Afghanistan, Networks and Connectivity

Abstract

Afghanistan is often thought to be a failed state because it is isolated from the networks of globalisation: for example, Afghanistan is viewed as part of Thomas Barnett's Non-Integrating Gap. On the contrary, the article will show that Afghanistan has – for decades – been very much integrated into a range of international networks. These networks have played major roles in Afghanistan and have also spread to have significant impact across the world: offering an example of what Friedman has referred to as the flattening of the world. Afghanistan is thus an example of the substantial role which networks and connectivity can play in ‘failed’ states and of the unpredictable outcomes that can result from such networks.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Thanks are due to David Campbell, Michael Dillon, Stuart Elden and Steve Graham for their insightful comments on the PhD thesis from which this article was drawn, to Nick Megoran and James Sidaway for their invaluable feedback on a draft of this article, to three anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments and to Dundee, Durham, and Newcastle Universities for providing positive environments in which to do this research. I am also grateful to all those who offered helpful feedback on the versions of the article presented at the 2007 RGS-IBG and BISA conferences. Much of the research on which the article is based was made possible by ESRC funding.

Notes

1. T. L. Friedman The World is Flat: The Globalized World in the Twenty-First Century, Updated and expanded (London: Penguin 2007) p. 10.

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3. The White House, ‘Fact Sheet: The Way Forward in Afghanistan’ (December 2009), available at <http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/way-forward-afghanistan>, accessed 23 Dec. 2009.

4. N. Klein, The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism (London, New York and Ontario: Penguin 2007) pp. 424–425.

5. B. Gills ‘Empire Versus Cosmopolis’, in B. Gills (ed.), The Global Politics of Globalization: ‘Empire’ vs ‘Cosmopolis’ (London: Routledge 2008) p. 5.

6. Ibid.

7. P. Cerny, Globalisation, Governance and Complexity (Leeds: University of Leeds Centre for Industrial Policy and Performance 1998) p. 1; P. Cerny, G. Menz and S. Soederberg ‘Different Roads to Globalization: Neoliberalism, the Competition State, and Politics in a More Open World’, in P. Cerny, G. Menz and S. Soederberg (eds.), Internalizing Globalization: The Rise of Neoliberalism and the Decline of National Varieties of Capitalism (Basingstoke and New York: Palgrave Macmillan 2005) p. 1.

8. B. Gills and W. Thompson, ‘Globalizations, Global Histories and Historical Globalities’, in B. Gills and W. Thompson (eds.), Globalization and Global History (London: Routledge 2006) p. 3.

9. R. Falk, Predatory Globalization: A Critique (Cambridge: Polity Press 1999) p. iix.

10. Cerny, Globalisation, Governance and Complexity (note 7) p. 1.

11. B. Nayar, The Geopolitics of Globalization: The Consequences for Development (New Delhi: Oxford University Press 2007) pp. 1–4.

12. Falk (note 9) p. 2.

13. Nayar (note 11) p. 5.

14. Ibid.

15. P. Hirst and D. Thompson, Globalization in Question (Cambridge: Polity Press 1999) pp. 2–3.

16. Nayar (note 11) p. 15.

17. R. Gilpin The Challenge of Global Capitalism (Princeton: Princeton University Press 2000) p. 20.

18. Nayar (note 11) pp. 47–48.

19. N. Smith, The Endgame of Globalization (New York: Routledge 2005) p. 52.

20. Ibid., p. 51–52

21. T. Barnett, The Pentagon's New Map: War and Peace in the Twenty-first Century (New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons 2004). While I disagree with many of Barnett's political positions – I will explicitly challenge a number of his arguments in the paper, and I support political action that very much differs from what Barnett would want – I have found his work interesting, provocative and often productive. Barnett's work has also been influential in military and policy circles (see G. Jaffe, ‘At The Pentagon, Quirky PowerPoint Carries Big Punch’, The Wall Street Journal, 11 May 2004, available at <http://web.archive.org/web/20080506115711/http://www.thomaspmbarnett.com/published/wsj.htm>, accessed 5 October 2010). It therefore does merit serious discussion in the paper.

