Rules for State Conduct in the Cyber Domain

This chapter explains the puzzling 2013 agreement of the UN Group of Governmental Experts (GGE) on cybersecurity that existing international law applies to state military use of information and communication technologies (ICTs), and the 2015 GGE report that extended the consensus reached in 2013. These important developments in the emergence of rules and norms for cyberspace took place despite deteriorating relations between the United States and Russia. They also took place despite increasing global contention over Internet governance and cybersecurity issues more broadly, and occurred with less controversy than related (but lower-priority) Internet governance issues. The chapter argues that the 2013 and 2015 GGE reports were reached in large part as a result of a conscious process of rule-making and interpretation structured by agreed-upon secondary rules, and that the timing of the agreements reflected emerging consensus among participants despite remaining divergence on substantive preferences about governance arrangements for cyberspace.

Social Practices of Rule-Making and the Global War on Terror

This chapter examines public dialogue between al-Qaeda and the United States from 1996 until the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Both sides spoke clearly and consistently about actual and preferred rules for the international system, and the way they should be applied; and both sides engaged in procedural criticism and justification. Both sides knew that conflict was overdetermined, and that they had deep disagreements about relevant social practices of rule-making. So why engage in futile dialogue? Attempts to reach like-minded audiences clearly matter, but esoteric appeals about legitimate rule-making procedures are typically not expected to move political audiences. The chapter argues that participants on both sides had internalized ideas about legitimate rule-making practices, and tied these understandings to conceptions of the appropriate nature and ends of political community. The case demonstrates the emotional power of secondary rules, and the difficulty of resolving conflict in the absence of common rule-making practices.

Banning War

This chapter questions standard interpretations of the interwar period as one of failed utopianism. It demonstrates that the Locarno agreements and especially the Kellogg-Briand Pact were part of a larger rule system originating in the late nineteenth century that sought to curtail the state’s right to use force. In particular, it shows that secondary rules can create unintended outcomes. Neither Kellogg nor Briand sought to create a multilateral treaty banning war except in self-defense and collective security. Rather, in seeking to manipulate procedural rules to force each other into abandoning the treaty, both men came to genuinely embrace it. This norm clearly informed subsequent state practice, despite being imperfectly adhered to, and was reasserted in the UN Charter. The case also shows the robustness of social practices of rule-making, which were adhered to consistently even by new states like Japan and states like the Soviet Union that had renounced international institutions.

Conclusion

The concluding chapter summarizes the main argument of the book concerning the nature and operation of social practices of rule-making and reviews the main findings from the four empirical cases. It then discusses the book’s significance. It sheds light on how to resolve comparability issues and investigate scope conditions among various proposed mechanisms for creating shared knowledge such as rules and institutions. It extends the range of applications of the practice-turn to the practice of rule-making, and identifies synergies between rule and practice constructivisms. It also demonstrates that the study of social practices of rule-making improves existing explanations of change in international systems. In doing so, it highlights the importance of these practices to contemporary global governance, as well as the overlooked importance of global governance for the study of international systems and world orders. Finally, it demonstrates the book’s utility for studying hierarchy and authority in world politics.

The Social Construction of Great Power Management, 1815–1822

This chapter shows that secondary rules help to explain the emergence of active practices of great power management of the international system after the Napoleonic Wars. Actors were aware of themselves as joint participants in a practice of rule-making and interpretation. They presented proposals according to the rules of that practice, both criticizing and justifying proposals on procedural grounds. The chapter covers the initial creation of great power management in the Congress of Vienna, and its development in the initial conferences of the Concert of Europe at Aix-la-Chapelle, Troppau, Laibach, and Verona. Actors who more skillfully employed secondary rules were more successful in obtaining their goals. Talleyrand secured France’s readmission to the ranks of the great powers, and Metternich and Castlereagh consistently employed procedural rules to achieve their objectives. Procedural rules also help explain the failure of the Tsar’s proposed Holy Alliance in contrast to the substantively similar Quadruple Alliance.

Social Practices of Rule-Making

This chapter begins by outlining the conceptions of rules, institutions, and social practices employed throughout the book. It demonstrates that attention to procedural rules for rule-making and interpretation, or secondary rules, sheds light on the puzzle of how actors know how and when to engage in particular forms of social construction and therefore on why we observe patterned practices of global rule-making. Secondary rules shape the way actors present and evaluate proposals for making, changing, and interpreting rules. As such, they are a key overlooked cause of the form, process, and timing of change in the rules and institutions of the international system. They also help explain the success or failure of particular attempts to create such change, since proposals presented according to relevant secondary rules are more likely to be accepted. Finally, the chapter outlines the book’s significance and contributions, and discusses issues of method and evidence.

Introduction

This chapter begins by identifying a gap in International Relations scholarship. Despite many proposed mechanisms by which actors create and change various forms of shared knowledge (such as persuasion, norm contestation, and strategic social construction), the field lacks clear knowledge about how these mechanisms relate or compare to one another, and about how actors know how and when to engage in them. It then introduces the central argument of the book—that participants in world politics are also simultaneously engaged in an ongoing social practice of rule-making, interpretation, and application. This practice, itself governed by specialized procedural rules, provides an instruction manual that enables actors to engage in contextually appropriate ways of making and interpreting rules. These procedural rules shape outcomes, and thus help to explain change in international rules and institutions. The chapter concludes by introducing the case studies and by providing an overview of the plan of the book.