The state's contribution to social order in national societies : Somalia as an illustrative case

There is a growing evidence that the spontaneous emergence of cooperation in dyads and small groups is possible without external enforcement. This has led some to conclude that social order is possible without the state. We criticize this conclusion by first drawing a distinction between local and global orders, and then noting that the mechanism producing local orders in some groups reduce those in others. The paper will conclude that the state, acting as a third-party enforcer, is necessary for the maintenance of global order in heterogeneous societies; external enforcement is neccessary for the production of global orders precisely because local orders are possible without it. We will use evidence from the recent events in Somalia to illustrate our argument