Empire in Denial: The Politics of State-Building [Paperback]

Chandler's work is a most valuable contribution to the debate on state-and peace-building interventions. It moreover hints at the inadequacy of literature that lumps Western states, intervening agencies and post-conflict societies into one analytical field. (Alex Veit, Development and Change )

A provocative and insightful study which raises many important questions about how the international community employs its power and resources. Chandler's perspective, regarding the limits of foreign state builders’ interventions and their mixed motives and rationales, is a cautionary tale that deserves to be carefully considered by both policy-makers and analysts alike. At a time when the literature on democracy promotion and on fragile and failed states is a growth industry, Empire in Denial carefully and clearly explores important and original issues that require fresh debate and resolution. (Lenard Cohen, Professor of Political Science, Simon Fraser University, British Columbia )

David Chandler’s book is a very important one, with a powerful and convincing thesis. It stands out from a field dominated either by narrow, technical and depoliticised policy pieces or by leftist critiques which assume that state-building is driven by the disciplinary drives of neo-liberal ideologues. For Chandler, new forms of international regulation are driven by the desire to avoid political accountability and policy responsibility; it is this logic of avoidance which is at the heart of Empire in Denial. (Didier Bigo, Professor of International Relations, Sciences-Po (Institut d'Etudes Politiques), Paris )

Western-supported 'state building' in places like Bosnian and Kosovo has produced 'governments' without the institutional capacity to govern and disempowered local officials who were chosen in relatively 'free and fair' elections, mainly in the name of spreading democracy. David Chandler reveals the mechanisms through which these dysfunctional 'states' are constructed, but more importantly, he links their creation to the spread of ideologies that devalue politics and self-government in favor of administration by experts and bureaucracies. The result is a strong, original critique of the Western ideologies of rule that threaten to destroy democracy in order to save it. (Robert M. Hayden, University of Pittsburgh )

'A strong, original critique of the Western ideologies of rule that threaten to destroy democracy in order to save it.' --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.