State Building Research Papers - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Beginning in 1260, the Mongol ruler Khubilai Khan embarked on the creation of a Chinese-style bureaucracy to govern his realm more effectively. At the same time, the court began to promulgate a salary code for its officials. Though both processes were led in large part by Chinese scholar-officials, this group continually complained about the shortcomings of the salary code and its negative effects on the bureaucracy. By studying their writings on salaries and official government records, this article will demonstrate that the Chinese literati used their complaints about the salary code to level criticisms against flaws in the administration and to push for bureaucratic reform, and that the Yuan court was genuinely concerned about the salary problem and took measures to alleviate it. Yet the court never actually reformed, and this article will ultimately aim to show how the response to the issue of salaries reflected the Mongols’ desires to cling to the power and privilege that was afforded to them by a bureaucratic structure which preserved much of their traditional steppe institutions and values.

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- Political History, State Building, Yuan Dynasty, Institutions

“Warlords, Strongman Governors, and the State in Afghanistan” was written by Dipali Mukhopadhyay, Assistant Professor of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University, and explores how some of the warlords in Afghanistan turned into political representatives of the central government after 2001. Though warlords are often considered as threats to the stability of a country, the central government of Kabul engaged some of them to establish a strong administration beyond the capital of Kabul and manage the periphery.

- by Zafar Shayan
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- Afghanistan, State Building, Warlords, Governors

The present volume focuses on the relationship between office-holders and local communities in premodern Europe. It aims to further our understanding of popular political participation in practices of controlling officers by shifting the emphasis from bureaucratic expansion and state-building to the agency of the people. The underlying assumption is that communities played a central role in holding office-holders to account and thereby contributed fundamentally to shaping premodern rule and authority.
The essays in the volume address different mechanisms of accountability in various geographical and chronological contexts. Yet none offers a traditional study of office-holders using institutional and prosopographical approaches. Instead, they all focus on the people in their various communities and their interactions with representatives of central authority taking a bottom-up perspective and highlighting these communities as key actors who exerted tangible and visible control over the officers’ behaviour, their self-image, and their individual scope for action. This article serves as an introductory essay to the historiographical context in which the volume operates, before developing its methodological and thematic approach. A last section will introduce the individual contributions connecting them to the themes and the main questions of the volume.

À cheval sur les Alpes occidentales, le Piémont-Savoie occupe une place majeure sur l'échiquier européen à l'époque moderne. L’étude de la construction de cet État d’entre-deux propose d’envisager la géopolitique européenne à travers l’histoire d’une maison princière, celle de Savoie, de la restauration de son duché en 1559 à l’annexion de ses territoires francophones par la France révolutionnaire en 1792-1793. Elle s’articulera autour de trois axes : l’ambitieuse politique territoriale des Savoie, la diplomatie de cette dynastie et le jeu des grandes puissances.

- by Alexandre Ruelle
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- Geopolitics, War Studies, State Building, Diplomatie

This essay analyzes Indonesian policy on West Papua, one of the most conflict-prone regions in the country. It aims to explain the limits as well as the risks of a prosperity approach—as opposed to a security approach—taken by the Government of Indonesia in order to bring peace and to strengthen its legitimacy in the region. Particularly, this paper looks at two strategic policies in the last 15 years—decentralization with special autonomy (Otsus) and the establishment of new local governments (Pemekaran) that signify the shifting of the government approach to Papua from a security to prosperity approach. Instead of bringing peace and strengthening the state’s legitimacy, these policies tend to deteriorate.

- by Arie Ruhyanto
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- State Formation, Indonesia, State Building, West Papua
- by Archit Vasudev
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- Comparative Politics, Social Contract Theory, Political Science, State Building

Part I of this article found that, in South Korea and Taiwan, institutional
legacy and continuity as well as the politics of aid did matter for
post-war state-building. The inheritance and continuity of Weberian
states and the receipt of aid either as budget support or increasingly
aligned with local priorities helped to foster state-building. Part II of
the study in this article explores a different dynamic of post-war aid
to Afghanistan and Iraq which had a legacy of neopatrimonial and
weak states. It argues that under more adverse initial conditions – for
a neopatrimonial state – the role of aid regime and state-building
strategies become even more important. Under these conditions,
aid and state-building strategies may undermine state-building if
they induce discontinuity in the existing state capacity and create
parallel institutions to those of the state. Depending on the policies,
state weakness may be reinforced if leaders are preoccupied with the
politics of patronage.

