Connected: information and state power between the United States and South Africa

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Content CONNECTED: INFORMATION AND STATE POWER BETWEEN THE UNITED STATES AND SOUTH AFRICA by Amelia Hardee Arsenault A Dissertation Presented to the FACULTY OF THE USC GRADUATE SCHOOL UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY (COMMUNICATION) December 2009 Copyright 2009 Amelia Hardee Arsenault ii DEDICATION For my parents, Raymond and Kathleen Arsenault, and for my sister, Anne Arsenault. iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This dissertation is partly the result of the hundreds of hours that I spent in front of my computer. It is also partly the result of ingesting amounts of Diet Coke known to kill rats in laboratory testing. More importantly, it is the product of the intellectual and emotional support of a long list of people. My first thanks go to my committee members. My advisor, mentor, and dissertation committee chair Manuel Castells spent countless hours helping me refine this project. His counsel, kindness, and boundless intellectual curiosity will continue to inspire me throughout my academic career. I thank Ernest Wilson for continually challenging me to think in new and different ways and for sharing his considerable knowledge about Washington, DC, and South Africa. I thank Philip Seib for his always‐helpful comments, speedy responses, and many interesting conversations. I also thank Geoffrey Cowan and Thomas Goodnight for their guidance and support. My appreciation also goes out to all the other faculty and staff at USC Annenberg that made this project possible, including: Christine Lloreda, Melody Lutz, Sherine Baldwin, and Deb Lawler. I would also like to thank my interviewees for taking time out of their busy schedules to speak with me. Writing a dissertation is a long journey that begins before you ever put pen to paper. From pre‐school to PhD, my parents, Raymond and Kathleen Arsenault, have been a never‐ending source of inspiration and support. They have always encouraged me to explore new ideas and new experiences. My sister Anne has also iv been my rock. Grownup Amelia wishes she could go back and tell 10 year‐old Amelia not to tease her sister so much. I am also grateful to my late grandmother Suzanne Hardee. A globetrotter until the end of her life, she inspired me to want to see the world. I would also like to thank my dear friends and colleagues in Zimbabwe, particularly, Heeten Bhagat, Nakai Matema, and Farai Mpfunya and his family, who took in a blond American from Florida and treated her like family. They instilled in me a love and respect for Africa and never fail to remind me to step out my box and try to see the world from a different perspective. I also owe a debt of gratitude to my friends and colleagues at the USC Annenberg School, including: Omri Ceren, Craig Hayden, John Kephart, Jade Miller, Lauren Movius, Katya Ognyanova, and many, many others. The PhD experience would have not been nearly as fun or as rewarding without your friendship and intellectual input. I would also like to give thanks to all my friends, who have been with me every step of the way and never gave me any grief because I canceled plans in order to do work… again. In particular, I would like to thank Meredith Bell, Courtney Crummett, Anna Dimond, Marissa Gluck, Amanda Horwitz, Elisa Lynskey, Matteo Sardi, and Poppy Trowbridge. Last but not least, I would like to thank Shawn Powers, who never fails to make me smile. I am lucky to have had him by my side during every step of the PhD process. v To anyone else I have forgotten, my apologies. I think all the Diet Coke may have rotted my brain. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Dedication ii Acknowledgments iii List of Tables ix List of Figures x Abbreviations xi Abstract xvii Introduction 1 Background & Significance 3 Plan of the Dissertation 12 Chapter 1: Information and State Power 14 Why the Nation‐State? 16 Informational Power 24 Informational Power in Practice 29 Traditional Measures of State Power in International Relations 36 Perspectives on Information and State Power 40 Information as Interdependence 41 Information as Domination 44 Information as World Culture 46 A Statement of the Problem 48 Chapter 2: An Ecosystem of Communications 50 The Case Study Approach 51 Constructing a Processual Model of Information Flows 63 Conceptualizing the South African Information Environment 66 Defining an Ecosystem of Communications 72 Military 76 Diplomacy 78 Economics and Trade 80 Aid 83 Multilateral 87 Covert Operations 90 Non‐State Transnational Relations 91 Interactions Across Channels 94 My Initial Theoretical Model 96 vii Measuring Information and Power as Endgame 98 Data Sources and Levels of Analysis 103 Limitations of the Study 110 Moving Forward 112 Chapter 3: Information and Power in South Africa 113 The Contemporary South African Information Environment 114 The Socio‐political Context 118 Economics and Ownership 131 The American Connection 144 Conclusion 154 Chapter 4: Promoting US Foreign Policy 156 Changing Rhetoric and Changing Realities 164 Dollar Diplomacy 170 PEPFAR to the Rescue? 181 Continuity 187 A Conduit for the Continent 192 Beyond Borders 192 Leveraging the Regional Hegemon 194 Mapping Political Information Strategies 198 Chapter 5: Conditioning Minds: Promoting US Culture and Ideology 206 Anatomy of Informational Strategies for Ideology and Culture 210 Selling Democracy 215 Promoting Media as an Actor in Society 222 Cultural Diplomacy 232 Influencing the Public Mind 240 Chapter 6: Improving Information Infrastructure: Expanding Economic Opportunities 249 A Marshall Plan for ICTs 253 Championing an Open Communications Market 266 Structuring the Telecommunications Market 273 The Regional Strategy 277 Creating Market Opportunities for US Businesses 286 ICT4D – The Economic Angle 294 Mapping Economic Information Strategies 297 Chapter 7: Mapping the System of Influence 302 US Informational Power in Theory 303 US Informational Power in Practice 306 US Objectives 311 viii Channels and Actors 314 Approach and Methods 318 The Objects of Influence 321 The Conditions of Influence 322 Interactions 324 The Building Blocks 326 A Nation of Individuals 327 Leveraging the Ecosystem of Communications 333 Conclusion 337 US Informational Strategies Toward South Africa 339 Advocating the Foreign Policy Agenda 342 Promoting American Values 344 Seeking Economic Opportunities 345 Information Imperialism Revisited 347 Future Directions 351 Bibliography 354 Appendices 390 Appendix A: Interviews 390 Appendix B: General Timeline of Major Events in US‐South African Foreign Policy Relations 394 Appendix C: Timeline of Key South African Events in Information Policy 397 Appendix D: Major US Government or Government‐Funded Actors Involved in Democracy Promotion and Media Assistance in South Africa 400 Appendix E: Major South African Organizations Involved in Democracy Promotion Receiving US Funding 402 ix LIST OF TABLES Table 1.1: Definitions of Information 34 Table 2.1: Channels of State Influence 75 Table 2.2: Dimensions of Informational Power 102 Table 3.1: South Africa’s Communications Environment in Comparative Perspective 115 Table 4.1: Typology of US Political Information Strategies Targeting the South African Information Environment 161 Table 4.2: Trends in American Foreign Policy Toward South Africa 169 Table 5.1: Typology of US Cultural/Ideological Information Strategies Targeting the South African Information Environment 208 Table 5.2: Specific South African Attitudes Toward the United States 247 Table 6.1: US Government Broadcasting and Telecommunications Initiatives 256 Table 6.2: Regional US Government Broadcasting and Telecommunications Initiatives 278 Table 6.3: US Information and Communications Companies Operating in South Africa 287 Table 7.1: Revised Framework for Analyzing Information and State Power 310 Table 7.2: South African Media & ICT Ownership Demographics 329 x LIST OF FIGURES Figure 2.1: Initial Theoretical Model 69 Figure 2.2: Initial