Founded in Memory of the ‘Good Old Times’: The Clan Assembly of Hiddii, in Eastern Shewa, Ethiopia

Dealing with questions of the transmittance and transformation of social institutions and organisational patterns throughout history, this article describes an Ethiopian clan assembly which was founded in 1992 in eastern Shewa by members of the Oromo ethnic group, in response to ongoing changes in the ethno-political arena that went along with previous government changes in Ethiopia. The notion of ‘nostalgia’ is introduced as an analytical tool to explain the foundation and growth of this institution. Nostalgia, in this context, is understood as a non-derogative, dynamic concept, and recognised as a powerful motivating force for social action with at times direct effects on social structure. The article shows that, although the official designation of the assembly was to re-install old, traditional patterns of Oromo social organisation and to establish a counter-force to Amhara dominance in the region, the Oromo clan assembly relied to a significant degree on organisational patterns and ‘know-how’ deriving from modern-day contexts and spheres of interaction with the Amhara, such as jointly-run burial associations, NGO capital-raising, and market-oriented projects. The question about the relationship between a possible recognition of ‘tradition’, or continuity on the one hand, and innovation, or ‘invented tradition’ on the other, is thus raised.