Making Sense of South Africa’s Soft Power: Projections, Prospects and Possibilities

Ogunnubi, Olusola; Ettang, Dorcas

doi:10.1007/978-3-319-74905-1_7

Olusola Ogunnubi⁵ &
Dorcas Ettang⁶

Part of the book series: African Histories and Modernities ((AHAM))

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Abstract

New scholarly literature that focuses on the currency of soft power is emerging in the analysis of South Africa’s foreign policy. This nascent strand of discourse captures the nexus between the ideational value of soft power and Pretoria’s foreign policy. Within this analytical context, Ogunnubi and Ettang probe the agents, sources and subjects involved in the projection of South Africa’s soft power. These issues are critical, given the role and utility of soft power for achieving South Africa’s foreign policy ambitions, and recognizing the country’s important position in the African continent. The chapter stresses that the deepening of South Africa’s soft power capability and influence will depend largely on the extent of the strategic calibration between the communicative realms of actors, instruments and recipients.

An earlier and shorter draft of this chapter was initially published in Communicatio: South African Journal for Communication Theory and Research. We acknowledge the comments from two anonymous reviewers.

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Notes

1.
For example, see Peter Vale (Starting Over: Some Early Questions on a Post-Apartheid Foreign Policy : 1990, Points of Re-entry: Prospects for a Post-Apartheid Foreign Policy: 1992), Geldenhuys (Towards a New South Africa: The Foreign Policy Dimension: 1991), Davies (Integration or Cooperation in a Post-Apartheid Southern Africa : Some Reflections on an Emerging Debate: 1992), Du Pisani (Post-Settlement South Africa and the Future of Southern Africa: 1993); McGowan (The ‘New’ South Africa: Ascent or Descent in the World System?: 1993), Koos van Wyk (Foreign policy options for a new South Africa: 1993).
2.
Mills (From Pariah to Participant : South Africa’s Evolving Foreign Relations, 1990–1994: 1994), Bischoff (Democratic South Africa One Year After: Towards a New Foreign Policy : 1995), Davies (South African Foreign Policy Options in a Changing Global Context : 1995), Carlsnaes and Muller (Change and South African External Relations: 1997), Landsberg (Selling South Africa: New Foreign Policy and Strategic Ambiguity or Ambitious Strategy?, Foreign Policy Since the 1994 Election: 1995), Le Pere and van Nieuwkerk (Mission Imperfect: Redirecting South Africa’s Foreign Policy: 1995), Evans (South Africa in Remission: The Foreign Policy of an Altered State: 1996) and Spence (The Debate over South Africa’s Foreign Policy : 1996), and Van der Westhuizen (Can the giant be Gentle? Peacemaking as South African foreign policy: 1995).
3.
Ryall (Caught Between Two Worlds: Understanding South Africa’s Foreign Policy Options: 1997); Solomon (In Search of a South African Foreign Policy : 1997); Le Pere, Lambrechts and Van Nieuwkerk (The Burden of the Future: South Africa’s Foreign Policy Challenges in the New Millennium: 1999); Vale and Taylor (South Africa’s Post-Apartheid Foreign Policy Five Years on – From Pariah State to ‘Just Another Country’?: 1999); Sidiropoulos (Ed) (Apartheid Past, Renaissance Future: South Africa’s Foreign Policy, 1994–2004; 2004); and Adebajo et al. (Eds.) (South Africa in Africa: The Post-Apartheid Era ; 2007); Vanusha Naidoo, “Between Scylla and Charybdis: South Africa’s foreign policy dilemma in southern Africa ” (PhD thesis, University of KwaZulu-Natal, 2010).
4.
Olusola Ogunnubi, “Hegemonic order and regional stability in sub-Saharan Africa : A comparative study of Nigeria and South Africa” (PhD thesis, University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, 2014).
5.
