Predatory peace: fiscal fragmentation and coercive statebuilding in South Sudan and beyond

This article analyses how peace agreements have reconfigured, rather than dismantled, predatory fiscal rule in South Sudan. Drawing on 210 interviews, archival sources, and a peace agreements dataset, it shows how elite pacts redistribute rents in ways that stabilise ruling coalitions while legitimising coercion. I introduce the concept of predatory peace to capture how agreements entrench fiscal predation under the guise of statebuilding and strategic fiscal fragmentation to describe how opaque and overlapping revenue systems sustain authority and diffuse accountability. By foregrounding South Sudan’s revenue complex, the article shows how peacebuilding frameworks embed coercion as durable rule across conflict-affected countries.