In order to truly address the problems af icting post-con ict countries, donors must not settle... more In order to truly address the problems af icting post-con ict countries, donors must not settle for super cial, humbug solutions. Instead, they must presume that a problem they are encountering here is unique and idiosyncratic, presume it is incredibly complex and nuanced, and presume it is nowhere close to monolithic and that the symptoms in one part of the country or in one part of the world must stem from entirely different pathologies than those working to create the same symptoms in another part. At a minimum, such presumptions will force donors to do the foundational diligence that is truly necessary to accomplish sustainable change.-Christiana Tah, minister of justice, Liberia 1 Introduction: Justice and Con ict 2 There is broad and growing recognition across a range of development actors that fragile and con ict-affected states (FCSs) pose particular development challenges; indeed, they are a key development challenge of the coming decade. Home to approximately 1.5 billion people, FCSs contain many of the world's poorest and most vulnerable. People in FCSs are more than twice as likely to be undernourished as those in other developing countries, more than three times as likely to be unable to send their children to school, twice as likely to see their children die before the age of ve, and more than twice as likely to lack clean water. No low-income FCS has yet achieved a single Millennium Development Goal. 3
This article reflects on the experience of the two authors as 'experts' during consultations on j... more This article reflects on the experience of the two authors as 'experts' during consultations on justice and security indicators for the Sustainable Development Goals. The authors examine how the tension between the indeterminacy of the concepts to be measured-justice and security-and the concreteness of indicators shaped the politics of the consultations. Participants used this tension strategically to destabilize notions of time, space and identity on which knowledge production rests. In doing so, they blurred the distinction between academics, advocates and policy makers. They did this to lay claim to some aspects of implementation while distancing themselves from others. The authors then juxtapose this with personal experience of researching South Sudanese citizens, who challenged and deconstructed that distinction. At the same time, experts at the consultations incorporated an image of these citizens as an ethical justification for the discussion. The authors argue that a more complex sociology of knowledge is required to understand how these global knowledge practices work from the global to the local. Such a sociology of knowledge acknowledges fluidity and grapples with how knowledge practices defer and delimit moments of decision; it requires an ethico-political-rather than just a political-critique.
The rule of law (ROL), although an "essentially contested concept", can be understood pragmatical... more The rule of law (ROL), although an "essentially contested concept", can be understood pragmatically as a system that informs people of what to expect from others through durable and enforceable rules applying equally to all constituent members of a given juridical space. This literature review engages with "the politics of what works" with regard to ROL interventions in development, through an exploration of how these expectations and encompassing rules are shaped within and between groups, as political settlements broaden across political, economic and social dimensions. We understand the politics of ROL as deeply complex and inherently multi-directional: elites, for example, certainly use ROL, but legalization is powerful and can be used in unpredictable ways against elites by other elite groups or by non-elite actors. We review an extensive literature to explore how contests among and between elites and end users shape institutions through a contested, iterative and dynamic process that, in any given setting, is likely to yield an idiosyncratic outcome borne of a unique hybrid mix of local and external inputs. As such, "more research" as conventionally understood will only yield marginal improvements in conceptual clarity and to our cumulative empirical knowledge of the dynamic relationship between ROL, politics and development. The political salience, legitimacy and action-ability of such understandings much be negotiated anew in each setting, between different epistemic groups (professions, users, policymakers) and across divides of gender, ideology and class. We conclude with some specific suggestions for how to enhance the rigor and relevance of ROL interventions from both an analytical and practical standpoint.
The capacity to act collectively is not just a matter of groups sharing interests, incentives and... more The capacity to act collectively is not just a matter of groups sharing interests, incentives and values (or being sufficiently small), as standard economic theory predicts, but a prior and shared understanding of the constituent elements of problem(s) and possible solutions. From this standpoint, the failure to act collectively can stem at least in part from relevant groups failing to ascribe a common intersubjective meaning to situations, processes and events. We develop a conceptual account of intersubjective meanings, explain its relevance to development practice and research, and examine its implications for development work related to building the rule of law and managing common pool resources.
