The Convention and Beyond — Future Prospects for an Analysis of Norm Change through Discourse

Abstract

This book has set out to expand the concept and analysis of discourse in International Relations scholarship. It has sought to ascertain the place that sociolinguistic methodologies should occupy within constructivist approaches to international politics. Underlying this study has been the belief that further elaboration on the linguistic, communicative and discursive dimensions of international politics can deliver valuable insights into the intersubjective nature of political action, and the various ways in which stakeholders interacting on an international and transnational level meaningfully develop commonly accepted norms. Exploring the increasingly pivotal roles that language and discourse have come to occupy in constructivist reflections on intersubjective reality and social norms (both constructivism’s ‘middle-ground’ and its edges), the study has strengthened the argument that discourse research is likely to assert its place as a sub-field of constructivist research on international politics and that it will continue to play a vital role in the discipline’s epistemological and methodological debates.