ABSTRACT
The lions may have been removed from the budget forms, but the actual surviving imperial lions still roar occasionally. They can be seen in the cages where they are kept-ironically enough, across the street from the Ministry of Finance. In Ethiopia, the lions represent the ancient regime. A budget reform is about change-cultural, organizational, and managerial. In a society with strong traditions and imbued with deep deference to hierarchy, the removal of the lion images from the budget documents was an unmistakable reminder for Ethiopian officials that the times were truly changing. The consternation of Amhara officials-whose ethnic group had dominated Ethiopia politically and bureaucratically for centuries-was palpable. With a click, several thousand years of dynastic rule was erased from the budgeting process in Ethiopia.
