Is there any way to have an early Amhara nationalist movement arise by the time other ethnic nationalist movements do under Haile Selassie's government?
WI - Early Amhara nationalist movement?
- Thread starter twistedirregular
- Start date
I'm unsure but depending on how this Amhara nationalist movement develops, it could become disillusioned with the Ethiopian Monarchy as many in the Ethiopian intelligentsia were becoming at the time and pursue a course not too unlike of that of the Tigrayan People's Liberation Front.
It seems quite unlikely for an Amhara nationalist movement to arise, considering the circumstances in which other ethno-nationalist movements came along by the '60s - it might happen, if say, the Italian colonial administration encourages the establishment of an Amhara identity independent from Ethiopia to further the divisions being exploited in Italian-occupied Ethiopia as a means of consolidating Italian control of Ethiopia (this is unlikely to change the fact that the Italians can barely project their influence into the Ethiopian countryside). This could serve as a starting point from which Amhara nationalism could emerge in the aftermath of World War II where some figure (perhaps some popular veteran from the Second World War) rises as the face of a nascent Amhara nationalist movement in the 1960s and transforms the movement into an armed one similar to the TPLF around the time the Derg comes around.
As twistedirregular points out, TTL's Amhara nationalist movement could take on a Republican bent upon becoming disillusioned with the Monarchy.
Would this movement agitate for an Amharic Republic or an Amhara-dominated Ethiopian Republic?
It could go either way but I doubt the desire for independence from Ethiopia would occur, considering even modern-day Amhara nationalist movements reject that. An Amhara-dominated Republican state is possible but it all depends on what series of events occur - for any Amhara nationalist movement to be successful, you’d need to get rid of most (if not all) ethnic nationalist movements in Ethiopia who opposed “Amhara colonialism” and whatnot.
Could there be a federation/confederation of nationalist republics like OTL Ethiopia?
I think it's definitely possible, perhaps even along the same lines of the TPLF but the Amhara take their place ITTL - however, I'm not completely sure about all of this.
You could also have TTL's Amhara nationalist movement focus on reclaiming the historically majority-Amhara provinces to establish their own Republic while the rest of the ethnic groups in Ethiopia get their own ethnic-based states during the 1990s, maybe even having Tigray join Eritrea to form a pan-Tigrayan state. Another idea could be the formation of a pan-Habesha state mostly within the borders of Old Ethiopia (Eritrea, Tigray, Gojjam, Gondar, Welega, Wollo, Shewa) while the ethnic groups to the south and east get their own countries.