For our blog topic this week, we are doing “failed states.” A failed state is a country that has no government or their government is currently failing. Now those states are pretty much living in anarchy. In the first article what I took away from it was that it doesn’t always necessarily mean that your country is going to fail because of its location or resources available; it’s the people who make it work. There are countries that are rich in resources, but yet still find themselves desperate for help. Not to say that countries with little resources will succeed, but it’s the people of the country who are either going to make or break it. Location also plays a big part in whether the country will succeed. If you’re surrounded by nations, it is more likely that the government will be unstable. But overall, it’s the people who really determine if the country is going to come out on top. The United States is a great example of this, starting from scratch, coming out of the Great Depression and things like that.The next article I read was about the current state of the nation of Somalia. Somalia is in a desperate state right now. They have been ranked number one on the failed states list for the past two years! I'm so glad to be living here in America where things have never been that bad.For Somalia, things really started falling apart after Europeans started arriving and breaking up their clan systems. In this system, there were 5 clans. Each clan kinda just fended for themselves and had the young people do all the dirty work. They would steal from other tribes, and as long as they had permission from their clan leader, this was considered acceptable. I think it's wrong to do things like that, and any time you have a system like that, it's bound for failure. Another key point was when they overthrew their dictator Mohammed Siad Barre. This happened in 1995, and ever since, the country has been in complete and utter chaos.There are pirates who dock on the coast of Somalia because they know that with the state it is in right now, nothing will be done, no one will try to catch them. The only thing that's really left of Somalia now is the city of Mogadishu, and that is pretty well destroyed. You can tell that it used to be beautiful, which is one of the sadest things about it. People take refuge in abandoned lighthouses, like the one above, that's how bad it is over there. There are refugee camps they can go to, but some of the Somalians have a die hard attitude and want to remain in Somalia until they die. I think they would just be better off going to these camps instead of sitting around waiting to die. Let the UN step in and take control, and when it is back under control, then go back and start over with your family. Right now, it sounds like anything would be better than the current situations they're in over there.
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