Reconstructing political order among the Somalis: the historical record in the south and centre

The reconstruction of Somalia was envisaged to be built upon a new social contract, which should be negotiated between the superordinate body and the local units of governance. This paper shows that while the founding leaders in north Somalia consulted extensively with the assemblies of elders, creating civilian constitutional orders, military leaders in the south and central regions chose a different approach. The paper presents the following findings: • the economics, demographics and conflicts in the south and centre of Somalia all were such as to make the involvement of elders and other local structures in shaping and legitimating regional governance more difficult • after the UN retreated from its early effort to build decentralised regional governments up into a national federation, communities were left to govern themselves • nevertheless, this gap in local governance was taken up not only by sub-clan and other traditional structures but increasingly by Sharia courts (i.e. radical Islamists) as well • ultimately, various Islamic movements did build on community-level governance and used it to successfully challenge the old warlords • by the time, the warlords realised that their real opponents were the proponents of political Islam, the opportunities to counter were largely lost. Conclusions include: • in a conflict country, the social contract that exists between citizens and their local governance structures not only does not disappear but becomes much more critical to the security of those at the bottom • a primary part of post-conflict reconstruction must be rebuilding the social contract between community governance structures and national ones, and in some circumstances local governance may need to be reformed.