Assessing Trade and Human Rights Regime Impacts on State Autonomy for Policy and Regulatory Activities

Abstract: The human rights regime and the trade regime set obligations on states that may create conflicts that challenge a state’s autonomy for policy and regulatory practices. To deal with these conflicts, we argue that states employ different causal mechanisms from Risse, Ropp and Sikkink’s spiral model when setting their commitments to, and executing compliance with, these regime obligations, and that the conditions that determine their willingness and ability to do so change over time. We further argue that the presence of more negative than positive spillovers between the two regimes compel states to integrate the two regimes into a policy framework with primary influence coming from the regime with the most substantial incentives and persuasion. We evaluate these arguments based on a case study of water management policy in the nation of Cape Verde over the period of 2001 to 2015, using the method of process tracing to evaluate official documents and contemporary accounts. Based on these findings, we are not able to conclude that states prefer to mitigate negative spillovers through regime integration within a policy framework. Instead, we note that comparative studies across states should be performed to make this determination. However, we are able to conclude that the trade – specifically aid-for-trade – regime offered Cape Verde the most in terms of incentives and persuasion, and that its policy framework integrates its policy goals for both regimes but with the aid-for-trade regime significantly shaping Cape Verde’s policy preferences.