Nationalism and Secession in the Horn of Africa: A Critique of the Ethnic Interpretation

Nationalism and Secession in the Horn of Africa: A Critique of the Ethnic Interpretation

القومية والانفصال في القرن الأفريقي: دراسة نقدية للتفسير العرقي

بالإشارة للتجربة الارترية وتجربة الصوماليلاند 

A 1999 PhD thesis by Dominique Jacquin

can be accessed here:
http://etheses.lse.ac.uk/73/1/Jacquin_Nationalism_and_secession_in_the_Horn_of_Africa.pdf

Abstract

This thesis seeks to assess the relevance of existing theories about the origins of nationalism and investigate more specifically the claim that nationalism is rooted in ethnicity. It does so by examining the cases of Eritrea and Somaliland, which proclaimed their independence in May 1991 after seceding from the states to which they were formerly united. Having explained in the introduction why International Relations needs to take a closer look at the causes of nationalism, the second chapter proceeds to review some of the main theories about the origins of nationalism. It retraces the history of the primordialist-modernist debate, discusses the main contentions of the ethnonationalist approach and presents some of the factors singled-out by recent scholarship as propitious for the emergence of nationalism. Given that most of the theories about the origins of nationalism presented in chapter two centre on Europe, chapter three surveys the literature on the rise of nationalism in Africa i_n order to determine whether any additional factors need to be considered before analysing Eritrea and Somaliland. Chapter three also includes a discussion of the anthropological literature on ethnicity in Africa and questions the ethnonationalist claim that ethnic groups are pre-modern. Using as a framework the factors identified previously, chapter four offers a historical account of the emergence of nationalism in Eritrea. Chapter five does the same for the case of Somaliland. As the analysis provided in chapters four and five illustrate, the claim that nationalism and secession have ethnic roots is not empirically substantiated by the cases of Eritrea and Somaliland. The thesis concludes by discussing the practical implications of these fmdings with regard to the right of secession and proposals for boundary adjustment in Africa. It also highlights the ways International Relations may contribute to our understanding of the causes of nationalism.
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The book discusses among other things:

What is an ethnic group? How it is defined ( some consider it to compose of those who conceive themselves as being alike by virtue of their common ancestry, real or fictitious, and who are regarded as such by others), and how it developed through history?

Factors that gave rise to nationalism in Africa, how literate and bilingual elites played a role in the rise of nationalism in Africa, how the number of Africans who had access to secondary and university education, at home or abroad, produced the most nationalist leaders,  Nationalism in Africa, as the expression of African elites discontent with the European colonial administration, how Europeans had been very successful in implanting the territorial state in Africa and had been 'able to draw sharp boundaries, not only in political and economic reality, but also in the psychic identity and cultural vision on the new elites, The legitimation and enforcement of existing ex-colonial international boundaries in Africa is undoubtedly the supreme purpose of the O.A.U., but very few of those boundaries have substantial indigenous African referents, so we cannot conclude that the O.A.U. is maintaining traditional African national identities.

How tribes developed into ethnic groups under colonialism, some anthropologists and historians argue that ethnic identities in Africa were the product of 19th and 20^th century age of European imperialism, mass politics and cultural nationalism, To say that ethnic groups and nations are modem occurrences is not to deny their importance or appeal. It is evident that some groups in Africa have achieved an ethnic or national self-consciousness and that this consciousness dictates their political demands...

 On the discussion of the emergenee of nationalism in Africa, particular attention is  given to the following when discussing the cases of Eritrea and Somaliland. 1) economic factors, indicated by industrialization, urbanization and the development of networks of communication; 2) sociological factors, such as the level of education as indicated by the number of state-run or mission-schools, literacy and more specifically the rise of an educated elite; 3) political factors, that is the existence of a modem state administration with a geographically demarcated territory and its attempts to instill a sense of nationhood; 4) ideological factors such as the prevalence/Western ideas of democracy and national self-determination; 5) psychological factors such as discrimination and exclusion, and more importantly the impact of war on identity formation. Finally, and more importantly, notwithstanding the above discussion about the modernity of ethnie identities, we will investigate the extent to which Eritrea and Somaliland's claims to national self-determination were ethnically motivated. Indeed, the ethno-nationalist empirical contention is that ethnicity is the main cause behind today's nationalist claims and hence behind secession. The fact that states have regularly been challenged by ethno-regional movements seeking greater

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Thanks to Omer Abdelgadir Mohamed Ali for sharing the link