International Relations Arena: A Ripe Domain for Zimbabwe’s Non-State Actors (NSAs)

by Trevor Maisiri

Introduction

Whereas Zimbabwe’s international relations, under Mugabe, was underpinned by isolationism and a distinct form of populistic nationalism, Mnangagwa’s era has emerged with a neoliberal approach and an attempt at pragmatism. At the center of the new administration’s international relations approach is an expressed intention to rebuild relations with the West, mainly the United States of America and Britain, while consolidating with the East, especially the Chinese and Russians. While relations with the East largely depend on buttressing pre-existing economic ties, from the Mugabe era, and building upon them; Western relations are dependent on Mnangagwa administration’s demonstration of change in political behavior, contrasted to Mugabe. The new administration is desperate for economic recovery and its foreign policy construction reflects this quest, in comparison to Mugabe’s which was ideological.

However, for many Zimbabweans the realm of international relations has been the prerogative of the State. Citizens have had limited participation in foreign policy making nor in shaping the country’s engagement, commitments and accountability at international levels. Citizens’ power and influence can no longer be restricted to the domestic space only, especially when States are increasingly being influenced by international systems, for good or worse. States are also swiftly escaping censure from some international systems, as these systems are becoming systematic in conniving against citizen needs, rights and priorities. Therefore, there is justification in exploring ways in which the citizens become active participants in international relations; projecting their influence beyond domestic spaces into the international arena. Non-State Actors (NSAs), ^[1] defined for the purposes of this paper as organizations with social and economic power derived from their genuine representation of citizens, have the most opportune role in leading this international relations foray.

Zimbabwean NSAs will need to exploit the evolving citizen diplomacy approach as a way of inserting themselves into international relations spaces. They also need to expand their transnational solidarity by investing more into other African and South-South struggles as a way of consolidating camaraderie consciousness and building international coalitions helpful in influencing shifts in international systems. With Zimbabwe government’s desperation to re-engage international lenders, NSAs need to insert themselves in engaging international financiers to project the citizens’ voice in providing checking mechanisms for Zimbabwe’s international commitments and transactions.

In the global development sector, current donor models are increasingly being questioned and are in need of change and disruption. Zimbabwean NSAs have an opportunity to begin to challenge current international development and donor models applied in the domestic context, while joining the international movements seeking to influence similar changes at the global level.

With regards to international mediation, Southern African Development Community (SADC) facilitation in Zimbabwe, from early 2000s resulted in the Global Political Agreement (GPA) and formation of the Government of National Unity (GNU) in 2009. Despite these hallmarks, the mediation process compromised citizens’ expectations around state reconstruction, institution of justice and reconciliation. Having excluded the citizens in the mediation process, including in the 2008 political and economic crisis, and considering the mounting political and economic tensions in the country in 2019 and possibly beyond; NSAs need to be ready to mobilize the involvement of citizens in any future local or international mediation processes, rather than leave such critical processes to political parties only.

This paper explores the role that Zimbabwean NSAs can undertake in shaping international relations spaces, on behalf of citizens and leveraging the evolving opportunities to do so at a global level.

Citizen Diplomacy: A Way into International Relations

The realm of international relations, though complex, has for long been preserved as the domain of exercise for professionals and experts, and rarely for laypersons. Across the wide African spectrum, including Zimbabwe, this has displaced citizens from active participation in shaping how States behave, conduct themselves and dispense their interests as well as engage with others’ at the international level.^[2] The concept of citizen diplomacy³ has evolved and emerged as the arsenal by which citizens’ active participation and shaping of international relations can be propelled. Citizen diplomacy is a society-centric approach that challenges the overdominance of State-centric public diplomacy.^[3] The proposition of citizen diplomacy is that; State-centric diplomacy limits the international relations arena and engagements to mere trade and investments interests by States. This disregards the fundamentals of citizens’ proximate and broader needs, and in most cases these trade and investment interests sacrifice citizens’ fundamental rights.^[4] Globally there is evolving openness within the international relations domain for inclusion of Non-State Actors and that contemporary diplomacy has become too important in shaping global existentialism to be left only in the hands of diplomats and their forefront representation of State interests.^[5] Citizen diplomacy is therefore the new global social contract.^[6][7] The foremost distinction between citizen diplomacy and conventional state led diplomacy is that while the earlier is dispensed through a people-to-people approach, the later is primarily concerned with governmentto-government.^[8]  Citizen diplomacy concerns itself with NSAs engaging transnationally in ways that leverage and mobilize the people-to-people nexus to confront the excesses of States’ hegemony in the global space.^[9] Therefore, the emergence of citizen diplomacy is highly contested by the realm of public diplomacy especially by authoritarian regimes and their extended influence in some regional and continental bodies such as regional economic communities (RECs) and others.

