How to build a State in a non State environment?

[M-A Lagrange]

Coming back to the beginning of the threat, I would like to share this website from OECD:
http://www.oecd.org/site/0,3407,en_2..._1_1_1,00.html

What I found interesting in that particular site is the endorsement of the various governance frames and legitimacy sources in non western countries.
I believe that a good identification of what is the local understanding of local governance (basically what people expect from government, how they can get it and what government provides) is the starting point to be able to file Bob’s matrix.
Once you have this, you may have a starting point.
Naturally, it is set in the context of fragile state therefore; it is assumed that you have some sort of administration running somewhere. But still, the frame they propose is very interest in to understand what is at work in a non state context.
My primary assumption being that as mankind is a political animal, there is a form of governance what so ever at grass root level.

The various reports linked on that site may respond many of the questions raised here. (Not saying they are the bible and cannot be challenged, far from it).
Also, it’s a donor/development agencies oriented work. But still some good stuff in it.

[Stan]

I guess that is as close to the protectorate model I mentioned earlier as you are going to get. But is assumes that there is someone there we are supporting. What happens when there is no one there, do you create them?

The best way I can remotely answer some of that is using our (USG) creation and sustainment of a National Demining Office. It began with a a requests for projects out of State with DOD on the "who does it line". We at ground zero came up with a country plan, found the potential players and got the whole enchilada endorsed.

Enter US Army with a survey and State begins the funding process. The initial injection was pretty hefty to get the ball rolling and TDY personnel settled. Training and equipment was our first step and that meant finding the students who would eventually keep this project alive. Some folks were readily available from Rescue and the military, but we still needed many more and had to start advertising and screening. Better than a year before we had what we deemed necessary to commence training and providing equipment. We also had a ton of infrastructure problems that we had not counted on.

Two years into the project and things are rolling along smoothly (nobody has died).

Once they win, do you hand them off to State? What promises of support can you make?

Enter EUCOM and DOD funding in the form of more training and sustaining funds. This part is the hidden treasure albeit very complicated and intense documentation. We had a dedicated SNCO just to keep track of the money and equipment (also funded by the same pot).

A typical project or country plan with State starting and DOD sustaining is 5 years. Thereafter the people on the ground have to assess the status and progress based on established goals, etc. In our case we became an exporter of security vs just another consumer and that went over big at State and EUCOM. We are now in our 12th year and responsible for teaching and supporting neighboring countries as well as NATO.

All this also seems to assume a level of infrastructure that may not exist elsewhere - something to fight over that we have an interest in. What if our only interest is stability?

I like the principle, its the details that are not working out so well.

I may have over simplified our project when comparing it to what you're up against, but my point was there are various avenues that fund and support. The bad news... The Embassy has to get really involved and they normally assign their most junior officer with the least amount of time in country and the most Sierra already on his plate

[Bob's World]

Is this part of a larger presentation or a stand alone document?

It's a snapshot of a concept that fits into much of my work. I will continue to flesh this out and integrate it.

But this covers major conflicts, such as the defeat of the Confederacy and reintegration into the Union; the defeat of Germany and Japan getting those countries back up and running as sovereigns once again. We are still in purgatory in Iraq, but seem to be close to moving into stability; it will be understanding what lends itself most to that stability and enforcing those things that will be key to continued progress. In Afghanistan we are stuck fast in Purgatory, and little of the Coalition approach to date has focused on those things that move the country forward into stability (IMO).

Every situation is unique, but this framework is intended to be generally universal. Recognizing the current operations as peacetime combat rather than wartime combat is one significant difference offered here. The other is recognizing that resistance and revolutionary push-back is natural and that focusing on addressing the issues of governance and foreign presence that feed those natural conditions are the essential tasks in getting to stability.

Instead we enabled and protect an unsustainable model of governance that codifies illegitimacy; and then work to help defeat those who actively resist; or buy off those who merely provide support or stand neutral. Such approaches may achieve a calm period of suppressed violence, but are unlikely to produce true stability, as they pointedly ignore the essential tasks.

[slapout9]

But this covers major conflicts, such as the defeat of the Confederacy

Shouldn't be spreading enemy propaganda

[TheCurmudgeon]

M-A

I checked out the site and it was pretty good. A lot of information here. I have not had a chance to work through it but it does appear to have a little more flexibility than other things I have seen. I liked "Building Peaceful States and Societies: A DFID Practice Paper" http://www.gsdrc.org/docs/open/CON75.pdf.

