Although worker self-help associations appeared much

earlier, trade union organization was forbidden until 1 962.

Intent on maintaining a cheap, docile labour supply as the key

attraction for foreign capital, the government designed a Labour

Relations Decree as a means of regimenting a labour force it

could no longer ignore. It put definite limits to its potential

for growth by ruling out organization for any part of the

public sector, which included a growing number of government

owned enterprises. Nevertheless, the Confederation of Ethiopian

Labour Unions (CELU) was established, and by the end of the

decade it claimed more than 50,000 members. The government

continued to regard worker actions, particularly strikes, as

quasi-insurrections, and never hesitated to use force. Strikes

there were plenty during the following years, but few were

successful. Mass dismissals were a more frequent outcome.

CELU's leadership was not distinguished by its militancy, and

the labour movement seemed bereft of dynamism and sense of

direction. The position of labour deteriorated further in th_e late

1960s and early 1970s due to growing urban unemployment

and the ravages of inflation.

Unemployment was the inevitable result of capitalist methods

encouraged by the government's own policies. Import substitution was developed through what an ILO report termed

'highly mechanized and extremely capital intensive' methods. 15

The propensity of foreign capital for such methods was strongly

encouraged by the government's policy, which granted long tax

holidays on new investment and exempted imported machinery

from duty, while levying heavy duties on imported hand tools.

Ethiopia's overvalued exchange rate vis-a-vis its major trading

partner, the United States, had a similar effect. Consequently,

14. A favoured ploy, used also by government-owned enterprises, was to deny

workers leave pay and other benefits by listing them as seasonal or dailv

labour, even though they were continuously employed. ·

15. Report to the Imperial Ethiopian Government of the Exploraton ,. F,"

ment Mission, (Geneva: International Labour Organization, l o ~'·

PERIPHERAL CAPITALISM A N D DEV ELOPMENT 47

while manufacturing production expanded at an average annual

rate of 11 . l per cent during the 1960s, with the higher rates of

growth registered during the second half of the decade, the rate

of labour absorption in this sector followed a reverse trend and

reached the point of insignificance at the end of the decade.

As we will see below, this, coincided neatly with a similar trend

in the public sector, and produced an employment crisis of the

16 first order.

Year

1961

1962

1963

1964

1965/66

1966/67

1968/69

1970/71

Manufacturing Industry Growth in the 1960s

Gross Value % Growth Labour Force

of production

Eth. $ (000) (000)

114,412 28,314

128,880 12.6 32,584

156,894 21.7 33,553

219,894 40.1 47,745

269,822 22.7 47,343

357,110 32.3 48,652

467,093 30.7 48,903

625,936 34.0 51 ,312

Source : Statistical Abstracts Note : Eth.~2 = US.$1 approx.

%Growth

15.0

0.3

42.2

- 0.8

2.7

0.05

4.9

The inflation menace manifested itself in 1969, and from

then on it acquired momentum rapidly as a result of converging

domestic and international trends. World inflationary pressures

were felt in steeply rising import prices. The country's petroleum bill tripled in just one year. The effects of domestic

drought began to be reflected by 1972 in increasing food prices.

The_ retail price index for Addis Ababa jumped about 30 points

between December 1972 and July 1973, with food, clothing

and household goods leading the way .

17 The harsh conditions of

its existence provoked increasingly militant actions on the part

16. An official study forecast an urban unemployment rate of 20 per , ..

1990, and twice that for the 14-24 age group. The Employmen t 7'

Ethiopia, Planning Commission Office, Addis Ababa 1972, p.19.

17. Rake, Alan, 'Winds of Change', African Development, v~ 1

p.E.5.

48 CLASS AND REVOLUTION IN ETHIOPIA

of the workers. This, in turn, invited harsher repressive measures

on the part of the regime. Constant and forceful intervention

of the state on behalf of capital provided a clear demonstration

of the link between these two, and promoted the rapid development of political consciousness among the Ethiopian proletariat.

Against this background, the militancy displayed by the working class during the 1974 revolution and afterwards is easily

comprehended.

The radicalization of the petty bourgeoisie was a gradual and

more complicated process. This class comprised what may be

termed the 'salariat' in the public and private sectors and the

self-employed in local and retail trade. In terms of theory, the

juxtaposition of these two social strata within the boundaries

of the same class has little to.recommend it other than common

usage. 18 Obviously, these are distinct social groups, differently

placed in the economic structure of the ancien regime. This

difference is reflected in their social position and political

orientation. The first is definitely fixed, while the second is

variable, and in the given instance it became a difference of degree

rather than kind. During the crisis of the imperial regime, the

educated 'salariat' element assumed the leading role in the

political offensive, while the trader and merchant group played

a supporting role. The reasons for this conjunction are explained

below.

