Doctoral Degrees (Political Science)

Permanent URI for this collection

https://scholar.sun.ac.za/handle/10019.1/658

Browse

Browsing Doctoral Degrees (Political Science) by Author "Bridgman, Martha"

Now showing 1 - 1 of 1
  • Thumbnail Image
    Item
    Between 'partnership' and disengagement : mapping the contours of US policy towards post-apartheid South Africa
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 1999-12) Bridgman, Martha; Nel, Philip R.; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Political Science.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: As Pretoria grapples simultaneously with its apartheid past and its promising but precarious future, an accurate map of US policy towards post-apartheid South Africa is critical. Without such a map, policymakers are liable to miscalculate US commitment to engagement, perhaps to detrimental effect. Seeking to draw the contours of US policy between 1994 and 1999, this study operates at the junctures between realism and liberalism, and between international relations and comparative foreign policy theory, allowing insights from each to illuminate analysis across a broad range of issue-areas. US calls for "partnership" with South Africa must be considered against the backdrop of global developments, historical patterns, and current political exigencies in the US, especially pressures for disengagement. Discussion thus begins at the system level before presenting a brief overview of the history of US South Africa policy and of policy under Clinton as demonstrated via official statements, administrative initiatives, and US responses to events involving South Africa. Analysis then delves into the subunit level, considering the role of public opinion and bureaucratic process and politics in US policymaking. The study disaggregates Clinton's South Africa policy across four issue-areas, as suggested by Zimmerman's "issue-based foreign policy paradigm," in this case namely development assistance, trade, global and regional security, and issues of political symbolism. Issue-area analysis reveals interest group and bureaucratic activity in each of these areas, and indicates the net direction of policy towards Pretoria with regard to engagement. The research found that the end of the Cold War, a reduced US economic advantage internationally, and globalisation have created the conditions for a return to the fundamental US policy of democracy promotion. Under this policy, South Africa has featured as both a pivotal state and a big emerging market, and as one of a few nations to share a Binational Commission with America. Democracy promotion is not free from detractors, however, who denounce it as a "recolonisation" of the developing world. Such criticism warrants attention. Further, the analysis confirmed the suggestion that US foreign policy is more accurately described as a set of policies, and therefore that issuearea analysis has value in clarifying the net direction of the various threads of US policy towards a particular nation, based on the domestic factors underlying policy in each issuearea. At the sub-national level, issue-area analysis showed that, since 1994, both interest group and bureaucratic activity has, on balance, encouraged deeper engagement in South Africa. In fact, there is unprecedented interest from sources within the public and the government. The Binational Commission stands as an example of this, as well as of the Clinton/Gore drive to "reinvent government." On this note, while the BNC has not revolutionised Africa policymaking, it has accomplished projects in record time and established valuable links which should last beyond the current period. The US emphasis on its "partnership" with South Africa may need reviewing, however, in view of the potential cost of such a liaison for South Africa. Delivery on promises, rather than rhetoric, would be of greater assistance to South Africa in it's quest to grow as a democratic, economically thriving and independent leader among developing nations.