When partisan conflict tore apart the Palestinian Authority in June 2007, economist Salam Fayyad suddenly found himself in the role of prime minister—responsible for security, for basic service delivery, and for recharting Palestine’s path to statehood. Few wanted to serve in the emergency cabinet the president had asked him to form, so great seemed the risk of failure. The cabinet faced competing claims to legitimacy from Hamas, which headed the unity government that had just collapsed. The Basic Law, the territories’ constitution, included specific provisions that both provided clear guidance on how to move forward under the unforeseen conditions and contained enough ambiguity that allowed government legitimacy to be politically contested. As the internationally recognized prime minister, Fayyad persuaded a diverse group of independents and technocrats to accept ministerial posts in the emergency government. To support decision-making and implementation at the center of government, he tasked a close adviser with setting up a prime minister’s office; strengthened the role of the cabinet secretariat; established systems for paying civil servants, including those in Gaza, where his predecessor, Ismail Haniyeh, continued to assert authority; worked with international partners to help meet basic citizen needs in the territory the government could not easily reach; and strengthened communications and transparency. Those steps enabled the cabinet to work more effectively and helped support urgent efforts to restore order, expand economic opportunities, and, ultimately, embark on a more ambitious political agenda toward independent Palestinian statehood.

Henrietta Toivanen, Jennifer Widner, and Gordon LaForge drafted this case study based on interviews conducted by Tristan Dreisbach in Ramallah, Nablus, and Jericho in June and July 2019 and by Dreisbach and others in additional locations during 2019 and 2020. The case is part of a series on state building in Palestine, 2002–05 and 2007–11. Case published April 2024.

When Salam Fayyad became finance minister of the Palestinian Authority in June 2002, the interim government was starved for cash and faced strong internal and external pressure for reform. To ensure the government could manage revenues and expenditures with fidelity, Fayyad had to improve the functioning and the professionalism of the ministry. He moved quickly to revise core procedures and change the organization’s culture. As he did so, he also began to transform the ministry from an organization based on personal allegiances into one based on institutional policies and standards. Success in that arena during the next three years depended on building coalitions to maintain support for reform as well as marshaling capacity within the ministry itself—by reshaping expectations, centralizing control, unifying geographically divided operations, and fostering talent.

Jennifer Widner and Tristan Dreisbach drafted this case study based on multiple conversations with Salam Fayyad in Princeton, New Jersey, during 2019, as well as other interviews conducted in the Palestinian cities of Ramallah, Nablus, and Jericho in June and July of the same year. The case is part of a series on state building in Palestine, 2002–05 and 2007–11. Case published March 2022.

In 2010, 20 years after the end of Augusto Pinochet’s military regime, Chile transformed its defense sector by restructuring the Ministry of National Defense, stripping military leaders of responsibility for planning and strategy and placing that authority in the hands of civilians. The event marked a sea change in the relationship between the armed forces and the government. Civilians at the ministry previously had provided the military with scant guidance regarding the country’s strategic goals—in part because they lacked the training and experience required to anticipate threats to the country or to determine what capabilities the armed forces required to confront such threats. The enabling law, enacted after years of debate, also gave new powers to a chief of Joint Staff, an officer whose job was to promote cooperation among the army, navy, and air force—three military branches that jealously protected their independence and were wary of any attempt to diminish the authority of their powerful commanders in chief. Sebastián Piñera, who became president in March 2010 just as the law took effect, faced the task of implementing the massive shift in expectations, norms, culture, and the chain of command. His administration restructured the ministry and hired civilians to manage tasks long controlled by military officers, and by the end of his term in 2014, the Ministry of National Defense had taken the lead in developing Chile’s defense policies.

Tristan Dreisbach drafted this case based on interviews conducted in Santiago, Chile during July and August 2015. Case published November 2015.