Model of the South African Information Environment 96 Figure 2.3: Dissertation Levels of Analysis 105 Figure 4.1: US Government Grants to South Africa (1986 – 2008) 174 Figure 4.2: Processual Model of US Political Information Strategies 199 Figure 4.3: American and South African Foreign Direct Investment 202 Figure 4.4: Balance of Trade in Goods and Services Between the US and South Africa (1992 – 2007) 203 Figure 5.1: Processual Model of US Government Cultural and Ideological Information Strategies 241 Figure 5.2: Views on the United States (2007) 246 Figure 6.1: Processual Model of US Economic and Structural Influence Strategies 298 Figure 7.1: Processual Model of Information Strategy Formulation 307 Figure 7.2: US Government Actors Involved in Informational Strategies in South Africa 316 Figure 7.3: The South African Information Environment 323 Figure 7.4: The Primary Spoken Language of South African Internet Users in 2007 331 xi ABBREVIATIONS ABT WTO Agreement on Basic Telecommunications ACCORD African Centre for the Constructive Resolution of Disputes ADF African Development Forum ADNA Advocacy Network for Africa AGOA African Growth and Opportunity Act AFCOM African Communications Conference AISI African Information Society Initiative ANC African National Congress APIC Africa Policy and Information Center ATU African Telecommunication’s Union ARICEA Information and Communication for Eastern and Southern Africa ARMSCOR Armament Corporation of South Africa ASGISA Accelerated and Shared Growth‐South Africa BCF US‐SA Bilateral Cooperation Forum BEE Black Economic Empowerment BTA The WTO Agreement on Basic Telecommunications Services CAAA Comprehensive Anti‐Apartheid Act CATIA Catalysing Access to ICTs in Africa CBC Congressional Black Caucus CCA Corporate Council on Africa xii CIP Department of State International Communication and Information Policy Group CIPE Center for International Private Enterprise CODESA Convention for a Democratic South Africa CODESIA Counsil for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa COMESA Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa COPE Congress of the People COSATU Congress of South African Trade Unions CRASA Communications Regulators Association of Southern Africa CRTC Canadian Radio‐Television Communications Commission DA Democratic Alliance DATA Debt, AIDS, Trade, and Africa DFA South African Department of Foreign Affairs DFI Digital Freedom Initiative of the United States DFID Department for International Development DIRC South African Department of International Relations and Cooperation DOC South African Department of Communications DOD United States Department of Defense DOS United States Department of State DPSA IT Policy for Government ECA Electronic Communications Act no. 36 of 2005 ECA Economic Commission for Africa xiii EFOIA The Electronic Freedom of Information Act Amendments FCC Federal Communication Commissions FDI Foreign Direct Investment FFATA Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act of 2006 FXI Freedom of Expression Institute GATS General Agreement on Trade and Services GCIS Government Communication and Information System GEAR Growth, Employment, and Redistribution Program GII Global Information Infrastructure GIIC Global Information Infrastructure Commission IBA Independent Broadcasting Authority IBI Intergovernmental Bureau of Informatics ICASA Independent Communications Authority of South Africa ICT Information and Communication Technology ICT4D Information and Communication Technology for Development IDASA Institute for a Democratic South Africa IDRC International Development Research Centre IMDT Independent Media Diversity Trust IMSSA Independent Mediation Service of Southern Africa IRI International Republican Institute ISAD G7 Information Society and Development Conference ISP Internet Service Provider xiv IT Information Technology ITA WTO Information Technology Agreement of 1996 ITAC International Trade Administration Commission for South Africa ITU International Telecommunications Union LPFM Low Power Frequency Modulation MISA Media Institute of Southern Africa MMP Media Monitoring Project MNC Multinational Corporation MOC Ministry of Communications MoC Minister of Communications MTN Mobile Telephone Networks, South Africa NED National Endowment for Democracy NCIP National Information and Communication Project NECC National Education Crisis Committee NetTel@Africa Network for Capacity Building and Knowledge Exchange in the Telecommunications Sector NEPAD New Partnership for Africa’s Development NII National Information Infrastructure Initiative NGBT WTO Negotiating Group on Basic Telecommunications NTCA American National Telephone Cooperative Association NTF South African National Telecommunications Forum NTIA US National Telecommunications and Information Administration xv NTTI US National Telecommunications Training Institute NWICO New World Information and Communication Order OAU Organization of African Unity OECD Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development OFTEL UK Office of Telecommunications OFCOM UK Office of Communications OMB Office of Management and Budget PANA Pan African News Agency PEPFAR US President’s Plan for AIDS Relief PIPA Program for International Policy Attitudes RDP South African Reconstruction and Development Programme RSA Republic of South Africa SACP South African Communist Party SADC Southern African Development Community SAFE South Africa‐Far East Cable SAIBL South African International Business Linkages‐II SAIRR South African Institute of Race Relations SAITIS South African Information Technology Industry Strategy SAPA South African Press Agency SAT‐3/WASC South Atlantic 3/West Africa Submarine Cable SATRA South African Telecommunications Regulatory Authority xvi SATCC‐TU Southern Africa Transport & Communications Commission – Technical Unit SIDA Swedish International Development Agency SIPRS The USAID Southern Africa Telecommunications Policy and Regulatory Support Project SITA State Information Technology Agency TDA Transition to Democracy Act TRASA Telecommunications Regulators Association of Southern Africa UN United Nations UNDP United Nations Development Programme UNESCO United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization USAID United States Agency for International Development USIA United States Information Agency USTDA United States Trade and Development Agency USTR United States Trade Representative VAN Value‐Added Network VANS Value‐Added Network Service WEF World Economic Forum WTO World Trade Organization xvii ABSTRACT In the face of rapid technological change, the global diffusion of electronic communication networks, and the related rise of a 24‐hour global communication sphere, states around the world at all levels of development and power have expanded their attempts to control and shape information flows both at home and abroad. States seek both to protect their information spaces from unwanted intrusions and to influence the information spaces of other states in order to achieve broader goals. The United States, as the world’s “information superpower,” has been a leader in the adoption of informational strategy as a tool of international relations, providing expertise, training, and direct messaging campaigns to countries around the world. While the US government is commonly discussed as a unitary actor with one agenda, the majority of existing studies of information and state power focus on one particular program or area, such as public diplomacy, media and journalism training, or telecommunications policy assistance. As of yet, very little is known about the coordination and commonality between these different efforts. In order to contribute to the larger theoretical debate about informational strategy as a tool of international relations, this dissertation offers an extensive case study of the array of strategies used by US government actors striving to influence the South African communications environment during the William Jefferson Clinton and George W. Bush administrations. Drawing upon interviews with US government actors and key South African stakeholders and analyses of primary xviii documents and spending patterns, it tests a theoretical model designed to explain the processes through which informational strategies are conceived and operationalized. This case study underscores the lack of coordination among different US government department involved in information programs and the decisive role of South African domestic actors and socio‐political trends in determining the success or failure of any American informational strategy. 