Government

Fragile states

Fragile states are countries where the government cannot or will not deliver its basic functions to the majority of its people, including the poor. In many fragile states, basic rights to life and security are violated, sufficient food is a luxury and there is little or no public provision for water, health and education.

The term fragile states includes a variety of situations:

• Collapsed states - such as Somalia
• States in conflict or recovering from conflict - such as Afghanistan, Sudan, Nepal, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Angola
• States where governments are strong but are not committed to poverty reduction - Burma and Zimbabwe
• Gradually improving states (with occasional setbacks) - such as Ethiopia and Yemen
• States where development has stopped or is in decline – such as Cote d’Ivoire.

Fragility does not necessarily match country borders. Particular areas with countries are often in conflict or beyond government control (e.g. northern Uganda). Sometimes the problems of fragile states can also spread across borders and affect entire regions.

We will not meet the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) without progress in fragile states. Currently over 300 million people are living on less than $1 a day in fragile states. Just under one half of all child deaths and maternal deaths in developing countries occur in fragile states.

In fragile states, the international community needs to do more to invest in the four essential public services needed to make faster progress towards the MDGs: education, health, water and sanitation and social protection. We also need to focus more on how to help build effective states.

What DFID is doing

DFID’s approach in fragile states is to:

• focus on state-building as the central objective
• use different ways to deliver aid
• work more closely with international partners
• stay committed for the longer-term to get results
• work with FCO and MOD to get a coherent UK response.

Where we are making a difference:

In Sierra Leone, co-ordinated work between the FCO, MOD and DFID helped to stabilise a tense post-conflict environment and has built the capacity to manage the economy and start to reduce poverty.

In Zimbabwe we have allocated £35 m to tackling HIV/AIDS and health since 2002 resulting in:

• First country in Southern Africa to have reduced HIV prevalence - from 24% to between 18 and 20% in 2005
• Zimbabwe is expected to be declared polio free by the WHO within a short time.

In Rwanda, the UK’s decision to provide long term development assistance through budget support since 1998 helped to reduce dependency on humanitarian aid and contributed to a 12% growth rate and steady improvements in some aspects of governance and progress against the MDGs.

Links

• Why we need to work more effectively in fragile states (414kb)
• Crisis, Fragile and Failed States. Definitions used by the Crisis States Research Centre (14kb)
• Retaining legitimacy in fragile states (921kb)
• Research4development - Crisis States
• DFID Governance Research from IDS Knowledge Services