Creating a Regional Security Community in Southern Latin America: The Institutionalisation of the Regional Defence and Security Policies

Interdependence, collective identities and common institutions are the preconditions for the evolution of a pluralistic security community. While the interaction of the states of Southern Latin America already meets the first two criteria, this article focuses on the third one, particularly the common institutions of the regional defence and security sector. The bilaterally organised defence cooperation has been attested democratic deficiencies because military actors are over-proportionally represented in these committees. Military nationalism and an exaggerated notion of national sovereignty in the military academies of the region can be regarded as cooperation hampering qualifiers. Non-military threats (organised crime, transnational terrorism) have centripetal effects on the subregional cooperation, which is structured multilaterally and shows a relatively high degree of institutionalisation.security community, regional cooperation, defence and security policies, Latin America, Mercosur, Argentina, Brazil, Chile

Conceptualising Regional Power in International Relations: Lessons from the South African Case

Regional powers can be distinguished by four pivotal criteria: claim to leadership, power resources, employment of foreign policy instruments, and acceptance of leadership. Applying these indicators to the South African case, the analysis demonstrates the crucial significance of institutional foreign policy instruments. But although the South African government is ready to pay the costs of co-operative hegemony (such as capacity building for regional institutions and peacekeeping), the regional acceptance of South Africa’s leadership is constrained by its historical legacy. Additionally, Pretoria’s foreign policy is based on ideational resources such as its reputation as an advocate of democracy and human rights and the legitimacy derived from its paradigmatic behaviour as a ‘good global citizen’. However, the Mbeki presidency is more successful in converting these resources into discursive instruments of interest-assertion in global, rather than in regional bargains. In effect the regional power’s reformist South-oriented multilateralism is challenging some of the guiding principles of the current international system.South Africa, regional power, foreign policy, co-operative hegemony, multipolarisation of the international system

Emerging Middle Powers’ Soft Balancing Strategy: State and Perspectives of the IBSA Dialogue Forum

How can weaker states influence stronger ones? This article offers a case study of one recent exercise in coalition building among Southern middle powers, the ‘India, Brazil, South Africa (IBSA) Dialogue Forum’. The analysis outlines five major points: first, it argues that the three emerging players can be defined as middle powers in order to frame their foreign policy behavior and options at the global level. Second, soft balancing is a suitable concept to explain IBSA’s strategy in global institutions. Third, institutional foreign policy instruments are of pivotal significance in IBSA’s soft balancing strategy. Fourth, the potential gains of IBSA’s sector cooperation, particularly in trade, are limited due to a lack of complementarity of the three economies. And fifth, IBSA’s perspectives and impact on the international system will depend on four variables: IBSA’s ability to focus on distinct areas of cooperation, the consolidation of its common strategy of soft balancing, the institutionalization of IBSA, and its enlargement in order to obtain more weight in global bargains.India, Brazil, South Africa, IBSA Dialogue Forum, middle power, foreign policy, international relations, South-South relations

Nigeria: A Prime Example of the Resource Curse? Revisiting the Oil-Violence Link in the Niger Delta

Given the importance of the assertion or prevention of regional leadership for the future global order, this paper examines the strategies and resources being used to assert regional leadership as well as the reactions of other states within and outside the respective regions. Secondary powers play a key role in the regional acceptance of a leadership claim. In this article we identify the factors motivating secondary powers to accept or contest this claim. Three regional dyads, marked by different degrees of “contested leadership,” are analyzed: Brazil vs. Venezuela, India vs. Pakistan, and South Africa vs. Nigeria. The research outcomes demonstrate that the strategies of regional powers and the reactions of secondary powers result from the distribution of material capabilities and their application, the regional powers’ ability to project ideational resources, the respective national interests of regional and secondary powers, and the regional impact of external powers.Brazil, India, South Africa, regional powers, regional and global order, leadership

Creating Multilevel Security Governance in South America

South America’s security agenda demands the simultaneous management of domestic crises, interstate conflicts and transnational threats. Though located at different systemic levels (national, international, transnational), the three conflict clusters are often interrelated and tend to overlap in the region’s border areas. The region’s policy makers, aware of this highly complex agenda and in spite of their striking differences, have tended to build regional structures of authority that coordinate, manage and rule collective responses to these threats. In addition, the unilateral, bilateral and multilateral structures and the region’s capabilities to solve conflicts have become more important than the respective inter- American bodies over the past decade. Given this shift in the management of regional security affairs, we ask if a multilevel approach on the part of an overarching security architecture is more effective than separate governance schemes regarding each specific security threat. Since neither the traditional models of power balancing and alliance building nor the security-community approach can sufficiently explain the region’s security dynamics, we assume and provide evidence that different systems of security governance overlap and coexist in South America.Central African Republic, peace process, political parties, rebel movements,representation

India-Brazil-South Africa (IBSA) in the new global order: interests, strategies and values of the emerging coalition

A question of interest to scholars of International Politics concerns the manner in which weaker states attempt to influence stronger ones. This article offers a case study of one recent exercise in coalition-building among southern powers as a vehicle for change in international relations. It analyzes the global interests, strategies and values of India-Brazil-South Africa (IBSA) and the impact of the IBSA Dialogue Forum on the global order. Five major points are outlined. First, common ideas and values shape the global discourse of the emerging coalition. Second, soft balancing based on a value-driven middle power discourse is a suitable concept to explain IBSA’s strategy in global institutions. Third, institutional foreign policy instruments such as agenda-setting and coalition-building are pivotal elements of IBSA’s soft balancing approach. Fourth, the trilateral coalition suffers from considerable divergence of interest in global governance issues and limited potential gains of its sectoral cooperation, particularly in trade, due to a lack of complementarities of the participating economies. Finally, despite these obstacles the IBSA Forum has impacted the global order in recent years as a powerful driver for change. India, Brazil and South Africa have contributed to an incremental global power shift in their favour. The southern coalition also induced a change in the character of multilateralism and, in particular, its procedural values

Brazil’s Nuclear Policy. From Technological Dependence to Civil Nuclear Power

Since March 2006 Brazil has been the ninth country to control the full nuclear fuel cycle. While the U.S. government bashes the uranium enrichment activities in Iran, it has come to an arrangement with the uranium enrichment in its backyard after transitional diplomatic tensions. As signer of the Non-Proliferation Treaty Brazil has the right to enrich uranium for peaceful use. This article focuses on the political motives and objectives connected with the domination of this key technology. Brasilia has been striving for regional leadership and participation in international decision making processes. In historical perspective the Brazilian enrichment procedure marks the liberation from the technological U.S. dependence. Brazil seems to be on the way to establish itself as a civil nuclear power in international relations.Brazil, nuclear policy, uranium enrichment, Non-Proliferation Treaty, U.S. foreign policy