Markus V . Hoehne

This report deals with the conditions and challenges for transitional justice in Somalia. It is based on a thorough lietrature research and the collection of primary (interview) data in Mogadishu, Kismayo, Baidoa, Galkayo, and Garowe. The analysis provides insights into the parameters and scope for TJ programming in Somalia and highlights the contradictions and challenges that any process will have to engage in

This is my full dissertation in social anthropology (in ENGLISH; it only has a German summary!) on dynamics of state and identity formation in northern Somalia - Somaliland and Puntland. It was concluded 2011. It consists of substantial chapters on "Identity and State", The Somali peninsula, its history and culture and society of Somalis, and, more recently, on rebuilding state structures and various political actors in the (geographical) north. Chapter 6 provides a very dense account of "Traditional Authorities in Processes of State and Identity Formation" and Chapter 7 outlines a quite personal story "Of Heroes and Killers: Violence, Trauma and Identity in Post-War Northern Somalia". Chapter 8 on "Guerrillas, Dervishes and the Queen: (Re-)Interpreting Somali History" follows the conflicting (collective) trauma narratives of people in the area.

Between Somaliland and Puntland analyses the political evolution of the Republic of Somaliland (created in 1991), and the federalist Puntland State of Somalia (established in 1998). Based on extensive ethnographic research, it describes the efforts by those living in between the two polities to create their own autonomously governed states. Markus Hoehne provides an account of the political history of the region, the actors, the grievances and the aspirations that lie behind their competing political visions. It is here, he argues, that “the future political order of the Somali states will take shape”.

The principal part of the study (written in German) deals with the different strategies, which restrain violence and enhance a peaceful social order. External political interventions at international Levels, under the auspices of the UN and the USA, proved to be unsuccessful. Even the measures undertaken by the Life and Peace Institute on behalf of civilian Organizations and in co-operation with the UN ultimately failed owing to insufficient efforts to adapt the projects to local conditions and considerations. However, a close examination of developments within the local and regional context and unrelated to the international interventions shows that peace-promoting policies can be successful if local realities are taken as starting point and the responsibility for curtailing violence and maintaining peace is primarily left to the persons directly affected. This means, however, in the case of Somalia that the priority is not likely to be the reconstruction of a unitary state system within the borders of the former Republic of Somalia. Somaliland in the north is a prime example of successful bottom-up peace building and state formation without much external help. In this context, Somali traditions of conflict settlement were used by local actors with great success.

State borders are more than barriers. They structure social, economic and political spaces and as such provide opportunities as well as obstacles for the communities straddling both sides of the border. This book deals with the conduits and opportunities of state borders in the Horn of Africa, and investigates how the people living there exploit state borders through various strategies.
Using a micro level perspective, the case studies, which include the Horn and Eastern Africa, particularly the borders of Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Sudan, Somalia, Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania, focus on opportunities, highlight the agency of the borderlanders, and acknowledge the permeability but consequentiality of the borders.

This volume offers a comprehensive overview of scholarship on Somalia and Somaliland, one that transcends the usual boundaries and presents readers with a timely, incisive and compelling introduction to Somali culture, history and politics. Topics covered include: history including the impact of the different colonial powers (Britain and Italy); the Somali poetic heritage and its relation to politics; the variations within Somali culture between northern/pastoral and southern/agro-pastoral populations; the question of the significance of clanship, including its relation to livestock trading networks, and the Somali 'total genealogy' and its origin; the political future since the breakdown of the centralised state; and, the role of the Somali Diaspora. There are chapters on the 'spirit possession cults', and on the Somali language, names and kinship terms. An introduction describes I.M. Lewis' career and discusses the legacy of over fifty years of his scholarship, assessing its impact on Somali society's view of itself and that of the wider academic and policy communities.

There is not just one reason for the conflict. Rather, a combination of factors has led to the armed uprising in Lasanod that started at the end of December 2022 and is still continuing at the time of writing (June 2023). It is very likely, indeed, that very serious military clashes between the Somaliland army (which is strongly backed by members of the Isaaq clan family and hardly includes any members of the Dhulbahante and Warsangeli clans anymore) and Harti forces (which is a clan coalition including fighters from the Dhulbahante, Warsangeli, Majeerteen and other clans) will take place in the near future. This report will first outline the long-term and structural factors involved in the conflict. It then covers some immediate factors that led to the armed uprising in Lasanod. In addition, the report discusses three turning points that, together with the long-term and immediate factors, led to the current war over Lasanod beginning on 6 February. The penultimate section of the report gives an overview over the current (February-May) situation including mediation efforts. At the end, the report outlines three scenarios for the near future (i.e. the coming months) and discusses the prospects for settling the conflict through political means, which is likely to take longer.

