The diffusion of policy norms to international organizations: the protection of civilians and public information in UN peacekeeping operations

Abstract

Behavior and change in international organizations (IOs) have been recently recognized as important yet understudied phenomena in international relations. While a number of notable works focusing on IO authority and autonomy have appeared recently, the debates on whether member states or bureaucrats have the upper hand in determining IO behavior masks the complex reality in which states, IO officials, independent experts and civil society actors enter into discussions or negotiations about courses of action which are appropriate for a given IO. In order to provide a more nuanced account of this reality, the thesis applies the norm diffusion theory to explaining the evolution of UN peacekeeping operations in the aftermath of the Cold War. The paper looks at policy norms prescribing missions to afford protection to civilians under imminent threat of physical violence and develop public information campaigns targeted at the local population. The thesis theorizes four diffusion mechanisms and five categories of scope conditions which have a bearing on diffusion. It hypothesizes and subsequently demonstrates that each mechanism's functioning depends on a specific constellation of the conditions from the five categories. Despite a number of difficulties associated with the application of the norm diffusion theory to IOs, the study cases has produced interesting results which other theories of IOs behavior and change have struggled to deliver.