Based on the study of chiefs, elders and local leaders in southern Ethiopia, this paper analyses the idea of authority, legitimacy and governance among three small-scale societies, the Me'en, the... Show moreBased on the study of chiefs, elders and local leaders in southern Ethiopia, this paper analyses the idea of authority, legitimacy and governance among three small-scale societies, the Me'en, the Dizi and the Suri. It shows that in southern Ethiopia efforts were made to replace charismatic and traditional authority by a bureaucratic structure of rulers and legal procedures instigated by the expanding national State, but that this process was neither complete nor successful, because the sources of legitimacy of leadership and authority remained firmly within the local societies and were ill understood by outsiders, including State authorities. The central imperial State (upto 1974) did not use the pre-existing forms of local chiefs and other authorities and simply bypassed them either by appointing its own administrators as an extra layer of power or by relying upon provincial lords or kings in the core regions of the empire. The appointees had little connection with the local population. If they became too popular they were removed. Their loyalty only had to be upward, towards the emperor and his political circle. In the Derg era (1974-1991), this authoritarian pattern was reinforced, and wherever traditional chiefs existed, they were violently removed and suppressed. To date these three forms of authority co-exist and interact and define much of the local political dynamics, including violent conflict. Includes bibliographic references and notes. [ASC Leiden abstract] Show less
This article examines recent developments of local authority and 'leadership' among the Surma of southern Ethiopia, where the author carried out field research over the years 1990-1995. The... Show moreThis article examines recent developments of local authority and 'leadership' among the Surma of southern Ethiopia, where the author carried out field research over the years 1990-1995. The intention is to analyse the nature of 'authority' in a non-State social formation, in which 'chiefs' in the proper sense of the word are absent. The author gives an overview of the three different political systems which have succeeded each other in Ethiopia since the late 19th century: Haile Selassie's feudalist monarchy (until 1974), the Dergue's centralist republic (1974-1991), and the present ethno-regional federal republic, and examines to what extent these different types of governance have had a transformative impact on traditional forms of local leadership. He argues that southern Ethiopian local administration has always been characterized by an uneasy alliance of two types of leaders: imported highland rulers and local, indigenous 'chiefs' or ritual leaders ('komoru'). The Surma 'komoru' have generally remained outside the political arena. Bibliogr., notes, ref., sum. in French and Italian Show less
