Elections as a strategy for democratization and conflict transformation?: Liberal peace and the 1996 elections in Sierra Leone

Abstract

This paper examines the 1996 elections in Sierra Leone and its connection to the twin processes of
democratization and conflict transformation in that country. It interprets those elections as part of an
emerging liberal peace agenda which since the 1990s has become the dominant approach to managing
conflicts, peace-building, societal reconstruction and democratization favoured by international policy
community for areas in the emerging from conflicts around the world. Three themes are pursued in this
paper: (a) specifying the liberal peace agenda, which is interpreted as an ideological and neo-imperialist
posture; (b) illustrating how the interpretations and representations of contemporary conflicts have
helped in legitimating the hegemony of this liberal agenda; and, (c) examining the 1996 elections in
relation to that agenda. By examining the Sierra Leone example, this paper seeks to problematise the
assumption that elections can lead to conflict transformation and democracy in societies affected by, or
emerging from armed conflicts and civil wars.