In a 2007 survey of how Bangladesh was viewed by the American foreign policy establishment, fellow Drishtipat Writer Tazreena Sajjad described a failed state thus.
In layman’s terms, they are generally categorised by what they do not, or cannot, do. Failing and failed states do not control their territory or their borders, creating the scope for groups to move in and out without hindrance. Such states also do not control many areas, which can be under control of rebels and warlords, and do not provide basic services (health, nutrition, infrastructure, public services). Finally, they cannot fulfill international treaty obligations, and agreements of international concern. The most extreme examples are, of course, places like Somalia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sudan, Haiti and, increasingly, Iraq and Afghanistan.
Every year, the US based Foreign Policy magazine publishes an index of failed or failing states — details here. The index is a sum of 12 specific factors. A country can receive up to 10 points for each factor, with a higher score meaning a worse (ie failing) outcome. There may be serious methodological issues with trying to quantify something that is essentially qualitative. And one has to be very cautious about using an index that consistently ranks North Korea as a less failing state than Pakistan when we won’t find many Pakistanis willing to have Kim Il Jong running their country (this point is explained better here).
These methodological issues notwithstanding, the index is relevant for two reasons. Firstly, it is a high profile index that US foreign policy apparatchiks pay attention to. And when all is said and done, we still live in a world where if the American establishment is concerned that a particular country is ‘trouble’, it is likely that the country will find itself in trouble eventually. And second, we should still go through the index to see whether the findings reflect our ground realities.
For example, in 2008, Bangladesh scored higher than Haiti — a country used by Ms Sajjad as an ‘extreme example’ of a failed state. That is, after 18 months under an experiment that was supposed to improve our republic, Bangladesh was more of a failed state than Haiti — this unfortunate result didn’t come as a surprise to those of us who rejected that experiment from a very early stage.
(More at Mukti)
I was not too sure about that. I mean, Hitler and Bangladesh… really? Who will buy that? But my friend continued-
