[3] At the time of writing, Herbst argued that the political science literature had largely ignored the African state-building experience and focused instead on state creation in Western Europe.

In Europe, social scientists such as Charles Tilly have argued that European states consolidated power to survive in an anarchic international system during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.

Faced with the constant threat of war, European political elites sent administrators and armed forces from the urban centers into rural hinterlands to raise taxes, recruit soldiers, and fortify buffer zones.

The European state-building experience was unusual and exceptional because it occurred under systemic geographic pressures that favored state consolidation – namely, scarcity of land and high-population densities.

[8] Herbst argues that geographic features influenced how precolonial African states conceived of meaningful power.

[13] Varied and harsh terrain made it difficult for precolonial leaders to continuously exert power from political centers to the hinterlands.

[14] The largest precolonial polities arose in the Sudanian Savanna belt of West Africa because the horses and camels could transport armies over the terrain.

[17] It is part of the Princeton Studies in International History and Politics book series, edited by John Ikenberry, Marc Trachtenberg, and William Wohlforth.

[23] He also contests Herbst's conclusion that modern powers should allow the disintegration of the African states to promote experimentation with new forms of sovereignty.