Abstract
From the dawn of South Africa’s democracy, the African Agenda has been at the centre of its foreign policy imperatives, reflecting an appreciation that a stable and prosperous African Continent is in South Africa’s national interests.
But what are these national interests, have they been defined, from where do they derive, and who is tasked with conceptualising and institutionalising these interests? This study is aimed at exploring the challenges of achieving tangible foreign policy outcomes with respect to South Africa’s Africa-first policy and in the absence of a clear and discernible ‘national interests’ doctrine. Using critical realism as a frame of enquiry, an assessment will be undertaken through an evaluation of the implementation of South Africa’s African agenda and its diplomatic and bilateral initiatives in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), during the period 1998–2016.
This study also assesses arguments for and against the conceptualisation of South Africa’s national interests, concluding that without such a document, South Africa’s international relations remains lacking strategic direction; the status quo further facilitates the government’s lack of accountability for foreign policy decision making and the use of state resources.
Without such a doctrine being conceptualised, legitimised and discernible through a national interests paradigm, South Africa has been unable to realise its domestic ‘socio-economic agenda, or to expand its political and security interests with regards to the African Continent’, despite the employment of considerable resources.
The study concludes that that nearly 30 years into democracy, South Africa is yet to conceptualise its national interests. Although successful democratic administrations regularly make broad declarations and deliver rhetoric that South Africa’s foreign policy, including its African Agenda, is driven by its national interests, none have been able to clarify what these interests are. Furthermore, they have often conflated national interests and domestic priorities, or national interests and constitutional values.
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The study calls for an expeditious, comprehensive, and all-inclusive process to develop and articulate South Africa’s national interests, as well as for ongoing consultations between state and non-state actors to continuously assess and measure South Africa’s foreign policy outcomes, successes and failures.