The Revolutionary Democracy of Ethiopia: A Wartime Ideology Both Shaping and Shaped by Peacetime Policy Needs

Abstract

The Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), victor in the civil war in 1991, has since transformed into an authoritarian party. While this transition is well covered in the literature, few studies have explored how the party’s ideology has adapted after its position was consolidated. This article addresses this gap, by analysing the EPRDF’s ideology of revolutionary democracy, and how the interpretation of it has changed over time. The Ethiopian case shows that wartime ideologies should not be considered as static remnants of the past. Instead, the ideology has served as a flexible political tool for controlling the state and for justifying or concealing major policy changes. More recent protests and ruptures in the ruling party, however, indicate that revolutionary democracy may have an expiry date. There seems thus to be a limit to how long a wartime ideology can provide power to uphold a rebel government’s hegemony and coherence.

Transforming State Visions: Ideology and Ideas in Armed Groups Turned Political Parties – Introduction to Special Issue

“…Usually, scholars will analyse the political vocabulary of a movement as a sign of its identity and beliefs. This includes the study of political manifestos, programmes, and/or declarations and political speeches (Berti 2019; Burihabwa and Curtis 2019; Sindre 2019, all in this issue; Aalen 2019; Pearce 2018; Reyntjens 2016; Straus 2015), the analysis of party name changes (Ishiyama 2019) or interviews with group leaders and/or members (Özçelik 2019; Pearce 2018). Scholars also study the discourses through which ideology is both constituted and spread.…”

“…Burihabwa and Curtis (2019) show, for instance, that the Marxist-Leninist ideas that once animated the CNDD-FDD in Burundi were largely abandoned. In other cases former rebel parties have sought to maintain revolutionary ideas, for instance the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front’s (EPRDF) ideology of revolutionary democracy in Ethiopia explained by Lovise Aalen (2019), and the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front’s (FMLN), continued commitment to a socialist revolution in El Salvador as part of an ‘ideological composite’ described by Ralph Sprenkels (2019). Even in cases where former rebel parties do not have Marxist-Leninist roots, ideas about economic redistribution remain central.…”

“…While the emergence of authoritarian governance practices by rebel victors has been analysed at length (Aalen and Muriaas 2017; Lyons 2016a, 2016b), Aalen (2019) points out that little attention has been paid to understanding changes in the overarching ideological underpinnings of such regimes. In her analysis of Ethiopia’s ruling party, the EPRDF, Aalen argues that the ideological framework of ‘revolutionary democracy’ is used to legitimize a range of practices.…”

“…In other cases, different factions of the armed group may express different ideological preferences, and part of the struggle is fought between different movement factions. Internal divisions within the group have an impact on ideological content, as described by Berti (2019), Burihabwa and Curtis (2019), Sprenkels (2019) and Aalen (2019). Relatedly, some ideas are malleable and others are more fixed.…”

“…The respective contributions of Wilson (2019 – Western Sahara), Aalen (2019 – Ethiopia), Pearce (2018 – Angola) and Burihabwa and Curtis (2019 – Burundi) all take up the question of whether wartime visions and ideas are put into practice once former rebel groups turned parties get the chance to govern.…”