The 'salariat' came into existence in the postwar period,

spawned by the modem educational process and sheltered by

the growing bureaucratic structure of the state and, to a lesser

extent, by the modem sector of the economy. Its size was

modest, but its bulk was highly concentrated in a few urban

centres, particularly the restless capital cities of Addis Ababa

and Asmara. 19 The social and ethnic origins of the educated

18. This usage has been debated in the pages of the Review of African Political

Economy, Numbers 4,5 and 6. Since the debate did not clarify conceptual

alternatives, we retain the terminology while drawing attention to factors

it tends to obscure.

19. The number of university and secondary school graduates in 1967 was estimated at 6,500 and 30,000 respectively. 'Application of a Planning Model

for the Calcu!ati?~ of ~~ucational R~quirements for the Economic Development of Eth1op1a, Mtmstry of National Community Development, Addis

Ababa, 1970. A large number left secondary school at some point before

completion.

PERIPHERAL CAPITALISM A ND D EV ELOPMENT 49

petty bourgeoisie were far more diverse than the origins of

the bureaucratic-military bourgeoisie. Nevertheless, the urban

bias of the educational system, particularly at the secondary

level, favoured the children of urban families with a regular

income considerably above the average. Northerners were

predominant in this category at all parts of the country, since

southern towns were the habitat of landlords of northern

origin. The major occupation of this class was public service.

Practically all graduates of higher education institutions, and

most secondary school graduates, were employed in the state

sector. Included in this category are the military and police,

as well as the teaching profession.

Until the mid-l 960s, educated Ethiopians enjoyed unrestricted access to public employment and, in many respects,

preferential treatment and privileges. This class was totally

unaffected by competition for social status and economic

advantage. Both of these were automatically attained upon

graduation through entrance into state service, an entrance

also gained automatically, as if by right. The starting salary

for a university graduate - regardless of professional specialization, rank or branch of service - was 500 Ethiopian dollars

per month, and for secondary school graduates about half

that amount, while the per capita income for the country was

only 150 Ethiopian dollars per annum. The educated petty

bourgeoisie thus enjoyed a standard of life that was far above

average and decidedly modern, a fact that distinguished this

class from the masses who still adhered to the traditional mode.

Such inducements ensured the smooth absorption of the

educated Ethiopians into the expanding state apparatus, where

they occupied the clerical, technical and professional posts,

and the middle level in the military and police forces. A smaller

group was absorbed in the modern sector of the economy where

they performed similar roles for the same rewards. Readily

acquired privilege helped to stifle latent intellectual and political

discontent, and rendered the educated petty bourgeoisie a submissive and quiescent social class which performed an auxiliary

role in the ancien regime.

A degree of discontent was natural in the given situation

which forced the educated person to perform modern roles

so CLASS AND REVOLUTION IN ETHIOPIA

within a system governed by traditional norms. Frustration as

a result of this incongruity was endemic within this class. Its

abject subordination to the medieval coalition of royal retainers

and feudal aristocrats was galling. However, discontent remained

diffuse and muted. Political activity of any kind was proscribed,

associational activity atrophied, and the petty bourgeoisie

showed no inclination to challenge the regime. Radicalism during

this period was manifested only by the university student body.

Destined to join the petty bourgeoisie, but currently unhindered

by dependence on the regime, the youth took the initiative in

exposing the regime's defects in a series of tumultuous and

eventually bloody demonstrations commencing in 1965.

The radicalization of the petty bourgeoisie coincided with a

number of developments which affected the economic position

of this class adversely. To begin with, as the state apparatus

became crowded with people of relatively young age, the rate

of promotion slowed down accordingly, and rapid upward

mobility, a feature of the period of expansion in the 1940s and

1950s, was now replaced by the prospect of stagnation. 20 In

the late 1960s, there were approximately 100,000 people employed in the public sector, one-third of whom were in the state

owned enterprises. By this time, both the civil service and the

state owned enterprises had reached the saturation point, and

recruitment was seriously curtailed. Ethiopia entered a period

of economic stringency, due to the closing of the Suez Canal

in 1967, the consequent trade depression which reduced state

revenue from that source, and a parallel decline in the price of

coffee, Ethiopia's m~jor export. The country's borrowing

capacity was already badly strained. Debt servicing in 1968

equalled 15.8 per cent of export earnings. Further expansion of

the public sector was ruled out, and this coincided with the

drastic decline in the rate of labour absorption in the private

sector.