Still based off the idea of a state built on rules rather than social ties - something I would consider a more recent historical development that requires a fairly substantial economic base to achieve. It still had an "if you build it they will come" feel to it, but it spent more time trying to understand the issues that matter to the people.

I have to keep telling myself that "how to build a state in a non-state environment" is the name of the thread but it seems that we (the successful states) are forcing the lessor developed territories into a mold that requires more than they can sustain. It is expensive to keep the huge bureaucracy associated with a state (particularly its external relationships and defenses). It requires the development of a cadre of experts and bureaucrats - years of training. It requires an education system to train those experts and bureaucrats. How do you do that when you have no economic base?

It seems to me that the first mission after establishing security is establishing a functioning economic system. The government could be a caretaker system at this point working "by, with, and through" the local leadership (most likely tribal leaders at this point). Once the economic system is in place (or concurrent with its establishment) you can start to build within the limits of the capabilities of that economic system. Don't try to build a Rolls Royce when all you can afford to maintain is a Hugo.

[Bob's World]

Curmudgeon,

Instead of "how" to build a state in a non-state environment, an equally important, if not more so, question is "WHY" build a state in a non-state environment??

Many of the same regions the west agonizes over as being "non-state" or "failed state" or "ungoverned" are also the same regions that skipped generations of technology, such as landline telephones, and went straight to satellite and cellular.

As many important voices are recognizing, the world is changing, and that concepts such as "sovereignty" are evolving as well. Why would these regions, these populaces, not skip a generation of governance as well?? Perhaps, in fact, they already are and it is freaking us out.

This is one more case where making minor adaptations within ourselves is probably far more proper and effective than setting out to force major adaptations onto others.

Just a thought.

Bob

[TheCurmudgeon]

Many of the same regions the west agonizes over as being "non-state" or "failed state" or "ungoverned" are also the same regions that skipped generations of technology, such as landline telephones, and went straight to satellite and cellular.

Reminds me of the advantage of backwardness:

From time to time during the last seventy years, students of societal development have proposed some version of what has come to be known as the "advantage of backwardness" hypothesis (e.g., Service; Spencer; Trotsky; Veblen). Reduced to barest essentials, this hypothesis asserts that less developed societies sometimes enjoy advantages that allow them to overtake more developed societies at a later date. Proponents of this hypothesis have noted that societies that pioneer in the development of new technoeconomic systems have to pay the sometimes heavy costs of innovation (i.e., the costs of "research and development"). More important still, they become committed by heavy capital investments to early forms of the new technology that may soon be surpassed. In contrast, their more backward competitors avoid the costs of research and development and are freer to adopt later and more advanced forms of the technology when they appear.

(Patrick D. Nolan and Gerhard Lenski, Technoeconomic Heritage, Patterns of Development, and the Advantage of Backwardness Social Forces, Vol. 64, No. 2 (Dec., 1985), pp. 341-358, p. 341)

I understand the idea in theory, but still think it requires an economic base. It also seems to be more closely associate with technology than with political organizations. Maybe I have been reading too much Materialism theory trying to get to the basics of what governments have to provide to be seen as legitimate. In any case, there must be another model that can be developed. Something less than a state but more than chaos.

[Bob's World]

Well, when one maps out "failed states" they typically occur where some colonial western power has sought to impose a foreign concept of governance onto a populace with no historical or cultural foundation for the same. Then we accuse these same disrupted people of being "failed" once that colonial influence withdraws and leaves them to their own devices.

By focusing less on creating "states" and more on empowering the development of workable solutions to governance, tailored by region, populace, culture (I believe this is called "Self-determination" and was once highly regarded as a noble concept in America), we get to better results.

[TheCurmudgeon]

Instead of "how" to build a state in a non-state environment, an equally important, if not more so, question is "WHY" build a state in a non-state environment??

I actually think that is the what we ourselves don't understand. Why are we doing this. Is it for our own security? Is it to promote a political agenda like exporting democracy? Is it to extend human rights to places where they have not existed before? Is it to gain access to natural resources or preclude a potential adversary from the same? Is it all of the above?

Back to the problem of mission creep. What is the FINAL objective or do we even know what it is?

Again, off topic - so I will cease and desist my rant.

[TheCurmudgeon]

Well, when one maps out "failed states" they typically occur where some colonial western power has sought to impose a foreign concept of governance onto a populace with no historical or cultural foundation for the same. Then we accuse these same disrupted people of being "failed" once that colonial influence withdraws and leaves them to their own devices.

By focusing less on creating "states" and more on empowering the development of workable solutions to governance, tailored by region, populace, culture (I believe this is called "Self-determination" and was once highly regarded as a noble concept in America), we get to better results.