Karen Smith, “Soft power: The essence of South Africa’s foreign policy ,” in South African foreign policy review, vol. 1, ed. Chris Landsberg and Jo-Ansie van Wyk (Pretoria : Africa Institute of South Africa and the Institute for Global Dialogue, 2012), 68–83.
6.
Deon Geldenhuys, “South Africa: The idea-driven foreign policy of a regional power,” in Regional leadership in the global system, ed. Daniel Flemes (Farnham: Ashgate, 2010), 151–167.
7.
Olusola Ogunnubi and Lester Shawa, “Analysing South Africa’s soft power in Africa through the knowledge diplomacy of higher education .” Manuscript submitted for publication.
8.
Oluwaseun Tella and Olusola Ogunnubi, “Hegemony or survival: South Africa’s regional pursuit of soft power and the challenges of xenophobia,” Africa Insight 44, no. 3 (2014): 145–163.
9.
Olusola Ogunnubi, and Christopher Isike, “Regional hegemonic contention and the asymmetry of soft power: A comparative analysis of South Africa and Nigeria,” Strategic Review for Southern Africa 37, no. 1 (2015): 152–177.
10.
Olusola Ogunnubi and Nwabufo Okeke-Uzodike, “South Africa’s foreign policy and the strategy of soft power,” South African Journal of International Affairs 22, no. 1 (2015): 23–41.
11.
Elizabeth Sidiropoulos, “South Africa’s emerging soft power,” Current History 113, no. 763 (2014): 197–202.
12.
Olusola Ogunnubi, “South Africa’s soft power: A comparative content analysis,” Politeia 34, no. 2 (2015): 39–56.
13.
Jo-Ansie Van Wyk, “Reflections on South Africa’s post-apartheid foreign policy and preliminary comments on future foreign policy,” in South African foreign policy review, vol. 1, ed. Chris Landsberg and Jo-Ansie van Wyk (Pretoria : Africa Institute of South Africa and the Institute for Global Dialogue, 2012), 274–290.
14.
Van Wyk, Reflections on South Africa’s post-apartheid foreign policy, 286.
15.
Ibid.
16.
Ibid.
17.
National Planning Commission, National Development Plan 2030 (Pretoria : Government Printer, 2012).
18.
Alexander Wendt, Social theory of international politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999).
19.
Alexander Wendt, “Anarchy is what states make of it,” International Organisations 46, (1992): 391–425.
20.
Ted Hopf, 1998. “The promise of constructivism in International Relations Theory,” International Security 23, (1998): 171–200.
21.
Ibid.
22.
Wendt, Anarchy is what states make of it, 391.
23.
Ibid., 396.
24.
Wendt 1999, Social theory, 175.
25.
Ibid., 181.
26.
Marc Lynch, “Kissinger the Constructivist,” The Washington Post, October 21, 2014. Accessed: March 27, 2015. Available from: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2014/10/21/kissinger-the-constructivist/?utm_term=.b3eaca54cea9
27.
Dale, C. Copeland, “The Constructivist Challenge to Structural Realism: A Review Essay,” International Security 25, no. 2 (2000): 187–212.
28.
Wendt, Anarchy is what states make of it, 395.
29.
Emmanuel Adler, “Seizing the middle ground: Constructivism in world politics,” European Journal of International Relations 3, (1997): 319–363.
30.
Adler, Seizing the middle ground, 336.
31.
Ibid.
32.
Ibid., 336.
33.
Craig Hayden, The Rhetoric of Soft Power: Public Diplomacy in Global Contexts (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2012).
34.
Lynch, Kissinger the Constructivist.
35.
White Paper on South Africa’s Foreign Policy , Building a Better World: The Diplomacy of Ubuntu DIRCO . Final Draft, 13 May 2011.
36.
Alexander L. Vuving, “How soft power works” (Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association annual meeting, Toronto, September 3, 2009).
37.
Hopf, The promise of constructivism, 173.
38.
Ganjar Nugroho, “Constructivism and international relations theories,” Global & Strategies Th 2, no. 1 (2008): 85–98.
39.
Georg Sørensen and Robert Jackson, Introduction to International Relations: Theories and Approaches (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006).
