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Paper presented at the annual conference of the National Civic Forum, Nairobi, Kenya,
The key research question this paper is going to examine is whether civil societies in a stateless environment hinder or help in reestablishing the failed state. Somalia has been without a functioning government since the start of the civil war in 1991, earning the dubious distinction of the longest occurrence of state collapse in postcolonial history. In the absence of a functioning government, Western donors use civil society as a vehicle to deliver services to populations within failed states, like Somalia. This makes civil societies more powerful and reliable than the failed governments under which they function. Scholars should study civil societies as a vital part of the failed state, not as a tool to deliver services, as is currently the case in Somalia. As the state collapses and civil society becomes stronger, sometimes the only employer in town becomes a profit maker for the individual actors who manages such civil society. Fear of losing that profit led to the individual actors and civil society’s decision to adopt obstructionism as a modus operandi that ultimately hinders reestablishment of the state. One exception however, is the educationally based groups in civil societies. They would rather have a strong functioning government that can help them advance and reach out to more people to educate.
According to Ken Menkhaus (2007), since the collapse of the Somali state, the international community has attempted a two-track method to reconstitute a conventional central government. The first was several peace accords imposed by foreign powers to build a transitional government in a top-down process of power sharing among Somalia’s political elite and warlords; this effort has failed Somalis consistently. The cause of the failure is the direct result of an inharmonious environment. The international community has always been were interested in forming a government that would consist of several different warring factions in a power sharing arrangement without genuine reconciliation. This approach has failed consistently. As a result, the trajectory of a top down approach is a failed one. The second track was a bottom up approach that was based on funding one civil society organization after another for local projects. Many institution have been embracing the idea of state building through civil society, among them the World Bank, the European Community and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) - to name a few. The notion was a noble one, “that state building and civil society go hand in hand” (Mertus and Sajjad, 2010:13). To further justify funding civil society organizations, Mertus and Sajjad referenced a recent USAID publication that proclaims that civil society plays a critical role in democracies by “informing citizens about their rights and responsibilities and ensuring that governments meet citizen needs.” (Mertus and Sajjad, 2010:5) The notion was civil society will promote governance and later foster democratic values. Decades of civil strife and an international community eager to aid Somalia have made the civil society more powerful and reliable in delivering goods and services than the national government institutions that exist in Somalia.
However, state leaders failed to create functioning governance systems that could displace the civil society. Once established, civil society becomes strong and profitable, the element of that society advocating the establishment of a government that may later limit its power and profit is very unlikely.
Western scholars differentiate between for profit and nonprofit establishments, theorizing that for-profit originations are part of the market, not of civil society; however, as I outlined above such distinction does not exist in a failed state environment. To guide my research, let me establish a working definition that is helpful in understanding Somali civil society.
Civil society refers to the arena of uncoerced collective action around shared interests, purposes and values. In theory, its institutional forms are distinct from those of the state, family and market, though in practice, the boundaries between state, civil society, family and market are often complex, blurred and negotiated. Civil society commonly embraces a diversity of spaces, actors and institutional forms, varying in their degree of formality, autonomy and power. (LSE: 2004)
There have been four eras of Somali history in which civil societies have been active: the initial stage of the colonial period from 1950 to 1960, the second stage, after independence and the establishment of a democratically elected civilian government from 1960 to 1969, the third stage, the dismantlement of the civil society following the 1969 military coup d’états that ousted the civilian government and finally, the fourth stage, which has seen the reemergence of the civil society in a stateless environment during the civil war from 1990 to the present. These four different periods broadly define the role Somali civil societies played and their functions.
Civil society in Somalia was established during the colonial times and was a mechanism to defeat the colonial power in that era. Colonialism, therefore, has been the catalyst for the formation of modern Somali civil society. After independence in 1960, a powerful amalgam of civil societies formed a modern civilian Somali government that allowed them to mature. However, the 1969 military coup d’états that ousted the civilian government ushered in the third stage of Somali civil society. The first action of the military government was to prohibit the existence and activities of independent civil society groups. As a result, the civil society that Locke and Hume envisioned, which was a civil society that establishes a government so that it is people may be secure in their lives, liberties, and properties, has vanished under this regime.
