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This article argues that `contested compliance', i.e. a situation in which compliance conditions are challenged by the expected norm followers, offers an empirical access point for studying changes in the normative structure of world politics. It conceptualizes the normative structure as the `structure of meaning-in-use' that works as a reference frame for decision-makers. The argument builds on a distinction between type, category and meaning of norms. In addition, the article distinguishes between a behaviorist approach to the impact of regulative and constitutive norms on state behavior, and a reflexive perspective on the impact of discursive interventions on the normative structure of world politics. The intention of the argument is twofold. First, it addresses the puzzle of good norm following despite increasingly contested norms, e.g. regarding the European Union's accession criteria, on the one hand, and the United Nations Security Council resolution 1441, on the other. Second, it draws on and develops further the input of reflexive sociology on International Relations theory.
KEY WORDS * compliance * conflict * enlargement * European Union * Iraq * legitimacy * regional integration * sovereignty
Introduction
So far, compliance literature has addressed the question of why states comply with supranational norms (Koh, 1997), or, in turn, how non-compliance with such norms could be explained (Boerzel, 2001). This article highlights situations in which compliance conditions are contested by the designated norm followers. I argue that cases of contested compliance have, so far, received little attention in International Relations theories, despite entailing key information about stability or change of the `normative structure' (Barnett, 1999: 8) in world politics. The normative structure is constituted by discursive interventions that secure the (re)construction of the values, norms and rules entailed in it (Taylor, 1993: 58; Reus-Smit, 1997, 2001a). It is conceptualized as the `structure of meaning-in-use' (Milliken, 1999: 132) that 'frames' decisions (Keck and Sikkink, 1998; Payne, 2001), or, in any case sets a framework of reference for decision-makers in world politics. The article develops the argument about the central role of contested compliance in world politics based on a distinction between two different perspectives in the subfield of compliance research. These two perspectives are distinguished according to their analytical emphasis on either state behavior or social practices. So far, political scientists...