THE ROOT CAUSE OF ETHIOPIA’S POLITICAL CRISIS: A DIALECTICAL-PHILOSOPHICAL ANALYSIS

THE ROOT CAUSE OF ETHIOPIA’S POLITICAL CRISIS: A DIALECTICAL-PHILOSOPHICAL ANALYSIS

Introduction

Ethiopia’s political turbulence is not a recent accident—it is a historical product of unresolved contradictions. The country continues to oscillate between competing political identities, clashing historical narratives, and mutually exclusive visions of statehood. To identify the true root cause, Ethiopia must be examined through the philosophical tools of dialectical analysis: thesis, antithesis, and synthesis, and the law of negation, which explains how an old order collapses and a new one emerges.

The Ethiopian crisis is fundamentally a struggle between the remnants of an imperial-feudal order and the forces of self-determination seeking to dismantle it. The failure to resolve this contradiction is the seed of today’s political chaos.

1. Thesis: The Imperial–Feudal Order and the Birth of Antagonism

From the late 19th century onward, Ethiopia was not formed as a consensual political community, but as a hierarchical imperial project. This project produced:

A ruling class concentrated mainly in the highland Amhara nobility

An imposed state identity centred on Amharic language, Orthodox Christianity, and monarchic culture

A structure of domination imposed on nations, nationalities, and peoples incorporated through conquest

This thesis established a rigid social order:

rulers vs. ruled, masters vs. serfs, civilizers vs. “uncivilized” subjects, according to imperial ideology.

Even after the fall of feudal monarchy, the ideological infrastructure—Amhara cultural hegemony, Orthodox supremacy, political centralism—survived. Thus, the imperial class did not disappear; it simply reproduced itself within the bureaucratic, military, and intellectual institutions of the modern state.

This is the root contradiction:

a society built on domination resisted by those who were dominated.

2. Antithesis: The Rise of Self-Determination Movements

Dialectics teaches that every oppressive structure generates its own resistance—the antithesis.

From the Oromo, Sidama, Somali, Tigray, Afar, Benishangul, Gambella and others emerged liberation movements calling for:

self-rule

cultural recognition

linguistic rights

equitable federalism

freedom from monolithic Ethiopianism

The 1995 multinational constitutional order was the first formal negation of imperial Ethiopia. But the remnants of the reactionary class, though weakened, never disappeared. They reorganized themselves intellectually, economically, and politically.

This old elite now wages a cultural and psychological counteroffensive. They romanticize imperial Ethiopia, downplay historic atrocities, and demonize the rise of identities—especially Oromummaa, which challenges their ideological supremacy.

This resistance to equality is the historical antithesis of Ethiopia’s democratization.

3. The Law of Negation: Why Crisis Persists

According to the law of negation, an old order collapses only when it is truly negated—not symbolically, but structurally.

Ethiopia attempted partial negation but never completed it:

The imperial language (Amharic) remained dominant.

Orthodox Christianity continued as the ideological fortress of “true Ethiopian identity.”

Narratives of conquest were sanitized and celebrated.

Old elites re-emerged as “intellectuals” preaching Ethiopian unity against federalism.

Thus, Ethiopia lives in a half-negated political structure—neither fully imperial nor fully democratic. The old feudal ideology continues to haunt the modern state like a ghost that refuses to die.

This incomplete negation is the root cause of Ethiopia’s permanent instability.

4. The Role of Reactionary Intellectuals: The Case of Dr. Yonas Biru

In any dialectical struggle, the old order does not collapse quietly—it produces ideological warriors who defend its legacy under modern language.

Dr. Yonas Biru represents this phenomenon:

He attacks Oromummaa, the cultural and political awakening of the Oromo.

He labels it a “cancer,” weaponizing pathology as rhetoric.

He systematically demonizes Oromo scholars, leaders, and institutions.

He works to delegitimize the multinational federal arrangement.

He rewrites history to sanitize feudal conquest and elevate imperial Ethiopia as the ideal model.

His critique is not intellectual inquiry—it is a counterrevolutionary effort to restore ideological supremacy, using updated versions of old imperial narratives.

Every liberation movement produces its opposite.

Dr. Biru represents the ideological negation of Oromo and other marginalized nations' political awakening.

5. Synthesis: What Ethiopia Needs to Move Forward

A stable Ethiopia will not emerge by reverting to the old imperial thesis nor by living in permanent antagonism. A new synthesis must arise—one that resolves the historical contradiction instead of suppressing it.

This synthesis requires:

1. Full negation of imperial ideology

No glorification of feudal lords

No celebration of Minilik as a nation-builder

No privileged language or religion

2. Genuine multinational democracy

True equality of languages

Self-rule for nations and nationalities

Federalism protected from centralist sabotage

3. Secular statehood

Orthodox Christianity cannot continue functioning as the cultural backbone of state ideology.

4. Intellectual honesty and historical truth

The crimes of empire must be acknowledged, not rewritten.

5. Liberation from outdated elites

Those who profit from imperial nostalgia—including ideological actors like Yonas Biru—must lose their power to shape the national discourse.

This synthesis is not anti-Ethiopia; it is the only path to building a just, inclusive, and stable Ethiopia.

Conclusion

The root cause of Ethiopia’s political problems is the unresolved contradiction between imperial domination and the struggle for self-determination. Ethiopia stands at the crossroads of an incomplete dialectical process:

Thesis: Imperial-feudal domination

Antithesis: National liberation and multinational federalism

Incomplete Negation: Survival of old elites and ideologies

Future Synthesis: A democratic federation rooted in equality, truth, and justice

Until Ethiopia fully negates the ideological remnants of the feudal-imperial order—its language supremacy, its religious domination, its historical distortions—it will remain trapped in cycles of violence and fragmentation.

Those who attack Oromummaa or federalism are not offering solutions—they are protecting the past.

A new Ethiopia can emerge only when the old Ethiopia is finally, decisively, and permanently negated.