[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
hood, and most have been held up through international aid.
The Deceptions of Sovereignty
Although many recently independent states are unable to face the tri-
ple challenges of lack of governmental organization, lack of resources,
and lack of national integration, one of the substantial resources avail-
able to weak states has been the support of the international commu-
nity. The international community has validated the sovereignty of
these states despite their lack of functional capabilities, and has even
provided material resources in the form of development aid to main-
tain some level of governmental capacity (Jackson 1990). This support
of the international system sustains the contemporary ecology of states,
in which weak states continue on despite little de facto sovereignty or
control.
In the contemporary world, the international community has gone
to great lengths to support the sovereignty of weak states, effectively
conferring the status of sovereignty on them de jure even when de facto
sovereignty is absent. Weak states are granted privileges denoting
sovereign equality in matters such as diplomatic recognition and an
equal vote in the United Nations (Badie 2000). As Robert Jackson has
noted: Ramshackle states today are not open invitations for unsolic-
ited external intervention. They are not allowed to disappear juridi-
cally even if for all intents and purposes they have already fallen or
been pulled down in fact (Jackson 1990:23). Historically, the interna-
tional community had taken a rather difference stance toward weak or
disorganized territories. Most commonly, such regions were incorpo-
rated through territorial expansion or colonial domination. However,
the collapse of states today has not resulted in recolonization or annex-
ation that might bring resolution to endemic disorganization or con-
flict. Instead, weak states persist, as do their civil wars, perpetuating the
contemporary ecology of states.
Additionally, the international community has provided large
amounts of development aid, both state-based and funded by interna-
tional organizations such as the World Bank and the International
Monetary Fund. Bertram Badie has pointed out that this international
development aid significantly contributes to perpetuating the illusion
64 Neverending Wars
that weak states conform to the ideal state despite varying degrees of
dysfunction, labeling these efforts the deceptions of sovereignty
(Badie 2000:37). Badie argues that world polity institutions have cre-
ated deception by camouflaging the reality of economic dependence
of newly independent states and the weakness of their political struc-
tures, thus producing an erroneous picture of serviceable statehood
(Badie 2000:131 2).
For states that are incapable of maintaining the reality of sovereign
statehood, these deceptions are necessary to claim the status of a state.
Weak states enact statehood by holding a seat in the United Nations,
participating in summits and dialogues held by international organiza-
tions, and in general presenting the appearance of a functioning state.
The international community supports this façade by providing sub-
stantial resources, both material and moral. Behind the façade, how-
ever, the state may lack the capability to fulfill the implied promises
made to maintain order and control within its designated territorial
borders.
Cyprus is an extreme example of a state that does not empirically fit
the definition of a sovereign state. Since the ceasefire of its civil war
in 1974, Cyprus has in reality been an island with two governments.
The southern government, recognized as the legitimate government of
Cyprus by the world polity, controls only half of the island. The north-
ern half of the island, for all practical purposes, is governed by the
Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (Minahan 1995). Inhabitants of
the northern part of Cyprus pay taxes to, abide by the laws of, and ac-
cept the decisions of the northern government (Attalides 1979). But
the international system only recognizes the southern government of
Cyprus, even though that government does not have control over the
entire island. Moreover, only the southern government is allowed to
send representatives to the United Nations, sign treaties, and receive
development aid from the World Bank and other banks. As one scholar
notes without sarcasm: The Government of Cyprus, which now only
controls 60% of the area of the island, has not, by the mere fact of oc-
cupation, lost international recognition (Attalides 1979:187).
In order to understand contemporary civil wars, it is necessary to ac-
knowledge the fundamental weakness of state structures in many states,
despite their appearance of robust sovereignty. The example of Soma-
lia illustrates how the challenges of state-building, coupled with the de-
Weak States and the Difficulties of State-building 65
mands of a modern nation-state, created the conditions for protracted
civil war.
Somalia as a Weak State
Like many recently independent states, Somalia has not yet resolved
the structural problems that it confronted when it became independent
in 1960. Somalia s struggles for territorial integration are reminiscent
of the historic difficulties England faced in the incorporation of Scot-
land and Ireland, or France s difficulties in the incorporation of
Brittany. Somalia, however, lacked the resources possessed by these
European states. Impoverished in natural resources and lacking a ro-
bust economy, Somalia managed to survive primarily by its reliance
upon international aid. When civil war broke out in 1982, international
aid proved insufficient to quell the uprising, and so the war escalated.
Somalia s civil war raged for nearly a decade, at horrible cost to the ci-
vilian population. The consequences of the civil war and the with-
drawal of international aid in the early 1990s led to the demise of that
country as a functioning state.
Somalia was typical of a weak state in its lack of a coherent state
structure and absence of material resources. The structural fragmenta-
tion of the Somali state was a relic of the circumstances of its in-
dependence, which required the unification of two separate colonial
administrative structures. Before independence, the Somali people
were divided amongst several different colonies, including Italian So-
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]