I’ve just finished reading an article on Liberia from the 1965 Journal of Economic History. The author, George Dalton, spent a year or two in Liberia in the early 1960s. I can email anyone interested a copy of the article, or you can access it from the “files” section on the Liberia Expats Google Group.
Dalton used the word “backward” three times, which was a bit infuriating, but he arrived at a conclusion I agree with: Typical pro-development economic policies in the 1960s weren’t working because the root problem was political–Americo-Liberians did not want to cede power.
I love the figure (shown above) that Dalton reprints in his article. (The figure was originally put together by J. Gus Liebenow.) It shows how government officials from 1960-1961 were related to each other. If you have trouble reading the figure, you can click on it to see a larger version.
If a similar figure was constructed today, would it look much different?
To be more cinvinced about what Dalton said, read J. Gus Liebenow’s Liberia, The quest For Democracy. You will understand how deeply rooted Americo-Liberians were into Liberian politics. Liebenow described Liberia from its emerging political dominance by Americo-Liberians to its political uncertainties and native control of state power.
Shelby, Saki is now blogging as svl(Student Vision Liberia) I posted the first comment. I forget to say that the political family tree, which was once uprooted, has started sowing seeds.