Dreams of Power

The Role of the Organization of African Unity in the Politics of Africa 1963-1993

K. van Walraven

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN:
  9780367134730
• eBook ISBN:
  9780429640285
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: African History
• Index: History

Originally published in 1999, this book was the first study to provide a systematic reconstruction of the OAU's ideological ground-work. It is based on OAU documents; a corpus of African perceptions of OAU functioning collected from governmental and non-governmental newspapers and publications from more than thirty African countries; and on interviews held with African diplomats and OAU officials. It was also the first study to pay attention to the OAU's role in the political psychology of state elites, which comes to the fore in the areas of OAU co-operation discussed in this book: the OAU's internal functioning; the former struggle against apartheid and colonialism; conflict management; and the OAU's role in representing collective African viewpoints in global fora. This study was originally a Ph.D. thesis, which was considered to be among the best three dissertations in political science in The Netherlands in 1997.

1 Introduction, methodology and theoretical perspectives

1.1 Introduction

This chapter first discusses the objective of this study and how it came to be formulated. It then outlines the kind of sources that were used and the methodology that was adopted in the search for those sources. Part of this methodology is a classification of African states, which is discussed in the last section of section 1.2. The relevant theoretical perspectives are introduced in section 1.3. This is followed, in section 1.4, by an analysis of the phenomenon of ideology, which is a central concept in this study. This section includes a discussion of how ideology in general and the sources used in this study in particular, are interpreted. The last section explains how the concepts of Africa and the OAU are approached. It also outlines the limitations necessary for implementing the research objective; the structure of the overall narrative; and the way in which the sources will be cited.

1.2 Methodology

The research objective

The objective of this study is to determine how the Organization of African Unity (OAU) functions in African politics. The latter term is broadly conceived as encompassing both the continent’s international relations and the domestic political configurations inside the OAU’s member states.

In formulating this central research question we were particularly interested in finding out what inter-African co-operation by way of the OAU amounted to and how this could be explained. How and under which conditions would the Organization be able to realize its objectives and to what extent would the various cleavages marking inter-African relations, as well as the OAU’s relations with other organizations, play a role in this? Answers to these inter-related queries are given in the course of this study.

Naturally, no researcher embarks on a study without holding certain initial assumptions that may colour one’s perspective on the subject. It is therefore important to know what these assumptions were. Thus, it was presumed that the kind of co-operation embodied by the OAU could be related to the configurations of power at the national level, in the sense that the Organization functions as a platform for Africa’s leaders and only reflects the interests of state elites rather than the aspirations of the mass of African peoples. It was thought that the OAU is to some extent able to structure Africa’s international relations, both in terms of inter-African ties and relations with the non-African world, although it was not clear exactly how and to what degree. We also presumed that the ideology of Pan-Africanism constitutes a useful source of influence for the OAU which, it was held, forms an organization with a low degree of institutional development and limited legal powers. It was also thought that in the field of political co-operation the OAU enjoys more prestige than other African international organizations.

This study attempts to confirm and refine these ideas. Following the by now classical, seminal analysis by Claude¹ it was — and is — contended that four variables determine the OAU’s functioning. These are the structures of Africa’s international relations; the foreign policy objectives of the OAU’s member states; the Organization’s “resources” (financial, legal); and the OAU’s objectives. It is contended that the first two variables are the most important, the other two being essentially off-shoots of Africa’s international relations and the goals of member states. As Claude puts it, international organizations do not really have objectives of themselves, but only those that are attributed to them by the member states. However, he qualifies this by observing that international organizations are dualist in nature, in the sense that they are made up of member state representatives and the personnel of the organization’s secretariat. The secretariat personnel to some extent embodies the organization’s identity. It may have its own, different, objectives.²

These observations explain why it is possible that the nature of the OAU’s objectives, and thus its role in African politics, are not undisputed. Its goals cannot simply be reduced to the formal aims inscribed in its Charter. This is especially so because this document was the result of a complex compromise and therefore excels in generalized formulations. The real objectives of the OAU can thus only be found by looking at what aims and roles are attributed to it by all its member states and, to a lesser extent, its secretariat personnel. It must be borne in mind that the whole purpose of an international organization with a large membership can be complex and may also change over time.

While international relations theorists agree that the structures of international politics exert greater influence on international organizations than vice versa, many contend that such organizations also affect international relations. If our principal aim is to determine how the OAU functions in African politics the question of its real objectives and, thus, its role therein, therefore assumes considerable importance. This importance is reinforced by the wide divergence in opinion among Africans on the issue of the Organization’s role in Africa.

Thus, governmental presentations of the OAU as an heroic institution that waged war on white minority regimes alternate with lamentations over its impotence or positive evaluation of its role in global politics. Images of the OAU as the embodiment of Pan-Africanism are articulated by its Secretariat alongside awareness of its weak position vis-à-vis the member states. Non-governmental perceptions of the OAU as the incarnation of neo-colonialism, patron of Africa’s state elites and defender of Western interests interchange with pleas for a “peoples OAU” and emphasis on the importance of an institution capable of defending the continent’s interests against the rest of the world.

