num_pages: 402
description: No one likes nation-building. The public dismisses it. Politicians criticize it. The traditional military disdains it and civilian agencies lack the blueprint necessary to make it work. Yet functioning states play a foundational role in international security and stability. Left unattended ungoverned spaces can produce crises from migration to economic collapse to terrorism. Keith W. Mines has taken part in nation-building efforts as a Special Forces officer diplomat occupation administrator and United Nations official. In Why Nation-Building Matters he uses cases from his own career to argue that repairing failed states is a high-yield investment in our own nations global future. Eyewitness accounts of eight projectsin Colombia Grenada El Salvador Somalia Haiti Darfur Afghanistan and Iraqinform Miness in-depth analysis of how foreign interventions succeed and fail. Building on that analysis he establishes a framework for nation-building in the core areas of building security forces economic development and political consolidation that blend soft and hard power into an effective package. Grounded in real-world experience Why Nation-Building Matters is an informed and essential guide to meeting one of the foremost challenges of our foreign policy present and future.
language: None
title: Why Nation-Building Matters: Political Consolidation, Building Security Forces, and Economic Development in Failed and Fragile States
publisher: Potomac Books