Somalia: Libertarian Paradise ?

[macalimuu]

Democracy For $ale:

Libertarian Paradise

 

DR. JACK MILLER / Monitor Winter 2004-05 20feb2005

 

 

The United States has the lowest taxes and smallest government of any industrial nation (as a percent of Gross Domestic Product). After years of huge tax cuts for wealthy elites and corporations, government at all levels is struggling to meet public needs.

 

Nevertheless, with services being slashed, infra-structure crumbling and deficits soaring, demands continue for smaller government and lower taxes. A key player in this process is arch-libertarian Grover Norquist—the most powerful man you never heard of in Washington. He runs the well-funded Americans for Tax Reform, and his goal is to shrink government to the point "you can drown it in a bathtub." Norquist's ideal citizen is "the self-employed, home schooling, IRA-owning guy with a concealed-carry permit because that per-son doesn't need the goddamn government for any-thing.'" Norquist has made a living of bashing anything with the word "public" attached, and his message heavily influences the Bush administration and resonates with many anti-government Americans.

 

 

Well, I've done some research and have great news for Grover and his followers. I actually found a place where the government has already been "drowned in a bathtub—"a tax-free paradise awaiting any libertarian who cares to travel a little: Somalia! That's right! Located in picturesque East Africa, caressed by the warm waters of the Indian Ocean, Somalia has no functioning government, so there's no one to steal your hard-earned dollars.

 

Well, almost no one—since there are no police, the warlords sort of call the shots (no pun intended). They may demand some tribute, but it's not like wasting your money on police protection, garbage collection, sidewalks, schools, libraries, clean water, etc. Think about it: by paying tribute you're getting something really personal in return—your life! Don't despair—if the war-lord even leaves you fifty bucks, you'll still be a Somali millionaire. According to the CIA, "The absence of central government authority, as well as profiteering from counterfeiting, has rapidly debased Somalia's currency" to where one U.S. dollar now buys 30,000 Somali shillings!"

 

Also, if you arrive by sea, be careful. Somalia has no tax-supported Coast Guard, so our State Department advises that there are real live pirates who keep a sharp lookout for over-upholstered, spoiled libertarians (like Grover) to snatch for ransom. At the risk of seeming wimpy, you might want to check the "Weekly Piracy Report" on the International Chamber of Commerce's web site before sailing."'

 

Arrhh, matey, if you are kidnapped, the closest U.S. Embassy is in Nairobi, Kenya! But who cares? Since embassies are another symptom of bloated tax-hungry governments, self-respecting libertarians will gladly walk the plank before submitting to any such official meddling. That may not become a problem, anyway, because you can hit the beach heavily armed (remember, no gun laws). In fact, no laws at all! No patronizing, nosey officials to keep you from doing absolutely anything you want to do.

 

With no public health system or sanitation in Somalia, malaria, tuberculosis, tetanus and leprosy may become a problem for even the tidiest libertarian. Try to limit your contact with the waterways; no wading or swimming is suggested, but of course, not ordered. The inland waters are a veritable toxic brew of microbes, which cause cholera, hepatitis, typhoid, dysentery, and several other ailments not routinely found in brutally high-tax areas. Don't despair, there is good news! According to our tax-supported Centers for Disease Control, at least one pesky parasite, the blood fluke, dislikes salt water and only bores through tender, libertarian skin exposed to fresh water in'and. Whew! That means the warm waters of the Indian Ocean off Somalia are blood fluke-free—so enjoy!

 

While frolicking in the Indian Ocean there is one minor concern: Since Somalia has no tax-supported Navy to patrol its shoreline, foreign ships routinely dump highly toxic waste into the coastal waters. According to the BBC, a massive fish kill a couple years ago was caused by nuclear waste freely off-loaded into Somalia's territorial waters. Well, a quick dip shouldn't hurt—a slight bodily glow at worst. Most of the locals don't have to worry very long about such inconveniences since the average person only lives 46 years.

 

Remember to take along a powerful radio since the public telecommunications system was completely destroyed during the last civil war. If another freedom lover, say a bandit, liberates your powerful radio, you can currently make international connections from the capitol, Mogadishu, by satellite.

 

When you visit Mogadishu to send your message, plan on doing some walking. According to the UN, "No car, no bus, no heavily armed jeep can make its way through this Mogadishu road block: only goats and pedestrians attempt to climb the huge mound of rubbish—a solid mass.'"

