State Fragility and Service Delivery in North-East Nigeria: Evidence from Adamawa State

This study investigates the relationship between state fragility indicators and service delivery performance in Adamawa State, generating empirical evidence on how conflict-affected governance contexts shape citizen access to healthcare, education, and water services. State fragility research in sub-Saharan Africa has advanced considerably at the national level but has produced less insight into subnational fragility dynamics within single-country settings, representing a gap this research addresses. Using a multi-method design, the study constructs a subnational fragility index for Adamawa State's 21 local government areas by combining security incident data, governance capacity measures, and fiscal resource indicators. This index is then correlated with service delivery outcome data drawn from the National Bureau of Statistics' Multi-Indicator Cluster Survey and facility readiness assessments from the state health and education ministries. The state fragility theory and the governance-service delivery nexus literature are applied to interpret the findings. Results demonstrate that local government areas with higher fragility scores record markedly lower service delivery outcomes, with particularly sharp gradients in access to skilled birth attendance, functional primary school facilities, and piped water supply. The study also finds that fragility undermines service delivery through multiple pathways, including direct infrastructure destruction, displacement of service workers, and fiscal distress that disrupts routine maintenance and supply chains. The North East geopolitical zone context provides the critical backdrop for these findings. Recommendations include targeted service delivery resilience investments in high-fragility local government areas, community-managed service points for conflict-affected populations, and adaptive humanitarian-development programming. Keywords: state fragility, service delivery, Adamawa State, North East Nigeria, conflict-affected governance