May 21, 2026
The Inversion of the State: From Conflict Resolution to Conflict Management
The modern state is traditionally justified as an institution designed to prevent society from descending into violent conflict. In the tradition of Thomas Hobbes and later social contract theorists, political authority gains legitimacy by replacing insecurity with order and safeguarding citizens from violence, instability, and arbitrary power. Yet under Ethiopia’s Prosperity government, this foundational principle increasingly appears to have been reversed. Rather than functioning primarily as a conflict-resolving institution, the state increasingly appears to reproduce and politically instrumentalize fragmentation as a mechanism of governance. Drawing on Carl Schmitt’s friend-enemy distinction (2007) and Harold Lasswell’s (1936), formulation of politics as “who gets what, when, how,” this article argues that conflict in contemporary Ethiopia increasingly functions not merely as a political crisis, but as part of the logic through which power is organized and maintained. This should not simply be understood as institutional weakness or transitional instability. Rather, it reflects a broader political logic in which fragmentation, insecurity, and selective inclusion increasingly shape state practice.
Governing Through Friend-Enemy Distinctions
One of the defining features of Ethiopia’s current political trajectory is the growing use of political inclusion and exclusion as mechanisms of governance. In The Concept of the Political, Schmitt argued that politics ultimately revolves around the distinction between friend and enemy. Contemporary Ethiopian politics increasingly reflects this logic through selective access to political protection, economic opportunities, and institutional legitimacy. Groups and individuals aligned with ruling political structures often benefit from privileged access to state resources, contracts, and administrative support, while opposition actors frequently encounter surveillance, detention, political exclusion, or coercive pressure.
Scholars of Ethiopian federalism and ethnicity, including Assefa Fiseha and Lovise Aalen, have shown how ethnicized political competition can intensify fragmentation and weaken broader civic solidarity. Under such conditions, mistrust becomes embedded within political life. Communities increasingly relate to one another through competitive rather than cooperative frameworks, and local grievances become politicized in ways that undermine national cohesion. Fragmentation, therefore, risks becoming politically functional because it limits the emergence of broad-based political alternatives capable of transcending ethnic or regional divisions.
When the State Produces Insecurity
Hobbes justified strong sovereign authority on the grounds that only the state could prevent generalized violence and social collapse. However, the prosperity regime in Ethiopia increasingly blurs the line between protection and insecurity. 2025 Reports from Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International have documented arbitrary detention, civilian abuses, displacement, and patterns of violence affecting multiple regions since 2020. These reports describe abuses involving both state-affiliated actors and armed groups operating within the broader conflict environment.
The broader concern extends beyond the existence of conflict itself. Many states confront security crises, insurgencies, or communal violence. The deeper issue in Ethiopia is the normalization of emergency governance and selective law enforcement. Communities that once depended on local coexistence and interdependence increasingly experienced insecurity, displacement, and uncertainty. As these conditions deepen, public trust in institutions erodes. Citizens begin to perceive state institutions not as neutral guarantors of collective security, but as structures shaped by political loyalty and coercive calculation.
A political order that increasingly relies on insecurity to regulate dissent risks reproducing precisely the instability the state is historically expected to prevent.
The Political Economy of Selective Distribution
The current political order also reflects a broader political economy in which development and distribution increasingly appear connected to political loyalty and elite-centered priorities. Lasswell’s definition of politics as “who gets what, when, how” remains highly relevant in understanding these dynamics. Large-scale urban redevelopment initiatives, particularly in Addis Ababa, have transformed major parts of the capital through corridor development and infrastructure expansion. Supporters describe these projects as symbols of modernization and economic transformation, while critics argue that redevelopment has frequently displaced low-income residents, informal workers, and small-scale traders without sufficient compensation or social safeguards.
Research on urban restructuring and informal economies in African cities, including the work of AbdouMaliq Simone (2004), demonstrates how redevelopment projects can deepen exclusion when implemented without participatory mechanisms and distributive protections. At the same time, multidimensional poverty remains widespread across Ethiopia. According to recent findings from the United Nations Development Programme and the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative, large segments of the population continue to experience severe deprivation in income, health, and living standards.
The issue is not development itself. Infrastructure expansion and urban modernization are necessary components of economic transformation. The problem emerges when development becomes disconnected from social protection and distributive inclusion. In such contexts, modernization risks functioning less as a collective national project and more as a selective process that disproportionately benefits politically connected actors while marginalizing vulnerable communities. This deepens inequality, social resentment, and distrust toward public institutions.
