The Horn of Africa

Kidane Mengisteab

• Publisher: Polity
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9780745672359
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Política y relaciones internacionales
• Subtopic: Relaciones internacionales

The Horn of Africa is a deeply troubled region engulfed in three interlocking crises. The first is a security crisis characterized by a range of devastating inter-state and inter-communal conflicts, including civil wars. The second is an economic crisis, evidenced by widespread debilitating poverty, chronic food insecurity, and frequent cycles of famines. The effects of the third - environmental - crisis are all too visible in the droughts, deforestation and desertification ravaging the region. What is more, these three crises are mutually reinforcing locking the region into a cycle of disaster. Conflicts contribute to poverty, which in turn intensifies environmental degradation, leading to scarcities which fuel further conflicts. In this clear and authoritative guide, Kidane Mengisteab explores the key drivers of instability in the Horn of Africa, suggesting structural and institutional changes that - if implemented - could help lift the region out of crisis. The Horn's complex crises must be tackled in a comprehensive manner. But, he contends, this can only be achieved if the causes of conflict are addressed head-on. Without peace, the region cannot resolve its economic problems, and nor can it develop the capabilities required to cope with environmental change. The Horn of Africa will be essential reading for students and scholars in conflict and security studies, as well as anyone with an interest in learning more about the dynamics of this troubled region

1

The Greater Horn of Africa: Hot Spot in the Global System

The Greater Horn of Africa is a region that contains one of the deadliest clusters of conflicts in the global system. It is also a region facing an alarming rate of environmental degradation, which has made it prone to humanitarian disasters, including sporadic droughts and famines. Moreover, without substantive changes in the political structures and institutional systems, the region is likely to remain one of the hottest spots in the global system for decades to come. Given this prognosis, this book grapples with two crucial tasks. One is to provide a comprehensive and yet concise analysis of the key factors which have engendered various levels of conflicts in the Greater Horn over the last sixty or so years and are likely to render the region prone to conflicts for some time to come. While key developments of the nineteenth century, which still impinge on contemporary conflicts, are examined briefly, the focus of this study is the post-decolonization era, which refers to the time period from the mid-1950s to the present.¹ Ethiopia, the largest country in the region, was not a colony and the concept of decolonization does not apply to it directly. However, decolonization has indirect relevance to Ethiopia since decolonization of neighbouring countries signified a new era in its regional as well as its internal relations. The second task is to explore rather briefly new political and institutional arrangements that may enable the region to transform the conflict factors and extricate itself from the devastations that have become its trade mark.

The conflicts that ravage the Greater Horn occur at multiple levels. Some of them are inter-state conflicts. Some are between the state and domestic armed entities that challenge it for various reasons, while others are among communities within the same country as well as across international boundaries. There are also one-sided conflicts where the state or rebel groups commit brutalities against civilian populations. The region has also seen some violent conflicts among armed groups, who, while fighting the state, also fight one another. Given such a variance in the nature of the region's conflicts, it is rather challenging to formulate a conceptual anchor that ties neatly together the factors that contribute to all the conflicts. One of the aims of this introductory chapter is to map out a workable conceptual framework that would help us in comprehending the complex set of factors that generate the region's various types of conflicts. A second task is to sketch the main objectives and tasks of each chapter in order to assist the reader in weaving though the various chapters and relate each one of them to the above identified two principal objectives of the book.

