Africa’s relations with the EU: a reset is possible if Europe changes its attitude
Niall Duggan, University College Cork; Luis Mah, Universidade de Lisboa , and Toni Haastrup, University of Stirling
Summits between the African Union and European Union are essential to setting the big picture agenda of contemporary Africa-EU relations. They also carry weight because of their potential to ensure that African perspectives are also prioritised within the relationship.
Over the past six decades, trade and development has constituted the main basis for interaction between African countries, the continent’s institutions, and the EU. The EU remains an important actor in Africa despite the growing interests of other actors such as China, Turkey and the US among others.
To negotiate and facilitate favourable terms of engagement, summits are important – even essential – diplomatic sites for African leaders. But they are not without their tensions, the main one being the fact that the power balance between the two blocs is wholly unequal.
The EU’s economic and political power in global relations far exceeds Africa’s. Consequently, the EU’s priorities dominate key agreements. Even at the inception of what is now the EU, in 1957, the terms of engagement with African countries was determined without consultation with Africans themselves. The EU has refused to check the power hierarchies that keep alienating Africans. The difference in approach to dealing with the pandemic further underscores these tensions.
The persistent power inequalities do not bode well for supposed change. This is why the latest summit presents an urgent opportunity for the EU to convince African decision makers that – this time – the desire for change can be followed through by action.
The EU of course must agree with the idea that African priorities matter and that they can be mutually beneficial for Africans and Europeans if given a chance.
This attitude benefits the EU’s own aims as a global actor while enhancing Africa-EU relations too.
Summits – what are they good for?
The first summit between the EU and African countries was held in Cairo, Egypt in 2002. It was held on the eve of the formation of the African Union, which replaced the Organisation of African Unity.
The summit marked an important milestone in Africa-EU relations.
First, it was engaging Africa as a region outside of the transnational African, Caribbean and Pacific grouping. Significantly, it provided the opening to move the relationship beyond trade and development cooperation. These had reinforced colonial patterns of interaction.
New areas were considered. They included the facilitation of regional integration, science and technology, energy governance, climate change, security, good governance and migration.
This period aligned with changes in both blocs. In Africa this was happening through the formation of the AU. For its part the EU was developing its own foreign policy practice. This was set out more clearly in its 2003 European Security Strategy.
Underpinning the move towards continent-to-continent engagement was the attempt to reconfigure relations. This was to ensure that the Africa side had a say in defining priorities within the relationship. With the creation of a new continental institution to set collective priorities, the summit reinforced the idea that the power asymmetries that had previously defined relations were coming to an end.
Yet, the opening provided by the summit was not fully realised. Beyond the broader issue areas, the relations remained more or less the same.
The opportunity to revisit the status came once again at the second summit in Lisbon, which launched the Joint Africa-EU Strategy, supported by an Action Plan 2008-2010.
The strategy was more political than previous agreements. It focused on peace and security, democratic governance and human rights, while reinforcing trade and regional integration. It was supported by a narrative that promised greater accountability to citizens and not just decision makers.
The idea seemed to be that this was a partnership of equals – that the problem of asymmetry had been confronted.
But not much changed as a result of this so-called people-centred partnership. The strategy was all but abandoned as a governance framework for Africa-EU relations. The EU appeared to favour the trade and development focused 2000 Cotonou agreement which had gained precedence in the context of existing EU-ACP relations.
Despite the minimal advancements in the scope of the relationship in Cairo and especially in Lisbon, the promise of a true continent-to-continent relationship seemed in the rear-view mirror.
A new dimension was included in 2010 at the third Africa-EU summit, held in Tripoli, Libya. This was the formal integration of civil society into the process of policy development and implementation.
The summit also endorsed the second Action Plan (2011-2013). But the process of getting there brought to a head some of the simmering tensions between the two sides.
For example, the AU refused to sign elements in the second declaration related to climate change commitments. It wanted these deferred. This pushback came at a time of increasing assertiveness on the part of Africa vis-a-vis the EU. Other examples included the AU’s resistance to the EU’s insistence that African countries sign up to the Economic Partnership Agreements. For some AU states, the EU’s tactics to force this issue illustrated the maintenance of hierarchical colonial relations.
Over the years, summits have been supported by the thematic ministerial-level and annual meetings between the European Commission and the Africa Union Commission as well as ad hoc delegations between European and Pan-African parliaments. These dialogue sites in between summits should have helped deepen trust and moved both sides towards a joint agenda.
However, underpinning the resistance to change is the architecture of engagement which has been forged in colonial hierarchies which unfortunately persist.
Yet, the current state of affairs would suggest they have only reinforced the power asymmetries in the relationship.
Old problems persist
As the partner with “special” relations with African countries, summits with the EU are especially important as sites for the articulation of African positions and priorities – African agency. Yet, the perception that the EU does not take seriously its own calls to reset or “overhaul” the Africa-EU relationship has created the space for new and close relationships with other actors.
One example of this is the EU insistence on Economic Partnership Agreements, which African countries have consistently resisted on the basis that they undermine Africa’s own regional economic integration plans. This, however, does not dissuade the EU from making them, at times, a condition for further engagement.