After the demise of Somali civil society during the military rule, a civil war broke out in Somalia that destroyed the Somali state in 1990. This destructive civil war gave birth to the fourth state, which will be the focus of my research, a civil society that reemerged in a stateless environment, and one that provides education, health care, develops the economy as a state would and consults with the international community in a state building capacity. As a result, many in the country see these civil entities as political groups in the bureaucratic sense.
A number of scholars have distinguished themselves by bringing together a wide variety of perspectives and traditions positioned within particular religious traditions, including those of Islam, Judaism, and Confucianism. I would assert the very exploration of non-Western tradition helps to foster an understanding of civil society that occurs in the non-Western world, Somalia included. The exploration of this context, in turn, might provide deeper insights into the religious and cultural dimensions of a global civil society of every tradition.
Hasan Hanafi (2002) explores “alternative” understandings of civil society from within and beyond Western traditions. Since Hanafi’s focus is on alternative civil society in the Muslim world, I hoped his approach would be different from that of Western scholars and give insight to Somali history. An example of this trend to examine civil society in varying cultural contexts can be found in the work of Hasan Hanfi(2002), who examines civil societies of Muslim countries that bear a resemblance to Somalia. He considers three different “Muslim political societies”: fundamentalist, secularist and reformist or modernist alternative. Hanafi assigns to each spectrum of Muslim societies an alternative conception of civil society that reflects their interpretations and values of civil society. First, on the far right spectrum of Muslim society are “radical fundamentalists” such as Al-Shabab in Somalia or Taliban in Afghanistan, whose position is to reject the actual idea of civil society because they claim it is a secular concept that originates from the West and is, therefore, antireligious and un-Islamic. The second position is secularism, which positions itself at the far left spectrum in direct opposition to the fundamentalist and affirms “the concept of civil society as a universal concept”. (Hanafi 2002:172) Regardless of its Western origin, the secular group embraces civil society as an ideal way of life for modern Muslim society. The third group is the reformists, or as Hanafi calls them “modernist alternative”. Reformists fall in between the two extremes. The reformist group acknowledges both the similarities and differences in the Western concept of civil societies and that of Islamic societies. However, they argue that civil society is compatible with modern Islam and therefore, the reformist may interpret Islamic teachings to align the need of the modern Muslim society without infringing Islamic norms. In Arabic, such interpretation is called ijtihad. The reformists, like the current Transitional Government in Somalia, argue that through ijtihad “similarities can be maintained and differences can be bridged,” (Hanafi 2002:171) while keeping with upstanding Islamic values.
If the concept of civil society is a Western one as the fundamentalist’s charge, is it relevant to its application? Hanafi affirms that “(t)he concept of civil society is a Western concept, coined in the seventeenth century by …Thomas Hobbes as alternative to Kingdom and Church.” (Hanafi 2002:172) Also, John Ehrenberg (1999: 3) states that “the classical understanding of civil society as a politically organized commonwealth received its first coherent formulation in the cities of ancient Greece.” Hanafi and Ehrenberg are in agreement that the concept of civil society is a Western one. Whether it originated in ancient Greece or in England is relevant to neither.
The third and final practice of an alternative concept of civil societies that Hanafi considers are the modernist Arab and Islamic states that employ an alternative concept of civil society through al-ijtihad. The countries he considers as being model are the North African Arabs like Egypt, Libya, Tunisia and the Kingdom of Morocco as well as Kuwait, Jordan, Oman and United Arab Emirates. Hanafi believes that these countries have struck a balance “between civil society and the dictates of medieval Islamic law.” (Hanafi 2002:172). Hanafi describes how in the public sphere “the rule of civil society are maintained: citizenship, equality of all in front of the law, the constitution, freedom of expression, democracy pluralism and the like”, In the private sphere of these countries he describes institutions “such as family law, the shari’a” and how the shari’a is the prevailing source of the civil law. I would question both of these assertions, as it is a matter of public record that democratic pluralism is nonexistent in these countries and freedom of expression is severely limited. The Shari’a’s use in the private sphere is informal at best and then only for family matters. However, the law of these lands is a statutory law informed by the shari’a indirectly. In the entire Muslim world, the only countries that claim to be using shari’a law are Iran, not mentioned in the article, and Saudi Arabia, where the will of monarchy trumps all else.