- by Nematullah Bizhan
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- Afghanistan, State Building, Iraq, Foreign Aid

Cómo citar: Uribe, Simón, Silvia Otero-Bahamón e Isabel Peñaranda. 2021. "Hacer el estado: carreteras, conflicto y órdenes locales en los territorios de las FARC". Revista de Estudios Sociales 75: 87-100. https://doi.org/10.7440/res75.2021.08 R E S U M E N | En agosto de 2017, como parte de los acuerdos de paz con el gobierno colombiano, las Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC) hicieron entrega de una extensa lista de bienes destinados a reparar a las víctimas del conflicto armado. Entre estos se incluyeron cerca de 3.700 kilómetros de carreteras, la mayoría localizadas en zonas de influencia de esta guerrilla. En este artículo indagamos el tipo de actores, colaboraciones, relaciones de poder y tecnologías que hicieron posible la construcción de carreteras en Puerto Guzmán, un municipio amazónico con presencia prolongada de las FARC. En este sentido, argumentamos que la construcción y transformación en el tiempo de estas infraestructuras permiten entender al estado como una coproducción que involucra dinámicas y actores distintos, algunos antagónicos al orden estatal.

- by Simón Uribe and +1
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- Latin American Studies, Peace and Conflict Studies, Colombia, Post-conflict Reconstruction and Development

The fall of Muammar al-Qadhafi in October 2011 marked the end of the Libyan uprising, led to the close of NATO’s intervention “Operation Unified Protector” (OUP), and ushered in a delicate political transformation which failed to come to a quick and decisive end with the first round of elections held in early July 2012. To assess some major pitfalls of the current transitional process, this article will propose an analysis of two main challenges the new Libyan authorities will face, the proper handling of which will determine the nature and stability of the future state. The first challenge is the political transition from an autocratic regime via revolutionary credentials to democratic legitimacy. The second involves the construction and governance of an entirely reshaped security sector, both in the military and civilian realms, transcending their previous roles in the Jamahiriyya either as Praetorian Guard or as state-sponsored bullies.

- by Justine Chauvin
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- State Building, Post-Conflict State Building
- by Alma Poloni
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- Medieval Studies, Rural History, State Building, History of the Family

Since the mid-twentieth century China and India have entertained a difficult
relationship, erupting into open war in 1962. Shadow States is the first book to
unpack Sino-Indian tensions from the angle of competitive state-building -
through a study of their simultaneous attempts to win the approval and support
of the Himalayan people. When China and India tried to expand into the
Himalayas in the twentieth century, their lack of strong ties to the region and
the absence of an easily enforceable border made their proximity threatening -
observing China and India’s state-making efforts, local inhabitants were in a
position to compare and potentially choose between them. Using rich and
original archival research, Bérénice Guyot-Réchard shows how India and China
became each other’s ‘shadow states’. Understanding these recent, competing
processes of state formation in the Himalayas is fundamental to understanding
the roots of tensions in Sino-Indian relations.

- by Marcello Bonazza
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- Modern History, State Formation, State Building, Fiscal History

Foucault’s Panopticon and Orwell’s Big Brother popularized the suggestive idea that we are constantly being observed from above or by a single central institution, yet many fundamental services in society like security, the rule of law and healthcare have relied in the past and still today rely at least partially on observations made and communicated by regular citizens who neither observe ‘from above’ nor are representatives of any particular institution. The concept of cultures of vigilance, developed by an interdisciplinary group of scholars based at the University of Munich,
aims to grasp the complex involvement of ordinary people in tasks set by society in the past and in the present. It thus shifts the attention from institutions and their norms to services rendered by people who willingly report what they have seen, heard or sometimes smelt. Acting in such a way often meant (and still means) walking a thin line between reporting on others and complying with civic duties.

- by Paola Molino and +1
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- American History, Modern History, Media Studies, Media and Cultural Studies

Acercamiento a la historia de la Inspección tributaria en la España del siglo XIX. Los orígenes históricos de la Inspección se ponen en relación con los principios que inspiraban la Hacienda liberal y la implementación de estos en una Administración fiscal encaminada a aplicarlos, todo ello en el marco del proceso histórico de construcción del Estado nacional.