22. Barnett, The Pentagon's New Map (note 21) p. 8.

23. Ibid., p. 4.

24. Ibid., p. 121.

25. Ibid., p. 2.

26. Ibid., pp. 121–122.

27. Ibid., pp. 121–122.

28. Ibid., p. 123.

29. S. Dalby, ‘Imperialism, Domination, Culture: The Continued Relevance of Critical Geopolitics’, Geopolitics 13/3 (2008) p. 428.

30. Barnett, The Pentagon's New Map (note 21) p. 8.

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32. Barnett, The Pentagon's New Map (note 21) p. 83.

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34. Barnett, The Pentagon's New Map (note 21) p. 123.

35. Ibid., p. 351.

36. Ibid., pp. 125–127.

37. Ibid., p. 127.

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39. Ibid., p. 597.

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41. Smith, The Endgame of Globalization (note 19) pp. 28–32.

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49. Ibid., p. 174.

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54. Ibid., pp. 3–4.

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56. Ibid.

57. Ibid.

58. Arquilla and Ronfeldt (note 33) p. vii.

59. Ibid., p. 11.

60. Ibid., p. 107.

61. S. Coll, Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan and Bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001 (New York: Penguin 2004) p. 116.

62. Ibid., p. 116; W. J. Boyne, ‘Moscow's Fatal Military Adventure’, Air Force Magazine, 2004, available at <http://web.archive.org/web/20041211043918/http://www.afa.org/magazine/dec2004/1204soviets.asp>, accessed 5 October 2010.

63. Coll (note 61) p. 17.

64. M. Binyon, ‘Mr Karmal Gives Promise of New Constitution Soon and Attacks US-Inspired ‘Hullabaloo’ Over Coup’, The Times, 5 Jan. 1980, p. 4.

65. Coll (note 61) p. 17.

66. Boyne (note 62).

67. Coll (note 61) pp. 116–117; Massoud (note 55).

68. Massoud (note 55).

69. Dombrowski et al. (note 52) p. 6.

70. Arquilla and Ronfeldt (note 33) p. 13.

71. Coll (note 61) pp. 61--63, 83.

72. R. Jacquard, In the Name of Osama Bin Laden: Global Terrorism and the Bin Laden Brotherhood, trans. by G. Holoch (Durham: Duke University Press 2002) p. 22.

73. Maktab al-Khidmat – literally the “Office of Services” – was a logistical organisation dealing with foreign volunteers who came to join the Afghan insurgency or do other (for example humanitarian) work with the Afghans (O. Bin Laden, ‘Exclusive Interview: Conversation with Terror. Osama bin Laden lashes out against the West: TIME's January 1999 interview’, Time Magazine, 11 January 1999, available at <http://www.time.com/time/asia/news/printout/0,9788,174550,00.html>, accessed 12 Nov. 2005; J. Burke, Al Qaeda: The True Story of Radical Islam (London: Penguin 2004) pp. 3, 73). Although the organisation was founded by Abdallah Azzam, Bin Laden came to play an extremely prominent role (ibid., pp. 72–75).

74. R. Gunaratna, Inside Al Qaeda: Global Network of Terror (London: C. Hurst 2003) p. 5.

75. Bin Laden, ‘Exclusive Interview’ (note 73).

76. J. Urry, ‘The Global Complexities of September 11th’, Theory Culture Society 19/4 (2002) p. 65.

77. Friedman (note 1) p. 8.

78. Ibid.

79. J. Burke, Al-Qaeda: Casting a Shadow of Terror (London and New York: I.B. Tauris 2003) p. 16.

80. Ibid., pp. 11–12.

81. B. Kahin, ‘Thinking about Information Infrastructure’, in Schwartzstein (ed.), The Information Revolution and National Security: Dimensions and Directions (Washington, DC: The Center for Strategic and International Studies 1996) pp. 10–11.

82. J. Mackinlay, Defeating Complex Insurgencies (London: Royal United Services Institute 2005) pp. 31–32.

83. J. Corbin, Al Qaeda: The Terror Network that Threatens the World (New York: Thunder Mouth Press/Nation Books 2002) pp. 191–194.

84. K. Barling, ‘The Legacy of Finsbury Park Mosque’, BBC News, 9 May 2006, available at <http://www.bbc.co.uk/london/content/articles/2006/05/09/kurt_finsbury_mosque_legacy_feature.shtml>, accessed 16 July 2006; Corbin (note 83) pp. 193–194; T. McKenna and A. Moussaoui, ‘The Recruiters’, ‘CBC News’, CBC News, 16 March 2004, available at <http://web.archive.org/web/20040607064912/http://www.cbc.ca/national/news/recruiters/abdsamad_interview.html>, accessed 5 October 2010.

