Mobility, Mobilization, and Counter/Insurgency

In Mobility, Mobilization, and Counter/Insurgency, Daniel Agbiboa takes African insurgencies back to their routes by providing a transdisciplinary perspective on the centrality of mobility to the strategies of insurgents, state security forces, and civilian populations caught in conflict. Drawing on one of the world’s deadliest insurgencies, the Boko Haram insurgency in northeast Nigeria and the Lake Chad region, this well-crafted and richly nuanced intervention offers fresh insights into how violent extremist organizations exploit forms of local immobility and border porosity to mobilize new recruits, how the state’s “war on terror” mobilizes against so-called subversive mobilities, and how civilian populations in transit are treated as could-be terrorists and subjected to extortion and state-sanctioned violence en route. The multiple and intersecting flows analyzed here upend Eurocentric representations of movement in Africa as one-sided, anarchic, and dangerous. Instead, this book underscores the contradictions of mobility in conflict zones as simultaneously a resource and a burden. Intellectually rigorous yet clear, engaging, and accessible, Mobility, Mobilization, and Counter/Insurgency is a seminal contribution that lays bare the neglected linkages between conflict and mobility.

Daniel E. Agbiboa is Assistant Professor of African and African American Studies at Harvard University.

Praise / Awards

• "By examining the concepts of corruption and insurgency through the tropes of mobility and transportation, the author charts a path less travelled by scholars working in these subject areas. . . make[s] a useful contribute to the discussions on corruption and security in Africa."
  —Theory, Culture & Society

• “This is a well-researched and provocative narrative. Dr. Agbiboa convincingly demonstrates how specific modalities of mobility and mobilization are closely entwined in the context of violent insurgency in Northeast Nigeria and the Lake Chad Basin. This book is a remarkably urgent, impressive and constructive contribution."

  —Professor Kenneth Omeje, Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia

• “This is the fruit of superior scholarship. Agbiboa has demonstrated an encyclopaedic knowledge of the subject matter and has deployed inter-disciplinary insights and approach to illuminate the discussion of an extra-ordinarily complex subject. Scholars on the subject will have Agbiboa to thank for a seminar book that is bound to dominate literature for quite some time to come.”

  —Professor Abiodun Alao, Professor of African Studies, King’s College London

• "Agbiboa's book convincingly bridges the gap between mobility and conflict studies and reveals how both the insurgents and the state instrumentalize mobility patterns to shape conflict. The study is a valuable addition to the burgeoning literature on the geography of conflicts in West Africa and a well-researched contribution to the spatiality of Boko Haram and its splinter group the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP)."
  —Space & Polity

• "The power of Agbiboa’s book lies in making a point and then offering us a glimpse into the truth of the opposite argument. ...a treasure trove for anyone interested in questions of mobility and conflict."
  —Perspectives on Politics
• "[Agbiboa] provides an interesting and novel examination of Boko Haram, in a way that other forms of analysis would miss. . . I would recommend this book to those who wish to look at insurgencies and conflict in a novel way."
  —Journal of Strategic Security
• "[Agbiboa] has written an exceptionally lucid book on the roots and routes of terrorism and counterterrorism that makes a seminal contribution to the fields of mobilities research, peace and conflict studies, political science, international relations, geography, and sociology."
  —Global Policy
• "[T]he sheer depth of his critical analysis and fieldwork make Daniel Agbiboa's study an invaluable addition to the current discourse on insurgency and counter-insurgency in Nigeria. It is must-reading for anyone interested in a shift in critical perspectives on Boko Haram's insurgency and the Nigerian government's response to it."
  —Michigan War Studies Review
   
• "The books considered in this review constitute invaluable material for those who are interested in the conversation among researchers from the global south. . . These dialogues are important and urgent to spread and enrich the production of knowledge."
  —Subjectivity
• "A perfect demonstration of how the “war on terror” is currently playing out in Africa’s Lake Chad Basin region. It sheds light on the implications of this phenomenon on the livelihoods of mobile subjects in this specific context, a new insight that should not be taken for granted."
  —E-International Relations
• Winner: International Studies Association (ISA) 2022 PEACE Best Global South Scholar Book Award
• Winner of the 2023 ISA Lee Ann Fujii Book Award