Risk management, neo-liberalism and coercion: the Asian Development Bank's approach to ‘fragile states’

Abstract

This article suggests that the Asian Development Bank's (ADB) approach to engaging with fragile states should be understood not as an attempt to improve development effectiveness in these countries but as a political project aimed at serving particular political and social interests. More specifically, it suggests that the ADB's approach is consistent with the recent securitisation of aid policy in many developed countries, a shift that has been driven primarily by a concern to manage the risks to developed countries posed by instability, conflict, crime and disease in fragile states, rather than developmental considerations. Second, while there are numerous ways in which these risks and development challenges could be managed, the ADB has chosen a strategy that privileges neo-liberal policies and the interests they embody over other agendas and interests. Finally, it has promoted these policies and interests through coercive means rather than allowing fragile states to exercise leadership in determining their own development strategies, as encouraged by recent international agreements on aid effectiveness such as the Paris Declaration. In this respect, the article suggests, the ADB's approach can be seen as an expression of a new mode of regional governance within the Asia-Pacific characterised by ‘regulatory regionalism’ and ‘metagovernance’.