- 1 Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front, led by the Tigray People’s Liberation Front and (...)
1Ethiopia’s historical identity as a nation (the idea of a shared political community) and a polity (the ensemble of institutions of the political community) is under scrutiny, notably since the advent of the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (eprdf) ethno-federalist regime (1991-2018), which discouraged an encompassing national narrative in favour of an ethnicized one. This has had its reflections not only in public debate and policy but also in the academic teaching of history in high schools and in higher education. In this paper, I discuss this process of rethinking Ethiopian history and history teaching, illustrating it by discussing an important recent product: the Module Hist 102, “History of Ethiopia and the Horn,” of January 2020. I thereby also place the discussion within the ubiquitous debates on “decolonization” in current social science and historiography. This History Module was designed to be the textbook for use across academic institutions in Ethiopia in the compulsory basic history course. It therefore attempted to avoid a bias reflecting majority ethnic group perspectives or “literate” (written) traditions. The discussion among the Ethiopian interlocutors (historians, politicians, students, activists, and indeed many public commentators) around the Module addressed the question of whether a “common,” minimally acceptable and scholarly truthful history of Ethiopia was now illusory or if it could still be a shared aim. If the latter, how might such a shared history be scientifically defended and taught as part of the national curriculum? These issues were always sensitive in Ethiopia, especially since 1991 but have become particularly pertinent due to: a) the armed conflict (since 4 November 2020) of the Tigray People's Liberation Front (tplf) with the federal government led since April 2018 by reformist Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, and b) the increase in violent “inter-ethnic” clashes, e.g. in parts of Oromia Regional State and the Southern Peoples Regional State of Ethiopia. These developments could in large part be seen as political consequences of the tplf-eprdf1 ideological approach to Ethiopia’s history.
2In this debate on Ethiopian history, the major topics of controversy are usually the following five elements. First, the “colonization” thesis (regarding the 19th-century imperial conquest of the South and West) and concomitantly the status of the various “ethnic groups” or peoples making up Ethiopia. Next, the status of “oral tradition as evidence” (strongly interfered with by post-tradition political influences), followed by the status of certain specific “historical facts,” and finally the idea of what a “unified,” all-Ethiopian identity could be. The discussion of Module 102—as a proposed discursive framework for Ethiopian history teaching—can thus be related to the recent calls for “decolonizing knowledge,” decentering hegemonic discourse. As in the debates in Western academia and elsewhere, alternative versions of history (writing) from the standpoint of indigenous or minority groups in Ethiopia have to be encouraged when they aim toward equality and inclusiveness of representation. However, they may be problematic when they “subjectivize” knowledge or become parochial and skewed, leading to reductionist, partial histories that make any national history outline remote and ignore its lines of connection.
3African post-colonial countries struggled for decades with “national identity.” After political decolonization, the (re)invention of new social and political symbolism for States, often without precolonial political or cultural cohesion, was problematic. A “colonization of the mind” had its effects and transformed local traditions and aspirations so as to never go back to a “before” State. Mutual influence and local appropriation shaped a new cultural context and reservoir for “nation-building” efforts.
4While Ethiopia was politically not colonized (apart from the Italian interlude), its modernization since the early 20th century was greatly influenced by ideas, models, techniques and educational programs from the rest of the world (notably from the West, Japan and Marxist ideology). The 1960s-1970s Ethiopian student movement and its ideas are one example (Marzagora 2017: 434; Messay 2008), copying radical Marxist ideas unsuited for direct application in Ethiopia. Whether and how far the “solution” to such extraneous socio-political influence is a campaign of “decolonizing” the cultural fabric (including education systems) in its current sense stands to be seen.
5In recent years, “decolonizing” everything has indeed become the talk of the town in social science and it creates challenges. This movement contests the supposed and real “epistemological” and knowledge biases in academic research, staffing and curricula, resulting from observed historically grown inequalities and dominance structures, including those in “knowledge production.” Even a so-called “coloniality of knowledge” in general has been asserted, often evident in a persistent approach to poorer countries as in all respects “underdeveloped.” African Studies is now a major frontline in the debate (Adams 2014; Cloete & Auriacombe 2019; Jansen 2019; Kessi, Marks & Ramugundo 2020).
6Already in African studies, anthropologists were historically at the forefront, contesting views of superiority and hegemony as found in government circles, mainstream media and the general public (Nader 2011). They also have scientifically questioned the cultural limits and conditioning of certain findings, e.g. in psychology or sociology. Cultural ecologists critically called attention to local environmental knowledge systems that reassess context and embeddedness and that can be appraised on their efficiency and value via universalist criteria (Asebe et al. 2017; Demssie et al. 2020; Frainer et al. 2020). In the adjacent field of psychological research, there has also been significant bias (Schulson 2020), reproducing Western epistemological assumptions and methods, thus distorting findings.
7So if decolonization means (there are many shades of meaning and also much unclarity on the term) to rid existing university curricula of (un)conscious racist, biased and prejudiced aspects so as to enlarge access to academia and to broaden the scientific discussion to un(der)represented parties and suppressed voices, then no one can object to it. This has been ongoing and will always be, in line with the promises of the Enlightenment (work in progress; Todorov 2009) as a project working towards a global conversation to interpret and explain the world, based on critical reason, argument and equality of access unencumbered by the dogmas of religion and State (or ideology).
8However, as usual when a new intellectual fad emerges, the proponents of today’s decolonization paradigm may be overdoing it. They often use reductionist arguments, “provincialize” knowledge, and deny the transcendent aspects of knowledge formation processes. This especially applies to scholars in African studies centers in the “global North,” where different preoccupations seem to prevail than in Africa itself (perhaps South Africa excluded). In this light, some critics of the “decolonizers” have spoken of the danger of a “recolonisation” (Long 2016; Williams 2017; Clapham 2020: 148). In African studies, the main focus of “decolonizing” efforts will profitably be on reforming the academic field and setting new agendas in Africa itself, at African universities and among researchers doing work on African societies (Clapham 2020: 141, 148), and not predominantly in the North.
