Date: Monday, 10 September 2018
International Affairs, Volume 94, Issue 5, 1 September 2018, Pages 1059–1075, https://doi.org/10.1093/ia/iiy117
10 September 2018
Abstract
Ethiopian foreign policy is based on ambitious domestic objectives, including aiming to become a middle-income country by 2025. Economic interdependence and integration are portrayed as the methods necessary to stabilize the region and fulfil those objectives. Why, then, is Ethiopian power challenged by regional actors when it claims to be acting as a security provider? This article interrogates the nature of one of Africa's powerful states in a region of conflict and examines the idea of hegemony. It proposes that Ethiopia sees itself as the regional hegemon while acting differently, and we analyse this notion by focusing on the concepts of hegemony. We conclude that Ethiopia is an imperfect hegemon, espousing a foreign policy characterized by a relationship of dominance over and assumption of allegiance from its neighbours, which could paradoxically lead to destabilizing policies. This policy was given momentum by former Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, and must now be studied in a new light in the absence of this charismatic leader.
Ethiopia emerged on the international and regional stages under the premiership of Meles Zenawi (1995–2012), in a national context marked by economic growth, major infrastructural projects, a presence in international forums and a commitment to peacekeeping operations. Ethiopia stood out as the regional power, a position it claimed on the basis of its territorial size, its geographic location, its thousand-year history and its large population (100 million). In 2002, in the aftermath of the costly conflict against Eritrea, the Ethiopian government under Meles's leadership drew up a new foreign policy doctrine. Taking for granted its status as a hub of stability in the context of the ‘war on terror’, and with the Tigrayan party shaken by internal dissent, Ethiopia promulgated what was in effect its own Monroe Doctrine in the region, identifying development, and the stable environment it requires, as a primary goal. Since then, the region has been a matter of fundamental national interest for the Ethiopian state, and its foreign policy discourse has asserted the primacy of stabilizing the area. Ethiopian interventions in Somalia, Eritrea and even South Sudan have contributed to the perception of its role in policing the region.1 Verhoeven summarizes the position thus: ‘The contemporary pursuit of a “Great Ethiopia” is pursued in terms of a benign regional hegemony: “What is good for Ethiopia is good for the Horn of Africa.”’2 It is important to question this claim and its regional impact.
Ethiopia is an important case-study in International Relations (IR). First, it is a rising power in a conflict-ridden region, presenting itself as a ‘benevolent hegemon’—although frequently perceived differently by its neighbours. Second, some argue that IR is about the politics of powerful states and that, as a consequence, there is a deficit of attention to Africa which explains IR's inability to adequately address African experiences. Indeed, Africa has often been neglected by the different theoretical approaches in IR, and more generally by the discipline itself. Christopher Clapham's famous work, Africa and the international system (1996), laid the foundations for a comprehensive discipline and analysis of African IR, and was followed by a body of other writing.3 But IR is still a western-centred discipline. International standards are disseminated from the centre to the peripheral areas. Contributions of the global South are still under-studied. In an attempt to redress this imbalance, this article interrogates the nature of one of Africa's powerful states in a region of conflict and examines the idea of hegemony.
Ethiopia has built an identity as security provider in its area. However, its actual achievements in this field are rather disappointing, prompting Ethiopia's neighbours to query the legitimacy of the hierarchy it has established. The regional security situation today is practically the same as it was 15 years ago: Somalia remains in crisis; Somaliland is in a state of precarious stability; Sudan and South Sudan, while distinct entities, are still in conflict; and Eritrea remains isolated. In this context, why is the Ethiopian power challenged by regional actors while it claims to be acting as a security provider? My argument is that Ethiopia's government believes itself to be a hegemon but acts differently. Its own ‘Monroe Doctrine’ in the Horn of Africa—its regional vision—helps us to challenge the hegemon concept. We could, indeed, label Ethiopia as ‘an imperfect hegemon’, in that the regional policy pursued by the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF)—the coalition in power in Ethiopia since 1991—intended as benevolent but sometimes destabilizing in practice, is failing.
In what follows, I will first examine the hegemonic concept. In the next section I will show that Ethiopia is an imperfect hegemon, espousing a foreign policy characterized by a relationship of dominance over and assumption of allegiance from its neighbours, which could paradoxically lead to destabilizing policies. The last section analyses the particular character of the hegemonic EPRDF project in the region.
As well as referring to the classical literature, I have—despite a penchant for secrecy in the conduct of Ethiopian foreign policy—gathered data revealing the discourses and practices of state elites, mostly in Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya and Eritrea, between 2009 and 2017, through interviews with local researchers and local elites affected by Ethiopia's external actions. I have also drawn on publicly available documents and secondary sources................
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Berhane