85. R. W. Mansbach, ‘The Meaning of 11 September and the Emerging Postinternational World,’ in S. Brunn (ed.), 11 September and its Aftermath: The Geopolitics of Terror (London: Frank Cass 2004) p. 20.

86. See M. van Creveld, The Changing Face of War: Combat from the Marine to Iraq (New York: Presidio Press) p. 258.

87. M. Van Creveld, The Rise and Decline of the State (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1999) pp. 378–380, 393–394.

88. S. Strange, The Retreat of the State: The Diffusion of Power in the World Economy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1996) p. 93.

89. Ibid., p. 110.

90. Ibid., pp. 111–117. One might also note Cerny's work on the way in which international financial networks constrain states: for example P. Cerny, ‘The Political Economy of International Finance’, in P. Cerny (ed.) Finance and World Politics: Markets, Regimes and States in the Post-Hegemonic Era (Aldershot: Edward Elgar 1993) pp. 10–11.

91. O. Bin Laden, ‘Declaration of War Against the Americans Occupying the Land of the Two Holy Places’, in Alexander and Swetnam (eds.), Usama bin Laden's al-Qaida: Profile of a Terrorist Network (Ardsley: Transnational Publishers 2001) pp. 14, 19.

92. O. Bin Laden, ‘Text: Osama bin Laden's 1998 interview’, The Guardian, 1998, available at <http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2001/oct/08/afghanistan.terrorism15/>, accessed 5 October 2010; Bin Laden, ‘Exclusive Interview’ (note 73); Bin Laden, ‘Declaration of War’ (note 91) pp. 1, 14, 19.

93. Bin Laden, ‘Declaration of War’ (note 91) pp. 2, 8.

94. O. Bin Laden, Messages to the World: The Statements of Osama Bin Laden ed. by B. Lawrence and trans. by J. Howarth (London: Verso 2005) p. 69.

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96. Bin Laden, ‘Exclusive Interview’ (note 73).

97. Bin Laden, Messages (note 94) p. 61.

98. O. Bin Laden and T. Alouni, ‘Transcript of Bin Laden's October Interview’, CNN.com, 5 February 2002, available at <http://archives.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/asiapcf/south/02/05/binladen.transcript/index.html>, accessed 6 Nov. 2006.

99. Friedman (note 1) p. 10.

100. Ibid.

101. J. Meek, ‘‘Spaghetti Organisation’’, Guardian Unlimited, 18 October 2001, available at <http://www.guardian.ac.uk/world/2001/oct/18/afghanistan.terrorism14>, accessed 4 October 2010.

102. Ibid.

103. See D. Campbell, Politics Without Principle: Sovereignty, Ethics, and the Narratives of the Gulf War (Boulder and London: Lynne Rienner Publishers 1993) p. 23.

104. M. Mann, ‘The Autonomous Power of the State: Its Origins, Mechanisms and Results’, in N. Brenner, B. Jessop, M. Jones, and G. MacLeod (eds.), State/Space: A Reader (Oxford: Blackwell 2003) p. 60.

105. Ibid., p. 62.

106. Cerny, Globalisation, Governance and Complexity (note 7) p. 3.

107. J. Painter, ‘Territoire et Réseau: Une Fausse Dichotomie?’, in M. Vanier (ed.), Territoires, Territorialité, Territorialisation: Controverses et Perspectives (Rennes: Presses Universitaires de Rennes 2009).

108. G. Ó Tuathail, ‘Borderless Worlds: Problematizing Discourses of Deterritorialization in Global Finance and Digital Culture’, Geopolitics 4/2 (1999) p. 143.

109. Smith, The Endgame of Globalization (note 19) p. 51.

110. Friedman (note 1) p. x.

111. Ibid., p. 506.

112. D. Hiro, War Without End: The Rise of Islamist Terrorism and Global Response (London and New York: Routledge 2002) pp. 233–237.

