Security Sector Reform as Strategic Intervention in the State-Building Trajectories of Ethiopia Since 1991
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Date
2023-07
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Addis Ababa Universty
Abstract
Security sector reform is taken as an essential intervention in a transition from violent conflict to peace or from authoritarian regime to democratic system. Although Ethiopia has experienced some comprehensive SSR interventions since 1991, democratic governance and/ or human security have still remained nightmares for its citizens. The objective of this thesis was, therefore, to critically examine the SSR experiences in the post-1991 state-building trajectories of Ethiopia and their implications for the security of the state and citizens by using international norms and principles within the human security paradigm as an analytical lens. To this end, a qualitative research approach was used to deeply explore and analyze the success and failure stories of SSR and the impacts it had for state-building. Accordingly, semi-structured in-depth and key informant interviews, document analysis, the analysis of the speeches of some government and security sectors’ officials, and non-participant field observations were employed as data collection tools and thematic analysis was used to extract meaning from the data. The findings indicated that state elites had, more or less, devised constitutional, legal, policy, strategic, structural and other normative provisions for security sector governance and displayed them for mere public consumption. But in practice they produced other whitepapers contradictory to these constitutional and legal provisions for the governance of SSIs. Consequently, SSR was manipulated as a cover to win the minds and hearts of those citizens who aspire – and in deed practically paid sacrifices – for democracy, rule of law, protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms at home and to get blessings in the face of the international development partners. Therefore, in the post-1991 state-building trajectories of Ethiopia SSR was a hype than reality. This has an implication for the efforts to pull the country out from the vicious cycle of violent conflicts and the apparent state weakness that privileged regime security at the cost of the security of the individual, communities and even the state. Unless the ruling elite is ready to sacrifice at least part of its monopoly over power, resource and status for the well-being of the people and the state, repeated engagements in SSR can produce nothing more than consuming time, energy and resources.
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Human security, regime security, security sector reform, state-building, state weakness