Atlas / Organisations / The Derg
The Derg
Mengistu, Ethiopia · 1974–1991 · Ethiopia · Marxist-Leninist Military · Held state power · coding confidence medium
Each axis runs from −10 to +10, with zero a genuine mixed or balanced position rather than an absence of opinion. A score describes a stated position and a governing record; it is not a judgement of merit. What each score means →
Core principles
A military committee that overthrew an emperor, declared Marxism-Leninism and conducted a campaign of mass killing against its own left.
Economic model
All rural land nationalised in 1975, forced collectivisation and villagisation, famine used as an instrument during the 1984–85 crisis.
Organisation of powers
No constitution for thirteen years, no legal opposition, executions of committee members by other committee members.
Reading note
The Red Terror of 1977–78 killed tens of thousands of urban leftists. A regime that was radical on every axis and is rarely cited on any of them.
Check a claim about The Derg. The interactive atlas measures the distance between any two organisations across all six axes and shows which ones carry the disagreement.
Open in the atlasThe evidence for every score
All six cells are sourced. A rationale explains what the score is measuring and each artefact is something a third party can check without taking anyone's word for it.
EC · Economic organisation · scored −10
At the floor: all rural land nationalised and collectivisation forced.
- Documented act or statuteThe 1975 proclamation nationalised all rural land without compensation.
CU · Social and cultural order · scored +03
Coded +3: a literacy campaign alongside a militarised social order.
- Documented act or statuteThe national literacy campaign of 1979 was internationally recognised while the Red Terror was under way.
AU · Organisation of power · scored +10
At the ceiling: no constitution for thirteen years and committee members executed by the committee.
- Documented act or statuteAround sixty officials of the previous government were executed without trial in November 1974.
SC · Scale of decision · scored +09
Coded +9: centralised planning with forced villagisation.
- Documented act or statuteAround 600,000 people were resettled from the north between 1984 and 1986.
ID · Rule of membership · scored +06
Coded +6: Amhara-centred centralisation against Eritrean and Tigrayan movements.
- Documented act or statuteEritrean autonomy was denied and the war continued for the regime's whole duration.
CH · Method and tempo · scored +09
Coded +9: the Red Terror as declared policy.
- Documented act or statuteTens of thousands of urban leftists were killed in 1977–78; families were charged for the bullets.
Where it came from, and what came after
- takes its doctrine fromClassical Marxism
The military committee declared Marxism-Leninism in 1974 and allied with Moscow.
Nearest organisations by measured distance
Straight-line separation across all six axes, out of a maximum of 49.0. Proximity means similarity of stated position, not endorsement and not resemblance in outcome.
Countries
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Scores are revised on evidence, so a citation should carry the version it refers to. Version 4.3.1 is current; the revision log records every change.
Free to quote and reproduce with attribution. This is a synthesis rather than a peer-reviewed dataset — where an authoritative figure is needed, cite the Chapel Hill Expert Survey, the Manifesto Project or V-Dem.