INTRODUCTION

1. Unilateralism, Rising Nationalism and Militarization of Foreign Policy in the Global Order: A Pan African Response By Dan Motaung (Senior Researcher, Humanity Faculty, Mapungubwe Institute for Strategic Reflection (MISTRA)

2. INTRODUCTION • My main aim in this presentation is to suggest possible ways of fortifying Africa’s response to the current broader global processes characterised by unilateralism, rising nationalism and militarisation of foreign policy. • Broadly, I see the three sub-themes of this topic broadly revolving around the dominant global economic interests. • But first I will venture some historicised reflection on the topic for the purposes of background.

3. BACKGROUND TO CURRENT GLOBAL CRISIS • Historically, two key moments have created the conditions of possibility for the legitimation of unilateralism, militarisation of foreign policy as well as the resultant emergence of extreme forms of nationalism. • The first was the end of the Cold War and the victorious emergence of unipolarity & the Western ideological thought-systems. • The second was the terrorist attack on the United States of America and the resultant so-called ‘War on Terror’. • My main thesis is that these two periods afforded the Western world, especially the U.S. (the global hegemon), the necessary moral high ground to set the political terms of reference for the global community in pursuit of its economic interests.

4. UNILATERALISM • Since the end of the Cold War the world have been plunged into a unipolar moment, with American primacy in the global distribution of capabilities unrivalled. • ‘An important research question is whether and in what ways this particular distribution of capabilities affects patterns of international politics to create outcomes that are different from what one might expect under conditions of bipolarity or multipolarity’ (Ikenburry, Mastanduno, Wohlforth; 2009). • The unilateral exercise of unipolar power has triumphed consent as the basis of global order. • The NeoCon ideology that was the driving force for the Iraqi regime change testifies to the emphatic presence of unilateralism at this point in history (‘You are either with us or against us’--- George Bush).

5. MILITARISATION OF FOREIGN POLICY • In theory, militarisation of foreign policy was supposed to have been scaled down with the end of the Cold War. • The U.S. reneged on its undertaking to Mikhail Gorbachev that NATO membership would not extend ‘one inch to the east’ to include Eastern European nations in return for the unification of Germany. • In 1999 Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic joined NATO, against strident Russian objection. Many more former Soviet Republics followed. • From now on a strong possibility existed for anti-Russian missile bases and adversarial armies to be located on the Russian doorstep. • In 1994 Bill Clinton signed the NATO Enlargement Pact. • ‘In 2008 the U.S closed a deal with Poland to deploy a missile defense system in Polish territory with a tracking system to be placed in the Czech Republic’ (King; 2014). • Russia responded by drawing up contingency plans for the destruction of the systems.

6. Neoliberalism: A Definition • Neoliberalism is ‘…a theory of political economic practices that proposes that human well-beings can best be advanced by liberating individual entrepreneurial freedoms and skills within an institutional framework characterised by strong private property rights, free markets, and free trade’ (Harvey, 2007; 2). • Contextualising the phenomenon of neoliberalism, Neil Faulkner states that ‘a new age in which the global economy was dominated by international banks and multinational corporations outside the control of nation-states was dawning’ (Faulkner, 2013; 281). • Immortalised by former British Premier Margaret Thatcher’s formulation that ‘There is No Alternative’ (TINA), ‘Neoliberalism has 'become hegemonic as a mode of discourse' (Harvey, 2005: 3)’. It has been integrated into our existential consciousness as a mandatory tool for thought and conception about our understanding of the world. • Resource-rich territories are prized open by military force, colonization, or commercial pressure…’ (Harvey; 2006)

7. Rise of Nationalism • Socio-economic insecurities produced by neo-liberalism have helped to provoke far right responses as an alternative form of racialised moral economy. • ‘…cities have became a dumping ground for a surplus population working in unskilled, unprotected and low-wage informal service industries and trade. The rise of this informal sector is a direct result of liberalisation’ (Davis; 2006) • The far right has helped secure the electoral–political hegemony of neo-liberalism within Britain and the United States since the early 1980s. • ‘They (i.e. Western working classes) see immigration as a ploy to create an industrial reserve army that exerts a downward pressure on salaries while simultaneously increasing corporate profits’ (Mishra; 2017).

8. A Pan-African Response (By Way of Conclusion) • Use the UN Security Council platform to assert the sanctity of the notion of sovereignty. • There is a need for honest self-reflection. For instance, how the situation in Libya was handled (against the advice of the African Union) cannot be divorced from the current waves of migration into Europe and the spread of terrorism in the Maghreb and Sahel regions – with the danger of terrorist groups spreading further south.. • Develop strategic alliances with like-minded global forces to augment the voice of the global moral majority. • Become more vocal on issues of human rights; sovereignty; national development; de-nuclearization, among others. • Push for permanent African representation on the UNSC.

9. An African Response cont. (By Way of Conclusion) • Afford the African masses national and continental platforms to forge strategic links with people from other continents on common global concerns. • Mobilise the Global South against the neoliberal assault as an agenda of its own. • Assert the BRICS developmental agenda in the fight against the neoliberal onslaught. • Locate the fight against neoliberalism in the AU’s African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights and the UN’s Universal Declaration on Human Rights. • Expediting the African agenda, especially such key dimensions as Agenda 2063, regional integration etc., is key to moving Africa forward in this trying times. • Espouse, promote and emphasis a capacious conception of pan-Africanism which seeks to build on shared African history to build a revolutionary African nationalism. • The trend towards democracy and a human rights culture needs to be supported. Beyond formal electoral processes, this includes civic activism, so Africa’s development can truly be people-centred and people-driven.

10. Thank you for your attention… We look neither East nor West. We look forward. Kwame Nkrumah