A Study of the Grounds of Formation and Growth of Islamic Radicalism in Nigeria: Case Study of Boko Haram

From nearly two decades ago the fundamentalist groups expanded their organized activities in the whole Africa continent and displayed a wave of Islamic radicalism in several African Countries. One of the recent groups that has been radicalized is Boko Haram in Nigeria. The article attempts to examine this group as a case study and evaluate the process of formation of Islamic radicalism in Nigeria. The paper takes the help of Alain Touraine’s theory of social movements to explain this question that, what are the factors that prepared the ground for the emergence and growth of Islamic radicalism in Nigeria? The underlying hypothesis of the paper is that internal variables like widespread poverty in Muslim inhabited areas as compared to Christian region, absence of effective participation in political arena, the existence of deep rooted ethnic conflicts, the feeling of losing identity in a secular government accompanied by external factor like the support of international terrorist groups have led to radicalization and resort to violence by Boko Haram. The finding of the study shows that for reducing human and financial losses of Boko Haram, alternative strategies to confrontation should be substituted so that the intensity of attack decreased and no new forces join them. Therefore, in the first step use of strategy of compromise and persuasion can be a suitable way for stopping Boko Haram attacks.