Whereas citizen diplomacy faces contestation from authoritarian regimes on one end, it also faces temptations for instrumentalization on the other.^[10] Instrumentalization transpires in cases where those purporting to be NSAs lack the credibility nor moral ground to represent citizens and instead are parochial proxies of the State, the donor community or other veiled elite interests.

Despite its nascency on the African landscape as well as challenges related to misrepresentation, under-representation and non-representation of citizen interests in public diplomacy; citizen diplomacy is a fertile and relevant conduit through with NSAs can carve out space for active international relations participation, including in the case of Zimbabwe. To facilitate effective citizen diplomacy, transnational solidarity is necessary.

Transnational Solidarity: Building Consciousness for Others’ Struggles

As asserted earlier, citizen diplomacy’s foundations are on people-to-people transnational linkages. NSAs from one country face prodigious barriers in attempting to move their national agenda by directly engaging other State players at the international level. This is because the international relations space is complex and is constructed based on States holding monopoly in influencing the international system given the system exists in accordance with the wishes of the States.^[11] Working within this complexity; NSAs cannot end or replace the State’s frontline role in shaping the international relations space, instead they should regulate the States’ excesses in the wake of both globalization and populist nationalism.^[12] Globalization and populist nationalism have the extreme tendencies of pushing States away from central considerations of citizens’ interests in both the domestic and international spaces; and therefore need active checking mechanisms. States are also increasingly escaping scrutiny at the international level as State-to-State or intramultilateral accountability is being compromised for ideological comradeships and overarching neo-liberal material interests.

The checking mechanism for this profligacy is robust NSAs that are effective at the international relations level due to their collective transnational engagement, leveraging the people-to-people power and influence to police the behavior of States and the multilateral space. NSAs should fully represent citizens (people) and then leverage this people base to influence State behavior, States’ individual conduct at the international level and the collective conduct of States aggregated as multilateral bodies. To do this, NSAs must firstly build strong transnational solidarity networks. Transnational solidarity requires NSAs to not only engage with others; but for NSAs of one country or region to be able to ‘practice otherness’; the exercise of ‘Ubuntu’ and ability to embed in others’ struggles even if they are geographically, culturally, ethnically or experientially distanced.

Zimbabwe’s NSA sector needs to expand its transnational solidarity perspective. During the liberation struggle Zimbabweans were matrixed into an effective regional and international solidarity network and benefited immensely from it.^[13] In the post-independence era, the role of transnational solidarity was largely delegated to the State and the NSA space had limited or sporadic flirtations in connecting to others’ struggles at the continental or South-South levels. Except for the recent scale-up in participation in the Southern African Development Community

(SADC) People Solidarity Network;^[14] Zimbabwean NSA’s role in transnational solidarity has largely been muted. This has also been influenced by many years of struggling with a ZANU-PF hegemony on the home front. The demands of concerted domestic focus by NSAs has usurped efforts in ‘practicing otherness’ in broader African and South-South struggles. Zimbabwean NSAs must realize that; though tribulations like racism, oppression, exploitation, violence manifest in nation-States, they are driven, urged and influenced by the international system.^[15] Globalization constructs do perpetuate some of these through international processes and so does the rise of populist nationalism in some instances. Therefore, home front struggles equally demand that NSA embed into transnational collective action that also targets international systems that incentivize State misbehavior.

