Middle Powers in World Trade Diplomacy

India, South Africa and the Doha Development Agenda

C. Efstathopoulos

• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Year: 2015
• Print ISBN: 9781137381750
• eBook ISBN: 9781137381767
• Topic: Política y relaciones internacionales
• Subtopic: Política africana

Examining how leading developing countries are increasingly shaping international economic negotiations, this book uses the case studies of India and South Africa to demonstrate the ability of states to exert diplomatic influence through different bargaining strategies and represent the interests of the developing world in global governance.

1

Middle Power Diplomacy in International Relations

The middle power concept has historically been developed as a framework for understanding the foreign policy of certain Western states, and especially Australia, Canada and the Nordic middle powers. Middle power diplomacy has been pursued extensively by industrialised states that have historically been able to “punch above their weight” through the deployment of an advanced diplomatic machinery in terms of knowledge, resources and expertise. The idea of “middlepowermanship” was developed as a foreign policy platform that could justify a special role for these states in international affairs, and it was often modified accordingly to accommodate the foreign policy needs of Western states (Ping, 2005, pp. 3–8). This functional treatment of the middle power concept often led to the misperception that only a limited number of Western states can act as middle powers.

A survey of the rich intellectual tradition of middle power approaches reveals that the analytical focus of many scholars was not to remain limited to the experiences of developed countries but to provide an analytical typology inclusive to the agency of both developed and developing countries capable and willing of pursuing an ambitious agenda in their foreign policy (Holbraad, 1984). In his approach to the concept of middlepowermanship, Robert Cox noted the need to disengage the concept from the specific experiences of certain states and treat middlepowermanship as an ideal type of statecraft and foreign policy orientation which needs to be recast in the context of the world order. As Cox noted, “the middle-power role is not a fixed universal but something that has to be rethought continually in the context of the changing state of the international system” (Cox, 1989, p. 242). In the post-Cold War era, various studies increasingly undertook this task and applied the middle power concept to the emerging states of the global South. Different Southern states took a more active role in international affairs and qualified for the middle power category, including Argentina, Brazil, Malaysia, Mexico, India and South Africa.¹

The two case studies of this book, India and South Africa, have followed comparable historical trajectories of middlepowermanship in order to exert great influence on the international stage. South Africa has often been described as the archetypal middle power of the global South, emerging to assume in the post-apartheid period an internationalist role which resembles the classic form of middlepowermanship pursued by Western states (Bischoff, 2003; Hamill and Lee, 2001; Schoeman, 2003; Van der Westhuizen, 1998). India has in the past been theorised as an aspiring middle power which attempted to exert an independent voice during the Cold War (Mellor, 1979), and which in the post-Cold war period has been in the process of completing the transition to a major power status (Nayar and Paul, 2003), though it retains key elements of a middle power approach to foreign policy (Efstathopoulos, 2011). The foreign policies of India and South Africa have also been interpreted as a new form of middle power diplomacy which allows these states to emerge as distinct actors in global governance and depart from the traditional Third World modes of diplomacy (Alden and Vieira, 2005; Flemes, 2009a). These works suggest that there are not only substantial similarities in the diplomatic behaviour of India and South Africa as emerging middle powers but also different paths to pursing a middle power path to international affairs and potentially overcoming the middle power role to emerge as a major power. It also becomes evident from these studies that understanding the contemporary foreign policy of Southern states such as India and South Africa requires revising and expanding the middle power concept to include aspects of statecraft and foreign policy reflective of the agency of these states.

Middle power approaches entail different theoretical frameworks for identifying intermediate states.² This book presents a synthesis of two major types of middle power approaches in order to present a theoretical framework that will help assess the diplomacy of India and South Africa in the WTO. The two approaches include (i) behavioural approaches to middle powers and (ii) theoretical approaches to the middle powers of the global South. Behavioural approaches comprise the most influential framework for identifying and theorising middle powers. They allow for identifying distinct patterns of diplomatic behaviour which are unique to middle powers, demonstrating how middle powers act internationally, how they frame their foreign policy and how they choose to operationalise their resources. These distinct patterns of diplomatic behaviour are understood to apply to all categories of middle powers. The second category of approaches that focus on the middle powers of the global South includes works which have already applied the behavioural approach to select developing countries which are understood to follow foreign policies that embody the key behavioural aspects of the first model. At the same time, these approaches attempt to identify characteristics which are specific to Southern Middle Powers (SMPs) and differentiate these states from Western Middle Powers (WMPs). Also included in this category is inter-related work on emerging powers which does not treat the middle power concept as a reference point per se but provides a theoretical taxonomy which overlaps substantially with behavioural approaches. The synthesis of these two approaches allows for theorising middle powers at the levels of structure and agency and comprises a methodological platform for understanding the different choices available to middle powers. The following sections identify the key analytical tools that will be deployed in this book and draw from these different approaches to present the three main arguments of this book.