 

Highway travel is possible elsewhere. The country's principle highway is a 700-mile two-lane paved road from Chisimayu to Hargeysa. Don't worry about getting stuck at a railroad crossing since there are no railroads in Somalia. Drive on whatever side of the road suits your mood! Hey, pedal to the metal, but keep yourfingers crossed because the northern segment of the highway still needs to be cleared of land mines. Links to neighboring countries are mostly dirt trails and tend to be impassable in rainy weather.

 

So there you are: a country about the size of Texas where you can roam free. Free from the Nanny-State, un-mined highways, laws, police, paramedics, telephones, museums, schools, clean water, libraries, hospitals, sanitation, old-age and most of all—free from taxes! Bon voyage, you lucky libertarians, and don't for-get to write. Oops! I forgot—there are no post offices there, either.

 

Dr. Jack Miller is Coordinator of the Indiana Alliance for Democracy.

Monitor is a publication of the Indianapolis-based Hoosier Environmental Council

 

Michael Scherer, "The Soul of the New Machine", Mother Jones, Jan/Feb, 2004

 

http://worldfacts.us/Somalia.htm

 

Canadian Dept. of Foreign Affairs Travel Report 4-19-01

 

http://unsomalia.org/sectors/health_nutrition/stories/20001221.htm

[macalimuu]

just a year ago they were writting this! anarchists/libertarians and their opponents are following the somali experiment/dilemma very closely - while we uncivilised dummies/nomads are obsessed with our ignorance and primitive clan culture ,we are being treated as guinea-pigs- by those civilised ideologits -

 

some arguments/philosophies are at stake here - do google search to acquint yourself with their debate!

 

 

 

 

SOMALIA - THE END OF A GLORIOUS HOLIDAY?

 

 

 

Written by Julius Blumfeld (22 April 2004)

 

In 1991 the Somalian government of President Siad Barre was overthrown. It was not replaced. Uniquely amongst modern nations, Somalia has had no central government for well over a decade. There was, as the BBC puts it, a "descent into anarchy."[1] A Dutch academic has described the country as a "Hobbesian nightmare." According to Abdullah Mohammed, a fellow at the University of Amsterdam's Department of Political Science,

 

"At present, Somalia has no central government, no embassies abroad, no national army or police force, no working system of justice, no public services, no national health system or schools. Everything in Somalia is now localised and extremely privatised."

 

Dr. Mohammed laments this state of affairs. The environment is one,

 

"in which only the fittest and the richest few can survive[2] There is no public welfare to cater for the needs of the poor majority, no national authority that takes collective responsibility if a natural calamity occurs. As one foreign aid worker put it, Somalia has become a "country run by militias, merchants and mullahs" who are all pursuing their private interests rather than the public good."[3]

 

Yet, according to an EU reported cited by Spencer MacCullum writing in 1998, the absence of government in Somalia has proved to be far from disastrous,

 

"Peace reigns in most of the country. ... markets in towns and cities have a large variety of imports and local entrepreneurs were furnishing consumer products and jobs. They now provide many services normally associated with government. The lack of state structures means no bureaucratic interference. Somalis seem particularly well adapted to operating in such an environment. . . . The clan tradition makes any form of central government difficult here. . . . Somalis consider themselves born free. To them, the State equals registration, regulation and restriction."[4]

 

Somalia may not be a fully-fledged libertarian paradise. The clan system means that those who are outside of it do not always have an easy time. But compared with existence under any of the governments that have misruled Africa for the last half a century, anarchy would seem to be a huge improvement.

 

Certainly the absence of a government has long offended the sensibilities of neighbouring politicians. The presidents of Kenya and Uganda recently warned Somali delegates at the latest constitutional conference that,

 

"the process has been going on for far too long. We must not let the patience of the international community run out."[5]

 

Such scarcely veiled threats are unsurprising. The governments of Kenya and Uganda were recently ranked, respectively, the sixth and ninth most corrupt in the world.[6] For them, a functioning stateless society just across their borders must set a very bad example.

 

Finally, however, the mixture of threats and bribes from international agencies and governments seems to have born fruit. On the 29th January this year, delegates at the constitutional conference signed an agreement to establish a National Government.[7] Kenyan politicians have threatened overwhelming force against any dissenters: the Kenyan foreign minister said any attempt to frustrate the advances brokered by his country would be met with "decisive punitive measures."[8]

 

It remains to be seen whether the Somalis' bold experiment in anarchy will now finally come to an end. However, if it does, and the Somalis become subject again to the depredations of politicians and bureaucrats, they will at least be able to console themelves with the thought that for thirteen years they have had (in the memorable words of Murray Rothbard) "a glorious holiday."

