What are fragile states?

Fragile states are commonly defined as those states where the government cannot or will not deliver core functions to the majority of its people, including the poor. Many development partners have their own list of fragile states based on various parameters, including risk of conflict, accountability of government institutions, capacity to manage public resources and deliver services, territorial control, levels of poverty, and ability to protect the poorest. Fundamental to all fragile states is the lack of effective political processes to influence the state to meet social expectations. Other characteristics include weak institutions and governance systems. Most experience conflict, but not all fragile states experience endemic violence. All suffer from poor governance and limited administrative capacity.

In addition post-conflict countries suffer from high rates of relapse to conflict, with a 44 per cent chance of a return to conflict within five years. Conflict has very severe affects on economic growth; most fragile states have growing levels of extreme poverty, which is opposite to the trend in most low income countries. They have been classified into four typologies:

• prolonged crisis or impasse
• post-conflict or political transition
• gradual improvement
• or deteriorating governance.

One commonly referred to list is from the World Bank, which assigns ‘fragile state’ classification to a country if it is (a) in the bottom two quintiles of the Country Political and Institutional Assessment (CPIA) rating, which assesses governance and a country’s ability to use development aid effectively, or (b) has not been rated by the World Bank. All eligible countries are low income states, and each year the lists are revised, so fragility is defined based on a spectrum of factors, reflecting a time-specific situation, not a permanent condition. Many countries do not wish to be labeled as fragile states, which is why donors do not commonly publish the lists of states they define as ‘fragile’.