1 INTRODUCTION In February 1996, Reed E. Hundt, Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission; Larry Irving, Assistant Secretary and Administrator for the National Telecommunications and Information Administration; Jeffrey M. Lang, Deputy US Trade Representative; and Vonya B. McCann, Coordinator of the International Communications and Information Policy for the US Department of State, delivered a 16‐page communiqué to Pallo M. Jordan, South African Minister of Communications. The document urged South Africa to privatize and liberalize its communications sector, “strongly recommending that South Africa bind its reforms through the trade process of the World Trade Organization’s Negotiating Group on Basic Telecommunications.” It also stressed that “the US remain[ed] committed to assisting … in this ambitious undertaking” (Hundt et al. 1995, 7, 18). Concurrently, the US Department of State, the Office of the Vice President, and the Office of the President participated in a high‐profile public diplomacy effort promoting US‐South African collaboration, and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) was busy with initiatives that promoted appreciation for Fourth Estate press ideals and provided training for journalists and media professionals. Why did this disparate group of American political actors take such a concerted interest in the South African communications environment? Did these activities evolve out of 2 or preview the development of a coordinated US government strategy to shape the post‐independence South African information environment? Therein lies a tale. In the early 1990s, the shadow of apartheid and decades of socio‐political upheaval hung heavily over the new African National Congress (ANC) administration as it took the reigns of power from the National Party (NP). Black South Africans, which accounted for 80 percent of the population, and all other non‐ white minorities had existed for almost a century under a codified system of racial segregation imposed first by Dutch and British colonialists and then aggressively expanded by the NP when it took power and instituted the apartheid system in 1949. The egregious apartheid system, which regularized and legalized human rights violations against all non‐whites, institutionalized racism into the very fabric of South African society. Despite Nelson Mandela’s heroic status and general outpourings of international goodwill, speculation proliferated about whether the fledgling government would adequately manage the still robust South African economy and draw the heterogeneous revolutionary and political factions into a cohesive political project of rebuilding the South African nation. In terms of international relations, South Africa stood between two worlds. Its unique colonial history, relative economic prosperity, and large white population meant that it was not entirely “African”; and its black majority, history of colonialism, and geographic position ensured its separation from the Western fold. On the domestic front, legacies of the brutal apartheid system, massive economic disparities, and widely 3 differing views on the path to national reconstruction only provided further complications. A host of actors, including the United States, maintained a concerted interest in South Africa’s future, seeing the country as a potentially lucrative trading partner and as prospective democratic capitalist anchor for a continent perceived to be spiraling out of control. With these exigencies in mind, the Clinton administration initiated numerous programs and projects designed to aid the fledgling country and encourage reforms in line with US interests. Many of these programs involved direct attempts to either influence the rules and regulations guiding South Africa’s communications sector or to promote “American‐friendly” ideals, policies, and socio‐cultural attitudes within the South African media sphere and in public opinion. This dissertation documents and analyzes these US government informational strategies towards South Africa in the context of theories of information and state power. In this introduction, I present an initial overview of the study’s background, significance, and methods, concluding with a concise overview of the layout of the subsequent chapters. Background & Significance A number of scholars have established that informational strategy is critical to the conduct of international relations and that states both attempt to protect their own information spaces from unwanted intrusion, and at times attempt to shape the 4 form and the content of the information environments of others. 1 Others have illustrated that the same asymmetrical power relationships that dictate international relations in general also influence the ability of states to determine the structure of their own information spaces and to participate in the processes of negotiations and rulemaking that influence the global flows of information. 2 State‐ sponsored programs that target the information environment of another sovereign nation—such as public diplomacy, media and journalism training, and telecommunications policy assistance—are imbued with issues of power. Just as with more concrete and measurable commodities, control over information is inherently political (Wilson 2004). Who controls, consumes, and shapes different information channels has important ramifications for actors attempting to achieve specific goals and for society at large. The United States, as the world’s “information superpower,” has maintained a concerted role in providing expertise, training, and direct messaging campaigns to countries around the world, including South Africa. While America’s informational strategies are the most expansive, it is not unique in this regard. In the face of rapid changes in the available information technologies and the related rise of a 24‐hour global communication sphere, states from across the ideological spectrum—representing all levels of development and power in the 1 See for example Price (2002a, 2002b); Drake and Wilson (2008); and Hills (2007). 2 See for example Braman (2006); Cohen & Gilwald (2008); Hills (2002, 2007); Roy (2005); and Singh (2008). 5 international arena—have expanded their existing international informational strategies and initiated new ones (Braman 2006). This widening array of state information strategies designed to influence communication channels at home and abroad both facilitate and reflect changing international power dynamics, with significant implications for national identity and culture, for war and peace, and for the global distribution of economic resources. This is particularly true for sub‐Saharan African countries, including South Africa. These were some of the last states to realize formal independence, where imperial powers controlled the mechanisms of communication for nearly a century. Africa has been always the final frontier in the deployment of each new generation of communication technology (Tunstall 2008, 285–325). It was the last to connect to the world’s telegraph cable lines in the nineteenth century, the last to build landline telephone infrastructure and then mobile and Internet networks in the twentieth century, and, in the second half of 2009, the last to integrate fully into to the global Internet cable backbone. Here, as in virtually every facet of African affairs, the formal end of colonialism did not lead easily to the independence of airwaves, screens, and communication networks. 