Description
Recent literature recognizes a shift in peace- and statebuilding from Western-liberal frameworks, focusing on democratic institutions, human rights, and economic reforms, to a more heterogeneous field of agents and practices. However, norm competition and complex power relations have shaped peace- and statebuilding already since the 1990s. In my contribution, I will focus on the domestic, regional, and international power dynamics and the complex realities of peace- and statebuilding in Timor-Leste to illustrate my arguments. The initial intervention in Timor-Leste in 1999 and the subsequent statebuilding process appear to be ‘textbook liberal peacebuilding’. However, the violent political power struggles of the Timorese elites, the rising competition between regional powers Australia and China in the country, or the ‘post-colonial renaissance’ of Portugal in Timor-Leste, with enormous Portuguese influence in political and socio-economic matters since the end of the 1990s, all counter liberal narratives. Instead, the case shows that liberal peace- and statebuilding norms never were as potent as suggested, and that practices of intervention have always been informed by (non-liberal) norms, political agency, and power competition. Consequently, the observed shift from liberal to new, non-liberal peacebuilding might be smaller than thought.