Unemployment now hit the petty bourgeoisie for the first

20. A recent survey showed that 74 per cent of the employees in the public

~ecto! were below 40 years of, age. The figure for the professional category

m thIS se~t~r was 88 per cent. A Survey of the Educational Level and other

Ch~actenstics of. Persons Employed in Different Occupations', Ministry of

National Commuruty Development, J\ddis Ababa, 1974.

PERIPHERAL CAPITALISM AND DEVELOPMENT 51

time. Primary school graduates had been in surplus for some

years, and secondary school dropouts and graduates were having

increasing difficulty finding work. When university graduates

joined the ranks of the unemployed, the government became

perturbed and appointed a commission to investigate the matter

in August 1969. 21 Unemployment among the educated signified a contradiction of the first order since it had always been

maintained that a shortage of such manpower was hampering

the country's economic development. It could not even be

maintained that this group did not have the proper skills, since

it was discovered that among the unemployed were a large

number of graduates from the Bahir Dar Polytechnic, the

country's best technical training institution. The government's

response to this embarrassment was to take the redundant

technicians into the Ministry of Education as teachers. As for

the rest of the unemployed, it did absolutely nothing.

Another blow to the position of the petty bourgeoisie was

the effect of inflation. Initially set high, salaries for this class in

the public sector were not easily adjusted to the rising cost of

living. Collective increases were granted by the regime only

under great stress, and the employees in state service, with the

notable exception of the teaching profession, lacked any form

of organization capable of exerting the required pressure. With

a consumption pattern oriented towards imported goods, the

petty bourgeoisie was hard pressed by inflation.

The petty bourgeoisie is an intermediate social class with an

ambiguous economic position and a correspondingly ambivalent

political orientation. In the short run, the radicalization of this

class in Ethiopia in the early 1970s can be attributed not to

deprivation, but to the threat of deterioration of a relatively

privileged position. However, the long term prospects for this

class were clearly unfavourable also. These prospects were

defined and limited by the major socio-economic and political

trends. Centralization and institutionalization in the public

sector had created a subordinate position for this class. The

21. It reported that out of 937 graduates of training institutions in the previous

year, 636 were unemployed. Also, 40 out of 136 university graduates of the

preceding year were unemployed. The Employment Problem in Ethiopia

op.cit., Annex I. '

52 CLASS AND REVOLUTION IN ETHIOPIA

limits of that position emerged clearly when the expansion of

the public sector came to a halt, trapping the petty bourgeoisie,

as it were, in the bottom half. However, this was not an established class accustomed to its modest position in the social

order. Rather, it was a new social group that had been launched

in an upward trajectory which suddenly levelled off. Its .qualifications inspired higher expectations, not to say ambition, than

could be fulfilled in its assigned position in the ancien regime.

It was the class that had come to power everywhere in Africa.

In Ethiopia, the absolutist regime barred all approaches to the

centre of power, and denied this group any meaningful role in

the government of the country. Foreign ownership and control

of the modem economic sector similarly barred the petty

bourgeoisie from anything but an employee role in this sphere

of activity. The onset of stagnation in this sector dispelled initial

illusions concerning the possibility of rapid capitalist transformation, and precluded the formation of a national bourgeoisie,

a position to which the petty bourgeoisie could have aspired.

Far more than any ·contemporary grievance, it was the definite

narrowing of its social horizon that turned the educated pettybourgeoisie towards radicalism.

The other section of the petty bourgeoisie comprised the

self-employed in local and retail trade. Although this was a sizeable group which performed a crucial economic function , little

data is available on it because it was not included in official

compilations of statistics. Historically, trade has been the occupation of minorities in Ethiopia because it was despised by the

highlanders of all classes. It became associated particularly with

Muslim communities who were barred from landholding as well

as state office in the Christian Kingdom. Muslims eventually

acquired a near monopoly oflocal trade in all regions of Ethiopia.

Their enterprises range from street corner kiosks to well-stocked

shops, such as those found in the Mercato district of Addis

Ababa. The typical trader has no modern education, nor a

modem style of life. Ethiopian Muslims were reluctant to send

their children to government schools, because of the Christian

orienta~ion_ of t~e state school system, _and also because they

saw their future 1n trade rather than public service.