9The tendency seen in much recent writing by “decolonialists” suggests, without much analysis, that today’s African universities and their curricula are too much shaped by “the colonial condition.” However, as Damtew (2020) recently noted, such an argument “[…] ignores the transformational growth and diversity the continent [Africa] has registered.” This holds especially for Africa-based higher education in the last 15 to 20 years, when it saw its growth and renewal after the financial and institutional crises of the 1980-1990s.
- 2 Which would be dubious and counter-productive; see (Wingfield 2017; Stokes 2019).
10A way forward in the “decolonize” debates is to wind down on ideology, not apply it as a blanket term for all criticism, not see “identity” and “minority position” as an automatic source of new (scientific) authority,2 and tackle concrete issues that enhance representation, access, and the full spectrum of knowledge acquisition, judged on canons of rational debate (as a regulative idea).
11One core field in which the “decolonizing” moment finds a target is history writing.3 It has, of course, long been argued, also in Western historiography, that history—as the public record of defining events and people’s deeds—is written by the winners, the politically hegemonic, and that the history of ordinary people and the lower classes or minorities was often forgotten. This may hold for much of pre-mid-20th-century history, on dynastic history, history of State-formation, elites and “great men” (few women), and histories of wars and battles. It was undoubtedly a dominant streak, especially since Roman times almost two millennia ago. However, the pioneers of history writing, Herodotus, did not start as such, and neither did Chinese historians like Sima Qian (1st cent. bc) and Ban Zhao (1st-2nd cent.), or Ibn Khaldoun, the great medieval social historian: they described also broader social and cultural developments and searched for explanations beyond mere elite behaviour. Since the middle and late 20th century, historiography and social sciences have significantly changed course in developing much attention to the societal and cultural developments, ideological social movements, demography, ethnic and social diversity, and processes of conflict and social change that were correlated to or underlying military and political events.
12History writing and education in many countries also submit to influence from the State for the general outlines of a shared corpus of knowledge (in some cases a canon) of minimally accepted historical narratives and facts, apart from the certification, quality control and institutional support that they need. Here the line between a dominant, hegemonic narrative and free and dissenting views on historical process and identity is tenuous, notably in the case of new (e.g., post-colonial), communist, Islamic, and pluralist countries. The “provincialization” of historical knowledge written from an explicitly limited perspective (religious, ethnic, regional, or class-oriented) is frequent and understandable but rarely useful for nation-building and shared civic identity in a country, as it precludes room for inclusiveness.
13Precisely such challenges have characterized Ethiopian historiography, especially since the early 1970s, and, as we will see, again evident in the History Module and its subsequent discussion by Ethiopian academics. Below, I first sketch the historiographical background of Ethiopia to contextualize the Module’s approach and contribution. Interesting in Ethiopia’s case is that the debates in historiography have mainly proceeded on the basis of a local framework. First of all, Ethiopia was not colonized (except for 1936-1941) and had less need to resist any imposed foreign authority structures or conceptual schemes/ideologies, and second, the country has shown independence and continuity in historical reflection: history writing and story-telling, already were well-developed in religious hagiographies, (royal) chronicles, ethno-history traditions, and travelogues and autobiographies of leading persons (De Lorenzi 2015). History pioneers in early 20th-century Ethiopia were largely self-educated and connected to a vernacular historiographical tradition, although inspired by Western and missionary education; they adapted or assimilated Western themes and interests into a local (Ethiopian-Eritrean) perspective (ibid.: 138).
14A broader academic discipline of history emerged after 1950 when the first university (Haile Sellassie i University) was founded. Here the formative influence of foreign/Western academics was indeed notable in many fields, including history. Still, the contents and choice of themes of curriculum and research, as well as the perspectives on Ethiopian society and history, were strongly determined by Ethiopian historians.
15One core issue always has been “national identity” and its historical roots. African postcolonial national identities in general have of course long been under (re)construction, facing persistent problems of regional disparity, religious and ethnic tensions, and socio-economic inequalities. In Ethiopia, these were already an issue since the era of Emperor Menilik ii (r. 1889-1913) when the country had expanded significantly after the conquest and incorporation of new areas around the Ethiopian highlands, the location of the historical Ethiopian (“Abyssinian”) State. As the Module also makes clear (see below), identifying Ethiopia’s “national identity” in any era is difficult, as the country’s borders were always in flux and because even in modern times, i.e. after the country acquired internationally recognized borders since ca. 1896 (the victory at Adwa against the Italians), the line of those borders belied constant insecurity and fuzziness about what they enclosed; they did not produce any clear or unified political cohesion but consolidated a certain hierarchical power structure.
16The history-writing and teaching of the imperial era (up to the 1974 revolution) was no doubt characterized by the narrative framework of a unitary imperial State, dominated by a highland literate core—the State makers and the power holders since at least the 13th century (Toggia 2008). This hegemonic model, centered on the Christian highlands where the historic kingdom going back to the Axum empire was located, is indicated by Marzagora (2017), following Clapham (2002), Triulzi (2002) and others, as the “Great Tradition.” No leaders in Ethiopia ever used this phrase; it is a Eurocentric concept, of course derived from F. R. Leavis’ idea of the dominant, “superior” or normative great literary tradition in Britain since the early 19th century. However, the aristocratic highland elites imbued by Orthodox Christianity often saw themselves as bringers of a civilized tradition in the wider realm and had an underlying idea of the so-called destiny of imperial rule and guidance for Ethiopia (Marzagora 2017: 443). And the hierarchical model of “lesser” and “more civilized” (State-forming, literate, Christian) groups was dominant. An important point made by Marzagora (ibid.: 427, 437) is that this dominant “Great Tradition” in historical discourse and attempted national identity was always accompanied by dissenting voices and localized counter-narratives, not only in the past 30-40 years but from the start of the “Ethiopian polity” (I would add, likely already in 4th-century Axum, which also was a multi-ethnic, multi-language realm). However, as Clapham’s analysis (2002) suggested, these counter-histories—of regions, peoples, minorities or religious groups—are yet to be effectively woven into a new integral historical picture of Ethiopia.
