SADC and the GCC: Shared regional challenges and potential links

This article assesses the prospects for a clearly articulated economic diplomacy approach in South Africa's foreign policy. It argues that while South Africa's foreign policy has been to a considerable extent normatively grounded, it has failed to develop a coherent economic diplomacy that is based on focused and distinctly expressed priorities. This is a crucial gap that limits the country's ability to respond to regional and global changes, in particular those posed by emerging powers. The article identifies a number of gaps in South Africa's foreign policy approach and highlights its oblivion to global developments and geopolitical dynamics in the African continent. It sets out possible policy outlines for developing a clearer and stronger economic diplomacy. The building blocks for such an approach include the identification of strategic foreign policy priorities; greater institutional co-operation among agencies dealing with economic and foreign policy development; synergies between corporate strategies and government's foreign policy objectives; and the need for South Africa to develop a stronger leadership ambition in the African continent, both to contribute to Africa's development and to pursue its own economic interests. This ambition will require awareness of South Africa's own limitations, thus focusing the better part of its foreign policy on a limited set of countries that match strategic priorities.     

South Africa's financial and economic prospects for the next five years

South African dominance of trade in Africa as well as its position as a regional hegemon was entrenched by the Trade, Development and Cooperation Agreement (TDCA) with the European Union in 1999. South Africa's full-blown integration into the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) formation since 2011 has brought new dynamics, however, as South Africa now has a marked BRICS orientation. Although the European Union (EU) as a bloc is still South Africa's largest trading partner, China has become South Africa's largest single-country trading partner. The question arises as to whether this new found loyalty makes sense in terms of South Africa's regional position and its trade prospects. Against the background of more intra-industry trade with the EU and the new and growing inter-industry trade with the other BRICS economies, South Africa's trade share of African trade has been in relative decline. This study uses an international political economy framework to analyse South African trade hegemony based on the TDCA and the possible effects of a shift towards BRICS. The conclusion is that, although the shift towards BRICS can politically be justified, economically it should not be at the expense of the benefits of the more advantageous relationship with the EU.     

The African renaissance and the Caribbean

In May 2010 South African President Jacob Zuma will have been in office for one year. During this time, the Zuma administration has been far less ambitious in its foreign policy than previous administrations. However, South Africa is not in a position where it is able to withdraw from foreign engagement, as regional issues — such as Zimbabwe, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Swaziland — continue to demand attention. The Zuma administration's approach in the future, in terms of both substance and style, will need to be informed by lessons from past engagement, including South African peacekeeping efforts in countries such as the DRC and Burundi, and South African mediation efforts in countries such as Angola, Côte d'Ivoire and the Comoros. Certainly, South Africa's record of success in taking on international responsibilities over the past 10 years has been mixed, but there is scope for past experience to shape future engagement positively. Indications of this can be seen, for example, in Zuma's efforts to redress former President Thabo Mbeki's clumsy mediation efforts in Angola by deciding to make his first state visit as South Africa's president to Luanda. Zuma's approach to Zimbabwe could build on the foundation set by Mbeki's long engagement with that country.     

Norm dynamics and international organisations: South Africa in the African Union and International Criminal Court

Over the past two decades, South Africa has sought to perform several roles on the world stage, such as the economic dynamo of Southern Africa, a diplomatic heavyweight representing the African continent, and a norm leader on the world stage as a so-called ‘middle-power’. Although South Africa's evolution and rise as an important player in global affairs has generated a welcome body of critical scholarly literature, comparatively little analysis has been allocated to understanding how norm dynamics and the country's ever-evolving international identities have enabled it to construct and reconstruct its ‘interests’. Social constructivism is best suited for such an analysis because it can operationalise norms, commitments, identities, and interests, and it provides the epistemological tools to map the increasingly multilateral connections between global, regional, and domestic forums. By employing a rationalist approach to constructivism, this paper remedies the aforementioned gap in the literature by illustrating how South Africa constructs and reconstructs its identities and interests in relation to membership in international organisations (IOs). To that end, the paper examines the evolution of South Africa's participation in the African Union (especially ‘peacekeeping’ contributions) and the International Criminal Court. The paper concludes by assessing the theoretical implications and practical ramifications of the norm dynamics involved in South Africa's commitment to these two IOs.     