Conceptual Framework

The region's various types of conflicts are caused by a complex mix of interrelated factors. While difficult to capture all the factors in a single coherent framework, it is nevertheless, plausible to contend that most of the conflicts emanate from two core conditions that characterize the region. One is the failure of the internal political and institutional systems to accommodate and advance the interests of the disparate identity groups and to facilitate peaceful management of conflicts that arise between the state and identity groups and among identities and communities. The second is the failure of the existing institutions of regional governance to promote peaceful relations among the countries of the region by a timely management of boundary and territorial disputes and also by creating socioeconomic arrangements that advance mutual well-being and reduce the burden of ethnic groups that are partitioned by national boundaries. In other words, the factors for most of the region's conflicts are rooted in the failure of structures and institutions of domestic and regional governance. The failures in the two core areas identified, however, are to a large extent influenced by some contextual factors. One is the historical context, which left legacies that perpetuate the conflict-engendering conditions. Another is the existing global context, which often impinges on the region's ability to address the conflict-engendering conditions without external intervention. The environmental degradation the region has faced over the last several decades is another contextual factor that complicates governance and is exacerbated by poor governance.

Under this broad conceptual framework at least six categories of conflict-generating factors can be identified:

• One category of factors relates to the historical context and the manner in which the states in the region were formed and how the socioeconomic structures established during the formation of the states through the expansion of pre-colonial empires and colonization have impacted the interests of and relations among the various identity groups in the region. Pre-colonial empires, such as the Abyssinian empire and the Mahdiya state of Sudan have, for instance, altered and often poisoned inter-identity relations, as did the colonial state.
• A second category of factors relates to the nature of the post-colonial state, including the divergence of its economic and institutional systems from those adhered to by different segments of society, the structures of the state that hinder accountability within its component organizations, and the quality of its leadership. The societies in the Greater Horn, like those in the rest of the African continent, range from those who live under the traditional economies of peasants and pastoralists to those in the modern economic system that rapidly changes in complexity. The region's governments, regardless of their ideological or political orientations, operate under institutional systems that detach the state from large segments of its populations. Even in the rare cases where leaders might be relatively committed to advancing broad social interests, they lack the structural and institutional capacity and flexibility to manage the socioeconomic diversity and challenges of their societies. Moreover, they also lack the farsightedness and audacity to disengage from the existing dysfunctional structures and construct new political and institutional systems that reflect the socioeconomic realities and cultural values of their populations and coordinate policy and resources with broad social interests. The institutional detachment of the state from segments of the population implies that those segments of the population are largely excluded from the political process. The different organizations of the state also lack independence from the executive branch of the government and strongmen, who subordinate the state and thereby hinder its development. The upper echelons of the functionaries of the state are also often ‘ethnocratic’, as Ali Mazrui (1975) notes. As a result, the state often is viewed to be an expression of certain identity groups instead of one that promotes the interests of society at large. In other cases the leaders, whose primary preoccupation has been to preserve their monopoly of power, are simply self-serving. In some cases, such self-serving leaders may even perpetuate various conflicts as they find them to be instrumental in extending their tenure on power, by either diverting public opinion from domestic ills to external enemies or by using wars as a means of squashing popular demands for democratization of the political system. Political entrepreneurs often exploit diversity in their struggle for power and instigate inter-identity hostilities. Under such conditions state-building by developing institutions and infrastructures for effective governance has been impeded. Such a grand failure in state-building has, in turn, created conditions that foster conflicts.
• A related category of factors is the poor management of diversity and crisis in the process of nation-building, which entails integrating disparate social, ethnic, clan, religious or regional identities to form a community of citizens governed by a shared system of institutions. A state which lacks the structures that foster accountability and often represent ethnic identity, or fails to develop political structures and institutional systems that advance broad social interests, is unlikely to be effective in nation-building through effective management of diversity. Failure in diversity management is manifested by politicization of identity, power struggle among the elite of different identities and inter-communal conflicts over dwindling resources, which are exacerbated by a combination of environmental degradation and rapid population growth.
• A fourth category of factors which has generated conflicts and tensions among states is the absence of effective management of disputes over boundaries. Like the boundaries of most African countries, the international boundaries of the Greater Horn countries are not yet clearly demarcated on the ground. The countries of the region also lack effective institutional arrangements that would mitigate the effects of marginalization of ethnic groups who are split into several countries by national boundaries. In the absence of strong institutions of regional governance, such border disputes, along with weak or near absence of mechanisms for peaceful settlement of inter-state disputes, have led the states of the region to fight border wars and to intervene in each other's affairs and engage in proxy wars that destabilize the region and prevent regional cooperation. Religious zeal and intolerance between countries have also contributed to tense relations and conflicts among neighbouring states.
• A fifth category of factors relates to the global socioeconomic environment and different forms of intervention by various actors from outside the region. On a number of occasions external intervention has been life-saving and conflict-reducing. In many other cases, however, external intervention has contributed to initiate or to intensify conflicts in the region. In some cases, it has even changed the region's course of history. To fortify their grip on power, regimes in the countries of the region have often participated in advancing the agenda of external actors often at the expense of the region's stability and well-being. External intervention can under certain conditions help in mitigating conflicts as well as in advancing democratization. However, it can also adversely affect relations among the states of the region as well as inter-identity relations within countries. Since democracy entails self-determination in decision-making, external intervention, which tends to deliberately or inadvertently exert influence, can also undermine democratization and the development of indigenous political arrangements of conflict resolution and diversity management.
• A sixth category of factors is the alarming rate of environmental degradation, which has culminated in economic and social dislocations and widespread resource-based conflicts. Much of the Greater Horn region is arid or semi-arid and has over the last four or so decades faced a rapid rate of environmental degradation. No doubt, global climatic changes have contributed to this problem. However, local and regional factors are also major contributors. Rapid population growth, changes in land-use patterns and chronic conflicts are among the regional factors for environmental degradation, which is manifested by cyclical droughts, chronic food and water shortages and periodic famines. These conditions have exerted growing pressure on the region's populations, especially the peasants and nomads and have resulted in land and water-based communal conflicts.