Recently, the EU’s approach to the governance of the COVID pandemic is at odds with Africa’s, reinforcing the perceptions that African priorities are either ignored or downplayed.
Reflecting on the summits in Brussels and Abidjan in 2014 and 2017 respectively, this desire for reset remains unrealised – the discussions surrounding this summit feel very much like déjà vu.
Arguably, the potential of the typical Africa-EU summits as sites to deepen the continent-to-continent relationship may be waning.
Niall Duggan, Lecturer in International Politics , University College Cork; Luis Mah, Lecturer in Development Studies , Universidade de Lisboa , and Toni Haastrup, Senior Lecturer in International Politics, University of Stirling
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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When Government Becomes the Umpire in Crisis
Written by Wonah Martin Odey, Commonwealth Scholar and Postgraduate student on the MSc International Conflict and Cooperation Programme at the University of Stirling. Published 11 August 2021.
India, a country with the second-largest population in the world is teaching us the role government plays in the lives of its citizens, especially when either religion or scientific advice must be followed. Humans may be free to practice their religion but sometimes the scientific advice for their safety in times of crisis can threaten their right to do so. When you must choose between religion and science and when that choice is to be done at the risk of Covid-19, then the situation can be likened to sitting on the sharpest edge of a knife. Any careless move will have grave consequences. In shocking defiance of global health precautions, pilgrims in India went ahead with one of their biggest religious festivals – the Kumbh Mela fete. The religious exercise happens every 12 years and pilgrims get to take a dip in the Ganges River, an action that is believed to cleanse from sins. This makes things both complicated and interesting. Complicated because we are talking about real life situations with consequences of deaths, but also interesting because it shows us how people react when they are caught between religion and science. One respondent who was interviewed by NTV Houston, maintained that “there is fear of Covid-19 but faith is at its peak”. The fact that infection rates from March 2020 to April 2021 stood above 25,300,565 did not ring a bell. Records show that there was over 500% spike in deaths and infection in the same month of April when the Kumbh Festival held.
The big question is; what will save India now? Before passing judgment, let us be reminded that India has an unshakable reputation in medical advancements. As early as 500 BC, the Indians had perfected the practice of herbal medicine and much of the medical exploits from herbs can be traced back to the Atharvaveda, an ancient text that prescribes medicines for various forms of ailments. Even the pseudoscientific Ayurveda is being used by over 80% of India’s population till today. Most of these discoveries have roots in Hinduism. We can still go on to mention Gregor Mendel, the Augustinian monk who invented the science of crossbreeding. All these point to the fact that science and religion can live and breathe in one space, but must be given their due places to thrive.
Neither religion nor science can save humanity in themselves as they soon drift to the extreme, having no tolerance for the other. The right question to be asking is: what will save India – religion, science or government? Without government action, neither science nor religion can be good for humanity. It is like having scientific prowess to develop nuclear weapons with no regulations or giving religion the power to judge science. In parts of the world where this is the case, scientists may not even live long enough to discover anything. The persecution of Galileo Galilei (1564 – 1642) by the early church comes to mind. Galileo already reminded us long before now that “the Bible shows the way to go to heaven, not the way the heavens go.” Finding a balance between religion and science is where prosperity lies and the umpire that does this is the government.
There were warning signs which should have as well been considered a buildup to the catastrophe. In January, the Central Bank of India painted a glamorous picture of what the future held for India and was quoted to be expecting a “glorious summer” after a very challenging winter. In the same month, the Prime Minister Narendra Modi declared all public places opened and crowds were seen gathering without Covid precautions. His actions were informed by the sharp decline of cases from 90,0000 in September to less than 20,000 in January 2021. When the second wave eventually struck in mid-April 2021, it proved that India was celebrating too early. Reports started coming in from hospitals concerning shortages of oxygen and rising patient arrival. The Indian government dispelled that claim, telling people to stay calm as the issue was only caused by hiccups of transporting oxygen to these hospitals.
But it was not up to two months from April before Hospitals were overwhelmed and the entire health system went wobbling in the face of the disaster. Just before the Kumbh Festival, scientists warned that the religious exercise may end up as a super-spreader event if nothing was done to avert it. Shahid Jameel, a virologist and director of the Trivedi School of Biosciences points out that there are three major causes of the surge India experiences: complacency; super spreader events and; new variants. When the cases escalated between April and May, it became clear that the country celebrated too early and was caught off guard. But this did not stop India from fighting back. Currently, India has had to suspend exportation of its Covax vaccine due to the in-country surge. More calls have also been made for the G7 to accelerate vaccine distribution to destinations like India. Experts have particularly called on the UK to lead others in speeding up shipments of vaccines to India. These calls are hinged upon the assumption that hoarded vaccines may be ineffective if distribution is delayed and the Indian variant finally makes its way to the UK – which has already happened. Without any surprise, the international community has taken quick steps to guard against importing this variant and not less than 22 countries have either totally banned or issued strict guidelines on travelling to India. The government of India has also sped up its vaccination programme and over 230 million citizens have received their first jab. But this is still below 30% of its entire population. These actions, joined with the newly imposed lockdown have resulted in a sharp fall of reported cases between mid-June and early July 2021. No doubt there is clearly more work to be done but the latest development proves that government plays the role of an umpire in times of crisis and its action/inaction can either save of take lives.
