Globalization is a cyclical phenomena with an engine characterized by technical developments that have made it possible to compress ever more the spatio-temporal dimension, which is the one that generates the most challenges for humanity. This influence may be felt in varied degrees of severity all across the world, but it is more noticeable in advanced or developing economies, but it does not prohibit less developed civilizations from feeling it.
Growing information technology has an influence on all areas of globalization: the economic, technological, and communication components of globalization, which has resulted in an ever-increasing reliance on the internet and other current modes of communication on the part of mankind. A complicated phenomena, globalization manifests itself in many different ways and has a broad variety of ramifications on people and the environment. The word “globalization” refers to a concept that has been around for a long time and has taken on a variety of forms depending on the historical period in which it was first introduced to the public. The motivating causes behind this phenomenon were those who wanted to gain fortune, discover new resources, expand their influence over a certain group, and explore new locations (Addo, 2011).
As expansionist inclinations and civilizational collisions gave rise to conflicts, economic and cultural interactions were the first indicators of globalization. These were swiftly followed by military activities as a result of the collision of civilizations and expansionist tendencies. Globalization grew more frequent as technology advanced and long-distance communication became more widespread. This contributed to an overall increase in the frequency of globalization as the world’s pulse sped. For example, when it comes to the relationship between globalization and security, we can say that society is changing as a result of growing interdependencies and the difficulty of interactions between nations, and the accumulation of obstacles necessitates an uniform framework and mutual endeavors. This is because “globalization is the particularly dynamic process of increasing interdependencies between national states as a result of the expansion and deepening of international relations,” (Bari, 2003). To achieve global solutions, there must be a shared knowledge of the issue, increased cooperation in identifying problems and solutions, and collaboration in addressing difficulties in all areas, especially security.
Economic integration and liberalization, an engine of global harmony and stability, have emerged as a result of globalization, giving people throughout the globe reason to be hopeful. Globalization has resulted in a higher feeling of political and economic stability throughout the globe, thanks to the increased collaboration between states that has resulted. As a consequence of globalization, East Africa’s political and economic issues persist, resulting in instability and economic hardship in Kenya and other East African countries. Even in Kenya and other East African nations, globalization is considered as the primary driver of political and economic instability. Smuggling of people and goods, money laundering, poaching, Indian Ocean piracy, guns, narcotics and human trafficking have all been recorded by members of the East African Community. Among the most serious threats to security in the East African Community is global terrorist groups, particularly in light of Al Shabaab’s current crisis. As a result of this occurrence, East African Community members have banded together to help combat Al Shabaab in Somalia.
Despite the challenges of insecurity in Somalia, the regional approach to security challenges has been hampered by a failure to recognize the significance of globalization for socioeconomic unification and security in East Africa, and terrorist activities in Kenya pose an additional threat to regional peace and security. The globalization process has had a negative impact on the stability and social framework of this East African nation.. Globalization poses a serious danger to the nation-state order. As a consequence of globalization, problems associated with balkanization have returned, bringing with them old and out-of-date concerns. East African nations have been confronted with new security challenges as a result of the end of the traditional superpower conflict between the United States and Russia, which had functioned as a deterrent to intrastate warfare.
Terrorism both at home and abroad has been linked to the rise of globalization in Africa, particularly in Eastern Africa. Terrorism, domestic and regional violence, and other forms of insecurity are common in East Africa as a consequence of escalating local disputes, corruption, political instability, maritime disputes, and other issues. Terrorism is the most pressing issue confronting the countries of East Africa. Terrorism has been exacerbated by poverty and social inequality, as well as by the problem of permeable borders. It is no secret that nations bordering the Indian and Red Seas face a high level of insecurity owing to the nature of their porous borders. Weapons may be easily transported throughout the area because of this. Due to a lack of resources, East African governments have been unable to adequately man their porous borders, making it harder to combat terrorist organizations (Gharsemi, 2012).
