Resource scarcity and weak policing keep self-help the primary sanction in Somali society

Evidence

To grasp the significance of this political and legal entity – whose members do not necessarily camp or move together in the pastures – but which is nevertheless the most clearly defined political unit in pastoral society, it must be appreciated that the nomadic Somali are a warlike people, driven by the poverty of their resources to intense competition for access to water and grazing. Even under modern administration self-help still retains much force as the most effective sanction for redressing wrongs and adjusting political and legal issues between groups. Hence, with the difficulty under present conditions of adequately policing much of the country, the security of the individual pastoralist’s person and property depends ultimately upon his membership of a diya-paying group. — I.M. Lewis, I. M. Lewis, A Modern History of the Somali_ Nation…, 69

Categorization

• XREF: Underpins recurring patterns of clan retaliation and the failure of centralized coercion throughout the book’s later history. — connects to: Somali political cohesion rests on patrilineal kinship rather than hereditary chiefs; Welfare can target the fact of poverty or its individual causes — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 434; Most scarcity is socially defined rather than intrinsic to resources — Anthony Giddens, The Consequences of Modernity, 387

Related

• Somali nationalism drew strength from a democratic pastoral political tradition (similarity 0.81)
• Somali pastoral society governs democratically without hierarchical chiefs (similarity 0.81)
• Somalia’s government weakened clan and religious authorities to build the modern state (similarity 0.78)
• Somali pastoral democracy trained every man as a skilled politician (similarity 0.78)

Broader Connections

• Somali political cohesion rests on patrilineal kinship rather than hereditary chiefs #corroborates (0.60)