| Review of: | Global Governance and the New Wars: The Merging of Development and Security by Mark Duffield |
|---|---|
| Reviewed By: | Joseph F. Bouchard |
| Reviewed in: | Journal of Contingencies and Crisis Management |
| Date accepted online: | 19/05/2004 |
| Published in print: | Volume 11, Issue 3, Pages 144-149 |
Book Reviews
Professor Duffield has produced an important work that contributes greatly to our understanding of the nature of conflict in under-developed countries and the reasons why developmental aid and humanitarian action have faced almost insurmountable challenges in attempting to ameliorate the plight of peoples suffering from underdevelopment and the conflicts that often arise from it.
I approached this book with great skepticism. As a specialist in strategic studies firmly rooted in the realist tradition, I have found little in the literature on development that has practical value in the area of crisis management. Nor have I found the grand prognostications on the nature of the post-cold War security environment or the implications of globalisation for international security to be of great value. Theories such as 'the end of history' or 'the clash of civilizations' may capture the fancy of pundits and the public, but offer little for scholars seeking to understand the myriad conflicts festering around the world today. Duffield's work stands in stark contrast to those pieces. He offers significant new insight into the nature of conflict and how it is intrinsically linked to prevailing views on security and development.
One issue needs to be raised at the outset. The war in Iraq, being fought as I write, is not an example of the 'new wars' that are the focus of Duffield's study; it is a classic inter-state war. The fact that an inter-state war is being fought two years after Duffield's book was published does not invalidate his thesis. It simply underscores the complexity of the post-Cold War security environment and the obvious fact that scholars and policy-makers must address a wide range of conflicts. Duffield has made a noteworthy contribution to our understanding of a significant number of those conflicts. Indeed, the current war in Iraq may well generate conditions, at least in portions of that country, ripe for one of the 'new wars' he describes.
Duffield argues persuasively that global governance lies in networks that bring together states, international governmental organizations (IGOs), non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and private companies to accomplish specific regulatory tasks. Since the end of the Cold War, global governance has been marked by growing emphasis on authority delegation: regional security arrangements, privatisation, subcontracting, and other network arrangements that share the burden of global management among a wide range of actors. These networks establish durable structures of global governance, yet are fluid and non-territorial, adapting to changing security perceptions and risk assessments. They also constitute what Duffield calls 'strategic complexes' of state and non-state actors, building connections within and between donor governments, military establishments, IGOs, NGOs and the commercial sector.
Duffield observes that the question of security has shifted dramatically: from being concerned with the biggest economies and war machines in the world to an interest in some of its smallest. He is right. In the United States, for example, this can be seen in public statements by American foreign policy officials and in the view of the world held by American defense planners.[1]
Although conflicts in underdeveloped countries traditionally have been described by aid providers as 'complex political emergencies', Duffield argues that they are in reality a new form of non-territorial
Duffield develops a convincing argument that the manner in which global governance has sought to deal with the new wars has led to a
Duffield's most provocative thesis is that the strategic complexes of global governance are implicated in a process of complicity and accommodation with the emerging political complexes that are the warring parties in network wars. He contends that, while opposing the violence and dislocation of the 'new wars', the strategic complexes of global governance selectively link the regulatory networks of the developed world with warring networks beyond the regulatory regimes of territorially defined governments. Further, Duffield contends that strategic actors, including politicians of powerful states, officials of donor organisations and even international interests that support market liberalisation, can facilitate violence either by tolerating the war by their actions or even making warfare easier. In a compelling case study of the violence in southern Sudan, Duffield shows these processes of complicity and accommodation in action.
Duffield concludes that, despite the post-Cold War evolution from a state-centered system of international regulation to one of networked global governance, the organisational culture in donor organisations and aid agencies has yet to undergo a corresponding process of systemic reform. The result has been a mismatch between the complexity of network wars and existing institutional cultures. Not only are many organisations culturally maladjusted to complexity, but this maladjustment is actively maintained by powerful groups and networks. Development organisations have been transformed into agents of crisis management as environments have become less predictable and more chaotic. This, in turn, inhibits the formulation of effective development strategies that are capable of moving beyond the complicity and accommodation that the strategic complexes of global governance have fallen into with the political complexes of network wars.
Duffield argues for radical reform of the institutional culture of aid and development organisations - turning their rule-based bureaucracies into adaptive, learning and networked organisations - in order for global liberal governance to deliver the relative security of the Cold War era, when states had greater authority to regulate commerce and violence. To reform aid and development bureaucracies into adaptive, learning organisations, he advocates studying the process of development policy formulation. Correcting development policy failure is more complex, he contends, than finding a better way of delivering assistance in underdeveloped countries; it requires an understanding of the groups and interests on both sides - the strategic complexes global governance and the political complexes of network wars - that are perpetuating the current system of using development to serve conflict resolution ends, rather than to improve the lot of those adversely impacted by underdevelopment.
This work is a significant contribution to the literature on development and security. I commend it to professionals in both fields seeking to understand the complexities of security and stability in underdeveloped countries and the challenges of providing effective development. For scholars and policy-makers dealing with contingency planning and crisis management for what have traditionally been called 'complex political emergencies', this book will dramatically change their perspective on the nature of such conflicts and the policies that would be effective for handling them.
[1]See for example Richard N. Haass, Director, Policy Planning Staff, U.S. Department of State, 'Remarks to the School of Foreign Service and the Mortara Center for International Studies, Georgetown University', January 14, 2003, Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of State, 2003; and Thomas P.M. Barnett, U.S. Naval War College, 'The Pentagon's New Map',