Character and Future of Nation Building

▪ 2005

by Ray Salvatore Jennings

      By 2004 the U.S. involvement in nation building in Afghanistan and Iraq had many people wondering whether an effort to rebuild these failed nation-states was appropriate or would succeed. Nation building, or nation-state building (a more accurate designation)—a process to resuscitate a failed or failing nation-state that has been weakened by internal disorder, natural disaster, or loss of statehood through foreign occupation—is intended to transform a country's economic, social, and political institutions. The diplomatic, development, and military communities all agree that nation-state building can be considered successful once a recovering country is again stable, has rejoined the international community, and has met the criteria for being a sovereign nation-state. This measure of success, however, has rarely been met.

      Nation in the present context refers to the dominant sociopolitical culture of a country, and state refers to its political condition. To be a state a territory must have a permanent population, a defined terrain, a government with a monopoly of force, and the ability to order the daily affairs of the populace. It must also have the capacity to enter into relations with other states and be sovereign in its affairs at home. With a few exceptions, the 193 countries in existence claim to be nation-states or territories that meet the criteria for statehood and where one or two national cultures predominate.

      A nation-state may occasionally fail; this happens largely because the criteria defining a state are unmet. In Somalia in the early 1990s, a central government with a monopoly on force within its borders was supplanted by chaotic rule by local militia groups; the state could no longer carry on relations with other countries or order the affairs of its citizens. In 2004 Afghanistan and Iraq did not meet the criteria of statehood after U.S.-led invasions removed the regimes in power. Neither country had control over its borders, a central government with a monopoly of force, or true sovereignty. The Sudan, Côte d'Ivoire, Sri Lanka, Burundi, Liberia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Chad, Liberia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Haiti, and Angola can be said to be failed or failing states that lack a strong sovereign central government, sustained internal order, or consistent relations with other nation-states.

      Failed nation-states pose serious problems for regional and international order. They often destabilize bordering countries and frequently displace large numbers of refugees into neighbouring states. Violations of basic human rights are common in failed and failing nation-states, and they often harbour transnational criminal activity, such as money laundering, terrorist operations, and trafficking in narcotics, weapons, and humans. Moreover, such situations seldom simply fade away on their own or are able to repair themselves without outside assistance.

      Understanding the needs of a failed nation-state is a complex challenge, as is determining the most appropriate type of nation-building assistance to be provided. Sometimes, simple foreign aid by civilian agencies, the United Nations, international donor agencies, and nongovernmental organizations can help reform institutions and strengthen a country's ability to manage conflict. This is the approach being used in Sri Lanka, Angola, Rwanda, and, until recently, Côte d'Ivoire, the DRC, Burundi, and The Sudan. Military personnel now assist in nation building in the latter four countries.

      In other cases of nation-state building, military forces acting in coalition or with United Nations' authorization intervene as peacekeepers to separate warring parties and provide limited reconstruction assistance while additional foreign aid is provided by civilian agencies. This is the approach that has continued in Haiti, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Liberia, and, for a time, Somalia and East Timor.

      In yet other instances of nation-state building a stable nation-state is invaded and occupied by foreign militaries intent on displacing the regime. The sovereignty of the occupied nation-state is extinguished under military occupation, and statehood is lost until the country recovers. Foreign civilian assistance and foreign military rule are used to support the transition back to nation-state status. This was the approach that was used in Japan and Germany after 1945 and in Grenada, Panama, Afghanistan, and Iraq in later years.

      Nation building often overtly promotes the virtues of strong central security forces, democratic governance, a free-market economy, a free press, and an active civil society. Typically, however, the nation-building process is driven less by altruistic motives than by the national security concerns of the nation builders. Nation building as defined above has been attempted so far only by Western democracies that believe that political and economic systems that resemble their own are more likely to be stable and beneficial to their national security and economic interests.

      Among the nation-building endeavours cited, however, only the post-World War II occupations of Japan and Germany can be considered unqualified successes. There are many causes of nation building's poor track record, including a lack of adequate planning and funding for long-term programs, flawed peace agreements, insufficient numbers of peacekeepers or occupation troops, deteriorating security environments, resistance by entrenched local elites, changes in the political climate at home, and the need to cut short assistance because of other international emergencies. Nation building in Afghanistan and Iraq, for instance, continues to be weakened by an initial lack of planning for the peace, preparation and training of forces for occupation, insufficient troop commitment, and unrealistic expectations in regard to the local populations, that have proved more hostile towards military occupation than originally anticipated by many in the U.S. administration.

      Experience of the past several decades suggests that success in nation building depends on several factors. The military occupations of Japan and Germany lasted more than five years and involved the efforts of several hundred thousand trained troops, police, and civilian administrators. Intense planning began two years before each operation, and occupation handbooks were even prepared and given to soldiers and occupation administrators. Aid continued to flow to Japan and Germany in the 1950s, after they had regained statehood. In the process of occupation, the predominant national culture was transformed, as were the country's economic, social, and political institutions. In the reasonably successful cases of nation building on a small scale, as in Panama and Grenada, modest planning and small commitments of troops and funding proved adequate.

      Over the course of nation-building interventions, several lessons have been learned, often the hard way. If nation building is to be undertaken, it must be adequately funded, and it should be anticipated that resources may need to be committed for as long as a decade in order to influence the character of state institutions and the national culture of the failed or failing state. Given the likelihood that nation building will be required in the future, it is critical that leading states and institutions develop standing capacities to conduct such work, especially in the area of policing. Other indicators of success are the building of international support and legitimacy prior to an intervention, the participation of local populations in the process of transforming their societies, and the undertaking of some projects that are sure to be successful within the first 18 months of an intercession.

      The future of the United States' nation building—in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere—is uncertain, however. The U.S. fundamentally reshaped its doctrine of military engagement after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, without simultaneously reforming its commitment and capacities to stabilize and transform failed and failing states. Beneath this dissonance between an overdeveloped ability to wage and win war and an anemic facility for peace and nation building may lie the unenviable reality that rather than ameliorating global instability and misery, nation building poorly done simply contributes to it.

Ray Salvatore Jennings teaches War and Peace Transitions at Georgetown University, Washington, D.C., and is the author of The Road Ahead: Endurance, Political Will and Lessons in Nation Building from Japan, Germany and Afghanistan for Postwar Iraq (USIP Press, 2004).

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