The Practicalities of Living with Failed States Seyoum Mesfin & Abdeta Dribssa Beyene Abstract: State security and survival are critical issues in the rough regional environment of the Horn of Africa. Ensuring security for a state and its population is a priority and a raison d’être for any govern- ment. The buffer zone has emerged as a key strategy for nations in the Horn of Africa to manage success- fully the security challenges of the several failed states in their neighborhood. Buffer zones are established adjacent to the borders of stronger states that oversee the buffer zones’ affairs directly or through proxies. This essay explores the practical aspects of power asymmetries between successful and failed states from the perspectives of two officials in successful states who deal directly with this security challenge within the constraints of current norms and practices of sovereignty. The situation in the Horn of Africa provides in- sights into the effects of failed states on the security of their neighbors and the challenges that failed states present to the wider international community. Failed and failing states lack the political will and the capacity to enter into, much less abide by, agreements with other states to ensure mutual security. This sit- uation points to problems that attend the growing asymmetry not only in the capacities, but also in the divergent character of the domestic political orders in the Horn of Africa. This asymmetry, assessed from SEYOUM MESFIN is Ethiopia’s the perspectives of two officials of a nation adjacent to Ambassador to the People’s Re- two failed states, challenges some of the basic tenets public of China. Prior to that ap- of an international system of states, such as govern- pointment, he was the Ethiopian ment capacity to abide by agreements. These failed Minister of Foreign Affairs for states fundamentally lack the capacity to fulfill obliga- nearly twenty years. tions of sovereignty, such as monitoring and govern- ABDETA DRIBSSA BEYENE is the ing their territories to prevent different actors there Executive Director of the Centre from launching unauthorized attacks on neighbors or for Dialogue, Research and Coop- more generally spreading disorder across their bor- eration (cdrc) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. He previously served as ders. These problems remain a primary source of con- Director General for African Af- flict in the Horn of Africa, and have become increas- fairs at the Ethiopian Ministry of ingly pressing for countries that neighbor Libya, Syria, Foreign Affairs. Afghanistan, and other tumultuous and failing states. © 2018 by the American Academy of Arts & Sciences doi:10.1162/DAED_a_00479 128 The Horn of Africa hosts an assortment mentary strategies: supporting islands Seyoum of failed and failing states. Somalia and of governance and creating buffer zones. Mesfin & Abdeta South Sudan clearly belong to the catego- With decades of combined experience at Dribssa Beyene ry of totally failed states. Officials in Sudan the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ethiopia, and South Sudan have lost a significant por- we note that Ethiopia’s strategy is most ev- tion of their capacities to enforce their au- ident vis-à-vis the “Republic of Somali- thority in large parts of their respective ter- land,” and to some extent the “Puntland ritories; Eritrea’s leadership frequently de- State of Somalia.” Both provide basic lev- fies basic international norms; and Kenya’s els of order and security to their popula- recurrent electoral violence raises doubts tions locally. Though not diplomatically about whether its government can ensure recognized, close ties to Ethiopia enable domestic stability. In addition, states in the their citizens to travel on local documents subregion face very real threats of terrorist and help these authorities to organize in- attacks from Al Shabaab, a Somalia-based ternational trade relations and develop in- terrorist group. This regional political en- frastructure, as well as influence develop- vironment tempts governments to use ments in Mogadishu and elsewhere. armed groups as proxies to influence pol- Ethiopia’s support is critical to limit the itics in neighboring countries. Since the extent to which other foreign governments 1960s, many countries have participated are compelled to intervene in the internal in tit-for-tat violence to undermine rivals, affairs of these semiautonomous regions forcing some to create buffer zones along over matters of mutual concern. Ethiopia their borders. also assists in the establishment of oth- Ethiopia, for example, engaged in this re- er regional states in Somalia. All these ef- taliatory violence in the 1980s when its gov- forts face challenges from Mogadishu: the ernment provided