In her article from 2019, Fleur Johns describes a change: from a style of development work marked... more In her article from 2019, Fleur Johns describes a change: from a style of development work marked by a propensity for ‘planning’, to one marked by a propensity for ‘prototyping’. Our project in this paper is to propose a modest shift in perspective. Where Johns traces a transition from old to new styles, we emphasise the enduring links between planning and prototyping, such that both styles are best understood through their ongoing relationships and entanglements. Returning to Pulse Lab Jakarta (PLJ), the site of Johns’ initial inquiry, we offer a reinterpretation of what might be novel about PLJ for development practice. Our claim is that to understand the particular intervention that PLJ represents, and the new modes of practice it produces, it may be helpful to understand PLJ's work in the manner of a ‘modular’ attachment to existing development apparatuses, that combines big data analytics with design thinking. We then develop some reflections and speculations on the forms a...
In 2017, we established a reading group that sought to make sense of how to understand, respond t... more In 2017, we established a reading group that sought to make sense of how to understand, respond to, and inherit the international projects of which we were becoming a part (or, increasingly, apart). A seminar followed, and, in 2018, a workshop was held called 'Learning from Failure', which included our two essayists. Picking through the mounting debris of the liberal (secular, anti-racist) international order are, Vasuki Nesiah, on 'Freedom at sea', and Adam Sitze, on 'The crime of apartheid: genealogy of a successful failure'. Essays to come from the project will explore revolutionary failures and the role of failure in the ethical formation of international lawyers.
ABSTRACTThis article reflects on the experience of the two authors as ‘experts’ during consultati... more ABSTRACTThis article reflects on the experience of the two authors as ‘experts’ during consultations on justice and security indicators for the Sustainable Development Goals. The authors examine how the tension between the indeterminacy of the concepts to be measured — justice and security — and the concreteness of indicators shaped the politics of the consultations. Participants used this tension strategically to destabilize notions of time, space and identity on which knowledge production rests. In doing so, they blurred the distinction between academics, advocates and policy makers. They did this to lay claim to some aspects of implementation while distancing themselves from others. The authors then juxtapose this with personal experience of researching South Sudanese citizens, who challenged and deconstructed that distinction. At the same time, experts at the consultations incorporated an image of these citizens as an ethical justification for the discussion. The authors argue t...
Mary Kaldor’s recent work on security cultures is rooted in a puzzle: if the term security is by ... more Mary Kaldor’s recent work on security cultures is rooted in a puzzle: if the term security is by its very nature complex and ambiguous, why do we keep doing the same things and making the same mistakes? Her answer: security cultures, or shared styles of doing security. She argues that we need to find ‘nodal points’— or experts in their context—and disrupt their way of operating through ‘security experiments’. This reflects recent arguments in my field of rule of law reform and elsewhere. Drawing on these arguments, my experiences of rule of law reform and theory from the sociology of knowledge, I ask whether Kaldor’s call for security experiments may actually contribute to the reproduction of the same mistakes. I argue that the indeterminacy of the core idea distinguishes fields such as rule of law reform and security. It also makes it difficult to change them, as any statement that orders these fields is subject to being captured by experts and mobilized as a resource in their contests. I then look at the training curriculum of the International Institute for Justice and the Rule of Law in Malta to explore how experimentation might be conservative, rather than disruptive, arguing that experts may inoculate themselves against critique by using the sophisticated rhetoric of experiments, while hiding their agency and decisions behind the veneer of being responsive.
Rule of law orthodoxy—legal transplants from high- to low-income countries—has endured despite pe... more Rule of law orthodoxy—legal transplants from high- to low-income countries—has endured despite persistent critiques. A key reason for this, we argue, is the absence of positive theories of praxis that can instantiate essentially contested concepts such as rule of law. We discuss the emergence of one nascent alternative, the World Bank's Justice for the Poor program, locating it within broader turns to experimental approaches to development. In doing so, we argue that rule of law reform must be understood in the context of the politics of the relationship between development experts and the domestic political forums in and through which rules systems emerge. As such, a primary task of external agencies is to help forge and sustain such forums, to recognize the deep imbrication between the process norms of these forums and the nature of the rule of law being produced, and to ensure that the empirical foundations on which ensuing deliberations rest are both sound and accessible. We...
