Assessing Proposals for New Global Health Treaties: An Analytic Framework

Abstract

We have presented an analytic framework and 4 criteria for assessing when global health treaties have reasonable prospects of yielding net positive effects. First, there must be a significant transnational dimension to the problem being addressed. Second, the goals should justify the coercive nature of treaties. Third, proposed global health treaties should have a reasonable chance of achieving benefits. Fourth, treaties should be the best commitment mechanism among the many competing alternatives. Applying this analytic framework to 9 recent calls for new global health treaties revealed that none fully meet the 4 criteria. Efforts aiming to better use or revise existing international instruments may be more productive than is advocating new treaties.

FIGURE 1—

Strategic balance between treaties’ strength of commitment and depth of content. Note. International treaties’ high strength of commitment may diminish their depth of content. The expected impact of any international agreement depends on both the content provisions it contains and the strength in which they are imposed on or enforced in countries that adopted it. Although not always true, the strength of an agreement’s commitment is often inversely proportional to the depth of its content. Enacting international treaties is the strongest way countries can communicate their intent to behave in a certain way. Countries may be willing to include more ambitious content in agreements like political declarations or codes of practice that do not commit them as forcefully.