- by Juan Pro
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- State Building, State-Building, Historia fiscal, Historia Contemporánea de España
- by Erik Swart
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- Military History, History of Mathematics, State Formation, State Building

Spies played a crucial role in early modern imperial rivalries. While past scholars have emphasized the Islam/Christendom divide in the Mediterranean, these go-betweens, who mastered the codes of both cultures, easily crossed invisible boundaries between civilizations and connected the Ottomans and the Habsburgs, two imperial powers at each other’s throat. Apart from providing both empires with regular information on political and military developments, these entrepreneur information brokers played an active diplomatic role between two capitals and even participated in Ottoman factional politics. This dissertation compares both empires’ secret services and explains the differences between the two systems of information gathering based on these empires’ differing organizational structures. It argues that the Habsburgs tried to institutionalize and standardize their secret services in accordance with their general efforts of bureaucratization and centralization, even though the effect...

This is a year-long research project aiming to understand to what extent armed groups can participate (sustain or undermine) in endogenous state-building projects. Case studies : Somaliland (successful integration and state-making) and... more

- by Luiza G Cerioli and +2
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- United Nations, State Building

Dans les contextes sécuritaire et politique actuels marqués par les exactions de la secte islamiste Boko Haram et la crise anglophone, le thème de l'unité nationale alimente en permanence les discours des hommes politiques, des leaders d'opinion et des citoyens ordinaires au Cameroun. Tandis que certains célèbrent l'unité d'un pays un et indivisible, d'autres dénoncent la marginalisation et la conspiration. Ainsi, au-delà de l'instinct patriotique manifesté par le rejet de toute influence étrangère dans leurs affaires intérieures, il reste difficile pour les Camerounais de dépasser leurs différences pour construire une nation multiculturelle débarrassée de luttes politiques et d'autres instrumentalisations ethniques et linguistiques. Notre ambition dans cette contribution est d'explorer les fondements du discours sur l'unité nationale au Cameroun, les manifestations de l'échec et de proposer des pistes d'action.

- by Juan Carlos Sarazua
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- Welfare State, State Building, Nation building and State making

The reconstruction of the duchy achieved by Filippo Maria between 1412 and 1421 is a vantage point to observe some of the deep structures on which the Milanese State relied. The analysis of the oaths of allegiance to the prince shows that the Lombard political society of the early fifteenth century did not fully coincide with the urban élites, and reveals a plurality of subjects (rural lords, lineages, communities, factions) capable to undertake political initiative at different levels.

- by Marco Gentile
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- History, Medieval History, Italian (European History), State Building

The broader subject of this study relates to the reasons why states emulate the military technologies and organizational structures one another. It focuses on large-scale emulation, those that encompasses the entire military system, instead of the mere adoption of weapons systems or punctual adjusts in the existing practices. In this sense, its main goal is to analyze and to explain the absence and the presence of a large-scale military reform in Russia after the post-Cold War period, with a special emphasis on what regards its level of external threat, state capacity, proven ineffectiveness and the large-scale emulation process that began after the Russo-Georgian War. In order to do so, this master thesis makes use of Neoclassical Realism as well as Historical Comparative Method and use of process tracing tool. It aims to answer the following question: why Russia set in motion its military reform in 2008? The hypothesis is that Russia has initiated it military reform in 2008 due to concomitant existence of: i) a high level of external threat (absence of strategic stability or in risk); ii) high level of state capacity (state capable of extracting and mobilizing resources) and; iii) presence of proven ineffectiveness (Russo-Georgian War). Finally, it argues that to equate the absence of a balanced distribution of material capacities in the international system, during the post-Cold War, to the lack of balancing by other states and, consequently, decreeing the end of the dynamics of the balance of power in unipolarity is only possible if one ignores the main dynamics of the balance of power, namely internal balancing. In sum, the dynamics of the balance of power did not cease in the post-Cold War period, especially if Russia's military reform is understood as an internal balancing strategy of large-scale military emulation aimed at balancing the United States in order to maintaining strategic stability.