 

Julius Blumfeld

 

24th February 2004

 

Julius Blumfeld is a lawyer and a libertarian. He lives and works in London and can be emailed at juliusblumfeld@btopenworld.com.

[macalimuu]

two months ago:

 

Somalia's Libertarian experiment draws to a close

 

Somalis Reach Peace Deal After Dozen Years of Fighting

By MARC LACEY

 

AIROBI, Kenya, Jan. 29 — An array of Somali warlords and clan leaders struck a deal here on Thursday that could lay the groundwork for the country's first national government since 1991.

 

Previous peace deals — there have been more than a dozen rounds of talks since 1991 — have quickly collapsed, and Western diplomats cautioned that continued clan violence could doom this accord as well.

 

But the current pact, signed by leaders of all the major warring parties, is widely regarded as more credible than earlier efforts.

 

The agreement calls for a 275-member parliament, based in Mogadishu. That body will select an interim Somali president who, in turn, will appoint a prime minister who will put together a coalition government.

 

Each of Somalia's four major clans will select 61 members of the parliament, while a coalition of smaller clans will fill the other 31 slots. But the selection process is expected to be very divisive, as each of Somalia's clans is divided into subclans that are eager for their own political voice.

 

The negotiations that led to the new agreement have stretched on since November 2002 and have been marked by fistfights, shouting matches and, until now, few achievements. There were varying opinions on Thursday on whether the deal would hold together, ultimately uniting a country that has spent more than a decade as a collection of warring fiefs.

[macalimuu]

Somalia is the quintessential failed state. After t he autocratic regime of Siad Barre fell in 1991, the country collapsed into civil war. Peace has bbeen established in some regions, but Somalia has only a limited government in the Northwest and no recognized government in the South. In these circumstances the private sector has been surprisingly innovative. Competition thrives in markets where transactions are simple, such as retail and construction. In more complex sectors, such as telecommunications and electricity supply, the private solutions are flawed but impressive: coverage has expanded since the 1980s, and prices are attractive compared with those in other African countries. Only when it comes to public goods or to private goods with strong spillover effects—roads, monetary stability, a legal system, primary education,a cross-border financial system—does the state seem to be sorely missed. But even here the private sector has developed creative approaches that partially substitute for effective government. As a result, Somalia boasts lower rates of extreme poverty and, in some cases, better infrastructure than richer countries in africa.

 

Somali entrepreneurs have used three methods to compensate for the lack of effective government regulation (table 2). First, “importing govenance †by relying on foreign institutions—for example, for airline safety, currency stability, and company law. Second, using clans and other local networks of trust to help with contract enforcement, payment, and transmission of funds. Third, simplifying transactions until they can be carried out with help from neither the clan nor the international economy.

 

Telecommunications: networks link up

 

Many local companies have teamed up with international giants such as Sprint (U.S.) and Telenor (Norway), providing mobile phones and building new landlines. Vigorous competition has pushed prices well below typical levels in Africa, and Somalia now has 112,000 fixed lines and 50,000 mobile subscribers, up from 17,000 lines before 1991. Yet not all is well. Calling every phone subscriber in Hargeisa, in the northwest, would require connections from four telephone firms. But firms in Mogadishu have now agreed on interconnection standards, and those in Hargeisa appear to be following suit. The negotiations were brokered by the Somali Telecom Association, set up with the help of the United Nations and International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and headquartered in Dubai.

 

Electricity: simple solutions yield results Entrepreneurs have worked around somalia’s lack of a functioning electricity grid, payment systems, and metering. They have divided cities into manageable quarters and provide electricity locally using secondhand generators bought in Dubai. They offer households a menu of choices (daytime, evening, or 24-hour service) and charge per lightbulb.

 

Water: access but not cheap or safe Public water provision is limited to urban areas, but a private system extends to all parts of the country as entrepreneurs build cement catchments, drill private boreholes, or ship water from public systems in the cities. Prices naturally rise in times of drought. Traditionally, destitute families have not had to pay for water, while the slightly better-off borrow funds from relatives. Nevertheless, after several years of drought the United Nations estimates that many families in the Eastern Sanaag have debts of US$50–100 for water. Moreover, access to safe water is low even by African standards because neither regulators nor the market have been able to persuade merchants to purify their water.

 

Air travel: outsourcing safety In 1989 the national carrier (partly owned by Alitalia) operated just one airplane and one international route.2 Today the sector boasts about 15 firms, more than 60 aircraft, 6 international destinations, more domestic routes, and many more flights. But safety is a concern. Airports lack trained air traffic controllers, fire services, runway lights, and a sealed perimeter against stray animals, and checks on aircraft and crew are inadequate.

