Decentralization and State Building in Iraq.
Al Kli, Shahla.
2019
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ABSTRACT In post-2003 Iraq, new legal foundations for governance,
institutions, and the social contract between the people and the government of
Iraq (GOI) were established based on three different governing strategies. These
can broadly be called the Shia strategy, the Sunni strategy, and the Kurdish
strategy. These extremely divergent strategies evolved because of cycles of
state-led conflicts ... read moreand abuses by successive Iraqi governments that have been
struggling to attain positive legitimacy and external sovereignty. These
challenges are reflected in contradictory constitutional articles and conflicting
laws by the Parliament and GOI that pertain to the decentralization process, which
in turn has kept the Iraqi state-building project stumbling into a vicious cycle
of poor government performance, unstable governance policies, and dysfunctional
implementation of decentralization. This dissertation examines the implementation
of the decentralization process launched in the fragile state of Iraq between 2014
and 2018. The process was launched during the time when the Iraqi state was at its
weakest and most fragile, due to the ISIS occupation of a vast swath of Iraqi
lands, the subsequent costly war to liberate those areas, plummeting oil prices,
and widespread public discontent, with the most intense protests occurring in the
southern provinces. Thus, the research tests the implementation in view of its
impact on the government's legitimacy and state sovereignty in five Iraqi
provinces representative of the country's ethnoreligious mosaic and distinct
political structures: Baghdad, Basrah, Babil, Anbar, and Ninewa. The core areas of
inquiry of this research are whether decentralization weakens or strengthens the
state-building process in a fragile state; whether it weakens or strengthens the
government legitimacy and state sovereignty in such complex political and
governance structures; and whether decentralization leads to stabilization in
highly polarized and mobilized societies. This study reconsiders the theoretical
and conceptual parameters of how a fragile state like Iraq can proceed with
state-building and advance decentralization while struggling with its legitimacy
and weakened sovereignty. The dissertation concludes with an exploration of the
themes emerging from the analysis of the five provinces' case studies;
recommendations on the policy, strategy, and implementation of such governance
reform policies; and suggestions for future studies.
Thesis (Ph.D.)--Tufts University, 2019.
Submitted to the Dept. of Diplomacy, History, and Politics.
Advisor: Andrew Hess.
Committee: Elizabeth Prodromou, and Karen Jacobsen.
Keywords: International relations, Political science, and Middle Eastern studies.read less - ID:
- x059cn07f
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