William Easterly is a Professor of Economics at the New York
University, who in a 2006 publication: The White Man’s Burden: Why the West’s
Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Harm and So Little Good, enunciated
that fragile states are plagued by two factors, namely: political identity
fragmentation and weak national institutions in their development.
According to him, states with poor
institutions have negative effects on growth and public policy implementation.
Relying on this line of argument, what any
serious democracy should strive for should be the state whereby institutions
are stronger than individuals or persons, no matter how powerful. What usually
transpires in the Nigerian public affairs tends to suggest otherwise.
