ABSTRACT
A number of scholars have pointed out that the level of compliance with international agreements in general, and international environmental agreements in particular, is largely quite good (Henkin, 1979; Brown Weiss and Jacobsson, 1999; Chayes and Chayes, 1993; 1995; Jacobsson and Brown Weiss, 1998). There are a number of potential explanations for this. According to one major view, states simply do not make decisions about compliance on the basis of a calculation of advantage. Instead, compliance is largely determined by factors such as standard operating procedures, internalized identities, norms of appropriate behaviour, domestic linkages and the perceived legitimacy of the relevant rules (Alter, 1998; Chayes and Chayes, 1993; 1995; Checkel, 2001; Franck, 1990; Mattli and Slaughter, 1998).
