Paper short abstract:

Burkina, Mali and Niger have responded differently to their security crises, from near collapse to counterinsurgency. Why? We seek answers in their process of state formation, state-territory relations, and the connections between politics in the capital and in the rest of the country.

Paper long abstract:

Since the overthrow of Muammar Qaddafi in Libya in 2011, Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger have experienced an expanding security crisis. Each country has faced increasing threat from regionally based insurgent jihadist groups, which have pushed out of peripheral territories into more central, core areas. Despite these similarities, their responses have varied significantly. What accounts for this divergence? To answer this question, we probe into the foundations and political economies of these three states. After providing an analysis of their military, political, institutional and economic responses to the threat, we focus on their process of state formation (particularly on the nature of their implicit social contract), in the relations between the states and their territories (particularly in terms of revenues derived from natural resources), and in the manner in which politics in the capital amplifies or deflates politics in the rest of the country.