War and the Politics of Identity in Ethiopia

The Making of Enemies and Allies in the Horn of Africa
Erscheinungsjahr 2009
ISBN: 978-1-84701-612-6
Verlag: Boydell & Brewer

Buch, Englisch, 256 Seiten, Print PDF, Format (B × H): 145 mm x 218 mm, Gewicht: 476 g

Reihe: Eastern Africa Series

Examines war and the impact of warfare on identity formation in Ethiopia.

Images of war, narratives of suffering and notions of ethnicity are intrinsically linked to Western perceptions of Africa. Filtered through a mostly international media the information of African wars is confined to narrow categories of explanation emerging from and adapted to a Western history and political culture. This book aims at reversing this process; to look at war and suffering from the point of view of those who fight it and suffer through it. Indoing so it reveals that the simplistic models explaining contemporary wars in Africa which are reproduced in a Western discourse are basically false.

This book examines the understanding of war and the impact of warfare onthe formation and conceptualisation of identities in Ethiopia. Building on historical trajectories of enemy images, the recent Eritean-Ethiopian war [1998-2000] is used as an empirical backdrop to explore war's formative impact, by analysing politics of identity and shifting perceptions of enemies and allies.

KJETIL TRONVOLL is Professor in Human Rights, Peace and Conflict Studies at the Norwegian Centre for Human Rights, University of Oslo. Hisother publications include Brothers at War: Making Sense of the Eritrean-Ethiopian War (co-author; James Currey/Ohio University Press, 2000) and The Ethiopian Red Terror Trials: Transitional Justice Challenged (co-editor; James Currey 2009).

Autoren/Hrsg.

Tronvoll, Kjetil

Fachgebiete

• Sozialwissenschaften Politikwissenschaft Militärwesen

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Introduction: making enemies & allies
Land, hierarchy & alliances in Highland Ethiopia
Historical trajectories of enemy images
Alternating enemies & allies: ethnicity in play
War behind the frontlines: individual approaches
Recontructing 'Ethiopianness': competing nationalisms
Ethiopia & its malcontents: purifying the nation
Conclusion: arresting Ethiopian nationalism
Postscript: after war, new enemies

Über Autor(innen)

Tronvoll, Kjetil
KJETIL TRONVOLL is Professor of Peace and Conflict Studies at Bjørknes University College, Director of Oslo Analytica policy research and advisory company, and a former Professor of Human Rights at the University of Oslo. His books include, with Daniel R. Mekonnen, The African Garrison State: Human Rights & Political Development in Eritrea (2017).