Health and the governance agenda
Rethinking neo-liberal state building: building post-conflict development states
Alternative post conflict state building
Authors:
J. Barbara
Publisher:
Development in Practice, 2008
In attempting to rebuild post-conflict failed states, the international community has drawn heavily on neo-liberal development paradigms. This article in Development in Practice argues that neo-liberal state building has proved ineffectual in stimulating economic development in post-conflict states, thus undermining prospects for state consolidation. The author offers the developmental state as an alternative model for international state building, better suited to overcoming the developmental challenges that face post-conflict states. Drawing on the East Asian experience, developmental state building would seek to build state capacity to intervene in the economy to guide development, compensating for the failure of growth led by the private sector to materialise in many post-conflict states.
It is argued that the international community needs to embrace an alternative vision of the state as a model for post-conflict state building. Developmental state building would require a more expansive approach to institution building, one which acknowledges that the post-conflict state may itself, with international assistance, have a key role to play in guiding economic development in directions which reinforce efforts to consolidate the state. Such an approach would require the international community to accept more honestly its development responsibilities when it decides to intervene to rebuild failed states.