UK government was among the first to restrict religious gatherings and put a halt on any such festivals in the country. It may have appeared like a “sanctuary to sofa” experience but see how these policies have landed the country in relative success. At the moment, over 35,245,004 Brits have received their first doses of vaccines and 17,199,495 have already returned for their second shots. According to latest scientific evidence, the Pfizer-BioNTech or Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine reduces the risk of infection and death by over 70%. Prime Minister, Boris Johnson has said the new variant from India has already been found in the UK and could pose a serious threat to the planned easing of restrictions in June.
How did Saudi Arabia respond? The Saudi government teaches us how quick action from the government could avert impending doom. In June 2020, International pilgrims were told to forget about travelling for the Hajj and in 2021, all travelers have been required to vaccinate. No better proactive measure could have been asked of Saudi Arabia. The important lesson here is that governments have the responsibility to regulate scientific and religious adventures, especially when they pose a threat to human life.
But all actions to contain the situation in India may now be regarded as reactionary. The government could have moved first and fast to stop the “super-spreader event”. Painfully, we have learned that between religion and science, government plays the proactive role of regulator. At every step of the way, the UK and Saudi governments were there to give decisive policies that saved millions of lives. If anything, the takeaway has been a painful reminder that government stands between religion and science and has the responsibility to ensure continuous harmony so that one does not override the other at the expense of human lives.
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Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) Enters into Force January 22, 2021
A New Chapter of Humanitarianism or a Dangerous Finale of Mistrust?
20 January 2021, Written by Michael Robinett, 4th year BA (hons) Philosophy & Politics
What is TPNW and Why is it Historical?
TPNW is the first legally binding multilateral agreement to ban nuclear weapons
One of the foundational pillars of global nuclear security found in the 1968 Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons Treaty (NPT) is the obligation made by the nuclear-weapon states to take steps towards total disarmament of their nuclear arsenals. Yet, the TPNW – opened for signature at the end of a long process of debate in 2017 – is a new ‘legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons, leading towards their total elimination’. The TPNW is replete with a sophisticated and robust host of prohibitions: weapon development, testing, acquiring, stockpiling, threatening, etc., pursuant to commitments of participating NPT signatories (i.e. the nuclear club and non-nuclear crowd respectively). While many IGOs and NGOs alike have contributed to the push and pull of nuclear politics which produces history today, it cannot be denied some of the most effective pressure comes from the ‘humanitarian initiative’ – an effort to reframe the narratives around nuclear deterrence and security onto the humanitarian impact of nuclear weapons use Organizations like The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) have been effective in selling the idea that international society should legally accelerate disarmament by stigmatizing, prohibiting, and eliminating nuclear weapons.
How does TPNW affect Current Nuclear Politics?
While the TPNW is legally binding on the now 50 states that have ratified, and is supported with a humanitarian narrative, the nuclear club has not signed. Tensions between the club and the non-nuclear weapon crowd are high, with the necessary trust for a safe and non-nuclear world order in the balance.
In TPNW’s aim to legally accelerate disarmament, it potentially leaves the classical project of deterrence in its wake. To appreciate this, it is important to recall that the grand bargain between Nuclear weapon states (NWS) and non-nuclear weapon possessing states (nNWS) is that nNWSs agree not to develop nuclear weapons/technology in exchange for an NWS agreement to pursue both general and complete nuclear disarmament. An implicit consequence of this is the doctrine of nuclear deterrence, where NWSs provide nNWSs the ‘nuclear umbrella’ – that is – protection from nuclear exchange via daily deterrence while other pillars in NPT are being worked on by international society (Non-Proliferation: NPT Article I-III and Peaceful uses of nuclear technology: NPT Article IV).
It should also be appreciated that umbrella states are only those which are bound by the NPT and support the P5 (NWSs) having nuclear weapons (and thus directly benefit from their security through public advocation/request). Many nNWSs do not support the P5 nuclear position, like the developing states of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) and do not technically have direct access to the security umbrella. However, it can be argued that the exercise of nuclear deterrence, given that more than one powerful state has nuclear weapons, indirectly confers security advantage to NAM objectors (a potentially uncomfortable security reality for disarmament over deterrence advocates).
Breakdown at the Faultline of Trust
While it is easy to justify accelerated disarmament with the rhetoric: we need to do it anyway for both NPT commitments and humanitarian law, it could be argued NWSs feel circumnavigated by their nNWS partners. At the same time, doubts about the compatibility of NPT and TPNW have been raised, perhaps demonstrating the most public controversy.
Much but not all of the non-nuclear crowd have developed a cynical view of the nuclear club, insofar as suspicions like:
A) The club will never give up weapons. Perhaps NWSs were never serious about the commitments upon which international society rests? If so, does it render their public commitments to international institutions as mere political theatre; which in reality – facilitates the maintenance of NWS influence and or control over the IR system?
