Herder-Farmer Conflicts in Africa : An Analysis of Cases in Southwest Ethiopia

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  • アフリカにおける牧畜民・農耕民紛争 : エチオピア西南部の事例分析
  • アフリカ ニ オケル ボクチクミン ノウコウミン フンソウ エチオピア セイナンブ ノ ジレイ ブンセキ

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Abstract

<p>Conflicts in Africa, especially on a local small-scale, are often discussed in terms of 'conflicts over scarce resources' in the context of environmental change or 'degradation.' That also applies to conflicts between herders and farmers (herder-farmer conflict), which represent the majority of cases reported in West Africa, and typically involve disputes between immigrant herders looking for better grazing land and indigenous farmers seeking extra land for the cultivation of crops. This study examines herder-farmer conflict in southwest Ethiopia by focusing on four cases: conflict in Malo (between the Me'en and the Malo), Konta (between the Me'en and the Konta), Dime (between the Me'en and the Dime), and Dizi (between the Suri and the Dizi). The first case is based on the author's field research, whereas the others derive from a literature review. In all cases, cattle-herding agropastoralists who are sparsely populated in the lowlands (the Me'en and Suri) waged raiding conflicts against mountain farmers who are densely populated in the highlands (the Malo, Konta, Dime and Dizi) in those decades. The former speak Surmic in the Nilo-Saharan tradition, whereas the latter speak Omotic in the Afro-Asiatic tradition. The Me'en began raids by occasionally rustling cattle and killing a few local farmers from neighboring Dime in the late 1960s. The raids subsequently intensified to the extent of massacre, and did not come to an end until 1971 when the imperial government forces intervened. Although the murderous violence towards the Dime ended after this period, the land and other property held by the Dime nevertheless continued to be gradually taken over by the Me'en, who now almost totally occupy the territory to the extent that the Dime appear to have become subordinate to the Me'en. The Wen raids have continued to gravitate toward both the Konta (including part of the Dawro) and Malo territories, which are located in the middle Omo Valley (Konta in the north and Malo in the south) and some distance beyond the Me'en territory to the east. In an organized group often several hundred strong, the Me'en carry out armed attacks by stealthily infiltrating into their targeted areas via the Omo riverbank when the water is at its lowest. Then they conduct a surprise attack on peripheral settlements at dawn by rustling as many cattle as possible and stealing other property, often ruthlessly killing local inhabitants, mostly mothers and their children who fail to escape; after the raid, the intruders immediately return home to avoid remaining in the settlements overnight. In that way, since the mid-1970s, both the Konta and Malo have been repeatedly attacked by the Me'en, while the Konta have been more frequently and viciously raided than the Malo. The rise in the number of such violent incidents seems to have occurred along with the decline and sometimes complete lack of state control. On the other hand, the Suri attacks against neighboring Dizi commenced relatively late in their shared history, but now seem to be on the rise because the traditional ways of reconciliation have almost vanished. The main causes of the herder-farmer disputes in these cases may be summarized as follows. The first concerns the historical impact of state governance. Following the region's incorporation into the Ethiopian empire at the end of the 19th century, an inconsistent state policy was imposed upon lowland agropastoralists and mountain farmers in southwest Ethiopia during the imperial era. Whereas nomadic lowland herders were largely left alone, sedentary mountain farmers were heavily controlled by numerous state agents known as naft'anna (pl. ngft'annoch) who settled in farming areas during the early 20th century. Although the settlers managed to prevent the farmers from owning firearms, they provided copious</p><p>(View PDF for the rest of the abstract.)</p>

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