The Paradox of Global Norms

• Caterina García ^[1] ; Pablo Pareja ^[1] ; Ángel J. Rodrigo ^[1]
  1. [1] University Pompeu Fabra
• Localización: Spanish yearbook of international law, ISSN 0928-0634, Nº 25, 2021, págs. 93-99
• Idioma: inglés
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• Dialnet Métricas: 1 Cita
• Resumen

  • The need to create global rules to address global problems or challenges (climate change, international migration, biodiversity reduction, activities in cyberspace and even outer space), to protect global common resources and to provide global public goods is increasingly pressing. However, this demand contrasts with an international practice in which it is complicated and sometimes very difficult to adopt new global norms. This is a critical paradox as global norms are more necessary than ever but at the same time more difficult to adopt. Describing, understanding and explaining this paradox was the aim of the research project on The creation of global norms: between soft cosmopolitanism and the revitalization of Westphalia that was developed by a group of researchers at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra between 2017 and 2021. This group is characterized by two features. The first is its international composition, as its members come from six different nationalities. The second is its interdisciplinary approach, mostly combining International Law and International Relations. This interdisciplinary perspective is a feature that has characterized the group for many years and which, we believe, provides mutual benefits both to the members of the group and to the resulting work produced by each of them. Attempting to understand, describe and analyze the paradox resulting from the growing need for global norms and the reluctance or inability of international actors to adopt them requires three complementary components: first, to build a common understanding of global norms; second, to contextualise the process of creation and its difficulties in an international community in which two underlying trends –soft cosmopolitanism and a certain Westphalian resurgence in international relations– coincide and coexist; and, finally, to identify some of the hypotheses on which the project is based and which need to be confirmed, refuted or nuanced.