Afghanistan: The Patrimonial Trap and the Dream of Institution-Building

Content Provider	Scilit
Author	Giustozzi, Antonio
Copyright Year	2016
Description	This chapter explains state weakness in Afghanistan by outlining a number of factors: social heterogeneity, the impact of the imperial past, international rivalry, and incomplete modernization. It explains the imperial model of governance adopted by the original Afghan state found by Abdur Rahman. This model was characterized by both relative resilience in the face of adversity, but also by strong internal fissures. The imperial model rested on the domination of a small tribal aristocracy, which had at different stages conquered the rest of what is today Afghanistan. The focus of the modernization effort after the Second World War was on the development of infrastructure rather than the expansion of agricultural/industrial production. The Afghan case shows well, perhaps in an extreme way, that the availability of financial resources per se is not the key factor in state-building; what matters is the way the cash is accumulated and then spent. Book Name: Persistent State Weakness in the Global Age
Related Links	https://api.taylorfrancis.com/content/chapters/edit/download?identifierName=doi&identifierValue=10.4324/9781315600093-5&type=chapterpdf
Ending Page	82
Page Count	14
Starting Page	69
DOI	10.4324/9781315600093-5
Language	English
Publisher	Informa UK Limited
Publisher Date	2016-05-13
Access Restriction	Open
Subject Keyword	Book Name: Persistent State Weakness in the Global Age History and Philosophy of Science Building Afghanistan Extreme Modernization Imperial Model
Content Type	Text
Resource Type	Chapter