The rule of law (ROL), although an "essentially contested concept", can be understood pragmatical... more The rule of law (ROL), although an "essentially contested concept", can be understood pragmatically as a system that informs people of what to expect from others through durable and enforceable rules applying equally to all constituent members of a given juridical space. This literature review engages with "the politics of what works" with regard to ROL interventions in development, through an exploration of how these expectations and encompassing rules are shaped within and between groups, as political settlements broaden across political, economic and social dimensions. We understand the politics of ROL as deeply complex and inherently multi-directional: elites, for example, certainly use ROL, but legalization is powerful and can be used in unpredictable ways against elites by other elite groups or by non-elite actors. We review an extensive literature to explore how contests among and between elites and end users shape institutions through a contested, iterative and dynamic process that, in any given setting, is likely to yield an idiosyncratic outcome borne of a unique hybrid mix of local and external inputs. As such, "more research" as conventionally understood will only yield marginal improvements in conceptual clarity and to our cumulative empirical knowledge of the dynamic relationship between ROL, politics and development. The political salience, legitimacy and action-ability of such understandings much be negotiated anew in each setting, between different epistemic groups (professions, users, policymakers) and across divides of gender, ideology and class. We conclude with some specific suggestions for how to enhance the rigor and relevance of ROL interventions from both an analytical and practical standpoint.
The Policy Research Working Paper Series disseminates the findings of work in progress to encoura... more The Policy Research Working Paper Series disseminates the findings of work in progress to encourage the exchange of ideas about development issues. An objective of the series is to get the findings out quickly, even if the presentations are less than fully polished. The papers carry the names of the authors and should be cited accordingly. The findings, interpretations, and conclusions expressed in this paper are entirely those of the authors. They do not necessarily represent the views of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development/World Bank and its affiliated organizations, or those of the Executive Directors of the World Bank or the governments they represent.
• Rule of law and justice reform is integral to sustainable development, yet is complex and bound... more • Rule of law and justice reform is integral to sustainable development, yet is complex and bound in social norms and political power. • International support to this agenda is moving away from top-down, state-centric approaches, to be more bottom-up and end-user focused. • There is also a growing interest in politically smart and adaptive approaches. However, what makes for 'effective experimentalism' is under-documented, under-explored and under-systematised.
In order to truly address the problems af icting post-con ict countries, donors must not settle... more In order to truly address the problems af icting post-con ict countries, donors must not settle for super cial, humbug solutions. Instead, they must presume that a problem they are encountering here is unique and idiosyncratic, presume it is incredibly complex and nuanced, and presume it is nowhere close to monolithic and that the symptoms in one part of the country or in one part of the world must stem from entirely different pathologies than those working to create the same symptoms in another part. At a minimum, such presumptions will force donors to do the foundational diligence that is truly necessary to accomplish sustainable change.-Christiana Tah, minister of justice, Liberia 1 Introduction: Justice and Con ict 2 There is broad and growing recognition across a range of development actors that fragile and con ict-affected states (FCSs) pose particular development challenges; indeed, they are a key development challenge of the coming decade. Home to approximately 1.5 billion people, FCSs contain many of the world's poorest and most vulnerable. People in FCSs are more than twice as likely to be undernourished as those in other developing countries, more than three times as likely to be unable to send their children to school, twice as likely to see their children die before the age of ve, and more than twice as likely to lack clean water. No low-income FCS has yet achieved a single Millennium Development Goal. 3
This article reflects on the experience of the two authors as 'experts' during consultations on j... more This article reflects on the experience of the two authors as 'experts' during consultations on justice and security indicators for the Sustainable Development Goals. The authors examine how the tension between the indeterminacy of the concepts to be measured-justice and security-and the concreteness of indicators shaped the politics of the consultations. Participants used this tension strategically to destabilize notions of time, space and identity on which knowledge production rests. In doing so, they blurred the distinction between academics, advocates and policy makers. They did this to lay claim to some aspects of implementation while distancing themselves from others. The authors then juxtapose this with personal experience of researching South Sudanese citizens, who challenged and deconstructed that distinction. At the same time, experts at the consultations incorporated an image of these citizens as an ethical justification for the discussion. The authors argue that a more complex sociology of knowledge is required to understand how these global knowledge practices work from the global to the local. Such a sociology of knowledge acknowledges fluidity and grapples with how knowledge practices defer and delimit moments of decision; it requires an ethico-political-rather than just a political-critique.
