Underdevelopment in Somalia: Dictatorship without Hegemony

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Periodical article

Title:	Underdevelopment in Somalia: Dictatorship without Hegemony
Author:	Samatar, Ahmed I.
Year:	1985
Periodical:	Africa Today
Volume:	32
Issue:	3
Period:	3rd Quarter
Pages:	23-40
Language:	English
Geographic term:	Somalia
Subjects:	political conditions economic conditions 1960-1969 1970-1979 1980-1989 Politics and Government Development and Technology Economics and Trade
External link:	https://www.jstor.org/stable/4186304
Abstract:	By deploying Gramscian theoretical concepts of 'dictatorship' and 'hegemony' the author lays bare, in a macro form, the marked dissonance between the Somali regime's pronouncements and the empirical political and economic record of more than a dozen years of military rule. The ruling Somali petty bourgeoisie and the state structures they have controlled since the current regime came to power in 1969, despite the initial mass enthusiasm, have failed miserably: political turpitude, economic involution, and the rise of a malignant and cruel dictatorship are increasingly evident. Only by establishing a new and positive hegemony, through substantially different class alliances and the constitution of a more competent and progressive ideological bloc, can Somalia hope to move beyond militaristic despotism, primordial atavism, war and violence, hunger and destitution. Notes.