17Due to historical processes and specific features of the expansion of the imperial State, the elite strata mentioned above were dominated by Amharic-speaking people—although in certain periods also by Tigrayans, like in the late 18th-early 19th-century Zemene Mesafint period (the “era of princes”) and during the rule of emperor Yohannis iv (1872-1889), and also in the mid-18th-early 19th century by Oromo, then dominant at the court and the “king makers” (Tekeste 1990: 56, 59; Bahru 1998: 106-107; Pankhurst 1998: 124-125). These identities then were not so much ethnic in the modern sense than linguistic or, roughly, based on alleged territory of origin, and hybrid by nature. Provincial rulers and the emperor primarily saw themselves as (Orthodox) Christian custodians of the land, and for a long stretch of its history, they indeed were. In addition, the simple historical fact is that many territories now part of the State of Ethiopia were not politically included in it before the 19th century. However, trade and tribute relations, as well as religious-cultural influences (like Islam), existed for ages before the annexation in the late 19th century: with Afar, Wolaitta, Harar, the Gibe States, or Käfa, and denying this latter fact will not help forge a minimally “shareable” conception of the (federal) State that exists today.
- 4 Many of such local ethnic histories have been produced, see Nocho 1994; Wanna 2001; Bekele 2010; A(...)
18The image mentioned above of Ethiopia as the never-colonized, ancient, unified African country with a strong degree of boundary and permanence began to crumble after the empire’s demise in 1974. Still today, the country is host to critical, if not acrimonious, debates on what the shared history of Ethiopia in the post-imperial period is or can be. There is a recognition of a wider Ethiopian historical domain or “culture area” and a lack of unity and agreement across different sections of the political spectrum and intellectual (ethno-)elites on what is “the nation’s history” in any unifying sense. The political contours of a polity called Ethiopia since at least the 13th century are a fact (and some would effortlessly trace it back to the Axumite empire of two millennia ago) but these are deemed insufficient to provide for a sense of continuity today. There is no need to dwell on the alternative stories and histories of “subaltern” or “marginalized” or ethnic groups that now produce self-appointed leaders and local intellectuals reinterpreting their (part-)histories and deconstructing the pan-Ethiopian narrative in a political sense: from Oromo to Silt’é to Käfa to Gurage to Tigray to Wolaitta, ethno-regions each claiming their specific history,4 often purposely detached from Ethiopia and the former empire, and not seldomly mirroring a teleology similar to the dominant narrative (Clapham 2002: 42). Many today go along with this view, but for equally many ordinary Ethiopians it is bizarre to witness this centrifugalist debate, driven by a modern preoccupation par excellence: ethno-linguistic or ethnic-based identity politics—the politics of the group or the collectivity, instead of a focus on interconnecting processes, individuals, structures of political economic power, education, class, and competition. Ethiopian activists and “ethnic” historians here connect to the global debates which, in the form of identity-centered decolonization discourse, have problematized much of academic life in several other African countries (notably South Africa), and perhaps even more so American academia (Mac Donald 2018) and some European countries, like the uk (Black 2019). As we noted, however, Ethiopia is a special case, because decolonization ideology takes another form and does not resemble the South African and us cases. Despite being the oldest independent African country and having a heritage of State identity and “unity in diversity” for many ages, Ethiopia internally has tied into these debates, despite its fundamental differences from Africa’s postcolonial States. Up to 1991 the centralist model of Ethiopian political unity prevailed, first in the empire under emperor Haile Selassie (d. 1974) and later under the Marxist-socialist Derg regime. This was clearly reflected in history writing and education.
19Most historiography until ca. 1975 accordingly focused on the power holders (the imperial dynasty, provincial leaders), religious communities/relations, economic development and modernization, foreign relations, and efforts to resist external invaders and colonial efforts (cf. Egyptian incursions in the 1870s, the Sudanese Mahdist attack in the 1880s, the 1896 battle of Adwa with the Italians). A nationalist flavour, imbued with Ethiopia being defined primarily as a largely Orthodox-Christian, independent country, was prominent. With Toggia (2008), we might conclude that history writing (and teaching) was then to a certain extent “ideological,” building or reinforcing political legitimacy claims of the imperial elite. However, this also applies to the successor regimes after 1974 (and indeed to most State ruling classes anywhere). We have to distinguish between the projected narrative of the State elite in power vs the narratives presented in educational institutions via its textbooks and research work. There is no one-to-one correspondence between the two, although the first kept check of the broad outlines of the second. While a detailed analysis of the historical narratives in the textbooks for the last two grades (11 and 12) of high school and university introductory history courses written by local Ethiopian academics could tell us more about this, in practice, the distinction between State ideology and educational narrative is indeed precarious, because final Ministry of Education approval was always needed on the educational texts. Especially in the Derg time (1974-1991) and the eprdf period (1991-2018), this was strong (Toggia 2008). History education always served as an “ideological instrument.”
- 5 An analysis of high school textbooks under the Derg was provided by Tekeste (1990: 55-70).
20The Derg regime’s political self-image turned away radically from an imperial model of highlander-dominant Christian rulers, church leaders, nobles and emperors towards a political model of class-based “popular” leaders that led a socialist regime and were ruling in the name of the farmers and workers. Ethiopian historiography reluctantly followed, to pay more attention to the “history of the broad masses” and “class relations,” or “structures of oppression,” etc., including attention to historical processes of conquest and violent contestation of the imperial, “feudal” order (Tekeste 1990: 55f.). But not to the extent that all Ethiopian historians, although progressive, bought into the ideologies of socialism (and later Marxism-Leninism), far from it. They continued to negotiate space for independent historical research and teaching—although means were dwindling and university budgets stagnant (Bahru 2000: 17). High school textbooks, however, underwent a more rapid turn towards the new non-imperial, non-religious and class-oriented perspective on Ethiopia and its peoples. This went parallel with a new “nationalities” policy—on a kind of Stalinist base—, i.e., an identification of all the ethno-linguistic groups (= “nationalities”) to be translated into an effort to draw them into a new socialist egalitarian society on the basis of class position and material economic development.5
- 6 Based on material produced by staff of Addis Ababa’s History Department. See also Merid’s (1998) p (...)