The variations in these assessments point to the use of different criteria with which the Organization is judged. In order to determine the function of the OAU in African politics one must therefore also find out what exactly constitutes its fundamental rationale. This can be gleaned from its underlying ideological basis or ground-work, as composed of aims and roles attributed by the majority of member states and, secondarily, its Secretariat personnel.

Thus, the central research question had to be re-phrased as follows: finding out how the Organization of African Unity functions, in an objective sense, in African politics, with special emphasis on how this is perceived by member states and Secretariat functionaries and, in this respect, the roles and objectives attributed by them to the OAU. With member states are actually meant the state elites, i.e. the top political leadership of those countries. A precise definition of state elites is given in section 2.2. Focus on state elites is justified by the fact that, in the OAU, only governments are represented and by the assumption that the Organization tends (or tended) to act as a protector of the narrow interests of those state elites. However, one can therefore not divorce the OAU’s functioning from its role in the domestic order of member states. For this reason the revised research objective should also involve analysis of the OAU’s roles as perceived by African non-governmental circles.

This study therefore aims at providing important building-stones for a systematic reconstruction of the OAU’s ideological ground-work. Although various studies provide insights in its ideology, such a reconstruction has never been undertaken. In this respect it is noteworthy that most studies usually give an advance, rather general and superficial, assessment of the Organization’s ideological foundations, on the basis of which their authors proceed to analyse and judge its functioning.³ In attempting to reconstruct the OAU’s ideological ground-work we hope to establish the role of the OAU in African political thought. This study being intended, above all, as a contribution to the field of African studies, this aim is supposed to yield insight in African political thought on questions of international co-operation. One can think here of perceptions of Africa’s post-colonial set-up, its global position and the utility of international organizations to the management of the continental order.

However, as can be seen in the revised central research question our reconstruction is set within the goal of determining the OAU’s objective functioning in African politics. With regard to the latter’s international dimension — i.e. Africa’s international relations with the non-African world and the relations between member states (inter-African relations) — this study is undertaken in the framework of two international relations theories. Inter-African relations will be analysed from the perspective of hegemonic stability theory and Africa’s relations with the outside world are assessed through the perspective of dependency theory. While various forms of criticism have been levelled against these theories this study will, as part of its principal objective, attempt to show that both do have considerable explanatory power.

The search for sources

Broadly, the sources for this study fall into three categories: documents of the OAU; African governmental newspapers and other government publications; and data obtained through interviews.

The importance to this study of OAU documents is self-evident. OAU documentation consists of public documents and documents intended for internal use by its organs. Public documents are resolutions; declarations; decisions; statements; official publications by the General Secretariat or any of its special or regional offices; treaties; charters; conventions; communiqués; and policy statements in the form of action plans. Documents intended for internal use are verbatim records of meetings by OAU organs that were held in camera’, reports of the Secretary-General to the OAU’s policy organs; memoranda; rules of procedure of organs; financial reports and statements; protocols; notes; activity reports; and briefs. Of all these types documents were collected. An overview is given in Appendix A, which also provides information on where they can be located.

Documents carrying the formal title of resolutions, declarations, decisions and statements represent official expressions of OAU policy. Usually they are, or are intended to be, of the greatest importance, whether in actual fact or in terms of perception and publicity profile. Although they constitute an enormous volume of documents, we therefore simply tried to collect as many as possible of them. As annual reports of the Secretary-General are rather voluminous overviews of OAU activities in various fields we collected examples from different points in time. Verbatim records were also collected. Unfortunately, after the 1960s the production of these documents became rare.⁴ They consist of transcripts of tape recordings of deliberations by member state delegates at OAU meetings. Transcripts of the oral interventions of non-Anglophone delegates are always based on the simultaneous translation by interpreters. Some of these records, especially that of the founding conference⁵ are a mine of information on the disagreements, cleavages and areas of consensus between member states.

With regard to other types of OAU documents, we collected material from every field of co-operation in which the OAU is known to engage because of the wide-ranging nature of the research objective. However, in view of the importance of co-operation on political issues and co-operation in the field of decolonization documents in these areas predominate. Most OAU documents collected are in English and some in French.⁶

The second category of sources — governmental newspapers and other government publications — consists of data which demand a more detailed discussion as to their nature and significance for this study and the research procedure followed. This will be given after treatment of the third category of sources.

This third category is made up of data obtained through interviews. For this field-work was undertaken in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, in September and October 1989. Interviews were held with two groups of people: functionaries of the OAU’s General Secretariat and diplomats of African embassies in Addis Ababa.⁷ The data obtained are meant as a supplement to, and verification of, the other, written, sources, although they also contain interesting information that cannot be found in documents, such as on perceptions of OAU officials and makeshift budgeting practices.

The questi...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of Tables
• List of Figures
• Preface and acknowledgements
• Glossary
• Abbreviations
• 1 Introduction, methodology and theoretical perspectives
• 2 The structures of African politics: domestic conditions, foreign policy and international relations
• 3 Some historical and ideological perspectives
• 4 The formation of the Organization of African Unity
• 5 The internal functioning of the OAU
• 6 The OAU and the struggle against colonialism
• 7 The OAU and the management of Africa’s political order (I)
• 8 The OAU and the management of Africa’s political order (II)
• 9 Conclusions
• Epilogue: Africa and unity
• Appendices
• Bibliography