Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

War and Peace in Somalia

  • Living reference work entry
  • First Online:
The Palgrave Encyclopedia of Peace and Conflict Studies

Synonyms

Civil war; Conflict resolution; Counterterrorism; Organized crime; Peacebuilding; Traditional peace approaches; Transformation of conflict; Violence; Xeer

Definition/Description

This chapter examines how and why peace has remained elusive in the Somali crisis following the events that marked the collapse of Siad Barre’s regime in 1991. Although several studies have been undertaken on this case and a number of recommendations suggested, limited attention has been placed on the transformation of the conflict and the need to modify some of the peacebuilding strategies to cope with the changes. This study discusses how the conflict in Somalia has evolved, weaknesses in the previous peace efforts, and provides recommendations. It looks at the traditional Xeer practices in Somalia and its relevance in solving contemporary conflict.

Introduction

In 1960, Somalia (Jamhuuriyadda Soomaaliyeed) joined the category of the first African countries to gain independence following the...

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution

Institutional subscriptions

References

  • Abdile, M. (2012). Customary dispute resolution in Somalia. African Conflict and Peace building Review, 2(1), 87–110.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Adam, H. M. (2008). From tyranny to anarchy: The Somali experience. Trenton, NJ: Red Sea Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Aden, A. M. (2011). Xeer: Traditional Mediation in Somalia. Boston MA: University of Massachusetts Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Avruch, K. (1998). Culture and Conflict Resolution. Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Barnes, C., & Hassan, H. (2007). The rise and fall of Mogadishu’s Islamic courts. Journal of Eastern African Studies, 1(2), 151–160.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bowd, R., & Chikwanha, A. B. (2010). Understanding Africa’s contemporary conflicts: Origins, challenges and peacebuilding. Institute for Security Studies Monographs, 2010(173), 281.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bradbury, M. (1999). The Somali conflict: Prospects for peace. Oxford England: Oxfam.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brock-Utne, B. (2001). Indigenous conflict resolution in Africa. In A draft presented to a weekend seminar on indigenous solutions to conflicts held at the University of Oslo, Institute of Educational Research (pp. 23–24).

    Google Scholar 

  • Brown, M. E. (2001). Ethnic and Internal Conflict: Causes and Implications. In: Crocker, C.A., Hampson, F.O. & Aall, P. (eds). Turbulent Peace: The Challenges of Managing International Conflict. Washington, D.C: United States Institute of Peace Press, pp. 209–226.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bryden, M. (2013). Somalia redux?: Assessing the new Somali federal government. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.

    Google Scholar 

  • Clark, J. (1992). The debacle in Somalia. Foreign Affairs, 72, 109.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cornwell, R. (2006). Somalia: Distorting reality? African Security Studies, 15(2), 75–78.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dagne, T. (2009). Somalia: Prospects for lasting peace. Mediterranean Quarterly, 20(2), 95–112.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dersso, S. (2009). The Somalia Conflict – Implications for peacemaking and peacekeeping efforts, ISS Paper 198. Pretoria: Institute for Security Studies

    Google Scholar 

  • Deutsch, M., Coleman, P. T., & Marcus, E. C. (Eds.). (2011). The handbook of conflict resolution: Theory and practice. Wiley.

    Google Scholar 

  • Doornbos, M. & Markakis J. (1994). Society and State in Crisis: What Went Wrong in Somalia? Review of African Political Economy, 21, (59) (1), 82–88.

    Google Scholar 

  • Elmi, A. A. and Barise, A. (2006). The Somali Conflict: Root causes, obstacles, and peace-building strategies. African Security Studies, 15(1), 32–54.

    Google Scholar 

  • Farah, A. Y., & Lewis, I. M. (1997). Making peace in Somaliland. Cahiers d’études africaines, XXXVII (2): 349–377.