21After 1991, with the victory of the insurgent movement eprdf—originally also strongly socialist in orientation, with a Marxist-Leninist background—the above model was abandoned in favour of an ethno-federalist political model of government (1991-2018), whereby the emphasis was laid—both administratively and educationally—on the recognition of all ca. 75 ethno-linguistic groups that could nominally be distinguished in the country. Toggia (2008: 323) contended that the then government “[…] revised the history lessons in all public schools and Addis Ababa University’s curricula to reflect the heterogeneity of ethnonational groups.” The extent to which this happened is unclear because many professional historians resisted the pressure. For instance, in the teaching material used since the early 1980s—the Introduction to the History of Ethiopia, Hist 102 (Merid 1998: x)—fairly traditional State and power-center perspective was used, though with more attention to the (peripheral) regions, peoples, classes and ethnic groups in the country. This also applied to the follow-up manual compiled by Bahru Zewde (1998), which was used for at least two years for university-wide history teaching.6 After ca. 2000 however, there seems to have been no obligatory introductory history course for first-year students in the higher education curriculum (Commentary 2020).
- 7 Cited in Levine (1992: 15).
22But this process of rethinking, as well as governmental pressure, seems to have massively stimulated a general questioning of the country’s historical identity. It was a feature already emerging in previous decades and in the Derg years (Bahru 2000: 15-16). eprdf ideologues like the late Prime Minister Meles Zenawi (r. 1991-2012) actively devalued the idea of Ethiopian national identity and fomented ethnic identity thinking and radical political restructuring as a substitute. (In)famous is his 1992 statement on the alleged unity of Ethiopia: “The Tigreans had Axum, but what could that mean to the Gurague? The Agew had Lalibela, but what could that mean to the Oromo? The Gonderes had castles, but what could that mean to the Wolaita?”7 By reducing the multilayered symbolic value of those places (religious, cultural, and historical) to ethnicity only, this statement was highly contested at the time, even by many belonging to these peoples.
23Since the 1991 political changes, a concomitant new discourse on “ethnic self-determination” has emerged in the country. It partly contravened the parallel government discourse on the “developmental State,” which was premised on overall national development. These discursive moments of ethnicity as primary and driven by grievances are also reflected in history education and curricula. In the past decades, history education in secondary schools and introductory university courses in Ethiopia have shown important changes, as is usual. However, specifically, the eprdf regime’s political ideology and administrative practices based on ethno-regional diversity and ethnic identity put a premium on emphasizing diversity and “ethnic citizenship” above all. This was despite the regime reverting to core elements of the so-called “Ethiopianist” hegemonic discourse when needed (as in the Eritrea war in 1998-2000). As Marzagora (2017: 442) noted: “[the] State-sponsored nationalism in today’s Ethiopia thus draws both from the Great Tradition and from the counter-historiographies. It attempts to accommodate both, and selectively emphasises one or the other.”
- 8 In the past four years until today, there have been multiple mass expulsions and targeted killings (...)
24In any case, the tilting towards particularist ethnic identities—with an underlying “divide-and rule” model—led to a certain measure of fragmentation and “identity politics,” which have undoubtedly contributed to the articulation of violent minority targeting and “ethnic cleansing,” still ongoing.8 Bahru Zewde (2000: 5) noted the effects on the historical discipline at the time: “[…] the deification of ethnicity has presented a constant nuisance to the day-to-day activity of teaching and research.”
25Certainly, under eprdf, the dominant notions of Ethiopian national identity were further questioned and the idea of the nature of any “Ethiopian nation” was put on hold. Endless ideological debates followed on what (still) could constitute Ethiopia and how its history should be taught. These discussions, in their own fashion, tuned in to global debates on decolonizing models of knowledge, but in unexpected ways and without solutions. Interestingly, in Ethiopia, these debates—i.e. in their specific form of decolonization talk—have not really caught on in academia but only in sectarian ethnic and political circles.
26Module Hist 102, the latest reform of the history curriculum for university students, was written in 2018-2019 and proposed in November 2019 (Surafel et al. 2020). Again it may have been partly authored in line with instructions from the Ministry of Education and reflected the new ethno-political realities of the eprdf era. It is not clear if and how the influence or guidelines of the new reformist government since April 2018 (under Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed) were in any way relevant.
27In commenting on this text here, the idea is not to explore and weigh the veracity or the most suitable and commonly acceptable history of Ethiopia from a factual perspective, but only to see how historiographic issues and points of debate and controversy were represented in this textbook. I do not deny, however, that in a comprehensive study of Ethiopian history, the two aspects have to be combined because not all diverging histories can have equal value or be true at the same time. I will come back to this below when discussing some specific examples.
- 9 Exception was Eritrea, detached from Ethiopia and made an Italian colony from 1890 to 1941.