I agree. I am not sure where this is taking us, but I like "self-determination" a lot better than state building.

[Stan]

I agree. I am not sure where this is taking us, but I like "self-determination" a lot better than state building.

This reminds me of the 11-plus years that the international community has been struggling with Kosovo.

International state-building in Kosovo – security, self-determination, and privatisation

If international state building represents a challenge to dominant conceptualisations of sovereignty, democracy and self-determination, this challenge is particularly pointed in the case of Kosovo. What is at stake with Kosovo’s international state building project goes to the heart of questions of what a state is, and who has the right to govern and define its legitimacy, scope and legal basis.

Entire report at the link...

[slapout9]

Curmudgeon, you just hit the nail on the head IMO. I have asked many times why do people join gangs. (gangs are miniature governments) they join for Protection and Prosperity. If there is no prosperity there is nothing to protect so they (people) begin to disintegrate the system. If there is prosperity they will have something worth protecting. It is about bringing home the bacon and making sure the wolf doesn't get the bacon. It doesn't really matter what political ideology controls it, my opinion anyway. Just watch this happening in America, DC keeps sending the bacon overseas and the wolfs are starting to form their packs.

[M-A Lagrange]

From Bob
Instead of "how" to build a state in a non-state environment, an equally important, if not more so, question is "WHY" build a state in a non-state environment??

From The Curmudgeon
I have to keep telling myself that "how to build a state in a non-state environment" is the name of the thread but it seems that we (the successful states) are forcing the lessor developed territories into a mold that requires more than they can sustain. It is expensive to keep the huge bureaucracy associated with a state (particularly its external relationships and defenses). It requires the development of a cadre of experts and bureaucrats - years of training. It requires an education system to train those experts and bureaucrats. How do you do that when you have no economic base?
It seems to me that the first mission after establishing security is establishing a functioning economic system. The government could be a caretaker system at this point working "by, with, and through" the local leadership (most likely tribal leaders at this point). Once the economic system is in place (or concurrent with its establishment) you can start to build within the limits of the capabilities of that economic system. Don't try to build a Rolls Royce when all you can afford to maintain is a Hugo.

I tend to agree with both of you that the problematic of building a modern State in a non-state context is bound to the need of external powers to have an interlocutor. We are definitively in the dictate of the norm as defined by Foucault. A dictate for us rather than for them, by the way.

But never the less, governance does exist in non-state environment, therefore it should be possible to establish a form of government that is acceptable for the populace.
Also, as you pointed very well, the main problem to establish a state is in the need of tax collection by the state.
One of the reasons why there is so much resistance to the establishment of a state in Somalia is the question of taxes (among many others). But even Al Shabab do collect taxes. They collect them through religious taxes or other protection revenues but they do collect taxes.
What they sell is not security or protection; it’s a simple form a basic racket: if you do not pay, then I will harm you.
Do not forget that in a non-state environment; almost 90% of the population is economically not in capacity to pay any taxes. Therefore, the one who will pay taxes are the one who do already control the economy. In such perspective, they want to have a benefit from their “tax investment”. This basically what DFID defines as patronage and leads straight to kleptocracy.

In South Sudan, there is an interesting experiment that is being done: the central state wants to empower the traditional chiefs to distribute justice and police. I personally have nothing against but I cannot avoid seeing it as a redo of what was done in the 70th by most of the African governments. Mobutu was extremely good at it.
The main problem being that by empowering local traditional leaders, the central state skip its responsibility to administrate its territory. It builds artificially a distance between the modern administration and the people, allows the modern administration to be only a tax collector tool which actually does not deliver anything except sanctions if the taxes are not paid. Basically sets all the bases for any insurgency or reject of modern state and discredit all efforts do have good/responsible governance.
I must say that I do not know were the response is but at least, I see many of the walls…

The Curmudgeon:
I agree. I am not sure where this is taking us, but I like "self-determination" a lot better than state building.

Curmudgeon,

Could you please define self determination? I am in one of those exercise at the moment and it’s quite creepy actually.

[Dayuhan]

there is a zone of "purgatory" that occurs between the time that old forms of governance are "defeated" (that could be a Genghis-like effort to consolidate governance over a state-less region of tribal centers of governance or it could be an intervention such as the US most recently in Iraq or Afghanistan) and such time as the new government comes to be accepted by their own populace (and similarly by neighboring governments and populaces as well). This acceptance being broadly described as "Legitimacy."

