In it for the long haul? Post - conflict statebuilding, peacebuilding, and the good governance agenda in Timor - Leste

Goldfinch, Shaun and DeRouen, K. (2014) In it for the long haul? Post - conflict statebuilding, peacebuilding, and the good governance agenda in Timor - Leste. Public Administration and Development, 34 (2). pp. 96-108. ISSN 0271-2075

PDF - Published Version Restricted to Repository staff only Download (141kB)

Abstract

Statebuilding after conflict often entails liberal peacebuilding measures. The end of the UN mission in post-conflict Timor-Leste in December 2012 provides a unique opportunity to investigate statebuilding in practice. The liberal peacebuilding agenda has met with stiff academic resistance—mainly from the critical theorist camp—and is questioned as an appropriate measure of …statebuilding success. We deploy instead the good governance (GG) agenda as a hybrid local-liberal guide. Drawing on field work, interviews, and secondary documents, we investigate what we see as four key, intertwined and overlapping aspects of GG: state capacity including the establishment of a state bureaucracy, participation and the engagement of civil society, institution building and rule of law, and corruption control and transparency. We note GG provides a useful policy heuristic, while abstract “one-size-fits-all” liberal peacebuilding models, which avoid the complexities of machinery of government issues, the time taken to develop institutions, and historical and contextual environments of countries, are likely to face severe problems. New states may be dependent on external forces to maintain monopoly of violence. The reversibility and uncertainty of statebuilding and the decades-long commitment needed by international agencies are noted.

Item Type:	Journal Article
Subjects:	J Political Science > JA Political science (General)
Divisions:	Faculty of Business and Economics (FBE) > School of Management and Public Administration
Depositing User:	Shaun Goldfinch
Date Deposited:	05 Aug 2014 22:08
Last Modified:	22 Sep 2016 04:48
URI:	https://repository.usp.ac.fj/id/eprint/7559

Actions (login required)

View Item