Emerging powers and the responsibility to protect: non-linear norm dynamics in complex international society

The perceived clash of norms associated with the emergence of rising powers is nowhere more pronounced than in relation to the responsibility to protect (RtoP). However, attempts to explain rising powers’ engagement with norms such as the RtoP are often limited and limiting in what they can tell us. Orthodox models portray predominantly linear and diffusionist logics of norm evolution that underplay the complex interaction implicit in unpredictable outcomes at the systemic level. This article identifies a range of factors that drive participation (or generate hesitation) amongst emerging powers in the development and application of the RtoP. It proceeds to illustrate how changes in normative behaviour emanate from top-down and bottom-up processes as well as the feedback between them. It argues that norm evolution is consequently a unique and emergent outcome of complex international society and therefore argues for using complexity thinking as a heuristic to augment current models and explanations of the evolution of norms in the international system.     

Regional security arrangements as a filter for norm diffusion: the African Union,the European Union and the responsibility to protect

Regional security arrangements play a central role in modifying emerging norms as they travel from the global to the local level. This process of norm localization is shaped by various factors such as the characteristics of regional security cultures, corresponding resonance with the emerging norm, institutional voice opportunities, and mechanisms of framing and pruning as they are utilized by norm entrepreneurs. The article applies this analytical framework to the localization of the responsibility to protect (R2P) norm by the African Union and the European Union. Subsequently, the paper examines how localization of the R2P norm in both regions affected their reactions to the Libyan crisis in 2011. It also examines the likely ramifications that the intervention may have on the future reception of the R2P by African and European actors.     

Investing in international security: rising powers and organizational choices

How do rising powers choose to allocate their finite resources among the multiple global and regional security organizations? Building on the literatures on forum shopping and rising powers, we argue that the different organizational investment choices of rising powers are explained by varying regional ideational affinities. Organizational settings have ideational foundations that can look very different from region to region. We argue that regional ideational affinity leads rising powers to invest in regional rather than global organizations. However, if the ideational composition of the region is highly diverse, global organizations are a better vehicle to accommodate rising powers’ emergent ambitions. To demonstrate our argument, we examine the choices of Brazil and South Africa in terms of their material and ideational investments in regional and global organizations.     

Norm compliance by proximity: explaining the surge of regional actors in responsibility to protect

International military interventions in Libya and Côte d'Ivoire in 2011 revealed that regional and sub-regional organisations are playing an increasingly active and important role in the implementation of Responsibility to Protect (RtoP). However, the academic and policy analyses of RtoP have not thus far presented any comprehensive model to explain the emergence of regional actors in RtoP. This article develops and applies a four-fold taxonomy, according to which the unique powers of regional actors in initiating and implementing RtoP can be attributed to four types of compliance effects. First, regional actors themselves can directly promote RtoP for either normative or strategic reasons. Second, they can wield either normative or strategic compliance pull on other actors, such as the permanent members of the UN Security Council, which is an indirect but effective way to implement RtoP. As a benefit, this taxonomy reveals the diversity and depth of compliance effects wielded by regional actors in the RtoP process. The powers of regional actors in RtoP are realised on multiple fronts, rather than through a singular channel. This conclusion challenges the whole conception of RtoP by demonstrating that the traditional two-layered idea of RtoP developed in the mainstream literature, according to which RtoP is composed of the levels of international society and its member states, should be replaced with a tri-layered conception which also recognises the emerging middle level of regional actors.     

World society,international society and the colonization of Africa

This article utilizes an English School approach to examine the European colonization of Africa between 1871 and 1908. Drawing upon Clark's framework for understanding the relationship between world society, international society and international institutions, it argues that the colonization of Africa was very much dependent upon the activity of non-state actors who essentially pushed European states into the formal colonization of the African interior. Such a case sheds important light on the destructive role world society has played in international politics, a topic which has received no attention in the English School literature. Moreover the study provides additional empirical insights into the relationship between world society, international society and international institutions, while also bringing much needed empirical discussion of colonization into the English School catalogue.     

