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Volume two in Bereket Habte Selassie's memoir continues where The Crown and the Pen (Africa World Press - also available from Turnaround) left off. Through historical and political analyses, Selassie lays bare the hidden - and not so hidden - elements that led to Eritrea's descent from a stellar model of democracy to a tragic abyss of dictatorship and isolation. Combined with the first volume, Wounded Nation is a must-read for anyone interested in the history and politics of Eritrea and the Horn of Africa.
Emperor Haile Selassie was an iconic figure of the twentieth century, a progressive monarch who ruled Ethiopia from 1916 to 1974. This book, written by a former state official who served in a number of important positions in Selassie’s government, tells both the story of the emperor’s life and the story of modern Ethiopia. After a struggle for the throne in 1916, the young Selassie emerged first as regent and then as supreme leader of Ethiopia. Over the course of his nearly six-decade rule, the emperor abolished slavery, introduced constitutional reform, and expanded educational opportunity. The Italian invasion of Ethiopia in the 1930s led to a five-year exile in England, from which he ...
For the first time in their history, Eritreans were engaged in the making of a document by which they would be governed. Seen as the culmination of their struggle for self-determination, the Constitution was written over a three-year period, informed by intensive public debate held in villages and towns throughout the newly liberated country. Written by a scholar who led the process of constitution drafting, this book analyses the process from beginning to end, arguing that the value of a constitution lies in the degree of pubic participation that goes into its making.
This is a Drama based on contemporary political realities in some African countries, which arrived at liberation through armed struggle. Eritrea (God's land, according to the ancient Egyptians) is an example of a country and society in convulsion because of the abandonment by its leadership, particularly among the ex-combatants, of the lofty principles of democracy, serving the people, equality and solidarity: aspirations that characterized the rhetoric of the revolution. The incidences and personalities in it are, however, purely fictitious although similarities are bound to exist since the principles during the wars of liberation and the abuses thereafter tend to be the same in all undemocratic countries. Poetic license has been used to draw characters from the army, students, political dissidents and political opportunists, the Catholic Church and a nun who escapes rape but is martyred in the process of resistance. This is a drama with elements of suspense, farce, comedy and tragedy, woven in a way that will not fail to move the reader in and outside Eritrea by the in depth understanding of the inside workings and "intelligence" of a contemporary African dictatorship.
Analyzing nineteen cases, this title offers practical perspective on the implications of constitution-making procedure, and explores emerging international legal norms.
In the nineteen 60s and 70s, the University of Dar es salaam was recognised internationally as a great academic institution, and the site of anti-colonialist, anti-imperialist, socialist studies and activism. With the onslaught of neo-liberalism beginning with Structural Adjustment Programmes in Tanzania in the mid 80s, the university was one of its prime targets; subjected to numerous pressures designed to extinguish the flames of revolutionary scholarship and activism. The establishment in 2008 of the Mwalimu Nyerere Chair on Pan - Africanism with Professor Issa Shivji as its first Chairman, and the annual Distinguished Nyerere Lectures Series inaugurating annual intellectual festivals was...
By analyzing Ethiopia's rule over Eritrea and Indonesia's rule over East Timor, Third World Colonialism and Strategies of Liberation compares the colonialism of powerful third world countries on their small, less powerful neighbors. Through a comparative study of Eritrean and East Timorese grand strategies of liberation, this book documents the inner workings of the nationalist movements and traces the sources of government types in these countries. In doing so, Awet Tewelde Weldemichael challenges existing notions of grand strategy as a unique prerogative of the West and opposes established understanding of colonialism as an exclusively Western project on the non-Western world. In addition to showing how Eritrea and East Timor developed sophisticated military and non-military strategies, Weldemichael emphasizes that the insurgents avoided terrorist methods when their colonizers indiscriminately bombed their countries, tortured and executed civilians, held them hostage, starved them deliberately, and continuously threatened them with harsher measures.
This omnibus edition brings together concise and up-to-date biographies of Steve Biko, Emperor Haile Selassie, Patrice Lumumba, and Thomas Sankara. African Leaders of the Twentieth Century will complement courses in history and political science and serve as a useful collection for the general reader.
Two different leaders, with more contrasting characteristics. Comparing the two leaders from two countries with striking contrast in size, history and government structure may seem strange. America is a democratic republic with a constitution two hundred and thirty years old; Eritrea is a dictatorship ruled by an unelected former guerrilla leader who suppressed a ratified constitution and rules by decree. However, both leaders are dedicated to the destruction of, or at the very least, the demeaning of the primary values of the democratic epoch, namely, democracy and rule of law.