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This introductory chapter discusses the objectives and the scope of the book, and argues for the importance of a normative approach to international administrations. It explores three important methodological questions: first, in what ways can norms affect the activities of international administrations; second, how can we conceptualize and operationalize the ‘international community’ that creates and staffs these international administrations; and third, the selection of case studies.

This chapter develops the theoretical framework, discussing the concept of sovereignty and its evolution since 1945. Looking at sovereignty in terms of political authority, it argues that sovereignty must be legitimized by the way and the ends towards which it is exercised. It argues that a new ‘standard of civilisation’, encompassing democracy, human rights, the rule of law, a free market economy, and effective administration, has emerged since the end of the cold war, and has influenced sovereignty-related practices of state recognition and statebuilding.

This chapter analyses the statebuilding efforts of the international administration in Bosnia and Herzegovina, led by the Office of the High Representative (OHR). It is divided into three parts. The first part outlines the political structures of the international administration and of the Bosnian state, to provide the necessary understanding of the institutions involved in the policymaking process in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The following two parts contain detailed case studies of statebuilding: the dismantling of the payment bureaux and the reform of the civil service. The case studies illustrate the influence of elements of the new ‘standard of civilisation’ on the objectives and policies of the international administration.

This chapter analyses the statebuilding efforts of the United Nations Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) that was established after the Kosovo war in 1999. It is divided into three parts. While the first part outlines the background to the intervention, analyses the scope of the international authority, and discusses the transition to local rule, the other two sections contain detailed case studies of statebuilding: the reform of the judicial system, and the privatization of socially owned enterprises, one of the most controversial reform efforts of UNMIK. The chapter not only shows the influence of norms on UNMIK's statebuilding policies, but also the problems of ‘statebuilding without statehood’: building political and administrative institutions if the future legal status of a territory remains unresolved.

This third case study chapter analyses the statebuilding activities of the United Nations Transitional Administration of East Timor (UNTAET). It is divided into three parts. The first part outlines the background to the intervention, the scope and evolution of international authority, and the transition to self-governance and Timorese independence. The remaining two sections are case studies of statebuilding in East Timor: the establishment of a new judicial system, and the reform of the civil service. The case studies show how these reforms are informed by the new ‘standard of civilisation’, and how these norms compete with other, local traditional normative frameworks and understandings of authority, compromising the effectiveness of the reforms.

This last chapter brings together the findings from the analysis, and raises a range of theoretical and practical questions that arise from the analysis of the normative framework underlying statebuilding. Part One discusses the implications of the findings for our understanding of the role of sovereignty in international society. Part Two considers the implications of the book's findings for the governance and development efforts of international administrations. It examines whether international administrations possess the legitimacy and authority themselves that they try to establish in the territories they govern and restructure, and how their authority could be strengthened. It also looks at some of the pathologies of international administration, and concludes by discussing what the book's findings suggests for exit strategies of international administrations.

This chapter offers a more detailed theoretical explanation of the tools employed to assess the coordination capacities at network and actor level. The different sections link the two major theoretical concepts (networks and governance), provide different views on the management of networks, present a scale covering the different meanings of coordination, and describe how this will be used to assess coordination during the different phases of EU policy making.

This chapter argues that many scholars still have failed to understand the American state as a “state” and that issues before regarding “sustainability”, “fiscal crisis”, and “legitimation crisis” are still eminent up to now. This raises questions about the state' capacity and responsibility. In addition, the American state remains to be described in terms of false dichotomies–strong versus weak, active versus passive, conservative versus liberal, even state versus society. Also, the chapter presents how the American state appears to be increasingly egalitarian but continues to be hierarchal. The American state's apparent changeability and un-state-like characteristics such as volatility, unpredictability, and reversibility may likely be exacerbated than resolved by the Obama administration.

The most distinctive feature of transitional administrations is the establishment and management of interim administrative structures with wholesale responsibility for the implementation of public policy and the delivery of essential public services—the core functions of a government. Examines the structures and practices that have been adopted for the purpose of performing civil administrative functions and the relationship these institutions have to local governmental bodies. A better balance, it is argued here, needs to be struck between the demands for effective and efficient international administration in the short term and the strengthening of local capacity in the longer term if transitional authorities are not to leave behind weak states or territories as a part of their legacy.

A summary of the stages through which the modern state has passed historically. It began as authoritarian and patrimonial in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries: it was the absolutist state. In the nineteenth century, it turned liberal and bureaucratic: the liberal state imposed the rule of law and assured civil rights. In the first part of the twentieth century, the transition to democracy was completed: it was the time of the liberal state, of elitist or liberal democracy, and, still, of bureaucratic administration. In the second part of that century, the state becomes social-democratic, and assumes a developmental character; democracy now is social or plural rather than just liberal. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, the state is aiming to become social-liberal and republican; democracy is aiming to become participatory or republican; and administration is aiming to become managerial, or inspired by the principles of new public management.

