Situated polycrises: Somali responses to COVID-19

In: International affairs, Band 101, Heft 1, S. 233-252

Open Access

Abstract

Abstract
This article interrogates the concept of polycrisis through a case-study of Somali perceptions of and responses to the COVID-19 pandemic, introducing the notion of situated polycrises. Inspired by Heidegger's thinking on thrownness and Haraway's on situated knowledges, the term 'situated polycrises' underscores the importance of localized perspectives in understanding global crises, challenging universal narratives about their nature and effect. Based on a collective multi-sited methodology with insights from 14 locations in east African and western countries, we examine how Somalis navigated the pandemic amid ongoing emergencies, highlighting the interplay of social, political and cultural factors that influence crisis perceptions and responses. We show that for Somalis drought constitutes a crisis baseline, and that family-related support intensified while collective crisis response occurred at a low level except in the UK, putting claims that COVID-19 was an unprecedented crisis into perspective. We further argue against understanding polycrisis as a novel phenomenon, suggesting that in regions like Somali-inhabited east Africa, where multiple emergencies have intertwined and reinforced one another for decades, the pandemic occurred in an overall context of a long-term polycrisis. We thereby contribute to the nascent literature on polycrisis, both as perceived and confronted from below and in a transnational social field perspective.