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Introduction
Studies on why, when, and how states adopt foreign norms on the path to European Union (EU) membership has emerged as a thriving branch of scholarship.1In this 'Europeanisation' literature, certain assumptions prevail on how the international transfer of norms unfolds, with the relevance of discursive mechanisms centred on communicative reason, criticism, praise, and framing typically downplayed next to the sanctioning mechanisms of material rewards and punishments. Explanations justifying the transformative primacy of material incentives begin with the observation that accession places significant reform burdens on states and conclude with the assertion that under such circumstances compliance with European reform directives will result only once it is made 'attractive - and non-compliance visible and costly'.2External pressure delivered merely through discourse is seen as incapable of producing such pronormative change, either because it supposedly fails to harness the utility-maximising behaviour of norm-receivers by prompting them to consider reforms merely in terms of their ethical validity, or simply because criticism and shaming are apparently too feeble a form of pressure to motivate cooperation next the 'tremendous geopolitical, sociocultural and economic benefits' of EU membership.3
However, the proliferation of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT)-friendly legislation and the relaxation of attitudes towards homosexuality throughout Europe defy the central assumptions behind this explanatory model of international socialisation. These legislative and social shifts emerged in the absence of a sustained programme of material incentives from the EU, which avoided stalling or accelerating accession progress in relation to how aspiring member states treated their LGBT populations.4Instead, change unfolded in the context of a critical discourse on LGBT rights that was led by advocacy groups and facilitated by nation-states with progressive LGBT policies, but also international organisations like the EU, which were troubled by human rights violations being committed against LGBT individuals. These actors campaigned for LGBT acceptance by defending it as a European value and presenting its observance as ethically binding on all who consider themselves European,5but not by extending or withholding material benefits in a sustained fashion.
I draw on these developments to specify the conditions under which discourse is likely to facilitate the diffusion of contentious norms. My aim is not to dispute the motivating power of material incentives,...