Peace, Intervention, and State Fragility

Abstract

This chapter explores the relationship between discourses of state fragility and peacebuilding and statebuilding interventions. The chapter covers two different (yet compatible) discourses of state fragility and intervention. The first one is grounded in the modern episteme, based on a dichotomy between strong and weak states through state rankings and fragile states listings that legitimize intervention in these weak states. The second one is an emerging discourse on risk and resilience, with more fluid understandings of fragility that go beyond the dichotomy of strong versus weak states, but also opens up new interventionary possibilities for international actors. The chapter takes stock of these discourses, emphasizing commonalities and divergences between them, as well as the repercussions for the peacebuilding and statebuilding practice and academic literature. Show more