Government and Opposition (2019), 1–15 doi:10.1017/gov.2019.23
ARTICLE
The Legacy of a Revolution that Never Happened: The Post-War Politics of Former Rebel Party
RUFP in Sierra Leone 7 20 1 364 6 2 4 4 20 1 364 7 Mimmi Söderberg Kovacs*
Mimmi Söderberg Kovacs, Folke Bernadotte Academy (FBA), Sweden *Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]
(Received 6 March 2018; revised 3 June 2019; accepted 26 June 2019)
Abstract The former rebel party Revolutionary United Front Party (RUFP) in Sierra Leone has struggled with a discredited wartime reputation and electoral defeats throughout the post-war period. In spite of this, the party has remained loyal to its wartime revolutionary ideas, symbols and political rhetoric. Why is this the case? In this article, I argue that the answer lies in the premises of party politics in war-torn states and new democracies on the African continent. In a political landscape where brokerage is power, retaining wartime