The economic position of the trader group, characterized by

PERIPHERAL CAPITALISM AND DEVELOPMENT 53

insignificant capital and s1nall profit margins, had always been

precarious. Its pat?. to expansion was blocked by the older

expatriate communities of Arabs, Greeks, Italians and Armenians

who controlled large scale trade and acted as suppliers for the

Ethiopian merchant. These communities enjoyed the undisguised

protection of the imperial regime, and operated with a minimum

regard for state regulations, including the tax code. Recently

developed trade in high-priced goods, such as machinery, automobiles, construction material, pharmaceuticals, etc., was completely in the hands of newly established western firms. Thus,

the Ethiopian trader community had little capital and less hope

of adding to it. Development in the model of peripheral capitalism had fixed the position of the native entrepreneur at the

local retail level. When a political solution to this predicament

presented itself, this group supported it, though it had nothing

to do with its formulation.

Official religious discrimination was another cause of discon tent among the trader group. Ethiopian Muslims deeply

resented the subordinate status of their faith in the Christian

state. Although the haphazard persecution of Islam had ended

with the expansion, which incorporated large Muslim communities in the southern region, the position of this creed remained submerged. Islam as a religion was not persecuted in

Ethiopia; it was simply ignored. Despite its vast following, no

official notice was taken of it in a state where Christianity was

the official religion. I ts adherents were similarly isolated from

national life. Ethiopian Muslims were not represented in the

ruling classes, and they formed only a very small minority of

the educated petty bourgeoisie. They represented the majority

of the peasantry in the southern region, and the totality of

the pastoral population along the periphery of Ethiopia. As

traders they were to be found in all towns.

The abrupt narrowing of its social horizon transformed the

educated petty bourgeoisie into a disgruntled and politically

dissident class. Its subordinate economic status and dim prospects for the future within the economic structure of the

ancien regime, turned this social group in a radical direction,

which led it to make common cause with the workers and

peasants. Taking the lead in the attack against the old regime,

54 CLASS AND REVOLUTION IN ETHIOPIA

the educated petty bourgeois sector prepared the ground for

the popular movement sometime before the crucial year of

1974. The radical section of the petty bourgeoisie, which was

especially active within the student movement, succeeded in

politicizing a number of basic issues which had been considered

previously in narrow technical terms and in isolation from one

another. The issue of land, for example, was brought to the

forefront in 1965 with a student demonstration demanding the

return of 'land to the tiller'. In subsequent years, the various

palliatives recommended for agricultural reform were debated

and discredited, and the necessity for the elimination of landlordism through political means was established. Such necessity

was easily accepted by the petty bourgeoisie, for it had no vested

interest in land, moreover, it regarded landlordism as an obstacle

to the modernization of agriculture, hence, to progress in

general. Similarly, the radicals championed the cause of the

oppressed proletariat, and linked the merciless exploitation of

the Ethiopian worker to the dominance of foreign capital and

its alliance with the domestic ruling classes. Again, the petty

bourgeoisie, which had no capital nor any prospect of acquiring

it, could make common cause with the working class against the

foreign capitalist and his domestic allies. In the given situation,

even the prospect of nationalization of the economy was not

forbidding to this class, since nationalization would bring assets

under its control in a greatly expanded state sector. Thus, the

efforts of the radical intelligentsia succeeded not only in expanding the consciousness of their own class, but also established

ideological links and a potential programme for common political action with the worker and peasant classes. The speed with

which the revolutionary movement later on resolved some of

these basic issues can be traced to this preliminary understanding.

Chapter 4

Capitalism and Agriculture

55

The intrusion of capitalism was not limited to the urban sector.

With the active encouragement of the government, it spread

into the rural sector where it produced quick and startling

results. Needless to say, the regime exerted little effort of its

own to promote agricultural development. 22 However, it did

consider commercialization in agriculture desirable, and thought

it essential for this purpose 'to induce more foreign private

investment and import the needed managerial skills'. 23 In line

with this policy, · the government offered every possible inducement to foreign investors, and abetted the exploitation of an

emerging rural proletariat. Mechanization was encouraged

by the usual exemption from import duty for agricultural

machinery.

