After thirty years of war, Eritrean exiles returned home after liberation in 1991 and independence in 1993. How did the post-war government set about the monumental task of reviving a population and an economy destroyed by conflict? A recent study by the University of Oxford, poses two key questions. How are returnees integrating into the fabric of the newly independent Eritrea? What is the effect of government initiatives to transform deep-rooted traditions and practices? Have reintegration programmes been sufficiently participatory to prevent tension between the local population and returnees? The research further questions the description of these programmes as ‘reintegratory’: do they not prevent returnees - with their differing experiences, expectations and needs - from taking part in negotiated debate?

The government has focused on the creation of a single nation out of the disparate groups of people inside and outside its borders. Examining the activities of Eritreans returning to their homeland, the report focuses particularly on issues of land use and gender equity in several towns that hosted the official ‘re-integration’ programmes. It also assesses the lives of Eritreans who had returned on their own initiative, as well as those of internally displaced persons and local residents.

Eritrea, it is clear, remains a patriarchal society, within which women struggle to achieve equality with men. Further key research findings include:

• Emphasis on nation building, by radically and permanently altering long-held concepts of kinship, land and locality, has repercussions for issues such as integration and women’s rights.
• Efforts to steer agriculture away from pastoralism to settled commercial farming, and eventual privatisation, will restrict the livelihood of many Eritreans.
• Legal instruments and policy mechanisms exist concerning women’s rights, yet both are ineffective.
• Access for women to education, health care, land and other services is limited by a lack of supply and by male dominance.

The research suggests that the nation-building programme may not be the best way forward for sustainable development and integration. A process that grows out of existing traditions and through recognition of disparate voices is more likely to have a greater chance of success. Further policy-relevant suggestions include:

• Ensuring that development of women's rights proceeds in tandem with negotiation between returnees and the local population - especially crucial when plans to alter traditional practices are also taking place.
• Incorporating greater flexibility in the implementation of policy.
• Giving wider publicity to changes in gender laws to allow the situation for women to change.

Source(s):
'Post-return Re-Integration in Eritrea', ESCOR Research Report (6836) by Janet Gruber (1999)

Funded by: UK Department for International Development (ESCOR), 1997-1998)

id21 Research Highlight: 31 October 2000

Further Information:
Janet Gruber
Wolfson College
University of Oxford
Oxford OX2 6UD
UK

Tel: 00 291 1 12 58 77 (Eritrea)
Contact the contributor: janetgvonk@hotmail.com; asmara.janet@virgin.net

Wolfson College

Other related links:
Search Eldis for sources on conflict and re-building