Social:Norm entrepreneur

Short description: Someone interested in changing social norms

A norm entrepreneur is someone interested in changing social norms. Cass Sunstein coined the term in his 1996 paper titled Social Norms and Social Roles. He highlights in his paper that existing social conditions can frequently be more fragile than is typically supposed as they depend on social norms to which many may not be strongly allied. Sunstein identifies a category of people, who he calls norm entrepreneurs, who are interested in changing social norms. Their willingness and ability to persuade others of the desirability and appropriateness of certain behaviors drives the first stage of the life cycle of a norm – norm emergence. If they are successful in their endeavors they can produce what he calls norm bandwagons and norm cascades which lead to substantial changes in social norms.

Wunderlich (2020) provides an overview of norms research and discusses the ways in which international norms have emerged and developed. She defines norm entrepreneurship and provides a taxonomy of differing types of norm entrepreneurs; exploring their motives, objectives and deliminating their tools and conditions for their success. She argues there is a bias towards “feel-good” norm Entrepreneurship.

See also

• Moral entrepreneur
• Social norm