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The political economy of state failure

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  • Paul Collier

Abstract

Rapid decolonization created many arbitrary countries. In contrast to those states which had emerged through a quasi-Darwinian process of selection, some of these new countries had structural characteristics which gravely impeded the provision of public goods. Their lack of a unifying sense of shared identity made cooperation difficult, and their tiny economic size left them unable to reap scale economies. Two public goods, security and accountability, are particularly important for development and so, where they could not be provided, states failed. The cause of a problem is not necessarily a guide to its solution: Darwinian struggle among failing states is not something to be encouraged. Solutions lie partly in a phase of international provision of the key public goods, partly in enhanced regional pooling of sovereignty, and partly in institutional innovation to make the domestic provision of public goods less demanding of the state. Copyright 2009, Oxford University Press.

Suggested Citation

  • Paul Collier, 2009. "The political economy of state failure," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 25(2), pages 219-240, Summer.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:oxford:v:25:y:2009:i:2:p:219-240
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    Cited by:

    1. Abid Rashid Gill & Sallahuddin Hassan & K Kuperan Viswanathan, 2019. "Is democracy enough to get early turn of the environmental Kuznets curve in ASEAN countries?," Energy & Environment, , vol. 30(8), pages 1491-1505, December.
    2. Mark Turner & Ribaun Korm & Kim Veara, 2017. "Government policy and private sector development in post-conflict states: Growing Cambodia’s rice production and export industries," The Economic and Labour Relations Review, , vol. 28(2), pages 252-269, June.
    3. Joshua K. Ault & Andrew Spicer, 2014. "The institutional context of poverty: State fragility as a predictor of cross-national variation in commercial microfinance lending," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 35(12), pages 1818-1838, December.
    4. Samuel Adams & Edem Kwame Mensah Klobodu, 2019. "Urbanization, Economic Structure, Political Regime, and Income Inequality," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 142(3), pages 971-995, April.
    5. Oana Borcan & Ola Olsson & Louis Putterman, 2018. "State history and economic development: evidence from six millennia," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 23(1), pages 1-40, March.
    6. Estrada, Fernando & Mutascu, Mihai & Tiwari, Aviral, 2011. "Estabilidad política y tributación [Taxation and political stability]," MPRA Paper 32414, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    7. Jimenez-Ayora, Pablo & Ulubaşoğlu, Mehmet Ali, 2015. "What underlies weak states? The role of terrain ruggedness," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 39(C), pages 167-183.
    8. David Hulme & Antonio Savoia & Kunal Sen, 2015. "Governance as a Global Development Goal? Setting, Measuring and Monitoring the Post-2015 Development Agenda," Global Policy, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 6(2), pages 85-96, May.
    9. José Ernesto Amorós & Luciano Ciravegna & Vesna Mandakovic & Pekka Stenholm, 2019. "Necessity or Opportunity? The Effects of State Fragility and Economic Development on Entrepreneurial Efforts," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 43(4), pages 725-750, July.
    10. Princewilliams Odera Oguejiofor & Onwuasoigwe, Chioma Alice, 2024. "Hordes of Struggling African Youths will Continue to Migrate En Masse to Developed Countries: The Political Economy of “Japa†from Nigeria to the United Kingdom (2015-2023)," International Journal of Research and Innovation in Social Science, International Journal of Research and Innovation in Social Science (IJRISS), vol. 8(4), pages 144-156, April.
    11. Estrada, Fernando, 2013. "Estabilidad política y poder fiscal [political stability and tax power]," MPRA Paper 58458, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 2014.
    12. Arik Sadeh & Claudia Florina Radu & Cristina Feniser & Andrei Borşa, 2020. "Governmental Intervention and Its Impact on Growth, Economic Development, and Technology in OECD Countries," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(1), pages 1-30, December.
    13. Jessica R. Hawkins, 2014. "Historicizing the state in development theory: Michael Mann’s model of social power," Progress in Development Studies, , vol. 14(3), pages 299-308, July.
    14. Ault, Joshua K. & Spicer, Andrew, 2022. "The formal institutional context of informal entrepreneurship: A cross-national, configurational-based perspective," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 51(9).
    15. Antonio Savoia & Kunal Sen, 2015. "Measurement, Evolution, Determinants, And Consequences Of State Capacity: A Review Of Recent Research," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(3), pages 441-458, July.

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