Making a difference in Mogadishu?

The research explores how young members of the Somali diaspora, specifically those born or raised in Norway and the United States, navigate their identities and civic participation. It challenges binary views of citizenship and integration, proposing 'multi-sited embeddedness' to describe how these individuals belong to and act within multiple communities simultaneously. The study finds that civic engagement is both a result of belonging and a tool used to claim inclusion in various national and local contexts.

• The author proposes the concept of 'multi-sited embeddedness' to replace binary frameworks of citizenship, arguing that belonging and civic action are intrinsically linked and often occur across local, national, transnational, and global scales.
• Young Somali diaspora members often use civic engagement as a deliberate strategy to claim inclusion and membership in communities where they may otherwise feel excluded or perceived as 'other'.
• Return to Somalia among this demographic is typically circular and temporary rather than permanent, with many individuals staying for less than three years.
• Diaspora youth often experience a 'fluctuating sense of not belonging' in Somalia due to a lack of 'cultural stuff'—the subtle everyday cultural codes and knowledge possessed by locals.
• Civic engagement for these individuals extends beyond formal political participation to include business investments, remittances, and challenging stereotypes through their presence in the public sphere.
• In Norway, young Norwegian-Somalis face exclusionary discourses where markers such as skin color and religion place them outside the perceived national 'we', despite their own feelings of being Norwegian.

APA

Horst, C. (n.d.). Making a difference in Mogadishu? Peace Research Institute Oslo. https://cdn.cloud.prio.org/files/e9779055-8900-4fcf-aa6b-656e3bc84a3c/Making a difference in Mogadishu.pdf?inline=true

Chicago

Horst, Cindy. Making a difference in Mogadishu? Peace Research Institute Oslo, n.d. https://cdn.cloud.prio.org/files/e9779055-8900-4fcf-aa6b-656e3bc84a3c/Making a difference in Mogadishu.pdf?inline=true.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Horst |first1=Cindy |title=Making a difference in Mogadishu? |publisher=Peace Research Institute Oslo |url=https://cdn.cloud.prio.org/files/e9779055-8900-4fcf-aa6b-656e3bc84a3c/Making a difference in Mogadishu.pdf?inline=true |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{horstndmaking, author = {Horst, Cindy}, title = {{Making a difference in Mogadishu?}}, institution = {Peace Research Institute Oslo}, url = {https://cdn.cloud.prio.org/files/e9779055-8900-4fcf-aa6b-656e3bc84a3c/Making a difference in Mogadishu.pdf?inline=true}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }