If successfully orchestrated, the elections will mark the first time in recent memory that a democratically elected Liberian president – Ellen Johnson Sirleaf – will hand over power to a similarly elected head of state.

This is very likely to be a close election and the briefing investigates changes and continuities in the candidates, political parties, electoral processes and the workings of the Liberian state at a watershed moment in a long and shifting democratic history.

Robtel Neajai Pailey and David Harris (2017) 'Liberia’s run-up to 2017: continuity and change in a long history of electoral politics', Review of African Political Economy, DOI: 10.1080/03056244.2017.1318361