The south eastern region offered nearly optimum conditions

for capitalist investment. The primary consideration was the

availability of land on the scale required by the new mode of

production. As mentioned earlier, in this region the state

claimed all pastoral lands, and it now proceeded to make good

on this claim. The eviction of the pastoralists from their land

22. From 1963 to 1973 agriculture was allotted only 4.2 per cent of the state's

combined ordinary and capital expenditure. 'The Public Sector of the Ethiopian

Economy', Central Statistical Office, Addis Ababa, 2 May, 1974, p.16. In

1969, per capita income in the urban sector was estimated at 680 Ethiopian

dollars per annum, of which 649 was monetary income. Per capita income in

the rural sector at this time was estimated at 109 dollars per annum, of which

only 35 was monetary income. Cited in the Report of the Education Sector

Review, Ministry of Education and Fine Arts, Addis Ababa, August 1972,

Appendix 11-A-1, p.9.

23. Third Five Year Development Plan: 1968/69-1972/73, Ministry of Planning

and Development, Addis Ababa, 1968, p.191.

56 CLASS AND REVOLUTION IN ETHIOPIA

presented few problems, since it as assumed that they could

choose to move elsewhere or to take up employment in the

plantations that sprung up on their land. More significantly,

whatever they chose to do, they had no power to resist their

displacement. The area of concentration of capitalist agricultural investment was the valley of the Awash river which flows

in a north easterly direction below Addis Ababa. This region

offered the additional attractions of irrigation from the water

of the river, road and rail transportation, and proximity to the

area of industrial concentration that extended along the railway line below the capital.

The introduction of plantation agriculture was made in 1954,

when the government evicted the Gile, an Oromo pastoralist

group, from its land in the upper Awash Valley. The land was

acquired for a nominal rent by the Handels Verenigins Amsterdam (HVA), a Dutch firm with colonial experience in Indonesia

which set up a sugar cane plantation and processing factory.

With a veritable monopoly of the internal market guaranteed

by a high tariff on imported sugar, complete exemption from

taxation for all goods, including fuel, imported by the company, and a brutally exploited labour force that required a

company of government police stationed on company grounds

to keep it in line, HV A was soon able to expand operations to

satisfy domestic demand and even engage in export. In the

meantime, the Gile community disintegrated and virtually disappeared as a group. In 1962, the government set up the Awash

Valley Authority (A VA) to promote agricultural commercialization in the valley. A VA succeeded in attracting foreign

capital investment for the cultivation of cotton on the plains

flanking the river in the middle and lower parts of the valley.

The Tendaho Plantation Share Company, a subsidiary of the

Mitchell Cotts Group, began cotton production in the early

1960s on land vacated by the Afar pastoralists. The growing

demand by the domestic textile industry, itself owned and

managed by foreign capital, encouraged further investment in

cotton plantations by Israeli and Italian firms.

A surprise entry in this field was Ali Mira, the Afar Sultan of

Awsa. Quick to recognize the economic potential of cotton

production, as well as the danger of being dispossessed by foreign

..

CAPITALISM A ND AG RICU LTU RE 57

capital, Ali Mira began to block the latter's expansion by setting

up his own plantations in the path of the foreign firms. A number of Afar chiefs followed his example, and set their people

to work on their plantations for little or no pay. Impoverished

highlanders also descended to the valley to work as sharecroppers. When the price of cotton nearly doubled in the early

1970s, and profits rose to an incredible 67 per cent of the

value of production, Ali Mira and his chiefs were hard put to

spend their newly gained wealth. The effect on the people of

the valley was quite different. The harsh environment offers few

opportunities for subsistence and provides no margin for contingency. The Afar depend for their livelihood on the pastures

along the river banks. By 1973, about one-third of the total

irrigable land had been put under cultivation. The grazing area

was correspondingly reduced, and the Afar were forced to

congregate on less fertile land, with overpopulation and overgrazing as the result. Dispossessed by capitalism and betrayed

by their traditional leaders, the Afar were doomed when drought

hit the region in 1973. 24

An alternative approach to commercialization in agriculture

was designed to promote differentiation within the ranks of the

peasantry by fostering the emergence of a class of middle

peasants. Designed and implemented by foreign aid agencies,

the so-called 'minimum package' programme was tried in several

southern provinces. Its genesis lay with a scheme launched by

the Swedish aid agency in 1967 in the Chilalo district of Arussi

province. The scheme integrated planning, credit and marketing

facilities, price stabilization, mechanization, and even contemplated reform of local institutions; all these to be managed by

the agency known as the Chilalo Agricultural Development Unit

(CADU). The objective was to develop small farmer production

for the market. Within a few years, the attained results proved

startling to most people, the planners themselves included.

