Spaces of Conflict and Conflict of Spaces: Territory and Communal Conflicts in Jos, North Central Nigeria

Abstract

Communal violence, one of the deadliest forms of political violence in Africa, has characterised Jos and other central Nigerian cities since the 1990s. With origins in colonial land and administrative policies at the inception of the city, communal tensions rooted in local elite competition over ‘indigeneship’ and entitlement to political and government positions, access to higher education and land rights have manifested more forcefully in contemporary time claiming over 5,000 lives. This article focuses on the relationship between collective identity, struggle for space and collective violence. It explores persistent attachment to territory by urban communal groups and violent conflicts over those territorial stakes. It does so because emerging research has focused on land rights, neglecting how conflicts structure territory—the living space—and how territory, in turn, shapes conflict. Inspired by the motivation versus opportunity framework, it relies on focus groups, interviews, oral history, archival documents and secondary sources to generate data.