40.
Nugroho, Constructivism, 85–86.
41.
Patrick, T. Jackson, “Defending the West: Occidentalism and the Formation of NATO,” Journal of Political Philosophy, 11, no. 3 (2003): 223–252.
42.
Matthias Hofferberth and Christian Weber, “Lost in Translation: A Critique of Constructivist Norm Research,” Journal of International Relations and Development, 18, no. 1 (2015): 75–103.
43.
Ibid., 81.
44.
Jeffrey Checkel, “Review: The Constructivist Turn in International Relations Theory,” World Politics 50, no. 2 (1998): 324–328.
45.
Wendt, Anarchy is what states make of it; Peter Katzenstein, ed. The culture of national security: Norms and identity in world politics (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996); Henry Kissinger, World Order (New York: Penguin Press, 2014); Audie, J. Klotz, Norms in international relations: The struggle against apartheid (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1995).
46.
Richard Price and Christian Reus-Smit, “Dangerous Liaisons? Critical International Theory and Constructivism,” European Journal of International Relations 4, no. 3 (1998): 259–294.
47.
Checkel, The Constructivist Turn, 338.
48.
Hopf, The promise of constructivism, 1777.
49.
Hofferbeth and Weber, Lost in Translation.
50.
Ibid.
51.
Ian Hurd, “Constructivism,” in The Oxford handbook of international relations, ed. Christian Reus-Smit and Duncan Snidal (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008).
52.
Hurd, Constructivism, 300.
53.
Price and Reus-Smit, Dangerous Liaisons? 265.
54.
Ioannis, J. Galariotis, “The theoretical and empirical application of social constructivism in the EU’s foreign and security policy,” Cyprus Center of European and International Affairs 04, January (2008): 1–53.
55.
Ibid., The theoretical and empirical application of social constructivism, 23–24.
56.
Nugroho Constructivism, 92.
57.
Checkel, The Constructivist Turn, 326.
58.
Alexander Wendt, “Constructing international politics,” International Security 20, no. 1 (1995): 71–81.
59.
Hurd, Constructivism, 298.
60.
Ibid., 299.
61.
Jeffrey Legro, Rethinking the World: Great Power Strategies and International Order (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2005).
62.
Hurd, Constructivism, 303.
63.
Wendt, Social theory.
64.
Łukasz Fijałkowski, “China’s ‘soft power’ in Africa?,” Journal of Contemporary African Studies 29, no. 2 (2011): 223–232.
65.
Ibid.
66.
Nye, The future of power, 84.
67.
Fijałkowski, China’s ‘soft power’, 225.
68.
Smith, Soft power.
69.
Fijałkowski, China’s ‘soft power’, 225.
70.
Chris Alden and Maxi Schoeman, “South Africa’s symbolic hegemony in Africa,” International Politics 52, (2015): 239–254; Elizabeth Sidiropoulos, “South Africa: Development, international cooperation and soft power,” in Development cooperation and emerging powers: New partners or old patterns?, ed. Sachin Chaturvedi, Tom Fues and Elizabeth Sidiropoulos (London and New York: Zed Books, 2012), 216–242.
71.
Alden and Schoeman South Africa’s symbolic hegemony, 241.
72.
Ibid.
73.
Ibid.
74.
Nye, The future of power.
75.
Lesley Masters, “Opening the ‘black box’: South African foreign policy-making,” in South African foreign policy review, vol. 1, ed. Chris Landsberg and Jo-Ansie van Wyk (Pretoria : Africa Institute of South Africa and the Institute for Global Dialogue, 2012), 20–41.
76.
Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO) , White Paper on South Africa’s foreign policy. Building a better world: The diplomacy of ubuntu. Final draft, May 13, 2011.
77.
Ibid.
78.
NPC, National Development Plan 2030.
79.
Smith, Soft Power.
80.
Olusola Ogunnubi and Christopher Isike, “South Africa’s foreign policy aspirations and the National Development Plan (NDP) : The role of soft power,” Journal of Contemporary African Studies, (forthcoming).
81.
Vying, How soft power works.
82.
Ogunnubi and Isike, The role of soft power.
83.
