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Even though ethnicity had a profound influence in African politics, the official rhetoric
was dedicated to nation-building. Due to the generalized economic and political
failures of the postcolonial state in Africa, these efforts have been thoroughly
discredited. In the aftermath of massive resource limitations, the way has been
opened up for a more explicit assertion of ethnic differences as a basis for economic
and political claims. Since these perceived differences may form the basis of violent,
sometimes genocidal, clashes between people, the topic of ethnic conflict has
received considerable research attention from social scientists. The main area of
debate is how to make citizens of everyone under conditions of such diversity and
with so many subnational forms of belonging. This relates directly to the necessity of
building legitimate polities in Africa in which all people have a sense of inclusion and
national loyalties do not contradict cultural pluralism.
The cultural diversity of Africa has long been recognized. Audrey Richards, for
example, provided a detailed account of the linguistic, religious, and cultural
differentiation of communities in East Africa in a book presciently entitled The
Multicultural States of East Africa. One of the contested concepts in multiculturalism
is assimilation. An example from Ethiopia provides a unique insight into this policy.
Bahru Zewde considers the situation of the Oromo in East Africa in the following
manner: "[T]he Ethiopian emperor has three options with regard to the Oromo:
enslavement and expropriation, assimilation, and indirect rule." While the first and
the last mentioned are rejected for various reasons, "assimilation therefore remains
the only credible and sensible option." In short, the Oromo should become Amhara
since, "two peoples who are allowed to evolve separately will end up forming two
different, and perhaps antagonistic, nations" (pp. 132–133). Assimilation thus implies
the eradication of difference in favor of the dominant culture. It is essentially a
homogenizing project that imposes itself on others on the basis of assumed cultural
superiority. It is precisely this kind of cultural chauvinism that multiculturalism seeks
to oppose, usually for the sake of the oppressed.