The rule of law (ROL), although an "essentially contested concept", can be understood pragmatical... more The rule of law (ROL), although an "essentially contested concept", can be understood pragmatically as a system that informs people of what to expect from others through durable and enforceable rules applying equally to all constituent members of a given juridical space. This literature review engages with "the politics of what works" with regard to ROL interventions in development, through an exploration of how these expectations and encompassing rules are shaped within and between groups, as political settlements broaden across political, economic and social dimensions. We understand the politics of ROL as deeply complex and inherently multi-directional: elites, for example, certainly use ROL, but legalization is powerful and can be used in unpredictable ways against elites by other elite groups or by non-elite actors. We review an extensive literature to explore how contests among and between elites and end users shape institutions through a contested, iterative and dynamic process that, in any given setting, is likely to yield an idiosyncratic outcome borne of a unique hybrid mix of local and external inputs. As such, "more research" as conventionally understood will only yield marginal improvements in conceptual clarity and to our cumulative empirical knowledge of the dynamic relationship between ROL, politics and development. The political salience, legitimacy and action-ability of such understandings much be negotiated anew in each setting, between different epistemic groups (professions, users, policymakers) and across divides of gender, ideology and class. We conclude with some specific suggestions for how to enhance the rigor and relevance of ROL interventions from both an analytical and practical standpoint.
The capacity to act collectively is not just a matter of groups sharing interests, incentives and... more The capacity to act collectively is not just a matter of groups sharing interests, incentives and values (or being sufficiently small), as standard economic theory predicts, but a prior and shared understanding of the constituent elements of problem(s) and possible solutions. From this standpoint, the failure to act collectively can stem at least in part from relevant groups failing to ascribe a common intersubjective meaning to situations, processes and events. We develop a conceptual account of intersubjective meanings, explain its relevance to development practice and research, and examine its implications for development work related to building the rule of law and managing common pool resources.
In her article from 2019, Fleur Johns describes a change: from a style of development work marked... more In her article from 2019, Fleur Johns describes a change: from a style of development work marked by a propensity for ‘planning’, to one marked by a propensity for ‘prototyping’. Our project in this paper is to propose a modest shift in perspective. Where Johns traces a transition from old to new styles, we emphasise the enduring links between planning and prototyping, such that both styles are best understood through their ongoing relationships and entanglements. Returning to Pulse Lab Jakarta (PLJ), the site of Johns’ initial inquiry, we offer a reinterpretation of what might be novel about PLJ for development practice. Our claim is that to understand the particular intervention that PLJ represents, and the new modes of practice it produces, it may be helpful to understand PLJ's work in the manner of a ‘modular’ attachment to existing development apparatuses, that combines big data analytics with design thinking. We then develop some reflections and speculations on the forms a...
In 2017, we established a reading group that sought to make sense of how to understand, respond t... more In 2017, we established a reading group that sought to make sense of how to understand, respond to, and inherit the international projects of which we were becoming a part (or, increasingly, apart). A seminar followed, and, in 2018, a workshop was held called 'Learning from Failure', which included our two essayists. Picking through the mounting debris of the liberal (secular, anti-racist) international order are, Vasuki Nesiah, on 'Freedom at sea', and Adam Sitze, on 'The crime of apartheid: genealogy of a successful failure'. Essays to come from the project will explore revolutionary failures and the role of failure in the ethical formation of international lawyers.
ABSTRACTThis article reflects on the experience of the two authors as ‘experts’ during consultati... more ABSTRACTThis article reflects on the experience of the two authors as ‘experts’ during consultations on justice and security indicators for the Sustainable Development Goals. The authors examine how the tension between the indeterminacy of the concepts to be measured — justice and security — and the concreteness of indicators shaped the politics of the consultations. Participants used this tension strategically to destabilize notions of time, space and identity on which knowledge production rests. In doing so, they blurred the distinction between academics, advocates and policy makers. They did this to lay claim to some aspects of implementation while distancing themselves from others. The authors then juxtapose this with personal experience of researching South Sudanese citizens, who challenged and deconstructed that distinction. At the same time, experts at the consultations incorporated an image of these citizens as an ethical justification for the discussion. The authors argue t...