Olusola Ogunnubi and Lester Shawa, “Analysing South Africa’s soft power in Africa through the knowledge diplomacy of higher education,” Manuscript submitted for publication; Jenny Lee and Chika Sehoole, “Regional, continental and global mobility to an emerging economy: The case of South Africa,” Higher Education 70, no. 5 (2015): 827–843.
84.
Ogunnubi and Shawa, Analysing South Africa’s soft power.
85.
Masters, Opening the ‘black box’.
86.
Sidiropoulos, South Africa’s emerging soft power.
87.
Mbeki’s African Renaissance project was a pan-Africanist and ‘progressive’ African agenda for the total liberation of African states and the institution of values that would replace corruption and incompetence as an approach to solving Africa’s problems (see Landsberg 2007). NEPAD was essentially an economic blueprint for the development of the African continent.
88.
Ogunnubi and Uzodike South Africa’s foreign policy.
89.
Fijałkowski, China’s ‘soft power’, 225.
90.
Janis Van der Westhuizen, “Has South Africa lost its soft power?,” Foreign Policy, April 10, 2009. http://foreignpolicy.com/2009/04/10/has-south-africa-lost-its-soft-power (accessed July 12, 2016).
91.
Ibid.
92.
Ibid.
93.
Joe, J. Clarke, South Africa’s failure to arrest Omar Al-Bashir is betrayal of Mandela’s ideals. The Guardian, June 24, 2015. https://www.theguardian.com/global-development-professionalsnetwork/2015/jun/24/south-africas-failure-arrest-al-bashir-not-in-keeping-mandelas-ideals (accessed July 12, 2016).
94.
Clarke, South Africa’s failure to arrest Omar Al-Bashir.
95.
Simon Allison, “South Africa in the CAR: Was pulling the troops a catastrophic mistake?” Daily Maverick, January 21, 2014. http://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2014-01-21-south-africa-inthe-car-was-pulling-the-troops-a-catastrophic-mistake/#.V4Xnz_l97IV (accessed July 12, 2016).
96.
Allison, South Africa in the CAR.
97.
AmaBhungane Reporters, “Central African Republic: Is this what our soldiers died for?” Mail & Guardian, March 28, 2013. http://mg.co.za/article/2013-03-28-00-central-african-republic-isthis-what-our-soldiers-died-for (accessed July 12, 2016).
98.
Ibid.
99.
“South Africa’s Zuma vows to end attacks on migrants,” BBC, April 18, 2015. http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-32365157 (accessed July 12, 2016).
100.
Ibid.
101.
The views by President Zuma’s son Edward Zuma, for an end to the “unnecessary accommodation of foreign national ” further fanned previous statements made by King Zwelithini (See “‘Several dead’ in South Africa xenophobic attacks, as Zuma son renews anti-foreigner sentiments,” Mail & Guardian Africa, April 14, 2015. http://mgafrica.com/article/2015-04-14-severaldead-in-south-africa-attacks-on-foreigners-swell-as-zuma-son-makes-anti-foreignersentiments-again (accessed July 12, 2016)).
102.
BBC, South Africa’s Zuma vows.
103.
eNCA News, “News Night [television broadcast],” May 18, 2015. Johannesburg, South Africa.
104.
Ogunnubi and Isike, The role of soft power.
105.
Nye, The future of power.
106.
Masters, Opening the ‘black box’, 33–35.
107.
Ibid.
108.
Jean-Paul Marthoz, The Challenges and Ambiguities of South Africa’s Foreign Policy, (Oslo: Norwegian Peacebuilding Resource, 2012).
109.
African National Congress (ANC) , International relations discussion policy document (Pretoria : ANC, 2012). http://www.anc.org.za/docs/discus/2012/internationalb.pdf (accessed July 12, 2016).
110.
Van Wyk, Reflections on South Africa’s post-apartheid foreign policy, 284.
111.
Smith, Soft Power.
112.
Geldenhuys, The idea-driven foreign policy of a regional power.
113.
Smith, Soft Power 2012.
114.
Jo-Ansie Van Wyk, “South Africa’s nuclear diplomacy since the termination of its nuclear weapons programme,” South African Journal of Military Studies 42, no. 1 (2014): 80–101.
115.
Ibid.
116.
