In psyche, we unite: rethinking norm diffusion through nondualist global IR

Abstract

This paper interrogates the diffusionist foundations of norm research in international relations (IR), arguing that both mainstream and critical approaches remain constrained by a shared dualist assumption separating the West from the non-West. While mainstream scholarship advances a linear 'West-to-rest' model of norm diffusion, critical approaches often reverse rather than transcend this logic by privileging 'rest-to-West' dynamics, thereby reproducing the same binary framework. To move beyond this impasse, the paper advances a nondualist alternative grounded in a Lakatosian global IR research programme. Drawing on James Blaut's uniformitarian critique of diffusionism, it reinterprets norm dynamics through the principle of the 'psychic unity of humankind' and shifts the analytical focus from diffusion to norm emergence within a non-separable global field. Building on this foundation, the paper develops a post-binary methodology structured around three principles: rejecting exclusive claims to norm ownership, decentring fixed trajectories of norm travel and foregrounding compromise alongside contestation in contexts of global crisis. This framework conceptualises norm dynamics as a multi-sited, multidirectional process of co-production across interconnected geo-epistemic contexts, offering a novel methodological approach beyond the dualist limits of conventional IR theory.