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Urban-rural geographies of political violence in North and West Africa

Urban-rural geographies of political violence in North and West Africa
Urban-rural geographies of political violence in North and West Africa
This paper assesses the relationship between population density and political violence within North and West Africa. We find that while most violence currently occurs in rural areas, it also exhibits a classic distance-decay effect, commonly occurring near urbanized places. Regional differences are evident as Jihadist-led violence is increasingly rural in West Africa while urban violence was more common in North Africa. Important difference in states with major conflict are also present, exemplified by urbanized violence in Nigeria and rural violence in Mali. Our findings therefore provide mixed evidence for the typical “urbanization of conflict” discourse in the literature.
199-222
Radil, Steven M.
61934f4a-44da-4183-8e9e-e28190a772c4
Walther, Olivier
05892149-d475-44f1-8f8d-7cb661ff31ad
Dorward, Nick
a6c40613-4337-44f8-83e8-eb3730a7094d
Pflaum, Matthew
835f8b5b-122f-4b1b-85a8-caf20df95c40
Radil, Steven M.
61934f4a-44da-4183-8e9e-e28190a772c4
Walther, Olivier
05892149-d475-44f1-8f8d-7cb661ff31ad
Dorward, Nick
a6c40613-4337-44f8-83e8-eb3730a7094d
Pflaum, Matthew
835f8b5b-122f-4b1b-85a8-caf20df95c40

Radil, Steven M., Walther, Olivier, Dorward, Nick and Pflaum, Matthew (2023) Urban-rural geographies of political violence in North and West Africa. African Security, 16 (2-3), 199-222. (doi:10.1080/19392206.2023.2251286).

Record type: Article

Abstract

This paper assesses the relationship between population density and political violence within North and West Africa. We find that while most violence currently occurs in rural areas, it also exhibits a classic distance-decay effect, commonly occurring near urbanized places. Regional differences are evident as Jihadist-led violence is increasingly rural in West Africa while urban violence was more common in North Africa. Important difference in states with major conflict are also present, exemplified by urbanized violence in Nigeria and rural violence in Mali. Our findings therefore provide mixed evidence for the typical “urbanization of conflict” discourse in the literature.

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e-pub ahead of print date: 9 September 2023

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Local EPrints ID: 494997
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/494997
PURE UUID: ee1f4331-5ec4-4cff-a343-9954ba195e67
ORCID for Nick Dorward: ORCID iD orcid.org/0000-0003-0247-2995

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Date deposited: 25 Oct 2024 16:34
Last modified: 26 Oct 2024 02:11

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Contributors

Author: Steven M. Radil
Author: Olivier Walther
Author: Nick Dorward ORCID iD
Author: Matthew Pflaum

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