Norms have never been absent from the study of international politics, but the sweeping “ideational turn” in the 1980s and 1990s brought them back as a central theoretical concern in the field. Much theorizing about norms has focused on how they create social structure, standards of appropriateness, and stability in international politics. Recent empirical research on norms, in contrast, has examined their role in creating political change, but change processes have been less well-theorized. We induce from this research a variety of theoretical arguments and testable hypotheses about the role of norms in political change. We argue that norms evolve in a three-stage “life cycle” of emergence, “norm cascades,” and internalization, and that each stage is governed by different motives, mechanisms, and behavioral logics. We also highlight the rational and strategic nature of many social construction processes and argue that theoretical progress will only be made by placing attention on the connections between norms and rationality rather than by opposing the two.

/pdf/international-norm-dynamics-and-political-change-37ig9r9dlq.pdf

International Norm Dynamics and Political Change

Drawing upon philosophy and social theory, Social Theory of International Politics develops a theory of the international system as a social construction. Alexander Wendt clarifies the central claims of the constructivist approach, presenting a structural and idealist worldview which contrasts with the individualism and materialism which underpins much mainstream international relations theory. He builds a cultural theory of international politics, which takes whether states view each other as enemies, rivals or friends as a fundamental determinant. Wendt characterises these roles as 'cultures of anarchy', described as Hobbesian, Lockean and Kantian respectively. These cultures are shared ideas which help shape state interests and capabilities, and generate tendencies in the international system. The book describes four factors which can drive structural change from one culture to another - interdependence, common fate, homogenization, and self-restraint - and examines the effects of capitalism and democracy in the emergence of a Kantian culture in the West.

/pdf/social-theory-of-international-politics-3eegdnnwai.pdf

Social Theory of International Politics

Modernization theorists from Karl Marx to Daniel Bell have argued that economic development brings pervasive cultural changes. But others, from Max Weber to Samuel Huntington, have claimed that cultural values are an enduring and autonomous influence on society. We test the thesis that economic development is linked with systematic changes in basic values. Using data from the three waves of the World Values Surveys, which include 65 societies and 75 percent of the world's population, we find evidence of both massive cultural change and the persistence of distinctive cultural traditions. Economic development is associated with shifts away from absolute norms and values toward values that are increasingly rational, tolerant, trusting, and participatory. Cultural change, however, is path dependent. The broad cultural heritage of a society - Protestant, Roman Catholic, Orthodox, Confucian, or Communist - leaves an imprint on values that endures despite modernization. Moreover, the differences between the values held by members of different religions within given societies are much smaller than are cross-national differences. Once established, such cross-cultural differences become part of a national culture transmitted by educational institutions and mass media. We conclude with some proposed revisions of modernization theory

Modernization, cultural change, and the persistence of traditional values.

The authors analyze the nation‐state as a worldwide institution constructed by worldwide cultural and associational processes, developing four main topics: (1) properties of nation‐states that result from their exogenously driven construction, including isomorphism, decoupling, and expansive structuration; (2) processes by which rationalistic world culture affects national states; (3) characteristics of world society that enhance the impact of world culture on national states and societies, including conditions favoring the diffusion of world models, expansion of world‐level associations, and rationalized scientific and professional authority; (4) dynamic features of world culture and society that generate expansion, conflict, and change, especially the statelessness of world society, legitimation of multiple levels of rationalized actors, and internal inconsistencies and contradictions.

/pdf/world-society-and-the-nation-state-1467g9enna.pdf

World society and the nation-state

I offer an institutional theory of corporate social responsibility consisting of a series of propositions specifying the conditions under which corporations are likely to behave in socially responsible ways. I argue that the relationship between basic economic conditions and corporate behavior is mediated by several institutional conditions: public and private regulation, the presence of nongovernmental and other independent organizations that monitor corporate behavior, institutionalized norms regarding appropriate corporate behavior, associative behavior among corporations themselves, and organized dialogues among corporations and their stakeholders. Concerns about corporate social responsibility have grown significantly during the last two decades. Not only has the issue become commonplace in the business press and among business and political leaders (Buhr & Graf

http://laisumedu.org/DESIN_Ibarra/desin/imagenescampbell/tres-c.pdf

Why would corporations behave in socially responsible ways? an institutional theory of corporate social responsibility

