South Africa occupies a singular diplomatic and financial place that permits it to behave as a bridge between developed economies and the International South, one thing it’s leveraging throughout its G20 presidency to drive its imaginative and prescient of a fairer and extra equal world.
The nation has a twin id as a creating African state that’s considered an rising market however can also be a participant in world boards dominated by superior economies, together with the G20.
Analysts say this permits a reputable “two-way translation” that allows it to speak Africa’s growth considerations inside Western-led establishments and advocate pragmatic cooperation with states which can be a part of the International North.
South Africa has leveraged this to affect world governance reforms, champion growth priorities, and mediate between competing geopolitical pursuits. It does so alongside heavyweight multilateral actors such because the African Growth Financial institution.
Its lengthy membership of BRICS, earlier than the current accession of recent nations to the bloc, has positioned it as a champion of the International South. It has enabled the nation to introduce African growth priorities into BRICS agendas, develop outreach with African states and to place the bloc as being complementary, slightly than confrontational, with Western establishments.
The member states of the organisation, regardless of their different sizes and financial heft, additionally align themselves with the International South agenda.
The G20 has performed a key function in reflecting South Africa as a balanced presence in a multipolar world, whereas the nation has additionally had constant strategic engagement with the G7 over time and is certainly one of a small variety of non-G7 nations that has been often invited to G7 outreach periods.
South Africa additionally performs a moderating function between areas on the World Commerce Organisation, pushing for the foundations to work for growth slightly than towards it.
In his speech marking the thirtieth anniversary of the WTO, President Cyril Ramaphosa identified that the inclusivity promised by the multilateral buying and selling system and by the Doha Growth Spherical had not materialised for a lot of. Creating nations that account for many of the WTO’s membership stay locked into the decrease finish of world worth chains.
These challenges have been exacerbated by unilateral and protectionist measures being applied by some superior economies which can be outdoors the agreed-upon multilateral framework, he stated.
“It’s incumbent on us all to make sure that the multilateral buying and selling system is strengthened, or we danger the encroachment of a world commerce regime primarily based on energy dynamics.”
Divergent pursuits
The nation makes use of its engagement with highly effective economies of the world to drive the combination of African priorities such because the reform of world monetary establishments, local weather finance and the Simply Vitality Transition, debt sustainability for low-income nations and commerce and industrialisation efforts.
South Africa has tried to place itself as non-aligned, not desirous to be pressured to decide on between China and the USA, for instance, or between developed areas and rising markets.
This has been one thing of a tightrope because the strains get drawn ever deeper on contentious points across the globe and South Africa battles to maintain a fair keel, notably because it faces its personal inside challenges on this regard.
South Africa retains shut relationships with nations similar to Russia, Cuba and Palestine, with which it has lengthy historic ties, however that are frowned upon by major of its Western buying and selling companions.
And lots of of these disapproving of its selections are amongst its major buying and selling companions, which embrace the US, European Union nations and the UK.
For some, this highlights its potential to straddle many divergent pursuits, including to its credibility as an interlocuter between areas, points and pursuits.
Cedric de Coning, a analysis professor with the Norwegian Institute of Worldwide Affairs (NUPI), writes, “As a rustic that may be a democracy, with liberal values enshrined in its structure, and on the similar time a rustic that feels it’s a sufferer of the inequalities of the worldwide liberal order, South Africa is uniquely positioned to be a bridge-builder between the East and West, and between the North and the South.
De Coning posits that South Africa thus needs to alter features of the liberal order, which has been designed to learn the developed world. These embrace the western bias inherent in multilateral establishments and within the broader monetary structure, which is weighted towards Africa and different creating areas.
South Africa and Africa
Africa stays central to South Africa’s overseas coverage and is more and more related as world financial fragmentation intensifies. It is usually its place as essentially the most subtle economic system in Africa that has attracted the curiosity of outdoor actors, with its said political non-alignment and historical past of negotiating profitable outcomes on troublesome points being further components.
It has introduced Africa alongside on its journey because the host of the G20 in 2025, not simply by way of the relevance to the continent of points being raised on the year-long rollout of conferences, but additionally as a result of it’s utilizing this high-profile platform to lift Africa’s voice.
Behind the scenes, it labored prior to now to push for the African Union’s everlasting G20 membership, achieved in 2023 and at the moment assumed by the present chair of the AU, Angolan president João Lourenço.
It additionally pushed for Nigeria to turn into a member of BRICS and for the nation to host a G20 assembly, which was held in Abuja earlier this month.
This isn’t nearly politics. It makes use of its superior enterprise sector and monetary and logistics capabilities to spotlight alternatives in Africa, advocate for stronger North–South funding partnerships and promote intra-African commerce as a platform for regional integration. This additionally strengthens Africa’s bargaining energy with developed markets.
Constraints
The function of bridge-builder is ever more difficult in a fractured world surroundings. However the challenges confronted by South Africa in its favoured function as a bridge builder in worldwide affairs will not be nearly worldwide points.
Its home challenges which are sometimes out of step with the imaginative and prescient it’s espousing for the world. Whereas some could type a part of the very points it’s elevating on the worldwide stage, others are inside its grasp to unravel. These embrace sluggish financial development, logistics and vitality constraints as effectively excessive ranges of joblessness and inequality.
As famous above, there are additionally questions on South Africa’s geopolitical ambiguity, most lately concerning its positions on the Russia–Ukraine battle and points within the Center East, notably Gaza.
And regardless that South Africa has labored laborious to place itself as a key voice of the International South, there’s quickly rising competitors from different center powers similar to Kenya, Nigeria, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and the UAE, which even have financial heft and search to characterize African or International South pursuits with different areas.
The notion of South Africa as being the chief or consultant of Africa can also be not accepted by many different African nations, regardless that the nation has lengthy been perceived by world powers as a gateway to and main consultant of the continent.
South Africa has moved to deal with this by making certain that the continent makes use of its personal alternatives in world boards and groupings to spice up the fortunes of the remainder of Africa and provides the continent a voice.
