ABSTRACT
Ethiopia has gone from a peculiarly feudal ancien regime to military socialism to a post-socialist, developmental state pivoting towards the East Asian model of political economy. Land has been a central issue generating extraordinary energy driving these tumultuous political changes. Imperial policy in Ethiopia shares some key features with colonial land policies elsewhere in Africa in that it instituted a property rights regime that would legitimate dispossession of some category of persons and legalize secure land rights for others. Identity-based injustice pertaining to land rights is also manifested in recurrent forms of land disputes and conflicts in Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, South Africa, Sudan, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, and Zimbabwe, to name but a few countries. A related challenge was that cultural minorities such as the Manja became landholders in the context of a structural set up more favorable to the locally dominant majorities such as the Malla.