Zimbabwe NSAs need to urgently map others’ struggles on the continent and in the broader SouthSouth and grapple with playing their part in transnational solidarity networks and action. The consciousness of African and South-South struggles needs to be re-ignited. Such action will return Zimbabwean NSAs to a sobriety of understanding that struggles go beyond borders and are about humanity’s unbounded quests. Such solidarity also acts decisively against the connivance that exists at State-to-State and multilateral levels where state sovereignty has now become the excuse for unchecked States’ repression of their own citizens. SADC is a classic case, where the intergovernmental status of the body is employed as justification for the regional body’s inaction in building governance accountability amongst member states.^[16] Transitional solidarity is also a ‘double edged sword’; as Zimbabwean NSAs participate in others’ struggles, others also participate in their own; thereby mobilizing greater regional and continental partnerships.

The Frailty of International Financing & Lending Markets

International Financial Institutions (IFIs) serve as lenders of last resort enabling borrowing countries to do so under conditionalities related to domestic policy reforms. In most instances these conditions include concoctions of measures that have a bearing on human rights, labor rights, civil and political rights of the citizenry.^[17] The global influence of IFIs, and other international borrowers is growing and so are concerns around impositions of their liberal policy regimes and impact on domestic socio-economy. There is also an absence of consensus on the holistic effectiveness of IFIs and international lender mechanisms in turning around economies and social sectors of developing countries, especially in Africa.^[18]

Besides the need for NSA to exert their influence on domestic public finance accountability, they have also become enforcers to curtail the excesses of global capitalism; mobilizing ‘people-power’ in form of movements that attempt to hold IFIs and other international lenders to account.^[19] This has led to many IFIs and international lenders’ increased understanding that their transactions with nation-States are not private affairs, but public, that require levels of transparency in keeping citizens abreast so they can hold both their governments and the IFIs themselves to account.^[20] Despite the presence of domestic legal and constitutional compulsions for governments to be more transparent in their international borrowings and transactions, many authoritarian regimes, who are known for quashing the rule of law and constitutional order, usually override these domestic directives. They find exoneration from the IFIs and international lenders’ willingness to disregard these transgressions on domestic accountability; preferring to designate their transactions as private and simply focused on economics rather than politics.^[21]

In the Zimbabwean context NSA’s role in public finance accountability has been limited as many are focused and interested in civil and political rights issues only. This is a misnomer especially in a country where public resources have been highly abused and oil the authoritarian machinery.^[22] Additional to the need for NSAs’ insertion in matters of domestic public finance accountability, there has been an even glaring gap in their involvement in engagement and holding IFIs and international borrowers to account. This is especially in cases where IFI’s and international borrowers’ complicity has been a convenient lever for government’s suppression or disregard of citizen needs, rights and welfare.

Zimbabwe’s external debt is around US$8.83 billion with arrears of US$5.65 billion; inclusive of bilateral, multilateral and commercial debt.^[23] External debt has for long been merely viewed through economic rather than political and social lenses. There are emerging advocacy efforts to consider the debt discourse through human rights lenses, given how much a country’s debt condition can affect the most vulnerable, including women and youths, as well as intergenerational issues.^[24] There are also instances where external debt is applied to subsidize or finance elite rather than citizen interests and yet the debt obligation applies to whole countries.²⁵

In 2018, the Zimbabwe government introduced the Transitional Stabilization Program (TSP) focused on among other things; quick stimulus for economic growth, and stabilization of macroeconomic and financial sectors.^[25] The program projects at moving Zimbabwe into an upper-middle class economy by 2013, establishing a private sector led economy and opening up to international investors and financiers.^[26] Within it, are aspirations to continue with the Lima^[27] commitments and tackling misuse of public funds; something that has been consistently raised through the Auditor-

General’s reports but without political will to redress it. The implications of the TSP therefore seem to be around introducing austerity measures, which the current minister of Finance – Mthuli Ncube has already initiated, leading to addressing the debt question, among other things; and an eventual return to be an acceptable international borrower. In summary and in layperson’s terms, part of the roadmap of the TSP is a sacrifice to addressing legacy debt in order to establish new terms of entering into new debt.

