History of Somalia (1991–2006)

[1] Large areas of the country such as Puntland and Galmudug were internationally unrecognized and administered as autonomous regions of Somalia, while forces in the northwest declared the Republic of Somaliland.

The TFG was at the time not able to effectively collect taxes, had no notable finances or real power base,[4] and struggled to exert control over Mogadishu following an attempted move in late December 2006.

Benjamin Powell argued that statelessness led to more order and less chaos than had the previous state,[5] and economist Alex Tabarrok claimed that Somalia in its stateless period provided a "unique test of the theory of anarchy", in some aspects near of that espoused by anarcho-capitalists David D. Friedman and Murray Rothbard,[6] although this is disputed by anarchists and anarcho-capitalists, who contend it is not anarchy, but merely chaos,[7][8][9][10] perhaps resulting from unequal distribution of power and meddling by neighbors and developed nations like the United States.

While some urban areas such as Mogadishu had private police forces,[13] many Somalis simply returned to the traditional clan-based legal structures for local governance and dispute resolution.

[2] MacCallum credits the Xeer with "Somalia's success without a central government, since it provides an authentic rule of law to support trade and economic development.

Powell et al. (2006) find that the existence of the common law dispute resolution system in Somalia makes possible basic economic order.

For example, in a dispute involving telecommunications company Aerolite, the plaintiff from the weaker clan was unable to collect the "unfairly" small settlement they had been awarded.

[16] The impact on human development in Somalia of governmental collapse and ensuing civil war was profound, leading to the breakdown of political institutions, the destruction of social and economic infrastructure and massive internal and external migrations.

This compares favorably with circumstances in 1990, when Somalia last had a government and was ranked in the bottom 50 percent for all seven of the measures for which we had that year's data: death rate, infant mortality, life expectancy, main telephone lines, tuberculosis, and immunization for measles and DTP.

A 2004 World Bank study of the Somali economy concluded that "it may be easier than is commonly thought for basic systems of finance and some infrastructure services to function where government is extremely weak or absent.

"[16] The New York Times referred to post-state Mogadishu as "the ultimate example of deregulation,"[26] noting that "[g]utsy entrepreneurs, including some women, opened their own hospitals, schools… telephone companies, power plants and ports".

[3] In 2007 parts of Somalia had some of the best voice telecommunications in Africa, with 10 or more competing companies ready to wire home or office and provide crystal-clear service, including international long distance, for about $10 a month."

According to the CIA World Factbook, private telephone companies "offer service in most major cities" via wireless technology, charging "the lowest international rates on the continent",[1][27][28] Installation time for a land-line was just three days, while in neighboring Kenya waiting lists were many years long.

[36] The population grew in eight years from 5,000 to 150,000, sustained by public services provided on a competitive basis by private enterprise, and court systems, schools and a university founded by the local community.

With the establishment of the Transitional National Government in 2000, a group of businessmen imported about 30 billion shillings of Canadian-printed notes, sparking a collapse of the currency and wide-scale demonstrations and protests in Mogadishu.

Although the separatist authorities in Somaliland attempted to bar usage of the Somali shilling, Somalia's official currency remained the preferred means of exchange for many peoples in the region.

[39] Although it states that no reliable statistics are available for the period in question, the United Nations claims that Somalia, already one of the poorest countries in the world, has become even poorer as a result of civil war.

In 2005, some of these clerical organizations united to form the Islamic Courts Union, after the secular rebel leaders began to challenge the sharia-based judicial institutions.

Wary of Islamist paramilitaries in the age of the War on Terror, the CIA funneled hundreds of thousands of dollars to secular rebel leaders inside Somalia in 2006, intending thereby to neutralize the threat of suspected members of Al Qaeda they believed to be sheltered by the ICU.

[40] This was cited by experts as a factor in the resurgence of Islamic militias in the country, prompting the latter to engage in pre-emptive strikes which routed the rebel leaders and led to the seizure of Ford by the ICU.

Its forces are fighting to quell the ongoing insurgency in Somalia and are attempting to gain control of the southern half of the country, as the northern regions are both autonomous and comparatively stable.

As a truce, in March 2009, Somalia's newly established coalition government announced that it would implement Shari'a as the nation's official judicial system.

An abandoned Mogadishu street in 1993, shortly after the fall of the Siad Barre government
Private media enterprises – such as Haatuf newspaper from Hargeisa shown here – rapidly grew in the aftermath of state collapse.
A money exchange center in Hargeisa , Somaliland . In the absence of a formal banking sector, money exchange services have sprung up throughout the country, handling about $1 billion in remittances annually.
Bakaara Market in the heart of Mogadishu . In the absence of government regulation, Somali marketplaces have thrived. [ 13 ]
Political map of Somalia in December 2006 showing the political structure of the Islamic Courts Union at the height of its power during the Somali Civil War .