By: Mohamed Mukhtar Ibrahim
Sunday September 27, 2026
I had the opportunity to attend the 4th PDRC Annual Peace Conference, held from 21 to 23 September 2026 in Garowe, Somalia, where I presented a paper titled: “Has Somalia’s Political Settlement Collapsed or Is It Being Reconfigured?”
The question was deliberately provocative because Somalia’s current political moment is increasingly being described in two very different ways. On one side are those who argue that Somalia’s political settlement has collapsed. On the other are those who argue that the constitutional amendments are complete, the rules have changed, and Somalia has therefore completed its political reconfiguration.
I believe both extremes miss what is happening.
I asked the same question again after the presentation.
The most interesting result was the movement in opinion. The largest shift came from participants who initially believed that the political settlement had completely collapsed. Following the discussion and evidence presented in the paper, many moved toward the middle position: Somalia’s political settlement still exists, but it is under severe strain and is being reconfigured.
That distinction matters.
The first extreme: “The political settlement has collapsed”
There are serious reasons why some observers reach this conclusion.
Somalia has experienced deep disagreements over constitutional authority, electoral arrangements, federal–state relations, presidential and parliamentary mandates, and the rules governing political competition. Relations between the Federal Government and some Federal Member States have deteriorated. Opposition actors have challenged the legitimacy of the constitutional process and the extension of institutional mandates. The traditional mechanisms through which political elites negotiated power are under considerable pressure.
These are not minor disagreements. They go to the foundations of political authority.
Yet saying the political settlement has completely collapsed goes beyond what the evidence supports.
A political settlement is not simply an agreement written in a constitution. It consists of formal institutions, informal bargains, political expectations and mechanisms through which powerful actors negotiate and manage competition. Federalism, clan-based political inclusion, parliamentary institutions and negotiated mechanisms of political competition have shaped Somalia's post-2012 political order.
Important elements of that order remain.
Federalism has not disappeared. Political actors continue to contest how federalism should work, where authority lies, and how powers should be exercised. But disagreement over federalism is not the same as rejection of federalism itself.
Political bargaining has not disappeared. Somali political actors continue to negotiate over mandates, institutions, elections, representation, and political authority. Bargaining has become more difficult and increasingly concerns the rules themselves, but it remains part of the political landscape.
State institutions continue to function. Parliament, ministries, Federal Member State institutions and other bodies continue their daily operations. Political disputes have not produced wholesale institutional collapse.
Clan-based political inclusion remains relevant. Even as Somalia moves toward direct elections, political actors continue to consider representation, inclusion and political balance through established forms of political bargaining.
And critically, Somalia has not descended into sustained nationwide political conflict between competing political elites. There have been serious confrontations, but these have not resulted in the kind of wholesale institutional breakdown that would provide stronger evidence of total settlement collapse.
So, the argument that the settlement is under severe strain is more consistent with the evidence than the argument that it has completely disappeared.
The second extreme: “The new political order is already complete”
The opposite argument is equally problematic.
Somalia has made significant constitutional and institutional changes. The amendments introduced important changes to the formal rules governing political authority, including the move toward a five-year institutional cycle and the transition toward direct elections. The country has also started conducting local elections that have tested elements of the emerging electoral architecture. These are major developments. But institutional change is not the same thing as a completed political settlement.
A constitution can be amended. Parliament can approve new rules. Institutions can adopt new procedures. Elections can be organized.
But a political settlement becomes durable only when the principal political actors accept, accommodate, or at least sufficiently recognize the rules governing political competition.
This is where the distinction between legal validity and political legitimacy becomes important.
A reform may be legally adopted through procedures recognized by state institutions while remaining politically contested by important actors. Conversely, political rejection of a reform does not automatically render it legally invalid. From a political-settlement perspective, the question is whether the new rules have acquired sufficient political acceptance to regulate competition over time.
That acceptance has not yet been demonstrated.
The constitutional amendments remain politically contested. Disagreements persist over mandates, electoral timing, federal authority, the relationship between the Federal Government and Federal Member States, and the institutional arrangements for the transition.
The same applies to direct elections.
Significant institutional movement toward direct elections exists, but the political debate is no longer simply whether Somalia should have one-person, one-vote elections. It is increasingly about how those elections will be administered, when they will take place, who controls the process, how federal and state elections will relate to one another, and what institutions have legitimate authority during the transition.
That means the political reconfiguration is ongoing, not finished.
The space between the two extremes
This is where I believe the most useful analysis lies. Somalia's political settlement has neither collapsed nor consolidated a new political order. Instead, the country is experiencing what can best be described as a contested reconfiguration.
The old arrangements are under pressure. Some formal rules are changing. New institutions and electoral mechanisms are emerging. Political actors are challenging existing distributions of authority. But the new configuration has not yet acquired sufficient political acceptance to become a settled order. This creates a critical middle phase.
The old bargains are weakening, but the new bargains are not yet consolidated. That helps explain an apparent contradiction in Somalia today: institutions can continue functioning while political legitimacy remains contested.
This is not necessarily evidence of political settlement collapse. Nor is institutional functioning evidence that a new settlement has already been achieved. Institutional change can move faster than political agreement. Indeed, this may be the defining feature of Somalia's current political moment.
Why the distinction matters
If we describe Somalia as having completely collapsed, we risk overlooking the institutions and political mechanisms that continue to operate and through which a new accommodation could still be negotiated. If we describe Somalia as having already completed its political transition, we risk overlooking the unresolved disagreements that could undermine the durability of the emerging rules.
Both interpretations therefore obscure an important reality. The central issue is not simply whether Somalia has a new constitution. It is whether Somalia has a new political bargain around the constitution. The distinction is fundamental.
Re-engineering formal constitutional rules does not automatically establish a new political settlement unless the key political actors accept the new rules of political competition.
This is why constitutional, electoral and federal disputes should not be viewed as isolated crises. They are interconnected components of a broader contest over who has the authority to define the rules of political competition.
What happens next matters more than what we call it
Whether Somalia ultimately emerges with a more consolidated political order will depend less on the existence of new constitutional text and more on whether political actors can reach sufficient accommodation around the rules governing competition.
The question, therefore, should not be:
“Has Somalia changed its Constitution?”
The more important questions are: Do the principal political actors accept the new rules? Can Federal Government and Federal Member State disputes be managed through predictable mechanisms?
Can the transition to direct elections be agreed on in terms of sequencing, administration, representation and dispute resolution? Can political inclusion be maintained as the country moves away from negotiated indirect elections? And perhaps most importantly:
Can Somalia rebuild a shared understanding of the rules of political competition? These questions will determine whether today's reconfiguration eventually becomes a durable political settlement.
The lesson from Garowe
The discussion at the PDRC conference reinforced for me why political analysis must resist easy conclusions.
Somalia is undoubtedly experiencing a profound political transformation. But transformation should not automatically be called collapse, and constitutional change should not automatically be called consolidation.
The evidence points to something more complicated—and potentially more consequential.
Somalia is in a critical middle phase where old political bargains are decaying, new institutional arrangements are emerging, but the political accommodation required to make those arrangements durable remains incomplete.
The core takeaway is therefore simple:
Institutional redesign cannot deliver stability without political accommodation.
Somalia's political settlement has neither collapsed nor consolidated a new order. It is undergoing a contested reconfiguration.
The challenge now is not merely to defend the old order or declare the new one complete. It is to rebuild shared rules of political competition that Somalia's principal political actors—and ultimately its citizens—can recognize as sufficiently legitimate, inclusive and durable.
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Mohamed Mukhtar Ibrahim
[email protected]