This study refers to which dynamics should history be built on while
structuring a state. In this sense, function of history in building a state has been tried
to be determined through historiography that has been carried out in Azerbaijan for
the last two centuries. Thus, role of history, as a constructive element, in building a
state has been pointed out both theoretically and practically.
Azerbaijani historiography on which a feudal historiography tradition limited
to eastern Mohammedanism was prevailing methodologically in the 18th century
could make progress only after the Russian occupation in the 19th century.
Azerbaijani history started to be considered as a part of Turkish history under the
nationalism idea in early 20th century while it has been written in line with Russianguided
Marxist-Leninist views and on the basis of dialectic materialism as the Soviet
regime became prevailing on Azerbaijani life. In this time period, some subjective
approaches to Azerbaijani historiography had been seen and historical realities had
neglected. In particular, several subjects such as history-writing, history training and
establishing national identity had been tried to be re-formed in a Sovietic point of
view in order to be able to damage socio-cultural and political bonds between
Turkish-speaking populations. Azerbaijani historiography was also affected by these
policies designed especially for Turkish-speaking region.
Azerbaijani intelligentsia captivated by nationalism movement with the
dismemberment of the Soviet Union attempted to construct a new nation. The
principle of being national for Azerbaijan has come into existence together with
becoming free from Sovietic elements. On the other hand, duality experienced in
determining the context of nation concept leads to discussions on sincerity. The
national identity that was based on Turkish ethical structure in Elçibey period was
tried to be constructed on a cosmopolite population in Aliyev period which was
similar to the Soviet point of view.
The said fact has affected historiographical activities inevitably. Azerbaijani
history that is still tried to be formed depending on understandings from Soviet
period is now under construction through a cosmopolite structure limited to a
geographical area which is heritage of Soviet historiography. In conclusion,
Azerbaijani historiography suffers from not being able to draw away from Soviet
historiography. Despite all these complications, mission fastened on history in
nation-state construct of the Republic of Azerbaijan holds its validity.

- by Fuat Hacısalihoğlu
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- History, Russian Studies, Political Philosophy, Soviet Regime

Les régimes semi-autoritaires ont souvent été décrits sous l'angle de leur organisation, formelle et informelle ; on sait qu'ils autorisent la liberté d'association, le pluralisme politique, que les médias libéralisés y façonnent un espace public et qu'en même temps, des dispositifs non officiels rendent l'alternance pratiquement impossible. La démocratie et ses élections constituent une façade qui confère au régime sa légitimité sans l'exposer au risque de la compétition politique. Ce qu'il importe de documenter plus précisément. aujourd'hui, c'est la manière dont ces transformations institutionnelles (nouveaux pouvoirs locaux, élections, liberté d'association et de la presse...) rendent possibles et façonnent un espace imaginaire et pratique au sein duquel s'élabore une critique du pouvoir établi. La question est donc de savoir comment s'opèrent les oppositions de consciences et de pratiques, les insubordinations et les révoltes vis-à-vis du pouvoir dans un contexte où leur légitimité n'est pas remise en cause mais où elles aboutissent rarement aux résultats espérés. Qu'advient-il des oppositions frustrées ? Comment les transformations institutionnelles, même neutralisées, insufflent-elles un dynamisme politique ? Et quel dynamisme ? L'objectif de cet ouvrage est d'apporter quelques éléments de réponses à ces questions en partant d'études de cas menées au Burkina Faso. Outre une contribution à l'analyse des régimes semi-autoritaires, ce livre propose un aperçu à la fois synthétique et détaillé de la situation politique du pays.

- by Mathieu Hilgers
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- Entrepreneurship, Entrepreneurship, Religion, Sociology

Vivere ‘‘a modo di citta`’’. I centri minori italiani nel Basso Medioevo: autonomie, privilegio, fiscalita`. The ‘minor’ urbanization in Central and Northern Italy will be analysed examining the status, in terms of autonomy and privilege, of settlements which had not a see (but whose size and functions anywhere else in Europe wouldcertainly have been considered as urban) in comparison with the cities proper, i.e.episcopal centres, holders of wide powers on a large part of their diocese. This will
be done through an outline of fiscal systems of those states in which these ‘minor’towns and the major cities were absorbed during the 14th and 15th centuries; and also by reconsidering the previous stages (12th-13th cent.), during which the institutional and social distinction between cities and smaller towns (i.e. the powers and privileges
of the former, and the exclusion of the latter from them) was traced out and became a long lasting character.

- by Maria Ausiliatrice Ginatempo
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- Economic History, Medieval History, Urban History, State Building

Employing a poststructuralist-meets-anarchist stance that advances conceptual insight into the nature of sovereign power, this article examines the dialectics of capitalism/primitive accumulation, civilization/savagery, and law/violence, which are argued to exist in a mutually reinforcing 'trilateral of logics'. In deciphering this triadic system, this article offers a radical (re)appraisal of capitalism, its legal process, and its civilizing effects, which together serve to mask the originary and ongoing violences of primitive accumulation and the property system. Such obfuscation suggests that wherever the trilateral of logics is enacted, so too is the state of exception called into being, exposing us all as potential homo sacer (life that does not count). Proceeding as a diagnostic assessment of sovereign power, where although signposted by Cambodia's contemporary experiences of violent land conflict, this article is not intended as a fine-grained empirical analysis. Instead, it forwards a theoretical dialogue where Cambodia's neoliberalizing processes offer a window on how sovereign power configures itself around the three discursive-institutional constellations (i.e., capitalism, civilization, and law) that form the trilateral of logics. Rather than formulating prescriptive solutions, the intention here is critique, where in particular it is argued that the preoccupation with strengthening Cambodia's legal system should not be read as a panacea for contemporary social ills, but as an imposition that serves to legitimize the violences of property.

