Social media and the transnational everyday: Mobility, opportunity and risk in Hargeisa, Somaliland
Online and social media connectivity has increased rapidly across cities in the Horn of Africa, particularly amongst younger generations. Taking the post-conflict city of Hargeisa—capital of the de facto independent Republic of Somaliland—as its starting point, this report focuses on how educated young men engage with digital and social media platforms in relation to both […]
What next for the Juba Peace Agreement after the coup in Sudan?
The 25 October coup in Sudan saw the military component of the transitional government assert itself over its civilian counterpart. In the weeks since, attention has mostly focused on events in Khartoum, but the coup, which was actively or tacitly supported by several of Sudan’s opposition groups, reveals much about how the military has successfully […]
Trade, taxes and tensions in the Somali borderlands
Cross-border trade is crucial for ongoing state building in the Somali inhabited Horn of Africa. This is significantly enabled by revenue collection at border crossings, which forms a crucial part of states’ finances in this region. Cross-border trade is also a key factor in cooperation, and sometimes conflict, between states and the communities that live […]
Contested Commerce: Revenue and state-making in the Galkayo borderlands
Situated between Somalia’s Federal Member States of Puntland and Galmudug, the city of Galkayo forms an administrative and social boundary within the broader Bosaso trade corridor, which encompasses Puntland, Galmudug and Hirshabelle. Located at the edge of Puntland but at the heart of the Bosaso corridor, Galkayo is a geographical paradox. The city is simultaneously […]
Regularly Irregular: Varieties of informal trading in the Ethiopia-Somaliland borderlands
In Somaliland and Ethiopia’s Somali Regional State, small-scale informal trading far exceeds formal trade. However, most recent writing on trade in this region has disproportionately focused on formal trade thus neglecting a key area of economic activity. In contrast, Regularly Irregular: Varieties of informal trading in the Ethiopia-Somaliland borderlands, focuses on the Gaashamo corridor—a series […]
Lasanod: City at the margins. The politics of borderland trade between Somaliland and Puntland
Lasanod is located on the border between the Republic of Somaliland and Somalia’s federal state of Puntland. Now under the administrative control of Somaliland, the city is contested— sometimes violently— between the two polities, which are both products of Somalia’s post-1991 state-building project. Lasanod: City at the Margins examines the economic and political consequences of […]
Unequal Adaptations: A history of environmental change in the Sudan-Eritrea-Ethiopia border region
The Sudan-Eritrea-Ethiopia border region has long been a place of deep interconnection. Historically, collaboration across ethno-linguistic and religious divides allowed communities to develop life-sustaining complementary strategies for utilizing the region’s natural resources. These traditional patterns of human-environment interaction both offered protection from the region’s normal interannual environmental variability and minimized the harmful effects of droughts, […]
XCEPT research consortium (formerly X-border local research network)
Aims and Objectives Beginning in March 2018, the X-Border Local Research Network is a research consortium aimed at developing a better understanding of the causes and implications of conflict in the border areas of north-east Africa, the Middle East and Asia. This project is part of a broader FCDO programme, X (Cross) Border Conflict – […]
From Dust to Dollar: Gold mining and trade in the Sudan-Ethiopia borderland
From Dust to Dollar focuses on the borderland region between Sudan and Ethiopia, using gold-mining and trade to examine transnational flows of people and commodities across its semi-permeable frontier. Gold mining has shifted from being part of a long-term, family- and community-based livelihood strategy to a short-term entrepreneurial pursuit. Mining is increasingly dominated by the […]
How the Ever Given gave us a lesson in chokepoint politics
Jatin Dua – Associate Professor of Anthropology, University of Michigan. After six days stationary in the Suez Canal, the Ever Given—a Panamanian-flagged container ship traveling from Malaysia to the Netherlands—was finally unstuck and able to continue its journey. While the name Ever Given will soon become a piece of trivia associated with a temporary blocking […]