![\"boko\"](\"https:\/\/hcsblogdotorg.files.wordpress.com\/2016\/01\/boko.jpg?w=620\")
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By Peter Dorrie<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n With the exception of Syria, African countries currently get the worst rep when it comes to violence and conflict. Virtually every story coming out of the continent seems to showcase one atrocity or another.<\/p>\n This narrative is both true and false. In 2014, Africa experienced more than half of worldwide conflict incidents<\/a>, despite having only about 16 percent of the world population. This is a slightly larger share of the world\u2019s conflicts than even during the chaotic years of the post-Cold War 1990s.<\/p>\n But there are two important caveats. One, the absolute number of conflicts worldwide has greatly decreased<\/a> over the last two decades. So despite shouldering a larger share of the conflict burden, in absolute terms, Africa has become more peaceful<\/em> as well. And secondly, the remaining conflicts seem to cluster in specific regions and involve only a few of Africa\u2019s 54 nation-states.<\/p>\n According to the Uppsala Conflict Data Program<\/a>, 12 African countries experienced armed conflict in 2014. Three additional countries \u2014 Burundi, Niger and Chad \u2014 will likely be added to the list for the 2015 data.<\/p>\n Geographically Africa\u2019s conflicts are tightly clustered along\u00a0an\u00a0arc stretching from northern Mali through southern Algeria and Libya into Egypt, extending into the Sinai peninsula.<\/p>\n The Boko Haram conflict in northeastern Nigeria is another epicenter and situated in relative proximity to an area of\u00a0conflict hot spots in the Central African Republic, eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, Burundi, South Sudan and Darfur.<\/p>\n On Africa\u2019s eastern coast, the Somali civil war is still going strong in its third decade.<\/p>\n Modern conflicts in Africa are thus highly localized<\/em>, and they defy simplistic explanations based on stereotypes. That being said, these are our predictions for Africa\u2019s conflicts in 2016.<\/p>\n If you have not already watched it, Vice News has an excellent 30 minute Documentary on Boko Haram<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n
![According to the Uppsala Conflict Data Program<\/a>, 12 African countries experienced armed conflict in 2014. Three additional countries \u2014 Burundi, Niger and Chad \u2014 will likely be added to the list for the 2015 data.<\/p>\nGeographically Africa\u2019s conflicts are tightly clustered along\u00a0an\u00a0arc stretching from northern Mali through southern Algeria and Libya into Egypt, extending into the Sinai peninsula.<\/p>\nThe Boko Haram conflict in northeastern Nigeria is another epicenter and situated in relative proximity to an area of\u00a0conflict hot spots in the Central African Republic, eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, Burundi, South Sudan and Darfur.<\/p>\nOn Africa\u2019s eastern coast, the Somali civil war is still going strong in its third decade.<\/p>\nModern conflicts in Africa are thus highly localized<\/em>, and they defy simplistic explanations based on stereotypes. That being said, these are our predictions for Africa\u2019s conflicts in 2016.<\/p>\nIf you have not already watched it, Vice News has an excellent 30 minute Documentary on Boko Haram<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\nRead the Remainder at War is Boring<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Peter Dorrie With the exception of Syria, African countries currently get the worst rep when it comes to violence and conflict. Virtually every story coming out of the continent seems to showcase one atrocity or another. This narrative is both true and false. In 2014, Africa experienced more than half of worldwide conflict…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[2711,2280,1583,1704,74,2086,2004,475,2378,2417,2726,2933,1286,272,3321,1898],"tags":[3910,1115,1252,3911,1121,3912,3913],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10878"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10878"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10878\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10878"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10878"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10878"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}](\"http:\/\/www.pcr.uu.se\/digitalAssets\/66\/66314_1map14.png\"){kind=link}