A combination of several factors such as bad governance and economic, social and environmental disparities has exacerbated the Sahel’s vulnerability in recent years. Moreover, the emergence of social and political unrest directly connected to the Arab Spring and the collapse of state power in Libya and Mali contributed to increasing these structural problems. In this volatile landscape, violent extremism, armed militancy or the proliferation of transnational drivers of crime have created the conditions for the expansion of new threats in the Sahel region and in its Euro-Mediterranean neighbourhood.

This Policy Brief was written in the framework of the EuroMeSCo Working Package “Sahel and Security in the Mediterranean”, led by Dr Dalia Ghanem-Yazbeck, Resident Scholar at the Carnegie Middle East Center in Beirut.