Violence and political opportunities : a social movement study of the use of violence in the Nigerian Boko Haram

Abstract

This study investigates the use of violence by Salafi-Oriented Movement Organisations. Drawing mostly from Social Movement Theory’s “political opportunity” and “resource mobilisation” thesis, it uses the Northern Nigerian-born Boko Haram (BH) to study how such organisation evolved and used different forms of violent activisms for goal attainment. On that basis, three main research questions were formulated: (1) What socio-political structures enabled the evolution of the organisation in Northern Nigeria? (2) Under what conditions did BH begin to use armed violence against the Nigerian State? (3) What specific forms of armed violence did BH use and how were such forms of strategy sustained within the organisation? In answering these questions, the study relied on data collected through one-on-one semi-structured interviews from religious leaders in Northern Nigeria (particularly those within the Salafi networks); selected politicians in the areas where the group operates; some Nigerian security personnel, and on focus group interviews from victims of BH violence. In addition, the study also drew from other documentary sources (videos and audio recordings from different leaders in the group), and from internal correspondence between BH leaders and those of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb. Along the primary data, these documentary sources showed a striking historical continuity about the emergence and activities of BH from inception, up until they began using violence as a means for goal attainment. The data showed that while the emergence of the group was dependent on specific Northern Nigerian socio-political and mobilisatory structures, the adoption and sustenance of different forms of violence in the group were re-enforced by the interactions between the group’s leadership and the Borno state government; the violent response of the Nigerian government to the group's initial anti-state rhetoric; the mobilisation of different material resources (accruing from the organisation’s interactions and collaborations with similar international Salafi networks) and the internal dynamics in the group (competition between the different factions in the organisation). These inter-related conditions provided the windows of opportunity upon which both the establishment of the group, as well as the internal logic for the development and justification of different forms of violence were sustained within the organisation.