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| Pages: 75
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
To better understand the significance of ECOWAS’ intervention in Sierra Leone, it is important to understand the region’s political, social and economic landscape. It has been described by some as blighted by environmental degradation, corruption of every kind, disease, and grinding poverty. In a sense, Sierra Leone exemplifies some of these problems, especially the problem of precipitous political violence. Robert Kaplan, a journalist, underlines this apocalyptic doomsday picture of West Africa in his essay “The Coming Anarchy” written in 1994, in which he describes the region as ‘…the symbol of worldwide demographic, environmental and societal stress, in which criminal anarchy emerges as the real “strategic” danger.’ [1]
To this depressing scenario he added the picture of a region beset by “…the withering away of central government, the rise of tribal and regional domains, the unchecked spread of disease and the growing pervasiveness of war.”[2] Much of what he wrote mimicked prevailing conventional wisdom which in hindsight, proved to be a bit of exaggeration. All the same, there were some elements of truth in these assertions as the region grappled with some real and interminable issues such as security threats, low levels of economic development , political instability and lack of social cohesion. If there were problems, which undoubtedly there were, the question then becomes what to do about them.
There is no shortage of literature professing well intentioned “solutions” to these problems, but a great deal of it is thoroughly de-contextualized, meaning that the sort of “corrective measures” being proposed and implemented either fail to factor in the African experience [which often means that Africans are drafted in only as front men and women] or are based totally on foreign templates. In terms of economic development and security for
[1] Robert Kaplan, “The Coming Anarchy,” The Atlantic Monthly 273 (1994): 44-77.
[2] Kaplan 44-77
INTRODUCTION
To better understand the significance of ECOWAS’ intervention in Sierra Leone, it is important to understand the region’s political, social and economic landscape. It has been described by some as blighted by environmental degradation, corruption of every kind, disease, and grinding poverty. In a sense, Sierra Leone exemplifies some of these problems, especially the problem of precipitous political violence. Robert Kaplan, a journalist, underlines this apocalyptic doomsday picture of West Africa in his essay “The Coming Anarchy” written in 1994, in which he describes the region as ‘…the symbol of worldwide demographic, environmental and societal stress, in which criminal anarchy emerges as the real “strategic” danger.’ [1]
To this depressing scenario he added the picture of a region beset by “…the withering away of central government, the rise of tribal and regional domains, the unchecked spread of disease and the growing pervasiveness of war.”[2] Much of what he wrote mimicked prevailing conventional wisdom which in hindsight, proved to be a bit of exaggeration. All the same, there were some elements of truth in these assertions as the region grappled with some real and interminable issues such as security threats, low levels of economic development , political instability and lack of social cohesion. If there were problems, which undoubtedly there were, the question then becomes what to do about them.
There is no shortage of literature professing well intentioned “solutions” to these problems, but a great deal of it is thoroughly de-contextualized, meaning that the sort of “corrective measures” being proposed and implemented either fail to factor in the African experience [which often means that Africans are drafted in only as front men and women] or are based totally on foreign templates. In terms of economic development and security for
[1] Robert Kaplan, “The Coming Anarchy,” The Atlantic Monthly 273 (1994): 44-77.
[2] Kaplan 44-77
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