Conclusions

In his book's conclusions, the author elaborates about the nature of partitions as a key challenge for a study devoted to state dismemberment. The international research project that supported an interdisciplinary team of 4 authors to work on this subject at the Columbia Institute of Reid Hall in Paris together with La maison des Sciences de l'homme came in the end to believe that partitions are not the expression of clashes of civilization. Rather, they are a local, but widespread attempt at reacting against globalization by local/global means, patterns, symbols and convictions. They are a lever for multiplying states in a community of states in crisis and unable to govern the world. At the same time, partitions are also a global phenomenon that requires global politics and strategies in order to avoid the risk of multiplying the political cells of human societies, as a fortress of incommunicability in a world of networks and webs. In the end the author stresses how partitions are a litmus paper that human beings need for testing new forms of political organization, representation, and mediation.