Indigenous Democracy: Alternative Conflict Management Mechanisms Among Tigray People, The Experiences of Erob, Community

Abstract

The objective of this study was to explore how one of the communities in Northern Ethiopia, the Erob, deals with conflict using indigenous mechanism for the management of conflict and for examining how effective the mechanism is. The research design that the researcher employed was a qualitative approach particularly phenomenological. In doing so, I used three data collection tools such as semi-structured interview, focus group discussion and document analysis. The collected data were transcribed, organized, coded and categorized into themes and sub-themes based on the research objectives. Accordingly, the finding of the study revealed that regarding the conception of conflict, the participants of the study have different perceptions. Though most of the participants viewed conflict as inevitable and natural which could prevail in any society, on the contrary, few of them viewed it as bad and destructive. The types of conflicts presented and resolved in the study community are inter-personal, inter-group and inter-ethnic in nature which stemmed from competition over resources, violation of social values, drunkenness and extra sexual relationship with married women and unmarried girls. The findings further show the role and participation of women in the indigenous conflict management mechanism. Thus, the role and participation of women in the system is low and insignificant. The procedures (methods) of conflict management used by the study community vary depending on the nature and types of conflicts. Moreover, the findings of this study revealed that accessibility, restorative capacity, revealing crime committed under cover and acceptability as a major strengths of the system. On the contrary, economic extravagancy, time consuming or prolongation of appointments and exclusion of women from participation in conflict management are identified as the most glaring weaknesses of the system. Based on the above findings, sharing experiences with other communities and ethnic groups, challenging gender inequality, building institutional linkages between the formal court and the indigenous institutions, encouraging reform of the system regardingeconomic extravagancy and prolongation of appointments were forwarded as recommendations.