Hanafi presents no unique characteristics of functions for countries like Somalia. Whether one considers Western or non-Western thinkers in regards to the neo-Tocquevillean notion, civil societies everywhere endeavor to limit the thrust of state power and foster citizen participation to fight corruption, heighten transparency, and demand accountability and good governance. The disciplined-configurative method of reviewing alternative conceptions of civil society divulges no answers as to whether civil society in a stateless environment hinders or helps to reestablish failed states.
Somalia has become the most prominent example of state-failure in the modern history of mankind. It is important to note, however, that not the entire country is besieged by the breakdown of civil and state order. In the northwestern part of Somalia, the self declared Republic of Somaliland, a former British protectorate declared independence in 1991 and established a democratic political system with parliamentary elections. Also, the northeastern part of Somalia, a region known as Puntland, declared its autonomy within Somalia in 1998. Puntland established local administration that has achieved relative peace and stability on the mainland, with the exception of the pirates in coastal waters of the Puntland region, which does not affect the relative peace in the land.
Somalia has been a very unstable country since 1991, but much of the instability associated with Somalia is focused on the south of the country, particularly around Mogadishu, the Lower Shabelle, Hiran and Jubba valley. These southern regions are inhabited by several different clans, while northwestern Somalia, the Somaliland and Puntland are inhabited by mainly three clans. I am mentioning clan affiliation because western scholars tent to attribute state failure to clan differences; they also tend to think that eventual reconciliation will be based on settling clan differences. Clanism does exist but it did not cause the catastrophe the Somali people have endured and harmonious clan relationships will not usher in a lasting solution. Historically, Somalis were divided by clans and experienced clan based wars against each other, but never to the extent that Somali society has experienced in the last two decades.
The conflict in Somalia has attracted considerable academic attention in many ways. Most academic interest has focused on foreign military intervention and clan structures as the causes of the state failure. The negative externality that Somali civil society may represent since the collapse of the government in 1991 has drawn significantly less scholarly attention. The growth of a self interested civil society that has grown out of necessity in the absence of state may have fostered conflict and it can be asserted, and remains an obstacle for viable state formation.
Mertus and Sajjad (2010:3) report that, as in Somalia, a “record amount of international resources have gone into efforts to construct a strong state in Bosnian Civil society.” Due to this influx of international aid, the number of civil societies and their scope has grown exponentially. This is not to suggest that internationally funded projects run by Somali civil society have been ignored by the scholars. “What has been largely overlooked, however, is the role civil society has played in creating a weak state”, according to Mertus and Sajjad (2010: 4), or preventing a weak state to reemerge as a strong one. Since the top to bottom approach did not work and the bottom up grass moment has proven to be problematic, is state building in Somalia doomed? Menhkaus contends that “the problem in Somalia is not that state building itself is doomed to fail; it is rather that the type of state that both external and local actors have sought to construct has been unattainable and has as a consequence repeatedly set up Somali political leaders and their external mediators for failure.” (Menkhaus 2007; 105-106) While the external mediators and the elite are trying to perfect negotiated settlements, the civil society has evolved from service provider to a de facto government that will not relinquish the power it gains; essentially becoming what Simone Chambers (2002) termed “bad civil society”. While this author is generally favorable to civil society, she challenges the shortcoming of modern Western scholars who fail to recognize the danger some civil societies, like those in Somalia, pose to democracy. (Chambers 2002:101)
The lack of governance and the role of Somali civil society, Menkhaus (2007) believes, is an important area of research for two reasons: first, the intractable conflict and the role civil society played would have introduced a new understanding of the behavior of civil society in a stateless environment. Stephen Stedman (1997) calls such civil society a “spoiler’s problem,” he theorizes them as a group whose modus operandi is to undermine the peace process and devote their energy to blocking reconciliation. Most civil societies who provide services to the needy have become profitable enterprises, whose wealth will diminish once a functioning government is established. There are also, some criminal enterprises that work with civil societies whose profit will be compromised once law and order is established under centralized regime. These two forces are formative, allied and a barrier for a weak state to reestablish as a strong one.
