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Periodical article Periodical article Leiden University catalogue Leiden University catalogue WorldCat catalogue WorldCat
Title:Reform in defence of sovereignty: South Africa in the UN Security Council, 2007-2008
Author:Bischoff, Paul-HenriISNI
Year:2009
Periodical:Africa Spectrum
Volume:44
Issue:2
Pages:95-110
Language:English
Geographic term:South Africa
Subjects:foreign policy
UN Security Council
External link:https://journals.sub.uni-hamburg.de/giga/afsp/article/view/126
Abstract:After 1994, South Africa became the sine qua non of an internationalist State, willing to promote cooperation amongst a plurality of actors, believing common interests to be more important than their differences. Investing heavily in African-led mediation on African security, South Africa has advocated the dictum of 'African solutions to African conflicts'. This has been complemented by promoting South-South relations. All speaks of the wish to be recognized as a regional power defending southern sovereignty. To achieve this, the UN has been a key for South African diplomacy. South Africa's first tenure as a member of the Security Council during 2007-2008 shows the degree to which its foreign policy shifted ground from a pluralist cum solidarist reformist position to a pluralist-reformist one. South Africa's voting record at the UN General Assembly expressed its overriding concern to regionalize African issues and minimize the US and the West shaping political events. This brought the country's foreign policy into sharper relief: what had previously been seen as an ambiguous foreign policy had now shifted to something more assertively counterhegemonic. It damaged the country's identity as a democratic State, but it also marked its arrival in the world of international Realpolitik. Bibliogr., sum. in English and German. [ASC Leiden abstract]
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