Contents BOLI JOHN THOMAS GEORGE M Part One: 1 BOLI JOHN THOMAS GEORGE M 2 BOLI JOHN LOYA THOMAS A LOFTIN TERESA Part Two: 3 FRANK DAVID JOHN HIRONAKA ANN MEYER JOHN W SCHOFER EVAN TUMA NANCY BRANDON 4 BERKOVITCH NITZA 5 KIM YOUNG S 6 FINNEMORE MARTHA Part Three: 7 LOYA THOMAS A BOLI JOHN 8 BARRETT DEBORAH FRANK DAVID JOHN 9 CHABBOTT COLETTE 10 SCHOFER EVAN BOLI JOHN

[Constructing World Culture: International Nongovernmental Organizations since 1875]

The authors analyze the growth of international non-governmental organizations between 1875 and 1973 using a data set on almost 6,000 organizations. Although these organizations are highly interconnected with the expanding state system and world economy, as reflections of and contributors to world culture they have helped construct a world polity that cannot be reduced to networks of economic and political interaction. Their analysis of the structure and aims of these organizations identifies the principles of universalism, individualism, voluntaristic authority, rational progress, and world citizenship as central elements of world culture. They also describe the structure of world culture by studying the distribution of these organizations across major social sectors, highlighting the centrality of rationalizing scientific, technical, economic, and infrastructural organizations that go largely unnoticed. Finally, they review sectoral historical studies showing how these organizations shape world culture and influence states and intergovernmental organizations

World culture in the world polity : A century of international non-governmental organization

PART ONE: THEORETICAL ISSUES Ontology and Rationalization in the Western Cultural Account PART TWO: THE WORLD-POLITY AND STATE STRUCTURE The World-Polity and the Authority of the Nation-State World-Polity Sources of Expanding State Authority and Organization, 1870-1970 Regime Changes and State Power in an Intensifying World-State-System Structural Antecedents and Consequences of Statism PART THREE: CONSTITUTING NATION AND CITIZEN Human Rights or State Expansion? Cross-National Definitions of Constitutional Rights, 1870-1970 Global Patterns of Educational Institutionalization On the Union of States and Schools World-Polity Sources of National Welfare and Land Reform PART FOUR: CONSTRUCTING THE MODERN INDIVIDUAL The Ideology of Childhood and the State Rules Distinguishing Children in National Constitutions, 1870-1970 Self and Life Course Institutionalization and Its Effects The Political Construction of Rape PART FIVE: RATIONALIZATION AND COLLECTIVE ACTION Comparative Social Movements Revivalism, Nation-Building and Institutional Change PART SIX: THE POSSIBILITY OF A GENERAL HISTORICAL THEORY Institutional Analysis

Institutional Structure: Constituting State, Society and the Individual

The state has come to be a major focus of political and historical sociology in recent years. In the growing literature, there appears to be an underemphasis on the cultural and institutional contexts of the state's emergence and expansion. Two distinct issues are crucial: (a) the evolution of society as a collective actor, including the establishment of sovereignty and the expansion of its jurisdiction; and (b) the degree to which this sovereignty and jurisdiction are structured within a particular bureaucratic organization. We first review studies of the emergence of states in formerly stateless polities. We then discuss the processes of state formation and nation building in the Western system. Finally, we review more specialized theoretical works concerning classes, the world economy, and the construction of national institutions. The literature discussed has added considerably to macrosociology. More work is needed, however, in which the state is viewed as an institution that is essentially cultural in nature and that derives from a wider rationalizing project.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/info/2083185

George M. Thomas

Papers

World society and the nation-state

[Constructing World Culture: International Nongovernmental Organizations since 1875]

World culture in the world polity : A century of international non-governmental organization

Institutional Structure: Constituting State, Society and the Individual

The Expansion of the State