SA’s shift from non-alignment to Brics

SOUTH Africa’s foreign policy configuration since the twilight of apartheid has been characterised by an evolving commitment to “active nonalignment” and an strategic engagement within the Brics coalition of developing nations. Popular analytical frameworks predominantly interpret such shifts in terms of geopolitical pragmatism or economic strategy aimed at positioning South Africa favourably within the global order.

- PROFESSOR ITUMELENG MOTHOAGAE

However, a Negritude-inflected reading reveals South Africa’s foreign policy as an affirmation of African agency and decolonial sovereignty, an extension of the liberation project and a rejection of the Eurocentric structures that have historically circumscribed African participation in global governance. At the core of this reading is the recognition of Negritude as a foundational intellectual tradition that insists on the affirmation and valourisation of black identity, culture and political self-determination.