Let them eat policemen

Shorter David Brooks, "The Republic of Fear", New York Times, March 25 2014:

Several horrifying anecdotes prove that the entire developing world is locked in the grip of fear because the United States spends more money on eradicating poverty than on creating better justice systems in these unhappy countries. Startlingly, it seems that instead of having too much government, they don't have enough. Forget being the world's policeman, we need to be the world's personal organizer.

Kirsten Dunst in the 2006 film by Sophie Coppola.

The message Brooks is cribbing today is from a quite new book by Gary Haugen and Victor Boutros, The Locust Effect, whose authors and publisher will no doubt be too [jump]
grateful for the attention to complain about whatever infelicities it contains. On the book's main thesis, I'll just refer myself to the ferociously anti-imperialist Financial Times, whose reviewer, Peter Vanham, notes:

Because of their background in law, the authors overstate the importance of justice systems as the root for all development. Some economists and entrepreneurs might rather argue that economic progress brings prosperity, in turn reducing violence and helping to pay for more effective justice systems.

At times, Haugen and Boutros flirt with a paternalistic view of EMs [emerging markets]. They assume that western NGOs and governments will invariably be a part of the solution to the problems they describe.

NGOs such as Haugen's own International Justice Mission, of course (I should stress that I have nothing against Haugen, who sounds like a pretty nice guy for an Evangelical paternalist, or his organization, which may well be doing excellent work in spite of those assumptions), and Western governments such as our own. It cannot be said that the US record in developing police forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, where we've actually spent quite a significant amount of money on the project, is an encouraging sign of how well prepared we are to do this. Brooks wouldn't know about this, naturally, since he has had his memories of Iraq and Afghanistan modified by the Ministry of Magic.