The African Union and African Agency in International Politics

Description

This book examines the role of the African Union in relation to African agency in international politics. It examines the manner and extent to which the African Union exercises two forms of agency—shirking and slippage—in its strategic and collaborative partnerships. The author focuses on four major AU partnerships with the European Union, NATO, the United Nations and US AFRICOM. The books examines African agency in each partnership by exploring the politics and dynamics of each partnership in different aspects: the multilevel engagement, institutionalization, resource contribution and disbursement, as well as preference linkage. It specifically does that by examining African ownership and leadership in all of these aspects. The book highlights the role of agency slack as a survival strategy to escape from the AU’s subaltern position in international politics. It designates the partnership with the European Union as emblematic of African agency; while the others exhibit different forms of agency slack. Partnerships with NATO and the United Nations exhibit shirking, while that with the US AFRICOM exhibits slippage. Preface Acknowledgements Contents Acronyms List of Tables 1 Introduction Libya and That Other Thing: An Agential Cudgel The Problem of African Agency in International Affairs: From Fiction to “Agency Slack” The African Union and African Agency African Agency as an Inside-Out Dynamic Outline of the Chapters 2 African Agency as Agency Slack: From Fiction to Multilateral Empirics Agency Slack as African Agency: From Fiction and Phantoms to Realities A Case for African Multilateral Agency as Agency Slack Foreign Policy as African Agency and African Agency as Foreign Policy African Union: Foreign Policy Actor and Foreign Policy Maker The Context of Africa’s Agency Slack in International Affairs: Post-Coloniality, Identity and Ideology Agents, Elites and African Summitry as Drivers of African Agency Constituting Actors and Processes at AU: African Foreign Policy Making 3 African Agency in Historical Perspective: A History of Agency Slack African Agency in the Face of Imperialism and Patronage, 1950s–1990s France’s Unmasked Colonialism: An Unabashed on African Agency From Monrovia to Khartoum and Sirte (1960–1999) Regionalism and Agency: Africa’s Multilateral Arthritis African Agency Slack in the 1970s: Formation of the Africa-Arab League Partnership Negotiating African Agency from Within: Conferences and Summitry, 1980s–1990s 4 Agential Challenges Within African Regionalism and Security Agency in Regional Security Systems: Leadership, Roles and Burden Sharing Alliances and Coalitions in Regional Security Burden Sharing and Role Playing in Regional Security Politics of African Regional Security Empirics of African Collective Security and Implications for African Agency The AU Peace and Security Council and the African Security Regime No Hegemonic Leadership Decimated Political Will in the Era of Democratisation Financial Constraints Mutual Suspicion Lack of Coercive Power 5 African Agency in the Early Design of African Security Institutions The Institutionalization of the Peace and Security Council The Institutionalization of the Pan-African Network of the Panel of the Wise Continental Early Warning Systems The African Standby Force The AU Peace Fund Agency Without Leadership: An Experiment in Strategic Citizenship International Partners’ and APSA Institutions: Navigating Agency in the Mission Space EU Support Towards APSA Institutions The PSC and the COPS The African Standby Force and Peace Support Operations The Africa Peace Facility and the AU Peace Fund The Early Warning Systems and the PANWISE UN Support to the APSA UN Support to the ASF: AU PST to the UNOSOA UNSC Relationship with the Peace and Security Council UN Support to the Continental Early Warning Systems UN Support to the APF: The Parallel Funding Failed UN Support to PANWISE NATO Support to APSA Support to the ASF: Between HQ and the Mission Space Explaining Lack of Support to the PSC, CEWS, PANWISE, APF US AFRICOM Support to the AU and APSA Support to the African Standby Force Support to the AU Peace Fund Explaining Lack of Support to CEWS, PANWISE and PSC Partners’ Support and the Situs of African Agency 6 The Africa–EU Partnership and African Agency: Model or Pareidolia? Origins of the Partnership Diplomacy and Engagement: From Lomé to Cotonou Support Towards APSA Institutions and Latitude for More African Action The African Standby Force and Peace Support Operations The Africa Peace Facility and the AU Peace Fund Preference Coordination Between Africa and Europe On Palpable Agential Outcomes Is This an Epitome of African Agency in International Partnerships? Soft Coercion, Power and Forum Shopping: Teetering on the Verge of Agency Slack? 7 Shirking in AU Partnerships: The UN and NATO Introduction The AU–UN Partnership Origins of the Partnership Engagement and Contention Nested Causes of Shirking Shirking in an Indispensable Partnership Teetering on the Brink of Full African Agency? The AU–NATO Partnership Origins of Contentions in the AU–NATO Partnership Lackadaisical Diplomacy and Engagement: A Symptom of Shirking A Continuum of Diverging Preferences and Linked Interests Sources of Shirking in the AU–NATO Partnership Teetering on Slippage? AU–NATO Pre-Libyan Intervention 8 Slippage in AU Partnerships: The US Africa Command Institutional Design of AFRICOM Origins and Motivations for the Partnership Institutional Map of the Partnership Diplomacy and Engagement, 2007–2013 Contentious Preferences Slippage Between Addis and Washington Slippage or Another Degree of Shirking? African Agency in AU and AFRICOM Strategic Futures 9 Conclusion Diplomatic Engagement and Partnership Outcomes African Strategic Citizenship Imperialism, Coloniality and Forum Shopping The Historical and Chronological Influence on Agency Major Events in the History of the Partnerships The Nature of Agreement and Partnerships Cognitive Regionalism, Security and agency Interest and Preference Linkage and agency Caveats on These Conclusions Wither Agency Slack in the Partnerships Index