CIAO DATE: 12/2010
November 2010
Danish Institute for International Studies
In this DIIS Working Paper Peter Albrecht discusses the uneasy role of chiefs within three cycles of security and justice reform in Sierra Leone during the past decade. Interaction has been indirect, by default or marginal, and always hesitant. This has been the case, even though chiefs constitute the most important governing institution in Sierra Leone’s rural communities. One of the key tensions has been the tendency to cast chiefs as state or non-state, respectively, or even as a hybrid between the two. However, as this paper illustrates, while they are formally and discursively tied into a 'state system' in the Constitution and in legislation, they are subjected to limited oversight, and therefore govern in relative autonomy.
Resource link: Betwixt and between - chiefs and reform of Sierra Leone's justice sector [PDF] - 183K