The Politics of Eco-Violence: Why Is Conflict Escalating in Nigeria’s Middle Belt?

Ezenwa E. Olumba

Terrorism and Political Violence, 2024, vol. 36, issue 2, 180-197

Abstract: In Nigeria’s Middle Belt, competition for land and other resources has intensified between nomadic Fulani herders and sedentary farmers. What were initially sporadic conflicts over cropland and water resources have transformed into daily occurrences of mass violence. While extant research centres on the root causes of such conflicts, the reasons for their escalation remain insufficiently understood. This article examines how political developments have contributed to the escalation of conflicts. Using the Homer-Dixon model and secondary sources, the findings show that changes in Nigeria’s “political opportunity structure” since 2014 were catalysts for escalating violent conflicts. The consequences were the unvarnished adoption of nepotistic domestic policies and alliances between elites and militia members, which escalated the violent conflicts. This article advocates the devolution of natural resources and security governance to prevent leaders from leveraging shifts in political opportunity structures to favour a specific demographic group.

Date: 2024
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/09546553.2022.2129015 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:ftpvxx:v:36:y:2024:i:2:p:180-197

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/ftpv20

DOI: 10.1080/09546553.2022.2129015

Access Statistics for this article

Terrorism and Political Violence is currently edited by James Forest

More articles in Terrorism and Political Violence from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().