Summary

In the first wave of scholarship on international norms, the primary task was to convince a skeptical discipline that norms affect domestic and international outcomes. A second phase of international norms research developed political theories of the emergence and establishment of new international norms. Transnational actor models as well as “legalization” and “rational design” approaches tested propositions on norm creation but did not theorize what happens after norms are created. General norms inevitably collide with the relentless specificity of experience. Actors constantly dispute the meaning and application of norms. The resultant arguments modify the norms being contested, and the modified norms then shape subsequent behavior and disputes. The third wave of international norms research has focused on the inherent dynamism of norms and norm systems. Norms emerge through processes of transnational advocacy and institutional design, but they also evolve through cycles of application and disputation.