Collateral Benefit: Iraq and Increased Legitimacy for International Trusteeship

It takes an almost reckless optimism to find a silver lining in the abject failure of basic institutions, let alone democracy, to take root in postwar Iraq. But look hard enough and it's possible to discern one: enhanced legitimacy in the international community for what has been called "neotrusteeship," an arrangement whereby multilateral institutions temporarily govern states that have collapsed in spasms of misrule and violent conflict.