After the fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989 and the collapse of the Union of Soviet, Socialist Republics (USSR ), the United States’ ascendancy into a hegemon began. For some, this heralded the unipolar moment by the now-sole global superpower, almost unrivaled in its preponderance of power and influence and the capacity to do the utmost good—or in some instances, to do nothing good. Of course, there was the question of a few thousand nuclear weapons soon to be inherited by Russia , and a few other nuclear-armed states around the globe, but none with the economic or cultural clout the US wielded. After the collapse, the United States set about to establish a new pecking order; the first instance of this was by cobbling together a coalition that reinforced global rules-based norms that became the First Gulf War . As the former Soviet Union gradually declined, Russia was grappling with the possible future where it was ascendant. The new hegemon found itself almost required to deal with the perceived diminished international threats—perceived, for they would soon be hydra-headed. Over the next 25 years, it would need to successfully confront these threats, which called for the adoption of a different tact, different strategies, in its new role.
The early years of the post-Cold War period saw a trend toward multilateralism, and optimism that peace could be achieved, that the last great war and its aftermath were behind human history. Much like the end of the Cold War caught practically every major actor in the international system and politics by surprise, this period however, coincided with the rise of a new phenomenon in the context of statehood: state failure. Somalia ’s government collapsed, and despite the sporadic, several dozen attempts at reconstituting a central government, the task remains but a mirage. Yugoslavia quickly followed suit, beginning a most torturous break up into Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina (the Former Yugoslav) Republic of Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Kosovo. The former Czechoslovakia also subsequently split into the Czech and Slovak Republics. This was perhaps the only neat split in hitherto unitary polities, except for the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) , the fifteen successor republics that issued from the USSR.
The “fragmentation” of the binary bipolar world order, led on the one hand by the United States and the USSR on the other, had other far-reaching consequences. Former client states freed themselves of, or found themselves without global superpower sponsors, and adrift in a new world order. The western powers’ emphasis on democratization resulted in the rise of contested spaces in government and governance, with old regimes holding on, and the multiparty democratic experiment (or challenge) disintegrating unitary states. Other newer phenomena gained significance: non-state actors such as NGOs found a voice in a more liberal world order. Violent non-state actors (VNSAs), whose impact and influence was still significantly constrained by the bipolar system, began to assert themselves, and the instances of global terrorism grew in scope and severity. State failure characterized countries such as Somalia after 1991, and terrorists (and pirates) and found support in autocratic regimes, fragile, failing and failed states , for example, the Taliban (Osama bin Laden ) in Sudan and in Afghanistan.
Critically, the United States has largely applied a Cold War mentality to its interactions and relationship with most of the African continent, even where evidence suggests other approaches might be more valuable. The monograph concludes that new approaches such as rethinking the militarization of US foreign policy, contemplating a nonzero-sum approach, and constructive engagement, may be the way forward for US foreign policy toward the Horn of Africa and most of the rest of Africa. This is especially so, given the concepts of “the next billion” in Africa, the rapid rise of China and its growing engagement that approaches near dominance in Africa.
Great Powers and Foreign Policy Approaches
Great Powers have not fundamentally changed their approach to power and security despite “the privlege of place” of literature arguing that such changes have occurred, alternately in history, or especially in the immediate post-Cold War era. The Cold War , despite being a relatively shorter period as major global epochs go, witnessed a few key events previously mentioned; the fall of the Berlin Wall end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union and its competing ideology, a more globalized, interconnected world; bipolarity giving way to the rise of hegemony/interpolarity/multipolarity and regionalism, the gradual rise, strengthening and deepening of regional and intergovernmental organizations and institutions such as the EU, NATO and the UN . States continue to use the tools of foreign policy of a bygone era to address multiple new opportunities—and challenges.
Over history’s long arc, these tools have included diplomacy, preponderant military and economic capabilities, building and leveraging of alliances, and pursuit of other power variables, nowadays thought to include “soft power ” and “smart power.” This approach has neither reflected, nor addressed the unintended consequences of the end of post-World War era of bipolarity. The parallel process of increasing numbers of nation-states has produced a medley of nontraditional security threats. These include former and new client-states’ failure, increased inter- and intra-ethnic conflicts, demographic pressures due to refugees, humanitarian issues with internally displaced persons, rise of new security challenges such as international and domestic terrorism, rise of non-state actors competing against the Weberian state and the potential of nuclear proliferation, small-arms proliferation, low-intensity regional wars and a fragmented international order. Great Powers have generally not formulated strategic and cohesive foreign policy options to confront these changes and challenges, while the United States appears to stumble from crisis to the next with frequent leadership changes crafting new, improved, panacea-type solutions to the issues that bedevil the world.
