Entrusted Norms: Security, Trust, and Betrayal in the Gulf Cooperation Council Crisis

Keating, Vincent Charles and Lucy M Abbott (2021) “Entrusted Norms: Security, Trust, and Betrayal in the Gulf Cooperation Council Crisis” European Journal of International Relations 27 (4), 1090-1113.

Social constructivists are known for their theory that norms can be ‘internalized,’ that being, that they become a taken for granted part of the fabric of any particular social environment. This paper demonstrates the utility of considering how some norms might not just be internalized, but also entrusted. It argues that entrusted norms are different from internalized norms because they have light policing and, when broken, they result in not simply a reaction of disappointment, but betrayal. As such, the offending party cannot simply return to the behavioral status quo and expect a return to the political status quo.

This paper takes this model and shows how it can be applied to understand the political fallout between Saudi Arabia and Qatar in the Gulf Cooperation Council, providing a novel reinterpretation of these events