The external debt question is therefore perpetual and NSAs need to play a more active role both domestically and internationally in bringing into the public arena, what has for long been a private preserve of the State, IFIs and other international lenders. They need to enhance domestic public finance accountability, engage and hold IFIs and international borrower to account on their own part, and put into perspective the shielding of the most vulnerable in the broader debt and international financing paradigm. NSAs also need to push for debt audit and this will also require cooperation of the IFIs and other international lenders. They also need to play a critical advocacy role in ensuring current government-international lender conditions do not extend to mortgaging of the country’s resources thereby burdening future generational obligations.

The TSP and the Mnangagwa government are prone to moving towards an extreme neo-liberal agenda, given the desperation for international financing, so NSA have to ensure regulation to avoid the outright exposure of citizens to marginalization by capital’s excesses.

Disrupting the International Development Sector

The contemporary donor-driven model of development is increasingly questioned; and its capability to comprehensively and sustainably contribute to addressing Africa’s challenges is doubted.^[28] Uncertainties have also emerged around some donor agendas: their abhorred top-down approaches; limited contextualization; and the overall ineffectiveness around the mechanisms donors have for long applied in the development sector. This has been coupled with concerns around growing donor dependency and the evasiveness of Africa’s self-sufficiency and ownership in attending to its development needs.³⁰

In many cases, NSAs are sandwiched between donor impositions, on one end, and the citizens’ despondence with donor mechanisms on the other. This creates a moral conundrum for NSAs. How do they prioritize the voice of the citizens while they access donor funding and support, which in most cases isn’t fully aligned with citizens’ needs and priorities? This leads to further questions around the independence of NSAs and how much they can push-back or influence donors to align with what matters most for the citizens. Do citizens merely exist as fodder upon which both donors and NSAs trample to satisfy their own quests; veiled in the intent to do good? It is also too subjective to blanket all NSAs (as defined for purposes of this paper) under this malice? There exists a spectrum of some that have such a desperation for donor funding and resourcing which precludes their moral obligation to citizens, while others have intact moral compasses that keep them unwavering on citizens as a priority.

The deeper objective is to grapple with how NSAs can insert themselves locally and internationally to occupy a central space to push for transformation and reformation of international development, by enhancing the amenability of donor funding and resourcing to be more citizen-centric. The ideal is to, at some point in the future, wean Africa from donor dependency. The process towards that end is to transform and reform current donor mechanisms.

In 2011, the European Commission pledged to make aid more effective by placing NSAs at the center of development processes and ensure grassroots ownership of donor processes;^[29] thereby providing impetus for a basis for potential reformation of the sector. Other mainstream donors are also contending with a shift towards ‘localization’. This is a way of direct relaying of interventions implementation through local organizations rather than continue with the dominance of international NGOs in domestic spaces.^[30] This intentionality needs nurturing and tapping into by NSAs. They must be in these conversations to lay out propositions that accrue direct leverage for the citizenry. These are all first steps to what needs to be a deeper sectoral overhaul and NSAs have a critical role in this dispensation. The development sector and its models need disruption as the sector remains very traditional in an era where other sectors are open and amenable to adaptation.^[31] That disruption must however be propelled by ‘outside’ forces like the NSAs.^[32]  NSAs must build bottom-up coalitions that percolate these engagements and conversations from their domestic spaces to the international arena.^[33]

A start point for Zimbabwean NSAs is the creation of local coalitions focused on the transformation of the development sector and connecting that to other similar Pan-African initiatives across the academia, other NSAs, donors, development sector institutions and others. Although many cannot conceive NSAs being able to influence shifts in donor models, which are mostly crafted from the foreign policy enclaves of the donor countries or multilateral institutions, this journey needs to start immediately.^[34] There is enough evidence and moral ground to begin to challenge the status quo of the development space and donor models, and still, some donors are growing an appetite that contemplates such conversations.

International Mediation: Avoiding Another Compromise in Zimbabwe

Since the 2017 military-assisted transition, Zimbabwe which had reignited hopes of a return to normalcy, is once again gripped with political tensions amidst a poorly performing economy. It is difficult to predict what is to come, but it is also careless to disregard potential escalation. Whichever way the situation evolves, NSAs need to be better positioned, than in 2008, to play an active role in possible mediation of the ensuing political conflict. The 2008 conflict and the resultant Global Political Agreement (GPA) provide critical lessons for Zimbabwean NSAs.

