Abstract
Ethiopia is a very specific case study not only in African context as the country has never been systematically colonized by an external power (with an exception of the short-lived Italian occupation in 1936–41). While the phenomenon of nationalism in an African context is in many cases related to the European colonialism, and explained as a reaction to colonialism, in an Ethiopian social and political environment, we cannot use this logic due to an obvious absence of such determinant. Throughout the Cold War and up until today, Ethiopia has been experimenting with different types of nationalism, such as a unitary nationalism imposed by the Imperial regime, socialist nationalism, as well as federal arrangement which helped to create and revitalize multiple ethnonationalist movements. This chapter deals with these competing nationalisms and discusses its relevance for our understanding of current turbulent development in Ethiopia. It pays attention to the role of elites and historical myths as part of nationalist discourse which seems to be constantly redefined and renegotiated by multiple actors.
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Záhořík, J., Godesso, A. (2022). Multiple Layers of Competing Nationalisms in Contemporary Ethiopia. In: Záhořík, J., Morone, A.M. (eds) Histories of Nationalism beyond Europe. Palgrave Studies in Political History. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-92676-2_6
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