In the Horn of Africa, a diverse spectrum of terrorist organizations, including al-Qaeda and the Islamic State, have set up shop. These It is al-Shabaab, the primary terrorist organization in the East African Community, that has inflicted devastation throughout the area. Terrorists from the organisation have carried out a series of strikes both within and outside Somalia. There have been a disproportionate number of assaults against nations in the area directly supporting the African Union Mission in Somalia’s military operations in Somalia (AMISOM). Counterinsurgency activities against al-Shabaab have been stepped up by member governments of the East African Community. Terrorism perpetrated by non-African groups against foreign interests has become a major security problem in East Africa as a consequence a result of globalization. Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State (ISIS) have targeted foreign governments’ installations in the East African area in their assaults. Al-Shabaab, an al-Qaeda-affiliated organization, carried out the assault on Nairobi’s Westgate Shopping Mall in 2015. This restaurant was targeted because it is Israeli-owned and often frequented by tourists. Foreign countries’ interests are often jeopardized, while the host country suffers public humiliation as a result of these assaults. types of terrorism are included in this category: attacks on countries outside the region by terrorist organizations with ties to the region, attacks on countries within the region by terrorist organizations with ties to the region, and attacks on countries within the region by terrorist organizations with ties to the region. Several hundred people were wounded and four Americans were killed in the 1998 attack on the US embassies in Tanzania and Kenya, which was carried out by Al-Qaeda. Al-Qaeda claimed responsibility for the attack. In addition, in 2002, al-Qaeda attempted to conduct a missile attack on an Israeli flight in Mombasa and attacked the Kikambala hotel in Mombasa, both of which were successful. External extremist organizations, such as those based in the United States and Israel, get engaged in these circumstances because they are only concerned with hurting the interests of a third party, rather than with defending their own (Hitimana, Shukla, & Bajpai, 2014).
Additionally, the East African military’s intervention has raised concerns about regional security. African Union-funded AMISOM has been enlisted by the East African nations of Kenya, Uganda, Burundi, and Ethiopia to help stabilize the situation in Somalia. In response, al-Shabaab launched attacks on AMISOM soldiers in Somalia as well as civilian and military targets in Kenya, Uganda, and Ethiopia. Al-Qaeda in Somalia. The governments in the area face a serious security issue as a result of this circumstance. The East African countries face a security threat from indigenous terror organizations because they aim to attack the interests, population, and security forces of the region. Governments in the area should step up and broaden their efforts to gather information on these terrorist organizations in order to anticipate future assaults. Training and suitable counter-terrorism initiatives for rebel organizations should also be increased. Counter-terrorism measures and improved intelligence are also needed to eliminate the underlying circumstances that lead to the creation of terrorism.
As a whole, the East African area is affected by a number of conflicting issues. As a result of the wars that include terrorism, famine, and other connected tragedies such as the displacement of refugees, Kakuma and other refugee camps in East Africa have the world’s highest number of internally displaced individuals. The heightened level of distrust, animosity, and competitiveness among the UN member nations makes it difficult to find a solution to the problems. For a long length of time, East Africa has been plagued by violence. The main reasons of the insecurity crisis in East Africa range from ethnic issues, linguistic and cultural disparities, disputed borders, religiously associated ideological conflicts, struggle for few resources and thirst for power. The East African area has a high level of corruption, with the nations that make up the community rating poorly on the global corruption index. Transparency International’s annual Corruption Perception Index placed Kenya at number 96, Uganda at number 93, Tanzania at number 71, and Ethiopia at number 59 in 2016. Terrorist organizations have taken advantage of this circumstance to operate freely in the area, committing terrorist actions on a daily basis as a result. Terrorist organizations are more likely to attack a state with widespread corruption and poor pay for security workers ( Smith & William, 2018).
The East African area tends to face substantial social, economic, and security issues as a result of marine security concerns. East African marine security challenges are mostly land-based, therefore land-based tactics for long-term solutions are more effective. Unlawful Undisclosed and Uncontrolled fishing, terrorism and other multinational criminal activities are risks to marine security in the area. Human trafficking, small arms and light arms trafficking, drugs, and other transnational offenses also pose a danger to maritime stability in the country (Camilla, & Lins de Albuquerque, 2017). In order to cope with the core reasons and fight challenges to maritime security in the area, the East African Community members must focus on improving regional state capacity to manage their maritime territories and coping with Somalia’s stability, economic, and social circumstances.
