International records / OpenAlex research

Policing Nigeria: Control and Autonomy in the Exercise of Coercion

Claude Ake (1982: 8, 3), in his Presidential Address to the 1982 Convention of the Nigerian Political Science Association, criticized Nigerian society, politics, and state behavior in damning terms: A predatory capitalism has bred misery, turned politics into warfare and all but arrested the development of productive forces. The Nigerian ruling class has assaulted the masses with physical and psychological violence and thwarted their aspirations, particularly their escape from underdevelopment and poverty. Legitimacy has receded to the background, making way for relations of raw power and the …