Background
When looking at the academic literature on Eritrea from the liberation war to the present, this is dominated by an all too often uncritical admiration of the ‘exceptional’ happenings within the Eritrean revolution, followed by disappointment that developments have not turned out along the lines of ‘dynamic, egalitarian growth’ and a ‘commitment to political pluralism’ (Connell 2011). In consequence, contemporary literature on Eritrea has largely made up its mind and declared Eritrea a dictatorship since about 2001 (if not before), without much of an attempt to try to understand potential transitions within this transition since (among the few exceptions is Reid 2009). Such a perspective has always been ahistorical and not only ignorant of the fact that other liberation movements within their own historical conditions were similarly ‘exceptional’, while post-liberation consolidation has more often than not resulted in autocratic politics (Dorman 2006). It also pays scant attention to the fact that even within its own core support base among the population, the Eritrean People's Liberation Front (EPLF) never had quite the amount of uncritical support it claimed to have attained (Mahrt 2009).
This representation of Eritrea has been aided by the fact that due to government restrictions over the last decade, it has become increasingly difficult to conduct research in Eritrea itself. Research that has been carried out relies in various ways on informal arrangements (see Hirt 2010, Müller 2008, Reid 2009). This difficulty is compounded by an Eritrean studies scholarly community, prominent members of which regard anybody still willing to visit Eritrea or who has in fact been given a visa as a ‘traitor’, as somebody who must in some way do the government's bidding. Eritrea panels at African Studies conferences have thus become unduly politicised and often devoid of serious scholarship.1 Generalisations are being made about happenings inside Eritrea by observers who have not set foot in the country for many years, enforcing common stereotypes of ‘African dictatorship’. In an almost tragic way this state of affairs mirrors the intolerance of parts of the Eritrean political leadership itself.
I wish to argue here for a more nuanced understanding of what is happening in contemporary Eritrea, an understanding from which a picture emerges that focuses on the hybrid dimensions of the current situation. I borrow the concept of ‘hybridity’ from Mac Ginty (2010) who uses it to analyse resistance and other forms of agency in peacebuilding. ‘Hybridity’ on the one hand focuses on the counterforces to any hegemonic project. It includes what Scott (1985) has termed the ‘weapons of the weak’, everyday resistance to exploitation and coercion. On the other hand ‘hybridity’ also entails the dynamics that over time transform the hegemonic project from within, and thus goes beyond simply stating that every political project is by nature ambiguous. A number of studies have engaged with patterns of subversive disengagement in everyday practices in Eritrea. Those include the disappearance of youth to remote rural areas to evade national service; prison guards and army troops facilitating escapes of those imprisoned; the use of jokes or other tropes to reclaim an alternative narrative of history and future vision; or the pursuit of a protest lifestyle in urban Asmara – all with varying degrees of success (for concrete examples see Poole 2009, Treiber 2009, Wrong 2005). Even more pronounced is the ‘silent resistance’ (Reid 2009) of youth fleeing the country in order to escape national service or other obligations. While all the above provide valuable insights into aspects of life in contemporary Eritrea, two important dimensions of ‘hybridity’ are missing: insights into the lives of those who actively decided to stay, and, more importantly for this paper, an understanding of potentially intangible transformations from within. The only article I am aware of that has engaged with such an agenda was Reid's (2009) piece in ROAPE. Interestingly, Reid himself has meanwhile given some credence to the view that Eritrea is on the trajectory towards being a failed state (International Crisis Group 2010). Reid's report for the International Crisis Group (ICG) defines Eritrea as ‘the siege state’, based on the observation that its government is suspicious not only of its neighbours and the wider world, but equally its own population. This is indeed an important part of the mindset among the Eritrean leadership, and in particular of the president who is at the apex of the various power structures in Eritrea (ICG 2010). And while it is equally true that the dynamics of present-day politics in Eritrea have their roots in patterns of rebel governance combined with the violent patterns of history in the Horn as a whole (ICG 2010, Pool 2001), this does not imply that no ‘hybrid’ dimension exists and transitions from within, including from within parts of the current leadership, are not possible.