I suspect that it's really quite rare that the first government that arises after a period of non-governance is accepted by the populace as legitimate. More often the populace accepts it out of fear, fatigue, or both. That government may in time evolve into something that seeks and even finds popular approval, or it may be subsequently overthrown. A direct transition from non-governance to governance approved by the populace is not common.

We've gotten so used to seeing "the populace" as "the COG" that we often forget that the populace is not the arbiter of victory in a non-governance or weak governance situation. The winner is not the party that gains popular approval, the winner is the party that can bring the strongest and most durable armed force to the table. These populaces certainly don't see themselves as the arbiters of victory, for good reason. They aren't concerned with finding legitimate governance, they're concerned with staying alive.

On so-called "failed states", I don't think we call states "failed" because they lack western-style governance structures. We call them "failed" because of famine, genocide, civil war, pestilence, and other evidence of failure. I'd be the last to say they need a western-style government or state, but we also can't pretend that if we don't intervene they will happily revert to functioning self-governance. In many of these areas traditional tribal governance structures (arguably never as benign or popular as Western myth pretends) have been degraded by innumerable interventions and meddlings, and barely function if they function at all. What's left is rule by whoever has the most armed men on any given spot at any given time. It's pretty raw, and calling it "self-governance" is probably putting a bit too kind a face on it.

Building a functioning government is a place where there is none? Why do we assume that we can do that at all? Before we ask "how do we do it", we need to ask whether we can, and whether we need to try.

[Fuchs]

"...is dictatorship a necessary path or just the wall we all end up hitting? "

You need either a power advantage OR consent in absence of power asymmetry to organize a democratic political process orderly.

The power that organizes a democracy can be foreign troops, of course.


Young democracies often fail (example Weimar Republic) because the society isn't sold on democracy yet, if there's no consensus on democracy ('Republic without republicans.'). To set up of a dictatorship early on doesn't help against this problem at all.


The Afghanistan democracy project failed for several reasons - not the least the entirely unnecessary influx of huge amounts of foreign cash that would have corrupted any form of government.


The consent is ultimately what drives a democracy.
You still need the checks & balances and several precautions to secure a democracy once it's in place, of course.

[Bob's World]

On so-called "failed states", I don't think we call states "failed" because they lack western-style governance structures. We call them "failed" because of famine, genocide, civil war, pestilence, and other evidence of failure. I'd be the last to say they need a western-style government or state, but we also can't pretend that if we don't intervene they will happily revert to functioning self-governance. In many of these areas traditional tribal governance structures (arguably never as benign or popular as Western myth pretends) have been degraded by innumerable interventions and meddling, and barely function if they function at all. What's left is rule by whoever has the most armed men on any given spot at any given time. It's pretty raw, and calling it "self-governance" is probably putting a bit too kind a face on it.

Building a functioning government is a place where there is none? Why do we assume that we can do that at all? Before we ask "how do we do it", we need to ask whether we can, and whether we need to try.

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/article...p_and_rankings

The criteria really much more rooted in "do they look and act like us." The west scores itself high as it spirals into economic collapse, and scores Asian countries with robust economies low because they have cultures and governances different than ours.

We do need to meddle less, it is over-rated as to what "good" we can bring to others. We also need to stop using "well, we must intervene because their natural systems have become so disrupted by previous interventions" to rationalize additional invasive behavior.

We do the same thing with the environment. We abuse it until it breaks, then think we must engage just as hard to fix it. The fact is that such natural things are self-healing, and heal best if one just "fences them off" and gives them the space and time to sort it out. In nature we call it succession. If a forest is cleared away of the climax species it will return in time to that same climax state, but only after it works its way back up to it in a healing succession of species that each exist in their specific time to serve a specific function in that healing process. Repairing the soil and creating the conditions that allow the climax species to ultimately take root and grow and thrive. A very similar dynamic is true with people and governance. We want everything to be a climax species of governance just like ours, and we want it sooner rather than later. It doesn't work like that. They need time and they they need space, and if we can fence them off to some degree from further abuse, great; and we need to accept that the path taken is their own, and the climax achieved varies by "cultural ecosystem."

[Dayuhan]

It doesn't work like that. They need time and they they need space, and if we can fence them off to some degree from further abuse, great; and we need to accept that the path taken is their own, and the climax achieved varies by "cultural ecosystem."

Yes, that works quite well, as long as the slaughter, famine, mass rape, child soldiers, etc, ad infinitum, ad nauseam don't bother us. Some find it upsetting though. If we say the path taken in, say, Somalia is "their own"... who exactly are "they"? Does anyone think the average Somali enjoys the current state of affairs or would voluntarily have chosen it? Maybe the guys with the guns are having a good time, but it's a bit less than fun for everyone else. Not sure if an average Somali would think that what's going on has anything to do with self-healing.

