This social anthropological overview of the Somali people, their social institutions and their beliefs, based on first-hand research
(as well as documentary evidence) since the 1950s, is intended to provide a brief introduction to key features of Somali life past and present. Originally written in 1978, the text has been exhaustively revised and updated. It now deals at length with the political
changes that have befallen Somalia since the overthrow of the dictator General Muhammad Siyad Barre and the state’s anarchic
collapse in 1990/91. Given the amount of external intervention since then, it is a depressing commentary on the quality of international engagement that so little of a worthwhile nature has been accomplished.
The most positive political achievement has taken place quite independently, without this costly and ineffective international
intervention. This is the formation and consolidation of the democratic state of Somaliland which dissolved its union with Somalia
in 1991.
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