This paper attempts to provide an alternative reading of the current situation in Eritrea. It argues that while time may be running out, a transition process instigated by the current leadership is still possible, and small openings have indeed occurred in the recent past that may transform the Eritrean polity. My observations were largely made during a two-week visit to Eritrea in October 2011, my first visit since November 2006, combined with six weeks of intensive fieldwork among Eritrean refugees in Tel Aviv between June 2010 and April 2011. In addition, between 1996 and 2006 I visited Eritrea regularly for at least four weeks each year. I also spent one year at the University of Asmara in 2000/2001. This was the academic year during which students were forcefully sent to the Danakil dessert because they defied government orders (see Müller 2008). It was thus a time when state securitisation policies had very concrete implications for the lives of a cohort of the population that before was largely outside the political sphere. This was soon to be followed by the Warsay-Yekealo national service campaign (WYDC) for which no official definition exists in terms of lengths and objectives. In reality the WYDC has become the indefinite supplier of cheap labour to enterprises owned by the People's Front for Democracy and Justice (PFDJ), the sole ruling party (see Healy 2007, Hughes 2004, Mehreteab 2007). It is this campaign that is perceived to have caused the mass exodus of youth (Hirt 2010). I thus decided to conduct fieldwork among Eritrean refugees in Tel Aviv in order to get a better understanding of what made them leave. Findings from this fieldwork motivated me to embark on my visit to Eritrea in October 2011 in an effort to touch base again with developments inside the country. What I found among those I interviewed in Tel Aviv thus serves as a starting point for the wider observations I wish to make here.2
Eritrean refugees in Tel Aviv
Eritrea has in recent years become one of the largest producers of refugees in relation to its population size, with those fleeing being predominately young men (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) 2010). Since 2007 a growing number of Eritrean asylum seekers has made their way to Israel. By the end of 2009, asylum seekers from Eritrea had reached 11,952 and an estimated 1000 Eritrean refugees entered the country every month in 2010, making Israel the third largest recipient of Eritrean refugees worldwide (UNHCR 2010). The majority of Eritreans in Israel live in Tel Aviv.
When asked what made them leave Eritrea, interviewees usually refer to the aspiration of ‘being free’; as could have been expected. When probed, ‘being free’ means ‘be able to work and earn a salary, not work for nothing’ (I1), the latter referring to the stipulations of the WYDC. Most Eritreans work either on construction sites, as street cleaners, or as kitchen helpers in Tel Aviv restaurants. Very few secured qualified employment or a university place, or had the means to open a small business. The latter group has transformed a number of streets around the central bus station in southern Tel Aviv into ‘little Asmara’, dominated by Eritrean cafés, bars, shops, and hairdressing salons. Those who work in restaurants in the evenings spend their days sitting in one of those cafés watching the broadcast of the state television channel ERI-TV with its usual mix of patriotic music, videos of heroic fighters in Eritrea's past wars, Eritrean soap operas and the occasional speech by the president or other high-ranking officials.
What for me at first glance seemed rather ironic – to find this group of Eritrean youth spending their days in Tel Aviv watching the propaganda of a state they have escaped from – for those Eritreans made perfect sense. Even though in official government rhetoric they are labelled as ‘traitors’ – as are all those who leave the country and are regarded as not fulfilling their rightful obligations – this is not how they see themselves. In contrast, the Eritrean youth I encountered in Tel Aviv are deeply loyal to the Eritrean state consolidation project and committed to contributing their share to its success. What they reject are government policies, exemplified in the PFDJ securitisation agenda, the militarisation of society and the demands that spring from it. In particular they object to there being no time limits on service obligations ‘once in they never let you free from the military’ (I2), combined with a complete disregard for their own aspirations. The general thrust that runs through the narratives of all research participants in Tel Aviv centres on being denied the ability to live their identities as Eritreans in any meaningful sense. ‘We are leaving in order to upgrade and develop our country’ (I3) as one informant put it. He recalls that ‘when in 1994 national service was declared, everybody accepted it, it was to make Eritrea a well-developed country, but then the face of national service changed, it became a slavery system’ (I3). He himself did national service for four years and ultimately could not take it any longer, not just because his ‘salary’ did not allow him to properly care for his wife and two children, but equally because ‘there was no right to speak or say what you think, ever’ (I3).
