Capacity building outside the state-building framework? A post-Afghanistan analysis

State-building has been severely criticized over the past two decades for being an externally led intervention based on a liberal democratic blueprint that has led to top-down centralized state institutions with little to no buy-in from local actors. The rapid collapse of the internationally backed Afghan state to the Taliban in 2021 came to epitomize the failures of international state-building. The answer, many have argued, is to support bottom-up and locally led state-building which is far more likely to galvanize its citizens. Although for many areas of capacity-building this may indeed be a much-improved approach, it remains unclear what this local turn means for defence-related activities and in particular military capacity building. This research paper, based on documentary analysis and interviews with officials in relevant UK government and international institutions, examines what locally focused military capacity building initiatives may look like. It argues that such interventions are likely to result in capacity-building interventions with non-state armed groups that do not promote and may indeed directly oppose state-building. What does military capacity building outside of state-building logics imply and what are the principal risks and benefits of adopting such an approach?