How do Latin American States Engage with Responsibility to Protect Norms? A Typology of Positions

Abstract

Global norms are subject to dynamic processes, including contestation, revisionism and amplification. Even if they reach the status of a widely recognized standard, they can be challenged due to changing political context and modified accordingly. However, not all contestation leads to effective change and not all actors are considered norm-makers. The article explores the role of the global South, represented by the region of Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC), in the advancement of the Responsibility to Protect (R2P). It contributes to the regional reflections on R2P by moving beyond the “norm-entrepreneurs” vs. “spoilers” dichotomy and acknowledges contestation as a norm constitutive force. On the theoretical level, it elaborates on the concept of norm perception by introducing a framework, which combines the general standpoint with the level of engagement. This will help to distinguish the norm advocates from the norm-takers; the revisionists from the skeptics; and the antagonists from the indifferent. On the empirical level, it examines the input of various Latin American countries to the normative contestation over R2P during the past two decades (2001-2022). The article demonstrates that effective - norm constitutive - contestation depends on individual agents and their dispositions within global R2P advocacy networks. Therefore, countries from the periphery face structural as well as immediate obstacles that prevent greater impact of the global South on norms that shape global governance.