Thinking Politically About Money: The Changing Role of Political Finance in The Political (Un-)Settlements in Ethiopia and Sudan

This paper examines the relationship between ‘political finance’ and ‘political settlements’ in Sudan and Ethiopia. The countries are rarely compared, partially because governments in Addis Ababa and Khartoum pursued very different political and economic policies after the 1990s, such that Ethiopia was treated as a model developmental state, while Sudan faced recurrent political and economic crises. This paper argues that political finance – understood as discretionary cash available to a politician– has been a key determinant of the nature of political settlements in both countries, at all times mediated by violence or coercion. In turn, the nature of the political settlement has played a major role in shaping patterns of economic growth and development in these countries. Where political leaders have been able to exert control over and centralise the sources of political finance, so as to harness state power to achieve developmental goals, sustained economic growth has been the result.