The globalist vision predominant in the international community since the 1990s has prompted the Western nations to become actively involved in the Nation-Building processes in after-war countries.
This process is highly complex and multidisciplinary, so there are many approaches that shall be taken into account in order to fully understand this issue. The present article analyzes the study cases of Afghanistan, Bosnia and both Sudans, as well as all the scientific aspects to study and measure the Nation-Building objectives.
Each of the processes executed by the international community in these countries has had different procedures, strategies and results, due to the dimensions in which the conflict has been addressed: Military, cultural and social, which must be carried out harmonically at the same time in order to have a lasting peace and stability in the nation that is trying to rebuild.
Due to the ideological vision driven by globalization and cooperation during the 1990s, the international community assigned itself the responsibility of “nation-building”. IF we combine the visions of Boegue, Lockhart and Ghani it is possible to define “Nation Building” as the process of stimulating the capacities of state actors so they can implement and provide basic services, security and the Rule of Law to its population.
In other words, the process of nation-building consist in providing the host State all the tools it needs in order to be responsible for providing all the basic needs of the nation by itself in the short time, and to get up again after the war. Among the main tasks to be carried out by the international community, it is worth mentioning the infrastructure, the training to the security bodies of the State and the promotion of legal and constitutional reforms.
Due to the multidimensional approach that this type of operations requires, there are numerous sub-fields of political science where we can locate the concept of Nation-building: Geography, Sociology, Economics, Media studies, political law, political culture, peace and conflict studies and mass psychology, among many others.
Doyle and Sambanis have shown statistically the failure of the Nation Building projects, taking as an example the cases of Afghanistan, Bosnia, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Haiti and Iraq. The case of the Republic of Afghanistan is extremely complex, but in order to fully understand it, it is necessary to consider the contemporary history of that country: over the past 3 centuries Afghanistan has been a land without any political or social unity nor stability.
The people who inhabit that territory do not have a unique national identity, but instead they have grouped themselves around tribal, religious and regional groups. In other words, there is an “Afghanistan” but there are no “Afghans” who feel united and represented by the same flag, the same culture and the same national anthem.
This fact is manifested in the political and social history of that country as it is essentially anything else than the continuous struggle between modernism – in the style of Turkey or of Pre-Revolutionary Iran -, the conservatives of Islam, and also among those who want a nation-hood and those who prefer a completely tribal social model. Today, the situation has not changed much: There is still no Afghan government that has the rule of law, the rule of force or that has the same objectives as the international community.
In the case of Afghanistan, the Bonn Agreements and the Security Sector Reform (SSR) were signed. They manifest and promote a vision of “nation-building” which consists mainly in strengthening the security forces, and leaving all other social and economic aspects in the hands of the country receiving the aid.
This unique military approach caused the Taliban to withdraw to other areas of the region and continue their operations of drug trafficking and terror, which put the Afghan people at greater risk. In that way, the Afghan people began to perceive their new government as a puppet of the West that would not serve the best interests of their nation.
This popular discontent was exploited by the drug-lords to legitimately win the 2002 elections and take over most public offices. This resounding failure of the international community is due to the fact that at no time do they consider the social factor, that is, that in Afghanistan there are people who live in the territory and any action to take should consider them, and not only the interests of the Occidental countries.
It is not only about strength, but it’s also about serious political and social agreements that shall guarantee trust and legitimacy. For that reason, the situation in Afghanistan has not been resolved even to this day. The military aspect is necessary but it is not enough; we must build an institutional legitimacy that is sustainable over time.
As General Michael Symanski argues, the main problem in the current situation of Afghanistan is that the United States of America does not have (and actually never had) any clear and defined set of objectives, so it will never be possible to declare a “victory” or to withdraw with dignity from the Afghan territory. This political disaster was due to the fact that at no time were social or cultural aspects considered in the nation-building process, but only the military aspects were considered.
The approach used in Bosnia was very different: The international community stimulated the reconstruction of regional social capital and confidence through the depoliticization of national identity symbols. Through celebrations, rituals, events, symbols and common customs the people of Bosnia began to build their identity through reconciliation.
The aim was to build “Common Bosnianess” and stablishing the new Bosnian State into people’s mind and heart. The “nation-building” approach used in Bosnia was not to destroy the identity to force the creation of a new identity, but the strategy was simply to reorganize all the cultural elements in a more fancy and harmonious way in order to restore trust and respect among all citizens.
In other words, this nation-building approach did not only consider the military aspects (which are also important, and without which it would be impossible to guarantee peace, security and stability of the new territory) but it also considered cultural and social aspects in order to achieve a more meaningful result.
In the case of Sudan, traditional approaches were not enough to rebuild the social contract, but this situation needs new and better strategies in order to achieve the objectives. It is necessary to consider that this nation has two identities: One civic and one ethnic. The fact of not recognizing both identities and not planning all the actions based on these two, caused the international community to have another failure in “Nation-Building”.
Regarding the political science studies, it is worth mentioning that the way Nation-Building is measured depends largely on the approach taken. While nation-building can be studied from any level, it is preferable to build data from the institutional and personal point of view.
The purely military Nation-Building approach can be measured by statistics related to peace and citizen security. For example, number of terrorist attacks, number of deaths and injuries, homicide rate, and any other statistic that is considered representative of the efficiency of the State security forces and of the confidence and engaging that the local population has in them.
Bosnia’s approach, which includes social and cultural factors, should not only include the security aspects used in Afghanistan’s “nation-building” approach, but it also has tot take into account which are the identity symbols (historical and new) the population of the country is feeling identified with. Likewise, we must study the psychological and social impact that this symbols have on each ethnic group and specific location.
Obviously, this approach requires building a much more ambitious data than in the purely military approach. Finally, Sudan’s approach requires the realization of numerous sociological and cultural studies in order to determine the aspects of both identities: Civil identity and ethnic identity.
The Nation-building process is a very complex phenomenon that encompasses many of the areas and fields of study of political science, so there are numerous approaches with which the problem can be addressed. The best approach for nation-building is probably the one used in Bosnia because the best results were achieved in the medium and long term.
However, from the point of view of the studies in political science, the easiest approach to measure is the approach of Afghanistan, as it is purely military (and simplistic) since it does not require the most sophisticated statistics of the approaches that contemplate the social and cultural aspects for the restoration of capital and the trust in the legitimate institutions of the State. In other words, the mainly military approach is the easiest as there is less data needed.
In conclusion, there are several dimensions in Nation-Building, the purely military approach is insufficient to establish a lasting peace and stability in the country that is being helped. In that sense, it is also necessary to consider and design a set of meaningful social strategies in order to rebuild trust in a legitimate State through the use of historical or new symbols that impel the local population towards peace and stability.