Description:In its first part, the book (all in German) provides a basic overview over Somali society and culture and then elborates on the political history from colonialism to the civil war. Its second part focusses on international and local attempts to build peace and local order. It deals with the UN and US interventions in Somalia 1992-1995 and attempts by an international NGO to create district councils. It then presents the bottom-up process of peace and statebuilding in northwest Somalia/Somaliland in the 1990s, which wunfolded without much international support. In its conclusion the book highlights the advantages of local, bottom-up approaches to peace and state building over externally driven attempts in that regard.