Dam controversies: contested governance and developmental discourse on the Ethiopian Omo River dam
Year: 2012
Type: article
Abstract: State mega-infrastructure projects in developing countries evoke challenges to citizenship and reconstruct the imagery of statecraft. The Ethiopian government's construction of a large dam in the Omo River evoked contesting accounts of development and legitimate governance among a variety of actors. Debates between relevant actors centre on classic topoi of the ‘development’ discourse but present seemingly irreconcilable views. In the process, discourses of technocratic expertise claiming to evade ‘politics’ as well as culturally grounded socio-economic narratives are mobilised. They are juxtaposed here to develop an anthropological interpretation of the discursive positions, connecting the analysis to a consideration of precarious citizenship and coercive state consolidation in Ethiopia.
Source: Social Anthropology
Author: Jon Abbink
Institution: African Studies Centre
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W1618031887