The withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon on 26 April 2005 unleashed an overlapping regional and domestic struggle over post-Syria Lebanon. At the regional level the geopolitical confrontation involved the US, France, and the so-called ‘moderate’ Arab states against a regional axis including Iran, Syria, Hamas, and Hizbullah. Domestic Lebanese actors bandwagoned with external actors on either side of the regional divide to balance against local opponents. The ensuing domestic contest over the post-Syria Lebanese state has brought the country on the verge of sectarian civil war, remilitarized Lebanese society, and hardened sectarian fissures. This paper examines the domestic struggles over the institutions of the post-Syria Lebanese state. It investigates the contest between the 14 March alliance and the opposition – led by Hizbullah, Amal, and Awn’s Free Patriotic Movement – over both the civil and military institutions of post-Syria Lebanon. The state bureaucracy, the judiciary, the multiple security apparatuses, and civil society organizations but especially the labor unions and professional syndicates have all emerged as sites for this confrontation. Sectarian leaders have used neopatrimonial strategies to colonize state institutions, packing them with sectarian loyalists. This, in turn, has led to the atrophy of state institutions and their fracture along sectarian lines, thus hardening sectarian sentiments at the expense of national ones. In the process, the imperative of postwar state building has been replaced by the logic of sectarian chauvinism and clientalism. Research for this paper is based on primary material, namely personal interviews by the author with pertinent political actors and newspaper coverage in the past three years. The paper’s conclusions contribute to the substantial theoretical literature on the role of external intervention in postwar state building and democratization. It demonstrates how in Lebanon’s case external actors have spoiled the post-Syria state building process, supporting local actors who have undermined the prospects of a transition to truly accountable and representative democratic politics.