WHAT IT MEANSThe Somalization of Yemen? [Archives:2008/1128/Local News]
Khaled Fattah
kf62@st-andrews.ac.uk
Somalization is a geopolitical syndrome characterized by multiple long-term security, socio-political and economic breakdowns and abnormalities. In this sense, Somalization resembles other political syndromes like Afghanization, Lebanization and Balkanization.
Although, under normal circumstances, these syndromes are contained and not infectious, experts warn that fragmented societies governed by failing states are more prone to develop much political pathology, including these syndromes.
Some Yemeni politicians and commentators recently have been sounding warning bells at the possibility of Somalization Syndrome, or SS, infecting the young socio-political body of unified Yemen. How valid is this warning and how did they make their diagnosis?
To begin with, spotting cases at high risk of SS is notoriously controversial, with the epicenter of the debate being on which criteria the diagnosis should be made and by whom such criteria are established and validated.
However, the most widely accepted approach among investigators is based on accruing data from independent lines of evidence within weak states governing deeply fragmented societies. The most commonly used diagnostic validator in this approach is the level of ethnic, religious or tribal tensions and the impact of such tensions upon national identity.
On the other hand, in the first approach, diagnosis is made by measuring the degrees of legitimacy, resources and the capacity to penetrate society.
With this in mind, let's attempt to confirm or refute Yemen's diagnosis as a case at risk of Somalization Syndrome. A simple glance at Yemen reveals the absence of ethnic, religious or linguistic minorities that threaten social cohesion or challenge national identity. Despite existing tribal pluralism, Yemen is one of the most homogenous societies in the Middle East. Serious inter-tribal clashes in Yemen often are political administration-made.
Turning to the Yemeni state, one can't help but notice its fragility and weak performance in delivering its citizens political and social goods. However, the map of the developing world is covered with similarly weak states failing to meet international standard criteria of a “successful state.”
Records show that the majority of these states never were infected by SS. Only a few of them, due to particular contextual determinants, collapsed and developed the symptoms of Somalization Syndrome.
Observers of Yemen who adopt a “big picture” analytical focus are well aware that there's nothing new about the failure of the modern Yemeni state – Northern, Southern or united – to exercise its authority easily outside the major cities.
Today's Yemeni state isn't in a ceaseless struggle for survival in a Darwinian world; rather, it's the Yemeni administration that's struggling to extend the expiration date of a legitimacy based on the unification project.
Yemen isn't a dangerous political community with warlords and gang warfare by rival clans; fortunately, it's a nation free of severe ethnic and/or religious divisions. Instead, what plagues Yemen today is the political abuse by officials who are injecting the state's weak political and administrative bodies with higher doses of patronage and corruption.
Clearly, the warnings about a Somalization Syndrome are politically motivated, with the purpose being to shift focus away from the current political and economic crisis and give the impression that chaos will reign if the Yemeni state fails to control the roaring demands of a democracy based upon inclusion and social justice.
Khaled Fattah is a doctoral candidate, University of St. Andrews, U.K.
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