The Politics of Public Silence
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The London School of Economics and Political Science The Politics of Public Silence: Civil Society – State Relations Under the EPRDF Regime Camille Louise Pellerin A thesis submitted to the Department of International Development of the London School of Economics for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, London, December 2018 1 Declaration I certify that the thesis I have presented for examination for the MPhil/PhD degree of the London School of Economics and Political Science is solely my own work. The copyright of this thesis rests with the author. Quotation from it is permitted, provided that full acknowledgement is made. This thesis may not be reproduced without my prior written consent. I warrant that this authorisation does not, to the best of my belief, infringe on the rights of any third party. I declare that my thesis consists of 99,351 words. I can confirm that my thesis was copy edited for conventions of language, spelling and grammar by Nigel Thompson. Uppsala, 13th of December 2018 Camille Pellerin 2 Abstract Contributing to a larger canon of work that investigates how the presence of civil society organisations in authoritarian settings influences the durability of regimes in power, this thesis sets out to explain how the relationship between the Ethiopian state, under the rule of the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), and civil society organisations, affected regime stability. I demonstrate that the EPRDF tried to use civil society organisations to bolster its rule through: (1) curbing the power of civil society organisations to prevent challenges to its rule; and (2) mobilising civil society organisations as part of its developmental state programme. However, I argue that the EPRDF prioritised control at times at the expense of developmental objectives. While this prevented open contestation from civil society organisations, it indirectly weakened the EPRDF’s rule in two ways. First, the oppression of civil society organisations reduced their ability to function as a bridge between the Ethiopian people and the state, creating a vacuum between the state and citizens. Second, the control established over civil society organisations decreased the EPRDF’s ability to mobilise them behind its developmental state programme on which it tried to build political legitimacy. Drawing on 14 months of fieldwork, this thesis renders the micro-politics of civil society - state relations visible. The analysis goes beyond the publicly observable “silence”, characterised by the absence of open contestation by civil society organisations, and demonstrates the existence of negotiation and conflicts between actors and organisations operating in both spheres. Instead of taking the concepts of civil society and the state for granted, the thesis explores their empirical manifestations in Ethiopia. The contribution of this thesis lies in the nuance of the analysis, shedding light on how different state and civil society organisations, and the actors working within them, are linked and engage with each other. 3 “How do we study power relations when the powerless are often obliged to adopt a strategic pose in the presence of the powerful and when the powerful may have an interest in overdramatizing their reputation and mastery? If we take all of this at face value we risk mistaking what may be a tactic for the whole story. Instead, I try to make out a case for a different study of power that uncovers contradictions, tensions, and immanent possibilities. Every subordinate group creates, out of its ordeal, a "hidden transcript" that represents a critique of power spoken behind the back of the dominant. The powerful, for their part, also develop a hidden transcript representing the practices and claims of their rule that cannot be openly avowed. A comparison of the hidden transcript of the weak with that of the powerful and of both hidden transcripts to the public transcript of power relations offers a substantially new way of understanding resistance to domination” (Scott, 1990: xii). To Beza, Bini and Abdi 4 Acknowledgements First, I’d like to acknowledge the importance of the following academic institutions, without which this PhD would not have been possible: The London School of Economics and Political Sciences (LSE) which I thank for funding this project as part of an LSE studentship. At the LSE, I owe my thanks to Professor James Putzel for accepting me onto the PhD programme and providing thought-provoking supervision throughout the process; I am grateful for the chance you gave me. I’d also like to thank Professor David Lewis for joining the project as a second supervisor, for his thorough engagement with my work and his eye for detail. The Department of Government at Uppsala University I thank for hosting me as a Guest PhD student. Further, I would like to thank Anna Jarstad, Johanna Söderström and Helena Wockelberg, for facilitating my stay. My thanks go also to Anders Sjögren, Jenny Jansson, Oscar Almén and Maria Eriksson Baaz for providing valuable feedback on my work. In Addis Ababa, my grateful thanks go to the French Centre of Ethiopian Studies and the Institute of Ethiopian Studies at Addis Ababa University, for supporting my fieldwork both logistically and financially. I’d also like to thank David Ambrosetti and Ahmed Hassen for providing academic and administrative support throughout the process. Many people told me that a PhD is a lonely journey on which to embark. However, in my case, I can only say I felt I had the support of a whole village. While I had to write the thesis alone, I received a lot of support over the past four years, without which this whole project would not have been feasible. My first and special thanks go to the two hundred plus individuals who participated in this research project, in interviews, focus groups, informal conversations, bus rides, walks and other encounters, and who shared their knowledge and reflections that shaped my experience of Ethiopia. For reasons of anonymity and confidentiality I cannot name them here, but it is their stories that form the basis of this work. 5 Next I would like to recognise all those who have made Addis Ababa a second home for me and who have accompanied me on my fieldwork journey. There are no words to describe what you as people mean to me, or your contributions to this project, I can but say thank you: Margaux and Ayu, your house has become a second home for me, and you, my extended family. Thank you for taking me in, for teaching me survival skills for fieldwork, and for the many evenings spent on our terrace or out and about in Addis. Abdi, thank you for your friendship, for embarking on joint adventures, and for making sure I was up to date with the latest developments in Ethiopian politics. Beza, I am thankful and grateful for your relentless support to my research, for your lessons on life and for the many hours spent together. Bini, thank you for approaching me that day when I was ready to give up, for offering your help, and for making sure I didn’t leave stones unturned. Yohannes and Teshome, thank you for sharing your knowledge, for supporting my adventures logistically, and for all the time you dedicated to helping me negotiating the fieldwork jungle. Ahmedin and Damtaw, I am grateful that you shared your stories with me, took the time to explain all the little details I was hunting after and helped me digging through stacks of papers to make sure I got all the information I needed. Your courage and dedication have inspired me during my research. Abadir, thank you so much for your continuous support throughout these four years and for our countless inspiring discussions on Ethiopian politics. Hale, Gedi, Hanna, Kal and Blen, thank you for your friendship and for accompanying me on the PhD journey. Thank you, Danu, for ensuring that I learned to find my way around Addis, for drawing maps on paper, and for picking me up wherever and whenever to make sure I got home safely when I was wandering around Addis at late hours. A big thank you to the crew from the French Centre - Thomas, Amélie, Hanna, Alexandre, Mehedi, Sebastien, Cloe and Anne-Liz - for sharing many memorable moments in Ethiopia. There are many others who deserve thanks for helping me on this PhD journey: In Uppsala, I’d like to thank Lutz and Lauri for welcoming me on day one and helping me to find my place back in Sweden, and for the emergency sugar deliveries on the many work weekends towards the end of the PhD. Karin, without you the final stretch would have been impossible to manage. Thanks to you I stayed (mostly) sane. 6 I’m thankful for meeting you Nazita and for the academic and personal support you offered. Michal, Marcus and Johanna, thank you for keeping me anchored in reality and for providing much needed distractions from work. Thank you as well to the fellow PhD students, academics and administrators for welcoming me to the department and for providing a caring and productive environment to write up my PhD. Ingela and Joakim, thank you for hosting me upon my return to Sweden, the many hours spent at Aka together and the support provided throughout the years. In London, I would like to thank Lucy for accompanying me on this four-year journey, and for teaching me about time, the politics of waiting and public goods in India. A big thank you as well to the rest of the PhD crew Liz, Brian and Rebecca, for sharing this adventure and well done for hanging in there. Georgie, thank you for hosting me, for your friendship, and for taking breaks in the writing madness.