28While a case could be made that Ethiopia—or certain parts of the country—have suffered from (internal) colonialism, the decolonization debate has not been popular in Ethiopia. The nature of colonialism (as conquest and forced socio-cultural change by external powers) was obviously different from European colonialism elsewhere in Africa. Not that criticism on imperial (pre-1974) history-writing and on privileging one national/ethnic group above others has not been made; on the contrary. Accusations and critiques by representatives from various subjected, under-represented or minority peoples and groups in the country since the extension of its political boundaries in the wake of Emperor Menilik ii’s late-19th century conquests have been numerous. But apart from the absence of big debate on political decolonization,9 discussions on epistemological/cultural decolonization, as we saw, e.g. in South Africa, are not prominent either, and usually seen as irrelevant to the Ethiopian context. In addition, few dispute the value of general scientific insights, methods and epistemological canons as followed in mainstream science, be they “Western-based” or not. Even Messay Kebede, a leading Ethiopian-American philosopher and a critic of the adoption of Western models and ideologies into the Ethiopian context (Messay 2008), is a global thinker, bringing together Western and African traditions, and does not reject the canons of rational debate and argument or Western epistemology in general (unlike many ideological proponents of decolonisation today, like De Sousa, Mignolo, Quijano, etc.). Messay’s 2004 book was a nuanced argument for proper decolonization and for bridging narratives. In 2017, there was a mini-debate among some Ethiopian academics on decolonization: Hewan (2017) tried to call for “decolonizing Ethiopian studies,” but it was not elaborated—and even strongly questioned by several Ethiopian critics (Abinet 2017; Berihun 2017).
29Below, we briefly review the contents and approach of the Module Hist 102 on Ethiopian history in its latest version of January 2020: a key text in the academic cultivation of Ethiopian historical identity. I precede this with a note on high school textbooks, for which the Module, when accepted, will provide a framework to further elaboration (see below). When editing this paper (January 2022), the Module was neither finalized nor yet introduced as a teaching text. Reasons: a) the lack of consensus on a few historical controversies, notably the “Anole affair” (the harsh battles between the Arssi Oromo and the imperial army in the 1880s; cf. note 17). Discussion on it during historians’ meetings in 2021 did not yield a compromise; and b) national controversy after the conflict started by the tplf on 3-4 November 2020 and the subsequent devastation of northern Ethiopia, together with the ongoing violent attacks by the Oromo Liberation Army. These events increased the tensions between “ethnic” groups (elites) of the country and put comprehensive national discussion on the nation’s history on hold.
- 10 See Eshetu (2015a, b) and Girma (2015).
- 11 A full appraisal of the tenets and ideological contexts of Ethiopian history teaching would need a (...)
- 12 See works mentioned in footnote 4.
- 13 The Axum empire, the Zagwe era, the “restoration” of the Solomonic dynasty, the Muslim sultanates, (...)
- 14 Neither of these textbooks (including Girma 2015) devoted any attention to the period of EPRDF rul (...)
30As a preface to further commenting on Module 102 I note that Ethiopian history is also dealt with at high schools in specific textbooks10 in grades 9-10 and 11-12, but limitations of space preclude their full discussion here. Suffice it to say that the broad outlines of the textbooks across the various regimes of the past 50 years have differentially reflected the political spirit of the times.11 Tekeste (1990: 67) noted that the textbooks of the imperial times reflected, apart from many factual errors and unclear use of language, relatively little attention to specific Ethiopian history compared to “world history”. What he calls the “colonial” character of the textbooks was also upheld by a preponderance of foreign teachers in grades 11 and 12 of the high schools and in the Addis Ababa University History Department (ibid.: 69), founded in 1963. In the Derg period since 1974, the foreign influence on the history curriculum was evident in the stamp of Marxist-Leninist ideas, class analysis and developmental fixations, whereby “[…] the educational programme (curriculum and media of instruction) reflect[ed] very little the history and culture of the country” (ibid.: 69). As noted above, the eprdf era (1991-2018) saw the emergence of more diversity, with a focus on ethnicities (“nationalities”) and ethno-regional histories being explored, written and discussed12 but with a certain measure of confusion on how “national” or State Ethiopian history and national identity would be impacted. As was the case already with the textbooks of the 1960s, most recent textbooks in use (Eshetu 2015a, b; Girma 2015) show a combination of world history, African history and Ethiopian history, with the latter more prominent in the center of the narrative. In the 2015 grade 9-10 textbook, attention is paid to the preconquest southern States (Wolaitta, Käfa, the Gibe States) and to the either violent or peaceful expansion of emperor Menelik ii to the southern areas and the “harsh feudal exploitation” (Eshetu 2015a: 149). The narrative is still firmly focused on political events: kings, emperors, wars, local States, revolts, socio-political movements, and foreign relations (e.g., the interference of colonial powers since the mid-19th century). In grade 11-12 textbook (Eshetu 2015b), a similar but more in-depth mix of global and Ethiopian history is presented, with again Ethiopia as the central core of the story with eight of the twenty units (chapters) dealing directly with Ethiopia and the Horn of Africa. Here the great diversity of the region but also the longstanding connections between its peoples are emphasized; no privileged place is accorded to any one people (ibid.: 98). From the start, however, in the first section on Ethiopia (“Peoples and States in Ethiopia and the Horn of Africa up to 1270”), some ideological-interpretive statements are given on the modern State that seem out of place: “[…] the nations and nationalities […] lived side by side […] had many common experiences including the class oppression they have suffered. But very recently, conditions have begun to change, and the national oppression has started to fade away” (ibid.: 99). These politically correct statements seem unnecessary, or at least premature. Striking in both textbooks is the rather conventional periodization of Ethiopian history in dynastic eras and familiar power elites13 that were known—and much criticized—in previous history books (including those from the imperial era). But serious attention is again given to the pre-conquest kingdoms in the South, such as Wolaitta, Yem, Enarya, Sheka, Käfa and the Oromo monarchies: they get an entire chapter (pp. 278-289).14
31As noted, the Module (Surafel et al. 2020) is an important new history curriculum text that elaborates on the discourse of diversity and ethnicity in vogue since the 1990s. If adopted, it will be influential in shaping students’ thinking nationwide and in fueling the public debate. It was written to fill a void: for 26 years, Ethiopia had no introductory history course for its under-graduate university students (only courses in the History Departments). The authors were a more or less representative group of four historians from Addis Ababa, Jimma, Debre Tabor and Wollega Universities, with seven text reviewers, from Hawassa, Bahir Dar, Haramaya, Jimma, Arba Minč, Meqele and Gondar Universities.