refuge to the Sudan Peo- strategy is perceived to be weakening rath- ple’s Liberation Army as leverage against er than unifying Somalia because it under- Khartoum’s support for rebel groups inside mines the monopoly of coercion that the Ethiopia. In this case, Ethiopia was recipro- political center should theoretically exer- cating against Sudan and Somalia, which cise although it currently lacks the capaci- had similarly protected groups hostile to ty to do so. This situation creates a dilem- Ethiopia in the 1970s and 1980s. This sym- ma whereby Ethiopia is forced to infringe metry of support for proxy-armed groups on the sovereign prerogatives of the de jure also meant that the governments routine- recognized sovereign authority of Somalia. ly agreed to cease this behavior for mu- In fact, the government of Somalia is un- tual benefit. The records of these agree- able to credibly guarantee to Ethiopia that ments from that time show that these gov- these territories will not be used to threat- ernments possessed the political will and en Ethiopia, so Ethiopia often is blamed for the capacity to abide by these agreements. interference. This criticism highlights the While Ethiopia’s government strives to paradox in which Ethiopia has to infringe abide by the principle of respect for the on Somalia’s sovereignty in territories that sovereignty of its neighbors, the practical- Mogadishu is unable to control in order to ities of living next to failed and failing states ensure the fulfillment of basic obligations now challenge the country’s official com- required of a sovereign state. mitment to adhere to these principles. A second strategy revolves around cre- ating and maintaining buffer zones. Ethi- For Ethiopia, managing these problems opia and Kenya sustain buffer zones inside in Somalia in particular involves comple- Somalia, effectively denying Al Shabaab 147 (1) Winter 2018 129 The and other extremist groups the capacity to international system.1 This situation re- Practicalities launch attacks inside Ethiopia and Kenya. flects the reality in which state and non- of Living with Failed States More recently, Uganda has pursued a sim- state actors compete with one another. ilar strategy vis-à-vis South Sudan. Ethio- These actors and this reality of interstate pia’s intensive coordination with local au- conflict and competition among states thorities inside South Sudan remains neces- with sharply asymmetrical capacities con- sary to prevent the recurrence of the kind of tinue to be the basis for analysis.2 The de- attacks that occurred in April 2016 in Ethio- vice of the buffer zone is one of the main pia’s Gambella Region, where cross-bound- reasons why failed states do not challenge ary ethnic violence and ancillary cattle rus- this basic structure of the international tling and kidnapping have incited tensions system in the Horn of Africa, and in fact among local communities and the two contributes to its maintenance. states. Weak governance shapes interstate rela- The ways that Ethiopia, Kenya, and Ugan- tions in other ways. Civil-military relations da use buffer zones sheds light on how these scholar Herbert Howe has identified three governments manage their relations in an military strategies that African states use environment that includes states that ex- to address the threats to their present exis- hibit widely varying domestic capacities tence. These strategies include regional in- and organizations of authority and regional tervention forces, private security compa- susceptibility to involvement in proxy wars nies, and Western-sponsored assistance to and other interference on the part of exter- state militaries. He argues that all these are nal actors. While the Horn of Africa exhib- likely to fail unless African states empha- its particular features, this disjuncture in size indigenous military professionalism.3 the domestic capacities to exercise de fac- This conventional view misses the buffer to sovereignty has become more acute in zone as a self-help mechanism to maintain the region as state failure in Somalia and regional order, though some states are bet- South Sudan persists. ter than others at mastering this technique. This strategy of the region’s more-capable A buffer zone is “a neutral zone de- states is based on four core assumptions: signed to prevent acts of aggression be- 1) a state that establishes a buffer zone be- tween two hostile nations; and any area yond its borders must have the capacity to serving to mitigate or neutralize potential provide and sustain order in its domestic conflict.”4 Buffer zones can be established realm and in the buffer zone; 2) the state in a shared territory or created unilateral- that maintains a buffer zone requires pro- ly through force and monitored exclusive- fessionalism