Weak State Syndrome and Civil War in South Sudan

Abstract

South Sudan is the youngest state in Africa and, indeed, the world. It was created out of Sudan through a referendum on July 9 2011. With a total of 619,745 square kilometres land size, much of which is quite fertile for food production, a population of eleven million people and with the third largest oil reserves in Sub-Saharan Africa, one expected the new leaders of the country to employ this trinity of natural sources of power for rapid economic growth and development. But this is not to be. Instead, in December 2013 a political power struggle broke out between President Sylva Kiir and his ex-vice President Rich Machar, which degenerated into a Civil War. So far, the war has resulted in the dead of 10,000 people, 1,000,000 Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) inside South Sudan and about 400,000 citizens who have fled to neighbouring countries, particularly Sudan, The Democratic Republic of Congo, Central African Republic, Kenya and Uganda. This is a tragedy of immense proportion in a country that at independence was one of the poorest in the world with little infrastructure and few social structures. This paper uses the state-making theories to examine the state-building processes in South Sudan and particularly the triggers of conflicts, crises and Civil War. It is observed that the challenges of South Sudan revolve around the issues of the weak state syndrome which in turn triggers its Civil War.