The "Failed States" Index

according to this foreign policy article, a number of countries around the world are at risk of total collapse - some you might not suspect and some are all too obvious (iraq, haiti, sudan, the congo)... here's the "top 10" and a few more...

The 10 most at-risk countries in the index have already shown clear signs of state failure. Ivory Coast, a country cut in half by civil war, is the most vulnerable to disintegration; it would probably collapse completely if U.N. peacekeeping forces pulled out. It is followed by the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Sudan, Iraq, Somalia, Sierra Leone, Chad, Yemen, Liberia, and Haiti. The index includes others whose instability is less widely acknowledged, including Bangladesh (17th), Guatemala (31st), Egypt (38th), Saudi Arabia (45th), and Russia (59th).

here's the twelve indicators that are used to determine the potential for the collapse of a nation... both the criteria and the list have been compiled by the fund for peace...

Social Indicators

1. Mounting Demographic Pressures

2. Massive Movement of Refugees or Internally Displaced Persons creating Complex Humanitarian Emergencies

3. Legacy of Vengeance-Seeking Group Grievance or Group Paranoia

4. Chronic and Sustained Human Flight

Economic Indicators

5. Uneven Economic Development along Group Lines

6. Sharp and/or Severe Economic Decline

Political Indicators

7. Criminalization and/or Delegitimization of the State

8. Progressive Deterioration of Public Services

9. Suspension or Arbitrary Application of the Rule of Law and Widespread Violation of Human Rights

10. Security Apparatus Operates as a "State Within a State"

11. Rise of Factionalized Elites

12. Intervention of Other States or External Political Actors

and here's a brief narrative that talks about the criteria...

A state is failing when its government is losing physical control of its territory or lacks a monopoly on the legitimate use of force. Other symptoms of state failure include the erosion of authority to make collective decisions, an inability to provide reasonable public services, and the loss of the capacity to interact in formal relations with other states as a full member of the international community. As suggested by the list of 12 indicators, extensive corruption and criminal behavior, inability to collect taxes or otherwise draw on citizen support, large-scale involuntary dislocation of the population, sharp economic decline, group-based inequality, and institutionalized persecution or discrimination are other hallmarks of state failure. States can fail at varying rates of decline through explosion, implosion or erosion.

Submit To Propeller
Tweet