Fragile states are often mired in civil conflict. This volume focuses on the relationship between conflict and state stability and illustrates the causes and effects of fragile states on neighbouring countries and the global community.

1. Fragile States: An Overview ; PART I. CAUSES ; 2. State Fragility: Concept and Measurement ; 3. The Causes and Measurement of State Fragility ; 4. Resources, Conflict, and State Fragility: Iraq and Somalia ; PART II. COSTS ; 5. The Cost of Failing States and the Limits to Sovereignty ; 6. Fragility and Conflict in Palestine: The Costs of the Closures Regime on West Bank and Gaza ; 7. Gender and Ethnicity in Fragile States: The Case of Post-Conflict Kosovo ; PART III. RESPONSES ; 8. Enforcing Peace Agreements in Fragile States through Commitment Technologies ; 9. Aid Allocation and Fragile States ; 10. Enhancing Effective Utilization of Aid in Fragile States

Highlights the causes and costs of fragile states and considers what should be done to promote stability Contributions from eminent development economists who explain the criteria and classification of fragile states Focus on conflict, a major cause of state fragility, and the global impact of fragile states Clear structure, the volume is organized into three distinct parts: causes, costs, and responses

Wim Naudé is a graduate from the University of Warwick. His research focuses on entrepreneurship spatial economics and the challenges of small island developing countries and fragile states. He has been member of a number of international networks and advisory bodies including the International Council for Small Business (ICSB), the Club de Madrid, and the Households in Conflict Network (HiCN). He has served on the Faculty of Brown University's International Advanced Research Institutes (BIARI) on technology entrepreneurship, and on UNU-EHS' Expert Working Group on Measuring Vulnerability. Previously, he has been a lecturer and research officer at the Centre for the Study of African Economies at the University of Oxford, and a Senior Associate Member of St Antony's College, Oxford. He has published widely and has contributed to the World Development Report 2009 and the European Report on Development 2009. He is associate editor of Small Business Economics Journal. Amelia U. Santos-Paulino has been a Research Fellow at UNU-WIDER and at the University of Sussex's Institute of Development Studies and a Visiting Scholar at the University of California, Davis. Her research focuses on trade, macroeconomics, and development, and her work has been published in academic journals including the Economic Journal, Manchester School, Cambridge Journal of Economics, and World Development. At UNU-WIDER, she directed the projects on Fragility and Development, Southern Engines of Global Growth, and South-South Co-operation. She has served as a research economist in the Central Bank of the Dominican Republic, and as a trade policy advisor to the Government of the Dominican Republic, and has been a consultant for the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), and the World Bank. She holds a PhD in Economics from the University of Kent in the UK. Mark McGillivray's previous positions include Chief Economist of the Australian Agency for International Development and Deputy Director of the World Institute for Development Economics Research of the United Nations University. Professor McGillivray is also an Inaugural Fellow of the Human Development and Capability Association, an honorary Professor of Development Economics at the University of Glasgow, a Research Associate of the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative at the University of Oxford, and an External Fellow of the Centre for Economic Development and International Trade at the University of Nottingham. His main research interests are the allocation and effectiveness of foreign aid and measuring achieved human wellbeing. Mark is the recipient of a La Trobe University Distinguished Alumni Award. He is a contributor to the European Report on Development 2009 on Overcoming Fragility in Africa.

Highlights the causes and costs of fragile states and considers what should be done to promote stability Contributions from eminent development economists who explain the criteria and classification of fragile states Focus on conflict, a major cause of state fragility, and the global impact of fragile states Clear structure, the volume is organized into three distinct parts: causes, costs, and responses