This article takes the Ethiopian case as a lens on how the existence of the League refracted approaches to statehood and belonging for polities on the margins of the “family of nations.” Unlike many other doctrinal or historical treatments, this article does not focus on any one juridical concept or doctrine, such as sovereignty, statehood, or recognition. Rather, it traces the flux within concepts, and the uneasy relation between them, which come to light when public statements in the League are read alongside deliberations within European foreign ministries, and projects of reform pursued in Ethiopia itself. Refocusing on the complexity of contemporary discussions reveals how juridical approaches have shifted over time in their relation to concrete factors such as military force, bureaucratic organization and political structures, and bridges a distinction entrenched by disciplinary demarcations in the secondary literature on statehood and state-making.