SADC’s involvement in the Zimbabwe situation, prior to 2008, wasn’t just about electoral issues but involved the  rampant abuse of human rights and blatant disregard for responsible governance in Zimbabwe.^[35] Some of the distinct concerns on Zimbabwe were around; the subjugation of state institutions, erosion of non-state space, reduction of citizens  to subjects of the state rather than its proprietors and the inclusionary/exclusionary  mechanism of governance through patronage.  As such, the issues brought to SADC, by NSAs and pro-democracy forces, before 2008, were focused on regional/international mediation targeted at shaping the promulgation of justice and reconciliation in the country. The crafting of the GPA was intended to pitch it as a state reconstruction document and therefore also meant to dispense a course towards justice and reconciliation in Zimbabwe.^[36]

Despite SADC’s intent to influence a mediation process that would lead to justice and reconciliation in Zimbabwe, the regional bloc later adopted a reductionist approach.^[37] This approach was focused on containing the Zimbabwe crisis and establishing stability only, without pushing for mechanisms and processes that would see justice and reconciliation delivered.^[38] As established in earlier publications, SADC took this reductionist approach in response to ZANUPF’s political tactics that were calculated to manage the risks presented by the mediation process against the party’s historical hold on power and state control.^[39]

ZANU-PF’s embryonic resistance to the mediation process wasn’t simply about power obsession, as alluded by many of its opponents, nor was it about the thrust to repeal Western “recolonization” of the country, as strongly pitched by the party. Resistance was due to perceived economic and security risks.^[40] This is because the party had over time become a conduit for personal economic accumulation.⁴³ The SADC mediation process, with its focus on state reconstruction, was seen by ZANU-PF as progressively advancing towards institutionalization of justice and reconciliation as well as transparency and accountability, which would break the culture of impunity and result in possible prosecution of perpetrators of  contemporary  and past conflicts.^[41] For this reason,  the party was vehemently opposed to notions of transitional justice as well as security sector reforms (SSR) during mediation.^[42]  These two components were largely seen as the fulcrum of the justice and reconciliation agenda within and after the GNU period.

The SADC reductionist approach was exhibited through various ways. Whereas SADC’s initially perceived “end game” in the mediation process was institutionalization of justice and reconciliation, this focus shifted “mid-way” through. SADC’s expectation was that the GPA would get into full implementation before the holding of new elections that would dissolve the GNU. With that in mind, there would be reconstruction of state institutions and the pursuance of processes, including the new constitution, which would lead to justice and reconciliation.^[43] The ferocious resistance by ZANU-PF on the “full-implementation-of the-GPA-before-elections” stipulation led to limited options for SADC and the weakening of the regional bloc’s resolve. Faced with an economic and political crisis in the country, ZANU-PF needed the GPA for its political convenience, as a way of reconfiguring and renegotiating “the terms of its existence with the opposition, civil society and the international community”;⁴⁷ while it resisted its full implementation as it threatened the party’s hold on power.

Secondly, SADC attempted a political balancing act, rather than resolving the crisis in a manner beneficial to the citizenry. ZANU-PF mobilized other regional leaders in support of the party’s resistance to full mediation and implementation of the GPA. The party also attempted to apply the anti-Western rhetoric against the mediation process. While ZANU-PF plaid this deliberate game, the mediators also realized this would expose them and possibly lead to the MDC parties pulling out of the mediation process and the GNU, which would infuse further instability in Zimbabwe. So while they had to comprehend with the frustrations from ZANU-PF, the mediators also had to appease the MDCs so the parties would remain in the mediation process and in the GNU. The burden of playing that difficult political balancing act by the mediators therefore became part of the compulsion for SADC to settle for a reductionist approach in the mediation process in Zimbabwe.

