Failed States in the International System – Contributing Factors

1. Failed States in the International System – Contributing Factors Megan Woolsey mw5112a@american.edu American University School of International Service

2. Research Question & Research hypothesis • Research Question • Do certain social and economic indicators of the Failed States Index contribute more than others to the political failure of a state? • Research hypothesis • H0: The individual indicators of a failed state will not be correlated with the aggregate of political indicators of a failed state. • H1: The individual indicators of a failed state will be correlated with the aggregate of political indicators of a failed state.

3. Background Info/Lit. Review • James Piazza, “Do Failed and Failing States Promote Transnational Terrorism?”. • Findings: All forms of state failure show a positive association with transnational terrorist attacks both internally and externally failed states. • Stephen Kosack and Jennifer Tobin, “Development: The Role of Aid, FDI and Government in Economic Success”. • Findings: Aid can be positively associated with human development in some countries that have high human capital, though FDI did not demonstrate a positive association with growth and human development in countries with high human capital.

4. Data • Unit of analysis : country • Source of the data: Fund for Peace Failed States Index 2009, World Banks’ World Development Indicators • Reliability of the data is relatively strong, though some specifics could be debated. • Dependent variable/s • Y is the Average of Political Indicators of a Failed State • Unit of measurement is a score of 0-10 and LOM is I-R • Independent Variable • X1 is Demographic Pressures, Unit of measurement is a score of 0-10 and LOM is I-R • X2 is Refugees and Internally Displaced Persons, Unit of measurement is a score of 0-10 and LOM is I-R • X3 is Group Grievance, Unit of measurement is a score of 0-10 and LOM is I-R • X4 is Human Flight, Unit of measurement is a score of 0-10 and LOM is I-R • X5 is Uneven Economic Development, Unit of measurement is a score of 0-10 and LOM is I-R • X6 is Economic Decline, Unit of measurement is a score of 0-10 and LOM is I-R • X7 is Aid Per Capita, Unit of measurement is Current US dollars and LOM is I-R

5. Descriptive Statistics The dependent variable is uni-modal, has a slight negative skew and has a standard deviation of 2.17. • Central tendency is the mean, 6.51. • Range of 8.68. • The central tendency is reliable because the data falls roughly into a normal Z-Distribution. • Missing data is the result of the selection criteria for the Fund for Peace, only states with UN membership were studied. This means territories (such as Palestine and Kosovo) were not included.

6. Bivariate analysis

7. Regression Analysis – The Dependent Variable is the Average of Political Indicators of a Failed State • Interpretations: • i) The intercept coefficient is statistically significant. • ii) A positive, statistically significant association exists between all of the independent variables of this model and the dependent variable. The X coefficients are all positive. • iii) One unit change in X1 leads to 0.385 units change in Y. One unit change in X3 leads to 0.417 units change in Y. One unit change in X4 leads to 0.109 units change in Y. One unit change in X6 leads to 0.241 units change in Y. • iv) According to the Adj. R² of Model 6, this model explains 89.8% of the variation in the dependent variable.

8. Findings & Policy Implications of the research • Findings: Reject the Null Hypothesis. There is correlation between specific indicators of failed states and the average of political indicators of failed states • Policy Implications: To mitigate the effects of political failure, policy makers should not limit themselves to improving political issues, but should also direct resources and attention to Demographic Pressures, Group Grievance, Human Flight and Economic Decline.