Navigating normative change: China in the UN Peacekeeping Regime

Abstract

China is a key player in the UN peacekeeping regime – active in voting, deploying, designing mandates, and financing peacekeeping missions. China is a norm consumer within the UN peacekeeping regime – keenly supporting UN peacekeeping principles: consent, impartiality and limited use of force in self-defense or defense of the mandate. However, China is also a norm entrepreneur, using its position to reaffirm corollary peacekeeping norms: that all UN peacekeeping missions should only occur under UN Security Council authorization, and that regional organizations should have a greater input over peacekeeping activities. China’s pursuit of norms is partly driven by instrumental purposes – after all an international system that rests upon state control is of benefit to China, a strong proponent of Westphalian sovereignty underpinning the international system. However, there is also evidence that China pursues these norms for non-instrumental, identity purposes also. China is the only power in the UN peacekeeping regime that has two identities: simultaneously a great power and a developing state. By abiding by these norms and advocating for ones that further harden a state-centric system, China is indeed conforming to standards of good behaviour as defined by its peers in its reference groups.