The seeds of decay in Liberia had been sown well before 1980. President William Tolbert’s government was weak, corrupt and unpopular. However, things went from bad to worse when Samuel Doe became President after a military coup. Doe quickly discovered that all that was required to maintain power was to take a pro-American stance. This kept the CIA happy, and they helped to keep him in power.
Doe’s ten years of presidency were marked by brutality, genocide, corruption, kleptocracy, rigged elections and just about every form of bad government. Economic activity – particularly international trade – fell away, but the money which was lost as a result of Doe’s mismanagement was replaced by US foreign aid. The US aid enabled Doe’s cronies to continue merrily on their paths of embezzlement while the rest of the country went to ruin.
This leads to a significant moral question: to what extent are donor countries morally culpable for financial mismanagement and human rights violations committed by the government of a country to which they give foreign aid? This is a major dilemma, because of the high correlation between countries with bad governments and countries which are foreign aid recipients.