I would like to thank Glenn Palmer for suggesting that there would be great interest in a special issue of CMPS on failed states, and encouraging me to take on the task. Thanks also to the set of anonymous referees who blind-reviewed all of the submitted papers and provided useful comments for revision. Finally, thanks to the contributors who not only provided such first-rate papers, but who also met the series of deadlines I set for them.
Notes
While there are brief reviews of the literature in the other pieces, such as Iqbal and Starr, see Carment et al. for the fullest overview of current theory and findings.