Conflict and war have long been accepted as significant constraints to development. In the past decade, however, violence in ‘non-conflict’ situations has been increasingly recognised as a core security and development priority. This issue is particularly critical in contexts of rapid social change, and often most evident in ‘failing’ or ‘crisis’ states. This working paper explores the relationship between change and violence, and seeks to identify the key cutting edge issues of rural-urban change, which are underlying causes or trigger factors of increasing violence and insecurity, or indeed consequences of the phenomenon itself.