Failed states in 2008

The Fund for Peace is an independent nonprofit research and educational organization founded in 1957 by investment banker Randolph Compton. Since its inception, it aimed at prevention of conflicts and alleviation of causes of conflicts. Due to its historic role and analysis conducted in socio-economic, political and demographic fields, the Fund came up with the idea of evaluating countries based on indicators such as demographic pressures, economic development, and deterioration of environment, among others. From 2005 co-operating with Foreign Policy magazine, the Fund publishes its annual “Failed States Index” that provides results of analysing a large set of factors causing/contributing for a state to fail or become weak. While generally a good starting point of information for decision-makers, few criticize the notion of “a failed state” because its frequent references to countries considered a threat to the US government.

The index provides assessment only for sovereign states (determined by membership in the United Nations). Territories such as Taiwan, the Palestinian Territories, and Northern Cyprus are not figuring on the list until their political status and UN membership is ratified. Ranking is measured based on 12 indicators, which are divided into three categories: social, economic and political. For each indicator, the ratings are placed on a scale of 0 to 10, with 0 being the lowest (most stable) and 10 being the highest (least stable). The total score is the sum of the 12 indicators and is on a scale of 0 (least failed) to 120 (most failed).

Social Indicators

I-1. Mounting Demographic Pressures
I-2. Massive Movement of Refugees or Internally Displaced Persons creating Complex Humanitarian Emergencies
I-3. Legacy of Vengeance-Seeking Group Grievance or Group Paranoia
I-4. Chronic and Sustained Human Flight

Economic Indicators
I-5. Uneven Economic Development along Group Lines
I-6. Sharp and/or Severe Economic Decline

Political Indicators
I-7. Criminalization and/or Delegitimization of the State
I-8. Progressive Deterioration of Public Services
I-9. Suspension or Arbitrary Application of the Rule of Law and Widespread Violation of Human Rights
I-10. Security Apparatus Operates as a “State Within a State”
I-11. Rise of Factionalized Elites

I-12. Intervention of Other States or External Political Actors

In the words of the people from Foreign Policy:

Because it is crucial to closely monitor weak states—their progress, their deterioration, and their ability to withstand challenges—the Fund for Peace, an independent research organization, and FOREIGN POLICY present the fourth annual Failed States Index. Using 12 social, economic, political, and military indicators, we ranked 177 states in order of their vulnerability to violent internal conflict and societal deterioration. To do so, we examined more than 30,000 publicly available sources, collected from May to December 2007, to form the basis of the index’s scores. The 60 most vulnerable states are listed in the rankings, and the full results are available at ForeignPolicy.com and fundforpeace.org.

According to this year’s Index, Somalia is the number one failed state in the world while Norway is the most prosperous. Moreover, seven out of the ten most failed states in the world are from Africa (only exception being Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq). There are currently 35 failed states (marked in red) of which 19 are African.

The report claims Somalia is the most failed state in the world. Many researchers believe that Somalia is a collapsed state since the collapse of its national government in 1991. Somalia scored a record amount of points this year: 114.2 (out of maximum possible 120), which is also the closest a state got to complete failure since the Failed States Index was first published. The country report shows that none of Somalia’s indicators improved since the last year’s index.

Due to ongoing crisis in financial markets, Iceland (172nd on the 2008 list), considered one of the least failed or best countries in the world (the best country to live according to the UN Development Index 2007) turned in a matter of few weeks (mainly due to its almost exclusive economic reliance on the global financial markets) into a state on the verge of national bankruptcy.

Iceland is a glaring example of how “well” globalization works its magic in the modern era of interconnectedness and interdependence.

Story of Iridium

It all started one day in 1985 with a vision and commitment of one of Motorola’s brightest engineers, whose wife complained that she was unable to reach clients via her cell phone from the Bahamas. He envisioned a technology that would allow effortless communication from and to any corner of the earth. His name was Bary Bertiger. Bertiger submitted his idea to his superiors (who had rejected the concept, it was no less than Robert Galvin, Motorola’s chairman at the time, who gave Bertiger approval to go ahead with the project), gathered a star team of engineers and businessmen and started working on it. His idea was to put up a network of low orbiting satellites covering the entire orbit of the earth and linking them with mesh technology for routing calls to and from any point in the world.

Work on the project started in 1987. While satellite phones were available in the 1980s, they had limited global coverage and, owing to the height the satellites orbited, the transmission and receiving delay made a conversation sound as though speaking down a long tunnel. Motorola thought that the world was ready for something better, and proposed creating a massive network of satellites that would provide global coverage. These satellites would orbit at a much lower altitude than their competitors and so the quality of transmissions would improve dramatically. The initial cost of the project was estimated to be over A$7 billion and required to put 77 satellites into low earth orbit. Because of this number of satellites , the project was dubbed Iridium after element 77 in the periodic table of Mendeleev.

However, cost saving issues resulted in a proposed redesign of the project, reducing the number of satellites to 66 only. The marketers kept the name Iridium, instead of changing it to element 66 — dysprosium (from Greek “hard to get”).

The launch of satellites started early in 1997 and was completed by 1998 (from launching pads in Kazakhstan, China and America).

Iridium services commenced from December 1998. “Iridium’s core identity was defined by its transcendence of national borders, a structure that is particularly post-Cold War,” Wired magazine gushed in its October 1998 cover story. “Iridium may well serve as a first model of the 21st-century corporation.”

