Books

The State of Post-conflict Reconstruction; land, urban development, and state-building in Juba, South Sudan follows the story of a war-torn colonial town as it changes hands between the Northern Sudanese government, and the Sudan People’s Liberation Army after twenty years of civil war. It was published by James Currey Press in 2014.

From the publisher’s blurb: “Naseem Badiey examines the local dynamics of the emerging capital city of Juba, Southern Sudan, during the historically pivotal transition period following the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA). Focusing on the intersections of land tenure reform and urban development, she challenges the dominant paradigm of ‘post-conflict reconstruction’ and re-conceptualizes state-building as a social process underpinned by negotiation. Badiey explores local resistance to reconstruction programmes, debates over the interpretation of peace settlements, and competing claims to land and resources not as problems to be solved through interventions but as negotiations of authority which are fundamental to shaping the character of the ‘state’.

While donors and aid agency officials anticipated clashes between the Government of Sudan and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) following the CPA, they did not foresee internal divisions that impeded reconstruction in Southern Sudan, raising serious questions about the viability of an independent state. In Juba local elites interpreted the CPA in line with their economic and political interests, using claims to land, authority and political power to challenge the SPLM’s agenda for urban reconstruction. In revealing how local actors strategically interpreted the framework of land rights in Southern Sudan, the book offers a basis for understanding the challenges that confront the nascent South Sudan’s state-builders and their international partners in the future.”

You can read an excerpt here.

I also have an upcoming chapter in Steven Roach and Derrick Hudson’s book, South Sudan’s Challenged Peace: State-building, Accountability, and the Role of Foreign Intervention, entitled, “Corruption as Resistance: bureaucratic obstruction, ethno-spatial politics, and capital city planning in South Sudan.”