Dimensions of Nigeria’s National Security and Development Challenges in Changing Global Contexts

Abstract

Abstract Effective organization of the security and welfare of society is the raison d’être of the modern state. It is the critical nexus of state–society relations, and the essence of national and human security in any social formation. In the manner in which it is composed and organized, the Nigerian state has not delivered on this mandate. Thus, it has created an enduring basis for insecurity, such as has manifested in different forms, as the country evolved from colonialism, through bouts of civil and martial rule, in the context of a monocultural economy of grossly limited productive capacity. The past twenty years of civil but limited democratic rule has not significantly enhanced the responsiveness of the Nigerian state to the aspirations of a preponderance of its society, especially the youths that constitute an overwhelming majority of the total population, yet grossly excluded from the nation’s economic and political processes. A re-casting of the governance structure is imperative to reposition and imbue the state with the capacity and commitment to deliver on critical social needs that can be the basis for national security.