32The following points in Hist 102 are noteworthy:
33The Module’s scope is on Ethiopia and not so much on the Horn; the time period is from prehistory to 1995 (the start of eprdf rule under the new Constitution), and it counts a modest 196 pages. It contains a list of questions for study at the end of the units. It is written in English, the language of senior high school and higher education in Ethiopia.
34There are seven units (chapters, of some 28 pages each), treated in chronological order: an (excellent) introduction on aims, methods and sources; prehistory and languages/peoples; the evolution of States until the early 13th century; politics, economy and socio-cultural processes until the early 16th century; politics, economy and socio-cultural processes from the early 16th to the early 18th century; internal interactions and external relations from 1800 to 1941, and finally internal interactions and external relations from 1941 to 1994.
35The general objective is not to produce one history or one master narrative but to “[…] introduce the students to the diverse histories of Ethiopia and the Horn” (ibid.: 5). The authors thereby also mention the aim to look at “[…] the extent to which interaction between peoples [my emphasis] throughout the region […] have shaped the history of the region” (ibid.)—an important point. It is also emphasized as having produced long-term linkages (ibid.: 21, 74, 79). This point is sometimes over-emphasized, as in the discussion of the period just after the 16th-century Muslim-Christian war (ibid.: 79).
36The chronological and thematic outline of Ethiopian history is still fairly conventional, with an emphasis on power holders, States, trade and economic processes, and international relations, although the choice of topics, regions and peoples discussed is wider. Also, the depiction of religions and their origins or introduction into Ethiopia (mainly Christianity and Islam) is conventional and not much integrated into the broader narrative.
- 15 Although hardly on the authoritative 5-volume Encyclopaedia Aethiopica (2003-2014).
- 16 See “Commentary by Module reviewers on the the New ‘History of Ethiopia and the Horn’ Common Cours (...)
- 17 In the draft edition of the Module (Nov. 2019), the crucial issue of the “Anole amputations” was m (...)
37While based on academic historical literature,15 it seeks to project a politically correct, “acceptable” or “useable” history for all Ethiopians, with violent episodes and facts under-emphasized or omitted, and declaring an “equality” of constituent peoples. Indeed, in the reviewers’ commentary, it said: “[…] it tried to uncover what has been silenced and tried to serve as the voice of all. Above all, it tried to give recognition for the victims by addressing some issues in a modest way”.16 This seems to be a more political, not educational aim. It has led, in some places, to an approach aimed to address or meet perceived grievances of people previously less well-described in the older history courses, such as the Oromo. But it also led to the cavalier use of evidence, notably oral evidence, for which no straightforward methods are indicated on how to establish their reliability. It also has a number of factual errors, commented upon by others (e.g. Getachew 2020).17
38Remarkably, given the academic critiques of Ethiopian historiography and its “ideological” use (Triulzi 2002; Toggia 2008; Marzagora 2017; Smidt 2020), the paradigm of history presented in the Module is not radically different from that in previous textbooks and modules. The interpretive explanation is limited. An effort at rewriting or re-presenting history from an alternative baseline and with a different periodization, as suggested by Clapham (2002), or making use of the many anthropological and ethno-historical studies produced in the last 20-30 years, was not tried, except for brief, non-historical ethnographic profiles (Surafel et al. 2020: 93-103). Some concessions were, however, made to the well-known criticisms of “ethnonationalists” in decentering the historical account and not “privileging” any ethno-national group or elite. In the chapters on the Middle Ages, all the political formations of the Ethiopian realm, including those of the South, are listed. This was a continuation of the innovation made under the Derg regime.
39The Module text aims for consensus and “inclusivity.” This has led to the avoidance of major historical controversies and complicated facts. This avoiding has its limits and becomes somewhat problematic in the presentation of significant events like the 16th-century Muslim-Christian war and the Oromo “population movements” (more or less a euphemism for what the sources suggest in fact happened: expansion, violent and non-violent), as well as the past 150 years of Ethiopia’s history, marked by some very violent military campaigns. The narrative cannot be “‘inclusive” if one avoids discussion of the violence—inflicted on unwilling peoples—that nevertheless contributed to the formation of modern Ethiopia. Neither is there any word on the past two, rather impactful, decades of eprdf rule.
40Half of the literature used for the Module consists of “standard works” written by foreign scholars, and the rest is by Ethiopian scholars (also older works). There is no evidence of developing a “local epistemology” used for a specific “Ethiopian” perspective and no connection to the work of the first generation of independent Ethiopian-Eritrean historians discussed by De Lorenzi (2015).
41It therefore cannot be said how the Module, if adopted, will contribute to forging a new Ethiopian national identity or to a new form of “nation-building,” one of the expressed aims. However, despite its descriptive lacunae and factual errors, it has at least resisted a recolonization of Ethiopian history by other politically-driven agendas.
42The Module at least meets the desire expressed by many (Clapham 2002: 40-41; Smidt 2020: 33) that history should not be exclusively oriented towards the power holders and the State(s); it “fragments” the story and calls attention to other themes, like the integrative role of trade and exchange relations, the cultural and agrarian-technological exchanges across regions and groups, even in times of tension, and the trans-group role of religion, notably Christianity and Islam.
- 18 Smidt (2020: 26) noted that the meeting cycle ended in disagreement and was canceled after ten day (...)
- 19 “Commentary by Module reviewers on the New ‘History of Ethiopia and the Horn’ Common Course Module (...)