1.1 The behavioural approach

Middle power internationalism

Behavioural approaches to middle powers focus on identifying and theorising the diplomatic behaviour of this category of states. The willingness and ability to pursue distinct roles, strategies and interests at the international level is the context that defines certain states as middle powers.³ The analytical task of behavioural approaches is to identify a “commonality of behaviour” among states considered as middle powers and locate those behavioural parameters which are unique to middle powers in the global system (Ping, 2005, pp. 51–52). As Cooper has argued, “the classification of middle powers as a separate class of countries in the hierarchy of nations stands or falls not on their subjective identification but on the fact that this category of actors engages in some distinctive form of activity” (Cooper, 1997a, p. 7). Through this analytical exercise, middle powers are distinguished from major powers, from other countries with middle-ranking capabilities and from small states. Behavioural approaches therefore address the misperception that the middle power taxonomy constitutes a loose category where various states that “matter” in international politics can be placed. The middle power category is understood to comprise a distinct category of non-major powers which may not (yet) qualify for major power status but may exert considerable influence on international affairs.

Middle powers are distinguished from other intermediate, regional or middle-ranking powers by virtue of the influence they are able and willing to exert on the global stage (Flemes and Nolte, 2010, pp. 5–6). They are able to transcend regional boundaries and project a form of diplomatic internationalism that allows them to shape regime formation and decision-making outcomes within global governance. Such influence may not reach the degrees of structural power exhibited by the major powers, but it is nevertheless significantly higher compared to the roles of other categories of states on the global stage. Middle powers are not limited to influencing outcomes in one singular issue but play a leading role across different regimes and negotiations. In this respect, a middle power is a state that few would consider as a major power, “yet whose total capabilities suggest it belongs among the top-ten-plus global powers” (Armijo and Burges, 2010, p. 17). The middle power role therefore presupposes a substantial degree of influence at the international level. Lack of capacity and/or ability to pursue such an internationalist role automatically excludes a state from the middle power category. Middle power internationalism is a foreign policy platform that only a limited number of developing states are in a position to pursue.

The starting point of the behavioural model is the classic definition provided by Cooper, Higgott and Nossal, who define the behaviour of middle powers as “their tendency to pursue multilateral solutions to international problems, their tendency to embrace compromise positions in international disputes, and their tendency to embrace notions of ‘good international citizenship’ to guide their diplomacy” (Cooper et al., 1993, p. 19). This world view is operationalised by performing the distinct roles of catalyst, facilitator and manager (ibid, pp. 24–25). A catalyst state provides the leadership for gathering diplomatic momentum towards resolving a particular international issue. A facilitator state engages in collaborative activities for setting the agenda and reaching international agreement. A manager plays a central role in institution-building, whether this takes place in formal international regimes or conventions and norms, and performs confidence-building diplomacy to break deadlocks (ibid). Middle powers are also uniquely positioned to act as mediators in conflict management.⁴ A mediator promotes conciliation between opposing parties, generates collective understandings that facilitate conflict resolution and exercises bridge-building diplomacy between opposing blocs of states (such as East–West and North–South camps in multilateral fora) (Henrikson, 1997, pp. 56–60). All of these specialised roles allow middle powers to exercise maximum leverage in international politics.

