Insurgent engagement with kinship group authorities: production of order and governance in Somalia’s Lower Jubba province

ABSTRACT This paper explores the interactions between Islamist insurgents and kinship-based communities in southern Somalia’s Lower Jubba province in the period of 2006–2012. It demonstrates how Islamist insurgents were able to manoeuvre in a complex sociopolitical landscape, distinguished by various clan and sub-clan groups, and establish a relatively stable and predictable system of order and governance unprecedented in the Somali Civil War. The insurgents’ success, this paper argues, rests on a combination of several related and simultaneous processes which all involved various levels of interactions between the Islamist rulers and local institutions. While the reformist-minded insurgents instilled fear through the application of violence, corporal punishment, and moral policing, they also displayed deep local knowledge, sensitivity, and a pragmatic approach to local institutions, successfully balancing the fine line between divisive ‘clan politics’ and the risk of alienating local power constellations.