Session 18 - Norms: A force to be reckoned with!

Finnemore and Sikkink in their article “International Norm Dynamics and Political Change” highlight three main points. Firstly they highlight that a norm, which can be perceived as an idea or in the form of a behavioral act, stems from traditional theories of international relation domain. Time and time again it resurfaces taking new forms but comprising of the same ideological crux. Secondly norms always exist in a form of life cycle, which affects the behavioral events and all logic statements behind it. And thirdly norms are always rational and exist in a sphere of social arena of the world politics and international relations.

The authors state that a norm exists in three stages, a norm through these stages evolve and then become a dominate idea or practice in the international domain.  In the first phase the norm emerges as an idea which is conceived and promoted by norm entrepreneurs, these are agents who fight for the norm to be recognized and internalized by the society. This is also done by using establishing an organization which works for spreading the particular idea for example through NGO’s. This idea in the second phase makes its way to the international stage, further popularized by media which gives the international communities awareness of it. Hence, as a result the idea becomes internationally ingrained in the minds of people. The third and the final phase of the norm is where it gets internalized in the communities such as people start following it habitually. The norm becomes an idea which is fully powerful and does not demand questions which will threaten its existence.

The author’s arguments and the narration of their theory seem to be concrete and backed up by sound arguments. But, the theory can be questioned from the angle of the route which the idea takes to become an international norm. One can begin to ponder on the lines that can an idea, which is proposed in some international organization and did not sprout from a domestic level, be established among different countries having different cultures? Can this idea gain enough credit to be unquestionable? And mostly can this idea make grounds for itself in domestic domain of countries from which this idea did not originate from and in some way contradicts its age old local norms?