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Defining A Failed State Of The Soviet Union

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Defining a failed state
Before the many faults of the term ‘failed state’ can be enumerated, it is obviously pertinent to define what exactly is meant by the phrase. The idea of a state that does not meet certain requirements (i.e. fails) largely came to prominence in the last few decades, just before the turn of the 20th century and after the fall of the Soviet Union. Since then, the concept has morphed and shifted in response to development by its proponents and criticism by its detractors. Although accepted as a contemporary facet of foreign policy discourse, the term has its conceptual basis in early state formation theory. An early definition of a state asserts that a state succeeds (i.e. does not fail) if it maintains the legitimate use of force within its borders (Weber 1919). This thread of legitimate force became a major part of state failure theorising and, in the 1990s, many definitions added to this. Helman & Ratner (1992: 3) defined a state as a failure if it was unable to sustain its position as a member of the international community or function independently, emphasising the internationalist perspective of failed states. Further extensions to the term categorise a failed state as unable to provide internal services to its citizens, such as the provision of public goods and governance, the maintenance of law and order, the security of borders, and the protection of its population (Zartman 1995; Jones 2008: 180); a failure to do so thereby signifies a loss of

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