The announcement by the zoo in Augsburg Germany that it was hosting an “African Village” set off a wave of controversy that received widespread media coverage. A global protest developed, fueled by the rapidity of e-mail communication, with concern voiced by African-German organizations, rights organizations, academic associations, a Nobel Prize winner, and concerned individuals from many countries. This report is based on attendance at the four day event, the “African Village” in the zoo from 9 June to 12 June 2005 and interviews with the various participants. Our findings are as follows: (1) The event was not a village displaying people but a market in the zoo augmented by African singing, drumming, and “oriental” belly dancing. (2) The event was organized primarily to earn revenue for the zoo, the promotion company, and the exhibitors and performers. (3) The event organizers linked the zoo and Africans in an endeavor to attract visitors by an “exotic” event; they perceived the zoo with its “African panorama” as a perfect environment for an African fair. (4) Solidarity with African people and mutual understanding were not primary aims of the event. (5) After visiting the zoo, visitors frequently linked Africa, Africans, wild animals and nature. (6) Organizers and visitors were not racist but they participated in and reflected a process that has been called racialization: the daily and often taken-for-granted means by which humans are separated into supposedly biologically based and unequal categories. (7) The questions raised by protestors about the “African Village” in the zoo took the defenders of the event by surprise; the defenders equated racism with the atrocities of Nazism and attacks on Jews, Sinti and Roma and did not reflect critically on problems dating from German colonialism. (8) Images dating from those times contribute to contemporary exoticizing, eroticizing, or stereotyping of Africans and are sometimes promoted as multiculturalism. (9) Against this background the Augsburg zoo was an inappropriate setting to hold a market of African crafts together with forms of “traditional” African cultural performance. (10) The African exhibitors and performers bore the greatest financial risk and some felt exploited by the particular circumstances of the event; however in a situation of high unemployment and unequal power, they rely on the marketing of cultural difference. (11) The promotion of zoos through special events relating African culture, people and animals is not a phenomena limited to Augsburg or Germany; it is found also in other European and US zoos. (12) In the current global economy when marketing of difference is big business and when educational institutions such as zoos need to generate more revenues, there are incentives toward racialization. (13) The racialization processes facilitated by the Augsburg zoo and other zoos are not benign because they can lay the ground work for discrimination, barriers to social mobility, persecution, and repression. 2

In Dec. 2022 and Jan. 2023, a longstanding conflict in Lasanod, a city in northern Somalia, escalated. City dwellers forced the troops of Somaliland, a secessionist de facto state in northwestern Somalia, out of the city. They demand their own administration that shall come under the central government in Somalia. In early February 2023, fighting started. Armed locals fight the Somaliland army. How this conflict came about and what it's implications are beyond the local setting is explained in this article.

This is an interview conducted with Günther Schlee, former director of the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology in halle (Saale), Germany (1999-2019), a well-known German social anthropologist who had conducted intense field research among pastoral nomadic groups in Northeast Africa (e.g., among Rendille), and who has contributed substantially on the anthropology of of pastoral nomadims, conflict, ethnicity and identification dynamics (also globally).

More than a million Somalis live outside Somalia, either in refugee camps or in the diaspora, near and far. The war has also led to social fragmentation along lines that previously have been either suppressed or not recognized, and so in addition to issues of lineage and territory, Somalis define their status in terms of ‘race’, minority, political and religious orientation, generation and gender.

Segmentary lineage theory, as developed by Evans-Pritchard in his famous account of the Nuer (1940), was soon criricized and refused as a ‘folk model’, which was not in accordance with what was really happening on the ground.  In this chapter, I seek to distinguish between segmentary lineage theory and segmentary lineage systems as a model. I argue that whereas the former has rightly been criticized, the latter is still valid as a heuristic device. It can help observers (and is indeed also used by some locals) to understand options and variations of behaviour related to kinship structures in dynamic social situations. My ethnography from northern Somalia  shows that while in everyday life, unilineal descent is only one factor among many, in situations of escalating conflict, complex and highly flexible social formations can be transformed into rather rigid patrilineal formations

This chapter outlines the case of Somaliland as a successful de facto state that has a very complicated relationship with it’s (ex-)parent-state, Somalia. It first, provides the historical background for Somaliland’s emergence in the late 1980s and early 1990s, followed by an outline of local efforts to create peace and establish a hybrid political order throughout the first decade of its existence. Finally, the chapter focusses on political reforms that have taken place from the early 2000s onward. It argues that local and transnational elites but also ordinary Somalilanders use their experiences with peacebuilding and democratization to strengthen Somaliland’s claim to recognition, but so far in vain. Somaliland remains at the margins of international politics, despite it’s remarkable political and other achievements.

