Women's Role in Peacekeeping and Peace-Building in Somalia

Introduction

Women have an important role to play in peacekeeping and resolving societal conflicts. In their traditional roles, women are already expected to negotiate agreements within families, as heads of households, as community members, and increasingly as peace activists.

This paper examines the role that women have played in building and keeping peace in Somalia. It looks at whether the participation of women in the peace process leads to greater social recognition of women's rights. It also examines which factors can become obstacles to the greater participation of women in peace-building and decision-making.

The first part of this paper looks at the status of women in Somalia, with a special focus on legal protections for women's rights today. The second part then examines how women's organizations have participated in the peace-making and peace-building process. Special emphasis is given to the unconventional methods that Somali women have used to influence political policies, including the utilization of kinship and personal connections and other forms of advocacy.

In the conclusion, this paper examines whether these roles in peace-building have resulted in the greater participation of women in public life. In Somalia, despite playing an invaluable role in bringing about peace, the gains for Somali women have been limited. For larger reforms to continue and for the building of true gender equality, women need access to clan-based and regional political structures. Greater macroeconomic reforms, such as addressing concerns raised by privatization, would also improve the status of women in Somalia.

Finally, this paper argues that for the establishment of true gender equity, women should continue their work amid these challenging situations. Somali women had already initiated much reform amid conditions of famine, conflict, and war. Their pioneering work remains sorely needed to generate true structural reforms and usher in gender equity in Somalia.

Women's Status in Somalia

In many respects, Somalia reflects traditional gender roles found throughout the African continent. Unlike many countries in the West, there remains a very distinct division of labor between men and women. Men are charged with being the economic breadwinners for their families (Gardner 22). They are generally seen as the heads of the family, and they have greater access to participation in political and other aspects of public life.

Women, in contrast, occupy revered positions in private life. The tasks of caregiving for members of large, extended, and blended families often fall on women. Somali women are also charged with taking care of the home and, by extension, fields and livestock (Gardner 34). When they do participate in economic life, it is often through the informal or underground economy.

Somalia is a patriarchal society, and this social organization shapes the rights of women. The defining roles of Somali women are therefore related to childbearing, child-rearing, and the myriad other tasks of the home. Within the nomadic and agricultural structures of Somali economic life, the responsibilities of women are predefined (Gardner 62). Women live within these strictures, as formal decision-making falls on the male head of the household.

These roles are defined quite early in a Somali girl's life. Somali society takes extreme pride in family ties, and the behavior and honor of girls and women therefore reflect on their entire family. The importance of one's natal family is further stressed by the cultural practice of keeping one's surname rather than adopting that of the husband's. Somali tradition dictates that a woman keeps her father's surname, identifying her birth family even after marriage (Gardner 61).

In many poor families, the birth of a female child is not a cause for celebration. Boys are the preferred children, since males are able to engage in paid labor. Girls, on the other hand, can be seen as burdens or risks. If they engage in socially deviant behavior, girls can face severe punishment for bringing "shame" to their families (Mire). These punishments include the use of physical force; slapping, beating, and caning are commonplace.

This dynamic can change upon marriage, especially since polygyny is common in Somali society. Polyandry, however, is strictly forbidden, as are sexual relations outside marriage. Additionally, while Somali law allows daughters to inherit property, they can only inherit half the amount to which their brothers are entitled. Furthermore, in areas governed by traditional Muslim Shari'a laws, the families of female homicide victims are entitled to only half the compensation paid when the victim is male (U.S. Department of State). This disparity exists ostensibly because of the greater economic livelihood lost with the death of a male family member.

While significant differences exist between the lives of nomadic, rural, and urban women, the gendered division of labor permeates all aspects of Somali society. Unlike their male counterparts, girls are not expected or encouraged to pursue an education. Boys often attend day schools, while girls are initiated into household chores and caregiving tasks.

Somalia is not a signatory to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW). There is also a distinct lack of legal instruments protecting the rights of women. For example, there are no minimum age laws concerning marriage, and young girls are routinely married off to much older men. There are no laws against spousal rape. Furthermore, while laws against rape do exist, they are difficult to enforce. In 2005, for example, there were no officially reported cases of rape in Somalia. However, many non-governmental organizations reported rapes committed by police and militia members. Rapes also occur in the context of inter-clan conflicts, and many victims are said to be refugees displaced by civil war or members of minority clans (U.S. Department of State).

For the victims, the crime of rape is further compounded by the way sexual relations outside marriage reflect upon the family. Family reactions could range from ignoring a girl's rape to sustained discrimination due to her perceived "impurity." A rape victim also has virtually no access to protections against unwanted pregnancy or sexually transmitted diseases.

The practice of infibulation, more widely known as female genital mutilation (FGM), is also widely practiced in Somalia. While the practice is illegal, laws against FGM are not widely enforced. The lack of reliable statistics and cultural practices that valorize FGM make it difficult to assess the full extent of the problem (UNIFEM).