The comparative study of European executives stands at the interface of two subdisciplines of political science – comparative government (which focuses on the primarily political and governmental aspects of the executive) and comparative public administration (which focuses on the bureaucratic parts of the executive that extend beneath its thin political veneer). The tension between politics and administration is central to understanding the institutionalization of executives: it is first about the tasks that executives are expected to perform and the most appropriate executive organization; and second about the relation between the formal office and the office holders. The first main section of the chapter analyses how these two constitutive tensions in the institutionalization of executives play out in different countries; the discussion is with reference to executive coordination and the organization of centres of government. Further sections discuss the evaluation of executives, and executive reform. Overall, the analysis of the state of, and trends in, executive development suggests that the institutional foundations and fortifications of the executive may be less solid than is generally assumed.

The chapter is divided into two main parts, with the first part of the discussion providing the contextual backdrop to the detailed study of the Swedish permanent representation that follows. The argument presented in the first part is twofold: first, it is argued that effective co-ordination of EU policy at both the national and EU levels is regarded as extremely important by the Swedish government for at least two related reasons—the high political salience of EU matters in Sweden, and the Social Democratic government’s determination to be an influential actor in the EU policy arena; second, it is argued that, although Swedish administrative adjustment to EU membership has been relatively unproblematic in the short term, the process of adaptation is not yet complete—the initial belief that EU matters could simply be incorporated into the Swedish system of ministerial consultation has proved problematic, and the volume and pace of EU policy-making has placed considerable strains upon the limited resources of the Swedish ministries, and might yet prove to be incompatible with Swedish policy style. In an attempt to address these problems, the government introduced in 1998 new co-ordinating structures designed to streamline central EU policy co-ordination and strengthen political leadership on EU policy. The second part of the chapter examines how the Swedish permanent representation fits into this wider picture; it discusses the organization, personnel, internal functioning and working methods, and role of the Brussels-based administration, and evaluates its effectiveness and capacity to implement ambitions, bearing in mind the co-ordination needs and policy ambitions of the Swedish administration. The picture that emerges from this study is one of a technically specialized, functionally segmented, and non-hierarchical bureaucracy, which, after five years, is nevertheless still evolving as an administration, and whose effectiveness in delivering national policy ambitions is as much a reflection of its capacity to influence the national administration as of its diplomatic role in Brussels.

Examines the internationalization of trusteeship as it arose in the context of British colonial administration in Africa, the Berlin and Brussels Conferences, and the experience of the Congo Free State. It is out of these experiences and events that the idea of trusteeship emerges as a recognized and accepted practice of international society. The chapter has five sections: the first discusses British attitudes towards Africa; the second looks at Lord Lugard's ‘dual mandate’ principle of colonial administration—the proposal that the exploitation of Africa's natural wealth should reciprocally benefit the industrial classes of Europe and the native population of Africa; the third discusses the Berlin Conference of 1884–1885 and the Brussels Conference of 1890; the fourth describes trusteeship in relation to the Congo Free State. The fifth section of the chapter points out the progression from the idea of trusteeship in the East India Company's dominion in India—in which the improvement of native peoples would come about rapidly and result in institutional forms and practices that closely resembled those in Europe—to a new incrementalist approach in which societies and people were thought of as occupying different rungs on a progressive ‘ladder of civilization’, and, depending on their stage of development on this ladder, were suited to different forms of constitution.

An examination is made of the structure of the administrative system of the European Union (EU). Three general arguments are put forward: that the development of the EU’s administration has been conditioned by the nature of the EU as a political system, but that EU administration has similarly had an impact on the EU as a political system; that the entrenchment of national administrations in the EU bureaucratic system has had important consequences for its functioning and operation; and that national administrations have been affected, but not transformed, by the development of the EU. After outlining the features that characterize the EU’s political system, the chapter examines how national administrations have penetrated EU decision–making structures and institutions, and looks at the impact of this process at the European level. It then considers how national administrations have been affected by the development of the EU (European integration and Europeanization). Finally, the chapter provides an assessment of the EU’s administrative capacity.

Gives an account of the worsening relations between the US and Western Europe during the Carter and Reagan administrations of 1977–1984. Jimmy Carter took over as President of the US with the best of intentions: while continuing to improve relations with the Soviet Union and China, he would at the same time upgrade America's ties with its allies in Western Europe and Japan (trilateralism); this was not to be, and by the end of the 1970s Moscow had become so frustrated with Carter that the Soviet leaders actually preferred Ronald Reagan in the 1980 elections. American relations with some Western European countries, particularly West Germany, also reached a nadir. Ronald Reagan was determined to re‐establish the leadership role of the US with regard to both the Soviets and the Western Europeans: the ‘evil empire’ was to be defeated from a position of strength, and the ‘free world’ was to be united under America's firm leadership; neither was to be. Yet, even in these very difficult times for Atlantic relations most European leaders continued to issue at least some invitations to the Americans to increase their role militarily and economically, although these invitations were clearly more ambivalent now than before—public opinion was becoming more skeptical of the US, but still supported the main dimensions of the American role in Western Europe.