Phase One of the Crisis States Programme (2001-2005)

The aim of the Crisis States Research Centre at DESTIN is to provide new understanding of the causes of crisis and breakdown in the developing world and the processes of avoiding or overcoming them. We want to know why some political systems and communities, in what can be called the 'fragile states', found in many of the poor and middle income countries, have broken down even to the point of violent conflict while others have not. Our work asks whether processes of globalisation have precipitated or helped to avoid crisis and social breakdown. 

Director's Statement
Research objectives
DFID White Paper
Relevance to Development Policy & Practice
Capacity Building
About the DRC Crisis States Programme
Crisis States Programme Overview paper  

Research Objectives

• We will assess how constellations of power at local, national and global levels drive processes of institutional change, collapse and reconstruction and in doing so will challenge simplistic paradigms about the beneficial effects of economic and political liberalisation.

• We will examine the effects of international interventions promoting democratic reform, human rights and market competition on the 'conflict management capacity' and production and distributional systems of existing politics.

• We will analyse how communities have responded to crisis, and the incentives and moral frameworks that have led either toward violent of non-violent outcomes.

• We will examine what kinds of formal and informal institutional arrangements poor communities have constructed to deal with economic survival and local order.