Middle powers tend to perform these roles in specific issue areas of international affairs. In this way, they perform distinct forms of “niche diplomacy” by “concentrating resources in specific areas best able to generate returns worth having, rather than trying to cover the field” (Cooper et al., 1993, pp. 25–26; see also Cooper, 1997b). This concentration may be the result of resource limitations as middle powers, in contrast to major powers, lacking the capacity to spread and deploy their diplomatic resources across the board of international regimes. Resource constraints therefore require prioritising goals and the targeting of issue areas most likely to provide maximum returns (Ravenhill, 1998, p. 311). Niche diplomacy might entail a more targeted and concentrated form of foreign policy, but it cannot be limited to pursuing diplomatic activism on a singular issue. In that respect, middle powers are distinguished from other states that might have a strong influence on one particular regime but lack overall an internationalist orientation in their foreign policy.⁵ Middle power diplomacy rather entails securing multiple niches of international affairs in a more consistent fashion. Niche diplomacy should not therefore be misperceived as a reflection of limitations in international diplomacy. While middle powers face constraints by virtue of the distribution of material capabilities (as a realist interpretation would suggest), the deployment of alternative resources allows them to overcome material limitations. The behaviour of middle powers is distinguished from that of other states by the resources they tend to operationalise through niche diplomacy. The comparative advantage of middle powers mainly lies in their ideational resources, including bureaucratic capacity, technical expertise and policymaking knowledge and ideas. Middle power activism is driven and sustained by non-material and ideational resources, rather than material capabilities that are determined by systemic positioning (Lee, 1999, pp. 20–24).

The nature of ideational resources helps demonstrate why middle power behaviour is distinguished from major and other intermediate powers. A state possessing middle-range material capabilities may fail to project influence if it lacks the ideational resources, knowledge and capacity commensurate to middle power internationalism. Ideational resources allow middle powers to overcome material constraints and exert disproportionate influence on international regimes. In comparison, major powers command a greater array of resources and are therefore unlikely to be dependent solely on ideational resources to maximise their influence. Behavioural approaches to middle powers capture this qualitative difference by identifying the different types of leadership middle powers provide.⁶ Intellectual and entrepreneurial leadership are central to understanding the underlying significance of non-structural forms of leadership (i.e. material resources translated to bargaining leverage) that middle powers project in regime negotiation and formation.⁷

Middle power leadership is typically pursued through multilateralism. Middle powers demonstrate “an abiding preference for multilateralism” and perceive international institutions as “the most appropriate forum for multilateral negotiations” (Nossal and Stubbs, 1997, p. 151). They are inclined to support the formation of new organisations to govern new issue areas, while attempting to sustain the operation of existing institutions. International organisations provide legitimate access to critical issues of international politics and allow middle powers to promote their preferred solutions to global problems, and project and institutionalise their preferred norms of global governance. For these reasons, middle powers are averse to negotiating issues at the bilateral or plurilateral levels (ibid). They rather tend to concentrate their diplomatic activism on international institutions in order to maximise the bargaining power they lack unilaterally (ibid). Institutions provide the legal, normative and moral authority to operationalise the typical functions that middle powers perform. They facilitate mediatory and managerial roles due to institutional structures that naturally promote processes of consensus-building, diplomatic engagement and conflict management (Henrikson, 1997, p. 47). International institutions provide better opportunities for middle powers to articulate their interests and defend themselves more effectively against major powers that can be constrained through institutional rules (Hurrell, 2000, p. 4). Middle powers are provided with the political space to project their world vision on the global stage, demonstrate their commitment to peace and stability, and strengthen their image of responsibility and “global citizenship” (Schoeman, 2003, p. 351). Public diplomacy is central in operationalising middle power leadership, and the ability of middle powers to influence negotiating outcomes is increasingly determined by their ability to successfully advertise their causes at the public domain (Gilboa, 2009). As noted above, the condition of middle powers where material resources may be limited necessitates an innovative use of public diplomacy (Batora, 2006).

The tendency of middle powers to concentrate their activism at the multilateral level is often linked to initiatives aimed towards coalition-building with like-minded states (Higgott and Cooper, 1990; Lovbraek, 1990). States are likely to join middle power coalitions because of the symmetrical relations that are expected to determine interaction among like-minded allies and that sharply contrast with the relations of domination prevalent in major power coalitions (Lee, 1999, p. 21). Middle power coalitions have a greater impact when participating states are bound by collective understandings, share common norms, ideas and cultural values, and have common interests with regard to problemidentification and problem-solving (ibid, pp. 20, 23). Coalition-building allows for exerting greater leverage against major powers and may amount to veto diplomacy and the blocking of certain agendas that may seem as directly undermining the core beliefs of middle powers (Lightfoot, 2006). Coalition-building reflects both the weaknesses and strengths of middle powers. Middle powers may fail to realise their objectives outside of these coalitions as they face resource constraints when acting unilaterally. Their intellectual and entrepreneurial output, however, is catalytic for the formation of coalitions whose members would fail to cooperate in the absence of middle power leadership (Ravenhill, 1998, p. 312). Such coalitions may engulf a wider set of non-state actors. Coalitions between middle powers and NGOs have been notable in areas such as international law, development, disarmament and human rights, allowing middle powers to benefit from the process of NGO campaigning (Behringer, 2005; Bolton and Nash, 2010).

