Foreign and Security Policy under the Zuma Presidency: Shaping the Agenda

Development can be seen...as a process of expanding the real freedoms that people enjoy. It requires the removal of major sources of unfreedom: poverty as well as tyranny, poor economic opportunities as well as systematic social deprivation, neglect of public facilities as well as intolerance of repressive states.

Amartya Sen: Development as Freedom, 2000

Whether or not human rights promotion should sit at the heart of the Zuma administration's foreign policy approach depends on a number of factors. Following Sen, our point of departure is that the thrust of our foreign policy ought to be the promotion of development - for South Africa, the region, Africa, and the global South.

The deep desire to promote human rights and democracy the world over, can easily become subsumed under the dominant thrust of determining policy and position according to a narrow and short-time definition of the national interest - a risk illustrated by the poor management of the Dalai Lama affair earlier this year. However there are other factors to consider in responding to this question, and my presentation reflects on some of them.

I start with the thread of consistency. The ANC's long-term foreign policy approach was formulated in the years before it came to power. The Freedom Charter of 1955 contains five foreign policy guiding principles, indicative of the movement's international position. The ANC's foreign policy served as a strategic tool in the liberation struggle, when the overriding purpose was to overcome the apartheid regime. International solidarity, support for the armed struggle, and the international isolation of apartheid and white minority rule in southern Africa were key objectives.

As the transition to democracy took shape the ANC formulated a more comprehensive position in its 1992 policy guidelines entitled ‘Ready to Govern' and the 1994 publication entitled ‘Foreign policy perspective in a democratic South Africa'. This document - drawn up by members of the ANC's International Department and a handful of academics - declares: "The essence of South Africa's foreign policy is to promote and protect the interests and values of its citizens". It also formulated seven principles as a guide to foreign policy. A slightly modified version of this publication, entitled ‘Discussion Document on South African Foreign Policy' was brought out by the Department of Foreign Affiars (DFA) in 1996. In 1997 the ANC released a ‘reflection' - essentially recognising the limits to South Africa's ability to promote human rights and democracy, the value of strategic alliances, and the importance of economic relations.

In the absence of a formal white paper (policy framework) on foreign policy, these key documents have served the ANC government from 1994 until now. It is worth noting that the ANC's Polokwane Conference in 2007 generated a number of resolutions relating to international relations. These re-affirmed the ANC's commitment to progressive internationalism as a response to the challenge of imperialism (where the system of capitalism is seen to be dominated by one ‘hyper-power'); support for the establishment of an AU government via processes of regional integration, for example following a developmental approach to SADC's consolidation; support for India, Brazil and China as strategic partners; the ‘intensification' of economic diplomacy; and a name change from DFA to the Department of International Relations and Co-operation (‘DICO').

The ‘and Co-operation' part of the new name seems in line with the Polokwane resolution which speaks of a proposed SA Development Partnership Agency which together with the recently established Pan-African Infrastructure Development Fund ‘could be used as instruments to achieve the MDGs'. A more recent interpretation suggests putting South Africa's involvement in continental peace-making, multidimentional peace support, and post-conflict reconstruction and development (what some of us have called the exercise of its soft power) into a structure that will enable these diverse activities to be managed more holistically (and professionally).

There is much to be said for developing a strategy for coordinating the planning, implementation, and monitoring of the various ongoing development cooperation activities across government departments and agencies. This includes the management of funding thereof, whether from government as a provider of aid or via trilateral cooperation agreements involving International Cooperation Partners (ICPs) and other international agencies.

The current pressing global dynamics of an economic and security nature, the urgent developmental needs of the southern African region and the continent, and the paradox of South Africa - a regional superpower burdened by domestic inequality, poverty and unemployment - require government to develop a new kind of diplomat: internationalist in outlook, but who understands globalisation from an African perspective; one who is skilled in balancing the demands of chasing economic opportunity with the demands of facilitating peacemaking and recovery. Finding the balance is not easily achieved, but will be assisted by government's ability to -

• Deepen its analysis and understanding of the forces and currents at work on the global scale;
• Prioritise visionary leadership for the formulation of the ideal society and the world we want to live in, from whence we can deduce the national interest and policy priorities;
• Adjust foreign policy objectives to the realities of financial constraints;
• Grasp the nettle of interdepartmental and inter-agency coordination and cooperation, whether through clusters, commissions, a revamped Presidency, or a National Security Council;
• Coordinate the planning, implementation, and monitoring of development cooperation activities across government as well as managing funding thereof,
• Strengthen the department (and government) with appropriate training and education, deploying professional diplomats, improve communication and marketing, and interfacing more effectively with civil society and academia.

