Abstract
In the mainstream Western line of political thinking, fragile states are thus presented as a challenge to both development and security. This view is almost universally shared by policy makers and governments in the developed world and, as a consequence, state-building in regions of fragile statehood is presented as a central task of contemporary policies. Here, Boege et al argue that this perception of the fragility of states as an obstacle to the maintenance of peace and to sustainable development can be misleading, as can its corollary, the promotion of conventional state-building along the lines of the Western Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development state model. They therefore posit that rather than thinking in terms of fragile or failed states, it might be theoretically and practically more fruitful to think in terms of hybrid political orders.