Close analysis of how non-state actors adapt to state collapse is critical for effective strategies of peace building, development, and counter-terrorism in those crises. In Somalia, the nature of state collapse has changed significantly since 1995. Armed conflict is more localized; lawlessness is better contained by local authorities; and warlords have been weakened by an emerging commercial elite whose interests lie in stability, not plunder. Risk-aversion drives political behaviour and partially explains the reluctance of local elites to support a revived central government. Somalia has to date not been particularly attractive as a safe haven for terrorists due to the risk of betrayal and extortion foreigners face there. Instead, terrorist networks have used Somalia principally as a short-term transshipment site into Kenya. Efforts to revive a central state in Somalia risk creating a "paper state" - one which lacks a capacity to govern and is prone to police corruption, providing an environment in which terrorist networks thrive.

This work explores Somalia's state collapse and the security threats posed by Somalia's prolonged crisis. Communities are reduced to lawlessness, and the interests of commercial elites have shifted towards rule of law, but not a revived central state. Terrorists have found Somalia inhospitable, using it mainly for short-term transshipment.

Spanning the period from the cold war to the 'war on terror', examines the political economy dynamics of security and insecurity on the continent, as well as its implications for political actions. More than any other part of the globe, Africa has become associated with conflict, insecurity and human rights atrocities. In the popular imagination and the media, overpopulation, environmental degradation and ethnic hatred dominate accounts of African violence, while in academic and policy-making circles, conflict and insecurity have also come to occupy centre stage, with resource-hungry warlords and notions of 'greed' and 'grievance' playing key explanatory roles. Since the attacks of 9/11, there has also been mounting concern that the continent's so-called 'ungoverned spaces' will provide safe havens for terrorists intent on destroying Western civilization. The Review of African Political Economy has engaged extensively with issues of conflict and security, both analysing on-going conflicts and often challenging predominant modes of explanation and interpretation. This Review of African Political Economy Reader provides a timely, comprehensive and critical contribution to contemporary debates about conflict and security on the continent. The first section, covers some of the continent's main post-Cold War conflicts and demonstrates their global connections. The articles also discuss the so-called 'resource curse', as well as the global arms trade, and reveal the complexities of the relationship between the economic and the political. The second section focuses on security as part of post-Cold War global governance, and discusses the effects of liberal peace-building as well as the link between development assistance and the 'war on terror'. The final section examines life as it continues in conditions of war and shows how insecurity reconfigures urban space, transforms social order, identities and authority. Rita Abrahamsen is Professor in the Graduate School of Publicand International Affairs, University of Ottawa, Canada Published in association with ROAPE ROAPE African Readers Series Editors: Tunde Zack-Williams & Ray Bush