ABSTRACT
Chapter Two begins by outlining the basic tenets of the concept of legitimacy and considering current approaches to understanding international legitimacy, in order to critique the existing treatment of legitimacy by de facto state scholars. This chapter then draws on the discussion to establish a practicable definition of international legitimacy that is grounded in Ian Clark’s legitimist interpretation of international society. By synthesising this definition and the articulation of the international system and state identity complex in the previous chapter, it proposes a framework of normative standing that has explanatory utility for developing a deeper understanding of the relationship between de facto states and international society, which will be explored in the empirical case studies of Nagorno Karabakh, the Republic of Somaliland and the Kurdistan Region of Iraq in the remaining chapters.
