This book examines the impact of the federal restructuring of Ethiopia on ethnic conflicts. The adoption of ethnic federalism in Ethiopia was closely related with the problem of creating a state structure that could be used as instrument of managing the complex ethno-linguistic diversity of the country. Ethiopia is a multinational country with about 85 ethno-linguistic groups and since the 1960s, it suffered from ethno-regional conflicts. The book considers multiple governance and state factors that could explain the difficulties Ethiopian federalism faces to realise its objectives. These include lack of political pluralism and the use of ethnicity as the sole instrument of state organisation. Federalism and Ethnic Conflict in Ethiopia will be of interest to students and scholars of federal studies, ethnic conflict and regionalism.

This book examines the impact of the federal restructuring of Ethiopia on ethnic conflicts. The adoption of ethnic federalism in Ethiopia was closely related with the problem of creating a state structure that could be used as instrument of managing the complex ethno-linguistic diversity of the country. Ethiopia is a multinational country with about 85 ethno-linguistic groups and since the 1960s, it suffered from ethno-regional conflicts. The book considers multiple governance and state factors that could explain the difficulties Ethiopian federalism faces to realise its objectives. These include lack of political pluralism and the use of ethnicity as the sole instrument of state organisation. Federalism and Ethnic Conflict in Ethiopia will be of interest to students and scholars of federal studies, ethnic conflict and regionalism.

This book examines the impact of the federal restructuring of Ethiopia on ethnic conflicts. The adoption of ethnic federalism in Ethiopia was closely related with the problem of creating a state structure that could be used as instrument of managing the complex ethno-linguistic diversity of the country. Ethiopia is a multinational country with about 85 ethno-linguistic groups and since the 1960s, it suffered from ethno-regional conflicts. The book considers multiple governance and state factors that could explain the difficulties Ethiopian federalism faces to realise its objectives. These include lack of political pluralism and the use of ethnicity as the sole instrument of state organisation. Federalism and Ethnic Conflict in Ethiopia will be of interest to students and scholars of federal studies, ethnic conflict and regionalism.

Since 1991, Ethiopia has gone further than any other country in using ethnicity as the fundamental organizing principle of a federal system of government. And yet this pioneering experiment in 'ethnic federalism' has been largely ignored in the growing literature on democratization and ethnicity in Africa and on the accommodation of ethnic diversity in democratic states. Apart from giving close examination to aspects of the Ethiopian case, the book asks why the use of territorial decentralization to accommodate ethnic differences has been generally unpopular in Africa, while it is growing in popularity in the West. The book includes case studies of Nigerian and Indian federalism and suggests how Ethiopia might learn from both the failures and successes of these older federations. In the light of these broader issues and cases, it identifies the main challenges facing Ethiopia over the next few years, as it struggles to bring political practice into line with constitutional theory, and thereby achieve a genuinely federal division of powers. North America: Ohio U Press; Ethiopia: Addis Ababa U Press

Ethiopia s unique system of ethnic-based federalism claims to minimise conflict by organising political power along ethnic lines. This empirical study shows that the system eases conflict at some levels but also sharpens inter-ethnic and intra-ethnic divides on the ground.

This book investigates the role of ethnic federalism in Ethiopian politics, reflecting on a long history of division amongst the country’s political elites. The book argues that these patterns have enabled the resilience and survival of authoritarianism in the country, and have led to the failure of democratization. Ethnic conflict in Ethiopia stretches back to the country’s imperial history. Competing nationalisms begin to emerge towards the end of the imperial era, but were formalized by the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) from the 1990s onwards. Under the EPRDF, ethnicity and language classifications formed the main organizing principles for political parties and organizations, and the country’s new federal arrangement was also designed along ethnic fault lines. This book argues that this ethnic federal arrangement, and the continuation of an elite political culture are major factors in explaining the continuation of authoritarianism in Ethiopia. Focusing largely on the last 27 years under the EPRDF and on the political changes of the last few years, but also stretching back to historical narratives of ethnic grievances and division, this book is an important guide to the ethnic politics of Ethiopia and will be of interest to researchers of African politics, authoritarianism and ethnic conflict.

This book argues that the development of federalism in Ethiopia fits in with a global trend towards increased attention to ethnic minority rights and to federalism as a mechanism for ethnic conflict prevention and management. The Ethiopian federation is designed as a framework within which the Ethiopian ethnic groups can protect their rights and within which they are stimulated to develop a cooperative relationship. To put it differently, the constitutional objective of the federal structure is the creation of 'unity in diversity.' The book evaluates the capacity of Ethiopian federalism to achieve this objective by investigating the relevant historical, political, and legal aspects. (Series: Recht und Politik in Afrika/Law and Politics in Africa - Vol. 10)

Katharine Adeney demonstrates that institutional design is the most important explanatory variable in understanding the different intensity and types of conflict in the two countries rather than the role of religion. Adeney examines the extent to which previous constitutional choices explain current day conflicts.

Most governments in Africa, seeing the political mobilisation of ethnicity as a threat, have rejected the use of ethnic differences as an explicit basis for political representation. The one prominent exception is Ethiopia, which since 1991 has imposed a system of ethnic-based federalism that offers each ethnic group the right of ‘self-determination’. This book provides a detailed empirical study of this system at work in the complex multiethnic environment of southern Ethiopia. It finds that ethnic self-rule, in combination with the power politics of an authoritarian regime, has produced both intended and unintended outcomes. While arguably easing large-scale ethnic conflicts, it has led to ‘ethnicisation’ of local socioeconomic disputes and to sharper inter-ethnic and intra-ethnic divides, often to the disadvantage of historically marginalised groups.

Ethiopia witnessed a defining moment in the arena of national politics since the early 1990s. One of the most significant features of the political changes in the post-1991 period has been the recasting of the Ethiopian state structure into an ethnic federation. The government has constitutionally formalized ethnicity as the fundamental criterion of political organisation, inducing many changes in both ethnicity and governance. The political changes that are closely associated with the federalization of the country along ethnic lines pose sets of opportunities and challenges in managing inter-ethnic relations. This book aims at examining the shifting local inter-ethnic relations in Ethiopia, taking the conflicts between the Guji and Gedeo peoples of southern Ethiopia as a case study. It explores the root causes and the federal dispensation capacity in managing those conflicts, with the aim that settlement of the conflicts would contribute to the prevalence of peaceful relations in those contested areas. The author believes that the book would be useful for policy and decision makers', students of federalism and researchers who study in federalism and conflict management.