Thirdly, the SADC-Peace & Security Architecture instruments are non-binding, except for those that have been transformed into protocols. There is therefore a lack of accountability mechanisms to the SADC-PSA by member states and intervention processes such as mediation have therefore been exposed and undermined by this glaring lack. In the case of Zimbabwe, the mediation team didn’t have a robust mechanism to enforce its decisions and those of the summit around the full implementation of the GPA or guidelines of the mediation process. Without enforceability, the SADC-PSA remains self-defeating and at worst provides a veneer of mediation to processes that otherwise end “mid-way” or in distortion.

In reflecting back to the mediation process leading to the GPA as well and its implementation, citizens were mere bystanders. The mediation process excluded NSAs, as representatives of the citizens and there was hope that an international mediation process will self-regulate to deliver outcomes for citizens, including the full measure of state reconstruction, justice and reconciliation. To-date, the country still faces similar challenges to those which the SADC mediation process attempted to address; the mediation process changed very little in terms of what the Zimbabwean citizens face today. For Zimbabwean NSAs, there is a need to be proactive and develop a comprehensive mediation process in readiness for any potential of Zimbabwe returning to regional/international mediation, given what is looming. At the center of this process must be the need to include citizens and their voice to any mediation process, to avoid another exclusive political party process. NSAs must also develop their own ‘Early Warning System’ for conflicts that require regional/international mediation and proactively engage this at the regional/international levels whenever necessary. Having learnt from the past SADC mediation, another compromised process is unacceptable.

Conclusion & Recommendations

The role of NSAs in shaping international relations seems clear but requires intentional action. Zimbabwean NSAs must consider themselves in the wider perspective of regional and international spaces and have clarity and confidence in the role and influence they can exert at those levels. Below are specific recommendations for considerations in the quest for Zimbabwe NSAs to implant themselves more in the international relations space. Zimbabwe NSAs must:

• Urgently map transnational solidarity networks, agendas as well as others’ struggles in which they can dispense active solidarity as a way of consolidating Pan-African and SouthSouth consciousness.
• Expand their areas of focus and interest from being restricted to civil and political rights only but establish a vehement footprint in public finance accountability as well and ensure citizens can hold government to account on such matters.
• Build mechanism of regulating the tendency by Zimbabwean government to slide towards an extreme neo-liberal agenda which may expose citizens to marginalization from the excesses of capital interests.
• Engage and hold IFIs and international borrower to account on transparency and scrutiny on their part, and advocate for mechanism that shield the most vulnerable from issues related to debt and international financing.
• Push for Zimbabwe to implement a debt audit to ascertain the actual extent of current debt levels as well as understand how and where any such debt was applied; and establish a citizens-driven accountability mechanism for both current and future debt.
• Establish a tracking and accountability mechanism to ensure government-international lender conditions and transactions do not extend to mortgaging of the country’s resources thereby unnecessarily burdening future generations.
• Build local coalitions focused on the transformation of the development sector and donor models and connecting to similar Pan-African initiatives across the academia, other NSAs, donors, development sector institutions and others.
• Build proactive and comprehensive citizen-centric mediation process guidelines/mechanism in readiness for any potential of Zimbabwe returning to regional/international mediation in the short to medium term.
• Establish an ‘Early Warning System’ for conflicts that feeds into regional and international intergovernmental bodies and other NSAs in the transnational solidarity networks.

[1] “Non-state actors are individuals or organizations that have powerful economic, political or social power and are able to influence at a national and sometimes international level while not belonging to or ally themselves to any particular country or state.”, https://medium.com/@sayeds/what–are–the–non–state–actors–in–the–world–and–howeffective–are–they–dd30a8a30f45

[2] James Marshall, ‘International Affairs: Citizen Diplomacy’, American Political Science Review, 43/1, (1949) ³ The concept of citizen diplomacy was first articulated by James Marshall, after the second world war in his essay titled, “International Affairs: Citizens Diplomacy”. He pushed for what he termed as the need to democratize foreign affairs. He bemoaned the exclusion of citizens from shaping foreign policy and foreign relations and indicated the need to include laypeople in shaping this arena.

