![Sample our Area Studies journals, sign in here to start your access, latest two full volumes FREE to you for 14 days]({"type":"image" , "src" : "/sda/5922/TOC-Subject-Sample-2021-Area-Studies.jpg"})
ABSTRACT
The Somali education sector had almost collapsed by the time Somalia’s government collapsed in 1991. However, an education sector re-emerged in the self-declared independent Republic of Somaliland. Despite limited resources and lacking international recognition as a state, education continues to be provided. This paper sets out to analyse the role played by the state in this process. Although practices of organising primary education provision are largely located outside the state framework, the state continues to be productive for non-state actors in their continuous attempts to deliver education. Despite its distant role, the state is not completely powerless within the organisation of the sector. The paper describes first how the state accumulated sufficient power to be in charge of the education sector. This is followed by three cases unpacking how the state and its power is re-produced between state and non-state actors.
Acknowledgements
We want to express our deepest gratitude for those who have been willing to participate in the research. Without them this paper would not exist. Special thanks also to Ridwan Kheyre and Abdisalan Mohamed Ise for their continuous hard and always reliable work as translators and assistants. Also, thanks to Abdihakim Abdilahi Omer for his patience in translating both words and context. Lastly, thanks to Patrick Edmond and two anonymous reviewers for providing constructive feedback on earlier versions of this paper.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes
1. University student, Hargeisa, 19 March 2014. The question was posed to one of the authors during his first visit to Somaliland in 2014.
2. Bekalo, Brophy and Welford, “The Development of Education,” 464.
3. Abdi, “Education in Somalia.”
4. Menkhaus, “Governance without Government”; Raeymaekers, Menkhaus and Vlassenroot, “State and Non-State Regulation.”
5. Hagmann and Hoehne, “Failures of the State Failure.”
6. Hoehne, “Traditional Authorities in Northern Somalia”; Hoehne, “Limits of Hybrid Political Orders”; Bradbury, Becoming Somaliland; Renders and Terlinden, “Negotiating Statehood in a Hybrid”; Walls and Kibble, “Beyond Polarity.” Note that Renders and Terlinden, “Negotiating Statehood in a Hybrid”; and especially Hoehne, “Limits of Hybrid Political Orders” argue that while hybridity was productive in establishing political order in Somaliland it is now undermining both traditional and modern authorities.
7. War-torn Societies Project, Rebuilding Somaliland; Eubank, “Peace-Building without External.”
8. World Bank, Budget Policy.
9. Ministry of Finance, Budget 2017.
10. Ministry of National Planning and Development, Somaliland in Figures, 13th edition, 42.
11. The name of the village is anonymised.
12. Migdal and Schlichte, “Rethinking the State.”
13. Ibid., 14–5.
14. Ibid., 15.
15. Mitchell, “The Limits of the State,” 81.
16. Lund, “Twilight Institutions,” 686.
17. This concept has been used to refer to the ways in which state and non-state actors co-produce governance. See Clements et al., “State Building Reconsidered”; Boege, Brown and Nolan, On Hybrid Political Orders; Meagher et al., “Unravelling Public Authority”. Particularly for Somaliland, this concept has been used in a more specific meaning, i.e. to refer to the mixing of traditional and legal-rational (i.e. modern) authorities in the making of political order in Somaliland. See Renders and Terlinden, “Negotiating Statehood in a Hybrid”; Hoehne, “Limits of Hybrid Political Orders”; Moe, “Hybrid and ‘Everyday’ Political Ordering.”
18. Olivier de Sardan, “Researching Practical Norms”; Titeca and De Herdt, “Real Governance Beyond the ‘Failed State.’”
19. Hagmann and Peclard, “Negotiating Statehood.”
20. Specifically for the education sector, see Titeca et al., “God and Caesar”; De Herdt and Titeca “Governance with Empty Pockets.”
21. Ibid., 550.
22. Bourdieu, Language and Symbolic Power, 170.
23. Hallet, “Symbolic Power and Organizational Culture,” 133.
24. Bourdieu, Language and Symbolic Power, 170.
25. Loveman, “The Modern State,” 1658.
26. Ibid.
27. Ibid.
28. Weber, The Theory of Social, 152–7.
29. Von Trotha 2001 cited in Hagmann and Péclard, “Negotiating Statehood,” 543.
30. Migdal and Schlichte, “Rethinking the State.”
31. Nandy, “The Politics of Secularism.”
32. Gupta, “Blurred Boundaries.”
33. Ibid., 389–90.
34. Mitchell, “Society, Economy and the State Effect.”
35. Ibid., 83.
36. Ibid., 84.
37. Ibid., 83.
38. Ibid., 84.
39. Ibid., 95.
40. Compagnon, “Somali Armed Movements.”
41. Africa Watch, “Somalia: A Government at War,” 3.
42. Abdi, “Education in Somalia”; Morah, “Old Institutions, New Opportunities”; Abdinoor, “Constructing Education”; Hoehne, “Education and Peace-Building.”