The Somali Dervish ‘state’ was related to the Dervish uprising, that shook the British Protectorate and other parts of northern and also partly southern Somalia between 1899 and 1920. A ‘state’ implies a minimum of centralised and institutionalised power (i.e., a government), a territory and a population. The Somali Dervish state indeed featured a clear centralised governance structure, with Sayid Mohamed Abdille Hassan on top. The Sayid (which is an honorary title; the British called him ‘Mad Mullah’) was surrounded by a group of trusted commanders and advisors who were members of the Dervish council (in Somali called khusuusi). Together, the Sayid and the council controlled the military units. Islamic judges had the task of upholding law and order among the Dervishes and their kin. But clearly, Mohamed Abdille Hassan had the power to take the final decision in all matters he deemed important. The Somali Dervish state never had a clearly demarcated territory. The Dervishes operated...

State borders in Africa usually are perceived as artificial colonial constructs that divide and constrain people, and frequently are the cause for political tensions and even violent conflict. Any “positive” aspect of state borders in the literature usually refers to the various creative strategies of locals who circumvent borders and make a living in the borderlands through smuggling and other kinds of “illegal” and illicit activities. Where borderlands are politically and militarily contested zones researchers frequently stress their “subversive” qualities as areas of resistance and opposition. This paper adds to the analysis of borders and borderlands by turning the usual focus on borderlands as marginal spaces and borders as constraints upside down. In our view, borders and borderlands are centers since it is here that various economic and political resources are on offer. Our regional focus is on borders in Africa, which frequently are divisive and permeable at the same time. They separate different state systems. Exactly this separation, together with the fact that borders in Africa frequently lack administration and that social networks cross-cut them provide opportunities for smuggling, guerrilla politics, switching of identities, political alliances, and making use of different institutional set-ups on the different sides of the border. Based on literature review and ethnographic examples from the Horn of Africa the paper also shows how state-building processes are shaped and transformed by the borderland communities.

This article focusses on the 'shadows of war' (Nordstrom 2004), that is, the long­ term effects of the violence people experienced at the individual level, which often go unrecognised by those observers who are only looking at the 'big politics' of war and peace. The driving questions are: How does the life of those Somali women look, who experienced sexual or other forms of violence? What happened to all the Somali men who were socialised with brutal violence (as active guerrilla fighters or otherwise)?

In this chapter we are dealing with the dialectical relationship between bones as the material imbued with a certain ‘ontological’ force and the need to construct their relevance in particular normative spaces. Related theoretical considerations provide the framework for our case study in Somaliland on the forensic anthropological work, which also includes a fieldschool organized by the Peruvian NGO Equipo Peruano de Antropología Forense (EPAF).

Somaliland’s secession from Somalia did not follow careful cost- benefit calculations. It also did not involve the bargaining of a minority with a majority in power or a center. Nor did it cut-out a resource-rich region from the rest of Somalia. Nonetheless today (2018), after more than two decades without recognition, but continued (precarious) existence as a de facto state, Somaliland can be seen as one of the rare successful cases of secession in Africa. This chapter analyzes the factors influencing this ongoing process.

In November 2017, a presidential election was held in Somaliland. This report focuses on the technical and political aspects of the most recent voters-registration and the election. For the first time in Somaliland’s history (and even world-wide), biometric technology in the form of iris scanners was used to diminish multiple voting. The use of this technology was successful, in the eyes of many, despite the fact that problems are remaining. This report also looks at the immediate aftermaths of the election. The result of the election was contested, which led to tensions and some violent confrontations between the supporters of the main opposition party that had lost and the government forces. Yet, calm returned to Somaliland in late November, two weeks after the election, and anew government was formed in December. The report concludes by outlining the main political and economic challenges currently existing in Somaliland.

