Nation-Building Elevated

[Dayuhan]

I fully agree with Dayuhan, building a Nation is a myth. But building a State apparatus is possible.

Under some circumstances, I agree. I'm not convinced that those circumstances are universally present.

A group of people, with a leader and the capacity to be organised to use violence to defend their land: a Cite (in Greek in the text).
Here lay the roots of a country, a state, a nation….

Ok, stop right there and ask about these roots. Is the capacity to organize present, or is it obstructed by internal conflict? When we talk about "their land", who are "they". Already we are assuming a perception of unity, a consensus that the people of whatever territory we're discussing perceive themselves themselves as a discrete entity. This condition is in many cases simply not present.

Now, this leads us to what are the various kind of civil societies (knowing the fact that by this term we include military dictatorship, kingdoms… All kinds of societies which are not lead by civilians).

1) the societies without State (Stateless societies, Non State societies):
The most well known example are the Nuer from Sudan. Cf: E. E. Evans-Pritchard

In those kinds of societies, social hierarchy is low, power is not centralized and not structured through a centralized administration or proto administration. Authority is hold by family chiefs or elders or religious leaders.
Moral and religion are used as law or legal referent to sanction deviances, non respects of Tabou…
Such societies are centered on survival of the group.
Actual good example is Somalia. It is also the type of organization to which de regulated, and dismantled societies tend to go back in failed states during civil wars or more generally when the State (as an administration) is absent.
Such societies are seen by Hobbes as the Human Nature: the war of all against all. It’s the western imaginary “savage society”. (by the way, to me it’s much closer to Locke than Hobbes).
What in western politic has long been assimilated to anarchy (See Anarchy ) but is not, especially in traditional societies (See all theanthropoly in Africa, Oceania, South America…).

2) the societies with State:

The societies with Sate, at least the modern ones are based on Max Weber definition of the State.
Weber unveils the definition of the state that has become so pivotal to Western social thought: that the state is that entity which possesses a monopoly on the legitimate use of physical force
Weber distinguished three pure types of political leadership, domination and authority:
1. charismatic domination (familial and religious),
2. traditional domination (patriarchs, patrimonalism, feudalism), and
3. legal domination (modern law and state, bureaucracy).[56]
In his view, every historical relation between rulers and ruled contained such elements and they can be analysed on the basis of this tripartite distinction.[57] He also notes that the instability of charismatic authority inevitably forces it to "routinize" into a more structured form of authority. Likewise he notes that in a pure type of traditional rule, sufficient resistance to a master can lead to a "traditional revolution". Thus he alludes to an inevitable move towards a rational-legal structure of authority, utilising a bureaucratic structure.[58] Thus this theory can be sometimes viewed as part of the social evolutionism theory. This ties to his broader concept of rationalisation by suggesting the inevitability of a move in this direction.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Weber

Look at it from the other direction. What if the state we want to build contains multiple societies? What if these multiple societies are traditional rivals? What if they distrust each other, or loathe each other? These conditions are going to have a very real impact on the capacity to build a state, a nation, or an economy.

This is the key obstacle to... ok, call it what you will, nation building, state building, development, whatever in much of the post-colonial world. We're left with abstract lines drawn on maps by retreating colonists. We're inclined to assume that the people who live within these lines constitute a nation and possess the perception of unity that is required before building or growth can begin.

If we're talking about growing a nation, that perception of "us" is the seed, if we're talking about building a nation that's the raw material. Without it there are going to be pretty serious problems. Before we talk about a nation we have to ask whether the people in the territory in question see themselves as a nation. Is there an "us" there? Do the people who live within this arbitrary set of lines on a map see themselves as a discrete entity? Do they want to be a single nation? If the answer to those questions is "no", it's going to be pretty difficult to build a functional nation there.

Ultimately this question has to be sorted out by the people in question, and unfortunately human beings have generally gone through a fair bit of violence before coming up with an answer.

But this just means that Nation Building needs to be rethought not that Nation Building has to be thrown away. (by the way, I have probably 8 to 12 hours difference with you guys. So do not expect me to be too much at the page immediatly ) )

I also wouldn't suggest throwing the whole concept away, but I would certainly suggest that we need to ask in any given case whether the prerequisites for statehood exist before trying to apply our theories.

I'm also in a minority time zone; it all sorts out, not necessarily in any coherent fashion!