I'm not arguing for American intervention in these cases: it's too expensive, we're overcommitted elsewhere, there's no significant national interest at stake, and there's not much we can do beyond a bit of relief aid and in some cases forcing a temporary cessation of the devastation. Let's not kid ourselves, though, we're not enabling self-healing. We're turning our back on human catastrophe. It may be something we have to do, but it's not something we need to be proud of, and we can't pretend we're doing anyone a favor.

A more robust capacity for multilateral intervention might be a good (if unlikely) idea, along with a multilateral capacity for stability and reconstruction operations. It would probably be as ineffective as we are, but we wouldn't have the assumption that American self-interest was the driving force and we wouldn't have to pay the entire cost.

[TheCurmudgeon]

[url]A very similar dynamic is true with people and governance. We want everything to be a climax species of governance just like ours, and we want it sooner rather than later. It doesn't work like that. They need time and they they need space, and if we can fence them off to some degree from further abuse, great; and we need to accept that the path taken is their own, and the climax achieved varies by "cultural ecosystem."

I actually had much the same thought although I would never openly admit to it as it sounds too much like creating "human" preserves (although this is done with certain isolated tribes in the Pacific). This option might work in areas with very limited natural resources with a tribal, pre-state system. But, inevitably, someone would want to meddle. Save the Children would come in and disrupt the natural death rate for children. We would send in food during a crop failure. In anthropology it is believed that war was a result of conflicts over limited resources (or the best resources) so our good intentions result in increased population levels vying for limited resources - conflict and war. Although I like the idea in theory, we westerners are too passionate about the value of each individual life. Not saying it is a bad thing - it is correct where you are used to unlimited resources. Physics just prevent it from working where there is not enough to go around all the time.

[TheCurmudgeon]

Curmudgeon,

Could you please define self determination? I am in one of those exercise at the moment and it’s quite creepy actually.

It is a whole society concept, although I have only been working on the governance side. Right now I take into consideration four factors:
1) Human needs - what are the needs that the population are trying to satisfy (for convenience, I use Maslow's hierarchy [physiological, security, belongingness, self-expression, self-actualization).
2) Biophysical environment - what resources are available to the people living in the region. This includes what food and other crops can be grown as well as other natural resources like oil that can be used to form a tax base for the government. It should also consider what barriers there are to trade (no way to move goods) and who the neighbors are (are there a number of other societies waiting to pounce and steal the resources this society has).

From these first two you get:
3) economic state - this includes primarily the primary mode of food production (agriculture, herding, industrial), The level of that mode of production (sustenance [all people must work primarily on food production], work specialization [people ONLY doing things that are not food production], the state of the infrastructure (irrigation, housing, roads), the state of property ownership (corporate [the tribe owns the land], chiefdom [the chief owns everything], feudal [a series of chiefs underlings act as owners], or individual), and the trade system and distribution system (is it controlled by the chief or is there a merchant class).

and

4) cultural institutions - religion, governance, education, economy,as well as the ideology (history of the society is built into this variable).

1 and 2 combine to create 3. 3 limits but does not dictate the level of governance in 4.

Levels of governance are:

Egalitarian - no one rules, everyone is pretty much equal (except for age and sex diferences)
Big Man - a unenforced patron-client relationship where one person coordinates the efforts of voluntary followers. He must keep the followers happy or they will find someone else to follow.
Chiefdom - enforced patron-client relationship. Ownership and distribution of resources becomes centralized.
Kingdom - essentially a larger chiefdom with a feudal system. The early beginnings of both bureaucracy and the state.
Republic - Kingdom with certain key players having rights of their own not necessarily based on lineage. Akin to an early constitutional monarchy. Ownership and distribution fo resources becomes decentralized.
Democracy - Similar to democracies you know but not the same. A number of variations based on the suffrage rights (landed men only, only men of certain lineage or religion, all men, men and women).

The economic base allows for higher level governance but does not require it. Each level of governance is satisfying a higher level need.

Still a work in progress.

the trick is to determine which level of governance the society would be at if there was no externally imposed government. Most tribal systems fall somewhere in the Big-man to Chiefdom range. The need being satisfied is belonging and a place in society.

[slapout9]

Crumudgeon,
What about money? Who is going to control the issuance of money? IMO that is one of the main problems that has to be solved, perhaps the main one.