In four years, the CADU area had 126 commercial farmers,

with 184 tractors and 36 combines, cultivating 10 per cent of

the planted area. However, about 60 of these beneficiaries of

24. See Bondestam, Lars, 'People and Capitalism in the North-Eastern Lowlands

of Ethiopia', The Journal of Modern African Studies, 12, 3, 1974.

58 CLASS AND REVOLUTION IN ETHIOPIA

CADU's services were outsiders who had come to cash in on the

green revolution. Land prices and rents rose dramatically, and

tenants were being evicted at a rapidly increasing rate. By 1970,

it was estimated that 20 per cent of the tenants in the district

had been forced off the land. It was also discovered that CADU

facilities and credit had been monopolized by large farmers, and

that the additional income generated in the district had benefited

primarily the traders, landlords and local officials. Chagrined,

the Swedes were converted to advocacy of legislation for tenant

protection. Needless to say, the regime was not moved. Similar

programmes were tried elsewhere, and despite additional precautions taken, the results were the same. As soon as a district

was opened up through improved infrastructure, credit and

other facilities, landlords began to evict their tenants in order

to undertake cultivation themselves or to rent the land to outside

entrepreneurs who moved in with machinery to cultivate large

tracts.25 The latter group included merchants, officials and

a small number from the educated petty bourgeoisie. To this

incipient sector of domestic rural capitalism, we must add the

owners of the rich coffee lands in the south western province

of Kaffa. Here, Ethiopia's most valuable export product was

cultivated in owner-tended plantations, and was picked also in

its wild state in the estates of absentee landlords.

The promotion of rural capitalism had just began in Ethiopia,

yet its dire consequences were already quite evident. The

articulation of the new mode of production with the domestic

system which had just began to break out of its feudal mould,

had a clearly destructive effect on the latter. The most dynamic

capitalist agricultural enterprise was a neo-colonial plantation

system with foreign ownership and management. I ts growth

required the destruction of pastoralism, and the transformation

of the poor peasantry into a rural proletariat. The introduction of programmes designed to promote a middle peasant

class had triggered the mass eviction of tenants and the consolidation of land in the hands of native agricultural entre25. For a critical analysis of these programmes see Stahl M. Ethiopia · n0 1·t· I

d . · · A · / ' • • r, l lCQ Co:'tra iction. 1~ _gr-icu tural Development, (Publication of the Political

Science Assoc1atlon m Uppsala, 1974).

CAPITALISM AND AGRICULTURE 59

preneurs. Thus, either approach undermined both traditional

landlordism and tenancy in the southern region. The landlord

had the options of selling or renting land at high prices, or

taking up commercial production himself. The tenant had no

choice but to join a vast reservoir of rural labour at the disposal of plantation managers and commercial farmers. Although

the trend had just began, its impact on tenancy was perceptible

in numerous districts in the southern region. Displaced tenants

seldom moved out of the district, but usually settled on surrounding heights keeping watch on their lost land like birds

startled out of their nest. For them the revolution was the

signal to swoop down and reclaim their patrimony.

With the exception of Eritrea, capitalism had made little

inroad in the northern provinces. 26 The traditional land tenure

system here was still resistant to the intrusion, primarily because

it obstructed the alienation of land for large scale commercial

production. As we have noted, traditionally rist land was

seldom transferred outside the kinship group. A compelling

reason for preserving this tradition was the prevailing scarcity

of land. The majority of northern peasants subsisted on plots

whose size ranged from one-half to two hectares. Land alienation on any scale would have caused mass displacement and

was certain to be resisted. Consequently, the government never

attempted to do here what it did in the south eastern region in

order to provide land and labour for capitalist exploitation.

Thus, the existing mode of production in the north was not

significantly affected by the intrusion of capitalism elsewhere

in the country during the reign of the ancien regime.

However, the north did not remain entirely unaffected. To

be~in with, rist had been undermined in and around the northern

provincial towns, as land acquired commercial value and also

became subject to government regulation. Furthermore, as is

26. Commercial production of cotton, vegetables and fruit was developed in

Eritrea by expatriate and local producers. Commercial farming developed

spontaneously in the 1960s also in the north western border -area known as

Setit-Humera. A fertile, open area, it attracted Ethiopians from other regions,

who were assisted with credit by the World Bank to become producers of

sesame, cotton and sorghum.

