ABSTRACT
Over the past two decades, international peacebuilding has followed the liberal peace approach.1 Liberal peacebuilding is closely linked to statebuilding because state fragility has been seen as a major cause of violent confl ict. Hence, liberal peacebuilding has embarked on an ambitious project of state reconstruction, including the reform of the state’s security sector, building the capacities of the central machinery of government and fostering the eff ectiveness of the various branches of the state apparatus. The underlying assumption is that a ‘proper’ state – that is, a state of the Western liberal ideal type – is the best guarantor of sustainable peace. A liberal market economy and a liberal democratic civil society are seen as necessary underpinnings of such a liberal state; it is therefore part of the current peacebuilding philosophy to support the institutions of the market economy and civil society. However, this paradigm of ‘peace building as state building’ (Richmond 2011) has largely failed to achieve its goals.