This is in line with findings from a study by Hirt inside Eritrea, where she argues that government demands contradict not only personal aspirations but equally traditional norms and values in such a way that a ‘normal’ life is impossible in present-day Eritrea (Hirt 2010). At the same time very few among those I spoke to had any ambition to become politically active, not because they feared repercussions but because they simply wanted a ‘normal’ life and were not interested in politics of any kind. The majority passed through Shimelba refugee camp in Ethiopia on their way to Israel where ‘you were constantly targeted by different so-called opposition groups’ and ‘it became almost dangerous not to join one’ (I4). This state of affairs was one reason why many felt they had to move on from Ethiopia, because a desire to engage in opposition politics was not why they left Eritrea.
Meanwhile, many reflect critically on their decision to embark on this journey, as they have come to realise that securing their ambitions for a decent job or education is not much easier to achieve outside Eritrea. A number of Eritreans in Tel Aviv did experience personal abuse, violence, imprisonment or torture at the hands of Eritrean security forces, but most did not. They either left while in Sawa for their last year of education, because from Sawa it is fairly easy to make it across the border, or even before they were due to go to Sawa and be exposed to its demands.3 The remark of one interviewee who was in grade six when leaving is rather typical here: ‘I imagined people would go to a good place when I heard they were leaving, so I decided to join’ (I5).
In fact those who arrive in Tel Aviv are getting younger, and can be said to belong to the generation of youth from the global South who, in Ferguson's (2006) words, aspire for connection and are trying to create a viable future for themselves in a globalised world that has raised expectations only to seemingly close a door in their faces. The ‘refugee existence’ thus offers the promise of the realisation of modern aspirations in a global world and has rightly been described as part of a rite of passage for other populations of African refugee/migrants (see for example Jackson 2008, McKenzie and Triulzi, forthcoming). In fact, the majority of stories I have heard from Eritreans in Tel Aviv are not dissimilar to the narratives of other African populations who embark on such journeys and with whom Eritreans often arrive in Israel as part of bigger groups, pointing to the fact that the one-dimensional understanding of Eritreans fleeing dictatorship misses important dimensions of what is going on. In the Eritrean case there is the added dimension that one quarter of the Eritrean population live in diaspora settings and thus potentially provide valuable long-distance networks for those who wish to flee. Thus, while leaving the country is part of what Reid (2009, p. 212) has called ‘another manifestation of the politics of silence’, it is equally part of wider global dynamics among African youth and, as I have shown elsewhere in looking at old and new diasporas, does not necessarily imply disloyalty to the wider Eritrean state consolidation project (Müller 2012).
Tracing hybridity – observations from a recent visit
This hybrid understanding among Eritrean refugees in Tel Aviv of their own existence and its connection to Eritrea, real and imagined, made me embark on a trip to Eritrea in October 2011, in order to see for myself whether I could trace intangible transformations. A number of caveats are in order here. While I have been in regular contact with a number of key informants in Eritrea since my last previous visit in 2006, and thus had some degree of understanding of what was going on from the inside, a visit of two weeks could only allow me to scratch the surface of any putative change. In addition, due to travel restrictions and the lack of an official research permit, the following is based on conversations and informal interviews with Eritreans from different strands of society, some known to me for many years, others contacted specifically during the course of this visit. They include ministry officials, ex-fighters, party officials, teachers, students, and WYDC recruits, all of whom must remain anonymous. I did not tape-record any interviews but kept an extensive fieldwork diary. The majority of conversations and observations took place in Asmara and its environment, including the college at Mai Nefhi, supplemented by short visits to Keren, Ghinda and Massawa. In spite of those caveats, some interesting dynamics became apparent in the course of my visit.
