The Articles of Confederation was ratified in 1781 and is known for being very weak. The Articles gave little to no power to the federal government and many people felt as if it harmed the country.
The government could not create and enforce laws properly. With the Articles of Confederation, the government only had one branch, which was Congress. This made it very difficult to be able to enforce the laws onto citizens. In order to pass a law, 9 out of 13 of the colonies had to agree, which made it difficult to do anything as they usually weren't on the same page. In order to change or amend the Articles, all of the colonies had to agree to it.
The government could not tax the states. In order for the government to obtain money, they had to directly ask the states. Obviously, the states did not want to give their own money away, so it was hard for the government to pay war debts. The Articles of Confederation was careful in not creating "taxation without representation," so it made it a challenge to tax citizens.
The Articles of Confederation ended up getting scraped all together during the Constitutional Convention of 1787, which caused the United States Constitution to be created.