Violations of sovereignty and regime engineering: a critique of the state theory of Stephen Krasner

With the publication of his 1999 book Sovereignty: Organized Hypocrisy, and a welter of other publications on sovereignty, Krasner has represented a dominating voice in the recent resurgence of sovereignty discourse. Krasner's intricate discussions of international relations (IR) and US foreign policy have overshadowed the theoretical weaknesses of his account of sovereignty itself, leading to accusations by critics such as Amitav Acharya of 'disorganised hypocrisy'. This paper investigates both the content of his policy prescriptions for the State Department, of which he was a part from 2005 to 2007, and the thin account of sovereignty in his works, and demonstrates a possible relationship between the two. It also seeks to situate his position, as a neorealist with some liberal institutionalist tendencies,1 within the larger debate on sovereignty in IR. It is argued that Krasner does not satisfactorily resolve the contradictions between sovereignty and extended transitional administrations or similar arrangements, especially the regime established by the US in Iraq