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The objective of this study is to propose a theoretical model to investigate the mechanism by which contesting of a harmful legal norm by powerless individual actors results in the emergence of a new norm. While much work has been done on norm contestation at the "actor level" in the field, the structural conditions under which contesting of harmful norms by powerless individual actors lead to emergence of a new norm have been insufficiently studied, especially in the non-democratic cultural context. I developed a model that combine existing causal theories in one frame to reproduce observe conditions in the real world to determine necessary structural conditions for the emergence of a new norm by powerless individual actors. A modeling and simulation method and, more specifically, the theoretical model building paradigm is used to develop the model. Social identity theory and the system dynamics modeling approach are used to respectively build the conceptual model and implement the simulation model. The model is tested and compared within two types of communities: democratic and loose vs non-democratic and tight. My findings determine necessary structural conditions for the emergence of a new norm. Indeed, my model's result show that education among others play the main role in the process of norm emergence which is consistent with the previous literature. Moreover, the model's results demonstrate that while average-strength harmful norms can be replaced in democratic and loose societies, only weak norms can be replaced in non-democratic and tight societies. Finally, the simulation model introduces new counterfactual generated hypothesis that can be further tested through empirical studies.

Activists in the internet era are taking action through online petitions, twitter storms and by forming new digital advocacy organizations such as Campact, 38 Degrees and GetUp!. However, no International Relations (IR) scholarship has systematically examined the role of digital advocacy organizations in norm contestation. Digital advocacy organizations warrant study given their international reach, their large memberships, their longevity, their frequent campaigning activity and their claimed impact. This article focuses on the responses of three digital advocacy organizations in Australia, the UK and Ireland to the same external crisis: an increasing number of refugees worldwide. It asks: when and why did these organizations engage in behavioural norm contestation during the refugee crisis? Their use of behavioural contestation is a puzzle, given that digital advocacy organizations have low implementation power. The article draws on interviews with activists and experts, and finds that advocacy groups firstly use discursive contestation (debating the meaning and importance of norms), and then may engage in behavioural contestation (influencing the implementation of norms). Discursive contestation is less costly, and perceived to be less effective, than behavioural contestation. The article suggests that digital advocacy organizations can mobilize people online and offline, and IR scholars should examine this important source of power. This article forms part of the special section of the May 2019 issue of International Affairs on 'The dynamics of dissent', guest-edited by Anette Stimmer and Lea Wisken.

The introduction to the special issue sets out to examine the normative rivalry between the European Union and other regional actors and how it plays out at the domestic level in the societies of the European neighbourhood. Drawing on the International Relations literature on norm diffusion, and in particular on the scholarship on norm contestation, we posit that the degree and nature of domestic contestation of external political norms (both EU and non-EU) has consequences for norm diffusion in specific domestic settings. We deepen the conceptual understanding of the encounter between external and domestic political norms by emphasizing the agency of domestic societies and the importance of domestic normative structures in the processes of acceptance, modification or rejection of external normative influence. We provide empirical evidence about competing normative influences collected from a plethora of case studies from the eastern and the southern European neighbourhoods allowing us to draw a cross-regional parallel about the political ideas more likely to gain traction in the societies of Eastern Europe and the Middle East and North Africa.

Cyberspace appears to offer limitless possibilities for collaboration and economic opportunity in the twenty-first century, but cyber-attacks, breaches of privacy, and security threats also have become commonplace. In the face of these challenges, a number of governments have been locked in debates over the future of cyberspace governance, including the Russian Republic, the People's Republic of China, and the United States. This study examines the ongoing contestation of the international normative architecture for cyberspace, with a focus on the United States' role as a norm 'antipreneur', seeking to defend the status quo multi-stakeholder norm for a more open Internet from entrepreneurial efforts by Russia and China to establish multilateral governance with 'cyber-sovereignty'. Drawing on recent advances in constructivist theory, the study explores antipreneurial strategies to contest efforts by entrepreneurs to introduce new norms, as well as implications for norm development and change. Process tracing is employed to examine cyberspace governance debates. The study concludes by discussing prospects for an International Code of Conduct for Cyberspace, as well as theoretical and political implications of antipreneurship in modern norm contestations.