[3] Andreas Fulda (2019), ‘The Emergence of Citizen Diplomacy in European Union-China Relations: Principles, Pillars, Pioneers, Paradoxes”, Diplomacy & Statecraft, Vol. 30:1, 188-216)

[4] Presented at conference of the European Consortium for Political Research, under the theme: “From the OutsideIn – International Relations’ effects on Domestic Public Attitudes at Johannes Gutenberg Universität, Mainz in 2013

[5] Interview, African foreign policy expert, Washington DC, August 2019

[6] Marc Gopin, ‘To Make the Earth Whole: The Art of Citizen Diplomacy in the Age of Religious Militancy (Plymouth,

[7] ), 95 (quoted in Andreas Fulda (2019), ‘The Emergence of Citizen Diplomacy in European Union-China

Relations: Principles, Pillars, Pioneers, Paradoxes”, Diplomacy & Statecraft, Vol. 30:1, 188-216)

[8] Andreas Fulda (2019), ‘The Emergence of Citizen Diplomacy in European Union-China Relations: Principles, Pillars,

Pioneers, Paradoxes”, Diplomacy & Statecraft, Vol. 30:1, 188-216

[9] Interview, Africa foreign policy expert, Washington DC, August 2019

[10] Ibid

[11] Ibid

[12] While globalization is opening up states to extreme neo-liberal tendencies that have limited regard for citizens, populist nationalism is disintegrating the global space interest-group domains that are threatening international unity.

[13] Zimbabweans were hosted in regional and international spaces – e.g. Zambia, Mozambique, Tanzania while many others offered military training support and academic opportunities; also received moral and material support from those in the international community

[14] “Southern African People’s Solidarity Network (SAPSN)is a Southern African Regional network that gathers development NGOs and institutions, many civil society organisations such as trade unions, churches, communitybased movements. SAPSN aims to create a cohesive strategy of the Southern Countries that will resist and counterbalance the negative effects that the globalisation process is having on the South. SAPSN believes in the necessity to strengthen national struggles starting from supporting grass-root movements especially those that include marginalized communities. All these different national organisations or movements should then exchange experiences and co-operate with other Southern African organisations or international movements from Latin America, the Carribean, Asia and the Pacific. SAPSN believes also that targeting governments of the North is a basic strategy to limit the negative effects of global institutions as IMF, WB and WTO and the inter-linked issues of debt, structural adjustment and globalisation.” https://www.tni.org/en/article/southern–african–peoples–solidaritynetwork–sapsn

[15] Interview, Africa Foreign Policy expert, Washington DC, August 2019

[16] “Implementing Peace and Security Architecture (II): Southern Africa”, International Crisis Group Africa Report N°191, 15 October 2012

[17] Thomas Stubbs & Alexander Kentikelenis, “International Financial Institutions and Human Rights: Implications for Public Health”, Public Health & Review, Vol. 38, No. 27; 2017

[18] Stephen C. Nelson, “International Financial Institutions and Market Liberalization in the Developing World”, in the Oxford Handbook of Politics of Development. Oxford University Press, 2016.

[19] Louis W. Panly, “What New Architecture? International Financial Institutions and Global Economic Order”, Global Governance, Vol. 7, 469-484, 2001.

[20] Interview, International finance expert, Washington DC, August 2019

[21] Ibid

[22] https://www.auditorgeneral.gov.zw/downloads

[23] Figures are as at end of 2017 (IMF Country Report No.19/144 of 2019)

[24] At the Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa (OSISA) debt conference held in Johannesburg in July there were conclusions around the how effects of austerity measures meant related to debt burdens affect women and young people the most. Presenting at the meeting, Nancy Kachingwe indicated that, “women are the ones owed by both lenders and borrowers”. http://osisa.org/debt–gender–and–power/ . The conference also grappled with how debt must be “de-fiscalized and be politicized”, calling for a more robust socio-political engagement with the debt question rather than keeping it in economics discussions and considerations only. ²⁵ Interview, International finance expert, Washington DC, August 2019

[25] TSP also commits to addressing reduction of poverty, social service delivery (water, health, sanitation, energy etc.)