B) The threat of nuclear catastrophe is higher than it has ever been given new aggressive postures on the international stage (China/Russia/USA), the collapse of treaties like the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF), and the development of both ballistic missile and fissile refinement technology that makes cold war analogues look like the dark ages. Therefore, if the NWSs are currently unwilling to shift the proportional focus from deterrence to disarmament, perhaps they aren’t as concerned with these threats damaging nNWSs…
An Unstable Present Makes the ‘What Ifs’ Worse
This comes at a time where the USA, even with an outgoing Trump administration, is both domestically and internationally unstable like we have never seen before. Disinformation and cyberwarfare have contributed to this post-truth world where to the US electorate and statements proposed by some US international officials – nothing is true and everything is possible. Similarly, the European project has in some forums, moved on without the USA or castigated it as an unreliable partner. This trend has been exacerbated by US efforts to dissuade and or pressure states from signing TPNW. Given this reality, the US extension of the security umbrella is questionable (either by US offering or norms which might lead the world to reject said offer).
The truly stigmatizing feature of TPNW and thus its broader role in accelerating disarmament, is the maneuverer to make it illegal to possess nuclear weapons as opposed to simply ‘using them’. Obviously, this pressure is aimed squarely at the nuclear club, to put them on notice, and could be seen as the central theme in the story of NWSs not signing TPNW.
Among the many impacts being guessed at today, which ultimately only history shall reveal, two stand out:
- The grand bargain and thus the relations between the nuclear club, the umbrella they offer, and the non-nuclear crowd; are being strained to the point that a lack of trust will have serious ramifications for the project of collective nuclear security. Perhaps this is the natural result of the Trust Faultline?
- If nNWS advocates of TPNW are wrong about the imperative to accelerate disarmament given the current security situation of international society, they will have authored two long lasting harms. First, it could open the door to cheapening, through the use and ownership of political language, the humanitarian appeal upon which collective security and nuclear society was built upon. Second, this normative transformation will effectively invert the tried and tested protocol of deterrence to prefer accelerated disarmament. There may be a point in the future where we need to rely on deterrence logic and/or game theory but normatively speaking, with the punishments of international humanitarian law, we may forget how to use it when we need it most: to stop a nuclear exchange.
Either way, the Doomsday Clock is 100 seconds to midnight and history is upon us. Hopefully we make the best of it, learning to trust each other long enough to not only disarm, but to safely wield peaceful nuclear energy. If we can do that, there is nothing our species can’t achieve.
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Cashing in on Soft Power Capital: China, COVID-19, and the quest to reshape international reputation
October 1, 2020 Written by Chris White, MSc International Conflict and Cooperation
Long before COVID-19 emerged, the West has been battling the symptoms of an epidemic in public mistrust. COVID-19 highlighted how repeated violations of the voter’s trust by ‘establishment’ politicians have ensured any distrust in domestic institutions has permeated into the international system. As part of my own Masters research I have closely followed China’s attempts to manage this narrative. The damaged democracies in the West have been the perfect incubators for rival ideologies like populism and isolationism to seize elections undoing decades of globalisation. Internationally, states like Russia and China, that openly oppose the US-led liberal order, have sought to exploit this disarray through testing Western resolve as “Moscow and Beijing agree that Western liberalism and freedom undermine authoritarian rule…”. China has been cashing in on its soft power capital to emerge stronger post-COVID-19.
China’s COVID-19 propaganda
Firstly, Beijing’s domestic authority favours its political stability – or wei wen – over the individual liberty of Chinese citizens. Built upon an elaborate propaganda machine that synchronises media and security platforms to ensure ‘forced compliance’ by the state. Beijing’s failure to contain the COVID-19 outbreak to Wuhan; allowed rumours, false information, and fear to spread in a society already experiencing an information vacuum. In reality, this ideology pursued a “conceal as [much] as possible and keep it at the local level”, including the incarceration of vital doctors accused of “spreading rumours”, as they publicised China’s inaction.
By March, COVID-19’s epicentre shifted from Hubei to Europe. With it Chinese-traced disinformation and propaganda emerged depicting China as saviour rather than as the enabler of COVID-19’s spread into Europe. While COVID-19 killed thousands in Italy, Chinese newspapers broadcasted unsupported claims that COVID-19 spread from Italy’s Lombardy region to Wuhan in late 2019. While this was likely directed towards Chinese readers than Italians, it still angered Rome. Another claim by Chinese epidemiologist Nanshan suggested COVID-19 was imported to China. A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman fuelled this by claiming the US military manufactured COVID-19 and brought it into Wuhan through a US athlete. This second claim is reportedly Beijing attempting to distract Western audiences away from accusations of initial missteps by China in containing COVID-19. In response, US President Trump refers to the pandemic as the “Chinese Virus”, accusing China for creating the pandemic.
