State-Society Relations and Traditional Modes of Governance in Ethiopia: A Case Study of Sidama
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2014-06
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
This study deals with the political history and nature of state-society relations in Ethiopia in general and Sidama in particular. It is undertaken by analyzing the role that traditional modes of governance can play in contemporary Ethiopia in general by drawing on the experience in Sidama. State formation process, the role and impact of traditional governance and administrative practices, and the nature of state-society relations during successive regimes in Ethiopia are the core issues examined by the study. The study identified that there are deficits and gaps experienced in the efforts aimed at building democratic governance in multi-ethnic and multi-cultural societies like Ethiopia.
A qualitative methodological approach is employed in eliciting information from different but complementary sources on the subject in question. In eliciting the necessary data, the study basically relied on primary sources comprising of officials and functionaries of regional and local governments, community elders, and participants in focus group discussions. This is reinforced by conducting detailed review and analysis of relevant literature that helped in formulating the theoretical framework. More than 70 resource persons (key informants and FGD members) participated in providing information by responding to queries organized in the form of unstructured interview guides and checklists.
Based on the findings and analyses thereof, the study suggested that the overall structure of the contemporary Ethiopian state that is currently at work needs to incorporate the tenable and useful attributes of traditional political institutions in order to promote goals associated with the need for entrenching multiculturalism, peace and stability, and accommodation of diversity. Hence it argues that the failure to link the two modes of governance would result in divergence and incompatibility between formal processes and structures of governance and the enduring traditional systems thereby leading to acrimonious state-society relations. However, the current Ethiopian federal arrangement is hoped to provide opportunities for broadening the public space that could be instrumental in exercising alternative and contextualized modes of local governance in dealing with multifaceted and pressing problems
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