Decolonising Norms in International Relations — Charlotte Epstein

18. 2. 2026

In this episode, Professor Charlotte Epstein reflects on how postcolonial perspectives reshape the study of norms in international relations, challenging conventional accounts of diffusion, compliance, and legitimacy. The conversation explores colonial inheritances embedded in contemporary normative orders, while examining positionality, experience, and the epistemological stakes of critical scholarship.

Charlotte Epstein

Charlotte Epstein is Professor at Tokyo College, University of Tokyo, where her work examines how language and political power have jointly constituted the modern international order.

Working at the intersection of political theory, international relations, and intellectual history, she advances a genealogy of artifice to illuminate how modern configurations of agency have shaped phenomena ranging from environmental degradation to artificial intelligence. Her scholarship further interrogates identity, norms, and foundational concepts in IR theory, offering a historically grounded and theoretically innovative account of contemporary global politics.

Publications:

The power of words in international relations: Birth of an anti-whaling discourse

Who speaks? Discourse, the subject and the study of identity in international politics

Constructivism or the eternal return of universals in International Relations. Why returning to language is vital to prolonging the owl’s flight

The postcolonial perspective: an introduction

Against international relations norms: Postcolonial perspectives

Birth of the state: The place of the body in crafting modern politics

Content

00:00 – Introduction
01:42 – Colonialism and Postcolonialism: Conceptual Clarifications
04:08 – Rationale for Employing Postcolonial Perspectives
07:22 – Postcoloniality as Positionality Beyond Historical Periodisation
12:29 – Studying Norm Diffusion and Compliance Beyond Coercion
22:50 – Why Norms Reveal Colonial Inheritances More Sharply than Concepts
27:53 – From Norms as Practices to Norms as Epistemological Categories
32:25 – Situated Perspectives, Critical Authority, and the Risk of Relativism
35:42 – The Role of Experience in Postcolonial Norm Research
39:26 – Key Sources on the Concept of Experience
43:02 – ‘Norming’ and ‘Re-Norming’ in a Foucauldian Perspective
47:54 – The Ambivalences of Research Success
50:39 – Principal Challenges in Postcolonial Approaches to Norms