Mary Kaldor’s recent work on security cultures is rooted in a puzzle: if the term security is by ... more Mary Kaldor’s recent work on security cultures is rooted in a puzzle: if the term security is by its very nature complex and ambiguous, why do we keep doing the same things and making the same mistakes? Her answer: security cultures, or shared styles of doing security. She argues that we need to find ‘nodal points’— or experts in their context—and disrupt their way of operating through ‘security experiments’. This reflects recent arguments in my field of rule of law reform and elsewhere. Drawing on these arguments, my experiences of rule of law reform and theory from the sociology of knowledge, I ask whether Kaldor’s call for security experiments may actually contribute to the reproduction of the same mistakes. I argue that the indeterminacy of the core idea distinguishes fields such as rule of law reform and security. It also makes it difficult to change them, as any statement that orders these fields is subject to being captured by experts and mobilized as a resource in their contests. I then look at the training curriculum of the International Institute for Justice and the Rule of Law in Malta to explore how experimentation might be conservative, rather than disruptive, arguing that experts may inoculate themselves against critique by using the sophisticated rhetoric of experiments, while hiding their agency and decisions behind the veneer of being responsive.
Rule of law orthodoxy—legal transplants from high- to low-income countries—has endured despite pe... more Rule of law orthodoxy—legal transplants from high- to low-income countries—has endured despite persistent critiques. A key reason for this, we argue, is the absence of positive theories of praxis that can instantiate essentially contested concepts such as rule of law. We discuss the emergence of one nascent alternative, the World Bank's Justice for the Poor program, locating it within broader turns to experimental approaches to development. In doing so, we argue that rule of law reform must be understood in the context of the politics of the relationship between development experts and the domestic political forums in and through which rules systems emerge. As such, a primary task of external agencies is to help forge and sustain such forums, to recognize the deep imbrication between the process norms of these forums and the nature of the rule of law being produced, and to ensure that the empirical foundations on which ensuing deliberations rest are both sound and accessible. We...
The rule of law (ROL), although an "essentially contested concept", can be understood pragmatical... more The rule of law (ROL), although an "essentially contested concept", can be understood pragmatically as a system that informs people of what to expect from others through durable and enforceable rules applying equally to all constituent members of a given juridical space. This literature review engages with "the politics of what works" with regard to ROL interventions in development, through an exploration of how these expectations and encompassing rules are shaped within and between groups, as political settlements broaden across political, economic and social dimensions. We understand the politics of ROL as deeply complex and inherently multi-directional: elites, for example, certainly use ROL, but legalization is powerful and can be used in unpredictable ways against elites by other elite groups or by non-elite actors. We review an extensive literature to explore how contests among and between elites and end users shape institutions through a contested, iterative and dynamic process that, in any given setting, is likely to yield an idiosyncratic outcome borne of a unique hybrid mix of local and external inputs. As such, "more research" as conventionally understood will only yield marginal improvements in conceptual clarity and to our cumulative empirical knowledge of the dynamic relationship between ROL, politics and development. The political salience, legitimacy and action-ability of such understandings much be negotiated anew in each setting, between different epistemic groups (professions, users, policymakers) and across divides of gender, ideology and class. We conclude with some specific suggestions for how to enhance the rigor and relevance of ROL interventions from both an analytical and practical standpoint.
The Policy Research Working Paper Series disseminates the findings of work in progress to encoura... more The Policy Research Working Paper Series disseminates the findings of work in progress to encourage the exchange of ideas about development issues. An objective of the series is to get the findings out quickly, even if the presentations are less than fully polished. The papers carry the names of the authors and should be cited accordingly. The findings, interpretations, and conclusions expressed in this paper are entirely those of the authors. They do not necessarily represent the views of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development/World Bank and its affiliated organizations, or those of the Executive Directors of the World Bank or the governments they represent.
• Rule of law and justice reform is integral to sustainable development, yet is complex and bound... more • Rule of law and justice reform is integral to sustainable development, yet is complex and bound in social norms and political power. • International support to this agenda is moving away from top-down, state-centric approaches, to be more bottom-up and end-user focused. • There is also a growing interest in politically smart and adaptive approaches. However, what makes for 'effective experimentalism' is under-documented, under-explored and under-systematised.
This blog, published on the World Bank's Public Sphere, is a follow-up to the authors' online sy... more This blog, published on the World Bank's Public Sphere, is a follow-up to the authors' online symposium on the evolving ethics of qualitative research in fragile states. It presents key reflections from a round-table on the same topic at the International Studies Association 2016 in Atlanta.
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