The potential benefits of the end of the Cold War and its attendant consequences failed to produce the world that the United States had envisioned. At the same time, levels of cooperation, trade, technological development, communication and collaboration through institutions and regimes has increased. The retreat of communism to just a few hold-out countries has not produced democracy, or “liberal states”; non-state actors have increasingly been able to affect the direction of international relations, and as seen in the current pressing global issues, such as “the war on terror ”, the low-to-high intensity conflicts arising from the Arab Spring and the perennial conflict in the Great Lakes region in Africa. To understand how states have dealt with the changes in world order, this monograph briefly examines Great Power politics, summarizing the postwar world order. It then delves into the post-Cold War geopolitical situation and examines how the end of the era of bipolarity affected global geopolitics. Specifically, it addresses the issue of the rise of fragile, failing and failed states , the implications of failing states and the dangers these pose to world order and the Foreign Policy tools and options that the sole post-Cold War current hegemon has used to meet the challenges of failed states .
Among other things, this monograph broadly examines US foreign policy toward much of the African continent, with special attention to the greater East African and Horn of Africa region. It investigates how the United States has dealt with the growing existential threats emanating from the Horn of Africa, and especially the state failure phenomenon. For good measure, it studies the comparative foreign policy of other great powers, especially the European Union , and the now-rising BRICS. The United States, in its conduct of foreign policy, and despite the knowledge of the end of bipolarity, rise of state failure and contestation to state and global authority, has continually applied the traditional tools of diplomacy, power and influence to the new challenges and opportunities, rather than crafting appropriate responses to emergent conditions.
The latter is especially true of the postcolonial states of Africa, which joined an already existing system that generally marginalized them, and their attempts and processes to fit into this new world order. The monograph discusses potentially new, effective, nontraditional foreign policy strategies that have better prospects of addressing global changes in the twenty-first century, especially toward Africa, but more precisely, the Horn of Africa . It further argues that the success of such new strategies can provide the United States a template, a blueprint, for the future of its foreign policy strategies for the rest of the continent and parts of the world that have similar characteristics.
Post-Cold War : Oceans of Changes
Significant geopolitical events since the early 1990s can be divided into political/ideological, economic and technological categories. In the political arena, they included the fall of the Berlin Wall and the eventual reunification of Germany, the “end” of the Cold War the disintegration of the Soviet Union into the Commonwealth of Independent States , the collapse of several communist-leaning states including Romania, Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia , and the breakup of the latter two. On the economic arena, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade heralded the movement toward free trade, aided by the rise to supremacy of the Bretton Woods Institutions and increasing interdependence and globalization. The levels and complexity of global trade, occurring at a time of deepening political integration and economic expansion of Europe eastward affirmed an American-led future, one that then prized the free trade rules imputed by the World Trade Organization. On a less promising track, there was an increase in the number of state and non-state actors in the international system, including the ominous rise in and the power of violent non-state actors (VNSAs) and their brand of interstate relations such as terrorism. Although liberal democracy didn’t quite take hold everywhere, more countries were embracing tenets of democracy, which also brought about a change issues states would confront in the new century—including changes in the concepts of sovereignty, global governance, the cyber environment as a new frontier for conflict, human rights and climate change.
These changes have impacted—if not shifted—states’ security priorities and agendas, in ways that embrace traditional world order concerns such as the balance of power, anarchy and possibility of conventional war, states’ capabilities and alliances and outcomes of global trade; yet, they are confronting new challenges and threats including constraints in war, rebuilding states defeated in conflict, and the effects of environmental changes on their security (coastal lands flooding, necessitating populations moving, naval bases that may be relocated, etc.). The new expanded agenda also includes issues somewhat related to traditional security challenges: they include (in)security arising from inter/intra and ethnic conflicts, small weapons, weapons of mass destruction, nuclear, biological and chemical weapons proliferation, role diffusion and division in traditional state functions amongst several state and non-state actors , terrorism, effects of globalization, trade and trade wars, challenging economies threatening the global capitalist system, and the rise in the number of failed states .
The changes are thought to have altered the traditional security agenda so that it now includes humanitarian issues, a greater focus on terrorism and terrorist-client states, weapons proliferation, refugees, migration and demographic pressures, economic c...