Agricultural Corvée Labor in Ethiopia in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries.

As in Europe, Asia and the rest of Africa, corvée labor was used in Ethiopia for a host of activities ranging from farming to road construction and military conscription. Where it differed from the European case is in the relative absence of serfdom. Unlike some parts of Asia and much of Africa, the colonial factor was practically non-existent. The most enduring form of corvée labor in Ethiopia has been in the agricultural sphere. It was performed predominantly by the land-owning peasant (gabbar) and subsequently by the tenant on a category of land known as hudad. The land belonged either to the state or its representatives. The labour involved was not only farming but also transporting the grain to the lord's residence and performing sundry other duties as well. The exactions inherent in the system generated active and passive resistance by the peasantry and a sustained campaign against it by the reformist intellectuals of the early twentieth century. Partly as a result of this campaign, the progressive prince Ras Tafari (the future Emperor Haile Sellassie) promulgated a decree banning corvée labor in 1928. Although this was followed by a series of decrees reinforcing the ban, the practice persisted, especially among tenants. Ultimately, the entire edifice of landlordism in Ethiopia was swept away by the nationalization of rural land in March 1975. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]