Begun more than a decade ago while their author taught at the Ethiopian National University, this study examines the development of the institutions of higher education and the roles they played in transforming traditional Ethiopian society. Wagaw sets out to prove that, although other modernizing institutions of learning may contribute significantly to social and economic change, institutions of higher education and their students already have effected profound revolution and proven indispensable to the established order. His study argues that Ethiopian institutions of higher education were germane to the emerging society. They led Ethiopia down an often unpeaceful path from its oppressively traditional past toward progress and enlightenment.