Marcus Goncalves, Ph.D., Ed.D., Associate Professor of the Practice, Boston University Metropolitan College, Boston, MA, USA

Follow Marcus Goncalves, Ph.D., Ed.D.

View Profile


Subjects of Interest

  • Africa
  • Entreprenuership
  • Frontier and Emerging Markets
  • International Affairs
  • Private Sector Development

Developing a 'soft power' strategy in Africa 09 Sep 2015

China’s highly touted development strategy, the “Belt and Road” initiative, is based on the land-based Silk Road Economic Belt (SREB) and the parallel Maritime Silk Road (MSR). It is not only propping up China’s investments in the Eurasia region, but also its economic ties with several countries. The strategic framework, as proposed by China’s central government, provides China with important benefits that are helping the country seek and expand its role in a global setting.
    
The African continent could also take advantage of similar initiatives. Why not develop its own African “Silk Road,” as argued by World Bank Economic Adviser, Harry Broadman, in his book, Africa's Silk Road: China and India's New Economic Frontier, published in 2007? Back then, Broadman had already anticipated what can be easily confirmed eight years later as “skyrocketing Asian trade and investment in Africa.”  This is part of a global trend of South-South bi-lateral trade among emerging and frontier markets. According to United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and International Monetary Fund (IMF) data, goods traded with Africa amounts to more than $1 trillion dollars, with China being the largest trading partner, followed by the United States and France.

Policymakers in Africa must be aware that in order to establish Africa as an influential global trade and economic partner, the continent needs to adopt a ‘soft-power’ approach. I was in Macau recently and had the chance to advise an import/export company operating in Angola on the need to embrace soft power for long-lasting international trade. Looking puzzled, the two partners could not understand what soft power had to do with international trade, and with the ability to push products to consumers.

By soft power, I explained to them that I meant the ability to attract people through persuasion, rather than by coercion, use of force, bribery or extortion. The same is true for African policymakers and leading multinational corporations in terms of their ability to shape the preferences of their prospective partners through appeal and attraction. Soft power is never coercive; using, instead, culture, political values, and foreign policies as its main currency.

Research and development

In pursuing such strategy, I’d advise, first and foremost, that African policymakers make efforts to strengthen and encourage academic research covering the regions of South-South trade, or – borrowing from the Chinese strategy – the regions included in their “Belt and Road.” In the past, African diplomacy and international trade have focused on engagements with advanced economies. As a result, government and academic knowledge resources in Africa were all focused on North America and Europe. However, the new African Belt and Road initiative should focus on its major foreign direct investors, including United Kingdom and the United States, but also Italy, China, France, India, as well as Spain, Germany, Japan, and Brazil. These countries are, to date, the top investors in Africa, and yet, not much data about these markets are available to African policymakers or multinational corporations. African multinationals are forced to fly blind when developing business abroad, as with my client in Macau. The same is true for international corporations wanting to invest in Africa.

The result is not only a lack of general public knowledge of these regions, but even more serious, a lack of expertise in dealing with their unique economic, political and religious affairs. This is an underlying weakness that will become a major impediment for the success of any international trade initiative. In fact, it will be very detrimental even to China’s Belt and Road if its policymakers do not address the issue. The same is true for Africa, which should learn from it and avoid the mistake.

The lack of international studies is actually not only an African problem. According to Charles King, in his July/August 2015 article in Foreign Affairs, “The Decline of International Studies: Why Flying Blind is Dangerous,” the rise of the United States as a global power was not only due to its economic and military advantages, but mainly as a result of its “unmatched knowledge of the hidden interior of other nations: their languages and cultures, their histories and political systems, their local economies and human geographies.” He goes on to assert that “educational institutions and the disciplines they preserve are retreating from the task of cultivating men and women who are comfortable moving around the globe, both literally and figuratively.”

Most of my time as an international management consultant, and researcher, is spent on these issues. I would encourage African scholars, both graduate and undergraduate students who “possess the linguistic abilities, the historical sensitivity, and sheer intellectual inquisitiveness” to peer deeply into foreign affairs and societies, as the demand for understanding international business, and culture, is immense. I would also encourage policymakers to take some time to listen to these researchers and international business professionals. They can help shape public policy.

