Category: Economics

Ethiopia: The Last Two Frontiers

John Markakis’s latest book, ‘Ethiopia: The last two frontiers’, presents a political history of Ethiopia covering the period 1916 to 2010. Focusing on the transformation of a multicultural empire into a modern nation state, Markakis continuously leans on the “centre/periphery” dynamic as a method of analysis. In the vein of subaltern studies, he seeks to give agency to “peripheral” peoples in the state-building process.  Using a vast range of historical, political and anthropological sources, Markakis describes Ethiopia’s northern and central regions as comprising the “centre”. The “last two frontiers” are the two peripheries: the “highland periphery”, essentially the Oromo-dominated southern highlands, and the “lowland periphery”, inhabited by the Oromo but also by major pastoralist groups such as the Afar and the Somali, as well many other smaller ethnic groups.

Split into five parts, the book begins with a discussion of the main peripheral peoples, followed by a history of the modern Ethiopian empire from the nineteenth to the twentieth century, under Emperors Menelik II (1844–1913) and Haile Selassie (1916–74). During this period, Amharic became the lingua franca, excluding non-speakers from power. Both highland and lowland peripheries were subjugated: exploited for labour, taxes and tribute. Markakis then assesses the period of Dergue rule after the deposition of Haile Selassie, in 1974, in which the Marxist dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam succeeded in expanding the state apparatus until his overthrow in 1991. The fourth part describes how the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), led by Meles Zenawi, sought a state and national identity that would encapsulate Ethiopia’s diversity, empowering the three-quarters of the population that were not Amhara. Subsequently re-formed into the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), their brand of government has blended leftist nationalist ideology with a pragmatic drive to commercialize agriculture in the south. The final part of the book assesses the impacts of federalism on the diverse ethnic groups populating the southern regions.

Markakis believes the EPRDF has overseen an expansion of the state, with more schools and hospitals established in previously neglected regions. Pluralism has been feted. But beyond basic services and symbolic gestures, he argues, the “regime” has kept a “tight reign” and is “lacking in imagination” when it comes to offering real political power to peripheral regions.

‘Ethiopia: The last two frontiers’ reflects Markakis’s immense knowledge and passion for Ethiopia. Although the tone, structure and style could be lighter, readers will nevertheless find much worth in this expansive and original study.

 

Times Literary Supplement

Interventions – A Life in War and Peace

Kofi Annan’s memoirs narrate his career as a flying peacemaker, working for the United Nations. Interventions: A Life in War and Peace, takes us from one diplomatic precipice to the next. We traverse devastating failures and lasting successes. In the book’s chaotic world, Annan’s unwavering determination and moral conviction is perhaps the one constant.

Interventions is written by Annan with Nader Mousavizadeh, an ex-colleague, and focuses mostly on his efforts to prevent or resolve global conflict. After an opening chapter on his youth, observing the successful independence movement of Ghana’s first President, Kwame Nkrumah, and engaging in student politics, we then jump to his career, as head of the UN’s peacekeeping operation, followed by his ten years as Secretary General.

Chapters primarily cover the interventions in all forms of war since the early 1990s. Specific innovations such as the Responsibility to Protect doctrine, the International Criminal Court and the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are upheld. UN reform is explained, and UN resolutions are never far away.

The book could be more balanced, addressing Rwanda, Iraq and Afghanistan more, and Israel-Palestine a little less. It could also capture the rich detail of high-level political summits with more verve; at times the content is dry and excessively policy-orientated. Occasionally the language strays into latinate prose: “The impact of the MDGs in providing this coherence has not just secured the de-confliction of certain development paradigms…”

Despite these flaws in style, Interventions engages assiduously with key topics. Annan does not shy away from criticizing the Bush administration for undermining multilateralism over the Iraq war. He is right to point out that in development debates “the spotlight should not be on aid but trade. It should really be on the failures of rich countries to remove international trade regulations that stunt the economic ambitions of developing countries.”

Interventions really comes alive when we read about Annan’s efforts to work alongside difficult personalities such as the former Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. These passages reflect Annan’s sensitivity and steeliness, as well as his sense for human psychology. The book’s substance lies somewhere between the personal and the policy-driven – more of the former would have made it more readable, but nevertheless it remains a fascinating account of contemporary statecraft in the post-Cold War era.

 

Times Literary Supplement

Dead Aid

Dead Aid is almost a good title. Like dead wood, argues Dambisa Moyo, today’s aid is both useless and obstructive. The Zambian economist makes a strong case against the use of systematic aid money given yearly by Western donors to African governments, but her book lacks nuance. No one writing about “Africa” can escape the charge of generalizing, but Moyo’s prescriptions for a better future rest too narrowly and too optimistically on private sector-driven economic growth.

Moyo begins by discussing fifty years of rich countries’ wasted aid to Africa, in the form of concessional loans or grants that are frequently forgiven by donors. This leads to the most compelling (if unoriginal) argument in the book; namely, that aid fosters corruption, which in turn hampers growth.

Dirty money is not easy to track, but Moyo could have substantiated her principal argument with more exact cases of aid corruption and stated specifically where and how this has corroded growth. There are few detailed examples, which could lead readers to make assumptions about African politicians – precisely the kind of thinking Moyo wants to change. There are also oversights: she calls “glamour aid” a phenomenon of the past decade, although it began with Live Aid in 1985. Others would trace the birth of the African cause célèbre to the late nineteenth century when Joseph Conrad and Arthur Conan Doyle reported on King Leopold’s atrocities in the Congo.

Dead Aid simplifies and in so doing ignores the fact that Africa has been a site for multiple competing growth and policy discourses at various levels since aid began. The second part of the book proposes a narrow focus on foreign direct investment, trade with China and microfinance as the best routes for African aid-free growth.

Aid itself is not the factor obstructing an otherwise inevitable stream of private capital; by pushing these approaches, Moyo overestimates the singularity of African markets. Aid is controversial for its historical and political connotations, but in reality its impact on Africa is secondary to structural factors such as global trading systems.

That most African countries have gone from being net food exporters in the 1960s to net food importers today is enormously significant for the livelihoods of Africans. Increasingly driven to cities, partly because of the effects of economic liberalization in the 1980s, millions now cannot afford to buy imported commodities. One issue Moyo neglects is agriculture. Ensuring more effective, equitable agricultural development will do more to promote growth in Africa than ending institutional aid.

Times Literary Supplement

Dead Aid by Dambisa Moyo is published by Penguin.