The establishment of the South African Development Partnership Agency: Institutional complexities and political exigencies

Since 2007 there has been discussion to formalise, rationalise, coordinate and provide structure to South Africa's development cooperation through the establishment of a centralised South African Development Partnership Agency (SADPA). Progress in rolling out the new institution, however, has been extremely slow, owing to the political and technical complexities of South Africa's institutional environment. This paper elaborates on the rationale and driving forces which have led to the establishment of SADPA and the steps which have been taken to gradually operationalise the new agency and the partnership fund dedicated to providing development support on the continent. As plans move forward, will SADPA be expected to manage all of South Africa's development cooperation — bilateral, multilateral, regional, trilateral — as well as concessional loans, humanitarian aid and development financing, public and private? Clarity of roles and coordination is critical. The paper will examine the different mechanisms for the financing, implementation and oversight that need to be in place to take forward Pretoria's development cooperation, and the challenges of leadership, coordination, accountability and information management that face the new agency.     

The debate over south Africa's foreign policy

South Africa is no exception to the rule that there tends to be continuity in a state's foreign policy even in the event of far‐reaching domestic political change. But given the new South Africa's debt to a global human rights campaign, the emphasis on ‘staking out the moral high ground’ in the rhetoric of the country's new decision‐makers and of commentators is not surprising. The article discusses the creative tension between the claims of morality and the constraints of realpolitik in the debate on the formulation of the new South Africa's foreign policy. It identifies both differences and overlaps in the approaches of realists and radicals to the conduct of the country's foreign policy.     

South African foreign policy and China: converging visions,competing interests,contested identities

South Africa's burgeoning relationship with China exposes the increasing complexities of its post-apartheid international relations. On one hand bilateral relations have deepened since 1998, due to the increasing complementarities with South Africa's foreign policy priorities that emphasise developmental pragmatism and a Southward orientation within the broader African context. On the other hand this relationship emphasises the deeper schisms within South African society itself, where divergent and multi-layered perspectives on South Africa's post-apartheid identity and relationship with China, the country's largest trading partner, remains unresolved. This article maps out the nature of China–South Africa relations through a thematic approach. This allows for nuanced consideration of South Africa's contemporary foreign policy, one that remains compressed between a combination of external and domestic factors.     

An African response to the new wave of afro‐pessimism

The Afro‐pessimism that has resurfaced in parts of the world has no foundation and has provoked strong objections on several grounds. First, the timing is inappropriate as a number of new development indicators suggest that a good basis is now being laid in Africa for a better future economic performance. Secondly, there is an upsurge of Afro‐optimism among African and world leaders with the advent of the New Partnership for Africa's Development (Nepad). But more fundamentally, the growth concept which forms the basis for bleak projections on Africa's ability to reduce poverty, is flawed and the presumed strong growth‐poverty correlation empirically discredited. Additionally, it is a fallacy to assume that the reforms of the past 20 years were consistent with the continent's long‐term development trajectories given that the continent was unresponsive, remaining poor and ‘structurally undevelopable’.

On the contrary, these reforms have been pronounced by a World Bank assessment team as being defective in objectives and design, operationally dysfunctional and an example of massive resource misallocation, all of which have collectively worsened Africa's poverty and income disparity conditions. Particularly ironic is the concept of ‘structural stability’ prescribed in the ‘Memorandum for a New Start for German African Policy’, as it falls short of engaging fully and comprehensively the broader spectrum of structural distortions, weaknesses and rigidities, including the lack of economic structural transformation which is critical for achieving sustained economic growth and significant poverty reduction. The international community will now have to look at channelling resources to reshape, support and refine Africa's own initiative — Nepad.     

NEPAD and good governance

This paper is an analysis of South Africa's public service improvement strategies since 1994. It first describes the historical factors that underpinned South Africa's service delivery initiatives before 1994. It is argued that the pre-1994 public service sector was racialised and highly politicised, as opposed to being people-centred and service delivery oriented. The transition to democracy in 1994 necessitated a complete revision of South Africa's public administrative system in order to meet the developmental challenges of service delivery needs. However, this transition also coincided with global reform initiatives that were taking place in the public sector, as informed by the new public management (NPM) paradigm with its emphasis on cost effectiveness, accountability and transparency. The primary argument of the paper is that commendable legislative reforms have been enacted in South Africa's public administration system in the post-1994 period, based on the NPM, but the fragility of the state bureaucracy as manifested in the silo approach characterising the South African government operations, as well as capacity limitations, encumbers the success of these reforms. The Community Development Worker (CDW) programme, operating in South Africa's Eastern and Western Cape Provinces, is used as a case study to illustrate this argument. A brief look at India's experience of the NPM also informs the discussion. The significance of the case study lies in the fact that it was conceived in the interest of increased responsiveness and accessibility to government services, a vital pillar of the NPM framework.     

