“No Colonial Baggage”: Imagining a Decolonised Australia-Africa Relations

Muhammad Dan Suleiman*, Christopher Isike, David Mickler

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

As part of its strategy to win African votes for election to the UN Security Council (2008–12), Canberra sought to leverage its soft power potential by presenting Australia as having “no colonial baggage” in Africa while framing Australia as “a country from the Global North, located in the Global South,” and one that would “work with other small and middle powers.” Ultimately, the campaign was successful, including up to 50 of Africa's 54 countries voting for Australia. This paper considers this framing in the context of a shared but differentiated colonial history, including its contradictions, given that Australians fought several wars on African soil on behalf of the British Empire, supported white minority regimes and anti-communist movements on the continent, and maintained the white Australia policy until the 1970s. The paper deploys decoloniality theory to engage Australia's lack of a neat fit within a historicised articulation of a “coloniser-colonised” relationship between Europe and Africa. We show that, despite this lack of fit, Australia's relations with the countries of Africa reinforce long-standing of patterns of knowledge, power, and being associated with colonialism. Accordingly, the paper makes three recommendations for cooperation and innovative thinking in foreign policy and diaspora diplomacy between Africa and a more independent and multicultural Australia based on the “equality of being.”.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)522-541
Number of pages20
JournalAustralian Journal of Politics and History
Volume69
Issue number3
DOIs
StatePublished - Sep 2023
Externally publishedYes

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2023 The Authors. Australian Journal of Politics & History published by The University of Queensland and John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd.

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • History
  • Political Science and International Relations

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