ABSTRACT
South Africa remains the leading state actor in Africa, but there is considerable dispute about what type of actor it is and should be. In 2007 Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, then-minister of foreign affairs, said South Africa would use its 2007–08 term as a member of the UN Security Council to ‘serve the people of Africa’ and promote an African agenda, particularly through conflict resolution and peacebuilding on the continent. Since 2014 Pretoria’s approach to Africa has centred on a recognition of both the scale of the destruction apartheid-era South Africa inflicted upon its neighbours and the significant contribution these neighbours made to the country’s liberation struggle. By 1994, South Africa was a formidable economic power in Africa, albeit a modest force globally. The expanding role of South Africa’s companies across the continent constitutes the second pillar of its post-1994 regional economic programme.
