Summary

Since the spread of pastoralism in East Africa thousands of years ago, pastoral societies continue to face adverse and unpredictable ecological conditions as well as social, economic, and political changes. The former relates to aridity, drought, and livestock diseases while the latter includes violent conflicts and raiding, poor market participation, and policy changes relating to land use. The arid and semi-arid areas of northern Kenya and southern Ethiopia are particularly notable in the history of these changes. The Borana/Boran, Turkana, Somali, Samburu, and Rendille have inhabited these two regions for centuries, although historical processes of ethnic intermixture have created a fluid situation, making it often difficult to distinguish groups, clans, and their localities.

The long-term survival of these communities depends on widespread strategies that individuals and groups rely on to navigate both natural and anthropogenic shocks and stress. Notably, therefore, natural and social-economic changes continuously inform anticipatory actions linked to notions of “controlling” the future by reducing potential risks and uncertainties.

The dominant pastoralist strategies in northern Kenya and southern Ethiopia include seasonal mobility, herd diversification, accumulation, and dispersion, the creation of social networks and alliances, livelihood and income diversification, conflict, and raiding, with the latter becoming increasingly maladaptive. History gives a view of these societal changes and adaptations over time rather than fixation in some invariant “traditional” state. These adaptive strategies are reminiscent of historical patterns that are based on modifying behaviors at both individual and group levels according to existing environmental, social-economic, and political conditions. The capacity of pastoral societies to navigate change and the lessons they draw from adaptive actions constitutes an important aspect of the resilience of the pastoral economy and society in East Africa.