I certainly would not have characterized Barnett's analysis as shallow, as he provides a very helpful and insightful way of thinking about what is going on. There is an awful lot more to it than just the fact that central Africa and the Middle East are unstable, and if that is all that you think he is saying then you have completely missed his point.
I listened to the guy for an hour on CSPAN, and all it was is that the region of the damned was not connected to the world economy, and thus did not have a stake in it, stated 10 different ways. I already knew that.