The rise of the welfare state in international society

In this article I seek to develop a case for viewing the welfare state as a primary institution in international society. This is with particular reference to Norden (Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden), where in the course of the 1930s, and particularly in the post-1945 era, the welfare state was elevated to a core principle of legitimacy, largely defining the idea of nationhood for these countries. Furthermore, I will attempt to show how the adoption of this principle of legitimacy conditioned the Nordic countries’ interpretation of a number of other primary institutions in international society such as diplomacy, war and trade. A key contribution of this approach is that it aspires not only to examine the evolution of one institution in isolation, as has often been attempted in English School scholarship, but to actively explore how institutions interact with each other.     

World society,international society and the periphery: British abolitionists and the post-slave state of Haiti in the early nineteenth century*

Many studies of world society in the English School claim that non-state actors gain importance in international relations when they try to influence the most important members of the society of states. This article argues that such an approach overlooks the diversity of world society activities. First, it obscures the activities of world society actors beyond the core and therefore offers an incomplete account of the agency such actors exercise in global affairs. Second, it overlooks the fact that non-state actors from the core can disseminate some of the core’s values beyond its borders. The example of British abolitionist contact with the post-slave state of Haiti in the first two decades of the nineteenth century serves as an empirical illustration of these two points. The case study is particularly useful because conventional narratives of abolitionist activism tend to concentrate on contact with the core members of the society of states and overlook equally significant efforts to “teach” former slaves how to become respectable members of the society of states.     

Rationalist state,revolutionist EU and realist war: Austria in international society

This article examines Austria's position as a small, neutral state in the international society as framed by the English School. This examination is chiefly done in the face of the effects of great power conflicts and their impact on Western Europe's society of states. In doing so, the article provides insights to the fundamental puzzles concerning the ways power is managed between states, great and small alike. The article surveys how war (such as in South Ossetia in 2008) and war-like incidents affected Austria's position in the international society and the understanding of its place in great power conflicts between East and West. I argue that neutrality, despite European integration in the context of a peaceful international society, remains a political option for small states such as Austria. This option is especially lively if there is a domestic sentimental attachment to it and sticking to it does not undermine domestic or European and international foreign policy rationale and interests.     

Fundraising in Brazil: The major implications for civil society organisations and international NGOs

This paper looks at the opportunities for civil society organisations (CSOs) in Brazil to increase and diversify income. It demonstrates the range of potential new sources of funds, including the Brazilian public, commercial activities, and government institutions. The role of volunteers is also addressed. The institutional and cultural changes that CSOs must make in order to mobilise these resources are highlighted, along with associated risks, such as diversion away from their representational and advocacy roles, loss of political independence, and bureaucratisation. The paper then suggests how aid agencies might fulfil their responsibilities to help counterparts bolster income, and raises the possibility of more inter-institutional collaboration in what is increasingly a global rather than national activity. Finally, some comments are offered regarding the funding priorities of the international NGOs, given the new income opportunities facing CSOs. The main recommendation is that these concentrate on supporting advocacy work rather than service provision.     

Discourse and reality in international information society policy: the dominant scenario and its application in the developing world

Abstract

Since the early 1990s the concept of the information society has taken centre stage on the political agendas of several national governments in the North and South, as well as regional and international institutions, donor organisations and non-governmental organisations (NGOs). This article first sets out to analyse and describe both the content of, the evolution in, this policy discourse. It attempts to assess the validity of this discourse in light of the current changes at the global level and in the light of the problems associated with the practical implementation of policy in a developmental context. By so doing, it questions the basic – and overly simplistic – assumptions of the dominant scenario.     

Whom do international donors support in the name of civil society?

