The rapid and widespread emergence of an anti-plastic shopping bag norm
and associated regulatory policies around the world in recent years forces a
rethinking of current understandings of norm dynamics and policy
implementation. The patterns of this movement are explored and
characterised as a South to North, non-networked and multi-scalar series
of events that together represent a globally significant emergence of a new
environmental norm. It also shows that differences in policy outcomes as a
response to this norm in different countries and at different jurisdictional
levels are in many ways linked to the influence of material interests in the
interpretation of the norm into policy. These variations in domestic norm
interpretation in turn influence international norm dynamics.