Natasha Kassam, a former Australian diplomat believes Chinese propaganda is reshaping public narrative surrounding China’s actions in Wuhan and “bought the world time to prepare for this pandemic…”. China did give Europe the luxury of foresight to prepare for the epidemic’s arrival, in the form of weeks following the chaos COVID-19 caused in Wuhan. However, these vital weeks passed without proper planning, all made possible through “collective complacency [and] dangerous overconfidence” and evidenced through the poor preparation of many European healthcare services to adequately increase hospital capacity and stockpile PPE. Europe’s failures came at a time when China was once again able to help.
China deployed its medics to Italy and France to support the struggling healthcare workforces, while also undertaking a major effort distributing medical supplies across Europe. When Italian Foreign Minister Di Maio uploaded footage on social media of the first plane arriving with supplies – it was a public diplomacy triumph for Beijing. Italy’s battle was symbolic of the first wave, and when the European governments looked to Italy for answers, they saw China being touted as Rome’s saviour.
Reshaping China’s reputation: Supplies, supplies, supplies, but at what cost?
Research shows that a key tenet in China’s plan to reshape its global reputation is through donating and selling supplies. China supplied medical PPE, including masks, ventilators, testing kits and gloves to restock the depleted European stockpiles. China’s lockdown had stifled economic growth, so it used this opportunity to flex its manufacturing muscle, and China’s cheaper cost base to secure contracts, forcing governments to fight over the earliest deliveries. As factories reopened, both the Beijing Government and Chinese entrepreneurs alike donated supplies to Iran, Europe, Africa, and even the US. Not only does this support the Chinese economy in securing a much-needed boost after lengthy disruptions, but it crucially made Western countries anchored to China for vital medical supplies.
Serbian President Mr Vucic pleaded with China saying “I am asking that you send us anything you can [… we need …] literally everything, and most of all we need your knowledge and people”. Meanwhile, the Irish Government ordered flag-carrier airline Aer Lingus to redirect its entire long haul fleet to fly and maintain a 5x daily airlink to China in the short term to keep the Irish Health Service and military stocked with PPE. These measures signalled to Beijing that the image transformation from a country that (arguably) “accelerated the virus’s spread through cover-ups, to … [a] global power offering leadership at a time of panic and peril” was working. Meanwhile, the Americans were criticised for a poor domestic response, ensuring China’s “pandemic diplomacy” won headlines around the world for the positive support it is doing in fighting COVID-19 globally.
However, Turkey, an early recipient of Chinese stock, voiced concern regarding the quality of the COVID-19 testing kits, with 80% reportedly faulty and, of those functioning, their accuracy was barely 30%. Ankara went further by advising Spain that Madrid was making a mistake by accepting the same Chinese testing kits. Despite this, 89 countries received Chinese assistance.
Economic Realignment to boost China’s Soft Power appeal
There is little disagreement that the economic fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic will have global ramifications, economically. Though, China is using this to facilitate economic realignment from the US toward China. Louis Kuijs of the Asia Economics at Oxford Economics, expects China’s economy to bounce 8% in the second quarter. This lone comeback, Kuijs argues, will boost both its soft power appeal while giving room to support countries needing assistance, like Serbia. Kurlantzick believes China is seeking to capitalise on its soft power potential, for example in Estonia where Tallinn now hopes to “strengthen exchanges and cooperation with China to fight against Covid-19” after receiving Chinese assistance.
This process of winning over European governments required initial costs for China but solidifies long-term economic connections. Geopolitically, China’s agenda to rebrand itself as “Europe’s saviour” is central in Beijing’s quest against the US hegemony, with an economic advantage through the Belt and Road Initiative or, as Chinese President Xi calls the “Health Silk Road”. Regardless, China’s rise proves the EU/US no longer have sole economic superiority.
Rewriting history – saviour or saving face?
“China is rewriting history” is the phrase many journalists, politicians and Chinese political experts are using to describe Beijing’s aggressive PR campaign as it works to disassociate itself from the initial COVID-19 outbreak in Wuhan. That rewriting process includes not only the public diplomacy campaign of donating supplies and support but spreading conspiracy theories to try and reframe the global narrative around China being ‘victorious’ over COVID-19. The next significant step in this process is to be the first supplier of a safe COVID-19 vaccine.
While the West is consumed in domestic emergencies, lockdowns and economic fallout, China’s leaders are working to avoid being held responsible for the world’s fatalities, disruption, and inevitable economic downturn. With that initiative of influencing the future narrative of the pandemic through sharing of critical data regarding the virus, its health effects and financing future research and into producing a vaccine, China may yet succeed in rewriting the history of 2020.
Chris White is a Masters student at the University of Stirling, and has recently submitted his ICC dissertation exploring the role that church networks can have in influencing the peacebuilding activities in selected examples in Africa. Prior to his MSc Chris was a BA International Politics student at Stirling. In 2018, he was a joint-awardee of the Williamson Travel Scholarship. The award enabled him to travel to France and Italy to help research and compare refugee integration issues.