However, Menkhaus asserts that “the Somalia case suggests that a wider range of spoilers exists and must be accounted for in efforts to manage them”. War torn societies like Somalia, Menkhaus asserts are overwhelmed by “three interrelated but distinct crises—protracted warfare; chronic, often violent criminality or lawlessness; and state failure.” (Menkhaus 2007:75). The negative externalities of civil societies in such an environment are focused on propagating one or two of the above activities. In Somalia, Menkhaus writes “some spoilers have successfully undermined peace accords to perpetuate armed conflict; others have acted only to undercut local efforts to improve law and order and reduce criminality; still others support peace building and the reduction of crime, but block efforts to revive an effective central government.” (Menkhaus 2007:75) Civil society’s mistrust of a Somali government is a historic one, as I mentioned on the third era of Somali civil society and how government marginalized civil societies and severely limits or outlaws its activities. Given that history, the obstructionist behavior of the businesslike civil society is quite predictable. They would want to have a safe and predictable environment in which to conduct commercial activities, without government interference, taxation or the fear that a revived central government will become repressive and predatory at their expense. The history of Somalia’s government provides the current Somali civil society a legitimate cause for concern.
If this causal pattern holds true, it may offer some insight into rebuilding the Somali state. There are limits to what international efforts at state building can accomplish in the absence of revolutionary domestic change. This analysis also suggests that U.S. policies designed to further the stability of Somalia by giving economic support to civil societies without accountability have been misguided, because these businesslike civil societies maintain their authority only by preventing the emergence of a functioning state. If the international community would have eliminated the profit aspect out of the humanitarian work and service delivery, only the genuine humanitarian professionals would have been the care takers of the current civil society and they would not have rejected the formation of government. In fact, I would argue a civil society without a profit motive would welcome government that may provide them a safe environment in which a genuine civil society could function.
Bibliography
John Ehrenberg, Civil Society: The Critical History of an Idea (Paperback) (NYU Press, 1999)
Hasan Hanafi, Alternative Conceptions of Civil Society: A Reflective Islamic Approach (p171-189); Simone Chambers and Will Kymlicka, Eds. Alternative Conceptions of Civil Society (Princeton University Press, 2002).
Simone Chambers, A Critical Theory of Civil Society, ch5 (p90-110); Simone Chambers and Will Kymlicka, Eds. Alternative Conceptions of Civil Society (Princeton University Press, 2002).
Ken Menkhaus. 2007 Governance without Government in Somalia: Spoilers, State Building, and the Politics of Coping, International Security. Vol. 31. No. 3. pp. 74-106
Centre for Civil Society, London School of Economics. (LSE) 2004-03-01. http://www.lse.ac.uk/collections/CCS/what_is_civil_society.htm. Accessed 03-27-2010
Mertus, Julie. and Sajjad, Tazreena. “When Civil Society Promotion Fails State-Building: From Bosnia to Afghanistan and Beyond”. American University, School of International Service Prepared for 45 th Annual ISA Convention Montreal, Canada March 2010.
http://www.allacademic.com//meta/p_mla_apa_research_citation/0/7/3/1/2/pages73129/p73129-1.php (accessed 04/30/10)
Stephen John Stedman, “The Spoiler Problem in Peace Processes,” International Security, Vol. 22, No. 2 (Fall 1997), pp. 5–53.
Ibrahim Sh. Ahmed Mohamed
December 22, 2010