Despite warnings of interstate conflict over shared water resources, states are reaching hundreds of treaties and agreements over their international rivers. We have extensive knowledge about the negotiations process of individual treaties, but there is a paucity of systematic analysis of the forces influencing treaty formation. In addition, the few quantitative studies examining the formation of agreements fail to consider the different factors influencing the rise of bilateral versus multilateral agreements on multilateral basins. Correcting this omission is important because scholars have discovered that states frequently sign bilateral agreements over multilateral rivers, which contradicts the integrated river basin management approach advocated by environmentalists, engineers, and water experts. This study seeks to fill this vacuum within the existing literature by distinguishing between the formation of bilateral treaties on bilateral and multilateral basins and comparing these bilateral forms of cooperation to the formation of multilateral treaties on multilateral basins. Through quantitative analysis, we argue that treaty type is a by-product of state interest, transaction costs, and distribution of power.Although experts have been warning of the increasing potential for conflict over international rivers, states have been reaching hundreds of agreements to regulate their use of freshwater resources (Wolf 2002). An examination of these agreements reveals that the majority cover multilateral basins (shared by three or more states), even though 67% of the world's 263 international rivers are bilateral (shared by two states) (Wolf 1998). To govern multilateral basins, states have tended to select bilateral treaties rather than multilateral treaties (Song and Whittington 2004). Consequently, the conventional wisdom that has evolved is that negotiations are more likely to take place over multilateral rather than bilateral basins and that the by-product of these talks is more likely to be bilateral rather than multilateral treaties (Conca, Wu, and Mei 2006). However, we still 1 We thank Ariel Dinar, Mark Giordano, Paul Hensel, Cliff Morgan, Cameron Thies, and Jaroslav Tir for helpful comments. Replication data can be found online at http://www.saramitchell.org/research.html.

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Despite receiving accolades for being the example of cooperation, India and Pakistan's peaceful management of their Indus River system remains largely unexamined. Scholars that do consider this case classify it as passive cooperation. To support their classification, they point to the Indus Waters Treaty's allocation of the river system between India and Pakistan and suggest that it severed the interdependent relationship and need to cooperate. Consequently, this paper seeks to demonstrate that India and Pakistan remain interdependent in managing their Indus River system and for over 40 years, they have sustained active cooperation. To account for the maintenance of this cooperation the paper argues that it is necessary to consider the design of the Permanent Indus Commission, an institution established to manage the Indus River. The ability of Indian and Pakistani commissioners to communicate directly and hold regular meetings permitted them to perform the necessary standard and operating procedures for the functioning of the institution. The commission's ability to monitor development of the river system has enabled it to ease member states' fear of cheating and confirm the accuracy of all exchanged data. Finally, its conflict resolution mechanisms have permitted it to negotiate settlements to disputes as they arise.

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Third parties have been active in assisting adversarial states to navigate their international river disputes. By using the carrot and stick to facilitate compromise, mediators have also participated in the negotiations leading to the signing of treaties over international rivers. Yet, due to the nature of the issue confronting riparian states, the long-term impact of these efforts is likely to be unstable cooperation rather than cooperation. This is still an important contribution, because the absence of mediation efforts may contribute to an environment of conflict. However, since riparian states confront a relationship that involves the need to continuously manage disputes that arise as states develop their international rivers, a mediator may be more effective in facilitating cooperation if it assists developing states with a history of animosity to establish effectively designed river basin commissions and it oversees the implementation of treaties. Participating in the initial years of a treaty's implementation by coordinating the donor community to underwrite projects can minimize the potential disputes riparians confront. An effectively designed river basin commission can assist in facilitating cooperation long after the mediator has departed from the region. To demonstrate this argument, the article draws on the Indus River case, which has lived through four different phases. The Euphrates and Tigris Rivers are used to illustrate the argument's ability to explain other cases.