Unfortunately, despite the brilliance of the technology and the team behind its design and marketing, expectations had changed since 1987. People expected their phone to be lightweight, usable inside buildings and the calls to be relatively cheap. Iridium phones were heavy (not suitable for carrying in a pocket) — as they needed powerful batteries — and they didn’t work inside buildings, costing around A$10 per minute. In parallel, the demand, anticipated by the original Iridium creators, was slowly being met by a advent of portable mobile phones. 1G cellular telecoms have been launched by NET in Japan in 1979. However, the dawn of mobile phones came with the launch of 2G systems such as GSM in 1990s and still ubiquitous around the world. By then, the market for satellite phones was estimated at 2-3% of the mobile-phone market and there were other companies (Globalstar, ICO, and Ellipso) are chasing the same (satellite) customers.

Less than a year later, Wired News backtracked, saying, “After losing nearly US$1 billion in two disastrous quarters, the engineering marvel is in danger of becoming the Ford Edsel of the sky.”

At the cost of construction of A$7 billion, Iridium needed over one million subscribers to break even. By mid 1999 it had gained 55,000 subscribers and was rapidly running out of money. In August 1999, the Iridium was bankrupt and subscribers found themselves without a dial tone. There were several attempts at selling Iridium, but no company could afford it.

By early 2000 the only employees left at Iridium were those employed to ‘de-orbit’ the satellites (during the estimated period of two years).

In 2000, the company was taken over by Iridium Satellite LLC (for A$35 million), contracted by US Defence Department. In 2007, Iridium Satellite LLC announced that it would be launching new satellites to attract partners, providing services beyond voice calling such as a next-generation global positioning system, environmental monitoring and satellite photography, becoming fully operational by 2016.

It currently has 280,000 subscribers and counting, despite the fact that the phone requires a line-of-sight with a satellite and thus can’t work inside buildings.

Time will tell if its current incarnation is more successful than its first.

Crassus tries to take on Parthians

At the beginning of 54 BC, Marcus Licinius Crassus had just finished serving his joint-consul year with Pompey. Crassus was a greedy man and felt a great desire to achieve new glory and get even richer. He had seen no action since his defeat of Spartacus nearly 20 years earlier.

He turned to Parthia. Parthia was led by the Arsacid dynasty, which reunited and ruled over the Iranian plateau, after defeating the Seleucids, beginning in the late 3rd century BC and was the latest archenemy of the Roman Empire in the east. Parthia was the hereditary of the ancient Persian civilization and its wealth.

In 53 BC, Artavasdes, the Armenian king and vassal of Crassus, advised him to take a route through Armenia avoiding the desert, but Crassus refused. Parthian army – half of it while the other half was sent against Armenians – that met Crassus was commanded by Surena and consisted entirely of cavalry units, to scout out, delay, and, if possible, destroy Crassus. The two armies clashed near the town of Carrhae. Though demoralised by the hot climate and long route, Crassus’ troops heavily outnumbered the Parthians. The Parthian armies included two types of cavalry, heavily-armed and armoured cataphracts and lightly armed but highly-mobile mounted archers. For the Romans, who relied on heavy infantry, the Parthians were difficult to defeat, as both types of cavalry were much faster and more mobile than foot soldiers.

Furthermore, the Parthians used strategies during warfare unfamiliar to the Romans, such as the famous “Parthian shot“, firing arrows backwards at the gallop. Crassus having never encountered such an army or strategic warfare before was defeated decisively at the Battle of Carrhae. This was the beginning of a series of wars that were to last for almost three centuries.

After the defeat, Crassus was fed molten gold, a symbolic gesture for his greed. On the other hand, the Parthians found it difficult to conquer Roman eastern provinces completely.

While the Roman legions returned a few years later and stemmed the Parthians at the gates of Antioch (Syria), the folly of Crassus and the defeat at Carrhae of Roman’s renowned legions still lives in memory.

The Vasa sinking

The Swedish flagship Vasa‘s first and final sailing in August 1628 left fine fodder for future management consultants – an all-purpose cautionary tale of an overbearing but technically clueless boss pushing through his pet project. King Gustavus II Adolphus, striving to make Sweden a superpower (in his bid to make the Baltic fleet join the Thirty Year War), had wanted four new warships built fast. Workmen were already laying the Vasa’s keel when the king ordered its length extended. His seasoned master shipwright, fearing to challenge the famously hot-tempered king, went ahead. The shipwright then took ill, directed the project as best he could from his sickbed and died before it was finished. His inexperienced assistant then took over, and the king ordered a second gun deck, possibly spurred by false reports that rival Denmark was building a ship with double gun decks. The result was the most lavishly appointed and heavily armed warship of its day, but one too long and too tall for its beam and ballast – a matchless array of features on an unstable platform. When the stan dard stability test of the day – 30 sailors running from side to side trying to rock the boat–tilted the Vasa perilously, the test was canceled and the ship readied for launch.

Despite an obvious lack of stability in port, she was allowed to set sail and foundered a few minutes later when she first encountered a wind stronger than a breeze. She drowned.

Vasa was located again in the late 1950s, in a busy shipping lane just outside the Stockholm harbour. She was salvaged with a largely intact hull on April 24, 1961. During recovery thousands of artifacts and the remains of at least few dozen people were found in and around the hull of the Vasa by marine archaeologists. The artifacts and the ship itself have provided historians with invaluable insight into details of naval warfare, shipbuilding techniques and everyday life in early 17th-century Sweden.

The ship is currently one of Sweden’s most popular tourist attractions.