International norms and domestic contexts: NPT accession by Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan

Chair: Paul Roe, IRES

Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, three former Soviet republics were left with nuclear weapons stationed on their territory. Belarus, Kazakhstan and Ukraine were met with a uniform expectation on the part of the US and the international community to relinquish the weapons and join the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) as non-nuclear weapons states. The three states followed distinct and different paths toward nuclear disarmament. The presentation will interrogate the project’s theoretical focus on role of international norms and domestic contestation in the unfolding of these paths.