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Putting Gender into Climate Finance
October 1, 2020 Written by Svea Horn, MSc International Conflict and Cooperation
In the past three decades, the international community has been striving to tackle climate change, with climate finance becoming a core dimension of those efforts. Climate finance is defined as finance that seeks to support local, national and international climate change adaptation and mitigation activities which have been agreed upon by the international community in the United Nations’ Framework Convention on Climate Change. The aim is to transfer money to ‘developing countries’ who have struggled more to adapt to and mitigate climate change due to their historically disadvantaged position caused by imperialism and colonialism, as well as more recent neoliberal policies. Additionally, research has shown that climate change affects people of different genders and social groups asymmetrically due to biased socio-economic structures in our societies.
I understand gender as a social construct. This means that people will have a different understanding of what it means to be ‘male’ or ‘female’, depending on where they live or when they were born. Unfortunately, there is a bias against people who are perceived as feminine or female in our society which is equally prominent within the global climate change discourse, and the distribution of climate finance. Gender is particularly discriminating in relation to climate change, as climate change “reinforces existing gender inequalities in the key dimensions that are most crucial for coping with climate-related change” such as access to information, resources and power.
Inclusion of Gender into Climate Finance
In my own research I have explored how global climate finance institutions, such as the Green Climate Fund, the World Bank and UN-REDD are including gender and women’s concerns into their policies and institutional structures. It has quickly become apparent that climate finance providers only appear to attempt to include gender throughout the whole project cycle and their institutional structures. Moreover, I found that climate finance stakeholders – while clearly having substantial knowledge of women’s disadvantaged position in society, especially women in the Global South – do not fully design their climate finance programmes in an appropriate way (i.e. the AFAWA Project in Ghana).
In Ghana, similarly to other countries in the ‘Global South’, the inclusion of gender and women within climate finance is additionally impeded by the internal funding structures for local governments. There is a the lack of specific budget to include gender within governmental and climate change organisations, and gendered landownership which is a great disadvantage for women especially in relation to climate finance benefit sharing.
Obstacles Preventing a Successful Inclusion of Gender into Climate Finance
It is important to highlight that no international organisation and no society around the globe is gender neutral. There is no policy area that is gender neutral, including climate finance and science, as gender permeates all aspects of society. However, the lack of inclusion of gender and women’s concerns within climate finance makes me question whether the idea of a systematic inclusion of gender in all areas of politics and society – and specifically into climate finance – is too radical to be implemented. While international organisations and governments around the world have been keen to showcase their technical expertise and approaches to include gender, they seem to have stubbornly avoided bringing about actual institutional change which could speed up this process. By ignoring the political aspect of the issue of gender inequality within climate finance by merely employing gender checklists and quotas, they successfully avert the need to question “power relations, privilege and marginalisation” within their organisations and the societies they operate in.
Also identified during my research, is the essentialisation of women and the gender stereotypes that are being employed by climate finance organisations within their institutional and project policies and documents. For example, women are included in dispute mechanisms in programmes based on their ‘natural talent’ as peacemakers and negotiators’. Another example is the use of micro-credit schemes that specifically target women based on gender stereotypes that see women as more community-oriented and further victimise them. As long as international climate finance and development organisations do not move past an image of women and men in ‘developing’ countries which is based on Western and, in some cases, colonial assumptions (often made without taking the local context into account), achieving gender equality in climate finance will not go beyond the superficial level. Without an intersectional analysis, which takes into account the social categories, such as class, race, gender identity, sexual orientation and ethnicity, and the disadvantages that come with them and intersect with, gender equality will not become a reality within climate finance.
People as partners
As my research has shown, ‘gender’, as well as women and their needs, has so far not been included into global climate finance. This can primarily be traced back to the lack of political (and social) will power of both the institutions and organisations which implement the United Nations Framework Convention’s climate finance plans and promises to include women and a gender perspective into their policies and projects. Additionally, the superficial nature of these efforts to make climate finance more equal in relation to gender have hindered a successful inclusion, which is not aided by the stereotyping and essentialisation of both men and women.
If climate finance organisations are to truly move beyond superficial attempts to include gender, they must start to rethink not only their institutional structures, but also their stereotypical assumptions of the people they are working with in the Global South. Only if people, and particularly women, in ‘developing countries’ are seen as partners and equals and not victims in the fight against climate change, will the inclusion of gender within climate finance become a much more likely reality.
About the Author: Svea Horn is a Masters student at the University of Stirling, and has recently submitted her dissertation for her MSc International Conflict and Cooperation. Svea has a strong interest in gender studies, especially in relation to peace studies and climate change and sustainability . For her undergraduate dissertation on the implementation of the UNSCR 1325, Svea won the University of Stirling’s Murray Learmonth prize for best Single or Combined Honours in Politics dissertation at the University of Stirling. Svea plans to continue researching in these areas.
Turkey-Greece conflict in eastern Mediterranean is less about gas than vaccuum left by Trump
Clemens Hoffmann, University of Stirling First published in The Conversation, 18 August 2020
The worsening stand-off in the eastern Mediterranean, frequently described as a gas conflict, has been gaining momentum. Yet it is a strange time to be fighting over gas when prices remain in a slump due to weak demand and investors withdrawing. So what explains the escalating conflict between Turkey, Greece, Cyprus and Egypt, which is drawing in other regional and European powers?
