Alternate Norms: New Contestation Theory on Subsidiary Norms in the Changing World Order

International relations scholars note that the liberal, rules-based world order is changing, as the underpinning international norms and institutions face serious contestation from the global West to East and South. Norm dynamic (robustness) scholarships show concerns about norm survival and alternatives. I argue that constructivist norms (contestation) theory has a lapse of research in parallel norms and institutions in the global South that serve as contenders and replacements. I develop the alternate norms theory to study such norms. Drawing on concepts of grand strategy and contested subsidiarity, alternate norms theory explains that claims of the universality of liberal international norms generate enthusiastic contestation and resistance, weakening the world order. Regional powers (and global powers, too) act through regional organizations to make parallel norms and institutions, establishing primacy and dominance of governance of international issues within geographical/spatial boundaries. Alternate norms underpin regional powers’ strategic narratives and conceptions of the world.