 

The makeshift solution: international outsourcing. Somali carriers lease planes, often

with crews from Eastern Europe (the largest, Daallo Airlines, leases a Boeing from the United Kingdom, to boost customer confidence). And they operate out of Djibouti, Dubai, and Nairobi, using the facilities there to check aircraft safety.

 

 

A recent effort to endow Mogadishu with a functioning court collapsed when the court tried to levy taxes and take over the privately run port of El Ma’an. In any case Somalia lacks contract law,company law, the concept of limited liability, and other key pillars of commercial law. In some cases Somalis have used offshore registration of businesses to import legal concepts and services. More commonly, disputes are settled at the clan level, by traditional systems run by elders and with the clan collecting damages. Such measures are free—and fast by international standards. In a case involving the oppression of minority shareholders in a large livestock company, out-of-court talks were preferred, the company continued to operate successfully, and the dispute was settled amicably. But clan-based systems deal poorly with disputes outside the clan. In a dispute involving the telecommunications company Aerolite, the interclan committee of elders awarded the plaintiff from a weaker clan an unfairly small settlement, and since it was not enforced, he received nothing.

 

Currency: perfect competition for dollars Sharp inflation in 1994–96 and 2000–01 destroyed confidence in three local currencies. U.S. dollars are harder to forge, do not need to be carried around in large fragile bundles, and, most important, retain their value. The feeble capabilities of the central bank have allowed free entry into the currency exchange business,which is as close to perfectly competitive as is ever likely to be possible.

 

International fund transfers: hawala system The hawala system, a trust-based money transfer system used in many Muslim countries, moves US$0.5–1 billion into Somalia every year. A person in New York wishing to send money to his family in Tog-waajale gives the hawala agent in New York the sum in cash, paying a 5 percent commission. The agent deposits the cash in a local bank account to be transferred to the company bank account in Djibouti or Dubai, then alerts the clearinghouse in Hargeisa, which passes details on to Tog-waajale. When the recipient shows up, the local agent quizzes him about his clan lineage using questions provided by the relative overseas as security against fraud. The transaction is usually completed within 24 hours. Hawala networks are unregulated and do not always keep records of transactions, but they are coming under pressure from efforts to combat money laundering. Savings accounts and traveler’s checks Somalia has adopted the widespread African institution of rotating credit associations, which rely on clan links for enforcement and provide a safe haven for savings. More innovative is the system of traveler’s checks for the pilgrimage to Mecca, or hajj. Nobody would accept Somali checks, so Somali firms set up accounts in Saudi banks and write checks to pilgrims that can be cashed in any branch.

 

Gaps in private sector provision:

 

In some areas the private sector has made little progress. The Somali road system, for example, is limited and in poor condition. For a private supplier to build a road and collect fees to cover the costs is apparently too hard, partly because of prohibitive transaction costs and partly because fee-paying users are not the only ones who benefit from roads.

 

Primary education is another disappointing story. Some 71 percent of primary schools are privately owned (typically by parents or communities),but enrollment is just 17 percent. By contrast, it is 82 percent in West Africa, where countries are richer and more stable and the government is much more heavily involved in the economy. Ideally, benevolent government would sort out both problems. But government that is merely stronger might not help. Where municipal governments along the Berbera–Hargeisa road have the power to collect tolls, they do not spend them on maintenance. The failings of the education system are partly because half of Somalis are nomads. It is not clear that government would do much better, specially since the private schools are locally acknowledged to be superior to those run by local government. Rather than try to create a government system from scratch, a better policy would be to improve the network of higher-quality private schools.

 

Conclusion:

 

The achievements of the Somali private sector form a surprisingly long list. Where the private sector has failed—the list is long here too— there is a clear role for government interventions. But most such interventions appear to be failing. Government schools are of lower quality than private schools. Subsidized power is being supplied not to the rural areas that need it but to urban areas, hurting a well-functioning private industry. Road tolls are not spent on roads. Judges seem more interested in grabbing power than in developing laws and courts. A more productive role for government would be to build on the strengths of the private sector. Given Somali reliance on clan and reputation,any measures allowing these mechanisms to function more broadly would be welcome; credit and land registries would be a good start.And since Somali businesses rely heavily on institutions outside the economy, international and domestic policies supporting such connections would help. For governments and aid agencies, the capability of some business sectors to cope under the most difficult conditions should give hope and guidance in other reconstruction efforts. It may take less encouragement than is commonly

thought for stripped-down systems of finance, electricity, and telecommunications to grow.