In 2006, as had been the case from late 2001 onwards, what Connell (2011) writes about his own experiences in 2002 was still prevalent: the feeling (and likely reality) of always being monitored, combined with a reluctance by many Eritreans to speak openly and without constantly looking over their shoulders to see who might be listening in. This was combined with a general mistrust of any ‘foreigner’, transporting the siege-state mentality into everyday life practices. The first observation that struck me was, therefore, how different things were this time: long-term acquaintances and strangers alike were welcoming and discussed things openly and without holding back, in public and private settings.
One of the first things I did upon my arrival was to visit the college at Mai Nefhi near Asmara, one of the colleges created to replace the University of Asmara after its enforced closure from 2002 onwards. The last time I was at Mai Nefhi in 2006 it was run like a military camp, students were not allowed to leave for Asmara or anywhere else and subject to punishment if they did so, and various kinds of disciplinary regimes determined students’ everyday life. With the departure of Colonel Ezra, then de facto in charge of Mai Nefhi, to Sawa some time ago, dynamics at Mai Nefhi have been transformed. Now students come and go as they please, and the only sanctions they face is that their course credits might not be recognised if they miss too many classes – very much like in any ‘normal’ educational establishment (I7, I12). It has become the norm for many students to leave on Thursday to spend the weekend in Asmara, not least because on Friday local minibuses charge double prices (I8-9). The library, empty when I last visited, is now stocked in a manner not considerably worse than the old library at the University of Asmara, and was full of students studying; and the Internet in Mai Nefhi is faster and more reliable than in downtown Asmara. Students are aware that ‘we are privileged to be here, so we try to make the most of it’ (I11, I16) and, in contrast to 2006, students are visibly eager to study.
Many come from families dispersed all over the world as has been the norm for many Eritrean families for decades, long before the current leadership came into power. A typical example is one of my informants who grew up in Assab, completed her matriculation and service in Sawa and is now studying at Mai Nefhi. She has two older siblings, one of whom graduated and completed national service and now works in Juba A third is in the Democratic Republic of Congo, while her fourth sibling studies at the agricultural college near Keren. Thinking about her own future she is aware she will be given a job as a teacher, and ‘for a few years I would be happy to do this, then we will have to see’ (I10).
This pragmatic attitude, prevalent among many students at Mai Nefhi, is not fundamentally different from attitudes among previous generations of students when the University of Asmara still existed: students always needed to find a way to navigate between government demands on their future and their own ambitions, and have done so in different ways (see Müller 2005). Currently, students who graduate from Mai Nefhi are often assigned to Sawa as grade - 12 teachers. Many volunteer for this assignment, partly because from Sawa it is easy to get into Sudan if one plans to leave the country. Over the last three years roughly 30% of teachers assigned to Sawa used this opportunity to escape, and teachers are usually well prepared and hardly ever caught (I6). Escaping from Sawa also makes it easier for one's family, as when one is asked about the whereabouts of a family member one can always say they are in Sawa, and often one avoids having to pay the 50,000 Eritrean nakfa (ERN) ‘fine’ that relatives of escapees usually have to pay. Another reason to volunteer for a few years’ service in Sawa is the fact that the school year is short, as part of the year is taken up by military training, thus one can enjoy long periods of time without work in Asmara each year (I6).
At the same time, students are being sent abroad again on scholarships for master's or PhD degrees, a programme that had all but stopped in the last decade. Main destinations are China, Dubai and South Africa, but it is also becoming possible again to arrange to study in a Western country or find a scholarship of one's own (I6, I14).4 This represents a considerable advance compared with 2006, and can almost be described as a return to the time before the 1998–2000 war with Ethiopia, in the aftermath of which the siege mentality took hold.
