ABSTRACT
This chapter seeks to describe the state that has emerged in East Timor since independence and to assess whether, how, and how deeply international statebuilders, primarily the UN, its missions, and its agencies, influenced the new state’s shape. It argues, first, that UN missions influenced the shape of the state that has emerged in East Timor since independence, but in unexpected, unintended, and perverse ways. It will also argue that an autonomous East Timorese state has come into existence that resembles only superficially the donor-prescribed models, and whose defining characteristic has been its ability to cater to groups which see it as the focal point for their demands for various forms of recognition (material, political, and symbolic) to which they feel entitled as compensation for losses sustained or services rendered during the struggle for independence and since.
