Date of Award

8-2024

Document Type

Campus Access Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department

Global Governance and Human Security

First Advisor

Darren Kew

Second Advisor

Rita Kiki Edozie

Third Advisor

Timothy Shaw, Anne Fitzpatrick

Abstract

Thanks to a research grant from Innovation and Poverty Action (IPA), this dissertation conducted 340+ interviews in the commune of Dori in Northern Burkina Faso during the summer of 2019. The research evaluates the effectiveness of a local interfaith organization called Union Fraternelle des Croyants (UFC) in promoting inter-communal tolerance as a barrier to residents being recruited by violent extremist (VE) groups. UFC was created in the early 1970s to address the consequences of successive droughts that ravaged the Sahel region. As a rural development organization, UFC built dams and wells that improved residents' access to water and contributed to defusing conflicts that recurrently opposed farmers and cattle herders. In the aftermath of the 9/11 events, a “new” form of insecurity emerged in the region, one that is no longer caused by disadvantageous geography alone but mobilizes ideology and identity-related drivers. In that new security environment, UFC continues facilitating peace and stability by providing spiritual guidance and economic opportunity to disaffected residents who are otherwise vulnerable to VE ideological influence and recruitment strategies. This study combines two theoretical frameworks: the Intergroup Contact Model and the Economic Interest Model. It triangulates data collected through focus group discussions, in-depth interviews, and structured interviews. The study uses Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) statistical models to assess the effectiveness of UFC on its beneficiaries at the individual level. The research supplements the statistical findings with group-level analysis based on the contents of the in-depth interviews and focus group discussions. Four categories of residents were interviewed in Dori: (1) those who received no benefits from UFC; (2): those who benefited from poverty alleviation [PA] programs; (3): those who took part in religious guidance [RG] training, and finally (4): those who benefited from projects with both poverty alleviation and spiritual guidance components [PA&RG]. In partial contradiction to the central hypothesis of the dissertation –which associates UFC effectiveness with the combination of [PA&RG] programs—the OLS results indicate that at the individual level, only [RG] programs have positive and statistically significant effects on the beneficiaries’ behaviors. Among seven (7) indicators of tolerance identified locally, [RG] variables significantly increase the “number of visits/years” that recipients pay to outgroup friends, improve the “probability that beneficiaries will support random outgroup members in need or danger,” and raise the recipients’ overall “Integrated Tolerance Index” [ITI], ceteris paribus. On the contrary, and still, at the individual level, the OLS findings suggest that [PA] projects have either negative or statistically insignificant effects on the beneficiaries’ social behaviors justifiably because they incite win-or-lose competitions. The qualitative analysis widens the perspective of the above statistical assessment. It indicates that [PA] variables can also promote cohesion at the village level. Especially when they mobilize market-oriented activities that serve intercommunal interests through decreased search costs, improved market reach, increased bargaining powers, increased revenues, and improved access to services for all involved parties. Thus, at the group level, [PA&RG] combinations incite collaboration and facilitate participants’ identification with the values of tolerance and cohesion promoted by UFC. Building on these findings and the literature on the nexus between communal conflicts and VE, this dissertation argues that, by promoting tolerance among residents from different ethnoreligious backgrounds, UFC has been effective in reducing the ideological resonance of VE organizations, namely through processes of “bonding,” “bridging,” and “linking” that consolidate communal ties and undermine VE recruitment tactics. In neighboring communes where lack of cohesion affects intercommunal relations, VE organizations have been able to instrumentalize ethnicity and religion as divisive identity markers and to recruit new militants among the antagonized communities.

Comments

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AFP_SSPage.pdf (252 kB)

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