Professor Abosede Omowumi Babatunde

I am a Professor of Peace and Conflict Studies. My work explores the intersection of extractive politics, environmental conflict and peacebuilding. My research straddles resource governance, conflict studies, indigenous conflict resolution, peacebuilding and development, human rights and security studies, and gender studies.

View a selection of my work (list already provided on Afox website)

I am a faculty member and Professor at the Centre for Peace and Strategic Studies, University of Ilorin, Nigeria. I have been awarded several distinguished academic fellowships including the African Humanities Postdoctoral Fellow (2010), American Council of Learned Societies and the Research Fellowship in Peace Studies (2013) at the Consortium for Peace Studies, Faculty of Social Work, University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada. In 2017/18, I was a Fellow of the Rachel Carson Centre for Environment and Society, Ludwig-Maximillian University, Munich, Germany. In 2017, I was also a Fellow Brown International Advanced Research Institute (BIARI). Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, United States. I was a Guest Researcher at the Nordic Africa Institute, Uppsala, Sweden in 2019. I was also a 2023 Landhaus fellow, at the Rachel Carson Centre for Environment and Society, Ludwig-Maximillian University, Munich, Germany. I am a 24 Visiting Research Fellow (Afox-Africa-Oxford Initiative) in the Merton College (Trinity Term), University of Oxford, United Kingdom.  I am a former member of the Governing Council of the International Peace Research Association (IPRA). I am also a member of various professional bodies, including the American Political Science Association, Environmental Peacebuilding Association (EnPAx) and the German Studies Association (GSA) Environmental Studies Network

My work has been supported by research grants from the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA); African Peacebuilding Network of the Social Science Research Council (APN/SSRC), the American Political Science Association (APSA) Centennial Foundation and the International Peace Research Association Foundation Grant. My collaborative book “Managing Violent Religious Extremism in Fragile States: Building Institutional Capacity in Nigeria and Kenya. Routledge.” Routledge African Governance Series” (recommended by CHOICE) has been awarded the 2023 IPSI Tana High Level Forum Book Launch award). https://www.routledge.com/Managing-Violent-Religious-Extremism-in-Fragile-States-Building-Institutional/Babatunde-Adedimeji-Raji-Maweu-Githigaro/p/book/9780367342395

Research

During my Fellowship at the Merton College, I will be working on my research project: “Petromodernity and Cultural Resilience: Oil Conflict, Indigenous Ritual Practices and Peacebuilding in Nigeria’s Niger Delta.” My research will explore how some extractive communities in Nigeria’s Niger Delta deploy their cultural belief systems in conceptualising their everyday environmental and socioeconomic realities while working toward resolving oil conflict. Drawing on my ethnographic fieldwork, this study will seek to explain how existing (so-called ‘traditional’) belief systems and cultural practices are being utilised to resolve conflict and build sustainable peace in relevant extractive communities.