Norm‐making and the Global South: Attempts to Regulate Lethal Autonomous Weapons Systems
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/1758-5899.12684 |
| Author | Ingvild Bode |
| Published date | 01 September 2019 |
| Date | 01 September 2019 |
Norm-making and the Global South: Attempts
to Regulate Lethal Autonomous Weapons
Systems
Ingvild Bode
University of Kent
Abstract
The international community has been debating lethal autonomous weapons systems (LAWS) under the auspices of the UN
Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (UN-CCW) since 2014. Here, a growing number of states from the Global South
have been active participants and expressly support a preventive legal ban of fully autonomous systems. This is an interesting
observation for two reasons: first, their vocal activism within a UN disarmament forum is noteworthy as these sites have often
not been associated with significant representation from the Global South, not least due to financial pressures. Second, their
engagement speaks to an evolving critical agenda in norm research, recognising developing states as norm-makers rather
than norm-takers and thereby counteracting a long-standing hierarchical depiction of norm promotion, development, and dif-
fusion. The article therefore studies ongoing international deliberations on LAWS from the perspective of the Global South as
potential norm-makers.
States parties to the UN Convention on Certain Conven-
tional Weapons (UN-CCW) have been discussing lethal
autonomous weapons systems (LAWS) since 2014. Since the
creation of a Group of Governmental Experts (UN-GGE) in
December 2016, a move indicating a formalisation of delib-
eration, a growing number of states have supported a com-
prehensive, preventive legal ban of LAWS,
1
acting in close
alignment with the NGO coalition Campaign to Stop Killer
Robots. This group of 28 is primarily composed of states
from the Global South. Further, these states have been
among the most active participants at the four GGE meet-
ings in November 2017, April 2018, August 2018, and March
2019 in terms of both the number and the substance of
their interventions.
That these interventions happen within the context of a
UN disarmament forum is insightful as such forums are
often not associated with significant representation from the
Global South. Data collected by Article 36 (2016, p. 6) reveal
that ‘the lower a country’s income category, the less likely
they will [...] attend, speak or hold formal roles at any
given meeting’across international disarmament fora. This
underrepresentation has not only been associated with a
decreased effectiveness of disarmament negotiations (Borrie
and Thornton, 2008), but also has an effect on how disarma-
ment norms are framed to the detriment of priorities associ-
ated with the Global South (Nash, 2015).
Such dynamics make studying the Global South’s deliber-
ation efforts on LAWS an interesting case to highlight their
agency in potential norm-making at the international level.
Norm localisation scholars have long investigated the
agency of Global South countries in dynamic processes of
norm translation (Acharya, 2011, 2014; Zimmermann et al.,
2017). Their efforts echo post-colonial scholarship in examin-
ing global governance as a process integrating multiple
actors at various levels rather than as a top-down process
that is determined by the so-called ‘great powers’(Epstein,
2012). But efforts to study Global South norm-making at
international sites have only recently gained more attention
in norm research (Acharya, 2014; Bode, 2014a; Bode and
Karlsrud, 2018; Helleiner, 2014; Sikkink, 2014; Stalley, 2018;
Thakur, 2017) –notwithstanding the fact that post-colonial
states have long engaged in these activities, in particular at
the UN as initiatives centred around the so-called New Inter-
national Economic Order demonstrate (Rothstein, 1979).
Through studying how Global South countries contribute
to potential norm-making on LAWS, the article speaks to
this critical debate and contributes to addressing a Western
bias in norm research. Due to this focus, I frame the debate
on LAWS in the context of norm research rather than
reviewing the substance of arguments put forward in sup-
port or in opposition of a ban on LAWS at the UN-CCW. I
first survey literature in critical norm research and subse-
quently apply these insights into analysing ongoing deliber-
ations at the UN-CCW, gained through participant
observations of two UN-GGE meetings as well as two expert
interviews (conducted under the Chatham House Rule).
The global south and norm-making
Scholars of International Relations (IR) have frequently cap-
tured the processes leading to the institutionalisation of
new norms, loosely understood as ‘standards of
Global Policy (2019) 10:3 doi: 10.1111/1758-5899.12684 ©2019 University of Durham and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Global Policy Volume 10 . Issue 3 . September 2019 359
Special Section Article
To continue reading
Request your trial