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Ethiopia Ethnic and Social Relations
Interethnic Relations
Ethnicity in Ethiopia is an enormously complex concept. No
ethnic entity has been untouched by others. Groups in
existence in the twentieth century are biological and social
amalgams of several preexisting entities. The ingredients
are often discernible only by inference, particularly if the
mixing took place long ago. Nonetheless, such mixing led to
the formation of groups that think of themselves and are
considered by others as different. For instance, in the
prerevolutionary period there were thousands of non-Amhara
who had acquired the wherewithal to approximate the lifestyle of wealthy Amhara and had in fact gained recognition
as Amhara. Such mixing has continued, and the boundaries of
ethnic groups also continue to change.
Interethnic relations in prerevolutionary Ethiopia did not
conform to a single model and were complex because of the
nature of Amhara contact with other groups and the internal
social and economic dynamics of the groups. Each group
reacted differently to Amhara dominance. What makes this
analysis even more complex is that the Amhara themselves do
not constitute a cohesive group. Indeed, the tendency to see
Ethiopia before (and, by some accounts, after) the
revolution as dominated by Amhara has obscured the
complexity of interethnic relations.
The Amhara are found predominantly in Gojam, Gonder, in
parts of Welo such as Lasta and Wag, and in parts of Shewa
such as Menz. Amhara from one area view those from other
areas as different, and there is a long history of conflicts
among Amhara nobles aspiring to be kings or kingmakers.
Intraprovincial and interprovincial conflict between Amhara
nobles and their followers was quite common. Some aspects of
intra-Amhara friction may be seen in the relations of Shewan
Amhara to other Amhara and to other Ethiopians. Shewan
Amharic speakers are on the southern periphery of the
territory occupied by the Amhara. They made their presence
felt in much of the Shewa region relatively late, except in
areas such as Menz, which had always been Amhara. Thus, the
Shewans over the centuries developed a culture and a society
that emerged from Oromo, Amhara, and perhaps other groups.
Whereas the southern people considered Shewan Orthodox
Christians as Amhara, people from older Amhara areas such as
Gojam and Gonder thought of such persons as Shewans or
sometimes even as Oromo.
During the imperial regime, Amhara dominance led to the
adoption of Amharic as the language of government, commerce,
and education. Other forms of Amhara dominance occurred in
local government, where Amhara served as representatives of
the central government or became landholders.
Reaction to the Amhara varied even within individual ethnic
groups. Some resisted the Amhara bitterly, while others
aided them. In its most extreme form, resistance to Amhara
dominance resulted in enduring separatist movements,
particularly in Eritrea, Tigray, and the Ogaden. The
separatist movement in Eritrea reflects a somewhat different
historical experience from that of other areas of Ethiopia.
Despite Eritrea's seeming unity, ethnic and religious
differences among Eritreans abounded. For example, the
Kunema, a Nilo-Saharan-speaking people who formed an enclave
among Eritrea's Muslims and Christians and who have long
been treated as inferior by some groups that make up the
Eritrean independence movement, historically have provided
an island of support for the central government.
Perhaps the only region to which the Amhara did not bring
their sense of superiority was Tigray, home of the people
who lay claim to the Aksumite heritage. The Amhara did not
come to Tigray as receivers of land grants, and government
administrators were often Tigrayan themselves. Tigray
perspectives on the Amhara were, however, influenced
negatively by a number of historical factors. For example,
the son of the only emperor of Tigray origin to have ruled
Ethiopia, Yohannis IV (reigned 1872-89), was deprived of the
throne by Menelik II, an Amhara. In 1943 the imperial regime
brutally repressed a Tigray rebellion called the Weyane.
Ethiopia's Ogaden region, inhabited primarily by ethnic
Somali, was the scene of a series of Ethiopian-Somali
struggles in 1964, 1977-78, and intermittently after that
until 1987. Somalia supported self-determination for Ogaden
Somali. Although Somalia and Ethiopia signed a joint
communiqué in 1988 to end hostilities, Mogadishu refused to
abandon its claim to the Ogaden. Moreover, in 1989 and 1990,
the Ogaden region was home to about 350,000 Isaaq Somali
from northern Somalia who had escaped persecution by the
regime of Mahammad Siad Barre.
In April 1976, the PMAC promulgated its Program for the
National Democratic Revolution (PNDR), which accepted the
notions of self-determination for nationalities and regional
autonomy. In compliance with the program, the PMAC created
the Institute for the Study of Ethiopian Nationalities in
1983 to develop administrative and political proposals to
accommodate all the country's major nationalities. As a
result of the institute's findings, the government expressed
a desire to abolish Ethiopia's fourteen administrative
regions and to create thirty regions, of which five--
Eritrea, Tigray, Aseb, Dire Dawa, and the Ogaden--were to be
autonomous. Eritrean and Tigrayan leaders denounced the plan
as nothing more than an attempt to perpetuate government
control of Eritrea and Tigray. Their military campaigns to
wrest control of the two regions from the Mengistu regime
eventually succeeded.
The PMAC undermined the patterns of ethnic relations
prevailing in imperial Ethiopia and eliminated the basis for
Amhara dominance. However, postrevolutionary Ethiopia
continued to exhibit ethnic tension. Traits based on
ethnicity and religion are deeply ingrained and are not
susceptible to elimination by ideology.
Data as of 1991
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