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Fighting Against the Injustice of the State and Globalization
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Baissa for providing comments on earlier drafts of this paper. This chapter is pub-
lished in The Journal of Oromo Studies, vol. 4, nos.1 and 2 (July 1999), pp. 49–89.
2. See Leenco Lata, “Peculiar Challenges to Oromo Nationalism,” in Oromo Nationalism
and the Ethiopian Discourse: The Search for Freedom and Democracy, ed. Asafa Jalata,
(Lawrenceville: The Red Sea Press, 1998), pp. 125–152; A. Jalata, “The Struggle for
Knowledge:The Case of Emergent Oromo Studies,” The African Studies Review, vol. 39,
no. 2 (September, 1996), pp. 95–123; John Sorenson,“Ethiopian Discourse and Oromo
Nationalism,” in Oromo Nationalism and the Ethiopian Discourse, pp. 223–252;“Ethiopia:
Federal Sham,” The Economist, August 16, 1997, p. 36.
3. V. Y. Mudimbe, The Invention of Africa: Gnosis, Philosophy, and the Order of Knowledge
(Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1988), p. 16.
4. See, for example,William I. Robinson,“Global Capitalism and the Oromo Liberation
Struggle:Theoretical Notes on U.S. Policy Towards the Ethiopian Empire,” The Journal
of Oromo Studies, vol. 4, nos. 1 and 2 (July 1997), pp. 1–46; Bonnie K. Holcomb,“The
Tale of Two Democracies:The Encounter Between U.S.-Sponsored Ethiopian ‘Dem-
ocracy’ and Indigenous Oromo Democratic Forms,” The Journal of Oromo Studies, vol.
4, nos. 1 and 2 (July 1997), pp. 47–82; Sisai Ibssa,“The Ideological Foundations of Cur-
rent U.S. Foreign Policy: the ‘Promotion of Democracy’ and its Impact on the Oromo
National Movement,” The Journal of Oromo Studies, vol. 5, nos. 1 and 2 (July 1998), pp.
1–34.
5. See Asafa Jalata,“U.S.-Sponsored Ethiopian ‘Democracy’ and State Terrorism,” in Crisis
and Terror in the Horn of Africa, ed. Pietro Toggia, Pat Lauderdale, and Abebe Zegeye
(Dartmouth, Burlington:Ashgate, 2000).
6. Douglas Hellinger, “U.S. Assistance to Africa: No Room for Democracy,” TransAfrica
Forum, vol. 9, no. 2 (Summer 1992), p. 80.
7. For the connection between racism in U.S. domestic and foreign policies, see Gerald
Horne,“Race for the Globe: U.S. Foreign Policy and racial Interests,” Impacts of Racism
on White Americans, pp. 88–112.
8. See Asafa Jalata, Oromia and Ethiopia: State Formation and Ethnonational Conflict, 1868-
1992 (Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1993), pp. 88–99.This book argues that the
Haile Selassie regime was corrupt and oppressive.
9. See Asafa Jalata, ibid.; Bonnie K. Holcomb and Sisai Ibssa, The Invention of Ethiopia
(Trenton: N.J.:The Red Sea Press, 1990).
10. The policy of the Soviet Union was also racist toward the Oromo people.It supported the
Ethiopian colonizing structure and suppressed the Oromo struggle for self-determination
and democracy almost for two decades.
11. See Asafa Jalata, Oromia and Ethiopia, pp. 178–181.
12. Agency France Press notes that the United States “backed the Tigre People’s Liberation
Front (TPLF) for several years in their struggle against Lieutenant-Colonel Mengistu’s
regime and it was on American advice that the TPLF became the EPRDF, though for-
mer Tigrean guerrillas are still dominant in the government.” AFP (Agency France
Press),“Ethiopia-Politics,” Nairobi, June 24, 1992.
13. As the leader of TPLF/EPRDF, “Meles had strong CIA support even when he was
known for his Marxist belief (s). . . . ‘He dropped it in exchange for US support and
military power.’” The Oromia Support Group, September 1994, p. 6.
14. Paul Henze, Rebels and Separatists in Ethiopia: Regional Resistance to a Marxist Regime,
(Prepared for the office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy), (Santa Monica:
The Rand Corporation, 1985), p. 74.
15. Ibid., p. 65.
16. Ibid., p. 74.
17. Ibid.
18. Ibid., p. 65.