60 CLASS AND REVOLUTION IN ETHIOPIA

the case with traditional land tenure syste111s elsewhere, rist

had come under attack by bureaucrats and economic planners.

Despite the special protection afforded rist by the Civil Code,

bureaucrats considered the system a nuisance because it made

it impossible to rationalize the processes of land registration

and taxation.27 Economists denounced rist as the guarantee of

land fragmentation and low productivity, and for resisting bank

credit, since in the absence of individual title land could not be

mortgaged. These attitudes were becoming prevalent among the

bureaucratic bourgeoisie who considered the institution of

private property a prerequisite to agricultural development. In

time, the alliance of this class with capital would have overwhelmed the traditional defence of rist. Reports of sale of rist

land during the famine are indicative also of the commencing

deterioration of the communal landholding system in northern

Ethiopia.

Nevertheless, the linkage between the old and new modes of

production in northern Ethiopia was tenuous, and the impact of

capitalism in this region, with the exception of Eritrea, was still

incipient and less disruptive than it had proved to be in the

southern region. The position of the ristegna, which had been

reinforced by other measures in the post-war period, was not

openly and immediately threatened. Although the traditional

system was already under attack, this was not yet perceived

by the peasantry. Consequently, the northern peasant retained

the traditional perspective largely unmodified until the last

days of the old regime, and was not animated by the revolutionary spirit that gripped the rest of the country.

27. Rist land are often registered still in the name of the ancestor h fi 1 • d them. w o ust c aune

Chapter 5

Eritrea

61

The background, scope and intensity of the conflict in Eritrea

make it appear a unique instance of violent antagonism to the

ancien regime. The appearance of uniqueness is partially misleading. Although Eritrea's background is peculiar, it served

mainly to hasten the ripening and convergence of a constellation of contradictions which were to be found at various

stages of maturity elsewhere in the Ethiopian state. In short,

class and national contradictions fused to produce here an

explosion whose violence has not subsided yet. A brief analysis

of this process is called for, because the struggle in Eritrea not

only hastened the fall of the old regime, but it has also compounded immensely the problems of its successor.

The province of Eritrea comprises the northern edge of the

plateau and a large lowland area extending to the Sudan border

on the west and north and the Red Sea on the east. The foothills and the lowland plains are inhabited by pastoral groups

adhering to Islam and speaking languages not spoken on the

plateau. The Eritrean portion of the plateau is the natural and

historical extension of Tigre province, and is inhabited mainly

by members of the dominant northern national group, who are

Christian and speak Tigrinya. A minority of Muslims are also to

be found on the plateau. Massawa has long been the major port

in the area, coveted by every power which sought to control

trade in the Red Sea. It thus happened that the coastal area and

Massawa passed successively under the control of Arabs, Ottomans, Egyptians and Italians. The last moved on to the plateau

towards the end of the nineteenth century to establish the

colony they named Eritrea. In 1941, it came under British

control, and for the next decade its future became a bone of

62 CLASS ANO REVOLUTION IN ETHIOPIA

contention locally and abroad. Whiie the great powers argued,

the Eritrean people defined the issue for themselves mainly

along ethno-religious lines. Generally speaking, the Christian

Eritreans, who constituted approximately half of the population, supported Ethiopia's claim for unification. Nevertheless,

their enthusiasm for unity was tempered by the traditional

Tigre antagonism towards the Shoa dynasty, and by the knowledge that their language, Tigrinya, was suppressed in Ethiopia

along with other languages. The Muslims of Eritrea, who constituted the other half of the population were generally in

favour of independence.

A workable compromise was affected in 1950, through an

arrangement which gave Eritrea self-government within a

federation with Ethiopia. Eritrea adopted a model constitution

which accorded parity to the two religious groups in every

sphere of public life. Political parties, elections, a free press and

a viable labour movement, made Eritrean an unsettling contrast

to the rest of the domain of the ancien regime. Fully launched

on the drive for centralization, the regime found the assertion

of autonomy in Eritrea intolerable, and no sooner had it been

agreed upon, than the Ethiopian government set about to

undermine it. Working through accommodating cliques of

Christian politicians who had won control of the local government, the regime's representatives in Eritrea subverted the

fragile political arrangement which was the essential condition

for self-government. Complex manoeuvres and the exercise of

force majeure over a period of years culminated in the elimination of Eritrea's special status, and its incorporation into the

Ethiopian state as a simple province. With characteristic obtuseness, the regime made few concessions to the peculiarities of

the Eritrean situation, and placed the troubled province under

the medieval rule of the .Ministry of Interior.

