The Civil War and the Refugee Crisis in Liberia
On the eve of the twenty-first century, one of the greatest challenges and troubling phenomena facing the world is an increasing number of refugees, of whom there are about 18 million. The refugee problem has recently assumed international significance due to exploding refugee population movements. The global refugee problem is a subject of international concern as it affects Africa, Asia, Latin America, Europe, and North America. It is a particularly serious problem in Africa where the refugee population on the continent represents about 50 percent of the world's refugees, surpassing even the population of some individual African nations. In Sub-Saharan Africa, Mozambique, Angola, Sudan, Ethiopia, Somalia, Rwanda, and Liberia have generated the largest numbers of refugees.
Liberia 1989-1994 : a study of ethnic and spiritual violence
This article deals with the civil war which broke out in Liberia on 24 December 1989, when 100 or more fighters claiming allegiance to the National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL), led by Charles Taylor, advanced over the border from Cote d'Ivoire to attack the town of Butuo in Nimba County. The article examines how Liberia descended into conflict and why it took such violent form. It surveys the political and military events that took place since the NPFL invasion, paying attention to the collapse of the government, the arrival of the Ecomog intervention force in Monrovia in August 1990, the murder of President Doe by Prince Johnson's Independent National Patriotic Front of Liberia (INPFL), the role of Ulimo (United Liberation Movement for Democracy), an organization formed in 1991 by Liberians who had taken refuge in Sierra Leone, the emergence of warlords, the progress of negotiations and developments following the Cotonou Peace Accord of July 1993. It suggests that the causes of the war are not only political, but may also be explained in religious or spiritual terms. Much of the information in the article was acquired during a field trip to Liberia in July 1994. Notes, ref
Turkish Political Culture and Civil Society : an Unsettling Coupling?
This paper attempts to analyze Turkish politics in the post-1980 period with a special reference to the relationship among the state elites, political elites and societal actors and its impact on the constitution of civil society in Turkey. After the 1980 military intervention, the political and economic realms of Turkey witnessed a relative degree of liberalization through Uzal's neo-liberal policies. The January 24 economic decisions paved the way for economic liberalization as well as letting new economic and societal actors emerge. These new economic actors were different from the prevailing economic actors which used to enjoy having a considerable amount of opportunity spaces in the economic sphere. Together with the Uzal governments, Islamic segments started to become powerful in both political and economic realms. This paper analyses the chief traits of Turkish politics and economics and their impact upon civil society aftermath the 1980 coup in general, and the relationship and/or interaction among the state elites, political elites and societal actors in particular. The engagements of newly-emerging societal and economic actors into Turkish political scene and the challenge of these actors against the so-called 'Kemalist-Republican' elites are also illustrated in the paper. Moreover, state-Islam interaction, politics-Islam interaction as well as Kemalism-newly-emerging societal and economic actors interaction will be studied with a special emphasis to the post-1980 period. The major argument of the paper is that, in Turkey, both civil society issues and political issues reveal outcomes which are primarily shaped by the nature of the relationship between state elites and political elites in general and by Turkish political culture in particular.