The evolution of the African Renaissance as a foreign policy doctrine

Articulated as a grand vision, the African Renaissance served to reflect Mbeki’s intentional dimension of foreign policy. It became the hallmark of his administration’s foreign policy towards Africa when he took office in 1999.

For the purposes of this study it is significant that Mbeki first elaborated on the idea of an African Renaissance at a business conference while he was deputy president of South Africa in 1997.13 Addressing the Corporate Council on Africa, a United States-based organisation that facilitates commercial relationships between the US and the African continent, Mbeki (1998) spoke of the need for Africa to get a larger share of foreign investments destined for emerging markets.

Mbeki appeared to have understood that the success of such a grand vision needed material (dispositional) means beyond his dispositional capacity to articulate it. In the final analysis the grand vision depended as much on economic factors as it did on political factors. The two could not be meaningfully separated.

Mbeki (1998) recognised the importance of the African business sector which, he said, had a critical role to play in continuing the African Renaissance into the 21st century. The sector should be capable of acting on its own and in partnership with international investors. Africa, according to Mbeki, had been readying herself for growth and development, fuelled by her own efforts and the profitable and safe injection of international private capital. He appealed for joint efforts to achieve African development (Mbeki 1998).

In 1999, Mbeki’s advisor Vusi Mavimbela told the Foundation for Global Dialogue, a South African think-tank, that the advent of the East Asian economic miracle was

13

The idea of the African Renaissance can be traced back to Pixley Isaka ka Seme, one of the founders of the ANC in 1912. In 1905, at the University of Columbia, United States, he gave a speech on ‘The Regeneration of Africa’. In June 1994, at a summit of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), President Nelson Mandela spoke of the need to undo the destruction of Africa. After

Mandela’s call, Mbeki made the African Renaissance a centre piece of his foreign policy (Magubane, 1999: 10, 11, 31 & 32).

one of the most important socio-economic developments of the 20th Century. According to Vale and Maseko (2002: 127), Mavimbela contended the Asian Tigers offered hope to Africa that economic development could be rapid and could be achieved without the annexation of foreign markets through imperial physical force. Imperial strategies were not a consideration. According to Nathan (2008), Mbeki, having been an integral part of the struggle against apartheid, remained an anti- imperialist post-1994. His anti-imperialism revolved around the following themes: the political and economic power imbalance between North and South (Northern and Southern hemispheres) to the great detriment of the poor; the need to transform the UN and other international bodies in order to address global inequalities; the domineering, hypocritical and self-serving approach of Western countries that chide and bully developing states; multilateralism and respect for international law in the conduct of international affairs (cited by Firsing 2010: 75).

As Mbeki’s African Renaissance ideas gained traction within his government, it was followed with a change of tack. In 1997, the DFA indicated that because of South Africa’s past experiences of destabilisation in the Southern African region - and for fear of being labelled “big brother” - South Africa did not see itself as playing a leading role on the continent. But this normatively timid stance was altered by South Africa’s role expectation, and by the country’s self-interests in adopting a pro-active approach to African affairs (Lester et al 2000: 288).

The African Renaissance vision required more than fear for continental leadership. In a way, Mbeki had set himself up to lead continental renewal project. The African Renaissance, as articulated by Mbeki, was not meant to be an isolationist grand vision. It took cognisance of global developments and sought to negotiate means through which South Africa and the rest of the African continent could link up and participate in shaping the globalisation process, and thus reap benefits from it.

As Schraeder (2001: 232-233) observed, an emphasis on South Africa’s unique position as the leader of the African Renaissance – following the strengthening of democratic practices and economic liberalisation through Africa since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 – constituted an important component of foreign policy adaptation

in the post-Cold War era. This foreign policy stance was designed to emphasise the centrality of the African continent in South Africa’s foreign policy. South Africa would be an embodiment of Africa’s future political and economic potential.

The African Renaissance sought to position Africa as an expanding and prosperous market alongside Asia, Europe and North America, one in which South African MNCs were destined to play a special role via trade and strategic partnerships. This globalist framing of the African Renaissance was enthusiastically embraced by South African elites, whose understanding of modernisation is the generation of wealth, a world in which trade and global competitiveness are as important as the political dimension of diplomacy (Vale & Maseko 2002: 127).

The mention of the Asian Tigers as the model of what Africa could achieve was not without consequence. Mbeki sought to craft and popularise what is termed a “developmental state” – a term usually associated with East Asian countries that recorded magnificent economic growth towards the end of the 20th century and at the beginning of the new millennium. It is due to this growth that the “rise of the rest” emerged. This is phenomenal growth for non-Western countries – including those Antoine van Agtmael, Washington-based fund manager, called “emerging markets” (Zakaria 2008: 2).

Developmental states are those whose politics have concentrated on sufficient power, autonomy, capacity and legitimacy at the centre to shape, pursue and encourage the achievement of explicit developmental objectives, whether by establishing and promoting conditions of economic growth (in the capitalist developmental states), by organising it directly (in the socialist variants) or varying combinations of both (Leftwich 2000: 155). Mbeki pursued a developmental state within a market economy bequeathed by the racial polarisation of the past.

In 1998, at a conference on the African Renaissance, Mbeki elaborated further: central to his government’s vision was the provision of a better life for Africans who would enjoy and exercise their right to determine their future. The African Renaissance would address the question of sustainable development which would

impact positively on the standard of living and the quality of life of Africans. For its renewal, the continent needed human resource development, the emancipation of women, building of a modern economic, social and communications infrastructure, the cancellation of foreign debt, an improvement in terms of trade, an increase in domestic and foreign investment, the expansion of development assistance and access for Africa’s products into the markets of the world (Mbeki 1999: xvi).

Africa had to recognise that its struggle for development could not be won outside the context and framework of the world economy. The continent needed to take part in the globalisation debate for its own benefit, since the continent had not seen the results of this phenomenon. There was the need to attract into the African economy significant volumes of capital without which the development being sought would not happen. Both domestic and foreign investors, and both private and public sectors, were sources of capital (Mbeki 1999: xvi, xviii).

In 2000, the government made it clear that the African Renaissance informed its foreign policy programme during Mbeki’s tenure. The vision was to be implemented through four broad pillars linked with South Africa’s domestic considerations:

It would seek to achieve economic development. At the centre of this strategy would be the integration of not only the South African economy into the world system, but also those of other countries in the African continent. Such integration would advance the interests of the Africa continent;

It would pioneer social development; an exclusive focus on economic development was perceived as unwise and limited. The social development component acknowledged that technology made it possible for instantaneous dissemination of ideas, images and symbols. Africa needed to have access to this wealth of information and knowledge;

It would ensure peace and security. This was motivated by the realisation that regional conflicts were wreaking havoc across the continent, casting a dark shadow over the prospects and success of the vision of the African Renaissance. Instead of involvement by joining one or other belligerent in conflict situations, South Africa would intervene as a mediator and seek

political rather than military resolution of conflicts through legitimate international instruments; and

It would promote good governance anchored in human rights. It would not support undemocratic means to attain power (Dlamini-Zuma, 2000).

With his foreign policy vision, Mbeki had recast South Africa’s hierarchy of priorities in geo-ideological and practical terms. His focus was vast in outreach. Following the restructuring of his foreign policy machinery, the 14-member SADC region was his immediate focus, followed by Africa as a whole and an active diplomacy on behalf of developing countries in multilateral institutions. These platforms provided for Mbeki what Schraeder (2002: 261) described as a “coherent template and prudent compass” – although this description could have been an over-statement of Mbeki’s state-crafting and diplomacy.