3 Political, economic, and cultural struggles have underscored the deployment of each of these new technologies, and 3 See for example Alzouma, (2005), Banda (2006), Cohen & Gilwald (2008), Franklin & Love (1998), Hyden & Leslie (2002), Kivikuru (2006), Lewis (2006), Mbeki (2003), Nyamnjoh (2005), and Wilson and Wong (2007). 6 full and equitable participation in the Information Age has understandably been a major subject of concern across the continent. In the late 1970s, many African countries were active supporters of the New World Information Communication Order (NWICO) movement within UNESCO, a movement by non‐aligned countries to protest Third World dependence on Western sources of news and information. 4 Against the backdrop of the NWICO controversy, the Organization of African Unity (OAU) launched the Pan African News Agency (PANA), an organization that promised to combat that dependency: As a strategic telecommunications network, PANA will enable African countries to communicate with each other without recourse to non‐ African channels. Thus through PANA's work, the voice of Africa will be heard proclaiming and defending the collective interest of the nations and people of Africa (quoted in Cavanagh 1989, 355). The excitement surrounding PANA quickly faded, however, as it earned a reputation as a mouthpiece for various governments rather than a credible news source (Ibid.). In the years that followed, sweeping calls for independence and pluralism in the information sector regularly resurfaced. Following independence, members of the new ANC government echoed these sentiments. Jay Naidoo (1998b), South African Minister of Communications (MoC) from 1996 to 1999, for example, questioned: What is the content we are putting on our screens or through our infrastructure in terms of our Internet? . . . We are seeing a world 4 According to then Director-General of UNESCO, Amadou Mahtar M'Bow, the NWICO would counter “the systematic conditioning of minds and mentalities by information which is conceived and produced by people who are not only sometimes ignorant of Third World realities, but who also consider that the Third World should think and see things in a certain way” (quoted in Cavanagh 1989, 354). 7 increasingly dominated by a particular ideology that seeks to preserve the wealth and affluence and privilege of those who are powerful in the world today. So we could be very much grateful to a 21 st century dominated by a new form of colonialism, of info‐colonialism, which is more debilitating in its destruction of our cultures, of our value systems, of our languages, of our very heritages (quoted in Van Audenhove 2003). Currently, Africa remains the most under‐wired and under‐serviced continent, although this was changing in the second half of 2009 with the deployment of multiple broadband cable infrastructure projects. 5 Lack of capital investment, poor communications infrastructure, and the legacies of colonial media systems have combined to create an information environment rich in potential and subject to enormous political, economic, and social power struggles. Northern donor agencies and development experts; American, Chinese, Indian, and other multimedia corporations; multilateral organizations such as the ITU, the World Bank (WB), SADC, and the OAU; and domestic civil society groups, corporations, and state actors are just some of the players involved in the processes of African communications reform. A detailed study of the complete range of actors attempting to influence African communications would be difficult, if not impossible. Trading breadth for depth, this dissertation examines in detail the processes through which one of these external actors attempted to influence the information environment in a particular 5 See Chapter 3 for a more detailed description of these cable projects. 8 African country, South Africa. 6 My research involved a diachronic case study of US informational strategies targeting South Africa during the William Jefferson Clinton and George W. Bush administrations. In conducting this research, I utilized multiple methods—including interviews with United States government actors and their South African counterparts and an analysis of primary documents and spending patterns. My findings document how US government actors pursued broader geopolitical, economic, and socio‐cultural goals through programs and policies designed to influence the content and structure of the South African information environment. Through an empirical study of the array of strategies used by US government actors to influence the South African information environment, this dissertation addresses four holes in the literature on the relationship between information flows and state power. First, while there have been numerous studies of how states seek to protect their own information spaces (e.g. Price 2003; Smith 1980), there have been far fewer comprehensive studies of how states attempt to influence the information environments of other states and to what effect, particularly in the African context (Price 2002a, 19). In order to appreciate and measure the role (or lack thereof) of the state and other stakeholders in shaping information environments within and across geographic boarders, it is important to identify both processes. 6 Chapter 1 discusses in detail why I chose the United States and South Africa. 9 Second, the majority of extant academic literature focuses on a single dimension—such as public diplomacy or telecommunications policy—of state attempts to influence the information environments of another. As a point of departure, my research began with the premise that communication, as an international projection of state power, is multifaceted. In order to understand the role of communication and information policy, as both a tool and a condition of international relations, multiple channels should be examined. To date, there have been few, if any, comprehensive examinations of the range of state information strategies targeting another state. Third, I examine the ambit of American government informational activities in South Africa in the context of power relationships. There is a dichotomy in the existing literature. Public diplomacy, strategic communications, and at times telecommunications policy are commonly examined in the context of state power. However, considerations of media and ICT (information communication technology) for development typically focus on best practices, rather than the power‐related motivations and consequences of those practices. This dissertation argues that— while often framed as development exercises and produced by individuals with altruistic intensions—media assistance, regulatory and media policy assistance, and capacity building projects are equally important projections of state power in the international system. All informational strategies, when practiced by one state in or directed at the territory of another state, are political acts. Advocating for certain 10 communications practices, lobbying for contracts for constituent multimedia businesses, funding and training particular media actors, and engaging in activities designed to alter the content that flows through communication networks are all controversial actions that may undermine or solidify established power arrangements as they are negotiated in the communication sphere. This suggests the need for a case study that explores the diversity of communications‐related strategies that one state uses to influence the information environment of another. Fourth, while this dissertation is concerned with the successes and failures of US government attempts to influence the South African information environment, its primary focus is on the processes through which states wield informational power vis‐à‐vis other states. In discussions of information and state power, academics and pundits commonly refer to the “US government” as a monolithic actor with one agenda and one strategy. The implication is that the informational efforts of different government actors evolve out of a coordinated agenda to influence national and global