>
> Bahru Zewde.  _Pioneers of Change in Ethiopia: The Reformist
> Intellectuals of the Early Twentieth Century_.  Eastern African
> Studies Series. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2002.  xii + 228 pp.
> Illustrations, bibliography,and index. $49.95 (cloth), ISBN 0-8214-1445-
> 3; $24.95 (paper), ISBN 0-8214-1446-1.
>
> Reviewed for H-Africa by Charles W. McClellan <[log in to unmask]>,
> Department of History, Radford University
>
> Modernizing Ethiopia
>
> Students of history will be aware of late nineteenth and early twentieth
> century reformist groups such as the Young Turks or Young Italy, youthful
> intellectuals in their respective societies, of strong nationalist
inclination
> who recognized the need for change if their nations were to survive and
thrive
> in the modern world.  While they normally agreed on general goals, they
often
> were at odds on the methods and means to achieve them.  Less well known is
the
> group of intellectuals known as the Young Ethiopians.  _Pioneeers of
Change in
> Ethiopia_ seeks to enlighten us on this important group of young men.
>
> Until now, information on this group has been scattered and rather
> sketchy; it includes some occasional articles and an array of
> undergraduate theses by graduates of Addis Ababa University that,
> while useful, are not particularly defining.  Bahru contributes
> organization, definition, and clarity to this data, and by doing
> so, brings new perspective to bear on the politics and policies of
> emperors Menilek II and Haile Sellassie I.  Bahru is intrepid, to say
> the least, in his quest for documentation.  He commences with the
> considerable accumulation of diaries and manuscripts collected over the
> years by the Institute of Ethiopian Studies in Addis Ababa.  He ferrets
> out materials from various national archives, made easier by his years
> of previous research for other publications.  He travels to the sources
> of these young men's educations in Britain, France, Italy, and the
> United States, rummaging through college newspapers, journals and
> archives.  And of course he carefully ponders the written words of
> these intellectuals, published particularly in the columns of the state-
> supported _Berhanena Selaam_ newspaper, paying attention to nuances and
> always defining context.  Bahru produces a masterful analysis.
>
> Bahru begins with biographical sketches on the group of intellectuals
> involved.  First generation intellectuals include those associated
> with Menilek in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries,
> while those in the second generation are linked more closely to Haile
> Sellassie, and in some cases, are the sons of first-generation
> intellectuals.  He also sorts them out on the basis of where they
> received their educations: church versus secular education, and
> training within Ethiopia versus that in a foreign country.  Those in
> the first generation were less likely to have studied abroad, their
> differences mostly defined by their access to secular education.  Those
> in the second generation reflected greater numbers as well as greater
> diversity in their worldviews, just as one might expect.
>
> As a group, these individuals, no matter their training or background,
> tended to be consistently patriotic.  They identified strongly with the
> state, but not necessarily with its government.  First generation
> intellectuals placed great hope in Menilek as a reformer of Ethiopian
> society, but some were clearly disappointed by him.  He appeared
> to be more interested in "tinkering" with modernity than in
> effectuating it. Despite the reverence that many Ethiopians had for
> Menilek as the victor at Adwa, others blamed him for not being more
> decisive and for not displacing the Italians from Eritrea.  Menilek, in
> their minds, had let the nation down.  Second generation intellectuals
> were sustained by their faith and confidence in the young Ras Teferi
> (Haile Sellassie I) whom they saw as sharing their progressive views.
> They desired a broad transformation of Ethiopia that would culminate in
> the emergence of a constitution, land reform, independence for the
> Ethiopian Orthodox church, modernization of the economy, and
> improvements in social justice(including an end to slavery and
> religious persecution, although interestingly they professed little
> interest in women's equality).  Bahru encapsulates these broad
> interests in the chapter entitled "Independence,Efficiency, and
> Equity."  Some would become just as disenchanted with Haile Sellassie
> as an earlier generation had with Menilek, some criticizing him openly,
> others defecting to the Italians, few fully appreciating the political
> constraints within which the young emperor found himself.  Some felt
> that their skills were not effectively used or recognized and few rose
> to the highest ranks in government. That disenchantment for some would
> further deepen both during and after the Italian war. For some it was a
> matter of not preparing and defending the nation sufficiently, for
> others not moving expediently enough in transforming the state.