    Google Scholar 

  • Floudiotis, A. (2010). “Al-Shabaab: Troubling Youth”, News Blaze, 14 May. [online] http://newsblaze.com/story/20100514130442iiis.nb/topstory.html

  • Fox, M. J. (1999). Somalia divided: The African Cerberus (considerations on political culture). Civil Wars, 2(1), 1–34.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ghalib, J. M. (1995). The cost of dictatorship: The Somali experience. L. Barber Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Greenfield, R. (1987). An Embattled Barre. Africa Report, 32(3), 65.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gundel, J. (2009). Clans in Somalia. Austrian Red Cross, Vienna. http://www.ecoi.net/file_upload/90_1261130976_accord-report-clans-in-somalia-revised-edition-20091215. pdf. Accessed 18 Mar 2019.

  • Hesse, B. J. (2010). Introduction: The myth of ‘Somalia’. Journal of Contemporary African Studies, 28(3), 247–259.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hofmann, S. (2002). The divergent paths of Somalia and Somaliland: The effects of centralization on indigenous institutions of self-governance and post-collapse reconciliation and state-building. In Institutional analysis and development mini-conference on April (pp. 27–29).

    Google Scholar 

  • Holt, J. L., & DeVore, C. J. (2005). Culture, gender, organizational role, and stylthe es of conflict resolution: A meta-analysis. International Journal of Intercultural Relations, 29(2), 165–196.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ICG (International Crisis Group) (2008). Somalia: To Move Beyond the Failed State. Africa Report No. 147, 23 December 2008. [online] Available: http://www.crisisgroup.org/en/regions/africa/horn-of-africa/somalia/147-somalia-to-movebeyond-the-failed-state.aspx (7 January 2020).

  • Ingiriis, M. H. (2016). The suicidal state in Somalia: The rise and fall of the Siad Barre regime, 1969–1991. Lanham, MD: University Press of America.

    Google Scholar 

  • Jama, F. (2010). “Somali Women and Peace-Building.” In Bradbury, and D. Healy (eds) Whose Peace Is It Anyway? Connecting Somali and International Peacemaking, 62–65. London: Conciliation Resources.

    Google Scholar 

  • Knight, W. A. (1998). Establishing political authority in peace-maintenance. Global Governance, 4, 19.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kuperman A. (2015). Constitutions and conflict Management in Africa: Preventing civil war through institutional design. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kusow, A. M., & Mohamud, A. S. (2006). Why Somalia continues to remain a failed state. African Renaissance, 3(5), 13–23.

    Google Scholar 

  • Leeson, P. T. (2007). Better off stateless: Somalia before and after government collapse. Journal of Comparative Economics, 35(4), 689–710.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lewis, I. M. (2005). A modern history of the Somali: Nation and state in the Horn of Africa. Oxford: James Currey.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lewis, I. M. (2008). Understanding Somalia and Somaliland – Culture, history, society. London: Hurst Publishers Ltd.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lewis, I. M. (1999). A Pastoral Democracy: a study of pastoralism and politics among the northern Somali of the Horn of Africa. Oxford: James Currey Publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lewis, I. M. (2010). Making and breaking states in Africa: The Somali Experience. Trenton, NJ: Red Sea Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lewis, I. M., Lewis, I., ASCAP, & Dwyer, M. J. (2008). Understanding Somalia and Somaliland: Culture, history, society. New York: Columbia University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Loubser, H. M., & Solomon, H. (2014). Responding to state failure in Somalia. Africa Review, 6(1), 1–17.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lyons, T. & Samatar, A. I. (2010). Somalia: State collapse, multilateral intervention, and strategies for political reconstruction. Massachusetts: Brookings Institution Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mazrui, A. A. (1997). Crisis in Somalia: From tyranny to anarchy. In Mending rips in the sky: Options for Somali communities in the 21st century (pp. 5–12). Lawrenceville: The Red Sea Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Menkhaus, K. (1996). International peacebuilding and the dynamics of local and national reconciliation in Somalia. International Peacekeeping, 3(1), 42–67.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Menkhaus, K. (2003). State collapse in Somalia: Second thoughts. Review of African Political Economy, 30(97), 405–422.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Menkhaus, K. (2009). Somalia: ‘They created a desert and called it peace (building)’. Review of African Political Economy, 36(120), 223–233.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Menkhaus, K. (2010). Somalia: What went wrong? The RUSI Journal, 154(4), 6–12.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Møller, B. (2009). The Somali conflict: The role of external actors (No. 2009: 03). DIIS Reports/Danish Institute for International Studies.