Documents

South Africa's contemporary foreign policy cannot be understood outside an explanation of its post-apartheid political transition. Its actors, the ideas they express, the interests they represent and the institutions they craft are all crucially influenced and impacted upon by the democratic transition and how it has evolved. This democratic transition is defined by two foundational characteristics. First, as one of the last of the ‘anti-colonial’ transitions led by an African nationalist leadership, it is driven with a focus on achieving racial equality in both the domestic and global context. Second, the transition has occurred when a particular configuration of power prevailed in the global order that not only established the parameters which governed its evolution, but also determined which interests prevailed within it. The former's imprint on the foreign policy agenda is manifested in South Africa's prioritisation of Africa, its almost messianic zeal to modernise the continent through a focus on political stability and economic growth, and its desire to reform the global order so as to create an enabling environment for African development. It is also reflected in South Africa's insistence not to be seen to be dictated to by the West, especially in the fashioning of its economic policies and its approach to addressing the Zimbabwean question. The latter manifests itself not only in how corporate interests take centre stage in South Africa's foreign policy interactions, but also in how transnational alliances like India–Brazil–South Africa (IBSA) are being fashioned to challenge big powers and their interests in global forums and in the international system. These thematic concerns are the subject of investigation in this paper.     

Nuclear diplomacy as niche diplomacy: South Africa's post-apartheid relations with the International Atomic Energy Agency

Since the termination of its nuclear weapons programme, commenced in 1989 and verified by the International Atomic Energy Agency's (IAEA) in 1993, successive South African governments have consistently advocated the country's commitment to nuclear non-proliferation. South Africa has secured a niche role through norm construction and state identity for itself through its nuclear diplomacy with the IAEA. The article explores aspects of South Africa's nuclear diplomacy with the IAEA as an example of niche diplomacy. Therefore, it traces South Africa's diplomatic relations with the IAEA, starting with the IAEA's verification process and the implementation of a Safeguards Agreement (1989–1994) through the conversion of South Africa's research nuclear reactor (1991–2005); South Africa's position on greater representation for developing countries on the IAEA's Board of Governors; its ambition to be elected to the position of IAEA Director General (2008–2009); and its refusal to support the establishment of a nuclear fuel bank in Russia under the IAEA's auspices (2009–2010).     

Short term interests,long term perspectives: Balancing South Africa's peace and security approach in the EU–SA Strategic Partnership

ABSTRACT

South Africa’s peace and security outlook in the EU–South Africa Strategic Partnership has been guided by the content and substance of the founding document, which incorporates an interdependent approach to development. For South Africa, engagement in the EU–South Africa Strategic Partnership is framed by its historical background, its identity and the content of its foreign policy. South Africa's foreign policy in particular adopts an integrated approach to securing the state within its surrounding regional and continental geography. This article reviews South Africa's approach to peace and security, in the context of the strategic partnership. The article argues that, overall, South Africa's definition of peace and security is compatible with that of the EU; however, Pretoria's vision of how it provides peace and security has naturally changed in line with the varying international circumstances in which it has found itself. While this has proved difficult at times to reconcile, peace and security collaboration in the strategic partnership has managed to remain intact.     

Hybrid regimes and the challenges of deepening and sustaining democracy in developing countries1

South Africa's history of political domination during apartheid and the tendency of its companies to dominate business development on the continent may undermine the country's aim of being an African powerhouse due to resentment in other African countries. The article argues that South Africa's global ambitions can only be achieved if it is a leader on its own continent.     

Where in the world is South Africa? Lecture by Ambassador Tony Leon 14 February 2013

Most of the current constructs which theoretically underpin foreign policy for this country are either overblown or incoherent; they do not appropriately define or advance or prioritise South Africa's national interests abroad, nor do they acknowledge the tensions embedded in the clash between normative policies and realpolitik. Drawing from ‘real time’ experiences in international diplomacy, this lecture explores some of the dilemmas that South Africa, as a middle-range power in the world, confronts in its international engagements. The cost-effectiveness of South Africa's global projection is also examined, and some practical reforms to achieve better results in the current age of austerity suggested.     

Foreign policy without the policy? South Africa and activism on sexual orientation at the United Nations

Although South Africa led the UN to adopt its first resolution on sexual orientation in 2011, in recent years, South Africa has made various sharp foreign policy reversals on issues related to sexual orientation and human rights. This article discusses five such policymaking episodes over the period 2010–2016 and considers the wider implications of South Africa's flip-flopping. For one, South Africa's recent behaviour on international sexual orientation issues suggests that the foreign policymaking environment in South Africa is weak, unstructured and porous. Moreover, the sexual orientation issue exposes the limited scope South Africa has to act as a representative of Africa, as a leader in the developing world and as a bridge-building middle power.     

