The international community has recently been discussing the problem of “Conflict Diamonds”: diamonds that fuel the various conflicts in Africa. The problem was discussed on many occasions throughout the year in 2000, and finally a resolution calling upon all member states to deal with this problem was adopted at the United Nation General Assembly at the end of the year. The driving forces behind this resolution has been several interrelated factors: international awareness raised by UN and by reports and campains by other influential NGOs; the strength of interest of the British government in resolving the conflict in Sierra Leone; the concern of diamond producing countries and the diamond industry as a whole about the impact of the NGO-led anti- “Conflict Diamonds” movement; and a change in business strategy of De Beers, which is the most important diamond producing company.
Although the tragedies caused by the “Conflict Diamonds” have been reported in detail, some important points have not been addressed: although Sierra Leone and Angola have received a great deal of attention, the issues in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where the relationship among protagonists is more complicated, have not been sufficiently discussed; and the attitude of legitimate African governments in regard to using diamonds for the procurement of arms and to pay private military companies, may also cause serious problems from the “governance” point of view. In particular, the last point has received little attention at any international level and it is important to address this issue since the problem of the “Conflict Diamonds” is deeply linked with that of the management and development of public resources in weak African states.

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The concept of wildlife conservation, which originated in the developed countries in the North, has prevailed in the various conservation agencies' in Africa. However, the perceptions and experiences of local people in regard to the conservation of natural resources have been mostly neglected. As a result, the establishment of wildlife conservation areas has fueled the conflicts between local people and conservation agencies. Consequently, many conservation projects have failed.
In the 1980s, conservation agencies, began to place importance on the involvement of local people in conservation activities. At the same time the indigenous systems maintained in local societies started to be studied in regard to their social, cultural and ecological perspectives. However, to date only a few studies have been published focusing on the relationship between local people and conservation areas.
The aim of this study was to investigate the historical relationships between the livelihood of Oromo people and the conservation policies of Ethiopian governments, using the Senkelle Swayne's Hartebeest Sanctuary as an example. The author also investigated conservation-oriented activities of local people and their indigenous systems for the management of land and natural resources.
The establishment of the conservation area in 1976 has resulted in restricted access for local people to ancestral land and natural resources. The establishment of both the sanctuary and a state farm had a marked impact on their livelihood during the socialist regime (1974-1991). In reaction to this, local people have resisted certain policies, and have coped with the changing situations using different strategies to maintain their natural resources.
As a basic premise of conservation, it is vital that conservationists understand the structures and customs of local people from a variety of perspective. Moreover, in Ethiopia, comprehensive field studies on natural resource utilization by local people are needed to incorporate their indigenous systems of resource utilization into conservation activities and in order to not alienate the support for conservation activities.

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