International funding of civil society organisations within the framework of support for democratisation processes has increased significantly in recent years. Yet this raises a set of questions quite apart from the effectiveness of the activities of the recipient organisations. Who are these groups? Whom do they represent? What effect does international funding have on their organisational workings and their rootedness in their local societies and political systems? This article presents the results of a survey that examined the sources of financing, level of organisation, domestic constituencies, and relationships to political parties of 16 civil society groups in Latin America that received support from the National Endowment for Democracy in 1999. It finds that while the groups demonstrate a remarkable diversity in their sources of funding, all of them receive the lion's share of financing from international donors. The author argues, however, that given the scant possibilities for domestically generated funding, this dependence is to be expected. The article concludes with a series of questions about the meaning of international support for local groups in developing democracies and the potential effects it may have on de-linking such groups from their broader political and party system.     

The fifth debate and the emergence of complex international relations theory: notes on the application of complexity theory to the study of international life

The climate of post-Cold-War interactions remains uncertain. Rather than a transitory stage, the resilience of the pervasive randomness of international life has challenged the dominant frameworks for the study of world politics. Some commentators have therefore advocated the infusion of international relations theory with the conjectures of complexity theory. This article brings together the claims of the different proponents of such intersection and suggests the emergence of complex international relations theory. Although it requires further critical elaboration, the claim here is that this theory outlines the fifth debate in the study of international life and proffers intriguing heuristic devices that both challenge conventional wisdom and provoke analytical imaginations.

It is also possible that hard imaginative thinking has not increased so as to keep pace with the expansion and complication of human societies and organisations. That is the darkest shadow upon the hopes of mankind.     

Civil society,the state,and the limits to global civil society

Just as domestic civil society is widely regarded as serving the greater common good of a national democratic political community, global civil society is also promoted as a vehicle through which a host of humanity's ills may be remedied. This article argues that the pinning of such high hopes on global civil society is mistaken, for its proponents have failed to recognise that global civil society is insufficiently analogous to domestic civil society for it to be a similarly positive force. At the national level, civil society functions in a balanced interdependence with the state. At the global level there is no equivalent of the state to provide the necessary scrutiny and regulation that at the national level prevents constituents of domestic civil society from committing injustices.     

Democracy promotion and the challenges of illiberal regional powers: introduction to the special issue

This special issue examines Western efforts at democracy promotion, reactions by illiberal challengers and regional powers, and political and societal conditions in target states. We argue that Western powers are not unequivocally committed to the promotion of democracy and human rights, while non-democratic regional powers cannot simply be described as “autocracy supporters”. This article introduces the special issue. First, illiberal regional powers are likely to respond to Western efforts at democracy promotion in third countries if they perceive challenges to their geostrategic interests in the region or to the survival of their regime. Second, Western democracy promoters react to countervailing policies by illiberal regimes if they prioritize democracy and human rights goals over stability and security goals which depends in turn on their perception of the situation in the target countries and their overall relationships to the non-democratic regional powers. Third, the effects on the ground mostly depend on the domestic configuration of forces. Western democracy promoters are likely to empower liberal groups in the target countries, while countervailing efforts by non-democratic regional powers will empower illiberal groups. In some cases, though, countervailing efforts by illiberal regimes have the counterintuitive effect of fostering democracy by strengthening democratic elites and civil society.     

Beyond rwanda and kosovo: The interactive dynamics of international peacekeeping and Ethnic Mobilisation

Within the past few decades there has been a significant increase in multilateral interventions in ethnic conflicts in the name of peacekeeping. Most hope that these operations will assist in conflict resolution and reduce violence. However, recent examples indicate that this may not always be the case. This paper explores why international efforts to contain, curtail and resolve ethnic conflicts may not prove successful and even backfire. This enquiry is addressed by employing a cross-national comparative analysis of the involvement of peacekeeping operations in two recent ethnic conflict situations. A sociological model of mobilisation is systematically applied to the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda (UNAMIR) in Rwanda (1994) and NATO's Kosovo Force (KFOR) in Kosovo (1999) to determine whether international actors addressed the primary components that led to mobilisation of the contentious parties. This work argues that the key to successful peacekeeping is to address the primary components of violence. The paper synthesises conflict studies with work on social mobilisation theory and research on peacekeeping, offering both theoretical and policy-relevant contributions to understanding the nexus between effective peacekeeping and factors leading to violent mobilisation.