In this process, the violating states, including established democracies, display various forms and degrees of compliance with international norms and judicial rulings, raising significant questions about the factors accounting for such differences. It involves the efforts of national authorities to redress detected violations and to bring existing laws and practices in line with the underlying standards and principles. Established tribunals adjudicate on these claims, and when violations are detected, the respective contracting state(s) have an obligation to comply with their judgments.ĭomestic implementation of human rights court rulings is an especially demanding and obtrusive kind of state observance of international norms. 6 The most highly developed treaty-based regimes, like the European Convention on Human Rights (the ECHR) and the Inter-American Convention of Human Rights (the IACHR), provide for the right of individuals to bring complaints against states.
5 Others, though, counter that a treaty-based commitment to protect human rights sets in transnational and domestic dynamics with positive consequences for national level practices and rights protection. 3 Indeed, ratification of a human rights treaty may be only ‘loosely coupled’ with actual state performance, 4 or it may be accompanied by continuing gaps or even increased violations by states. 2 Some studies challenge their ability to do so, especially in repressive regimes, where they are seen to be needed most.
1 A burgeoning literature in international relations and comparative politics has debated whether human rights treaties have, in fact, any demonstrable effect in improving state practices. Since World War II, a variety of human rights treaties have sprung up around the world, with a large number of states ratifying them to demonstrate their newly assumed or ongoing commitment to democracy. When such capacity and effectiveness are high and diffused, the adverse judgments of the Strasbourg Court are unlikely to be obstructed or ignored, even when the government, political elites, or other actors are reluctant and not in favour of substantive remedies. Why do national authorities in some states adopt a more prompt and responsive attitude in implementing these judgments, in contrast to other states that procrastinate or respond reluctantly? On the basis of a large-N study of the Strasbourg Court’s judgments and a comparison across nine states, this article argues that variation in state implementation performance is closely linked to the overall legal infrastructure capacity and government effectiveness of a state. In this direction, and focusing on the European Court of Human Rights, this study inquires into the factors that account for variable patterns of state compliance with its judgments. Over the past couple of years, international law and international relations scholarship has shifted its focus from the question of whether human rights treaties bring any state-level improvements at all to investigations in the domestic context of the factors and dy namics influencing state compliance.
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