The Politics of Urban Industrialization: Integrating the Urban Industrial Nexus in Ethiopia's Disintegrating Ethno-Federal Party State

Africa’s ongoing radical transformation in the 21st century is characterized by two mega processes of change: its urban and industrial transitions. These interactive processes of change are, however, being steered through highly fragmented state action, which is generating infrastructural, social and economic challenges in a range of African countries. Through an interpretive policy analysis of the ongoing state-driven industrialization program in Ethiopia, and the case of the Hawassa Industrial Park more specifically, the research aims to examine the integration challenge between urban and industrial policy. It does this through a focus on key factors that have impeded holistic policymaking and coordinated action; the limits on the integrative potential of spatial development planning; and the various material consequences of disjointed planning. The thesis argues that in the Ethiopian case, the integration challenge is rooted in the political context of authoritarianism and the inherent tensions between the diametrically opposed socialist institutions of the ethno-federation and the party state.

Ethiopia serves as an extreme case of successful implementation of accelerated industrialization that nevertheless has serious implications for the continent’s ongoing urbanization. The research finds the gradual breakdown of the core integrative institutions of the party state, the party bureaucracy and the ethnic federation, to be at the heart of the integration challenge. The internal fracture of the party was mirrored in the breakdown of coordination between sectoral ministries as well as federal-regional and trans-regional planning. Political developments spurred on by these factors limited the integrative potential of spatial planning throughout the period of the development of industrial parks. The infrastructural and housing challenges that emerged as a result of this dissociated planning have been partially resolved, but the emerging Ethiopian urban-industrial nexus as a whole remains undefined and unaccounted for by the plethora of isolated streams of development planning and intervention, indicating continued implications for Ethiopia’s industrialization and urbanization in years ahead. Drawing on the in-depth grounded study of the Ethiopian case, the research makes empirical and theoretical contributions to the study of the politics of urban industrialization in a broader range of developmental authoritarian African states.