Upending the Hydropolitics of the Nile: From Cooperation to Unilateralism

This chapter examines the Ethiopian Peoples’ Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) Government’s efforts to challenge Egypt’s so-called ‘hydro-hegemony’ in the Nile Basin, first through cooperation and second through unilateralism. Given Egypt’s dominance, the EPRDF initially sought a collaborative approach through participation with Egypt, Sudan, and other Nile riparians in the Nile Basin Initiative (NBI). However, the NBI process ultimately collapsed with an inability to align river basin planning with the balance of political power in the basin. Unlike under past regimes, however, Ethiopia by 2011 had greatly strengthened its own economic position, as well as its capacity to build and finance major dam projects. The result was that the government was able to unilaterally launch the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD). This experience shows that Egypt was only a partial fit for the hydro-hegemony label. Egypt’s dominance of the Nile Basin was reliant on Ethiopia’s continued internal political fragmentation and was therefore vulnerable.