African Perspectives on Statebuilding -seminar (27.2.2009)

The Crisis Management Initiative of Finland and the Institute for Security Studies of South Africa held an international seminar on African Perspectives on Statebuilding – Institutional Capabilities and Legitimacy of the State, 19 February, 2009, in Brussels, Belgium.

The aim of the seminar on African Perspectives on Statebuilding was to discuss the importance of strengthening institutional capacities for service delivery in fragile countries in order to consolidate peace. Preventing state fragility and supporting statebuilding are the most important tasks facing the international community today. The seminar provoked critical discussion about the model of statebuilding in Africa. The seminar further raised the question how the donor community could better support legitimacy of the state and its ability to provide services.

The seminar was part of CMI’s Post-war statebuilding cluster. The objective of the cluster is to address the causes of state-fragility from the perspective of strengthening the ability of the state to better fullfill its function to serve and protect its citizens. The CMI’s Statebuilding cluster produces methodological tools for prioritising and sequencing in statebuilding programming and develops tools for effective implementation of the statebuilding priorities. It also aims to better link peacebuilding, statebuilding and long-term development processes.

Summary

Vice Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs of Belgium, Karel De Gucht said the donor community should be challenged to re-evaluate their strategies to strengthen institutions for service delivery in tune with hearts and souls of the Africans. Statebuilding should be a mean to have the citizenry to respect the state without force. Lack of respect leads to lack of legitimacy which in turn can lead to violence. Therefore, it is crucial to evaluate past mistakes for improving the way statebuilding processes are supported.

President Martti Ahtisaari, the Nobel Peace Prize Laureate of 2008, underlined that the international community sometimes contributes to state fragility more than it is ready to accept. The way donors operate is often agency and supply driven and lacks prioritization and coordination. He encouraged developing national systems for monitoring and evaluation, but in real action, not in policy mantra. A more frank reflection of the past mistakes is crucial for reforming donor policies.

Ambassador Ahmed Haggag, Secretary General of Africa Society and a Member of the Government Council of the Institute for Security Studies, made a distinction between the state and governments and pointed out that the nation state should better serve its citizens. In the African political realities of today, to deliver basic services is more important for stability and security than for example responding to external threats. He urged the donors to stop feeding the state and start empowering the society. Weak capacity of a state to fulfill its basic functions may cause not only conflicts but also mass migration, which can at its worst lead into regional instability.

The first session focused on state-society relationships and building legitimacy through the provision of basic services.

Andrew Mwenda, Managing Editor of the newspaper Independent in Uganda, argued that the lack of legitimacy of the African states is due to the lack of incentives for the governments to provide services to the citizenry. The political power base of the ruling elites is based on patrimonial and clientelist policies, by which they buy off the loyalty of the necessary elites. The regimes in power are not required to provide services to the citizenry to stay in power, and the service sector remains poor. The donors have not given the African states enough incentives to try and gain legitimacy by service delivery.

Rahul Chandran, Associate Director at the Center on International Cooperation at New York University reminded that the statebuilding process is very political. Improving service delivery is an ingredient in the process, but perhaps the least important one. A political settlement must be reached before entering into service delivery. Therefore, the donor community should not think that development aid and their involvement is somehow apolitical. Statebuilding is really about a bargain between the needs of the state and its citizens.



The second session focused on the alternative models of statebuilding.

Dr Zhang Wei-wei, Research Fellow at the Centre for Asian Studies in Geneva and Professor of International Relations at Fudan University in Shanghai said that the Chinese state model cannot be copied as such, but it may include elements that states in Africa can consider. Since late 1970’s, China has focused on indicators of growth and welfare and aimed at good performance as a way of gaining legitimacy to the state. According to Dr Zhang, the key difference between the so called Western state model and the Chinese one is how they are legitimized: the Chinese legitimacy is based on performance, where as the Western legitimacy is based on processes. The Chinese model has been developed through trial and error, learning from various models, including the Western one. The recommendation therefore for the states in Africa engaged in statebuilding is to learn from any model found relevant, to experiment for the best possible outcome, and take a carefully sequenced approach to any reform to maintain stability.

Minister Natty Davis, Minister of State and Director of Liberia Reconstruction and Development Committee from Liberia discussed how Africans see the Chinese model of statebuilding. Minister Davis stressed the fact that people matter first – in order to succeed, the state needs a system of governance which is able to respond to the needs of the citizenry. Very few African statebuilding processes have been based on the principle “let’s work with what we have”, which may lead to unrealistic expectations and donor dependency. What is needed is strong leadership – how to translate that leadership into strong institutions which are able to prioritise and sequence the statebuilding task, remains a challenge. Building the capacity of a state to provide basic services should be the first priority. However, often the international agencies deliver these services directly to the citizens undermining government’s role.

In the third session, two separate country case examples focused on the issue of building the legitimacy of the state by improved service delivery.

The session on Central African Republic concluded that the fundamental question of the state has been neglected. The end of conflict creates a unique opportunity to rethink the state. Engaging in effective SSR and making the state visible even in the more remote regions is necessary in the early phases of peace building and statebuilding in order to ensure success. The session on Sierra Leone concluded that regional organizations, and in the case of West Africa ECOWAS in particular, can play a constructive role in conflict resolution and statebuilding. Therefore, more attention to their capacity development is required for regional stability.



In his concluding remarks Dr Paul-Simon Handy, Head of the African Security Analysis Programme of ISS called for an African debate of what the state is. Currently, there is no pan-African debate on statebuilding, and only a handful of countries have engaged in national debate. More debate and research capacity on statebuilding is needed within Africa, to have realistic expectations as to what the state can do and how to anchor prioritization in to local concensus.

In her concluding remarks Kirsi Joenpolvi, Deputy Director, Programmes from Crisis Management Initiative said that no matter what the model, a resilient state needs to be structured for and capacitated to listen, respond to and deliver for its citizenry. She further called each country to have the courage to develop a model best suited for its needs, history and culture, but extended a question to the international donor community whether it has the courage to support countries that may choose a model different from the Western representative democracy.

She concluded by asking how this understanding of what makes a resilient state should be included in conflict resolution processes, including mediation. CMI will continue to explore this question.

The seminar was attended by representatives of EU institutions, governments, research organizations and civil society. It was funded by the Governments of Belgium, Finland and Norway.