Art & War: Dynamics of International Norm Change

University Of California-Irvine, Irvine CA

Investigators

Abstract

This project examines change in international norms and rule systems. In particular, this study investigates the evolution of international rules against art plundering in wartime, focusing on the period from the Napoleonic Wars to the present. Although until 1800 victors in war seized the art treasures of the vanquished, international rules prohibited the destruction or removal of artworks during war by the latter half of the twentieth century. An endogenous theory of norm change, built on the interactions among rules, actions, and discourses, generates testable propositions about the evolution of international rules. One implication of this theory is that victorious powers will act in accordance with new norms as these become internalized by incorporation into domestic law and policies. This stands in contrast to the realist tradition that suggests that great powers make rules to suit their interests, and therefore that international rules have no independent causal force. Evidence is provided by critical episodes in the evolution of norms against plunder. The research will show how actors interpreted normative tensions and ambiguities, how they sought to resolve them, and how their interactions altered the rules. Using secondary as well as primary and archival sources, the project will reconstruct the discourses, both between and within governments, that drove the evolution of rules. This research will also inform the understanding of other international norms governing the conduct of war (e.g., treatment of prisoners and civilians).