Taken together, at least among those in higher education opportunities exist to lead a ‘normal’ life and at least partly fulfil important aspirations, even if a majority might eventually join those who have decided to leave the country. In a conversation with one of my former students at the University of Asmara, the student told me how she recently watched the video of her graduation again ‘and all those with me there are not here now, I am the only one still in the country’ (I14). She has secured a fulfilling job, is married and has two children, and thus lives in many ways a satisfying life, according to her own judgement. Most of her former classmates who are now abroad – many of whom I know and am still in contact with – have left legally and after the completion of various national service demands that made them eligible to secure an exit visa.
It is those who fail the matriculation examination for whom this option of normality does not seem to exist. Only around a maximum of 20% of those who complete their final year of secondary schooling in Sawa actually pass the matriculation examination – roughly the same percentage as when the University of Asmara was still in existence. Apart from those 20%, plus another 3000 students (out of yearly cohorts of between 20,000 and 25,000) who can continue their education at one of the country's technical schools, all other Sawa recruits are assigned straight to the military within the confines of the WYDC (I6). It is predominately these people who try to flee the country, as the only future they can see is one of indefinite service, whether in military or civilian tasks.
This poses the question of what this rather large population of youth would do otherwise. While a percentage might return to their villages and work the land as suggested by some (see Hirt 2010), for many no viable economic alternatives exist. Government officials acknowledge that a major grievance of the country's youth is this lack of a future perspective combined with the low standard of living that the national service ‘wage’ – in reality no more than a small handout – condemns them to. Indeed, some ministries have increased payments for those on national service salaries, even though this new ‘wage’ is still inadequate to sustain a normal standard of living (I6, I15, I17).5 But there exists a widespread belief among government officials that the main reason behind discontent is ‘the economic situation’ (I17), and that this will be substantially improved from 2012 onwards, when the government expects considerable revenues from the now operational mine in Bisha, around 150 kilometres to the west of Asmara, where the Canadian firm Nevsun Resources began commercial gold production in February 2011, to be followed by high-grade copper and zinc (I17, I19, see also Connell 2011, and www.nevsun.com).6 There is an expectation that ‘then we can pay people adequate salaries and the situation will change’ (I17), an expectation that is in line with the more general observation made a few years after independence, that the ‘promise of development’ has to become the ‘legitimising strategy for the state’ (Makki 1996, p. 491).
Looking at the projected wealth from Bisha and the other mining project about to commence in its wake, a number of scenarios are possible. The Eritrean leadership may indeed use this new-found wealth to fulfil some of the promises of development, as it started to do in the first years of the post-independence decade, an agenda that in the official narrative was brought to a halt through the 1998–2000 war with Ethiopia. Or it can go the way of other African countries that experienced new mineral wealth and which subsequently saw mineral incomes disappear into often-corrupt government, party or military networks. The Eritrea of 2011 still shows similarities with the Eritrea of 1991, but it is also, in important ways, different. Among the similarities is a population that in spite of different levels of dissatisfaction still shows a considerable degree of loyalty towards the state consolidation project, if not the PFDJ that has monopolised state ownership. In addition, a substantial group of government officials have internalised the progressive ethos of what the EPLF originally set out to do and are genuinely committed to work for the good of the country (I13, I17, I19).
But there are also important differences. The style of political leadership focused on the figure of the ‘omnipotent president’, that has been described in detail elsewhere, has not only led to different centres of power within the military, the PFDJ and other organs of the state competing with and being played off against each other (see Connell 2011, Reid 2009). It has also allowed certain sectors of the population to take advantage of this political set-up and secure privileges that undermine the very ethos of a state consolidation project most visible in the WYDC to which everybody in theory is obliged to contribute their share (see examples in Hirt 2010).
