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What is the Alternative? Youth, Entrepreneurship and the Developmental State in Urban Ethiopia

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  • Marco Nunzio

Abstract

type="main"> This article investigates the implementation of small-scale entrepreneurship programmes in inner-city Addis Ababa. Drawing on eighteen months of ethnographic fieldwork, it discusses the failure of these programmes to open up opportunities for social improvement for young people. It also analyses how young people confronted with this failure suggest ways of conceptualizing ‘alternatives’ to established development concepts of poverty reduction, such as microfinance and small-scale entrepreneurship. In doing this, the author does not pretend either to offer a grand solution or to invent a brand new developmental concept. Rather, the aim is to provide a critical commentary on the reasons why some of the current academic debate on alternatives to neoliberalism have, de facto, amounted to an endorsement Ethiopia's political authoritarianism.

Suggested Citation

  • Marco Nunzio, 2015. "What is the Alternative? Youth, Entrepreneurship and the Developmental State in Urban Ethiopia," Development and Change, International Institute of Social Studies, vol. 46(5), pages 1179-1200, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:devchg:v:46:y:2015:i:5:p:1179-1200
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    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1111/dech.12187
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. repec:fth:oxesaf:98-9 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Pramila Krishnan & Tesfaye Gebre Selassie & Stefan Dercon, 1998. "The urban labour market during structural adjustment: Ethiopia 1990-1997," CSAE Working Paper Series 1998-09, Centre for the Study of African Economies, University of Oxford.
    3. Lovise Aalen & Kjetil Tronvoll, 2009. "The End of Democracy? Curtailing Political and Civil Rights in Ethiopia," Review of African Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 36(120), pages 193-207, June.
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    Cited by:

    1. Muñoz, Pablo & Kimmitt, Jonathan, 2018. "Entrepreneurship and the rest: The missing debate," Journal of Business Venturing Insights, Elsevier, vol. 9(C), pages 100-106.
    2. Kelecha, Mebratu, 2022. "A critique of building a developmental state in the EPRDF's Ethiopia," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 124870, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    3. Laura Camfield & Jen Leavy & Senait Endale & Tilahun Tefera, 2020. "People Who Once Had 40 Cattle Are Left Only with Fences: Coping with Persistent Drought in Awash, Ethiopia," The European Journal of Development Research, Palgrave Macmillan;European Association of Development Research and Training Institutes (EADI), vol. 32(4), pages 889-905, September.
    4. repec:ehl:lserod:115567 is not listed on IDEAS
    5. Ashenafi Biru & Pia Arenius & Garry Bruton & David Gilbert, 2024. "Firm Formalization Strategy : The Interaction of Entrepreneurs and Government Officials in the Enforcement of Regulation," Post-Print hal-04493248, HAL.

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