With two Liberians awarded the Nobel prize in 2011 and the country celebrating its second democratic election since the end of its civil war, days of anarchy seem to be in the distant past for Liberia. Yet it was only eight years ago that parties to the conflict and representatives of civil society signed the comprehensive agreement. Unlike previous agreements, this one has held, but the is, in essence, an absence of violence, a negative peace. The root causes and conflict drivers have not yet been addressed comprehensively and, as such, the grounds that led to violent conflict continue to exist.President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf addressed some of the realities in her country in her inaugural speech on 16 January 2012. While praising Liberians for holding the country up as a beacon of democracy and restoring hope to it, she referred to the enormity of the challenges that remain, discussing the need to create equality of opportunity and a better future for all liberians.1 These words allude to the historical marginalization and discrimination that triggered violent conflict in Liberia and date back to the founding of the country in 1822, and to what has been called the original sin.In brief, Liberia was founded by freed slaves from the United States who ruled the country in a segregated fashion. As it was, Liberia's indigenous population did not gain citizenship until 1904. Government benefited the Americo-Liberian freed-slave population residing primarily in and around the capital of Monrovia. In 1944, the government began to extend central administration throughout the country and, in 1946, offered suffrage to indigenous people who held property. In 1970, basic services were provided to populations outside of the capital. However, indigenous Liberians began to agitate for greater rights and, in 1980, a coup d'etat brought them to power for the first time. In late 1989, after almost a decade of dictatorship that primarily benefited the ethnic group of the then-ruling President Samuel Doe, ethnically based civil war erupted.Fourteen years later, the comprehensive agreement created a new opportunity to build durable and stability in Liberia. The UN, including the peacekeeping mission and a number of funds, agencies, and programs, has been one of the Liberian government's main partners in its peacebuilding endeavours. With the start of Sirleaf s second term and after more than eight years of concerted effort, this is an opportune moment to reflect on the consolidation of in Liberia. This article consequently focuses on these state- and peacebuilding efforts and the continued relevance of An agenda for peace for current UN operations. What emerges is that efforts at building state institutions in Liberia are not underpinned by credible political processes. It is clear that weak democratic institutions and the marginalization and discrimination that previously created the grounds for conflict are impeding the development of political space in Liberia.The UN has been instrumental in providing security and basic social services alongside the delivery of humanitarian aid. This has created a reasonably stable environment that is conducive to building government institutions in which the UN has also been a core partner, in terms of institutional reform, the capacity-building of government officials, and, to a lesser extent, national civil society actors. However, the UN has had limited involvement in strengthening democratic institutions. Moreover, efforts to address the root causes of the conflict have not succeeded in generating the necessary national political will for a comprehensive reconciliation process. Building state institutions without commensurate efforts to ensure that these activities are based on a credible political process has the potential to perpetuate conflict by inadvertently enabling a faulty social contract to be at the basis of state institutions. …