Tag Archives: inclusiveness
Social Covenants: The Missing Ingredient in State Building Efforts
Political theorists have for the most part focused on the state when thinking about how to make countries work better for their populations. This has naturally led to a concern with state-society relations, how governments are chosen and run, and institutions. There is wide consensus that social contracts play the central role in state building.
This thinking has heavily influenced how the international community approaches fragile states, post-conflict situations, and transitions as well as development in general. As the OECD/DAC explained in Concepts and Dilemmas of State Building in Fragile Situations:
Fragility arises primarily from weaknesses in the dynamic political process through which citizens’ expectations of the state and state expectations of citizens are reconciled and brought into equilibrium with the state’s capacity to deliver services. Reaching equilibrium in this negotiation over the social contract is the critical if not sole determinant of resilience, and disequilibrium the determinant of fragility. [page 7]
This focus on the state shapes responses to crises in places such as the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Libya, Syria, and Afghanistan, compelling the international community to prioritize the establishment of a transitional regime and fast track elections under the belief that this is the sole way to create legitimacy no matter the circumstances or the context.
But many of these countries have deeply-entrenched problems that a focus on the state cannot solve. Different religious, ethnic, and clan groups do not work together well, and see any competition for power as a zero sum game for exclusive control of the state. Government is weakly institutionalized, and unable to act as an independent, equitable arbitrator between different interests. Judges and officials are beholden to personal relationships, power politics, or money (and sometimes all three). In such places, winners of elections rarely see it as their duty to serve all their people, and often define their rights as whatever they can get away with—negating whatever social contract the process was supposed to establish. (more…)
Causes of Revolution: The Role of Youth and other Social Factors
By Jack A. Goldstone, George Mason University
The below are excerpts from an article originally appearing in World Politics Review.
The conditions for revolt or revolution to spread throughout society are reasonably well established: First, the national government must be closed to broad participation or popular control. Second, the government must be weakened by some sort of crisis. This crisis may be a material one, such as a military or development failure, fiscal distress, sustained inflation or sharp spikes in food prices. Or the crisis may be ideological, as when a government seeks to impose an ideology that is widely opposed by its own elites, or when a government is seen as compromised by identification with foreign enemies. Or it may be a succession crisis that leads elites to shift allegiances and contend for power in a coming leadership change. Several of these items may combine to create a widespread sense of uncertainty and anxiety about the future.
In such periods of social anxiety, a great deal depends on which groups are willing to support the regime and which groups still perceive the leadership as legitimate. Governments that are perceived as just and effective generally retain the support of key elites and thus popular groups; they are therefore quite resistant in the face of . . . challenges. On the other hand, states that are widely considered ineffective or unjust by their population rapidly lose key supporters and can succumb with astounding quickness in the face of challenges — as in the Philippines in 1986, the Soviet Union in 1989 and Tunisia and Egypt in 2010-2011. (more…)
More on Conflict and Security, Governance, Investing
What the Swiss Can Teach Us About Development
International efforts to help developing countries start with a mental model of how government should be structured. It is based on the most common European model of state building—a model initially developed by France but shared by most countries today. European history did, however, have another model, one that is not well remembered but that may be much more useful for fragile states—the Swiss model. (more…)
Legal Pluralism: Improving Security and Justice in Fragile States
Improving security and justice in fragile states is a major theme for political leaders, scholars, and donors. Foreign aid agencies have spent billions attempting to catalyze improvements in these areas within other countries. Yet despite this money and much hard work, the track record of past efforts has been paltry.
Why?
A large part of the reason can be traced to how these issues–and the concept of state building–is approached. (more…)
More on Africa, Capacity Building, Foreign aid, Fragile States, Governance, Review
Initiating and Sustaining Developmental States in Africa
What policies and governance conditions are needed in Africa for it to match the economic and social achievements of Asia? This video, from a presentation at Johns Hopkins University, presents some answers. It presents the findings of two research projects, with important implications for the future of development in Africa. Note the focus on developmental states. It is the nature of the regime more than the way it gains power that matters. (more…)
More on Africa, East Asia, Economic Development, Foreign aid, Governance, Policies, Poverty, Videos
How Myanmar (Burma)’s Ethnic Diversity Holds Back Democracy
The biggest problem facing Myanmar (Burma) today is not its lack of democracy, but its lack of peace. Since World War II, the country has experienced almost continuous conflict, with more sustained and diverse ethnic insurgencies than any other place in the world. This history has had devastating consequences for its politics, economy, and infrastructure. Introducing a set of policies that ends the insurgencies is a prerequisite for advancing democracy and development.
There are a number of things that differentiates Myanmar and its 60 million people from its far more successful Southeast Asian neighbors—and explain why its history is so different from theirs. (more…)
More on Conflict and Security, East Asia, Fragile States, Governance, Identity, Maps, South Asia
Diagram Explaining the Politics of Inclusive Development
The newly launched Effective States and Inclusive Development Research Centre (ESID) has put together a diagram that explains the relationship between politics and inclusive development. (more…)
More on Economic Development, Governance, Politics, Poverty
New Bibliography on the Politics of Development
The newly formed Effective States and Inclusive Development (ESID) Research Centre, based at the University of Manchester, has just produced an excellent annotated bibliography on “developmental states, political settlements, and citizenship formation.” (more…)
