by Dimitris Bouris
Routledge 2014 (Hardback) and 2015 (Paperback)
Drawing on extensive fieldwork and over 140 interviews carried out in Brussels, London, Jerusalem and Ramallah with EU, Palestinian and Israeli officials as well as academics, members of NGOs and civil society, the author evaluates the present approach of state-building and offers a framework to test the effectiveness of the EU as a state-builder. Examining security sector reform, judiciary sector reform and the rule of law, the book brings the ‘voices from the field’ to the forefront and measures the contribution of the EU to state-building against a backdrop of on-going conflict and a polarised social setting.
More on the Routledge website.
Reviews
“The Palestinian issue would seem to be well trodden scholarly ground, but Dimitris Bouris does us a
tremendous service by placing the European Union and Palestinian state-building at the center rather
than at the margins of his story.” – Nathan Brown, Professor of Political Science and International Affairs,
George Washington University and Nonresident Senior Associate Carnegie Endowment for
International Peace.
“Bouris’ book offers a unique insight into the EU’s role in the Palestinian institution-building.” Christian Berger
(Director for North Africa, Middle East, Arabian Peninsula, Iran and Iraq, EEAS).
“What makes the book unique is that it places the EU at the centre of the state-building project conducted in
the Occupied Palestinian Territories, an endeavour that has so far been missing from the academic literature.”
– Richard Youngs, Senior Associate Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and Professor of
International Relations at Warwick.
“Bouris lays bare the incoherence and inconsistency in EU policy and practices, and shows how statebuilding is
not a technical project, but is highly political. He usefully reminds us of how Europe has a major responsibility
not only historically for the situation in Israel/Palestine, but also for the current democratic deficit witnessed in
the oPt.” – Mandy Turner, Director of the Kenyon Institute in Jerusalem.
“Bouris takes on the hard task of offering an alternative to many books written on the Israeli–Palestinian
conflict. Its difference and strength lies in its special emphasis on the EU’s state-building policy on the
OPTs…another crucial strength of the book is the solid research that it involves, based on vast interviews that
Bouris had conducted with the people on the ground as well as the intensive use of primary sources and
empirical data.” – Münevver Cebeci Associate Professor, Marmara University.
“This is an important monograph that advances our knowledge on both conceptual and empirical grounds.
Bouris delivers a fascinating account of the EU’s engagement with the Palestinian territories that is well informed
and sharply analytical.” Dimitris Papadimitriou, Professor of Politics, University of Manchester.