According to a widely shared perception, international peace and security law is in crisis. Yet it often remains unclear what the constitutive features of this crisis are, how novel it really is, and what its sources, forms, and effects are. In the introduction to this symposium, we unpack the current crisis narrative by focussing on norm contestation in the law against war: Which norms are contested? Who are the actors that contest these norms and how? What are the effects of these contestations on peace and security law as a whole? To answer these questions, we draw on recent scholarship on illegality in Public International Law (PIL) and on contestation in International Relations (IR); we propose an interdisciplinary analytical framework that distinguishes between applicatory, legislative, and systemic contestation. Challenges to the application of norms and the factual basis are a common theme in legal disputes that specify international norms. Legislative contestation challenges the content of norms on a more abstract level, aiming to change its boundaries. Systemic contestation fundamentally questions the cornerstones of the international order. This typology invites PIL and IR scholars to study how different forms of contestation shape international norms in the law against war.

AbstractIn 2019, Thailand ratified the International Labour Organization Work in Fishing Convention to protect migrant fishers. The Thai government vigorously promoted the Convention among its constituents. Yet, despite the government's proactivity, such norms have been weakened upon local translation. This phenomenon is not readily explained by existing norms research that pays scant attention to norms in the domestic space. To address this oversight, this article unpacks domestic processes of norm validation and makes a two-step argument. First, it argues that norm validation is crucial for instigating domestic implementation by allowing stakeholders to deliberate and contest the 'appropriate' application of norms. Second, it argues that the locally acquired normative understanding, as influenced by norm antipreneurs, or actors who defend the status quo, weakens norm implementation while the norms' discursive strength is retained. In presenting the findings, this article contributes to the norms literature by illuminating a new life given to validated norms. The contribution also interrogates norms' global–local dynamics by scrutinizing norm contestation and the extent to which it generates an internalized sense of legal obligation to implement international norms.

Telling stories is intrinsic to legal practice. Clients, lawyers, and courts constantly tell stories about the facts and the law to make sense of the world around them. Legal narration is thus a familiar feature at the domestic as well as at the international level. In formal venues, legal storytelling is subject to arange of procedural and substantive requirements. For example, not everyone enjoys standing before a particular court. By contrast, in informal venues, few if any such conditions apply. Press releases, official statements and social media posts provide legal actors with considerable latitude and communicative freedom to give their version of events. Much of this has emancipatory potential, as it can lend a voice to those who lack representation in more formal circumstances. However, it also enables actors to engage in legal discourse, and to spin their stories, without the various checks and balances that apply in formal settings. Legal narratives are also a source of conflict, polemics and even misinformation. The purpose of this article is to take a closer look at the role that legal narratives play in the contestation of, and contestation through, international norms. The article argues that legal narratives display certain distinct features that set them apart from other types of storytelling. Specifically, they are marked by normative constraints imposed by the formal nature of legal reasoning and interpretation and by the logic of rhetoric and the policy choices they are meant to serve. These two features – the formalism of the law and the demands of rhetoric and instrumentalism – pull legal narratives in different directions. Outside formal processes and venues, this tension becomes acute. In the absence of epistemic scrutiny by experts and authorities, legal narratives may stray far from the formalism of the law in pursuit of competing goals. Where these goals gain the upper hand, attaining an information advantage may become their primary purpose, a point the article illustrates with reference to the justifications Russia offered for its invasion of Ukraine in 2022. In such circumstances, legal narratives may invoke the language and authority of the law not just unpersuasively, but falsely.

Since 2009, the South China Sea disputes have taken on increasing global significance. Situated within a rapidly transforming political landscape, these sovereignty and maritime disputes are totemic of contests over the regional security order and the institutions, rules and laws that support it. The United States has explicitly called upon 'like-minded' allies and partners to defend the so-called 'rules-based order' against the revisionism of the rising People's Republic of China, including in the maritime domain. In particular, the South China Sea has become a highly visible arena of 'normative contestation', one that raises questions about how norm-preservationist regional powers enact security practices to uphold their preferred vision of order. This study uses Australia as a regional power case study to assess the interests and approaches of a key US ally to normative contestation in the South China Sea. It addresses two questions: first, how does Australia perceive and articulate its interests in the South China Sea? Second, what security practices - diplomatic, legal and operational – can a regional power such as Australia bring to bear in its statecraft? It argues that as a regional power, Australia has adopted a normative approach to upholding maritime order. While Canberra has ratcheted up the rhetoric on the importance of maintaining the 'rules-based order' in response to China's actions in the South China Sea, its security practices have retained a routine, 'business-as-usual' quality. This approach is designed to support maritime rules while avoiding economic retaliation from Beijing, reflecting broader strategic dilemmas as a middle-sized state wedged between two great powers. Unpacking the nuances of Australia's South China Sea statecraft provides important insights for understanding for the preparedness and limitations of regional powers in defending their preferred conception of maritime order. (Pac Rev/GIGA)