This book investigates the emergence, the dissemination and the reception of the notion of state fragility . It analyses the process of conceptualisation, examining how the fragile states concept was framed by policy makers to describe reality in accordance with their priorities in the fields of development and security. Contributors investigate the instrumental use of the state fragility label in the legitimisation of Western policy interventions in countries facing violence and profound poverty. They also emphasise the agency of actors on the receiving end, describing how the elites and governments in so-called fragile states have incorporated and reinterpreted the concept to fit their own political agendas. A first set of articles examines the role played by the World Bank, the OECD, the European Union and the G7+ in the transnational diffusion of the concept, which is understood as a critical element in the new discourse on international aid and security. A second set of papers employs three case studies (Sudan, Indonesia and Uganda) to explore the processes of appropriation, reinterpretation and the strategic use of the fragile state concept.

This book was originally published as a special issue of "Third World Quarterly.""

This book investigates the emergence, the dissemination and the reception of the notion of 'state fragility'. It analyses the process of conceptualisation, examining how the 'fragile states' concept was framed by policy makers to describe reality in accordance with their priorities in the fields of development and security. Contributors investigate the instrumental use of the 'state fragility' label in the legitimisation of Western policy interventions in countries facing violence and profound poverty. They also emphasise the agency of actors 'on the receiving end', describing how the elites and governments in so-called 'fragile states' have incorporated and reinterpreted the concept to fit their own political agendas. A first set of articles examines the role played by the World Bank, the OECD, the European Union and the G7+ in the transnational diffusion of the concept, which is understood as a critical element in the new discourse on international aid and security. A second set of papers employs three case studies (Sudan, Indonesia and Uganda) to explore the processes of appropriation, reinterpretation and the strategic use of the 'fragile state' concept. This book was originally published as a special issue of Third World Quarterly.

The agenda of external actors often includes a number of objectives that do not necessarily and automatically go together. Fostering security and stability in semi-authoritarian regimes collides with policies aimed at the support of processes of democratization prone to conflict and destabilization. Meanwhile, the promotion of national self-determination and political empowerment might lead to forms of democracy, partially incompatible with liberal understandings. These conflicting objectives are often problematized as challenges to the effectiveness of international democracy promotion. This book presents systematic research about their emergence and effects. The contributing authors investigate (post-) conflict societies, developing countries, and authoritarian regimes in Southeast Europe, Latin America, Africa, and Asia. They identify the socio-economic and political conditions in the recipient country, the interaction between international and local actors, and the capacity of international and local actors as relevant for explaining the emergence of conflicting objectives. And they empirically show that faced with conflicting objectives donors either use a 'wait and see'-approach (i.e. not to act to overcome such conflicts), they prioritize security, state-building and development over democracy, or they compromise democracy promotion with other goals. However, convincing strategies for dealing with such conflicts still need to be devised. This book was published as a special issue of Democratization.

Promotion of democracy in post-war and post-conflict societies became a topic during the 1990s. The book deals with the legality, legitimacy and effectiveness of military interventions where the international community of states not only felt impelled to engage in military humanitarian or peace-building missions but also in long-term state- and democracy-building. External actors particularly engaged in four modes, namely enforcing democratization by enduring post-war occupation (mode 1); restoring an elected government by military intervention (mode 2); intervening in on-going massacres and civil war with military forces ('humanitarian intervention') and thereby curbing the national sovereignty of those countries (mode 3) and forcing democracy on rogue states by 'democratic intervention', in other words democracy through war (mode 4). The contributions link juridical and philosophical reflections on just war ad bellum with empirical evidence post bellum in Afghanistan, Georgia, Serbia, Croatia, Cambodia and East Timor. All empirical analyses stress the complexity and difficulties to establish democracy in post-conflict societies driven or monitored by external actors. Such an endeavour implies a comprehensive agenda of political, social, and economic methods of peace-building. However, if external actors withdraw before the roots of democracy are deep enough and before democratic institutions are strong enough to stand alone, then the entire endeavour may fail. This book was originally published as a special issue of Democratization.