1st Edition

Statebuilding and State-Formation The Political Sociology of Intervention

Edited By Berit Bliesemann de Guevara Copyright 2012
    286 Pages 1 B/W Illustrations
    by Routledge

    288 Pages 1 B/W Illustrations
    by Routledge

    This book examines the ways in which long-term processes of state-formation limit the possibilities for short-term political projects of statebuilding.

    Using process-oriented approaches, the contributing authors explore what happens when conscious efforts at statebuilding ‘meet’ social contexts, and are transformed into daily routines. In order to explain their findings, they also analyse the temporally and spatially broader structures of world society which shape the possibilities of statebuilding.

    Statebuilding and State-Formation includes a variety of case studies from post-conflict societies in Africa, Asia and Europe, as well as the headquarters and branch offices of international agencies. Drawing on various theoretical approaches from sociology and anthropology, the contributors discuss external interventions as well as self-led statebuilding projects. This edited volume is divided into three parts:

    • Part I: State-Formation, Violence and Political Economy
    • Part II: Governance, Legitimacy and Practice in Statebuilding and State-Formation
    • Part III: The International Self – Statebuilders’ Institutional Logics, Social Backgrounds and Subjectivities

    The book will be of great interest to students of statebuilding and intervention, war and conflict studies, international security and IR.

    Introduction: Statebuilding and State-Formation Berit Bliesemann de Guevara  Part I: State-Formation, Violence and Political Economy  1. Risk and Externalisation in Afghanistan – Why Statebuilding Upends State-Formation Florian P. Kühn  2. International Intervention and the Congolese Army: A Paradox of Intermediary Rule Alex Veit  3. War Makers and State Makers: On State-Formative Networks and Illiberal Political Economy in Kosovo Jens Stilhoff Sörensen  4. Georgia-South Ossetia Networks of Profit: Challenges to Statebuilding Stacy Closson  Part II: Governance, Legitimacy and Practice in Statebuilding and State-Formation  5. Statebuilding versus State-Formation in East Timor Lee Jones  6. The Limitations of International Analyses of the State and Post-Conflict Statebuilding in Sierra Leone Christof P. Kurz  7. Statebuilding as Tacit Trusteeship: The Case of Liberia Louise Riis Andersen  8. The Road Less Travelled: Self-Led Statebuilding and International ‘Non-Intervention’ in the Creation of Somaliland  Rebecca Richards  Part III: The International Self- Statebuilders' Institutional Logics, Social Backgrounds and Subjectivities  9. Three Arenas: The Conflictive Logic of External Statebuilding Alex Veit and Klaus Schlichte  10. The International Scramble for Police Reform in the Balkans Stephan Hensell  11. The ‘Statebuilding Habitus’: UN Staff and the Cultural Dimension of Liberal Intervention in Kosovo Catherine Goetze and Berit Bliesemann de Guevara  12. The International Self and the Humanitarianisation of Politics: A Case Study of Goma, DR Congo Kai Koddenbrock  13. The State We Are(n’t) In: Liminal Subjectivity in Aid Worker Auto-Biographies Lisa Smirl  Conclusions: Neither Built nor Formed – the Transformation of States under International Intervention John Heathershaw

    Biography

    Berit Bliesemann de Guevara is a researcher and lecturer in international relations at Helmut Schmidt University Hamburg. She co-authored Illusion Statebuilding (Hamburg 2010) and is assistant editor of the Journal of Intervention and Statebuilding.