The petty bourgeoisie in Eritrea assumed a leading political

role in tha~ province !ong b~fore its counterpart in Ethiopia

reached political matunty. This class emerged during the period

of Italian colonial rule, and attained political prominence in the

turbulent period that followe~. Its fom_iation was promoted by

the rather over-elaborate Itahan colonial administrative structure, and a degree of modem economic activity fuelled by

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ERITREA 63

colonial state investment in construction, transport and communication, and private investment in light manufacturing and

trade. Urbanization and education in Eritrea also advanced to a

relatively high degree during this period, as compared with the

rest of Ethiopia. With capital mostly in Italian hands, the

Eritrean urban, educated element was limited to wage employment and local trade. Italian rule undermined the position of

the traditional ruling class in this region. It destroyed the

authority of the Christian gultegna by eliminating the gult. It

weakened also the position of traditional chiefs among the

Muslim pastoral groups through the promotion of large scale

land alienation, which became the cause of perennial intra- and

inter-tribal conflict over land. Traditional chiefs did not prove

adept at the urban-centred political activity that flourished

following the collapse of Italian rule in 1941. In that setting,

the petty bourgeoisie rose to political leadership in both the

Christian and Muslim communities.

The loss of self-government shattered the delicate compromise

arrived at with great difficulty in 1950, and revived all the

elements of conflict that had prevailed at that time. The Muslim

population of Eritrea found the balance of power turned

heavily against it. Islam was relegated to unofficial status, and

the Arabic language was gradually eliminated from the school

system. 28 Parity in public employment was no longer enforced,

and Muslims found themselves supplanted by appointees of the

central government. Thus, while the pro-Ethiopian leadership

in the Christian community was rewarded with titles, appointments and grants, the Muslims found themselves politically

emasculated and placed in an increasingly precarious position.

In addition to the loss of parity in public employment, they

were faced with a deflated local economy, the result of the successive departure of the Italian and then British administrations

which ended the much-needed state investment input. A gradual

exodus of the civilian Italian population, which accelerated

after the imposition of Ethiopian direct rule, had a similar

effect. The growth of Asmara was stunted, and smaller towns

28. Tigrinya, the language of the Eritrean highlands where the Christians are

concentrated, was eliminated immediately.

64 CLASS AND REVOLUTION IN ETHIOPIA

in the province deteriorated rapidly. The small working class

suffered the permanent loss of its organization. Having enjoyed

a brief period of freedom and militancy, the labour movement

was banned by the Eritrean administration in 1959 and, for all

practical purposes, it was never allowed to revive. Christian

Eritreans migrated to other parts of Ethiopia where they found

employment in government, trade and skilled crafts. Muslims

found it much more difficult to make this adaptation.

An atmosphere of insecurity and intimidation forced a

number of prominent Eritrean political figures into exile, where

some of them began to prepare the ground for an armed challenge to Ethiopian rule. Within Eritrea, the pastoral groups in

the lowlands were the first to defy that rule. Attempts to collect the livestock tax and to control border crossing into the

Sudan led to violent clashes with government forces. Some

groups found refuge across the border, while others remained

in a state of permanent insurrection. They were quite naturally

attracted to the nationalist movement and provided it with

its initial strength in the field. The call for Eritrean independence evoked a strong response among the petty bourgeoisie

who provided the cadre for the struggle that followed.

The Eritrean Liberation Front (ELF) was organized in 1961

to struggle for the independence of Eritrea. The leadership of

the movement came from the Muslim petty bourgeoisie, and it

drew its initial support mainly from the Muslim population,

particularly the pastoralist groups of western Eritrea. The movement had no political orientation other than militant nationalism, and remained vulnerable to accusations of religious separatism - a weakness shrewdly exploited by the Ethiopian regime

in its effort to isolate the ELF from potential supporters.

Christian participation in the movement was initially limited

and highly selective. It came from younger, educated petty

bourgeois elements who were opposed to Ethiopian rule on

class as well as nationalist grounds. Their position in the movement remained somewhat anomalous, and their tendency to

stress the class element of the struggle brought them into conflict with the leadership's conservative, nationalist and Muslim

orientation. Support eventually came from Arab countries and

Somalia, and the conflict escalated significantly from the mid-

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