JOURNALS

ABSTRACT

The paper focused on the politics and diplomacy of peacekeeping in West Africa with emphasis on the ECOWAS operation in Liberia. The civil war in Liberia was one of the most devastating conflicts in the history of conflict in West Africa as the conflict claimed the lives of hundreds of thousands and led to the displacement of thousands in the country. The collective security theory was adopted as the theoretical framework. A secondary source of data was deployed; it involved the collection of data from textbooks, journals seminar papers etc. The study observed that the civil war in Liberia was a result of Samuel Doe's failure to implement people-oriented programmes in the country He was seen as a sectional leader who only promoted the interest of his ethnic group. This created mistrust in the system and led to the civil war. The study recommended that members of the force should be trained in two major languages (English and French) spoken in the sub-region. Common funds shall be established for peacekeeping operations in the sub-region. This fund shall be entrusted to the secretariat of the organization and contributions to the fund made mandatory for all members' state of ECOWAS