All of these behavioural characteristics are not unique to the diplomacy of middle powers. Major powers can also perform these roles and project similar behavioural patterns in their diplomacy. The behavioural model, however, suggests that such behavioural patterns are more likely to be associated with states that are understood as middle powers. It is the combination of these characteristics (and all of the characteristics that will be examined in the rest of this chapter) that constitutes and sustains the very categorisation of a state as a middle power. A middle power path of diplomacy may be available to major powers. The incentives, however, of major powers for adopting such a form of diplomacy are limited since they can pursue their objectives through other means of power. It is usually middle powers that tend to mobilise their entrepreneurial and technical resources in specific issue areas of international affairs.

Good international citizenship

The extent to which middle power behaviour is motivated by altruistic or instrumental factors has been a matter of debate and deserves special attention. For some scholars, middle powers practice a form of “humane internationalism” that is understood to “run directly counter to the basic assumptions of International Realism” (Pratt, 1990, p. 11). Guided by altruism, humanitarian principles and cosmopolitan values, the foreign policy of middle powers elevates them to a distinct category of “good states” or “global good Samaritans” (Brysk, 2009, pp. 4–7; Lawler, 2005). Other approaches note that middle power behaviour is guided by self-interest to the same degree as any other state in international relations, the difference being that middle powers will tend to locate their interests in those niches that allow them to exert maximum influence and obtain maximum returns (Ungerer, 2007, p. 540). Self-interest guides much of the discourse of “good international citizenship”, and that altruism cannot be taken as a strong, or at least a unique, indicator of middle power behaviour (Cooper et al., 1993, p. 19; Neack, 1995).

While the motivations driving good international citizenship can be contested, the very inclination to frame foreign policy in such a context comprises a central behavioural aspect of middle power internationalism. Good international citizenship forms an integral part of the behavioural model, as also stated in the classic definition by Cooper et al. that middle powers are identified by “. . . their tendency to embrace notions of ‘good international citizenship’ to guide their diplomacy” (Cooper et al., 1993, p. 19). The praxis of good international citizenship is a basic indicator of middle power behaviour, notwithstanding the degrees of altruism or instrumental calculation driving such behaviour. Middlepowermanship can serve as a strategic vision to achieve status and moral prestige in the pursuit of self-interest, but idealistic imperatives may remain relevant (Neack, 2003, pp. 165–166). Historical experience demonstrates that policymakers of middle powers tended to identify both instrumental and idealist objectives as central goals in their quest for international status. Good international citizenship may therefore be understood as a by-product of both “status-seeking” behaviour and enlightened self-interest (ibid, p. 165).

The historical experience of WMPs reveals how the blending of altruism and self-interest guided their foreign policy. It suggests that the propensity of middle powers towards good international citizenship derives from interest-based considerations that dictate that the interests of middle powers lay in preventing and diffusing destabilising crises at both the political and the economic spheres (Black, 1997). Middle powers cannot act as systemic stabilisers like major powers due to the resource constraints they face. The choice, however, of focusing on a particular niche of crisis management is determined by the interest or necessity of actively engaging in that particular issue area (ibid, p. 115). When no direct interest is involved, a range of other calculations take place. Middle powers will assess the space available for manoeuvring against the interests of major powers, the effects of their diplomatic activism on their relations with major powers and the extent to which middle power intervention can have a meaningful impact (ibid, p. 116). One of these calculations is the implication of activism or non-activism for a middle power’s international prestige. On the one hand, non-interf...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• List of Abbreviations
• Introduction
• 1. Middle Power Diplomacy in International Relations
• 2. The Doha Development Agenda, 2000–1
• 3. The Middle Power Offensive, 2002–3
• 4. A New Leadership, 2004–5
• 5. The Informal Phase and Crisis Management, 2006–13
• 6. Southern Middle Powers in Comparative Perspective
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index