More generally, it has resulted in making Eritrea a more unequal place, and a sharp increase in inequality can be observed at different levels. There are the inequalities between those who qualify for higher education and those who do not (discussed above). More visibly, there is a significant group of young people in the streets of Asmara, who are well heeled and spending money freely and in no apparent danger of being sent to Sawa. Their income derives from diaspora remittances and smuggling activities. In fact it is quite common when walking the streets of Asmara after dark to be approached with offers of various goods that are not easily available otherwise. Others are rumoured to be part of the networks that engage in facilitating escape to Sudan or Ethiopia, networks that are certain to include members of the Eritrean military (I6, I17, see also ICG 2010). This population group usually has some nominal national service obligations that can be combined with a normal urban lifestyle, often partly secured with some form of bribe. When I discussed this issue with a ministry official he said he had often wondered himself ‘where those young people get their resources from and how they can simply live like that’ (I17). Their existence is a visible sign of how certain shadowy networks dominated either by the PFDJ, the military, or a combination of both, demarcate spheres of political and social life.
In sharp contrast to this group, only a few streets from the main road in the poorer neighbourhoods of Asmara, people are too busy trying to survive in small trade, metal processing, repair workshops or other activities to have much interest in politics. When they are called up for national service it can also easily make the economic survival of their families precarious. And even those like my former student, who earns what is by Eritrean standards a decent salary, can only just make ends meet: ‘my children have never seen the sea as it is hard to afford to go to Massawa’, she says (I14).
In addition, there are also those who returned from the diaspora for at least part of the year and were enticed by a cash-strapped government to buy plots of land where they have built what are by local standards luxury houses on the fringes of Asmara and Massawa, and live quite removed from the worries of the majority of their compatriots (I23). In the past, the political leadership might have been trusted to spend the mineral wealth in a way that ameliorates these inequalities and benefits the wider population, but in the present it is this leadership, and the PFDJ in particular, that is behind the dynamics that created many of them. It thus remains open to question whether PFDJ trusteeship of mineral exploitation is going to result in inclusive development (I22). Much will depend on whether and how some of the openings and intangible and/or visible transformations described above will actually lead to a wider recognition of past mistakes by the government and party leadership, and a change of course in order to rectify them. Equally important is how future relations develop with the outside world, where in official rhetoric Eritrea is increasingly seen as a pariah for supporting movements like al-Shabaab in Somalia, and which has resulted in sanctions by the United Nations Security Council in 2009 and a reinforcement of the sanctions on 5 December 2011. The risk that the new mineral wealth might give Eritrea the means to pursue an even more aggressive foreign policy is one of the concerns expressed in the Security Council document, even though concrete sanctions on mineral exports have not been imposed.7 More generally, as will be discussed in the following section, Eritrea's relationship with the outside world is more complex than is suggested by this stance of parts of the international community.
Eritrea and the outside world
Eritrea's relationship with the outside world can be interpreted from two different perspectives. On the one hand there is the reading of Eritrea as an aggressor towards its neighbours, while at the same time being stubborn and uncompromising towards Western powers. What such a reading neglects is not only the historic reality that Eritrea has been ‘betrayed’ too often by outside powers, as argued convincingly in Wrong's (2005) book on the subject, combined with the fact that Eritrean foreign policy is a reflection of the region's century-old violent political environment characterised by mutual interference and proxy wars (Cliffe 1999, ICG 2010). In addition, much of Eritrea's politics of destabilisation in the region has its very concrete origins in the 1998–2000 war with Ethiopia and the dynamics of its aftermath, not least Ethiopia's refusal to abide by the verdict of the boundary commission, which has not provoked any negative response from the outside world.8 More generally, there is ample evidence that Ethiopia is regarded as an important ally in the war on terror by the Western powers in particular and the international community more generally, leaving Eritrea little room to get a fair hearing of its grievances on the international stage. As one informant said to me when discussing these issues, ‘it does not matter what we do, whether we are friendly or close the door into their faces, the West will always side with Ethiopia, so we need to look after ourselves’ (I17).
