Liberia: War and Peace 1989-2007: A Research Guide

Abstract

The Liberian civil wars spanned fourteen years, from 1989 to 2003. It is estimated that during this time over 250,000 people were killed and more than 1,000,000 were displaced. The wars were covered regularly in American news. Reports characteristically represented the child militias, human sacrifices, and crazed army tactics, including but not limited to soldiers cross-dressing or using nudity as methods of intimidation. Initially, little attention was offered to the greater social and political implications of the war, but recent news coverage and critical research has demanded a change in the way that the civil wars were viewed and addressed, internally and internationally.The first Liberian civil war was led by the conflicting political factions of Samuel Doe and Charles Taylor. These men were backed largely by members of different groups, divided by existing ethnic tensions. These factions divided further as the war progressed, and the war continued long after Doe's assassination in 1990 and his party's defeat.