The Al-Shabaab Series: How Al-Shabaab Recruits
Hello delegates!
I hope your research is going well. This is the second post in the Al Shabaab series. If you haven't already you should read the first post in the series. This post will cover some of the recruitment strategies employed by the group within their base of Somalia.
The name Al-Shabaab translates to "the youth". This is very much reflected in their recruitment strategies. A number of independent research studies have found that the organization's target recruitment demographic is boys aged 9 - 15. The UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres stated in 2017 that he believes that more than 50% of Al Shabaab militants are children. Additionally, a UN task force found that over 4000 children, predominantly boys, were recruited between 2010 and 2016. In addition to young boys, Al-Shabaab recruits women. This is because women are less conspicuous than men and can, therefore, more effectively carry out attacks. Additionally, female members can be used as a recruitment tool to entice adolescent boys.
You can read more about Al-Shabaab recruitment strategies below:
https://www.counterextremism.com/threat/al-shabab
https://www.ecoi.net/en/document/1424586.html
https://gsdrc.org/document-library/radicalisation-and-al-shabaab-recruitment-in-somalia/
I hope your research is going well. This is the second post in the Al Shabaab series. If you haven't already you should read the first post in the series. This post will cover some of the recruitment strategies employed by the group within their base of Somalia.
Targets
Tactics
The group employs a number of strategies to gain new recruits. However, they can be put into two major groups:- Conscription: one of the main ways Al-Shabaab gets new recruits is through involuntary enlistment. This happens through kidnappings and annexation of villages and towns where there is little to no government presence. Effectively combating this form of Al-Shabaab recruitment will require increased government security presence in rural parts of Somalia. It is important to note, that this requires increased police presence not simply bolstered military efforts. As such, any effective solution requires the compliance of local governments.
- Promises of elevated social status: another popular tactic is offering young uneducated, underprivileged boys stipends, an islamic education and wives if they enlist. Many Al Shabaab recruits feel they have no other means of attaining these things and therefore see enlistment as their only option. This recruitment strategy shows that terrorist activity cannot be decoupled from socioeconomic conditions. That is to say, it is impossible to eradicate terrorism in the Horn of Africa without addressing the various socio economic issues the region faces.
- Propaganda: the third tactic employed by Al-Shabaab during recruitment is the widespread dissemination of Propaganda. One of particularly interesting form of propaganda the group employs is nationalist rhetoric. They take advantage of widespread anti-western sentiments to create the perception that the Somali government are "infidels" who are conspiring with foreign powers to deplete the country's natural resources and eradicate Somali culture. This presents a challenge when developing solutions within committee. Increased foreign intervention plays to Al-Shabaab’s recruitment strategy. Preventing this will require changing public perception of the government and foreign powers.
You can read more about Al-Shabaab recruitment strategies below:
https://www.counterextremism.com/threat/al-shabab
https://www.ecoi.net/en/document/1424586.html
https://gsdrc.org/document-library/radicalisation-and-al-shabaab-recruitment-in-somalia/
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteHi everyone! As the United Kingdom, we think it's most important to focus on the 39% of Al-Shabaab members who joined because of the economic opportunities provided and stayed for the community. With Somalia's government (or lack of it) as it stands, it's really hard to implement economic policies with government intervention alone. Because of the difficulties, we've created a solution to deal with the fiscal crisis and would love to address it more in committee!
ReplyDeleteUnited Kingdom,
DeleteThe delegation of Peru would love to hear more about how you plan to tackle the economic side of this issue!
In addition to addressing the fiscal aspects of Al-shabaab recruitment, the delegation of Peru intends to turn the focus of the committee to marginalized women. Concerning numbers of Kenyan women have either willingly or unwillingly traveled to Somalia to join Al-shabaab. The UN Security Council has already been involved in Somalia to prevent recruitment, but the empowerment of Somalian and Kenyan women is where our current efforts are lacking. As such, we plan to focus on solutions that will effectively increase the involvement of women in anti-recruitment across the region.
United States
ReplyDeleteThe United States recognizes the pivotal role foreign intervention can have on nations in conflict. As for the case of recruitment by terrorist groups, we also recognize that the minimal to no governmental presence within numerous regions of Somalia provides a gateway for such terrorist recruitment. To deter this form of enlistment, we proposed a method to unify interstate, foreign actors in the region to establish targeted zones where this can be prevented in our position paper. After reading the article, we wonder if the creation of gender-targeted awareness programs are necessary to implement seeing as boys are more frequently targeted for recruitment, at least on a general scale.
- The United States of America