Jihad over Centuries (opens in new tab)

This paper investigates the origins of Islamist insurgencies as a form of cultural revival in West Africa. Exploiting variation in access to ancient water sources, which have largely disappeared, as an instrument, we show that the decline of trans-Saharan cities -- once-prosperous under pre-colonial Islamic states -- led to contemporary hotspots of Islamist violence. Contemporary violence is concentrated not where colonial resistance by Isla...