Ethiopia is a home to more than eighty ethnic groups which lived in relative peace and social cohesion until an outbreak of ethnic tensions in recent years. The production of dominant anti-Amhara narratives and systemic hatred has not received adequate study, particularly relating to their historical roots and the impact of Italy's five-year occupation on the country. This article seeks to explore the ways in which narratives sowed during colonial times helped perpetuate systemic hatred against the Amharas in Ethiopia. During this period, there was a narrative that portrayed Amharas as an 'oppressor' ethnic group while other ethnic groups are 'oppressed'. This narrative was later ingrained in Marxist and ethno-nationalist political programs in the 1970s and left Amharas more vulnerable to various forms of hatred and violence across the country. Since 1995, the Constitution formally institutionalised this colonial narrative that seeks to 'rectify unjust historical relationships', suggesting the existence of an ethnic group perceived as 'oppressor' of other ethnic groups throughout Ethiopian history. Using archival sources and official documents, this article provides a genealogical analysis of colonial and post-Italian period narratives and examines how the current discriminatory laws and practices in the country are meant to perpetuate systemic hatred (and violence) against the Amharas in Ethiopia.
Messele et al. (Mon,) studied this question.