CSIS Africa Notes Review #2: Liberia – Return to Civilian Rule?

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African governance, Americo - Liberians, Bongo family Gabon, CSIS Africa Note, J. Gus Liebenow, Liberia 1985 election, Liberia civil war, Liberia PRC, Mauritania, military rule in Africa, Monrovia, Samuel Doe, Togo dictatorship

In my last review of a CSIS monthly Africa note (a fascinating historical trove of newsletters), I commended the author of a 1983 piece on Zimbabwe for presciently identifying many of the issues that continue to dominate Zimbabwe’s political landscape.  I cannot say that the author of a piece on Liberia’s prospects for a return to civilian rule in the same year exhibited as much foresight.

I have never been particularly fond of the author of the piece, J. Gus Liebenow.  His work, Liberia: The Evolution of Privilege, is a seminal academic text on Liberia.  However, I feel that his critical take on the Liberian ruling class, a group descended from black Americans, completely ignores the institutional racism that they faced for well over a century of independence (I expound on this here).

My distaste for

CSIS Africa Notes Review #1: Whither Zimbabwe?

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black empowerment Zimbabwe, CSIS, CSIS Africa Note, indigenization Zimbabwe, Michael Clough, PF - ZAPU, Robert Mugabe, whites in Zimbabwe, ZANU - PF militancy, ZANU-PF, Zimbabwe election, Zimbabwe sanctions

I have previously committed to analyzing several of the CSIS Africa notes, monthly updates on a single issue from the CSIS Africa program that were distributed between 1982 and 2006.  In honor of my personal interest in Zimbabwe and the forthcoming elections, I will begin my review with an analysis of the November, 1983 note on ‘Whither Zimbabwe?’ by Michael Clough, a political scientist who has had affiliations with the Brookings Institution, the Council on Foreign Relations, and the University of California – Berkeley (note: I had never heard of him before reading this piece).

What instantly struck me about ‘Whither Zimbabwe?’ is