Somalia: New Networks of Power

The building of legitimate authority in Somalia is a hazardous task not only because of its’ warlord rivalry, lack of government infrastructure, authority and civil society, but also because of a low population density, and a fragile fluctuating social fabric. Due to a relatively low population density in Somalia it is expensive and more difficult to exert control over, and bond communities to one another, complicating the task of exerting a centralised authority over a diverse populous. This makes it increasingly hard to diminish the power of local elites and warlords that hold regional influence. A knock on effect of this is that peace building processes become more fragile, potential spoilers more numerous. It also increases the likelihood of peace processes further worsening a situation, potentially adding further complexities to already complex situations.

A further empirical problem faced in the establishment of a centralised government authority is due to its agricultural based economy, with livestock making up by far the largest export sector. Somalia’s agricultural based economy when combined with the nomadic nature of large swathes of its population makes it incredibly hard to implement legitimate taxation. Taxation of the commercial sector is equally difficult with petty traders and small businesses often oblivious to ideals of book keeping and accountancy. The problem of legitimate development in Somalia has been further complicated as wealth is often tied to regional power, similar to the colonial and Barre era where wealth was tied to political power. This led to a situation where the vastly wealthy often paid little or no taxes at all.

Jean-Francois Bayart claims that social divisions in African states are for more tangled and difficult to conceptualise through orthodox western notions upon the state and societal classes. He argues that the forming of hegemonic states in an African sense is radically different to the formation of state hegemony that was seen in Europe. In an African context, Bayart places the pursuit of state hegemony as being greatly influenced by ideology and ethnicity rather than territory or state based administration, as in Africa the state has been strongly acquainted with ideals of identity, inequality and inevitably separation. Due to the complex tangles of the Somali social structure between 1991 and 2006 where Somali has been without a centralised authoritive political power, there has been a great dependence upon the illegitimate use of force, largely reliant upon clan associations and economic divisions. It is through such nodes of authority that the power vacuum has been illegitimately filled in post 1991 Somalia, as outlined by political scientist Martin Doornbos, “state collapse is not the offspring of any state theory that promotes the total withering away of the state, but rather the pathological by-product of a combination of local and/or global political, social and economic development.” Somalia’s ethnic and cultural divisions also impact greatly upon Somalia’s social and political cohesion.

Ali Mazrui a leading Kenyan Scholar has argued that Western importation of political and social institutions during colonialism established narrow roots in African state infrastructure that have been continued through processes of globalisation. This has led to circumstance that allow violent sub-state groups to emerge with ease. Arguing that the neo-liberal agenda has led to an increase an outsourcing of the powers of weak, unconsolidated governments, leading some authors such as Bayart, Ellis, and Fibou to refer to the privatisation of the African state as the ‘criminalization of the African state’ for reasons Mazrui outlines, “in a technologically underdeveloped society in the twentieth century, ultimate power resides not with those who controlled the means of production (as postulated by Marx), but in those who controlled the means of destruction (captured by the soldier/ bandit with an AK-47)”

The weakening of state structures, social provisions, and the loss of economic controls due, to the deregulation of economic power away from the state can be linked to the empowerment of private groups in Somalia that filled the power vacuum left by the state. This was spurred on by Somalia’s quasi statehood during the Barre regime due to the reliance upon foreign aid and the ineffective building of political and social structures.

Informal Networks and Social Fragmentation

Academics and NGO’s have been fickle in their interpretation of informal economies over the past thirty years, switching between proclaiming it to be a viable exciting progressive system for growth for much of the developing world to condemning it for causing social and state breakdown in the global south. Over the last ten years informal economies have been interpreted negatively partly due to the illicit sale of gems and minerals through war economy networks. However, informal economics in Africa are so expansive and integral to the survival and daily routines for millions that it is far too large to be generalised. Furthermore, those processes that operate within it are integral to African cultural and social ideals of kinship, ethnic grouping and local elites outlining it as “essentially non-liberal in its structure and aims,” but still integral in upholding African social orthodoxy. When informal economies take the place of the formal economy due to the collapse of the state, empowers illegitimate networks of power.

The Somali state under Barre’s regime began to progressively deteriorate. During the 70s and 80s the shadow economy developed to provide the Somali people with services that the state did not. As the shadow economy expanded opportunities were created for a few Somali’s to generate large amounts of wealth, while many more became dependent upon it for survival. Elites involved in the Somali shadow economy generated wealth through the importing and exporting of goods so that there were few incentives for the elites involved to reform and clamp down on the shadow economy within Somalia.

It has been argued that political power and regional authority is proportionally linked to economic wealth and a monopolisation of authoritative violence in Somalia. The linking of personnel wealth with violence and authority is unrestrained by the state and civil society. However, due to conclusions being drawn between personalised profit and illegitimate networks of authority it is too simplistic to argue that the cause of conflict could be pinned down to a single variable such as wealth.

Underdevelopment, corruption and the weak legitimacy of many sub-Saharan African governments caused many African leaders to avoid the centralisation of the military and potentially powerful social structures due to the threat they would possess. However, such a strategy led by the Barre regime caused the creation of autonomous regional centres of power capable of dominating the use of violence within a given region. Such a fracturing of authority was also prevalent within the regime itself, leading to a situation where many of the warlords in Somalia once held high office in government. This allowed for them to develop important commercial connections through patronage networks because of their positions.

Position within government that originally enabled an accumulation of wealth also necessitated access to provisions beyond that of personalised economic relationships. Office within government also granted them access to other requirements for conflicts such as arsenal, armed youths and paramilitary units. Also the predominant position held by ex-regime elites and bureaucrats meant that they had been priory engaged with and able to exert influence over mass opposition movements that may have been more politicised and ideologically motivated than themselves but lacked capital and connections. A possible indication as to why many rebel groups across sub-Saharan Africa despite having an apparent ideological or political title do little to try and promote ground support or mass social movements through the promotion of an ideological plan at local levels. Cynics have argued this to be due to a lack of any true political will designed to benefit populations at large but rather and indicator of economic aims. Moreover, old regime elites operating through illegitimate networks of power often want attention turned away from real politics and any potential political misgivings they have been involved in.


Written by Lee Talyor


Links & Resourcs:

BBC - 'Somalia's Sudden Shift in Power'

Hii Dunia - Somalia: The Build up to Chaos - Parts 1 & 2