Karzai's curse – legitimacy as stability in Afghanistan and other post-conflict environments

Abstract

Post-conflict reconstruction and stabilisation have focused upon the establishment of both strong states capable of maintaining stability and various forms of ‘Good Governance’. However, both presume the development of substantial security sectors and highly functioning administrative systems within unrealistically brief periods of time. The failure to meet such inflated expectations commonly results in the disillusionment of both the local populations and the international community, and, hence, increased state fragility and decreased aid financing and effectiveness. As such the authors re-frame the basic question by asking how stabilisation can be achieved in spite of weak state institutions during reconstruction processes. Based upon extensive field research in Afghanistan and other conflict-affected contexts, the authors propose a model of post-conflict stabilisation focused primarily on the attainment of legitimacy by state institutions. Finally, the authors examine how legitimacy-oriented stabilisation and reconstruction will benefit from emerging models of ‘collaborative governance’ which will allow international interventions, through consociational relationships with fragile states and civil society, to bolster rather than undermine political legitimacy.

Keywords:

• Afghanistan
• conflict transformation
• good governance
• institution building
• legitimacy

Notes

1. This example is based upon the authors’ research in Lebanon. In such instances, community members were asked to muster available documentation regarding contested lands in an informal process (nonetheless sanctioned and run by local officials); the goal in doing so was to ensure property ownership was clarified so that families could begin investing in housing rehabilitation and agriculture without fear that lands would be re-allocated months later. This process was, in short, done outside of and in violation of the law but proved key in allowing some areas to recover far more quickly than others.

2. The notion of the ‘capacity trap’ has been previously referred to, in the context of Afghanistan, by Frederick Barton in his testimony to the US House of Representatives, 9 March 2006. While we use the term to reflect a tendency to become overly pessimistic regarding the possibility of capacity development, Barton sees the ‘trap’ as a tendency to focus too much upon working with government, thus distracting from the goal of providing assistance to the rural population as a form of peace dividend.

3. For information regarding the NSP and CDCs see Barakat et al. (2006).