Russia,NMD and the ABM treaty: The dangers of American unilateralism

In order to consolidate its strategic bilateral relations developed in Africa over the past 14 years, South Africa must choose five key ‘hubs’ (regional powers) in each of Africa's five sub-regions. In addition, South Africa should pick two additional ‘spokes’ (influential actors) in each sub-region. These 15 strategic partners can increase South Africa's engagement on the continent in the areas of diplomacy, conflict management, and trade relations. South Africa's bilateral relations would thus resemble a gigantic bicycle, with five hubs and ten spokes. The five hubs are Mozambique, Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Ethiopia, and Algeria. The ten spokes would be Zimbabwe, Angola, Burundi, Rwanda, Ghana, Côte d'Ivoire, Sudan, Tanzania, Egypt and Libya. It is around these countries that South Africa can build solid strategic bilateral relationships in Africa.     

After the euphoria: The United States and South Africa in the 1990s

The United States welcomed the recent transition in South Africa and has worked closely with the new government since April 1994. Traditional American interest in South Africa was motivated first by opposition to communism and then by opposition to apartheid. However, the demise of those systems as well as uncertainties regarding South Africa's transition make it doubtful that the US will give the country as much attention in the next several years. In the more distant future shared interests are likely to bring the United States and South Africa closer.     

From scarcity to security: Water as a potential factor for conflict and cooperation in Southern Africa

The authors argue that South Africa's role as an economic gateway for various African countries primarily depends on geography, that is, on naturally given and man-made structures in geographical space. Hence, they first examine South Africa's location and physio-geographical conditions in Southern Africa in order to show important factors that affect the scope of the South African gateway. Second, they shed light on regional transport infrastructure, revealing how South Africa interlinks its neighbouring countries globally. Thirdly, regional economic interaction is analysed with regard to structural features of South Africa's economy that make it prone to being a gateway. The authors recognise that the impact of all these factors is influenced by strategic decisions taken by politicians and businesspeople. The outlook of the paper therefore addresses policies of the South African government that are often problematic for the country's gateway role. Potential challengers and their competitive advantages are presented, too.     

Situating the European Union within South Africa's foreign policy calculus

ABSTRACT

This article reviews the importance of the EU–South Africa Strategic Partnership in South Africa's foreign policy calculations after a decade in existence. While political differences have been open for all to see in cases such as Zimbabwe and South Africa's notice of withdrawal from the International Criminal Court, the enhanced political dialogue is important in ensuring that the partners have a greater appreciation of the complexities faced by foreign policy-makers on both sides. This study is thus interested in uncovering why political relations have lagged behind the economic and social aspects of the relationship. After assessing South Africa's foreign policy interests towards the EU, it then reviews where the political fault lines have been located since the adoption of the Joint Action Plan before identifying areas of cooperation in meeting South Africa’s interests as stated in the 2011 white paper on foreign policy.     

South Africa’s Inclusion in BRICS: Challenges and Prospects for Development in Africa

Abstract

The forming of alliances on the international scene has reflected a provisional arrangement in the world economy. Amongst such alliances was the formation of BRICS by the five world economies—Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa into what is commonly known as BRICS. BRICS is considered a joint initiative, aimed at shifting conventional norms in international economic and political cooperation to create a new trans-continental platform for these actors. Each member country in BRICS has, in one way or another, reflected growth either through its economy foreign policy, and developmental pursuit. However, South Africa is portrayed by some researchers as lagging behind, when compared to the other member countries. Hence, this study sought to analyse the potential mediumand long-term implications of South Africa's inclusion in BRICS. The study also aimed to underscore the benefits and risks associated with South Africa's membership in the alliance in the area of development; specifically poverty reduction, foreign policy, trade, and global partnership. The researchers collected secondary data to analytically critique the inclusion of South Africa in the BRICS alliance, its benefits, and shortcomings for development in South Africa, and in Africa as a whole. We argue that as a global player under BRICS, South Africa has opened a new vista of opportunities, including transnational gateways to Brazil, Russia, India, and China, with the attendant inflow of infrastructural and developmental investments, enriching educational exchanges and technology transfers. The article concludes by stressing the need for South Africa and other African countries to formulate policies that will drive meaningful development in their respective countries. The authors recommend that African leaders should come up with innate policies that are Africa-centred, that would incite development internally.