This chapter argues that Somaliland does not feature one Hybrid Political Order (HPO), as is often mentioned in the literature, but at least two HPOs within the borders of the state territory claimed by its government in Hargeysa. At a generic level, the focus is on dynamics and degrees of HPOs.

The notion of territoriality has changed in the Somali setting. Once it con-noted flexibility and was mainly related to economic survival in a harsh environment; today (2016), after more than two decades of civil war, insecurity and foreign intervention, this notion is more rigid and exclusive. Clearly demarcated territory, inhabited by one group or at least under the control of a dominant group, has become a key political resource in an ongoing process of state formation. This article shows that territorialization in Somalia constitutes a complex mixture of bottom-up and externally driven dynamics. It also shows that new forms of territoriality accompany new forms of social-ity in the Somali setting. This is illustrated with regard to the diminishing relevance of cross-cutting ties among Somali descent groups.

Link to this article: http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S1744552316000136 How to cite this article: Markus Virgil Hoehne (2016). The strategic use of epistemological positions in a power-laden arena: anthropological expertise in asylum cases in the UK. Abstract This paper deals with social anthropologists serving as expert witnesses in asylum proceedings in the UK. It argues that it is not a fundamental epistemological divide, but rather massive power differentials that characterise the relationship between social anthropologists and legal practitioners in this context. Within a narrow framework provided by the law, which focuses on 'true facts' and 'objective evidence', social anthropologists have to position themselves, and they often must do so somewhere along a spectrum from positivist to post-positivist positions (regarding, for example, such concepts as 'culture' and 'identity'). This, as well as their subordinate position in the context of the proceedings, sits uneasily with the professional, moral and ethical standards of their discipline. Engagement as an expert, therefore, comes with certain costs for social anthropologists that range from having to bend one's own epistemological perspective to the risk of being 'demolished' as an expert (and beyond) in sometimes implicitly politicised asylum decisions.

The announcement by the zoo in Augsburg Germany that it was hosting an “African Village” set off a wave of controversy that received widespread media coverage. A global protest developed, fueled by the rapidity of e-mail communication, with concern voiced by African-German organizations, rights organizations, academic associations, a Nobel Prize winner, and concerned individuals from many countries. This report is based on attendance at the four day event, the “African Village” in the zoo from 9 June to 12 June 2005 and interviews with the various participants.

Somali society has long since been considered ethnically homogenous. The better known pastoral-nomadic section of society was perceived as representative. Politics and economy
throughout the twentieth century were controlled by majority’ clan members. ‘Minority group’ members were generally marginalized and sometimes even oppressed and
exploited; during the civil war from 1991 onwards, they became easy victims for majority group militias. Previously respected religious or occupational ‘castes’ also fell victim to
the general insecurity and lawlessness during that period. The civil war not only had enormous negative consequences for minority group members; in some cases, it increased
the self-consciousness of minority groups and led to the formation of new identities that, in combination with international organizations and their human rights policies, provided members of certain groups with chances for resettlement or made them actively demand more rights.

This chapter looks at investments of the diaspora in the economic and the educational sector in Somaliland. It introduces two sets of case studies. On the economic side, it first highlights the case of two hotels, the Maansoor Hotel and the Ambassador Hotel, both of which constituted major economic investments by diasporic actors in Somaliland. Beyond the immediate investments, these two case studies clearly show the larger structural impact of trusting private (diaspora) capital in a fragile post-conflict setting. On the side of education, we focus on the rebuilding of the educational sector from scratch after years of civil war and the complete destruction of the educational infrastructure. The case studies of two privately founded universities, the International Horn University (IHU) in Hargeysa and Nugaal University in Lasanod (located in the eastern periphery of Somaliland), illustrate the visions of the diaspora actors, who were leadingly involved, and the implementation of these visions with regard to peace and development in their home communities.

The conflict around Galgala, a small town in the Golis Mountains west of Bosaso in northern Somalia, poses the government of Puntland against clan militias and militant Islamists. The conflict was originally over natural resources, but soon turned into a conflict related to the ‘global war on terrorism’. It is additionally complicated due to its location in the contested borderlands between Somaliland and Puntland. The article analyses the effects of these dynamics on the local population and, more
generally, on stability and peace in the region. It argues that sustainable solutions to the ongoing conflict can only be found if one takes into account the legitimate claims of the Warsangeli, the clan to which the local mountain dwellers belong, regarding
the protection of their land and their resources. The anti-terrorism discourse that is currently foregrounded, mainly by the government of Puntland and its allies including the USA, is likely to inhibit the understanding of issues at stake.

