Dereje Feyissa & Markus Virgil Hoehne 
Borders and Borderlands as Resources in the Horn of Africa [PDF ebook] 

Borders offer opportunities as well as restrictions, and in the Horn of Africa they are used as economic, political, identity and status resources by borderland peoples.


State borders are more than barriers. They structure social, economic and political spaces and as such provide opportunities as well as obstacles for the communities straddling both sides of the border. This book deals with the conduits and opportunities of state borders in the Horn of Africa, and investigates how the people living there exploit state borders through various strategies.

Using a micro level perspective, the case studies, which includethe Horn and Eastern Africa, particularly the borders of Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Sudan, Somalia, Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania, focus on opportunities, highlight the agency of the borderlanders, and acknowledge the permeabilitybut consequentiality of the borders.


DEREJE FEYISSA, Max Planck Institute of Social Anthropology, Halle, Germany; MARKUS VIRGIL HOEHNE, Max Planck Institute of Social Anthropology, Halle, Germany.

Tabela de Conteúdo

Preface by Gunther Schlee – Günther Schlee

Preface by the Editors

State Borders & Borderlands as Resources: An Analytical Framework – Dereje Feyissa and Markus Virgil Hoehne

More State than the State? The Anywaa’s Call for the Rigidification of the Ethio-Sudanese Border – Dereje Feyissa

Making Use of the Kin Beyond the International Border: Inter-ethnic Relations along the Ethio-Kenyan Border – Fekadu Adugna

The Tigrinnya-speakers across the Borders: Discourses of Unity & Separation in Ethnohistorical Context – Wolbert G.C. Smidt

Trans-Border Political Alliance in the Horn of Africa: The Case of the Afar-Issa Conflict – Yasin Mohammed Yasin

People & Politics along and across the Somaliland-Puntland Border – Markus Virgil Hoehne

The Ethiopian-British Somaliland Boundary – Cedric Barnes

The Opportunistic Economies of the Kenya-Somali Borderland in Historical Perspective – Lee Cassanelli

Magendo & Survivalism: Babukusu-Bagisu Relations & Economic Ingenuity on the Kenya-Uganda Border 1962-80 – Peter Wafula Wekesa

Can Boundaries Not Border on One Another? The Zigula (Somali Bantu) between Somalia & Tanzania – Francesca Declich

Conclusion: Putting Back the Bigger Picture – Christopher Clapham