43There was a round of comments by reviewers, which led to improvements and corrections but not to a fundamental change of perspective. A validation workshop on the final text held in February 2020 did not bring unanimous approval (Smidt 2020: 26), and neither did the additional historians’ discussion days in mid-2021. Recurring topics of discussion—and entirely in line with those of the previous 30 years of debate—were the ones noted in the introduction: a) the “colonization’ thesis, regarding the 19th-century largely violent imperial conquest of the southern and western areas, and specifically the Anole affair of 1886; b) the status of “oral tradition as evidence” (especially when we know it was strongly interfered with by post-tradition political influences); c) the impossibility of agreeing on an idea of a unified, all-Ethiopian identity; and d) the status of the various “ethnic groups” or peoples making up Ethiopia (or by some seen as not belonging to Ethiopia).18 However, the commentators said that the criticisms “[…] waged against the Ministry [of Education] concerning the validated introductory history curriculum are unfounded and do not hold water,” and that instead it “[…] should have been unabashedly appreciated for taking such a commendable step in trying to salvage the generation by introducing arguably a balanced historical document”.19
44In this respect, the document questions, if not “decolonizes,” the past dominant story of Ethiopia with its tacit assumptions of normative hierarchy, formative power politics, socio-cultural prestige ranking, and the recurrent foreign perceptions of it as an “underdeveloped” country.
45Obviously, the debates mentioned above of history teachers in February 2020 and April 2021 showed that the new Module was a necessary but not sufficient new document on Ethiopian history teaching and for (re)forming an Ethiopian civic identity.
46Thus, the debate on what an Ethiopian nation-State and national unity or cohesiveness could ultimately look like, or if is at all possible after decades of sectarian debate and conflict, is ongoing and will likely not end soon. In fact, it has been fairly repetitive for the past 30 years, and the new Module will contribute to this. It may be noted that the debate is mostly conducted by “intellectuals,” media commentators and self-appointed ethnic group leaders/activists and, of course, vocal members of Ethiopian diaspora (in cyberspace), and hardly by the ordinary people that try to make do and to accommodate with others in daily life.
- 20 See Semir Yusuf’s book review of a work in this line, in African Affairs 109 (434), 2010, pp. 171- (...)
- 21 Abiy Ahmed, Meddemer (Addis Ababa: n.p.), 2019. It also came out in an Oromo version (Ida’amu).
47The ascent to power of Abiy Ahmed as new pm in April 2018 has rekindled the debates, this time with an unusual measure of political openness and a deluge of articles and comments in the printed and digital media, but often with no common end goal in mind and rehearsing parochial group views. The same duality already present in the 1970s-1980s in the student critiques on the hegemonic national narratives re-emerges in these debates: “ethno-nationalists”—those who want far-reaching autonomy if not “independence” for an ethnic region or ethnic group, contesting Ethiopia as “empire”20—and “unitarists”—those striving toward a unitary State structure that de-emphasizes ethnicity as an organizing principle of politics and often seeking for a “former glory” of the nation as a whole. The two labels (often fueled by diaspora radicalism) are, however, based on biased readings of history and less and less helpful to further the debate, clouding the broader range of positions across the spectrum and rarely appreciating the wishes and dilemmas of ordinary people in Ethiopia. The initial years of the Abiy government, marked by new political rhetoric of seeking citizens’ connection and cooperation in a future democratic order (as outlined in the pm’s 2019 book Meddemer21) held the promise of a rethinking of the possible unitary foundation and synergy of the country’s constituent peoples and regions. However, ethno-nationalist agitation and the outbreak of the tplf war on 4 November 2020 thwarted this process and, in fact, aggravated elite-led “ethnic” animosities.
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- 22 As evident in the Tigray armed conflict since 4 November 2020.
- 23 Interestingly, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s Meddemer (“Synergy”) pleads for this and contends that (...)
48Ethiopian national identity and history are still in flux. The new History 102 Module was written in post-eprdf days and the early period of the new pm Abiy Ahmed’s tenure. It is unclear how far the Ethiopian Ministry of Education influenced the Module’s composition beyond the general guidelines of inclusiveness. It was presented against the background of ongoing debates and controversies on the country’s political and national identity. Recent narratives on Ethiopian history and historiographical works on the country by both indigenous and academic historians are pretty diverse, to the point of often being exclusivist. However, a rethinking and literally a battling of the Ethiopian federation is also going on.22 Some authors, in a sustained critique of the old “imperial,” or Great Tradition approach, discern biases of representation that some have termed “native colonialism” (Yirga 2017). This term has more comprehensive application than the referring only to the disadvantaged political position of certain peoples and minorities: there is a historical “State bias” towards culturally different minorities, notably in the pastoralist and southern fringes of the country, that has led to the insensitive imposition of policy and development schemes (Ellison 2012; Amborn 2016). The great task in national history education is first to recognize this, identify the biases, and then confront the empirical realities with them. That the “[…] continued veneration of the nation-State,” as Bahru (2003-2004: 49) called it, is not fruitful is clear, and the broader social and cultural effects of the failed effort to impose it are to be addressed. The question is, can “diversity in unity” be realized, and how?23
49The Module of 2020 and the high school textbooks in Ethiopia of today devote attention to diversity and disparate ethno-regional histories as never before. The Module authors have tried to come to a non-colonial view of Ethiopian history, trying to steer away from conventional unitary histories by both Ethiopians and foreign scholars as well as from views by parochial historians that see Ethiopian history predominantly from a perspective of a “local colonialism,” injustice, victims, inequality, fragmented ethno-groups, etc. The authors also made an effort to open up lines toward a historical image of Ethiopia that is not imprisoned by the past—a path often taken by “ethno-nationalist” historians and activists seeking the future of Ethiopia in its past.
- 24 As we saw in note 19, on the Anole events. The disagreement extended to the controversial and arch (...)
50Nevertheless, the texts surely reflect that despite some underlying common themes and lines of knowledge, there is still no national consensus on the broad outlines of national history or identity, or even on the interpretive model of how to arrive at one. So it seems unlikely that there soon will be one in any substantial sense. There is sometimes ideology-fed disagreement even on elementary facts.24
51This situation of dialogic disagreement as to “reality” is manageable if the diversity and the controversies are inculcated as facts in themselves and when a continued debate is the purpose of history education in a “constructive-critical” sense. But in the sense of a minimum shared national narrative that can engage all Ethiopian citizens of varying backgrounds, it may not suffice. An appeal to the “specificity” and “uniqueness” of all ethno-linguistic groups and their “knowledge traditions,” on the other hand, in line with a “decolonial” practice declaring them all of more or less equal weight or value, is not a solution either and will fragment the picture even further. The diversity of Ethiopian peoples’ historical experiences and approaches necessitates in itself a shared epistemological and knowledge framework facilitating the debates on how societal relations and the mutual influencing of peoples, political power centers, ethnic groups and religious communities in the Ethiopian domain have emerged and developed.
