Columbia International Affairs Online: Working Papers

CIAO DATE: 12/2013

Can Development Interventions Help Post-conflict Communities Build Social Cohesion? The Case of the Liberia Millennium Villages

Elisabeth King

December 2013

Centre for International Governance Innovation

Abstract

The latest research from the Africa Initiative evaluates the efforts of one international development intervention — the Kokoyah Millennium Villages Project — to improve welfare and build social cohesion in post-conflict Liberia. Elisabeth King bases her research on data collected from a quasi-experimental, differences-in-differences research design. Her findings show that social cohesion was already higher than anticipated before the project began, and concludes that policy makers and practitioners should measure existing social cohesion before beginning a project and examine how best to harness what may already be there.