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Dis/ordering politics: urban riots and the socio-political configuration of contemporary Niger

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2020

Jannik Schritt
Jannik Schritt*
Affiliation:
Institute of Sociology, University of Technology Berlin, Straße des 17. Juni 135, 10623Berlin, Germany
*
Email: jannik.schritt@tu-berlin.de
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Abstract

This article focuses on ‘generic moments of becoming’, historical sedimentation and patterns of recurrent protests to explain the structural drivers that sparked the dramatic increase in urban protests and riots in Niger between 2013 and 2018. It identifies several factors in the country's socio-political configuration as particularly important for understanding the protests: new media and politics by proxy, political machines, the social and political embeddedness of civil society, ethnicity and regional political strongholds, the legacy of Françafrique, religious reform movements, and male youth violence. In examining these drivers, the article aims to provide an informative overview of contemporary politics and society in Niger and to counter culturalist, ahistoric and Eurocentric notions of ‘African disorder’.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Modern African Studies , Volume 57 , Issue 4 , December 2019 , pp. 613 - 634
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Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2020

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Footnotes

The research this article is based on was funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) within the project ‘Oil and Social Change in Niger and Chad’ (2011–2017) which was based at the universities of Goettingen, Halle and Mayence (Germany). I thank my interlocutors in Niger, the project team members and the two anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments.

References

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