This book maps out how political networks and centres of power, engaged in patronage, corruption, and illegality, effectively constituted the Afghan state, often with the complicity of the U.S.-led military intervention and the internationally directed statebuilding project. It argues that politics and statehood in Afghanistan, in particular in the last two decades, including the ultimate collapse of the government in August 2021, are best understood in terms of the dynamics of internal political networks, through which warlords and patronage networks came to capture and control key sectors within the state and economy, including mining, banking, and illicit drugs as well as elections and political processes. Networked politics emerged as the dominant mode of governance that further transformed and consolidated Afghanistan into a networked state, with the state institutions and structures functioning as the principal "marketplace" for political networks' bargains and rent-seeking. The facade of state survival and fragmented political order was a performative act, and the book contends, sustained through massive international military spending and development aid, obscuring the reality of resource redistribution among key networked elites and their supporters. Overall, the book offers a way to explain what it was that the international community and the Afghan elites in power got so wrong that brought Afghanistan full circle and the Taliban back to power.

About the Author

Timor Sharan is an Associate Fellow at IDEAS, London School of Economics and Political Science's foreign policy think tank, London, U.K. He was formerly the International Crisis Group's Policy Analyst for Afghanistan and worked as a Senior Civil Servant for the Afghan government. He completed his doctorate at the University of Exeter and his MPhil at the University of Cambridge, U.K.

Reviews

'The question of "what went wrong?" over decades of international engagement in Afghanistan now hangs over many capitals, most of all Kabul. Inside Afghanistan provides a compelling reply with a scholar's skill, a writer's eye, an expert's experience. Timor Sharan's original work combines the granular detail of daily lives and an overarching conceptual framework centered on the nexus between corrupt domestic political networks and the hefty flow of international aid and military spending. This is a book by both thinker and doer, drawn from his own unique engagement in Afghanistan as a policy-maker, field researcher, as well as a widely respected academic. There are valuable lessons learned and much-needed wisdom for scholars, soldiers, and politicians - looking forward and looking back on interventions of our time.' - Lyse Doucet BBC Chief International Correspondent

'Social scientists have long pointed to states and markets as institutions shaping distributions of wealth and power. Timor Sharan's brilliant study of Afghanistan highlights the need also to recognise the critical role of networks. Theoretically sophisticated and richly textured, this pathbreaking book provides crucial insights not just into the collapse of the Afghan government in 2021, but into challenges of statebuilding more generally.' - Professor William Maley, Emeritus Professor of Diplomacy at the Australian National University, Foundation Director of the Asia-Pacific College of Diplomacy, and author of "The Afghanistan Wars"

'Timor Sharan has written the definitive account of why global efforts to build the Afghan state failed so badly. In this magnum opus, Sharan shows how external largesse coupled with corrupt domestic networks fused, causing the collapse of the state and the heartbreak that followed. This book masterfully combines original first-hand insights while building elegant theory. This is absolutely essential reading for policymakers and scholars who are interested in the role military and civilian assistance work in practice in Afghanistan and far beyond.' - Professor Jennifer Brick Murtazashvili, Founding Director of the Center for Governance and Markets and Associate Professor at the University of Pittsburgh and author of "Informal Order and the State in Afghanistan"

'Inside Afghanistan is a most welcome addition to both social sciences and Afghanistan studies literature. Sharan, a gem among young scholars of Afghanistan arising from the fogs of war, provides a rare intimate explanation of how and why a network of US-led international allies and their Afghan political partners brought Afghanistan full circle- back to the Taliban terrorists ruling the country. This book is an edifying contribution, unpacking the reasons for the disastrous outcome of the American and international community's two decades of war in Afghanistan. A must read for those interested in understanding the persistence of "forever/useless wars", policy makers, social scientists and the curious public.' - M. Nazif Shahrani, Professor Emeritus of Anthropology, Central Asian and Middle Eastern Studies at Indiana University

'Inside Afghanistan the first scholarly treatment of the last 20 years of Afghan history focused primarily on the Afghan side of the story rather than the foreign. It explains and answers many questions. Its consideration of the networked state will be critical in considering future endeavors to deal with weak or failing states. Its conclusions will be ignored at our peril.' - Ambassador Ronald E. Neumann, President of American Academy of Diplomacy, former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State, US ambassador to Afghanistan (2005-2007), Author of "The Other War: Winning and Losing in Afghanistan"

'Inside Afghanistan provides an informative and interesting anatomy of the complicated political order and governance emerged in post-2001 Afghanistan. The political network approach substantiated by empirical knowledge is insightful in explaining a complex system of governance defined by internal conflict between extended families, tribes and networks. Unlike many foreign scholars studying Afghanistan, Sharan's approach is based on an indigenous insight that combines theory and practice in a remarkable fashion. This is a valuable contribution to the discourse on state building and nation building.' - Afrasiab Khattak, former Senator, and former Chairperson of Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (2002-2006)

'Timor Sharan's masterful work exposes the inner workings and the undoing of Afghanistan's Islamic Republic like no other. He shows how a pyramid of patronage-based networks inevitably collapsed as soon as the illusion of permanent foreign support was punctured. Sadly and sympathetically, he illuminates how ostensibly democratic institutions masked struggles for power and foreign patronage that could not be contained by a deluded leadership that refused to plan for or admit the reality of the American withdrawal. This work contains important lessons for all concerned with the limits of what external force and funding can do.' - Professor Barnett R. Rubin, Distinguished Fellow at The Stimson Center, Washington D.C., Non-Resident Senior Fellow at Center on International Cooperation, New York University, and Author of "The Fragmentation of Afghanistan: State Formation and Collapse in the International System"

'Inside Afghanistan is an empirically rich and analytically nuanced study of the Afghan state. Going beyond simplistic representations of Afghanistan as a "failed" or "fragile" state, Timor Sharan's elegantly written book deploys the notion of political network to understand the ways in which different groups of actors have sought to control access to and influence the nature of the Afghan state. Based on in-depth fieldwork and several years of active engagement in policy making in Afghanistan, the book combines the best of ethnography and political science and will be of interest to students and policy makers of Afghanistan and other comparable situated contexts alike.' - Professor Magnus Marsden, Director of the Sussex Asia Centre and author of "Beyond the Silk Roads: Trade, Mobility and Geopolitics across Eurasia"

Book Information
ISBN 9781032334943
Author Timor Sharan
Format Paperback
Page Count 332
Imprint Routledge
Publisher Taylor & Francis Ltd
Weight(grams) 453g