52Therefore, with the Module not accepted yet, history debates and curriculum (re)writing in Ethiopia continue, both in professional circles and publicly, in the press and (social) media. Contestation is a permanent feature, but somewhat surprising is the fact that some refuse to allow common ground and a priori reject any bridging narratives. There are the entrenched positions, notably in the diaspora communities, often based on dominant “victimhood” perspectives and identity-politics positions, seemingly fed by a politics of resentment and by competition (and job aspirations). Against such positions, it is difficult to marshal evidence and facts because these are rejected or doubted from the start. Ethiopia is not unique in this; it is also widespread in the West, e.g. in the excesses of “diversity discourse” (see Mac Donald’s trenchant critique 2018; Butcher 2018) and in conspiracy-thinking in the usa (swc 2020; Van der Linden et al. 2021). Interestingly, the approach chosen by ethnic intellectuals or spokespersons of the various peoples that were allegedly marginalized in the Ethiopian “grand imperial narrative” up to 1974 shows a “reverse essentialism:” to assert that they had a right to exist and were historically significant, the historiographers of such ethnic groups/peoples often constructed dubious historical identities and ancient timelines not supported by the facts as appraised in an academically responsible manner. Like the imperial narrative, they “[…] appealed to antiquity, authenticity and unity” (Marzagora 2017: 444), thus reproducing the error. This approach was often also extended to claiming the “specificity” of knowledge produced in a certain location and/or cultural tradition. But basically, there is no pure culture-specific or country-specific knowledge only applying in one location (Jansen 2019). While particular insights and bodies of knowledge emerged in, or are mainly geared to, the local physical-geographical, botanical or social context of a place, this does not mean that they are in a knowledge-class of their own and impervious to critical appraisal. The only valid reason for “decolonizing” calls is that we develop more understanding of context, local cultural entanglements and inequalities in sharing the discursive critical knowledge conversation, not in abolishing or provincializing it. The term “decolonizing” may become meaningless. As Mary Douglas (1975: xx) aptly noted “[…] our colonization of each other’s minds is the price we pay for thought” (my emphasis) and we should deal with it critically.
53The story of history education in Ethiopia has shown this: narratives that do not go beyond the (repetitive) argument of conquest, conflict, and internal “colonization” do not give the full range of historical events and neglect the complex patterns of interaction that have emerged over hundreds of years in Ethiopia—albeit with shifting borders of territory, power, “values,” inclusion and membership.
54The historiography of Ethiopia will be served best by its constant dissociation from politics in the broader sense and regaining academic autonomy. An academic perspective on Ethiopian history would profitably focus on the multiple and complex interactions—both peaceful and those marred by conflict—between the various constituent parts of the State domain in its diverse forms across the ages. Without subscribing to the “Greater Ethiopia” thesis (Levine 2000), it can be said that there is a field of interaction of “centers” and “peripheries” that stretches over centuries and, with a few exceptions, has shaped the participating territories, ethnic/religious groups and elites, more than interactions with neighbouring countries like Sudan, Kenya or the Somalias. It is thereby to be recognized that according to regional or religious traditions, the perception of “Ethiopia” will continue to differ and cannot be prescribed: for instance, no one can prevent the majority of the Orthodox-Christians from identifying their motherland with the idea of “covenant:” the historic bond forged between the people and the land of Ethiopia and its age-old religious heritage (including the belief of having inherited the biblical Ark of the Covenant, replicated in every Orthodox church). Indeed, “covenant thinking,” as Girma (2018: 7) has argued, is a familiar Ethiopian topos that has its counterpart among Ethiopian Muslims cherishing that Ethiopia is the first country/regime (in the 7th century) to have extended a warm welcome to Muslim fugitives from Arabia, thus allowing Islam to survive. The demand to develop a more inclusive Ethiopian historiography cannot proscribe such ideas that give meaning to the “Ethiopian” identity of a large part of its citizens. Neither can the lingering effects of feelings of past discrimination and marginalization of minorities and non-Amharic/Tigrinya/Oromo-speaking groups be neglected, although they equally relate to the Ethiopian State and its defects.
55“Ethiopia”—a term used in local sources across the area since at least the 13th century—has been an “idea,” a concept of varying territorial, religious and cultural contents, and this variety has to be recognized to give it a political-institutional content relevant for all citizens today. Regardless of its origins in a Byzantine-imperial and Christian heritage, the idea of Ethiopia has appeared as a durable (negative or positive) reference point for dozens of peoples or ethnic groups and their elites, and thus seems to provide a basis for constant though conflictual engagement. Ethiopia is not a metaphysical entity with manifest destiny but a shared arena, the open boundaries of which have shaped the quest for an encompassing historiographic narrative and continue to do so. To reiterate, any relevant historiography of Ethiopia has in that sense to be “decolonized”— i.e. not a priori privileging any group-based conception of it—and describe/represent the country as a relational complex with deep historical roots but with threads of cultural (including religious) difference that both unify and divide. Although it is not clear that we have much advanced beyond the problems set out by, for instance, Triulzi (2002), this effort towards decolonial historiography is in full swing, led by Ethiopian historians doing tremendously interesting and path-breaking empirical work. However, the venture does not logically imply the “subjectivization” or “parochialisation” of knowledge. In academic terms, the effort towards this new historiography will benefit from detaching it from both mythological self-images (Yonas 2022), fixations on history rather than present, and instrumentalized political agendas (Clapham 2002: 45), as the latter would perpetuate the controversies and fragment the quest for Ethiopian identity (or identities) to no good purpose.
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