The state and revolution in Ethiopia

Abstract

The sustained restructuring of the military regime which has taken place in the 1980s is an essentially ‘leninist’ project with three components: new and enhanced structures of institutional and centralised control, down to the grass roots level kebellesand peasant associations but one that has not succeeded in many regions; a drastic, state‐controlled restructuring of the economic base; plus a limited but significant expansion of political representation essentially through the new Workers' Party.

Some of its institutional forms and the economic and social changes (e.g. land reform) are probably irreversible but there has been over‐reliance on the use of state power as the solution to all problems.