Although the ANC government's foreign policy is characterised by continuity rather than change, there are compelling reasons for it to undertake a comprehensive foreign policy review. Arguably, this is currently under way as government prepares the state of the nation address, but as the new minister noted in her brief to the diplomatic core, "we plan to increase the level of our engagement with South Africans on foreign policy matters". I take this as signaling a welcome return to the consultative approach of the early 1990s, when civil society, NGOs and academia were drawn into substantive policy discussions.

What are the big issues on the foreign policy agenda?

The global economy is experiencing its worst economic downturn since the second world war. As Azar Jammine recently pointed out, a combination of complacency and greed has contributed towards this situation, and it will take years if not decades to eliminate the excesses of the past few decades.

In the meantime, a perfect storm rages in Africa's arc of instability, from Somalia in the East to Mauritania in the West. Global climate change combined with global economic recession will massively increase the need for humanitarian assistance in the arc of crisis, and as an academic colleague recently noted, we might very well be entering an era of chronic emergencies.

South Africa is also directly affected by the global downturn: its economy is highly dependent upon exports of raw materials used in the production of manufactured goods in countries such as China and the OECD. Jammine notes that although there is optimism that South Africa will weather the global economic storm reasonably successfully, there is also the reality of its main challenges: poverty, unemployment and inequality, coupled with the scourges of crime and disease. One might add that none of these challenges respect borders, which means that South and southern Africa's futures are entwined.

If we understand security as freedom from fear and freedom from want (the classic definition of human security), then these are the national issues on the foreign and security agenda. In many ways, we are back to the early assertion that foreign policy springs from domestic insecurity, or in the ANC language of 1994, that the essence of South Africa's foreign policy "...is to promote and protect the interests and values of its citizens".

Determining the country's foreign and security agenda, coupled with decisive decision-making and effective implementation, depends on the tactful management of the following:

• Successful implementation of government's revised management structures
• Ongoing, thoughtful interpretation of the future impact of current global trends
• Careful reading of the regional and continental socio-political climate
• A dose of good luck: an unexpected natural or man-made disaster usually puts policy implementation (and budgets) into disarray.

If we conclude at this point, it will do injustice to a fuller understanding of our foreign policy. Much of the ANC's international behaviour is driven by its ‘progressive internationalist' world view, leading it to play a formative role in Africa's stabilisation and recovery efforts; acting on a vision of justice for the Palestinian people; actively opposing nuclear weapons proliferation and imperialist over-reach in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere; democratising the UN; in short, the desire to contribute to "a better life for all and a vision of a better Africa and a just world".

Although neoliberal critics have argued that the ANC's multilateral diplomacy reached its limits - and ultimate failure - under the grandiose designs of Mbeki, there is still much to be said for the idea of making strategic partnerships work in the national (and African) interest. Again, for effective foreign policy-making and implementation, these ought to be subject to monitoring and evaluation as part of the national policy agenda. If anything, the proliferation of ‘strategic' partnerships and binational commissions (also in trade and defence diplomacy) requires continuous scrutiny and cost-benefit assessment: a ready task for the cooperation managers in the DIRC.

In conclusion, the overriding challenge is not to redefine foreign policy purpose and objectives. It is clear that our international relations must be conducted in a manner that draws from the ANC's experience of solidarity, and speaks to the removal of our "unfreedoms" - the triple burden of poverty, inequality and unemployment - in South Africa, the SADC region, Africa and the South.

In doing so, the incoming administration must spend time and energy to get policy management right (including policy prioritisation, budgeting, implementation and monitoring). Foreign and security policy requires experienced and professional attention: much of it is available already, and much can be gained from engaging civil society, think-tanks and universities. The Wits P&DM contribution, apart from educating our public policy managers, is the delivery of a new diploma in humanitarian assistance in conjunction with Medicines Sans Frontiers, a broader project on foreign and security policy management, and research on the development of Africa-relevant crisis management tools.

Anthoni van Nieuwkerk is an associate professor at the Graduate School of Public and Development Management, Wits University. This address was prepared for the Helen Suzman Foundation Human Rights Dialogue Series, May 28 2009

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