This book assesses the effectiveness of Nigeria's counterterrorist policies against Boko Haram. It takes a critical review of the interventionist strategies adopted by the Nigerian government, highlights the motivations behind the choice of strategies, and proffers a deeper understanding of the factors responsible for the state's inability, thus far, to rid the country of terrorism. Specifically, it evaluates the NACTEST policy framework that guides the Nigerian state's counterterrorist strategies, which contains both hard and soft power approaches. Adopting historical and case study approaches which put the Nigerian state and occurrences of violent conflict in context, it takes cognizance of the politics of ethno-religious diversity which reinforce violent conflicts among groups and against the state, and reviews the socio-economic and political realities that led to the emergence and sustenance of Boko Haram. The volume concludes by suggesting practical policy options for combating Boko Haram and other similar armed insurrection. This book is appropriate for researchers and students interested in African politics, conflict, security, peace studies, terrorism, and counterterrorism, as well as policy makers and government departments dealing with terrorism and counterterrorism.

This study examines a particularly successful rural development program: the partnership of the Aga Khan Rural Support Program (AKRSP) and the small farmers of northern Pakistan. The Aga Khan Rural Support Program was established in 1982 to act as a catalyst for the development of rural people living in the high mountain valleys of the Himalayas, Karakorum, and Hindu Kush. The experiment is based upon the premise that rural people can improve their economic and social status through organization at the village level. This experiment in regional development--affecting the lives of nearly 500,000 people--has been outstandingly successful and should provide a model with generalizable lessons for policymakers, practitioners, and researchers in economic development. The World Bank has concluded that the Aga Khan Rural Support Program continues to be remarkably successful . . . [and] provides a hopeful prospect that rural development can be made to work. The authors demonstrate that the organizational model found in the AKRSP is sustainable provided prospective beneficiaries participate fully, and that the AKRSP experiment can be used successfully in other rural underdeveloped areas--that the rural poor can be organized to promote their own economic and social development.