In spite of these dynamics, Eritrean foreign policy has a pragmatic component that has led to Eritrea actively trying to break its international isolation. Attempts have been made at behind-the-scenes rapprochement with the United States, thus far largely futile as both sides have shown little willingness to engage properly (I19). Talks have until recently been more constructive with delegations from the European Union (EU), and have resulted in a number of new EU-financed development initiatives. Things were ‘dormant for many years, [but] since about a year a lot of movement has happened’ (I19, I20, I21). Those initiatives were put on hold when the Eritrean government decided in November 2011 to terminate all ongoing programmes with the EU. Renewed engagement is only expected after a thorough internal review of the country's future National Development Plan.
These developments are, on the face of it, closely associated with the closure of a number of Western non-governmental organisations (NGOs) that were still in the country at the end of 2011. This followed a government directive that the UN and other aid organisations should in the future only engage in the three sectors relating to water, sanitation and health, and all other development arenas would be covered by the government (I17). Foreign NGOs were thus called for a meeting, thanked for their work and told to either reapply to operate in the country in those three sectors or leave. Connell (2011) in his recent article relates those restrictions to the expected mineral wealth and a government agenda that wishes little external oversight on how this income will be spent. This seems a rather ahistoric reading of the dynamics. When newly independent Eritrea took a similar stance towards foreign NGOs and the wider aid industry in the early 1990s it was congratulated within foreign aid circles for setting its own agenda and insisting on pursuing its own priorities. Even organisations such as the World Bank were full of praise (Fengler 2001). It remains to be seen if development activities in Eritrea will suffer from this new government policy, whether they will be financed by mineral revenues in the future, or whether organisations from other countries such as China will gain a more prominent role.
The recent restrictions on the work of certain foreign NGOs should also not distract from the fact that Eritrea is making an effort to present itself as a hospitable country that welcomes engagement with the outside world. Asmara is full of new hand-painted posters that describe life throughout the country in cheerful celebration or propaganda, depending on one's point of view. Eritrea successfully hosted the African Continental Cycling Championship in November 2011 at relatively short notice after Côte d'Ivoire withdrew for political reasons. The Eritrean national football team started to participate in the African Cup of Nations qualifying matches again – all away matches had been suspended after the whole team asked for political asylum in Kenya in 2009 and moved to Australia. I had a chance to meet the very young new team before they were due to travel to a qualifying match in Rwanda (which they lost). The whole team returned to Eritrea this time – which of course does not guarantee they will do so in the future.
Finally, Eritrea is often mentioned together with North Korea as a closed enclave whose people live in perpetual ignorance. But this is far from the truth. Even in poor neighbourhoods of Asmara satellite dishes are widespread and broadcast news from all over the world into Eritrean households. The government might first have ignored the Arab spring and then presented it as being driven by foreign NGOs and other interference (I18). But al-Jazeera beamed pictures and news of the Arab spring into many households and people are very aware of the associated political upheavals (I13, I14, I15, I17). Whether the Arab spring is a future many Eritreans aspire to is a different matter and open to question.
What for the future?