    Google Scholar 

  • Moore, C. (Ed.). (1996). The mediation process: Practical strategies for resolving conflict. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  • Murphy, M. N. (2011). Somalia, the new barbary?: Piracy and Islam in the horn of Africa. New York: Columbia University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mwangi, O. G. (2010). The union of Islamic courts and security governance in Somalia. African Security Review, 19(1), 88–94.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Nyadera, I. N., & Bincof, M. O. (2019). Human security, terrorism, and counterterrorism: Boko Haram and the Taliban. International Journal on World Peace, 36(1): 7–32.

    Google Scholar 

  • Nyadera, I. N. (2018). South Sudan conflict from 2013 to 2018: Rethinking the causes, situation and solutions. African Journal on Conflict Resolution, 18(2), 59–86.

    Google Scholar 

  • Nyadera, I., Ahmed, M., & Agwanda, B. (2019). Transformation of the Somali civil-war and reflections for a post -conflict social contract. Gaziantep University Journal of Social Sciences, 18(4), 1346–1366. https://doi.org/10.21547/jss.536203.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Prunier, G. (2015). British Somaliland: An administrative history, 1920–1960 by Brock Millman: Routledge studies in middle eastern history. London/New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Putman, D. B., & Noor, M. C. (1993). The Somalis: Their history and culture, refugee [Fact sheet no. 9]. International Rescue Committee.

    Google Scholar 

  • Reyner, A. S. (1960). Somalia: The problems of independence. The Middle East Journal, 247–255.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rutherford, K. (2008). Humanitarianism Under Fire. Sterling: Kumarian Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Shay, S. (2017). Somalia between jihad and restoration. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Shortland, A., & Varese, F. (2016). State-building, informal governance, and organized crime: The case of Somali piracy. Political Studies, 64(4), 811–831.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Tadesse, B., Tesfaye, Y., & Beyene, F. (2010). Women in conflict and indigenous conflict resolution among the Issa and Gurgura clans of Somali in Eastern Ethiopia. African Journal on Conflict Resolution, 10(1): 85–110.

    Google Scholar 

  • Touval, S. and Zartman, I.W. eds. (1985). International mediation in theory and practice. Westview Press with the Foreign Policy Institute, School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University.

    Google Scholar 

  • Van Notten, M. (2005). The law of the Somalis: A stable foundation for economic development in the Horn of Africa. Trenton: Red Sea Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wall, J. A., & Lynn, A. (1993). Mediation: A current review. Journal of Conflict Resolution, 37, 160–194.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Zartman, I. W. (1983). The political economy of Nigeria. New York: Praeger Publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  • Zartman, I. W. (Ed.). (2000). Traditional cures for modern conflicts: African conflict “medicine”. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  • Zartman, I. W. (Ed.). (2007). Peacemaking in international conflict: Methods & techniques. Washington, DC: US Institute of Peace Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Zartman, I. W. and Berman, M. R. (1982). The practical negotiator. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Zuin, M. (2008). A model of transitional justice for Somalia. PRAXIS: The Fletcher Journal of Human Security, 23, 89–108.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Macau, Macau, China

    Israel Nyaburi Nyadera

  2. Ankara Yildirim Beyazit University, Ankara, Turkey

    Israel Nyaburi Nyadera & Mohamed Salah Ahmed

  3. Hacettepe University, Ankara, Turkey

    Michael Otieno Kisaka

Authors
  1. Israel Nyaburi Nyadera
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Mohamed Salah Ahmed
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Michael Otieno Kisaka
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Israel Nyaburi Nyadera .

Section Editor information

  1. No affiliation provided

    Jasmin Ramovic

  2. No affiliation provided

    Liridona Veliu

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2020 The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG

About this entry

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this entry

Nyadera, I.N., Ahmed, M.S., Kisaka, M.O. (2020). War and Peace in Somalia. In: The Palgrave Encyclopedia of Peace and Conflict Studies. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-11795-5_107-1

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-11795-5_107-1

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-11795-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-11795-5

  • eBook Packages: Springer Reference Political Science and International StudiesReference Module Humanities and Social SciencesReference Module Business, Economics and Social Sciences

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation