Southern States in International Development Cooperation: From Contestation to Norm Conception

Abstract Why and how do Southern countries conceive norms in the field of international aid and cooperation in an attempt to craft a symbolic regime that challenges Northern-oriented development agendas? To answer this question, this article engages with the literature on the life cycle of norms and goes beyond the earlier concepts of cascade, localisation, subsidiarity, reluctance, rejection, and contestation. As it considers the international–domestic nexus as the main catalyst for norm conception, this paper contributes to the existing literature on norm circulation by providing a more nuanced and context-led analysis of Southern countries’ normative role. In building upon the dialectics between international and domestic politics, this paper refutes the simple norm-taker/norm-maker dyad wherein the former is regarded as the South’s only possible role. Written from a Southern perspective, this paper also explores a range of channels, mechanisms, and platforms that Southern actors mobilise to create and diffuse their development cooperation norms both regionally and globally.