State Collapse, Insurgency, and Famine in the Horn of Africa: Legitimacy and the Ongoing Somali Crisis

Abstract

The failure of Somalia's Transitional Federal Government (TFG) to defeat the insurgency led by the militant Islamists of al-Shabaab—to say nothing of accomplishing the political tasks of state-building that are its very raison d'être—is due to its inability to garner internal political legitimacy. In contrast, both the Islamist insurgents fighting the TFG and the relatively stable new polities that have emerged in various parts of the territory of the collapsed Somali state are better attuned to local community sensibilities and, consequently, have been relatively successful in mobilizing clan loyalties. This conclusion has significant implications for the international community, not only with respect to efforts to facilitate a political solution to more than two decades of statelessness, but also because massive drought and the resulting humanitarian emergency have weakened the hold of al-Shabaab on southern and central Somalia, presenting a unique political and strategic opportunity to achieve greater security and stability in the Horn of Africa. The lessons derived here are thus broadly applicable to other conflicts involving failed or failing states.