Somali society can be characterized as patriarchal ‘to the bone’. Despite tremendous political and economic changes in the 20th century, and from colonial to post-colonial rule, the situation of women changed only minimally. In fact, some authors argue that women enjoyed even less independence from male ‘wards’ during the democratic and later revolutionary governments from 1960 to 1991 that were promulgating modernization and gender equality, at least rhetorically. Paradoxically, the most substantial changes regarding gender relations that led to a considerable empowerment of women in the social, economic and political sphere were triggered by the tragedy of civil war and state collapse. Women had to bear the brunt of the fighting. But they also became actively involved in armed conflict as combatants, motivators of their men and also as peace-makers. Women also took over more economic responsibilities and fought their way into politics. This article traces the challenges and opportunities that the civil war and the collapse of the state provided for women, arguing that the Somali tragedy provided a blessing in disguise at least for some women who gained social, economic and political power. Still, what we are observing is not a revolution but at best an incidental ‘reform’. If this will eventually lead to more just gender relations in the long run remains to be seen.

Hybrid political orders are in the literature discussed as a heuristic tool to understand how power and legitimacy are negotiated in settings where the Western model of the liberal democratic state does not work. Sometimes they are presented as an alternative model for successful statehood, e.g., by combining ‘traditional’ and ‘modern’ political institutions. The Republic of Somaliland is frequently presented as functioning hybrid political order. A cornerstone for Somaliland’s success was the integration of traditional authorities in government. These authorities engaged in peace-building and state formation in the early 1990s. Their role was institutionalized in the ‘House of Elders’, the upper house of parliament. This article argues that the hybrid political order of Somaliland has outlived its success. What is left at the beginning of the 21st century is an imbalanced and in many regards ‘crippled’ hybrid. It threatens democratic progress and undermines the authority and legitimacy of the state institutions as well as the leading traditional authorities in the region. These developments in Somaliland show the limits of hybrid political systems in general.

Dieser Artikel leistet einen Überblick über wichtige Institutionen und Akteure, die in verschiedenen Teilen Somalias gleichzeitig oder zu verschiedenen Zeiten herrschend, regelnd und ordnend aktiv sind/waren. Dazu gehören traditionelle Autoritäten, Schari’a-Gerichtshöfe, Kriegsherren, Geschäftsmänner/-frauen, lokale NGOs, islamistische Milizen und Diasporagruppen. Das zentrale Argument ist, dass Staatslosigkeit nicht gleich Herrschaftslosigkeit und „Anarchie“ bedeutet. In Abwesenheit funktionierender staatlicher Institutionen können alternative politische Ordnungen entstehen, die durchaus ein hohes Maß an Legitimität in den Augen der betroffenen (lokalen und transntaionalen) Bevölkerung genießen können. Die seit 1991 durchgeführten externen Interventionen einzelner Staaten oder von Staatengruppen bzw. der internationalen Staatengemeinschaft mit dem Ziel, zentralstaatliche Strukturen in Somalia wieder aufzubauen, waren dagegen meist kontraproduktiv. Gerade weil sie, mit Ausnahme der Kriegsherren, die Kräfte jenseits des Staates ignorierten bzw. bekämpften, trugen externe Interventionen eher zur Perpetuierung des Staatszerfalls bei als zu seiner Beendigung. Im Umkehrschluss verdeutlichen die Entwicklungen in Somaliland und Puntland, dass stabile Formen politischer Ordnung im somalischen Kontext jenseits externer Interventionen entstehen können.

Somalia has been without effective state institutions since 1991. Over the past two decades, moderately effective state-like institutions have been rebuilt in Somaliland and Puntland in northern Somalia, but they do not enjoy international recognition and are limited in power and scope. This text concentrates on the integration of non-state actors, particularly traditional authorities, during the process of state-formation in Somaliland. Arguably, this integration has brought about a hybrid political system that functioned quite well during the first years of existence of Somaliland. Hybrid political systems are currently of great interest in various African settings, including the possibility of integrating traditional authorities into (local) government in South Sudan. These systems, however, mix modes of legitimacy of different political actors in a way that, in the long run, either undermines the democratic capabilities of modern states or seriously damages the credibility and effectiveness of traditional authorities. Thus, hybrid political systems may be a way to stabilize politics in a transitory phase (e.g., after civil war or independence) but they are not the easy way out of the dilemma that state institutions in many African states are weak, have only a very limited outreach and in many regards lack popular legitimacy.