In summary, even in the best of times, the lives of Somali women are governed by social strictures. They are compelled to carve out lives within the strict social parameters of second-class citizenship, which place severe limitations on women's participation in public life.

Conflict and Somali Women

The collapse of central government in Somalia in 1991 plunged the country into chaos. Fighting erupted among rival factions and clans, and thousands starved as the international community scrambled to mount a humanitarian response. The fighting and resultant displacement of thousands of Somalis affected women the hardest, due to their secondary social positions and the patriarchal nature of Somali society.

After dictator Mohamed Siad Barre was deposed in 1991, there was a pronounced decrease in women's participation in the public sphere. During Barre's 22-year regime, women had served in various public positions — in the military, as ambassadors, and in the judiciary. Their visibility was severely diminished in the ensuing conflict (UNIFEM).

Civil unrest and famine made it more difficult for women to regain their former positions. As food insecurity increased, women were placed in more vulnerable situations. They needed to venture further from the safety of their households to find food and other basic necessities, which in turn placed them at greater risk for rape and other violent acts.

The absence of a central government also helped usher in the growing influence of traditional Shari'a laws. By 1994, Shari'a courts were extending their jurisdiction beyond traditional civil and family law cases to include criminal proceedings (UNIFEM). Many of these laws run counter to women's interests. For example, a woman who commits adultery or engages in sexual relations outside marriage could be subject to death by stoning.

Somali women were also hard-hit by many indirect effects of civil unrest. In a country that never had a strong health system to begin with, Somalis suffered further from deteriorating health infrastructure. Women were at a particular disadvantage, as Somalia already had one of the highest maternal mortality and morbidity rates in the world (UNIFEM).

In the growing civil conflict and amid the absence of central government, clans increasingly dominated Somali public life. The rise of clan politics sparked additional dangers for women, who often became pawns and victims in inter-clan conflicts, facing assault and rape in escalating clan violence.

The Somali conflict further eroded legal protections for the already-disadvantaged Somali woman. There are currently three systems of law competing for dominance in Somalia: customary, civil, and Shari'a law. Each system already offers inadequate protections for women, and there is the additional complication of contradictions among them. There are no meaningful interventions for women who face abuse or assault. Furthermore, since the beginning of the conflict, there has been a dearth of women's input and participation in public life (Security Council).

In Somalia, war and civil conflict resulted in a shrinking of opportunities for women in public life. Women were further burdened by threats of violence and by the mounting difficulty of meeting their household and caregiving duties. The inadequate and conflicting protections offered by the various Somali legal systems placed women at further risk.

Conclusion

In the case of Somalia, the involvement and representation of women at the peace table resulted in the Arta Convention and the TNC — the country's only lasting peace charter. The participation of women also helped the delegates draft a Charter that expressed political commitment to women's rights. The TNC provided institutional frameworks within which to begin significant reform.

Even more significant, the fact that women from different regional clans were able to come together as a "sixth clan" highlighted the possibility of inter-clan cooperation. Analysts had initially believed that, due to clan politics, it would be impossible to forge a national identity for Somalia. However, as the women demonstrated, it is quite possible to form alliances even across clan lines, provided that participants share key interests.

Despite these promising starts, there are still significant challenges in implementing all the provisions of the TNC and generating genuine reform. While women's representation in the TNA is a good start, it risks remaining a nominal gesture. Women's grassroots organizations continue to draw attention to the plight of women in times of conflict, and individual women provide linkages between clans and strive to influence policy. To ensure that their work is successful, women's grassroots organizations and TNA representatives alike need to address important ongoing challenges.

First, Somali women's activists must remain vigilant. The allocation of women's seats in the TNA was acclaimed as a landmark in Somali women's rights. However, there is a danger of losing momentum and falling into complacency regarding women's rights. It is therefore important for women's groups to continue working toward greater gender equity in Somalia.

Second, as the failure of earlier charters demonstrated, any successful power-sharing scheme must take into account the existing social and political structures of society. Previous charters failed because they imposed state-based power-sharing models on a country divided along clan lines. The inclusion of women — who can hold membership in two or more clans — provided important bridges on which to build broader, lasting alliances.

Third, aside from formal political processes, there are many other opportunities to influence policy change. Somali women, for example, focused on the necessary tasks of rebuilding communities in the wake of civil strife. Because no one else had taken charge of these tasks, grassroots organizations built considerable credibility and goodwill in their communities — goodwill that in turn gave women's organizations a platform from which to initiate social change.

In Somalia and other areas of conflict, women's groups have shown how critical their work remains in the arenas of peacekeeping and peace-building. The inclusion of gender equity issues in structural reform is key to building the foundations for a lasting peace. In the case of Somalia, whether women continue to provide input into the implementation of lasting peace and continuing development, however, remains to be seen.

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