information systems in service of broader American goals of neo‐imperialism. Moreover, often the activities of the state are conflated with those of private sector actors; American communication companies, the State Department, the Department of Defense, etc. are seen as marching in lockstep. As David Morley (2006) points out, the work of Schiller (2000) and others characterize the supremacy of American‐based multinational media and telecommunications 11 corporations abroad as a direct instrument of US foreign policy rather than as a supporting mechanism (32). This dissertation offers evidence contrary to this depiction. Through an analysis of the wide array of programs and policies produced by US government actors within South Africa, it reveals a lack of coordination among these efforts. While US programs may be guided by similar economic, political, or cultural ideological goals, there is not a single overarching US government international information strategy. At times, specific actors have provided coordination in a particular facet of informational strategy, such as when the Office of the Vice President under Albert Gore guided telecommunications strategies in South Africa during the mid 1990s (see Chapter 6). In general, informational strategy with respect to South Africa has been fragmented with little collaboration or interaction across departments. While different programs and initiatives may share similar goals (e.g. promoting a specific foreign policy platform), they rarely, if ever, evolve out of a coordinated strategy. Moreover, in reality, as Chapter 6 will discuss further, private transnational actors such as AT&T, SBC Global, and others have at times furthered and at times undermined US government interests in South Africa. 12 Plan of the Dissertation In the following chapters, I explore the precise mechanisms through which US government actors have articulated and exercised informational strategies in South Africa during the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations. Chapter 1 wrestles with key theoretical challenges and definitional issues. First, it demonstrates the need for a dissertation that focuses on state informational strategies. Second, it defines key terms and provides a working definition of power and informational power in the context of the practice of international relations. Third, it discusses the definition of minor, middle, and major powers, and how and if that hierarchy mirrors levels of informational power. Finally, it explores the existing theories and approaches to the role of information in the conduct of international relations. Chapter 2 outlines the unique theoretical model that I developed upon beginning this study. It posits that a conditional set of communications‐related interactions best conceptualized as an ecosystem of communications exists among different countries. It argues that this ecosystem emerges out of the interaction between national information environments within seven interdependent channels of interaction: military, diplomatic, economics and trade, aid, multilateral interactions, intelligence connections, and last but not least non‐state transnational relations. After outlining this ecosystem approach and exploring the implications of 13 state information strategy, I provide an overview of the research methods employed to test this model. Chapter 3 contextualizes the contemporary South African information environment and the United States’ long history of involvement in the country against the backdrop of apartheid, colonialism, and the related economic, political, and social tensions. I then move on to present an analysis of my principal findings based on interviews and other primary research. Chapter 4 examines US informational strategies in service of its political goals, focusing on public diplomacy strategies and international broadcasting efforts. Chapter 5 details those informational strategies that promote America’s cultural and ideological worldview within South Africa. Chapter 6 examines government strategies most closely linked to the American government’s economic goals, including: telecommunications infrastructure and policy development and the promotion of US communications companies. In light of the research presented in chapters 4 through 6, Chapter 7 presents a revised theoretical model; and the concluding chapter provides a final summary and reflection on my analysis. 14 CHAPTER 1: INFORMATION AND STATE POWER It would be strange were the nations not in time brought to realize that modern civilization, which owes so much of its progress to the annihilation of space by the electric force, demands that this all important means of communication be a heritage of all peoples, to be administered and regulated in their common behoof. – President McKinley, 1898 Annual Message to Argentina (Moore, 1906, 480). Empire is a matter of transportation. It begins, culminates, and ends in the control of the means of communication. – Irwin S. Tucker, 1920 (Gilpin, 1981, 57). Throughout history, an actor’s ability to shape information, communication channels, and protocols has influenced the longevity, reach, and structure of its political power (Eisenstein 1979; Foucault 1982; Mokyr 1990). The Egyptians and the Romans depended on stone and papyrus respectively to solidify their empires (Innis 1950, 2008 [1951]). The invention of the printing press encouraged the formalization of national boundaries in Europe, partly according to markets for the printed word (Calabrese 1999; Anderson 1983). Aided by the deployment of telegraph communications systems, the British controlled a territory so vast that, for over a century, the sun never set upon its domain (Winseck & Pike 2008). However, rapid technological advances and the convergence of communication networks have had a profound effect on the form and structure of state power. The rise of multilateral institutions, increases in cross‐border trade, 15 the so‐called global War on Terror, and the global financial crisis are but a few reminders of the devolution of power from the state to global and supranational institutions. Scholars remain divided about whether these changes provide tools for furthering state power in a global system (e.g. Nye 2002, 2004; Goldsmith & Wu 2006), a mechanism for its undoing (e.g. Carey 1998; Cairncross 2001; Meyer et al. 1997; Singh 2002), or a catalyst for the reorganization of its form and function (e.g. Castells 2009; Ferguson 2006; Price 2002a; Sandholtz 1992). Some see these changes solidifying existing power relationships between states (e.g. Boyd‐Barrett 2006; McChesney 2004) or facilitating new ones (e.g. Gilpin 1981; Goldsmith & Wu 2006; Zakaria 2008); 7 but most agree that the state remains a critical actor in the modern age, although the terms of engagement may have changed. In this environment, access to and influence over the means of communication remain central to what Michael Mann (1984) terms the “infrastructural power” of the state, or “the ability of the state to actually penetrate civil society, and to implement logistically, political decisions across the realm,” whether that realm be domestic or international (334). As this dissertation hopes to demonstrate, the widening array of state information strategies designed to influence communication channels at home and abroad both facilitate and reflect changing international power dynamics, with significant implications for national identity and culture, for democracy, and 7 Gilpin (1981) only touches briefly on the “technology of communication.” Rather, he presents a general argument that the uncontrollable diffusion of technology (communication technology included) from existing centers of power to emerging ones would change the dynamics of international relations. 