This article outlines the process of (re-)constructing the educational sector up to the tertiary level in Somaliland, a secessionist republic in north-western Somalia.  It argues that during the ongoing second phase of sustainable peacebuilding in Somaliland since 1997 rebuilding education was an essential factor for stabilising the post-conflict society, particularly through providing the younger generation with chances for a peaceful and economically promising future. Particularly members of the Somali diaspora, besides some international organisations and local educationists were the main actors involved in this process. Their engagement was crowned by success in many regards. After having been in ruins in 1990, the educational sector in Somaliland is flourishing twenty years later. In the whole country, which otherwise is in great economic and political difficulty, exist hundreds of schools and almost a dozen universities. However, interviews with students and university staff during field research in 2008 and 2009 suggest that unemployment is a great burden for all graduates (and the wider society) and threatens to undo the positive effects, which the rebuilding of the educational sector had until circa 2005. Many students consider currently to leave school or university and to ‘try their luck’ by migrating abroad.  Most aim at reaching the west. The journey is expansive and very risky. Regularly, Somali migrants and refugees die on the way. In 2008, the death of around 150 graduates from Amuud University in western Somaliland who drowned when their boat turned over in the Mediterranean Sea shocked people in Somaliland and beyond.

This article presents the de facto state formation of the Republic of Somaliland in
the Horn of Africa that seceded from collapsing Somalia in May 1991, but still lacks
international recognition. It highlights the relationship between everyday practices
and decisions of local politicians, traditional authorities, members of the diaspora
and ordinary people with their often unforeseeable consequences, to the ongoing
state formation. It argues that Somaliland’s formation is also shaped by ‘external’
factors such as the state failure and warring in Somalia, and the conflict with Puntland,
a ‘counter-polity’ to Somaliland established in north-eastern Somalia in 1998. The
case of Somaliland provides a good example for the complexities of processes of
state formation in general. Its development from a war-torn polity into a viable state,
albeit without international recognition, defies any teleological concepts of linear
state formation or top-down approaches to state (re-)construction.

This article discusses the role of newspapers in the ongoing democratisation process in Somaliland. It shows that, embedded in Somali culture and the recent history of the region, freedom of speech in Hargeysa, the capital of Somaliland, is cultivated by and in print media established after
the civil war. Several debates in the newspapers which have centred on sensitive political issues are used to exemplify this point. In some regards, the newspapers continue the legacy of the civil war. Most newspaper owners and journalists participated actively in the guerrilla struggle against
the dictatorial regime of Mahamed Siyad Barre. The result of the struggle was secession from Somalia and the independence of Somaliland as a de facto state. The country, however, does not enjoy international recognition, and not all inhabitants support its independence. Against this background
the newspapers are actively involved in a ‘nation-building’ struggle that marginalises a significant part of the population and harbours the potential for renewed civil war in the region.

In this article, mimesis and mimicry are used as analytical concepts to explore dynamics of state and identity formation in Somaliland and Puntland since the early 1990s. Mimesis captures endeavours to imitate well-established models of social and political organisation. Mimicry involves the deceptive imitation of such models in order to reach a certain aim. In the particular setting of northern Somalia, miming and mimicking in state and identity formation are also related to conflict escalation. The paper first presents relevant political and legal positions on state collapse and secession. This helps to grasp the theoretical and policy implications of the empirical material. Subsequently, the establishment of Somaliland and Puntland through mimesis and mimicry is sketched. The outline of the repeated military confrontations between both sides, particularly the last round of fighting in and around the town of Laascaanood in late 2007, indicates the relation of state and identity formation to military conflict. These localised dynamics are embedded into the continuing conflict in southern Somalia that involves a number of internal and external actors. The article concludes that miming and mimicking underlie many of Somaliland’s and Puntland’s internal developments and their conflictive relationship. Moreover, since the conflict in northern Somalia concerns state formation, it might have far-reaching consequences for the future of Somalia as a whole. This finally leads to the suggestion that the international norms regarding state-collapse and secession have to be re-evaluated in light of the empirical realities at hand.

Harun Maruf and Dan Joseph provide an insightful account of Al-
Shabaab, the extremist organisation fighting in Somalia and conducting
terror attacks both there and beyond, in the Horn of Africa. The authors
embed the group’s history into the larger one of political Islam in Somalia
and beyond. They also clearly show Al-Shabaab’s relevance within the
global jihadist scene.