The Unintended Consequences of Fiji's International Peacekeeping

Abstract

The consequences of international peacekeeping operations on the domestic politics of a contributing country are an under-explored phenomenon. For Fiji, the intended outcome was that the fledgling state would play a positive role in international affairs. The unintended outcome was the development of a patron-client nexus between the ruling elite and the largely ethnic Fijian military. In the last twenty five years the military has intervened in domestic affairs, which has made Fiji a coup-prone state. This article considers why this has occurred.