16 for the global distribution of economic resources. Chapter 2 sets forth a theoretical model outlining the processes through which a state like the United States has influenced and/or attempted to influence economic, cultural/ideological, and political trends within South Africa. However, before moving forward, this chapter examines the principal debates, challenges, and definitional issues confronting an exploration of the role of information and state power articulation. Why the NationState? A case study of US government information strategies toward South Africa raises questions of the utility of focusing on the state given the array of non‐state interactions. Many academics argue that new communication technologies free information from spatial location, implying that an empirical study of state information strategies may be somewhat anachronistic (e.g. Carey 1998; Featherstone 1990; Harvey 1989; Kavoori 2007, Lash & Urry 1994). Carey (1998) for example, asserts, since the late 1970s, we have been undergoing a … communications revolution … whose scalar dynamic is at the global rather than the national level, a revolution producing in the words of the former chairman of Citicorp, ‘the twilight of sovereignty’ (191‐92). Similar reflections on the declining role of the state have echoed across disciplines and been expressed by postmodernists (e.g. Baudrillard 1994), geographers (e.g. Harvey 1989; Taylor 1996), sociologists (e.g. Giddens 1990; Lash & Urry 1994; Lash & Lury 2007; Meyer, et al. 1997) and political scientists (e.g. Fukuyama 1992; Mann 17 1997). This is also true in the communications field. In the last decade or so, many communication theorists have gravitated away from nation‐centered studies towards analyses of transnational corporate networks, diasporic consumption patterns, and information flows and counter flows (e.g. Artz 2007; Gershon 2005; Paterson & Sreberny 2004; Sakr 2001; and Thussu 2006, 2007). This movement is not surprising given that the dynamicism, size, and economic scale of the global information sphere are increasing at unparalleled rates. There were 50 pages on the World Wide Web in 1993, and no more than 150 by 1994. Fast forward to 2009, and there are approximately 1.6 billion Internet users and over 1 trillion web pages, approximately 150 web pages for every person on Earth. As Google puts it, if you envision a physical map of the Internet, it would “be a map about 50,000 times as big as the U.S., with 50,000 times as many roads and intersections” (Alpert & Hajaj 2008). Moreover, on average, every second of the day, individual users collectively upload approximately 13 hours of video to YouTube from countries around the world (Hurley 2008). If the social network Facebook were a country, it would the fourth largest on Earth with 250 million members (Qualman 2009). The Chinese equivalent, QZone, is even larger with 300 million users and growing (Ibid.). By the end of 2007, more than 50 percent of the world’s population connected to a mobile phone networks, engaging in billions of phone conversations and sending text messages in the trillions. The decreasing cost and size of microprocessors has also facilitated the convergence of mobile, Internet, 18 and media networks exponentially expanding the ability of individuals and corporations to produce and distribute information across national borders (Arsenault & Castells 2008; Castells 2009). As just one example of the ramifications of this network convergence for states, in June 2009 Iranian citizens used Twitter, which they accessed through both SMS and Internet, to communicate with the global media in the face of a national government media blackout and to coordinate protests of the re‐election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Other scholars also point out that the majority of this communications explosion is carried, produced, and financed by private financial networks, which operate largely independently of the state (e.g. Bagdikian 2004; Hesmondhalgh 2007; Lash & Lury 2007). The size of global traffic in cultural and communication goods is immense. In 2005, cultural exports surpassed $424 billion globally (UNDP 2008, 106). And total global spending on information and communications hovered around $4 trillion in 2008 (WITSA 2008, 1). Multimedia and telecommunications multinational corporations (MNCs), which are largely free from the restrictions of individual states, are central to these flows. As of 2006, Jensen (2006) estimated that MNCs accounted for one‐quarter of output and over one‐third of world trade, a trend that is also true of the information sector. A decreasing number of corporations (e.g. Time Warner, Google, Cisco, Tyco, AT&T, Microsoft, Disney, NewsCorp, etc.) have consolidated ownership and control over the expanding global information sphere. These corporations are significantly more de‐territorialized 19 than their twentieth century counterparts, with holdings, subsidiaries, and partnerships around the world (Arsenault & Castells 2008; Flew 2007). This trans‐ nationality gives them the flexibility to evade state restrictions in the form of national tax regulations (e.g. NewsCorp has paid almost no US taxes in 15 years) and other legal restrictions (e.g. Cisco, Google, and Yahoo have provided technical assistance in the Chinese government censorship of the Internet). The majority of information flows and MNCs originate from the global North, although there have been definitive signs of a reversal. While total penetration still hovers around 5 percent of the African continent, the number of Internet users increased by 1100 percent between 2000 and 2008. Similarly, the value of creative exports from developing economies more than quintupled from $51 billion in 1996 to $274 billion in 2005 (UNDP 2008, 5). Despite this increase in “contra flows” (Thussu 2006), MNC influence over communication networks is increasingly a subject of concern both inside academia (e.g. Arsenault & Castells 2008a, 2008b; Bagdikian 2004; Hesmondhalgh 2007; Lash & Lury 2007) as well as in the general public. A Globescan and PIPA (2006) poll found that while 61 percent of respondents in more than 20 countries supported a free market an average of 74 percent favored greater restrictions on MNCs in order to protect the environment, consumer rights, and political rights. According to a November 2007 BBC Globescan poll of 14 countries, 59 percent of respondents overall and 62 percent of South Africans considered communication ownership to be a major political issue. 20 Given these trends, the question remains: Why focus on the state’s role in shaping communication flows? The answer is multi‐faceted. States remain a central feature of the contemporary era (Morris & Waisboard 2001); but they are adapting. In the face of new technologies, convergence, and the dominance of MNCs, states are reconfiguring legislation, laws, and institutions in service of legitimacy, political control, and/or national economic improvements (Price 2002a, 4‐5). These reconfigurations have important implications for the role of the state and for the future development of the world information society. First, informational strategies are perhaps the most direct attempt by states to reformulate their position within a changing world system. Braman (2006) argues that the digitization of all forms of information has led to the rise of the “informational state”: Information policy is among the most ancient forms of governance, there has been a phase change—a change of state—in the extent to which governments deliberately, explicitly, and consistently control information creation, processing, flows, and use to exercise power (1). Sandholtz (1992) went so far as to argue that “in the late twentieth century, …[information] technology can survive without the modern state, but the reverse may not be true” (1). The United States, one‐half of the subject of this case study, has been a forerunner in this transition (Hallin & Mancini 2004a, 2004b; Starr 2004). Even before its emergence as a world power, the US exercised its political, economic, and political interests both at home and abroad largely through 21 information networks. 