Large reserves of oil and gas were discovered in the region a decade ago. The estimates are worth trillions of dollars to the surrounding countries even at today’s prices.
On August 13 Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan warned there would be a heavy price for anyone attacking the Turkish drilling vessel Oruç Reis, which is exploring for oil and gas in waters claimed by both Turkey and Greece. This came after a collision between Greek and Turkish navy frigates left international actors on high alert.
France immediately pledged military support to Greece, while Angela Merkel reportedly called the Greek and Turkish leaders to help de-escalate tensions. The old Aegean rivals are now almost as close to open conflict as during Turkey’s 1974 Cyprus invasion.
The eastern Mediterranean
Until recently, the Turkish-Greek conflict over oil and gas was very much associated with the Cyprus problem: Turkey was drilling off the coast of Turkish Cyprus, a state not recognised by the rest of the international community. But the current stand-off has dramatically shifted the conflict into open sea.
Turkey claims exploitation rights within an area it claims as continental shelf. Greece’s counter claim is that all its inhabited islands are surrounded by a 200-mile exclusive economic zone (EEZ), per the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, to which Turkey is not a party. A blind application of these rules “locks” Turkey’s exploitation rights into a small corner around the Gulf of Antalya.
Both claims are formalised in bilateral agreements with other countries in the region. Turkey signed an EEZ agreement in late 2019 with the Libyan Government of National Accord (GNA) in Tripoli and, more recently, Greece with Egypt.
The Turkish-Libyan agreement implies that not even the largest Greek island, Crete, has a continental shelf – let alone the much smaller Kastelorizo off the Turkish (Lycian) coast. This position is legally tricky, but Turkey’s claim for some share of the offshore cake seemed in particular to be understood by Germany. EU leaders haven’t been able to agree to impose new sanctions on Turkey to add to the ones they previously imposed in response to the drilling off Cyprus – at least for the time being. Erdoğan has allegedly promised Merkel that Turkey will soften its position in the days ahead.
Gas bonanza?
With gas prices so low, it calls into question whether it would be profitable to extract these resources right now – let alone the plan between Israel, Greece and Cyprus to build an EastMed pipeline to sell the gas to the EU (which excludes Turkey and any notion of Turkish Cyprus).
Gas price, US$/therm
Yet the collapse of gas prices is outweighed by the implosion of the Turkish lira. Turkey is hungry for hydrocarbon-based growth and urgently needs more foreign exchange to prop up its currency, having lately been relying on dollars from Qatar. In this context, seeking energy wealth seems intuitive.
Except that it is not. Gas exploration and production, especially on a seabed, requires hefty upfront investment – never mind the geopolitical cost. Unsurprisingly, Israel now prefers solar energy to gas-fired power stations, while (legal) drilling has stopped off Cyprus altogether.
Undeterred, Turkey claims its position is more defensive than expansionist, but some commentators point to its “mavi vatan” (“blue homeland”) strategy in the eastern Mediterranean. At best, this is about naval hegemony. At worst, it implies revising borders agreed in the 1923 Lausanne treaty.
Turkey’s continuing commitment to Turkish Cyprus, alongside introducing the lira to the parts of northern Syria it controls, are seen as clear evidence. Yet with Turkey frozen out by the EastMed pipeline and most EEZ agreements in the region, Erdoğan’s assertiveness may be less about seizing territory or energy than pushing for a seat at the negotiating table.
Regional alignments
Nonetheless, Turkish assertiveness has naturally galvanised potential adversaries – including Greece, Cyprus, Egypt, France and also Iraq, where Turkish forces are conducting a large operation against the Kurdish-separatist PKK. Meanwhile, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) that has come out as spearhead of this alliance.
The Gulf monarchies and Egypt are threatened by Turkey and Qatar’s pro-Muslim Brotherhood position, plus their military cooperation agreements – most recently including a naval facility in the Libyan rebel stronghold of Misrata. The UAE is intervening in Libya too, openly claiming responsibility for a recent airbase attack in western Libya where Turkish drones operate in support of the GNA. Together with the Turkey-Libya EEZ agreement, it shows how tightly the gas conflict is linked to Libya’s civil war.
The UAE’s peace deal with Israel can be seen in light of this Turkish expansionism – about which Jerusalem has been conspicuously quiet. But if Israel is tacitly supporting the alliance, more assertive is another Mediterranean power, headed by a president who declared NATO “brain dead” in 2019 partly in reference to Turkey’s invasion of northern Syria.
Emmanuel Macron’s visit to Beirut was by no means as accidental as the explosion that devastated the Lebanese capital. He and the UAE pledged to co-fund harbour repairs, pre-empting Turkey’s own bid. France now has military agreements with the UAE, Greece, Cyprus and Egypt, all geared towards curbing the actions of a fellow NATO member and EU candidate.
