Starvation in Somalia Causal Loop

EXERCISE 12 Starvation in Somalia

Try diagramming the starvation scenario that the source dates to 1983-84. That date appears inconsistent with the later account of U.S. military intervention; the excerpt does not resolve the chronology.

Part 1: Consider four major factors: starvation, media coverage, foreign assistance, and local warlords profiteering from the foreign assistance. Link the four factors together in a feedback loop and annotate the linkages with a "D" or "I" to indicate direct or inverse relationships. Is this a stable or unstable loop?

Draw a causal-flow diagram linking the factors before reading the proposed solution.

Part 2: Revise the diagram to include three additional factors:

The presence of aid workers

Violent attacks on aid workers by warlord forces

The presence of U.S. military forces

Identify as many feedback loops as you can, and indicate whether the linkages are direct or inverse relationships. What is the overall impact on the situation of the inclusion of these three factors?

Revise your diagram before reading on.

Part 1 of the solution to Exercise 12 (page 324) presents the source’s proposed model. All its linkages are direct, making it a reinforcing loop: a change can feed back to amplify itself under the model’s assumptions. The diagram shows that as starvation increased, media coverage increased, prompting increased foreign assistance and warlord profiteering, resulting in increased starvation, increased media coverage, and so on.

There are countless different ways to diagram cause-and-effect relationships. Part 2 of the solution to Exercise 12 presents one rendition of the Somalia situation. The diagram identifies four feedback loops:

Balancing loops in the proposed model

• Starvation → media coverage → foreign assistance → starvation.
• Starvation → media coverage → foreign assistance → aid workers present → warlord attacks on aid workers → U.S. military presence → warlord profiteering → starvation.
• Warlord attacks on aid workers → U.S. military presence → warlord attacks on aid workers.

Reinforcing loop in the proposed model

• Starvation → media coverage → foreign assistance → warlord profiteering → starvation.

Note that foreign assistance and U.S. military presence have opposite relationships with warlord profiteering. This had a stabilizing effect on warlord profiteering and on the situation as a whole. However, the deaths of a number of U.S. servicemen with the peacekeeping forces in Somalia ultimately led to the withdrawal of U.S. forces. How would you diagram the factor "U.S. military fatalities"?

Revise your diagram before reading on.

Part 3 (page 325) shows how I would diagram "U.S. military fatalities." As warlord attacks increased, U.S. military fatalities increased, causing a reduction in U.S. military presence. (The deaths led to strong U.S. public and congressional disenchantment with the U.S. administration’s policy in Somalia and prompted the eventual withdrawal of U.S. forces.) This reduction emboldened the warlords, who increased their attacks on workers and U.S. military forces, causing further casualties. This was an unstable feedback loop.

In the larger picture, the reduction in U.S. military presence encouraged increased profiteering by the warlords, causing increased starvation, and so on. The feedback loop linking all eight factors was thus rendered unstable.