The last two categories of factors may appear to be external to the identified conceptual framework since they do not entirely originate from the political and institutional systems in the region. On careful examination, however, it is clear that they are integral to the region's political and institutional systems as well as the conceptual framework. Competent domestic and regional governance systems do not allow destructive external intervention. The occurrence of self-serving external intervention is, thus, a clear indication of problems of domestic and regional governance. Similarly, environmental degradation becomes as destructive as it has been in the Greater Horn when the existing political and institutional arrangements are incapable of controlling its occurrence or in managing its impacts. Environmental degradation factors such as inappropriate land tenure systems, poor conservation measures and rapid demographic growth are largely problems of management, although the global factors of degradation, such as global warming, set the context within which the countries of the region have to operate.

Overview of the Book

The rest of the book consists of seven chapters. After briefly introducing the reader to the region's general socioeconomic characteristics, chapter 2 attempts to sort out the region's various conflicts into typologies and to provide a brief assessment of the socioeconomic costs of these conflicts. Chapter 3 examines the conflict-engendering contexts left behind by pre-colonial empires and kingdoms and the colonial state. Changes in inter-identity relations, fragmentation of economic and institutional systems and uneven development are some of the inherited contexts given special attention. Chapter 4 examines how and why the post-colonial state in the region continues to contribute to internal and external conflicts. To properly explain the role of the state, the chapter first conceptualizes the state and identifies the characteristics of a properly functioning and democracy-fostering state. The chapter then appraises the structures, institutions and quality of leadership of the Greater Horn's post-colonial state on the basis of the criteria of the properly functioning state. Chapter 5 examines how the state's failure in developing institutions of governance that accommodate the diverse groups of citizens has contributed in politicization of inter-identity relations and to the crisis of nation-building in the region. The sixth chapter examines the role of external intervention in fostering conflicts and instability in the region and in undermining its regional integration efforts. It also explains how lack of strong regional governance has exposed the region to a high level of external meddling. Chapter 7 explores how the environmental degradation that has ravaged the region has contributed to resource-based conflicts and general instability by threatening the viability of the peasant and pastoral economic systems that employ sizeable portions of the region's populations. The chapter also attempts to explain how poor management of resources has contributed to the alarming rate of environmental degradation the region has faced over the last several decades. Chapter 8 serves as a conclusion and explores political and institutional arrangements that can help the region transform the various conflict-engendering factors. One objective of this chapter is to explain how a contextualized and comprehensive democratization can adjust the institutional and political structures in the region so that they advance state-building and diversity management and nation-building. A second objective is to explore a system of institutions for more effective regional governance that (a) demarcates boundaries before they become sources of conflicts, (b) accommodates the social and cultural ties of identity groups split by national boundaries, (c) establishes mechanisms of regional cooperation to control proxy wars and harmful external intervention and (d) fosters regional economic development by taking advantage of the region's unrealized economic complementarities and by cooperating in environmental management.