And while Berlin is left trying to reach a balance in the Greece-Turkey confrontation, Washington, traditionally the guarantor of peace between the Aegean NATO rivals, has been almost totally silent. There is a sense that all parties want to take advantage of this, onshore and offshore, before the US elections. It is oddly this vacuum, rather than fossil fuels, that is fanning regional rivalries. With the US withdrawn, Moscow continuing its opaque brinkmanship and the EU split over Turkey, the scene is unfortunately set for more instability to come.
Clemens Hoffmann, Lecturer in International Politics, University of Stirling
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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NATO meeting: solidarity reinforced despite uncomfortable time for alliance to be in the spotlight
Megan Dee, University of Stirling First published in The Conversation, 4 December 2019
Anniversaries are meant to be a celebration. They represent a moment of reflection – a marker, a milestone, a time to look back. And therein lies their biggest problem. For anniversaries have that unfortunate effect of turning any subject – be it a past event, a married couple, or indeed an international institution – into an object of intense scrutiny. For the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) celebrating its 70th anniversary in London on December 3-4, that scrutiny has come at an unfortunate time.
Founded in 1949 with the signing of the Washington Treaty, NATO at 70 represents one the longest-standing and arguably most successful political and military alliances in history. Yet NATO’s evolution, longevity and very survival continues to draw debate for academics, practitioners and world leaders alike. Since the end of the Cold War, NATO’s raison d’etre has been constantly criticised, with many seeing it as a dinosaur of a bygone era.
Yet Russia’s resurgent efforts to disturb and disrupt the North Atlantic region since the 2014 annexation of Crimea has also seen a renewed impetus for NATO as a security alliance. And new threats are looming, as my own research and teaching on international negotiation has examined.
NATO in 2019 in fact faces an unenviable agenda and a political environment increasingly unconducive to building a consensus. NATO’s core geopolitical challenges not only include a resurgent Russia amid claims of a “New Cold War”, but an increasingly influential and encroaching China. China was on the agenda of this leaders’ meeting for the first time.
The alliance must also address new hybrid threats ranging from cyber-attacks on critical infrastructure, to public disinformation. Arms control is again a top agenda item for the alliance, not only over nuclear and chemical weapons, but now also addressing space as a new operational domain. Climate change and migration have also become hot topics for NATO.
NATO’s security environment has therefore become something of a multi-headed hydra, with each head representing a new challenge that only a strong and united NATO can ultimately meet.
Read more: Space may soon become a war zone – here’s how that would work
Fraying solidarity a NATO hallmark
Fraying solidarity has nevertheless become a hallmark for the alliance. The Syrian crisis has involved the US and Turkey both undertaking unilateral action without consulting with NATO allies. That action has been further exacerbated by Turkey’s growing ties with Russia, including the purchase of the S-400 missile system.
The French president, Emmanuel Macron, has also challenged the cohesion of the 29-nation alliance by emphasising his own preference for a strong European security architecture, independent of the US and citing NATO’s “brain-death”. Macron’s comments were sharply challenged by both Germany’s chancellor, Angela Merkel and US president, Donald Trump.
Amid it all, political contentions continue to fester within NATO over burden-sharing, and the US push for all 29 nations to meet their spending obligations to spend 2% of GDP on defence.
All this would seem to suggest that NATO’s anniversary really has come at the worst possible juncture for an ageing, somewhat challenged, alliance. As the London NATO leader’s meeting has highlighted, forced family gatherings can be fuelled by squabbling and the airing of past and current grievances rather than affection and unity. While anniversary gatherings are intended to celebrate, they also shine a spotlight on the cracks that fester.
Read more: NATO and the EU: a short history of an uneasy relationship
Introverted, yet successful
For a naturally introverted NATO that operates most effectively as a military alliance away from the political spotlight, the London anniversary meeting must have been gruelling. It is only when you remove the spotlight and political grandstanding of this 70th anniversary that NATO’s truest successes come to the fore.
For the success of NATO is its longevity, its adaptation, its ability to look out and seek to address the risks of an ever-changing security environment and its ability to maintain the ties that bind among its growing family. As NATO secretary general Jens Stoltenberg remarked at a conference the day before the leaders met, in contrast to most politicians who are criticised for being good on rhetoric but bad on substance, NATO is the opposite – it is “bad on rhetoric but good on substance”.
For all of the cracks that this 70th anniversary has revealed, it has provided a moment for reflection. As the declaration published after the three-hour meeting of leaders identifies, what is now needed is a “forward-looking reflection process.”
NATO’s 70-year history is itself testimony of the organisation’s ongoing self-reflection, coupled with a willingness to adapt. But this meeting has provided just such a time for deep reflection on the alliance’s future as both a political and military organisation.
In tackling the challenges facing NATO today, that reflective process must consider NATO’s institutional procedures, decision-making and political structures under a soon-to-be 30-nation alliance, with North Macedonia set to join in 2020. A focus on consultation will also be critical in ensuring the cohesion of the alliance and maintaining solidarity.
Moving beyond this anniversary, NATO has much to do and hard questions to answer. But take away the spotlight and NATO will continue to work away quietly on the substance over the rhetoric … at least until its 80th.
Megan Dee, Lecturer in International Politics, University of Stirling
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.