113. ‘Taliban’ is the plural term for ‘students’, and many of the Taliban were schooled in Pakistani Madrasas; in particular, many of their top leaders studied at the Madrasa Haqqaniya (B. D. Metcalf, ‘‘Traditionalist’ Islamic Activism: Deoband, Tablighis, and Talibs’, in C. Calhoun, P. Price, and A. Timmer (eds.), Understanding September 11 (New York: The New Press 2002) pp. 62–63).

114. Hiro (note 112) pp. 240–241.

115. Ibid., pp. 240–241.

116. Ibid., pp. 249–250.

117. Ibid., p. 263.

118. Ibid., pp. 257, 263.

119. J. Humphrys and F. Vendrell, ‘Interview: FRANCESC VENDRELL, Head of the UN Special Mission to Afghanistan’, BBC On The Record, 14 October 2001, available at <http://www.bbc.co.uk/otr/intext/20011014_int_1.html>, accessed 28 Jan. 2006.

120. Painter (note 107) p. 65--66.

121. G. W. K. Clark, Winning Modern Wars: Iraq, Terrorism, and the American Empire (New York: PublicAffairs 2003) p. 157.

122. M. Weber, ‘The Profession and Vocation of Politics’, in M. Lassman and R. Speirs (eds.), Weber: Political Writings, trans. by Speirs (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1994) pp. 310–311.

123. D. Gregory, The Colonial Present: Afghanistan, Palestine, Iraq (Oxford: Blackwell 2004) p. 50.

124. There are echoes here of some of Strange's work on how the recreational drug trade and money laundering cause certain problems for governments, although the paper will argue that things have gone rather further in the case of Afghanistan. See S. Strange, Mad Money (Manchester: Manchester University Press 1998) pp. 128–137.

125. C. Conetta, ‘Strange Victory: A Critical Appraisal of Operation Enduring Freedom and the Afghanistan War’, Project on Defense Alternatives (30 January 2002), available at <http://www.comw.org/pda/0201strangevic.html>, accessed 10 March 2003; A. Mukarji, Afghanistan: From Terror to Freedom (New Delhi: Sterling 2003) pp. 17–19.

126. United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, ‘Afghanistan: Opium Survey’ (2004), available at <http://www.unodc.org/pdf/afg/afghanistan_opium_survey_2004.pdf>, accessed 7 May 2006, p. 4; Mukarji (note 125) p. 53.

127. The White House, ‘Fact Sheet: Assisting People of Afghanistan’ (28 January 2002), available at <http://web.archive.org/web/20080521100247/http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2002/01/20020128-9.html>, accessed 5 October 2010; T. Blair, ‘Foreign Policy Speech I’, 10 Downing Street Website, 21 March 2006, available at <http://web.archive.org/web/20060411042815/http://www.number10.gov.uk/output/Page9224.asp>, accessed 5 October 2010.

128. The White House, ‘Way Forward’ (note 3).

129. Act is available at <http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-s496/show>.

130. As David Wilkinson notes, there are strong reasons for growing recreational drugs for export including “the relentless pressure of global consumers for…drugs [and] the absence of equally profitable cash crop exports” (D. Wilkinson, ‘Globalizations: The First Ten, Hundred, Five Thousand and Million Years’, in B. Gills and W. Thompson (eds.) Globalization and Global History (London: Routledge 2006) p. 70.

131. ‘The Policy Roots of Economic Crisis and Poverty: A Multi-Country Participatory Assessment of Structural Adjustment’, SAPRIN, April 2002, available at <http://www.saprin.org/SAPRI_Findings.pdf>, accessed 9 May 2006) p. 29.

132. M. Bolle, ‘Afghanistan and Pakistan Reconstruction Opportunity Zones’, FAS, 15 October 2009, available at <http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/R40627.pdf>, p. 17, accessed 30 September 2010

133. T. Barnett, Blueprint for Action: A Future Worth Creating (New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons 2005) p. 270.

134. Kean et al. (note 2) p. 340.

135. M. De Goede, ‘Hawala Discourses and the War on Terrorist Finance’, Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 21/5 (2003) p. 517.

136. Ibid.

137. T. Barnett, Great Powers: America and the World After Bush (New York: Putnam 2009) p. 303.

138. N. Smith, ‘The Endgame of Globalization’, Political Geography 25/1 (2006) p. 8.

139. Smith, The Endgame of Globalization (note 19) p. 209.