Future Watch, June 2005: The Failed State Industry

June 1, 2005

Drawing heavily from experience in Iraq and Afghanistan, U.S. policymakers continue to wrestle with the question of how to transform failed and weakened states. Francis Fukuyama, Professor in International Political Economy at Johns Hopkins University at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), engaged the topic of what he termed “Washington’s new failed state industry” at a recent Global Strategy Institute (GSI) Forum. Fukuyama drew from his most recent book, State Building: Governance and World Order in the 21st Century.