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There is a common perception that Ethiopia is unusual in Africa in having a relatively uniform system of state land ownership. While highly influential, state ownership is not the only body of law with implications for land administration. This article argues that the institutionalization of ethnic federalism and the persistence of neo-customary tenure result in considerable ambiguity, particularly regarding the land rights of nonindigenous minorities. The analysis highlights tensions between these three sets of land tenure institutions—state ownership, ethnic federalism and neo-customary tenure—and their implications for minority land rights. A case study of land-based conflict in Oromiya region, based on fieldwork conducted in 2009 and 2010, demonstrates the continuing relevance of these land tenure institutions and associated ideas in land debates in Ethiopia, both in terms of the use of these ideas by protagonists as means of justifying land claims, and the ambiguous state response to the conflict, which goes well beyond the provisions of the land policy. As such, while there are certainly particular characteristics of the Ethiopian case, many of the key issues regarding ethnicity and land mirror debates taking place across the continent. RESEARCH HAS REPEATEDLY HIGHLIGHTED THE ‘multiple and overlapping’ nature of land tenure in sub-Saharan Africa. This institutional plurality results from the claims of colonial and post-colonial authorities to ultimate ownership *Tom Lavers (tom.lavers@manchester.ac.uk) is a Lecturer in Politics and Development at the Global Development Institute (GDI), University of Manchester. This article is based on fieldwork conducted as part of a PhD at the University of Bath, funded by the UK’s Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) while affiliated to the Department of Political Science and International Relations at Addis Ababa University. I am very grateful to these organizations for their support and for comments received from three anonymous reviewers, the editors of African Affairs, Catherine Dom, Cathy Boone, and participants at the African Studies Association (UK) Annual Conference and the Land Politics reading group at the London School of Economics. Fieldwork greatly benefitted from research assistance by Tolosa Mamuye and Amsalu Darge.

Responding to land-based conflict in Ethiopia: The land rights of ethnic minorities under federalism