Lawful international business in Africa is threatened by piracy that impacts energy prices throughout the world and puts lives at risk. As a starting point, we should be concerned about Somalia, which has between 12 and 20 percent of all ships passing through the Gulf of Aden. Around 237 ships were assaulted at the peak of the pirate activity crisis in 2011, with 28 of them being ultimately hijacked. Trade losses of $22 to $25 billion per year were incurred by the European Union (EU) over the preceding 10 years due to Somali piracy. At the hands of Somali pirates, however, people have been personally threatened, and even killed. Around 3,741 sailors from 125 different countries had been kidnapped at various times by 2013, and 97 of them had died.
In accordance with international law, maritime piracy is a crime that puts the lives of seafarers at risk and harms the common economic interests of all states. One piracy strike may have a devastating effect on the economies and aspirations of several nations at once, such as the flag state, multiple captive states’ nationalities, coastline states, owners’ and transit point states, as well as the nations where the cargo is being transshipped and delivered. Global shipping is at risk from piracy off the coast of Somalia, where land-based pockets along an ungoverned and economically ruined 2,300-mile coast are growing audacious in their assaults. Other international concerns might grow in an environment where criminal behavior is rampant and the rule of law is absent (Nafula, 2012).
Due to the effects of globalization, as seen above, there has been an increase in a new kind of insecurity in the Gulf of Eden. This danger to security has the potential to spread to other nations in the region, particularly Kenya, if not addressed. Through the rumsums they get from pirate acts, the terrorists are able to support their operations. The abduction of two Western tourists from their beachfront vacation houses in an expensive resort on Kenya’s north coast, which sparked worries of a troubling change in tactics by both Somalia’s pirates and its Islamist militants, is an excellent illustration of security threat spillover. Both assaults took occurred in the Lamu archipelago, a line of white-sand islands that serves as the first sizable town south of the Somali border and is a prominent tourist destination in Kenya. In the most dramatic attack, a senior French journalist, Marie Dedieu, was captured early Saturday morning on Manda Island, where she was staying in a thatched cabin she had leased for half the year. Armed men opened fire on the residence on Saturday, which, like many others, had no fence and no closed entrance, and was advertised for its rustic simple located on the beach, which attracted the attention of the media. Mrs. Dedieu had already been transported into Somalia, which is 60 miles north of Kenya’s borders. Globalization is responsible for this security hazard.
During the late 2000s, Kenya sought to enforce a maritime boundary on Somalia that was comparable to its southern border with Tanzania, which sparked a conflict between the two countries. Somalia was at war, thus could not stop Kenya from occupying it (Coggins 2021). Kenya has made use of the maritime region for its own purposes while also contributing to the surveillance and protection of the seas. In Somalia’s view, the marine border must follow the trajectory of the land border rather than stretch out along the axis of latitude, as is usual practice in international law. A rise in tensions between the two nations has occurred as a result of this, which might erupt at any moment. International Court of Justice verdict was in favor of Somalia’s claim to a contentious maritime territory in the Indian Ocean on Oct. 12th, 2016. According to their retroactive argument of lack of jurisdiction by an international court, Kenya refused to accept the ruling. Both nations have withdrawn their ambassadors as a result of this, resulting in an escalation in tensions. Along the Kenya-Somalia border, troops from Somalia were also seen assembling. It’s possible that Somalia and we would be at war if it weren’t for Kenyan inaction.
