Transparency as a norm

: factors and motivations in extractive industries. Transparency initiative implementation in Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Norway

Abstract

This thesis explores how an international norm is implemented domestically based on the example of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) implementation in Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Norway. The EITI is a multi-stakeholder process (governments, extractive companies and civil society) that has been launched in 2003 and stipulates disclosure of information on revenues from extractive industries. The EITI process requires extractive companies to disclose figures on the payments to the government, which are then verified with the figures published by the government on how much it received. The voluntary nature of the EITI membership raises questions of how and why countries become members of the initiative. This thesis argues that a combination of factors result in critical junctures at which a state is motivated to commit to a norm. Understanding the pre-conditions to international norm commitment explains motivations of countries, with no prior experience of resource revenues information disclosure (e.g., Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan) and ones that are already doing this (e.g., Norway), to implement the EITI. I argue that international norm implementation depends also on the nature of domestic structures as well (e.g. government-civil society relationship, political decision-making process). Azerbaijan’s interest in attracting foreign investors motivated the country to implement the EITI, yet, the challenging situation with the work of civil society organizations put the process on hold. Kazakhstan was also motivated to improve its international image and attract investments, however, the EITI process has been pushed even further into a sub-national implementation. Norway’s EITI implementation was motivated by its foreign policy objective to be able to promote the initiative globally as the first OECD country implementing the process domestically. Thus, by looking at the initial motivations for norm commitment, how the norm is internalized (policies adopted and actions taken to implement the norm) I analyse the sustainability of norm compliance in each case study.

Date of Award	20 Jun 2017
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	University of St Andrews
Supervisor	Sally Nikoline Cummings (Supervisor) & Rick Fawn (Supervisor)