Preparing for the Global Rush: The Arctic Council, Institutional Norms, and Socialisation of Observer Behaviour

In the past years, the Arctic states have developed a normative framework that outside actors have to adopt in order to be accepted as observers to the Arctic Council. This chapter scrutinises inasmuch three non-Arctic actors—the European Union, Poland, and China—as observers to the Arctic Council have been socialised into Arctic ways of thinking through the norms and rules promoted by Arctic Council member states and Permanent Participants. Using a socialisation concept, the authors compare to which degree the three observers have internalised the mechanisms of conditionality contained in the observer rules with a special focus on the requirements of observers to respect the rights, values, and traditions of Arctic indigenous peoples and their willingness to contribute to the work of Permanent Participants.