8 This dates back to the American Revolution, when the fledgling government sought to develop a nationwide communication system (e.g. the introduction of a national postal system) in order to unite a politically, geographically, and economically dispersed group of colonies into a United States of America. These domestic reforms also helped to facilitate its emergence as a world power. As Paul Starr (2004) persuasively documents in The Creation of the Media: Political Origins of Modern Communication, [even] in the early nineteenth century, when the United States was neither a world power nor a primary center of scientific discovery, it was already a leader in communications—in postal service and newspaper publishing, then in development of the telegraph and telephone, later in the movies, broadcasting, and the whole repertoire of mass communications. . . The American framework of communications has been a remarkable engine of wealth and power creation, so much so that its influence now extends over not merely a continent, but the world (3). Some go so far as to argue that while the United States never amassed a colonial empire in the traditional sense of the word, it has in many ways operated as the center of a de facto empire, built not on traditional colonial and mercantilist relationships, but upon trade agreements, cultural cache, and hard power capacity, 8 The US government has long recognized the importance of communication in world affairs, particularly during times of war. The Creel Committee (1917-1919), the United States Information Agency (1952- 1999), and WorldNet Television (1981-2004) are just a few examples of previous initiatives designed to shape the international communication sphere in line with American interests. It also has a long history of subsidizing the deployment of communications infrastructures around the world in order to connect American politicians and private sector businesses to new markets, as was the motivation behind government support of the All-American Cable Company during the 1920s. 22 undergirded by an unparalleled influence over the means of international networked communication (e.g. Galtung 1971; Schiller 2000; Boyd‐Barrett 2006). Second, the adoption of information policy has been a major component of governance and of nationhood. Government bureaucracies increasingly depend on developing and maintaining communication channels amongst the governing bodies and between the governors and the would‐be governed. With the introduction of each new technology, states introduce laws and protocols designed to shape these technologies in service of the nation (Bimber 2003; Braman 2006). For example, over the last 30 years the number of US government initiatives, departments, and pieces of legislation concerned with state information policy has grown markedly including: The 1980 Paperwork Reduction Act, The 1996 Technology Management Reform Act (Clinger‐Cohen Act) 9 , The Electronic Freedom of Information Act Amendments (E‐FOIA); the 2002 Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA), the 2001 PATRIOT Act, the E‐Government Act of 2002, and the Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act of 2006 (FFATA). Moreover, as will be discussed further in the next section, state information policies adopted in one nation often invite corresponding reforms in other countries. Third, while, without question, Internet networks and multimedia business networks have helped to facilitate the de‐territorialization of information flows, the 9 This Act called for the hiring of chief information officers in all major departments to plan and manage agency information resources and better achieve program missions. 23 gradual solidification of a global network of multi (new and old media) communication networks controlled by an ever‐shrinking consortium of MNCs has not eclipsed the role of the state. In the globalized communication sphere, states often collude rather than compete with these private networks (Jensen 2006; Woll 2008). This collusion is most clearly evidenced in national attempts to court multimedia businesses and invite infrastructure development. But it is also seen through state lobbying on behalf of its domestic multimedia businesses. States have also influenced the ethos under which MNCs operate. Woll (2008), for example, documents the role of different governments in fostering an almost universal support for liberalization policies among American and European telecommunications firms that were once national monopolies. State cooperation with MNCs has a long history. Michael Hogan (1977) looking at the role of communication networks in foreign policy during the early twentieth century illustrated how “private networks of communication” supplemented rather than undermined the nation‐state from which they originated and vice versa. The British government, for example, welcomed and aided Reuters’ efforts to wire the world, considering the global expansion of telegraph networks as key to empire (Winseck & Pike 2008). However, while states have actively collaborated with private actors, the exponential expansion of communication channels and products has also broadened the range of legal and regulatory issues negotiated by states at the national, bilateral, and multilateral level (Singh 2008). 24 The rise of new regulatory agencies has in many ways increased state control over information flows while at the same time aiding the onward march of multinationals or vice versa. As Hills (2007) points out, MNCs require favorable regulations and laws to ease their entry into new markets. AT&T, for example, may not successfully win contracts in a country with no anti‐trust restrictions. Similarly, well‐designed public and cultural diplomacy programs may help expand markets for privately produced American media and communication content, while failed efforts may produce the opposite results. Finally, content, consumption, distribution, and production are largely dictated by connectivity, cost, and infrastructure—factors in which state policy continues to play a decisive role. State regulation and intervention has very real consequences for the ability of corporations and individuals to produce, consume, and distribute information. For example, the Congo, where the government licensed six mobile providers, has 13 times more mobile subscribers than Ethiopia, where the state has restricted licensing to just one provider (World Bank 2006). The state wields similar influence over rules governing freedom of expression and media licensing and ownership. Informational Power We have established that states are preoccupied with information as a source of political legitimacy and power. But the question remains: How is informational 25 power defined in the context of international relations? As with all forms of power, informational power may be consensual, instrumental, structural, or some combination of the three (Lukes 1974). First, state power over information flows may be instrumental, as articulated through acts of foreign policy and measured through causal outcomes. States exhibit instrumental informational power in wartime and in peace. The military destruction of communication channels has a long history. Dating back to the Franco‐German War, the War of the Pacific, and the Spanish‐American War, some of the first acts of aggression were to cut submarine telegraph cables (Moore 1906, 478). States may also demonstrate instrumental informational power by limiting or expanding the ability of foreign communication companies to enter domestic markets or domestic companies to enter foreign markets. In another example, states who own satellites (a particular source of concern for developing countries) may more easily penetrate the information spaces of others when they so wish (Thomas 1999). Braman (2006) also differentiates instrumental informational power (although she does not define it as such) in terms of phases. Power may be actual, that is, currently exercised. Or it may be potential; states may hold informational power at their disposal, the potential execution of which provides a valuable bargaining chip. It can also be virtual; informational power may not be in existence, but when required, it can be created from existing resources. 