It would certainly be foolish to make any predictions about the future of Eritrea based on these limited observations. My objective here was mainly to provide insights into everyday life practices in Eritrea based on in-country fieldwork and with this offer a more hybrid reading of developments in Eritrea than is usually the case – a reading that does not predominately focus on the current government's human rights abuses documented in detail elsewhere (see for example Human Rights Watch 2009), nor on the equally widely analysed dynamics of structural violence, but on the more complex reality of shifting allegiances and tentative transformations on the ground seen through the eyes of some of those living through them. In doing so I also raise questions about Connell's (2011, p. 425) dictum that in Eritrea the calm on the surface belies ‘the country's structural fragility’. The state I found is stronger than appears at first sight, a point I have made in detail elsewhere (Müller 2012). In addition, what Reid (2009, p. 219) wrote in 2009, that the ‘overriding popular desire is for relative peace and some form of economic development’ still holds largely true for the people I met on my trip to Eritrea, those mentioned in detail here and others I spoke to in informal daily encounters. Prospects for the latter have improved with unexpectedly good late rainfall and a subsequently good harvest in 2011 (Food and Agriculture Organisation [FAO] 2012), as well as the potential windfall from mining revenues.9 At the same time, in various ways openings have occurred in the sphere of everyday lives. Those in higher education are allowed more freedom and have the prospect of postgraduate study again. Service obligations have been loosened, in particular for women, round-ups are less frequent, and more people are said to be able to obtain exit visas (I14, I19). Whether those are temporary developments or part of a broader strategy that may result in demobilisation and limited service requirements as in the pre-1998 years – a strategy that has become possible in the eyes of the leadership due to expected mineral revenues – remains to be seen. In addition, many of those who have fled abroad have realised that the life they aspired to is much harder to achieve than envisaged. From my research among Eritreans in Tel Aviv and an informant's perception among Eritrean refugees in Switzerland it can be hypothesised that many of those who fled would return given a fair chance to do so (I22). An amnesty for those who have fled the country would go a long way here, combined with assurances that returnees could pursue paid labour instead of unpaid service. For the time being, those who left Eritrea illegally and need consular services abroad are forced not only to pay a lump sum of back-dated diaspora tax at 2%,10 but also have to sign a ‘confession’ that they have betrayed the country with their leaving and would accept any government punishment should they ever return.
The contentious issue for many of those who flee is not a rejection of government demands per se, but of demands that have become too inhibiting and leave no room for any form of life perceived as desirable (Hirt 2010). This general state of affairs is summarised well in the following joke that does the rounds in Asmara:
A group of people tries to escape from Eritrea and is caught at the border by soldiers. The soldiers ask them, ‘Why do you want to leave?’ They answer, ‘We have been giving one hundred percent to this country and this has not been recognised, those already outside the country just give two per cent and this is being recognised, they can come and go, they can buy houses, they can do everything – so we want to join those who give only two percent’.
The day I left Eritrea happened to be 20 October 2011, the day Muammar Qaddafi was killed. I heard the news during a telephone call with a friend who is based outside Asmara. ‘You know’, he said. ‘Gaddafi should have gone when he was still popular and not waited too long, as most autocratic leaders do’. This seems in many ways the real lesson from Eritrea, a lesson that equally applies to many revolutionary movements of the past. Those who have the skills to mastermind a successful revolutionary struggle rarely, if ever, have the skills to be successful leaders in peacetime. At the same time they are loath to step down and let others take ‘their’ revolution forward. It is indeed hard to image Issayas Afewerki going any time soon out of his own conviction. But while recent interpretations of the Eritrean polity are fixated on how present politics are simply a continuation of the way Issayas led the EPLF during the liberation struggle, implying that he has always been a rather ruthless dictator (Kibreab 2009), such an analysis ignores the fact that it was precisely those characteristics that ultimately made that struggle successful. Whether Eritrea can avoid divisions and power struggles once Issayas has left the stage in whatever way is hard to predict at this point. The fact remains that Eritrea has no tradition of democratic politics, nor do other countries in the region. It thus should come as no surprise that the Eritrean people seem to have no stomach for something along the lines of the Arab spring. Those spoken to in the course of this research quite realistically have become suspicious of grand political projects, be they wrapped in the language of democracy or otherwise, but focus instead on the microcosms of potentially intangible transformations from within.
Note on contributor
Tanja R. Müller is a senior lecturer in international development at the School of Environment and Development at the University of Manchester. She became a founding member of the Humanitarian and Conflict Response Institute (HCRI) at the University of Manchester in 2009 and is currently director of research at HCRI. She has written on African politics in general and Eritrea in particular since the 1990s.