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- This path-breaking volume presents broad guidelines and specific prescriptions for combating serious crime in societies emerging from conflict.
Latest from USIP on Liberia
- January 22, 2010 | In the Field
In December 2009, Deborah Isser and Tim Luccaro traveled to Monrovia, Liberia to present the findings of the recent USIP Peaceworks, "Looking for Justice: Liberian Experiences with and Perceptions of Local Justice Options," to senior government officials, and to facilitate a meeting between Liberia's Legal Working Group and the nation's traditional leaders.
- November 20, 2009 | Event
As Liberia continues its struggle to rebuild institutions destroyed by years of brutal conflict, the rule of law has emerged as a focus area of national and international development efforts. A key policy question concerns the future of Liberia’s dual justice system under which a hierarchy of chiefs’ courts managed by the Ministry of Internal Affairs exists in parallel to the formal judiciary. Co-authors Deborah Isser and Stephen Lubkemann discuss the policy implications of the newest USIP Peaceworks with the Chair of the Liberian Law Reform Commission.
- November 5, 2009 | Resource
This report presents the research findings and analysis of ten months of field study as part of the United States Institute of Peace and George Washington University project titled "From Current Practices of Justice to Rule of Law: Policy Options for Liberia's First Post-Conflict Decade."
- September 1, 2008 | Resource
Stemming from a survey of more than 1,400 ex-combatants in Liberia's 14-year civil war, this report explores the reasons behind renewed fighting, including poverty, unemployment, peer and family pressure, gender and tribal tensions.
The Current Situation
Since Liberia elected Africa's first female head of state, President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, in 2005 the nation has been able to slowly improve its security and stability. After 14 years of civil war, though, the nation continues to face a long and difficult path to recovery. With the ongoing political instability in the region and the pending draw down of the United Nations Mission in Liberia, Liberia remains in a fragile state of peace.
USIP's Ongoing Work in Liberia
In 2009, the Liberian Truth and Reconciliation Commission cited the historic discontent with the role of state institutions as one of the major factors behind Liberia's 14 year civil war, which ended in 2003. Lack of a reliable and appropriate mechanism for resolving disputes through the state justice system helped foster the social, political, and economic marginalization of a majority of the country’s population. USIP's programming in Liberia is centered around improving the citizenry's access to justice - through programs that target not only formal justice institutions, but also local legal practices and perceptions of justice.
USIP’s Rule of Law Center of Innovation has recently led a program to build rule of law based on this model. The project aims to develop policy options to expand the rule of law and consolidate peace over the next decade in ways that include the role of informal legal systems and local understandings of justice. The initiative draws on USIP’s ongoing research examining interactions between customary and formal legal systems during post-conflict transitions worldwide.