Global Strategy Lab, Dahdaleh Institute for Global Health Research, School of Global Health, York University, Toronto, ON, M3J 1P3, Canada.
Osgoode Hall Law School, York University, Toronto, ON, M3J 1P3, Canada.
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2022 Aug 9;119(32):e2122854119. doi: 10.1073/pnas.2122854119. Epub 2022 Aug 1.
There are over 250,000 international treaties that aim to foster global cooperation. But are treaties actually helpful for addressing global challenges? This systematic field-wide evidence synthesis of 224 primary studies and meta-analysis of the higher-quality 82 studies finds treaties have mostly failed to produce their intended effects. The only exceptions are treaties governing international trade and finance, which consistently produced intended effects. We also found evidence that impactful treaties achieve their effects through socialization and normative processes rather than longer-term legal processes and that enforcement mechanisms are the only modifiable treaty design choice with the potential to improve the effectiveness of treaties governing environmental, human rights, humanitarian, maritime, and security policy domains. This evidence synthesis raises doubts about the value of international treaties that neither regulate trade or finance nor contain enforcement mechanisms.
有超过 25 万份旨在促进全球合作的国际条约。但是，这些条约真的有助于应对全球挑战吗？本研究对 224 项原始研究进行了系统的全面证据综合分析，并对 82 项高质量研究进行了荟萃分析，结果发现，大多数条约都未能产生预期效果。唯一的例外是管理国际贸易和金融的条约，这些条约始终产生预期效果。我们还发现，有影响力的条约通过社会化和规范过程而不是长期的法律过程来实现其效果的证据，并且执行机制是唯一具有改进管理环境、人权、人道主义、海事和安全政策领域条约的有效性潜力的可修改条约设计选择。这项证据综合研究对那些既不规范贸易也不包含执行机制的国际条约的价值提出了质疑。
