Fostering National Integration in Nigeria: Exploring the Role of Political Science Education

Nigeria has been described by many scholars particularly, the demographers, sociologists and social studies educators as a country with more than three hundred and fifty (350) ethnic nationalities with diverse cultural, linguistic, religious orientations. This multiplicity or heterogeneous character of the Nigerian state tends to frustrate the various attempts at integrating these various entities that constitute the country. However, successive Nigerian regimes have strived to integrate their citizens through such schemes as National Youth Service Corps (NYSC), encouragement of inter-tribal marriages, institutionalization of lingua-franca, emplacement of Federal Character Commission, among others. Notwithstanding these giant strides, integration of various people of Nigeria has proven difficult and perhaps continues to remain a herculean task for the government. This paper, therefore, x-rays the probable nexus between political science education and national integration in Nigeria. It adopted a content-analysis as contained in the national dailies, textbooks, special reports and journal articles to review the extant but relevant literature and consequently, maintains that acquiring adequate knowledge of political science; a sub-field within the umbrella term of social sciences, can be used as a potent yet, veritable tool for national integration in Nigeria. It nevertheless recommends the need to make the subject matter of political science education a compulsion for all students of Nigerian schools, colleges, universities, among other recommendations.