Library

The transformation of the infrastructures for peace project into a state- and nation-building project, especially through the formalisation of informal I4P by the state and external actors, requires particular attention. Such a cooptation appears to be linked to the enduring idea that a stable and efficient state is the best guarantor of peace, and that one can build peace through ‘building’ states. In this article, the author explores whether infrastructures for peace can be an alternative entry door for the liberal state-building agenda. It builds upon Oliver Richmond’s article in the Berghof Handbook Dialogue No. 10, which stresses that “peace infrastructures bear significant potential as long as they are internally and not externally shaped”, by further exploring the contradictory elements of externally driven I4P.