Ideoscapes in the World Society: Framing Violence in Somalia

Bakonyi, Jutta

Abstract

The article uses the example of the Somali war to analyse how globally travelling ideas and political concepts are adapted to local settings and translated into frames that promote collective action and feature violence. It outlines how two ideas with universal claim, nationalism and modernisation were combined with an anti-colonial rhetoric and evolved into the meta-narrative of Somali history. This meta-narrative changed little, and keywords such as (pan-Somali) nationalism, anti-colonialism, development, sovereignty structure most of the discursive repertoires of political actors in Somalia. The main difference is that politicized clan affiliations were during the war dragged out of their shadowy existence and placed in the spot-light of political practice. They alone were however not sufficient to justify claims to power, but were complemented by ‘injustice’, ‘modernisation’ and ‘territorial’ narratives that justified violent deeds as ‘liberation’, ‘defence’ or ‘territorial rights’. Islamists employed similar key narratives and revived the pan-Somali anti-colonialist nationalism, but rooted it in a religious rational. Their ability to abandon culturalised frames contributed to their success.

Citation

Bakonyi, J. (2015). Ideoscapes in the World Society: Framing Violence in Somalia. Civil Wars, 17(2), 242-265. https://doi.org/10.1080/13698249.2015.1070456

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Jun 11, 2015
• Online Publication Date: Oct 11, 2015
• Publication Date: Oct 11, 2015
• Deposit Date: Oct 21, 2015
• Publicly Available Date: Apr 11, 2017
• Journal: Civil Wars
• Print ISSN: 1369-8249
• Electronic ISSN: 1743-968X
• Publisher: Taylor and Francis Group
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 17
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 242-265
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/13698249.2015.1070456
• Keywords: Somalia, Civil war, Nationalism, Modernisation, Clan, Religion, Islamist militias
• Public URL: https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/output/1428825