Book Talk: Countering Violent Extremism in Kenya
– Community, State, and Security Perspectives-
Through extended ethnographic research and fieldwork collected from focus groups within Nairobi and Mombasa between 2016 and 2022, Githigaro offers an opportunity to observe the evolution of counterterrorism interventions in Kenya and the dilemmas this has created around primarily state-society relations, an exploration of how different stakeholders perceive the efficacy of counterterrorism measures, and the appraisal of counterterrorism initiative (CT) interventions that render ongoing CVE interventions less effective.
About the Author
Dr John Mwangi, PhD, is an academic with interests in Peace and Security Studies within the Eastern Africa region. He was previously a Lecturer in Peace and Conflict Studies at St. Paul’s University, Limuru, Kenya. He holds a PhD in International Relations from the United States International University (USIU-A), Nairobi, Kenya. He is a three times recipient of the Social Science Research Council (SSRC) New York, Next Generation in Social Sciences fellowships (2016-2019). Between March 2019- January 31, 2020 he was a Co- Investigator for a project funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (UK) through Changing the Story Project run by the University of Leeds, UK titled: Examining Interpretations of Civic National Values: Advancing Shared Communications Through the Voices and Actions of Children in Post-Conflict Settings (An intercontinental comparative project between UK, Kenya and Nepal. In 2021, he was an African Peacebuilding Network (APN) fellow, a program of the Social Science Research Council (SSRC), New York for a project titled: Reintegrating Returning Foreign Fighters: An Assessment of Peacebuilding Interventions in Kenya’s Mombasa County. In Autumn 2023, he was a visiting fellow at the Moscow State Institute for International Relations (MGIMO University), Moscow, Russia. Some of his outputs have been published in the Terrorism and Political Violence Journal, Critical Studies on Terrorism, the Journal of Third World Studies, African Conflict and Peacebuilding Review, Africa Insight, African Peace and Conflict Journal, and the Journal for Deradicalization. His most recent book is titled: Countering Violent Extremism in Kenya: Community, State, and Security Perspectives, Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2024.
