“Good Enough” Governance and Peacekeeping

How should the international community set goals and define aspirations in contexts of international intervention in civil wars and weak states? And how does the way governance goals are shaped in international intervention have implications for peacekeeping?

All were invited to join a livestreamed discussion of the new paper from the American Academy’s Civil Wars, Violence, and International Responses project, “Good Enough” Governance: Humility and the Limits of Foreign Intervention in Response to Civil Wars and Intrastate Violence, by Karl Eikenberry and Stephen Krasner. The paper articulates under what conditions intervention in civil wars is warranted and with what tools. The authors examine policy implications and propose policy recommendations to achieve “good enough” governance, recognizing civil wars and weak states’ potential to give rise to major threats to international stability, including transnational terrorism, pandemics, and mass migration.

Following Eikenberry’s and Krasner’s presentations, the panelists discussed the “Good Enough” Governance paper and peacekeeping more generally, based on their research.

This event was co-hosted by the American Academy of Arts & Sciences and the UN Department of Peace Operations.