state decisions on the ratification of ICW treaties. It
argues that while democracies and countries located in regions with high ratification rates are prone
to ratify ICW treaties, an insecure external environment impedes or delays ratification. The argument
also claims that security costs resulting from the characteristics of the individual treaties can modify
the effects of these explanatory factors. To provide an empirical test for the argument, the article
conducts a survival analysis that covers the ratification processes of the three existing ICW treaties.
Keywords
arms control, inhumane conventional weapons, international institutions, international security
In the last 40 years, the international community has made considerable progress towards
the regulation of inhumane conventional weapons (ICWs). In the 1970s, a renewed endeav-
our to control ICWs began. The negotiations led to the adoption of the Convention on
Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Certain Conventional Weapons (CCCW) in
1980. Over the years, states participating in the CCCW accepted several protocols that
contain provisions on specific types of weapons. In the two subsequent decades, two con-
ventions prohibiting two concrete weapons came into being, namely, the 1997 Anti-
Personnel Mines Ban Convention (APMBC) and the 2008 Convention on Cluster
Munitions (CCM).
Corresponding author:
Jan Karlas, Department of International Relations, Institute of Political Studies, Faculty of Social Sciences,
Charles University, Pekařská 16, 158 00 Prague 5, Czech Republic.
Email: jan.karlas@fsv.cuni.cz
1113459CAC0010.1177/00108367221113459Cooperation and ConflictKarlas
research-article2022
Article
336 Cooperation and Conflict 58(3)
However, it holds true for each of these ICW treaties that a considerable number of states
have not ratified it. After 13 years of the ratification process, only 110 out of the possible 197
states have joined the CCM (the 197 states include the 193 UN member states and 4 other
states that can possibly join arms control treaties, namely, Cook Islands, the Holy See, Niue,
and the State of Palestine; see UNODA 2022). Although the CCCW was signed 40 years
ago, no more than 125 states have ratified it up to the present. The APMBC, with its 164
parties, comes closer to having universal membership. Nevertheless, more than two dozen
states have not even become parties to this treaty. The fact that so many states do not partici-
pate in one or more of the ICW treaties weakens the status of these treaties. Moreover, it
brings the universal character of their provisions into doubt, in particular because many of
the states that did not join the ICW treaties possess the weapons regulated by these treaties.
This state of affairs raises an interesting and important question: what explains why some
states join ICW treaties and others do not, or do so with a significant delay?
The existing research does not provide a satisfactory answer to this question. A theo-
retically informed literature focusing on ICW treaties builds mainly on the constructivist
approach to international relations. To explain the origin of ICW treaties, it highlights the
role of global socialization processes and the normative entrepreneurship carried out by
the coalitions of like-minded states and transnational non-governmental organizations
(NGOs; e.g. Alcade, 2014; Bolton and Nash, 2010; Bower, 2015; Garcia, 2015; Price,
1998; Rutherford, 2000, 2011). Some studies belonging to this literature also uncover
additional and more specific aspects of these normative changes (Petrova, 2019; Rosert,
2019a, 2019b). Overall, the constructivist research on ICW treaties offers a compelling
explanation for the creation of these treaties, as well as for the changes in the practices of
states related to ICWs, and yet the global socialization processes cannot satisfactorily
account for the variation among states in ratification of the ICW treaties. It is puzzling
why the attitudes of states towards participation in ICW treaties differed so significantly,
when they were all exposed to the same socialization processes taking place within the
international system.
The studies that examine the ratification of multilateral arms control treaties other
than ICW treaties are very scarce. Essentially, they are concerned only with the ratifica-
tion of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT) as the most prominent universal arms
control treaty. According to these studies, security alliances with the United States and
the USSR constituted a positive incentive for NPT ratification (Coe and Vaynman, 2015;
Paul, 2003; Verdier, 2008; Way and Sasikumar, 2004). Some of these studies also attrib-
ute a negative effect on treaty ratification to the participation of countries in militarized
interstate disputes (Herzog, 2021; Paul, 2003; Verdier, 2008; Way and Sasikumar, 2004).
The ratification process of the NPT can also reflect general treaty commitment prefer-
ences (Fuhrmann and Lupu, 2016). However, the research on NPT ratification cannot
provide a convincing indirect explanation for the ratification of ICW treaties. While a
security alliance with a superpower could pave the way for ratification of a nuclear
weapons treaty in the times of the Cold War, it can hardly play the same role with regard
to the three ICW treaties. Participation in militarized conflicts can certainly discourage
states from ratifying ICW treaties. Still, ICWs can serve as an important military means
even for states that face external security threats, but do not themselves frequently enter
into militarized disputes. Last but not least, while the general propensity of states to join
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