ABSTRACT
During the first half of the 1990s Chad experienced both internal and external pressures for political reform and democratization. This chapter provides a background from Chads earlier history, particularly from the period of 1945 to 1987. It describes the beginning of political reform in Chad from 1988 to late 1990, when President Hissène Habrè was overthrown. The chapter deals with the course of the pressures for change within the evolving context of Chadian life under Idriss Dèby in the 1990s. In November 1958 Chad became an autonomous republic within the French Community. Beginning in 1991, however, insecurity spread throughout the country, particularly because of the activities of armed former combatants, most of them young people, who had come from Sudan following Dèby's victory. They looted, stole, and murdered in both the capital and rural areas.