- by Simon Springer
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- Critical Theory, History, Economic History, Sociology

The media discourse on recent agricultural investments, frequently termed the 'land grab', has been quick to label these deals as 'neo-colonial', in doing so, implying that investment is undermining national sovereignty. For the most part, the emerging academic literature on the 'land grab' has not critically examined this assumption. This paper draws on the literature on state building and agrarian relations in Africa, constructing a framework that can be used to analyse the impact of agricultural investment on state-society relations and sovereignty. The paper then uses this framework to examine the case of Ethiopia, illustrating how the Ethiopian state has directed investors to peripheral lowlands and, in doing so, has enhanced, rather than diminished, state sovereignty. As such, while the erosion of sovereignty is certainly one possible outcome of agricultural investment, it is by no means the only one, and is an assumption that should be subjected to critical analysis.

- by Tom Lavers
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- Political Economy, Sovereignty, State Building, Agriculture

Il tema dell'aristocrazia territoriale e del suo ruolo nella costituzione del ducato visconteo-sforzesco è stato marginalizzato dalla storiografia politico-istituzionale in favore di un paradigma interpretativo centrato su un modello di stato territoriale a base urbana. Diverse ricerche recenti, tuttavia, hanno mostrato la necessità di complicare tale modello e di sottoporlo verifiche puntuali nelle sue articolazioni locali, rimarcando la pluralità di attori e di linguaggi politici che anima una dialettica non costringibile nell'alveo del rapporto preferenziale principe-città. Questo contributo si propone di sottolineare alcuni aspetti della complessa interazione fra i grandi casati signorili e un potere ducale non sempre in grado di preseguire un coerente sforzo di disciplinamento dell'aristocrazia, che mantiene almeno fino alla metà del XVI secolo un forte ascendente sulla società lombarda.

- by Marco Gentile
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- Medieval History, Italian (European History), Political History, State Building

This PhD thesis contributes to the study of neo-nationalism and nationalization by the proposal of a theoretical proposal that is enriched in the comparative analysis of two concrete cases. Although these complex phenomena involve many different factors, this thesis focuses on the connections between civil society, popular culture and nationalism. In the first section, the existing works on the topic are considered. The objective is to propose a theoretical framework that enriches the perspective from ‘above’, focused mainly on the political aspects, by incorporating aspects from ‘below’ and the cultural elements of nationalism. The second section presents two case studies: Quebec (Canada) and Catalonia (Spain). Documents, primary and secondary sources, and in-depth interviews are used to observe the connections between civil society, popular culture and nationalism. Finally, these case studies are compared and critical reflections are provided on how nationalism works with different nationalization factors

- by Pablo Giori
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- History, Cultural History, Cultural Studies, Political Sociology

Alors que l’État national souverain a longtemps été considéré comme l’acteur exclusif des relations internationales, ce projet a l’ambition de nouer un dialogue entre historiens et historiens du droit pour s’interroger sur le droit international conçu comme le cadre multi-normatif qui régit les relations entre une grande variété d’acteurs. Cette notion nous paraît mieux s’adapter aux traits spécifiques de la constellation politique médiévale et pré-moderne, qui était caractérisée par l’entrelacement de différentes juridictions, fondées sur des liens de dépendance personnelle et sur des relations de sujétion territoriale, par la coexistence d’une pluralité de centres de pouvoir au statut variable et par la répartition de l’autorité politique a différents niveaux.
Les the mes abordés dans les deux rencontres (la premie re a Rome le 20 septembre 2021 et la deuxie me a Lille et Courtrai les 18-19 mai 2022) incluent la guerre, les représailles, la diplomatie, les relations féodales, le droit de la mer, le commerce ou encore les relations avec les juifs et les « infide les », notre ambition générale étant de faire porter la réflexion sur trois questions transversales : celle des acteurs du droit international ; celle des sources du droit international, qui ne constituait pas a l’époque prémoderne une branche autonome de la science juridique ; celle enfin de la gestion des conflits, en particulier a travers la négociation, la médiation et l’arbitrage
Comité scientifique: Dante Fedele, Randall Lesaffer, Pierre Savy

- by Isabella Lazzarini
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- Medieval History, Early Modern History, International Law, State Building