ABSTRACT
Since the end of the Liberian civil war in 2003 the international community has been involved in various attempts at rebuilding the Liberian state. This process is regularly presented as a success and a showcase for what the United Nations (UN) and the international community can achieve together with local partners. It is, for example, argued that not only is the United Nations Mission in Liberia’s (UNMIL) approach to security sector reform (SSR) a success as far as the technical benchmarks set by the international community have been met and that the country has been peaceful since the arrival of UNMIL, but also that the most successful aspects of the mission have been the political will for reform, local ownership and technical expert capacity (see interview with Rory Keane, UNMIL advisor on SSR, in Stadelmayer, 2011). The Liberian SSR has therefore supposedly taken place in partnership with the Liberian government. However, as a growing body of independent third-party research has shown, there is in fact little if any local ownership in this process (Ebo, 2005, 2007; Loden, 2007; Stig, 2009; Bøås and Stig, 2010; Andersen, 2010).
