Statebuilding

Abstract

This chapter analyzes how international statebuilding has shifted from problem-solving to a new discursive regime of acceptance and affirmation. It seeks to explore how the shift to bottom-up or postliberal approaches in the early 2000s led to a focus on epistemological barriers to intervention and an appreciation of complexity. It describes a process of reflection upon statebuilding as a policy practice, whereby the need to focus on local context and relations in order to take problems seriously further undermines confidence in the Western episteme. In other words, the bottom-up approach, rather than resolving the crisis of policy practices of statebuilding, seems to have further intensified it. It is argued that the way out of this crisis is to reject the problem-solving external authority and instead to “unlearn” from the opportunities opened up through the practices of exploring and engaging with the “other.”