Development that prioritizes visibility and elite accumulation over inclusive welfare risks intensifying fragmentation rather than strengthening national cohesion.
Criminalizing Poverty and Weakening Social Solidarity
Another troubling development is the increasing tendency to manage poverty through administrative control rather than structural social support. Local reporting from Addis Standard and Population council (2026), and debates surrounding municipal policies in Addis Ababa indicate growing concern about measures aimed at restricting street begging, regulating informal charity, and limiting visible urban poverty. Critics argue that such policies often prioritize urban image management over long-term social welfare solutions.
The significance of these policies extends beyond poverty itself. Informal networks of mutual aid and public solidarity frequently serve as essential mechanisms of survival during periods of economic hardship. When poverty is treated primarily as a visibility or security issue, social trust weakens further. Citizens increasingly perceive governance as detached from everyday hardship and oriented more toward image management than public welfare. Over time, this weakens the moral legitimacy of the state and erodes the social bonds necessary for political stability.
Externalized Coercion and the Crisis of Sovereignty
The involvement of external actors in Ethiopia’s internal conflicts has also generated serious concerns regarding sovereignty and accountability. Reports from Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and the International Crisis Group (2020), have documented the presence and activities of Eritrean forces inside Ethiopian territory during the Tigray conflict. These reports describe allegations of mass atrocities, civilian abuses, and cross-border military involvement.
The use or toleration of external military actors in domestic conflicts carries significant political consequences. It complicates accountability, weakens institutional sovereignty, and deepens public distrust. More broadly, prolonged regional instability creates an environment in which emergency measures and exceptional forms of governance become normalized. Under such conditions, security policy increasingly reflects elite survival calculations rather than broad national consensus or democratic oversight.
When sovereignty becomes subordinated to short-term security calculations, the long-term legitimacy of the state is weakened.
The Fragility of Institutionalized Conflict
Governance systems that rely heavily on fragmentation and coercive management ultimately generate structural instability. Research on authoritarian resilience and civil conflict, including work by Jeremy Weinstein (2017), demonstrates that political systems dependent on exclusion and coercion often experience declining institutional legitimacy over time. While such systems may maintain temporary order through repression and fragmentation, they frequently weaken social trust, civic participation, and institutional credibility.
Controlled urban spaces, weakened opposition movements, and centralized authority may create the appearance of stability, but these conditions often conceal deeper social fractures. Once institutions become associated primarily with exclusion and insecurity, rebuilding public trust becomes increasingly difficult. A political order that normalizes fragmentation as a technology of governance ultimately corrodes the institutional foundations necessary for long-term political stability.
A Path Forward
Reversing this trajectory requires re-centering the Ethiopian state around protection, accountability, and inclusive governance. This includes strengthening legal protections against forced displacement, ensuring transparent oversight of security cooperation, expanding social protection frameworks, safeguarding independent media and civic space, and supporting local mechanisms of conflict resolution that build cross-cutting social trust.
International actors also bear responsibility. External engagement with Ethiopia should prioritize accountability, civilian protection, and institution-building rather than narrowly defined security cooperation. Sustainable political stability cannot emerge through managed fragmentation alone. Durable peace requires institutions capable of fostering inclusion, distributive fairness, and political trust across Ethiopia’s diverse communities.
Conclusion
Political theory traditionally views the state as the institution responsible for preventing generalized conflict and protecting collective security. Contemporary Ethiopia under prosperity party increasingly presents a troubling inversion of this principle. Patterns of selective inclusion, fragmented governance, coercive security practices, and uneven development suggest that conflict is no longer merely a symptom of political crisis but increasingly part of the logic through which power is organized and maintained.
This trajectory is ultimately unsustainable. A state that relies excessively on fragmentation, exclusion, and emergency governance risks undermining the very institutional legitimacy upon which long-term stability depends. Preserving Ethiopia as a viable multi-ethnic political community requires rebuilding institutions grounded in accountability, inclusion, and common security rather than division and coercion. When conflict becomes a governing strategy rather than a political failure, the state risks becoming the architect of its own instability.
When a government learns to survive through division, it eventually forgets how to govern through legitimacy.
Editor’s Note : Views in the article do not necessarily reflect the views of borkena.com
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