Boundaries and Conflict in the Mano River Region of West Africa

The porous and contestable features of African boundaries are two interacting themes that are closely linked to the emergence and spread of conflict in Africa in the last decade. This study uses the Mano River Region—Sierra Leone, Guinea, Liberia, and Ivory Coast—to illustrate how border issues contribute to the perpetuation of insecurity. Border evolution is traced from precolonial to colonial to the postindependence period to include the details of how the countries of the Mano River Region attained their current dimensions. The focus then shifts to the current decade, when violence in one country stimulated a similar phenomenon in a neighboring state until the entire region was enveloped. Several facets of porous borders facilitated this pattern to include the flow of weapons, the movement of former combatants, and the transnational exploitation of resources. Contestable borders have not been as much of a factor in stimulating conflict, but, given the current political and economic malaise in Africa, the potential certainly exists for more challenges to extant boundaries. If porous borders come under tighter national control, a goal in many African countries, then it is likely that more boundary locations will be contested.