Inherited Inequalities and Uneasy Transformation
Socioeconomic and Ethno-political Pitfalls of an Ongoing Crisis in Ethiopia
Abstract
In the last couple of years, Ethiopia has experienced the longest wave of protests against the government since the fall of the Derg regime. Hundreds of people have been killed, tens of thousands imprisoned, and a state of emergency proclaimed, cancelled, and proclaimed again. However, a closer look at the ongoing crisis in Ethiopia reveals historically inherited patterns of inequality that have characterized all three regimes – Imperial, Socialist, and Federal. This article focuses on some of the causes of the ongoing crisis in Ethiopia and puts the anti-governmental protests into a broader perspective in order to examine their social and political consequences and possible pitfalls of the current political turbulence, including the promising current period of leadership by the Prime Minister Dr. Abiy Ahmed. These include so-far unresolved socio-economic, generational, and ethnic issues inherited from past decades.
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