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This book is a critical reading of contemporary interventionism, exploring how interventions shape the course of conflicts and reconciliation processes in Somalia. In a critical departure from the state-capacity consensus that has dominated the debate on terrorism and state failure, this book argues that conflict and sovereignty transformations in Somalia cannot be understood as the result of a gap in state-capacity, as multiple interventions have compromised the autonomy of the target state and society to act as sovereign. Destabilising Interventions in Somalia focuses on the humanitarian intervention of the mid-1990s, the Ethiopia–Eritrean regional proxy war in the late 1990s and the Global War on Terror in the 2000s. Examining the politics and mechanisms of multiple interventions, this book shows how interveners complicate and amplify existing conflicts, how they reiterate the international dimension of the conflict itself, and how they orient the target state towards the outsourcing of sovereignty functions. Key to this process has been the violent and exclusionary nature of interventions grounded in the aspiration of transforming existing political orders.

Abstract: "To what extent is making peace not a neutral or impartial exercise? By analysing the peace initiatives undertaken in Somalia and Somaliland (1991-95), this article questions the positionality and alignment of the actors involved, and claims that neither process has been an impartial exercise. To explore this argument the article first theoretically frames how supporters and critics of liberal peace elaborate on the dilemma of neutrality and impartiality. Departing from Lederach's criticism of impartiality, I claim that the UN-US intervention in Somalia has been an instrument of division, as well as leverage for political and military advantage. External interveners have initially subverted the internal distribution of power, but they lacked the commitment and material capacity of sustaining the preferred 'winning' faction. By unpacking the category of 'local' I then map the protagonists of the Somaliland pacification, as well the mechanism of institution-building that enabled a multi-scale of stakeholders to sustain the conflict resolution. This analysis contributes to reconceptualise the political architecture of making peace. It also helps to disentangle the study of peace and violence from the myths of the liberal, neutral, intervention doctrine." (Seite 280)

This Working Paper is a background paper delivered to frame the workshop 'Global Governance by Indicators: Measuring corruption and corruption indicators' convened by the Global Governance Programme of the European University Institute in Florence on 17 and 18 October 2013. Successively it was developed further in EUI RSCAS WP 2014/37 - http://hdl.handle.net/1814/30582 ; The development of more sophisticated corruption measures has been stimulated by consistent and compelling demands for more effective action against corruption. However, the production of these indicators has rarely been addressed as a 'technique of governance' (Davis et al., 2012), or an instrument of 'governance without government' (Rosenau & Czempiel, 1992). The first section (1) reviews the major existing measures of corruption, by focusing on different categories of indices and indicators. The second part (2) pays particular attention to the major ontological and methodological criticisms, constraints and pitfalls, connected with these indicators. The third part (3) presents a comparative analysis of two of the most widely used indicators of corruption: the World Bank's Control of Corruption indicator (CC) and Transparency International's Corruption Perception Index (CPI). The fourth section (4) evaluates the policy implications embedded in the construction and employment of indicators, while the last part of the paper (5) concludes by summarizing the most important questions raised by this analysis.

This Working Paper is a background paper delivered to frame the workshop 'Global Governance by Indicators : Sustainability and Sustainable Public Finances' convened by the Global Governance Programme of the European University Institute in Florence on 10 and 11 April 2014. Successively it was developed further in EUI RSCAS WP 2014/78 http://hdl.handle.net/1814/31914 ; The concept of sustainability emerged on the global governance agenda during the 1970s, when, the economic crisis put the spotlight on environmental and social risks associated with economic growth. Although much has been written about it, the literature on pillars, dimensions and measures of sustainability has developed quite independently from the discussions on the idea of sustainability as a set of interlinked and interdependent concentric thematic circles (that is its environmental, social, economic and institutional dimensions). Beginning with this conceptual debate, the present paper argues that indicators of fiscal sustainability are caught between demands of a solvency criterion and the principles of inter- and intra-generational equity. Bypassing their function as a mere representation of reality, these indicators have played a key role in de facto regulating the current fiscal crisis and in eclipsing the other dimensions of sustainability. To discuss this argument, the paper's first section explores the literature on sustainability indicators and composite indices of sustainable development. Its second part focuses on indicators of fiscal sustainability evaluating concepts, measures and demands. The third part gives insight into two measures, the United Nations' (UN) Debt to GNI ratio and the European Union's (EU) fiscal sustainability gap indicators. The fourth part concludes by summarising conceptual, normative and ontological questions.

How is the space for contemporary interventions constructed? This article deepens our understanding of counterterrorism as a dialectical form of intervention by highlighting the importance of unifying rationalities in the creation of "ungoverned spaces" as abstract spaces for intervention purposes. We combine dialectical and decolonial thinking to track how unifying rationalities in Nigeria and Libya are deployed across cognitive, normative, and operational constructs. The article examines how interventions are cognitively tied to coloniality of knowing, being, and power, which exploit identity, religion, or societal divisions to justify ungovernance and normalize state and foreign violence. The simultaneous and reciprocal globalization of local security concerns and localization of global security predicaments facilitates the formation of abstract spaces for counterterrorism purposes. Empirically, our analysis shows how portraying Libya and Nigeria as ungoverned creates a void of meaning, putting external actors in charge of restoring governance and protecting human security, modernity, and civility. Interveners in Libya contributed to normalizing a broader spectrum of violence, frequently internalized by competing actors through their normative tropes. In Nigeria, state and foreign interventionism and counterinsurgency have been responsible for the widespread use of violence against entire communities.