Yvan Guichaoua is Senior Lecturer at the Brussels School of International Studies. His work focuses on security dynamics in the Sahel.

His presentation will detail the findings of a recent report written with Ferdaous Bouhlel on civilian-jihadist interactions in Mali and Niger. The report essentially explores the non-military aspects of the jihadists’ conquest of social and economic spaces in the Sahel. It studies the conditions of formation of jihadist orders with changing characteristics according to the respective doctrines of jihadist groups, the behaviour adopted by civilians, or the counter-insurgency choices of state forces and their allies. The research not only characterises the type of ‘social contract’ offered to populations by jihadist movements, but also identifies the circumstances that make civilians vulnerable to violence by armed groups, whether state or non-state.

Read the report here https://kar.kent.ac.uk/100623/

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)