The spread of Small Arms and Light Weapons (SAWL) in the East African area has had a disastrous effect on the region’s stability. Rwanda’s 1994 massacre alone claimed the lives of 800,000 people over the latter two decades of the 20th century, according to the United Nations Office of the Special Adviser on Africa (OSAA). Millions of non-combatants, including women, kids, the aged, the crippled, and the destitute, perished as a consequence of starvation, injury, and illness in this case (Malam, 2014). The Horn of Africa nations; Somalia, Ethiopia, Uganda, and Southern Sudan are the primary suppliers of SALW in Kenya. The past 50 years have seen a recurrence of civil wars and civic turmoil in several nations (Fulgence, 2015). Because of the absence of government oversight and instability in the area, illegal arms trafficking and proliferation have been made easier. Efforts to stem the flow of illegal weaponry are hindered by Kenya’s failure to manage its borders. Armed smuggling is tough to control when there are five neighboring nations with limited security expenditures. Corruption is rampant in the area, and this is on top of the absence of proper institutions.
Despite the fact that the spread of SAWL creates enormous profits for its makers and sellers, East African citizens pay a heavy cost for the atrocities that these goods cause owing to a lack of oversight and global rules. Eighty-eight percent of all conventional weaponry exports come from the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council: Russia, France, China, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Firepower illegally obtained by East African insurgents and armed gangs, terrorists and pirates are now being used to increase their strength. All parts of the world have been negatively impacted by the illegal trafficking of SAWL and their ammo (Khadiagala, 2003). Since the Cold War came to an end, the availability and sale of semiautomatic rifles, particularly AK47s, have radically altered. Middlemen and multinational networks of organizations, governmental organizations and people in Europe, The Middle East and North America are buying and selling thousands of Kalashnikovs to the East African area. Assault weapons are supplied by a slew of interrelated enterprises in the area to this new breed of arms dealers, who are engaged in complicated supply networks.
As a result, globalization has had a huge impact on governance systems all over the world, in both positive and negative ways. Several countries’ national security and global governance institutions have been weakened as a consequence of the internationalization of trade and financial markets. Certainly one of the most important and strong forces determining the regional security plans of a wide range of countries, it is a major player in the international arena. International governance systems are becoming more globalized, which is recognized as one of the most important aspects of international relations, and for good reason. When it comes to the new politics of the world, globalization has been a part of it for quite some time. As a consequence, globalization has had an impact on the international relations of many countries, both historically and geographically, in terms of the integration of their cultures.
In East Africa, there are several wars, spanning from intergovernmental to intragovernmental. The member nations’ security and economic progress are being hampered by these disputes. Governments in East Africa have a significant problem as a result of the interconnectedness of wars and other security challenges caused by globalization. As a result of the multiple crises in the area, such the flow of refugees infiltrated with terrorists, the terssror attacks have proliferated across the region and widened the war. EAC and IGAD are key players in settling disputes in East Africa, and much work has to be undertaken to secure the area in order for it to be developed for economic growth.
References
Addo, J. (2011). The Impact of Globalization on African Conflicts. A Master of Military Art and Science Thesis. University of Ghana, Accra.
Camilla, E. & Lins de Albuquerque, A., (2017). Challenges to Peace and Security in Eastern Africa: The role of IGAD, EAC and EASF. Studies in African Security.
Fulgence, N. (2015). War on Terrorism in Africa: A Challenge for Regional Integration and Cooperation Organizations in Eastern and Western Africa. Journal of Political Sciences & Public Affairs, 1, (1) 4-8.
Gharsemi, F. (2012). Globalization and Models of Regional Security in the Global System. Geopolitics Quarterly, 8 (3), 5-6.
Hitimana, S., Shukla, J. & Bajpai, G. (2014). Regional Integration and Evolving Security Issues in Africa. A Case Study of East Africa Community, International Journal of Social Science and Humanities Research, 2, (4,) (237-244).
Malam, B. (2014). Small Arms and Light Weapons Proliferation and Its Implication for West African Regional Security. International Journal of Humanities and Social Science, 4, No. (8); 260-261
Nafula, D. (2012). An assessment of the relationship between economic integration and regional security in East Africa. Unpublished Masters of Arts in International Studies Thesis of the University Of Nairobi.
Smith, J. M. & William, C. T (2018). The Terrorism Threat in Strategies Context, Available on website at http://www.suafa.af.mil/inss/terrchp.ltd Accessed on 7 April 2018.
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