[26] Zimbabwe Coalition on Debt & Development (ZIMCODD), “Transitional Stabilization Programme: October 2018 to December 2020”, 2019

[27] Under the Lima plan, Zimbabwe committed to planned simultaneous repayment modalities to the IMF, World Bank and the African Development Bank. The 2015 Lima process, received support from creditors and development partners. https://www.theindependent.co.zw/2017/09/15/lima–plan–stalled/

[28] Roger C Riddell, ‘The End of Foreign Aid to Africa? Concerns about Donor Policies’, African Affairs, Vol. 98, No. 392 (1999), pp. 309-335; Thompson Ayodele, Franklin Cudjoe, Temba A. Nolutshungu, & Charles K. Sunwabe, ‘African Perspectives on Aid: Foreign Assistance Will Not Pull Africa Out of Poverty’, CATO Institute, 2005. ³⁰ Moyo, D. (2009). Dead aid: Why aid is not working and how there is a better way for Africa. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

[29] European Commission, “Engaging Non-State Actors in New Aid Modalities”, January 2011.

https://ec.europa.eu/europeaid/sites/devco/files/methodology–tools–and–methods–engaging–non–state–actorsnew–aid–modalities–201101_en_2.pdf

[30] https://oxfamblogs.org/fp2p/localization–in–aid–why–isnt–it–happening–what–to–do–about–it/;

https://www.devex.com/news/localization–moves–from–advocacy–to–implementation–in–indo–pacific–90729;

 

[31] Interview, development sector expert, Washington DC, August 2019

[32] Ibid

[33] Ibid

[34] Ibid

[35] Although others infer to SADC’s intervention/mediation in 2007 as having been targeted at merely creating a conducive climate for the 2008 elections; the response was around excessive clampdown on political opponents by

ZANU-PF which had led to the beating of Morgan Tsvangirai and Arthur Mutambara at a “prayer rally” in Harare in May 2007. Thereafter SADC sought to meet opposition parties and ZANU-PF to calm down tensions as well as ensure some form of return to “rule of law”. There were indications that SADC even sought the postponement of the March, 2008 elections as a way of ensuring that conflict tensions were addressed before the said election. So the 2007 intervention wasn’t primarily for election purposes but to somehow restore order, rule of law and justice.

[36] Trevor Maisiri,            “Zim’s              elusive       reconstruction            agenda”,                  2013

http://www.crisisgroup.org/en/regions/africa/southern–africa/zimbabwe/op–eds/maisiri–zimbabwe–s–elusivereconstruction–agenda.aspx

[37] Trevor Maisiri, “Hindering Sadc from shaping poll landscape”, The Zimbabwe Independent, 1 November 2013

[38] Crisis Coalition of Zimbabwe, “The Zimbabwe Transition Barometer”, October 2012

[39] Trevor Maisiri,            “Zim’s              elusive       reconstruction            agenda”,                  2013

http://www.crisisgroup.org/en/regions/africa/southern–africa/zimbabwe/op–eds/maisiri–zimbabwe–s–elusivereconstruction–agenda.aspx

[40] “Zimbabwe: Election Scenarios”, International Crisis Group, report No. 202, May 2013 ⁴³ “Zimbabwe: Election Scenarios”, International Crisis Group, report No. 202, May 2013

[41] Ibid

[42] Shari Eppel & Brian Raftopolous, “Developing a Transformation Agenda: Political Crisis, Mediation and the Prospects for Transitional Justice in Zimbabwe”, IDASA & Zimbabwe Institute, November 2008

[43] The signing of the GPA (2008) with provisions on national healing and reconciliation (Article 7) indeed ushered in a new step for further discussions and mapping of reconciliation efforts in Zimbabwe to seek redress for violent conflicts that had happened in Zimbabwe’s history.” Moreblessing Mbire, “Seeking Reconciliation and National Healing in Zimbabwe: Case of the Organ on National Healing, Reconciliation and Integration (ONHRI)”, Masters degree thesis submitted to the International Institute for Social Studies,  The Hague, The Netherlands November, 2011 ⁴⁷ “The Global Political Agreement as a “Passive Revolution”: Notes on Contemporary Politics in Zimbabwe”, Brian Raftopoulos, The Round Table Vol. 99, No. 411, p. 705 – 718, 2010, p. 707