State Transitions from Rigidity to Fragility and Failure: The Case of Middle East and North Africa

ABSTRACT

The taxonomy of the state’s effective governance capacity present in the literature is evolving around state fragility. However, this article argues that a state moves along the state transition curve, resulting in governance capacity variations over time. It begins as a fragile state, consolidating to becoming a vibrant state, only to embark, eventually, on a downward trajectory through phases of rigidity, decaying, and fragility, before becoming a failed state. About one-third of MENA (Middle East and North Africa) countries are either fragile or failed states. Only technological change and knowledge accumulation and diffusion can shift this curve upward, thereby increasing a state’s effective governance capacity.