Seminar: Spectres of the state: State collapse and sovereign afterlives in Somalia

It is commonly assumed that the collapse of the socialist-military dictatorship signified the end of a functioning public administration within Somalia. While it is true that the Somali state ceased to exist as a ‘coercion wielding organization’ (Tilly 1992) in 1991, it did not disappear entirely from people’s lives. Indeed, non-state actors (in this case, businessmen, political organizations, etc.) not only engaged in governance tasks, but began to reproduce stately artefacts, meanings and practices. This seminar describes the re-emergence of these governmental technologies as spectres of a defunct Somali Democratic Republic that continue to haunt the Somali territories. The speaker examines three distinct stately things: first, the reprinting and continued circulation of legal tender (the Somali shilling) by Somali businessmen; second, the recycling of state symbols by various political groups who make discursive reference to Somali nationalist figurehead Mohammed Abdullah Hassan (nicknamed ‘Sayyid’ or ‘Mad Mullah’); and third the diplomatic relations of the Somali phantom state by self-sponsored Somali diplomats.