As Africa invests in the understanding of its South-South trading partners and its foreign policy adopts a more global scope, policymakers should make serious attempt to promote and encourage a study of relevant regions to cope with its shift in diplomatic focus. China has been doing so, realizing the need for such studies and the development of its knowledge capital. Africa should do it, too.

I am actually neck-deep in a research of Sino-Lusophone African trade at the University of Saint Joseph, in Macau, China.  This is only one of a few Chinese government-sponsored researches to better understand Lusophone African markets. The scope of the research is such that a sabbatical next year will be necessary to survey those countries in Africa, just to get closer to the data source. This is due to the fact that while there are a lot of international organizations, such as think tanks, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and the World Bank, who are producing qualitative data about global economies, including Africa, much of the data they provide is on “what” the trend is, often not stating much about “why” it is. Emic themes – which investigate how local people think, how businesses are conducted, and how culture and religious beliefs permeate it – are also very important to be understood for effective and efficient business transactions. That’s what my research attempts to comprehend.

Cultural communication

Another area African policymakers should focus on when developing their own Belt and Road initiative is to search for a more innovative and effective way to project their soft power as they seek to play a greater global role. Looking back, the Chinese government had launched several soft power initiatives. Two examples worth mentioning are its network of hundreds of Confucius institutes and the launch of numerous communication initiatives in the major capitals of the world. African policymakers need to develop similar initiatives to foster and safeguard its soft power strategies.

In the Chinese case, however, these initiatives were inevitably associated with propaganda inherent in the response to such government initiatives, which limited their ability to foster greater understanding of China. Moreover, with the significant rise of social media in China, and as Chinese tourists made more than 100 million trips overseas in 2014 alone, the government’s current approach to promote its soft power has become very obsolete.

But this is not so with Africa. The African continent, in my opinion, cannot accomplish its foreign policy objectives based on good governance alone, which as a continent, and not a single country, represents a major challenge. There is a need to rely on strategies, such as the development and support of civic interest groups, as a tactical tool for implementing soft power. Take for instance, the South African Dialogue for Women (SADW) initiative as an example of how South Africa may further achieve its objectives of an African renaissance by supporting civil society initiatives in promoting good governance on the ground.

Empowering civil society

In other words, instead of taking the lead in cultural communication, as China did, African policymakers should have a different approach, focusing on nurturing and encouraging positive behaviour among African civic groups, such as SADW, as well as African multinationals, professionals and individuals, who can then be independent ambassadors for the African culture as a whole. In the interim, Africa should further liberalize its policies governing non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to encourage the establishment of a robust sector across the continent. To some extent, it has become a cliché to refer to democratic changes being made across Africa, predominantly with the increase of civil and popular societies, human rights and political organizations, trade unions, women's organizations, and so forth, particularly across Benin, Ethiopia, Malawi and Zambia.

Unfortunately, this democratization process has been slow. There are examples of African nations, such as Angola and Rwanda, in which many NGOs, specifically civil and human societies, were not able to function during the difficult circumstances when there was complete political breakdown and even civil wars. Then, there are some other examples, such as the case of Mozambique and Liberia, which have both  been erratically evolving from the horrors of civil wars that included gross abuses of human rights, and where, to this date, many NGOs still face immense hindrances. There are yet another set of nations, such as the case of Kenya and Senegal, where several NGOs, particularly civil societies, despite the fact that they have had a much stronger history, are still being restricted from doing their work. This include the monitoring of serious political violence, as well as human rights abuses. The literature shows, and again China is a good example, that NGOs are far more effective than government agencies in projecting soft power, and yet such independent entities continue to operate under constant pressure from African governments.

To a greater extent, the Western view of Africa, particularly regarding African NGOs, which work as a barometer of freedom, democracy, and rule of law, is that these organizations, projectors of soft power, are often presented with rare challenges not seen in other parts of the world. These challenges include – but not limited to – lawlessness, widespread famine and disease, and military coups where the safety of civilians is not even an afterthought. The list goes on. African policymakers must change this image if they want to develop a solid two-way strategy for global markets trade.

Only through a commitment from African policymakers to foster a well-rounded and nuanced understanding of the political and cultural differences between nations, especially the targeted South-South trading belt, and the projection of a positive image of Africa without resorting to propaganda, will Africa be in a position to truly embrace an African Belt and Road initiative.