Chris Landsberg and Kwandi Kondlo, “South African and the ‘African Agenda’,” Policy Issues and Actors 20, no. 13 (2007): 1–10.
117.
ibid., 1–2.
118.
Ibid.
119.
Landsberg, C. n.d. “South Africa’s ‘African Agenda’: Challenges of policy and implementation,” Paper prepared for the Presidency Fifteen Year Review Project.
120.
Ibid.
121.
Ibid.
122.
Emmanuel Nibishaka, “South Africa’s peacekeeping role in Africa: Motives and challenges of peacekeeping. South Africa,” (Johannesburg, Southern Africa: Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung, 2011).
123.
Ibid.
124.
Chris Landsberg, “South Africa and the making of the African Union and Nepad: Mbeki’s ‘Progressive African Agenda’,” in South Africa in Africa: Post-apartheid era, ed. Adekeye Adebajo, Adebayo Adedeji and Chris Landsberg (Scottsville: University of KwaZulu-Natal Press, 2007) 195–212.
125.
Stephen Gelb, South Africa’s Role and Importance in Africa and for the Development of the African Agenda (Braamfontein: The EDGE Institute, 2001).
126.
Ibid.
127.
Nye, The future of power, 84.
128.
Joseph Nye, Bound to lead: The changing nature of American power (New York: Basic Books, 1990).
129.
Geldenhuys, The idea-driven foreign policy of a regional power; Smith, soft power.
130.
Aditi Lalbahadur, Moving beyond ‘trophy diplomacy’: How to consolidate South Africa’s position in the world (Pretoria : South African Institute of International Affairs, 2014).
131.
Sidiropoulos 2012.
132.
Nibishaka, South Africa’s peacekeeping role in Africa.
133.
Landsberg, South Africa’s ‘African Agenda’.
134.
Liesl Louw-Vaudran , South Africa in Africa: Super power or neocolonialist? (Cape Town: Tafelberg, 2016).
135.
Olivier Serräo, South Africa in the UN Security Council 2011–2012 (Johannesburg: Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, 2011).
136.
Ibid.
137.
Tjiurimo Hengari , “Expert perceptions of South Africa’s foreign policy : Views from Pretoria and Addis Ababa” (Paper presented at the BRICS Policy Centre, Brazil, for South African Institute of International Affairs, March 14, 2014).
138.
Ibid.
139.
Ibid.
140.
Alden and Schoeman South Africa’s symbolic hegemony.
141.
Nye, The future of power, 92; Vuving, How soft power works.
142.
Nye, The future of power, 92.
143.
Van der Westhuizen, Has South Africa lost its soft power?
144.
Ibid.
145.
Ibid.
146.
Louw-Vaudran , South Africa in Africa.
147.
Ibid.
148.
Ibid.
149.
Ibid.
150.
Ibid.
151.
“The Guptas and their links to South Africa’s Jacob Zuma,” BBC, March 17, 2016. http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-22513410 (accessed July 12, 2016).
152.
Van der Westhuizen, Has South Africa lost its soft power?
153.
Louw-Vaudran South Africa in Africa.
154.
Mehmet Ozkan, Does ‘rising power’ mean ‘rising donor’? Turkey’s development aid in Africa. Africa Review 5, (2013): 139–147.
155.
Moisés Naím, The end of power: From boardrooms to battlefields and churches to states: Why being in charge isn’t what it used to be (New York: Basic Books, 2013).

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Management Sciences, Mangosuthu University of Technology, Umlazi, Durban, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa
Olusola Ogunnubi
International and Public Affairs, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa
Dorcas Ettang

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Department of History, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX, USA
Toyin Falola
Global Management Ted Rogers School of Management, Ryerson University, Toronto, ON, Canada
Kenneth Kalu

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Ogunnubi, O., Ettang, D. (2018). Making Sense of South Africa’s Soft Power: Projections, Prospects and Possibilities. In: Falola, T., Kalu, K. (eds) Africa and Globalization. African Histories and Modernities. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-74905-1_7

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