Between 'thuwar' and national police - negotiations, violence, and competition in Tripoli's security field during Libya's transitional phase of 2011 - 2012

Although NATO intervened in Libya during the revolution there was no large international force present in the transitional phase: the timeframe between the end of the violent conflict and the first elections. Consequently Libyans themselves, headed by the self-appointed National Transitional Council (NTC) and the interim government, were responsible for forming state institutions and preparing the country for its first post-conflict elections. However, as a consequence of Qaddafi's 'stateless society' and the revolution of 2011 itself, there was no institutionalized security force that the newly formed political entities could utilize in order to provide security during the transitional phase. As a result, the multiple brigades that were formed by the revolutionary fighters over the course of the uprising became active in the security field afterwards. This resulted in a situation in which security was not provided by a single entity, such as the state, but rather by numerous different brigades and institutions. This research provides insight into the different processes and dynamics that occur within a security field after an international intervention and successful revolution. It will be argued that the brigades in Tripoli on the one hand have used their position as holders of the means of violence in the capital as leverage in their negotiations with the political entities, whilst on the other hand the brigades needed to uphold their reputations as invaluable security providers in the field in order to legitimize their use of violence and justify their existence in a territorial oligopoly of violence. This entailed using the state's image as the only legitimate holder of violence as a mechanism to legalize the actions of a brigade. However, interaction between the actors in the security field occurred in an uncoordinated and impersonalized manner, leader to the exclusion of several, both in and outside of Tripoli. Without alternatives such as an accessible political infrastructure, violence was therefore also used as a means to communicate with the political authorities