Note

1. Sudan's independence in 1956 represents the beginning of the era of decolonization of the countries of the region. The post-decolonization era in this study, thus, refers to the time period between the mid-1950s and the present.

2

Conflicts in the Greater Horn

Introduction

This chapter attempts to identify and categorize the key conflicts that have ravaged the region during the last half a century or so and to briefly outline some of the socioeconomic costs and implications of the conflicts. Before delving into these tasks, however, a brief description of the basic characteristics and socioeconomic conditions of the Greater Horn is provided in order to familiarize the reader with the region.

The region consists of eight countries with an estimated total population of about 226.9 million in 2012 and a total area of 5,209,975 sq km (see table 2.1 for details). The countries of the region include: Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, Sudan, South Sudan and Uganda, and they are all members of a regional integration, the Intergovernmental Authority for Development (IGAD), although Eritrea's membership in the regional body has been suspended since 2007.² Two of the youngest countries of the region, Eritrea and South Sudan, were formed through secessions from Ethiopia in 1993 and from Sudan in 2011, respectively. Somaliland has also declared its independence from Somalia but it has not yet obtained international recognition as an independent state.

Table 2.1. Area of territory and size of population of the countries of the Horn of Africa

A notable characteristic of the region is that it is a mosaic of cultures with considerable ethnic diversity both regionally and within countries. If language can serve as a proxy for ethnic identity, the region is said to be home to some 340 languages. Sudan (both north and south) is said to have 134 languages, followed by Ethiopia with eighty-nine languages, Kenya with sixty-two, Uganda with forty-three, Eritrea with nine and Djibouti with two local languages (Lewis, 2009). The countries of the region are also characterized by religious diversity with various denominations of Christianity and Islam coexisting, along with various forms of traditional religions. No doubt peaceful governance of the countries of the region requires effective strategies of management of diversity.

Many of the region's ethnic groups are also split across several countries by national boundaries established by colonialism. The Somali people, for example, live in Somalia, Djibouti, Ethiopia and Kenya. The Beja, Tigre and Rashaida live in Sudan and Eritrea. The Tigrigna speakers, the Kunama and Shaho live in Eritrea and northern Ethiopia; the Oromo live in Ethiopia and Kenya, the Afar live in Eritrea, Ethiopia and Djibouti. The Luo are spread over Kenya, Ethiopia, Sudan, Uganda, Tanzania and Eastern Congo, while the Luhya live in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania (see table 2.2 for further examples).

Table 2.2. Selected list of ethnic groups that are split into different countries

Ethnic group	Countries of habitation
Afar*	Djibouti, Eritrea, E...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Series page
• Title page
• Copyright page
• Abbreviations
• Map of the Horn of Africa
• Acknowledgements
• 1: The Greater Horn of Africa: Hot Spot in the Global System
• 2: Conflicts in the Greater Horn
• 3: The Legacy of Empires
• 4: The State as a Source of Conflict
• 5: Failures of Governance and Nation-Building
• 6: Regional Instability and External Intervention
• 7: Poor Resource Management and Environmental Degradation
• 8: Prospects for Democracy, Integration and Stability
• Bibliography
• Index