State Theory and Statebuilding: Towards a Gramscian Approach (original) (raw)

Introduction: The Limits of Statebuilding and the Analysis of State-Formation,

2010

The ‘international community’ is not the only actor engaged in statebuilding processes; contemporaneously with external intervention, at national and local levels of non-Western societies other actors are also engaged in struggles to establish their own visions of a state. The results are ambiguous: the states built tend to be hybrid, combining formal modern state façades with informal ways of functioning. This essay introduces the Special Issue by outlining the importance of the analysis of the dynamics of state-formation: the deformation that statebuilding undergoes in the process of its implementation. This framework can provide new insights into the limits of statebuilding by highlighting how the negotiation processes accompanying any attempt at statebuilding are shaped to a great extent by non-Western states' and societies' specific embeddedness in global structures. These states are currently subject to deepening dynamics of internationalization and informalization which, despite a growing formal convergence of state institutions with Western models, structurally limit the probabilities of ensuing liberal-democratic state-formation.

The Challenges of Statebuilding

The thread running through this essay is that there are really no easy ways to deal with the challenges and dilemmas of statebuilding as they are inherent to the process. The only safeguards are to follow the guidelines espoused in OECD Conflict Sensitive intervention protocols such as Do No Harm. The intervener has to understand local conflict dynamics and understand that their involvement is a possible incentive for continued conflict and thus act in a manner that mitigates their effects.

Jekyll or Hyde: what is statebuilding creating? Evidence from the ‘field’

As a response to the dynamics of state formation, statebuilding has not created model states in the last twenty years as was intended. Instead, the states that have emerged around the world are heavily contextually contingent. This is despite international attempts to shape them according to a common pattern, dominated by neoliberal models of statehood. This raises the question of what kind of hybrid states are actually forming as a result of the encounter between international statebuilding and local political dynamics? This article argues that international statebuilding aims to create neoliberal states and treats local political dynamics as dysfunctional. Yet from a local perspective the limitations of the statebuilding model are also apparent, as is the need for any locally legitimate state to be grounded in its context.

The State in Times of Statebuilding

Civil Wars, 2008

This article explores the effects of the contemporary politics of state building on the non-western state. The main argument is that the corresponding strategies of external institution building and/or the international substitution of state functions entail contradictions that inherently limit the chances of an external strengthening of stateness. Statebuilding is constrained, first, by the statebuilders’ own social logics limiting their scope and, second, by the incapacity of statebuilding practices to generate the local legitimacy necessary for stable political rule. Despite these limits, state building discourses and practices nonetheless have a strong influence on the nonwestern state. The state-in-society conception applied to study these effects suggests that statebuilding results in a simultaneous internationalisation and informalisation of the non-western state, i.e., in its enduring determination by international agencies and its constant bending, circumvention and contestation by informal local practices.

WHAT IS STATE-BUILDING (GENERALLY)? THE STATE-BUILDING AGENDA

State-building is a term used in state theory. It describes the construction of a functioning state. This concept was first used in connection to the creation of states in Western Europe and focused on the power enforcement of state in society (Tilly 1975). Tilly (1975: 70f.) described the advantages of state building in Europe as follows: "State building provided for the emergence of specialized personnel, control over consolidated territory, loyalty, and durability, permanent institutions with a centralized and autonomous state that held the monopoly of violence over a given population". STATE-BUILDING (AFGHANISTAN) The state is the basic unit of political control and legitimacy in the modern world. The international system is primarily composed of states that recognize each other's sovereignty—that is, ultimate legal authority—over a demarcated territory. According to international law and norms, the exercise of this sovereignty imposes obligations to respect the rights of citizens, other people, and other states, according to the law of nations. Yet, no state can carry out these obligations unless it has certain capacities. The basic capacity that defines a state and enables it to carry out the obligations of sovereignty is a monopoly, or near monopoly, of the legitimate use of force within the territory over which it is sovereign. To merit recognition, a state is expected to use force legitimately, in accordance with law. The monopoly of the use of force is a prerequisite for carrying out other obligations of a state, such as protecting the rights of and providing services to its citizens and other inhabitants, as well as participating in international organizations and institutions to promote and protect international security according to international law. During the past quarter-century in Afghanistan, several governments used the state to exercise violence lawlessly. In addition, the growth of numerous armed groups deprived any of them, including governments in Kabul (whether or not they received international recognition) of a monopoly of the use of force. All of these entities violated the rights of Afghans, and the ability of any of them to provide even a low level of services declined. Rather than participating in efforts to provide international security, Afghanistan became a source of international insecurity. Building a state that can protect rights, provide services, and promote security requires a number of interdependent processes. At a minimum, these include: i. Demobilizing and dissolving all armed forces not controlled by the state. ii. Forming and training armed forces and police to protect international and domestic security in accordance with law. iii. Forming and training all components of a legal system, from legislators to judges and prosecutors, to provide a legal framework for the functioning of the state and other social relations. iv. Raising revenue in accordance with law to pay for the functioning of the state. v. Creating and training an administration capable of raising revenue and providing services to citizens and other inhabitants. In a state long torn by conflict, all of these processes have to be started over, sometimes from a very low level. It is useful to make a conceptual distinction between de jure and de facto states. De jure states exist by fiat of the international community, which recognizes them as sovereign entities whether or not they have a government that can effectively control or administer their territory. De facto states actually administer a territory. States that enjoy international recognition and exercise control through adequate institutions are both de jure and de facto. States may provide better services and otherwise perform better when they are democratic, but building a state is not the same as building democracy. A functioning state is the foundation on which democracy must be built. Without a state apparatus capable of providing security and rule of law, the election of office holders does not enable people to govern themselves, for those elected have no tools to govern, and the people have no instrument to hold them accountable. Hence building a state is the primary task of building sustainable peace. The state-building agenda is at the heart of Afghanistan's economic, political, and social reconstruction—with strong linkages to economic growth and private sector development, poverty reduction, phasing out

Laying the Foundations of the State: Identifying the Constituent Factors of State Building

This paper seeks to synthesize theories from the comparative politics and international relations literature about what leads to state building and the growth of state capacity. It draws upon these theories to develop a range of empirical propositions and test them using the State Capacity Dataset (Hanson and Sigman 2013). The objective is for these findings to help determine the relative importance of different explanatory factors and facilitate the process of bringing them together into a holistic framework.

Rethinking Weberian Approaches to Statebuilding

Political sociology is key to understanding current debates on statebuilding. One’s conception of what to rebuild – the state – will necessarily impact the actual process of statebuilding, whether consciously or unconsciously. Drawing upon the vast contemporary literature on state collapse and statebuilding that has emerged since Helman and Ratner’s pioneer article in 1992-1993, this chapter analyses the rise of the ‘institutional approach’ to statebuilding, strongly influenced by the Weberian sociology of the state and legitimacy, and focusing on the capabilities of the state institutions to secure its grip on the society. Three practical implications of the institutional approach will be considered in this chapter: 1) the claim of forecasting state collapse and the underlying equation between fragile states and ‘underdevelopment’; 2) the hermetic distinction between state and society, which allows the differentiation between statebuilding activities and ‘nation-building’ ones; and 3) the ‘more is better’ approach that comes as a natural policy prescription – legitimizing intrusive interventions on the ground that they are more efficient for institutional reconstruction. Finally, this chapter will highlight an alternative approach to the state and statebuilding, dubbed here the ‘legitimacy approach’, more concerned with socio-political cohesion of the state than institutional reconstruction per se.