> Whatever the extent of their defiance of the emperor, they viewed
> themselves as loyal patriots of the state.
>
> Disappointed as some may have been, Bahru argues that their
> contributions to significant change in Ethiopia should not be
> underestimated.  Their models were, in particular, the countries in
> which they had lived and studied, but Japan came to be of particular
> interest in the minds of some--a country that had successfully made the
> transition from feudal to modern state while retaining many features of
> traditional society.  A number were also impressed by what they saw
> happening under the Italians in Eritrea, even suggesting that Ethiopia
> might benefit from a period of similar colonial rule (although none had
> any doubts that that colonialism would be short-lived).  Bahru suggests
> that these Young Ethiopians played a significant role in separating the
> Ethiopian Orthodox church from its counterpart in Alexandria and in
> framing the 1931 constitution (although it was not exactly what many
> might have envisioned).  They served their country as translators and
> diplomats (promoting understanding across cultures), and were important
> as arbiters on the Special Court that sorted out extraterritorial
> issues.  Haile Sellassie placed them in sub-administrative roles where
> they were disappointed not to garner the top positions, but where the
> emperor allowed them to experiment and where they often possessed more
> real power than they would have in the "honorary" positions of their
> superiors.
>
> The Italo-Ethiopian War of 1935-36 left the Ethiopian intellectuals of
> the second generation largely decimated or in exile.  Many of their
> forbearers would also be in exile and some would die there.  Once
> the war was over, Haile Sellassie had little further use for them; he
> had allied with them to neutralize his conservative opposition and then
> after the war largely ignored them.  The loss of so many intellectuals
> during the war left a generational void in the 1940s and 1950s.  The
> intellectuals of that era were more likely in the arts or literature,
> and those in public service were loyalists rather than dissidents, a
> stance an emperor in solid control could now demand.
>
> That intellectual ferment represented by the elite in the 1920s  and
> 1930s would re-emerge in the 1960s.  While the student movement of the
> later era borrowed ideology from Marxist-Leninism and followed patterns
> of student and protest movements elsewhere in the world, it seems
> clear from Bahru's analysis that the movement must also be understood
> in the context of Ethiopian ideas inherited from an earlier era.  Like
> the intellectuals of the 1920s and 1930s, the students of the 1960s
> were not always in agreement in terms of their courses of action, but
> the issues with which they struggled were substantially similar.  In
> _Berhanena Selaam_ we can see the beginnings of the struggle for a free
> press in Ethiopia, just as we can see that in the student publications
> of the 1960s, a struggle that goes on in Ethiopia yet today.  Although
> the Young Ethiopians were never organized officially as a political
> party, they did represent a set of ideas, an ideology, in terms of
> their vision of the future state.  The political factions that came to
> exist in the last half of the twentieth century were not true political
> parties (either because the emperor forbad their formation or because
> later governments came to sanction these parties for no other reason
> than to guarantee their own continuing control of power).  Bahru does
> not draw all the comparisons between the two periods that I do here,
> but he has promised to produce a followup volume that will describe the
> intellectuals of the later period.  I for one cannot wait for his
> analysis.  If it is as well-researched, well-written,and explicated as
> the volume under review here, it will indeed be a treat for the mind.
>
> If _Pioneers of Change in Ethiopia_ has any faults, they are minor.
> Some might wish for a somewhat fuller discussion of modernization which
> Bahru lays out at the beginning, but then scurries through at the end.
> He certainly makes clear how Ethiopia fits into the debate, but draws
> no firm conclusions.  Those who desire a somewhat more comparative
> approach will also be a bit disappointed.  Bahru does not go into any
> great detail in comparing Ethiopia to other states that preserved their
> independence in the Age of New Imperialism.  But the Ethiopian example
> standing alone is quite instructive and Bahru has teased out as much
> insight from his sources as he might safely do.  He is to be
> congratulated on a work well done, and one deserving wide readership.
>
>
> Submitted by H-Africa Book Review Editors Stephanie Beswick, Ball state
> University <[log in to unmask]> and Jay Spaulding, Kean University
> <[log in to unmask]>
>
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