43. The first ministry was called Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports.
44. Abdirahman Aw Ali, former minister of education, Hargeisa, 28 March 2017.
45. Ibid.
46. This is a reference to iska wax u qabso – meaning something close to ‘help yourself', which was a scheme developed during the reign of Siad Barre. In essence iska wax u qabso was a volunteer project in which people volunteered to construct roads, hospitals and schools (see Mukhtar, Historical dictionary of Somalia, 177; Ingiriis, The Suicidal State, 85–90). According to some interviewees the iska wax u qabso scheme was known colloquially as ‘forced voluntarism'.
47. Hussein Elmi Warsame, former DG of MoEHE, Hareysa, 14 February 2017.
48. Lindley, “Transnational Connections”; Hoehne, “Diasporic Engagement”; Hoehne and Ibrahim, “Rebuilding Somaliland through Economic.”
49. Head teacher, Hargeisa, 16 March 2017.
50. Ibid.
51. Former Director General of education, Hargeisa, 2 April 2017.
52. Ministry employee, Hargeisa, 22 March 2017.
53. Williams and Cummings, “Education from the Bottom Up.”
54. Abdullahi Yashin, November 23, 2017.
55. Morah, “Old Institutions, New Opportunities”; Hassan and Robleh, “Islamic Revival and Education in Somalia.”
56. The authors know of one case in which a private school was closed for a short period. This was due to suspicions of the school being funded by an organisation related to terrorism.
57. Brown, Final Synthesis Report for the Joint Review of the Educations Sector, Somaliland, 14.
58. Somaliland National Examination and Certification Board, Grade 8 and form 4 report 2017, 6.
59. Belonging to an area does not necessarily mean being born in the area. It can also mean being part of the family (sub-clan) residing in the area.
60. Diaspora group member, Hargeisa, 5 April 2017.
61. Chairman of community organization, 23 December 2017.
62. The ministry changed name to Ministry of Education and Science after the 2017 presidential election.
63. Loveman, “The Modern State,” 1662–3.
64. Ibid., 1663.
65. Interview with legal advisor, MoEHE, Hargeisa, 4 December 2017.
66. Interview with community group member, Hargeisa, 2 December 2017.
67. Interview with education coordinator, MoEHE, Hargeisa, 22 November 2017.
68. Loveman, “The Modern State,” 1659.
69. Head teacher, village, 16 July 2016.
70. Chairman of community group, Hargeisa, 17 July 2016.
71. The Somaliland administration is not officially recognised and can therefore not receive bilateral aid. Some development actors are less keen on working with an unrecognised states than others. Thus, all sorts of ‘gymnastics', as one informant from an NGO put it, are made to tunnel and reach out for international aid.
72. Parent, 6 July 2016.
73. Member of curriculum commission, 18 July 2016; see also Ahmed, “Somaliland: Keep Ddeology Out of k-12 Education.”
74. Ministry of Education and Higher Education, National Education Act 2013, 18.
75. Education manager, private school association, Hargeisa, 1 February 2017.
76. Education manager, private school association, Hargeisa, 4 April 2017.
77. Ibid.
78. Loveman, “The Modern State,” 1659.
79. Rahma Ibrahim, director of primary education, 26 February 2017.
80. Primary teacher, Hargeisa, 2 January 2017.
81. Salaries are paid in Somaliland shillings in cash. Prior to the policy salaries were SLsh300,000 (approximately US$50 plus top-up salaries from fees), the ministry doubled this to SLsh600,000. It was later raised to 700,000 which due to fluctuation in exchange rates still amounted to approximately US$100. Minimum salaries of teachers have recently been increased to SLsh800,000. Teachers with more seniority can earn SLsh920,000 per month.
82. Head teacher, Hargeisa, 26 April 2017.
83. Head teacher, Hargeisa, 3 April 2017.
84. Mitchell, “Society, Economy and the State Effect,” 83.