ABSTRACT
As one of the ethno-political and armed groups which emerged during the Ethiopian civil war, the Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF) has made an important contribution to the country’s political reality especially in its Somali Region. This chapter deals with ONLF’s evolution, objectives, and current trajectories. While discussing the circumstances surrounding the movement’s origins and salient dynamics in its development, it concentrates on debating ONLF’s political objectives which have oscillated between moderate approaches, ensuring a variable degree of internal self-determination within the country, and a hardline position, seeking to achieve external self-determination through secession. Using the ONLF as an example, the chapter argues that a historically contextualized analysis, conscious of organizational trajectories, mutable political objectives, and factors affecting cohesion, is necessary to gain a worthy understanding of the origins, evolution, and objectives of armed opposition movements.
