Insurgency, State Legitimacy, and Community Relations in Yobe State

This study examines the relationship between the Boko Haram insurgency, state legitimacy, and community relations in Yobe State, investigating how prolonged armed conflict affects the social contract between the state and citizens in the North East geopolitical zone. The insurgency has fundamentally disrupted state-society relations in the Lake Chad Basin, with communities caught between the violence and governance claims of non-state armed groups and the counter-insurgency operations of Nigerian security forces. Using a qualitative research design, the study draws on in-depth interviews with community members in five local government areas of Yobe State, including internally displaced persons and residents of communities recently liberated from insurgent control, supplemented by interviews with state officials and humanitarian workers. The state legitimacy theory, the social contract framework, and the political sociology of insurgency are applied to interpret the findings. Results reveal that state legitimacy in Yobe State has been severely eroded, with communities reporting distrust of security forces arising from abuses committed during counter-insurgency operations alongside recognition that state institutions have failed to provide basic security, services, and justice for victims of insurgent violence. The study identifies a legitimacy vacuum in areas previously controlled by Boko Haram, which the state has been slow to fill with credible governance presence, creating conditions for continued insurgent influence. Community respondents express a conditional willingness to re-engage with state institutions contingent on visible improvements in justice accountability and service restoration. Recommendations include transitional justice processes, accelerated governance restoration in liberated areas, and accountability mechanisms for security force conduct. Keywords: insurgency, state legitimacy, Yobe State, community relations, Boko Haram