Intelligence Reform in the Post-Dictatorial Democratic Republic of Congo. A Critical Analysis of DRC's Intelligence Service

While the current body of knowledge on the role of intelligence services in post-colonial Africa emphazises the protection of dictatorial regimes and poor governance of the security sector as the main contributing factors to the inefficiency and ineffectiveness of African intelligence services, this book offers a critical analysis of the missions assigned to intelligence agencies during different periods of DRC's political history and demonstrates that Congolese intelligence services rather efficiently protected Western interests during the Cold War period, when the West was competing with the Soviet Union over the control of the African continent. During this period, for over three decades, they incidentally protected the political leadership, which is the key role for intelligence services in virtually all states.