26 Second, power may also be exercised at the systems level. It does not have to be consciously exercised but may be embedded within structures and veiled even from its agents (Goverde et al. 2000, 1). This form of power articulation is at the heart of the cultural imperialism thesis, which is examined in greater detail later in this chapter. Linearity and causality are less apparent in this iteration. As Lukes (1974) points out, “A may exercise power over B by getting him to do what he does not want to do, but he also exercises power over him by influencing, shaping or determining his very wants” (23). Power is thus not necessarily evidenced through victory in a battle of wills, but in the absence of such a battle in the first place. Informational power in this estimation works through networks rather than hierarchies. By leading the charge to adopt changes at the national and multilateral level in terms of information policy and/or production, states may influence other states to enact similar changes, leading to a “structural isomorphism” of information systems (Meyer et al. 1997). As evidence of this trend, particularly beginning in the 1960s and intensifying in the late 1980s, states across the political and economic spectrum began to call for increasing investment in their information structures in order to compete in the “information economy.” Singapore sought to become an “intelligent island.” The European Union unveiled the Green Paper (1987) and White Paper (1992) on Development of the Common Market for Telecommunications Services and Equipment (Singh 2002, 8). In an effort to solidify US dominance in the area of 27 ICTs, the Clinton administration introduced a program for the advancement of the National Information Infrastructure (NII) (Steinhour, interview 2009). Multilateral initiatives paralleled these national ones. In 1996, with heavy input from the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) developed the African Information Society Initiative (AISI) as a guiding framework for communications development on the continent. The 2003 and 2005 World Summits on the Information Society (WSIS), first proposed by the ITU in 1998, were also responses to the growing importance of informational power in terms of economic, political, and cultural power. Furthermore, in order to join this information revolution, developing countries have also routinely invited donor states to participate in and fund the development of their domestic communication spheres. Even during the heyday of formal imperialism, non‐Western states were not the passive recipients of communications colonialism. The Ottoman Empire, for example, sought British financing to lay its telegraph systems (Winseck & Pike 2008). Today as they have historically, countries (including South Africa) have actively courted foreign investment to bolster their communications industries in service of larger economic, political, and social projects. Because informational power is embedded in structures, it may stem from developing domestic information structures. Domestic reforms can in turn influence changes at the systemic level by compelling other states to introduce similar reforms. In this sense, countries like the United States— 28 which have been (at times) at the forefront of the production of the physical and cultural components of the so‐called information revolution—potentially wield greater ability to program the network of national and global networks of information constituting the global information environment (Arsenault & Castells 2008a, 2008b; Castells 2009; Hallin & Mancini 2004a, 2004b). Conversely, this networked form of power means that actors outside the state system may also seed systems level changes. September 11, for example, invigorated state preoccupation with improving public diplomacy, soft power, and strategic communications. Governments around the world launched new outreach campaigns as a means of ameliorating a further “clash of civilizations” between the West and the Muslim world (Huntington 1996). Third, in terms of information flows, power may be articulated by both the presence and absence of specific information, what Lukes (1974) defines as the “third dimension of power.” The United States is considered not only the world’s political superpower, but also its information superpower due to the seeming omnipresence of available information from and about the country. Sadly, African nations commonly suffer the reverse problem; in the global information sphere Africa remains a dark continent. A seemingly minor, but telling, indication of Africa’s relative position within the information hierarchy is evidenced in popular culture, where what Schraeder (1994) calls the “National Geographic Image” of the continent dominates. In Western television shows and movies, characters often 29 visit or return from “Africa,” but rarely, if ever, do they mention what country they visited (there are 53 of them), and no one ever seems to ask for further information. Similarly, Africa rarely leads the news except for in the case of extreme humanitarian emergencies (and often not even then) or terrorist attacks. The continent appears mainly as a series of generalizations—a land of great mineral wealth, of natural beauty, and of poverty, disease, and despair, one great country with one set of problems. These generalizations have important implications for building constituencies for foreign policy issues facing specific African countries. African countries thus suffer most often from the lack of, rather than the presence of, information flows. Informational Power in Practice Identifying the role of information and state power is challenged by its dual nature. Communication networks are varyingly the subjects and the conduits for contemporary international relations. Governmental preoccupation with international information and communications can be divided according to three broad areas that straddle this duality: 1. Securing conduits through which broader political and economic messages can be sent; 2. Ensuring that their constituent information and technology businesses find requisite economic opportunities; 30 3. Establishing the necessary “information infrastructure” so that broader economic, political, and socio‐cultural goals may be carried out. This is further complicated by fluctuating definitions of what precisely constitutes information. The answer is ever changing. Information strategy subsumes many complementary and at times competing ways of conceptualizing information. Different US government departments, for example, use more than 100 legal definitions of information (Braman 2006, 9). The specifics of these definitions are largely a question of semantics. Informational definitions from a policymaker’s perspective may sway according to the needs at hand. Information may be treated as a commodity during trade negotiations on access to telecommunications landing rights, and as a constitutive force on discussions of freedom of speech or cultural rights. These approaches to information are embedded within perceptions of the role of information in political power. The most relevant definitions of information relating to state information policy in the international arena can be divided into the following five broad approaches: information (1) as data, (2) as a tool, (3) as a commodity, (4) as infrastructure, and (5) as an actor in society. 10 These approaches denote different definitions of information as well as different uses and measures of information. First, perhaps the most straightforward definition of information is that of data—facts and statistics about individuals, actors, economics, security, and other 10 This typology of approaches to information owes a debt to the work of Braman (2006), Tehranian (1997), and Hanson (2008). 31 subjects of national concern. The means to collect, process, and disseminate this data in service of foreign policy goals is a fundamental preoccupation of the security apparatuses of states. In this sense, information is conceptualized as a strategic resource that can be drawn upon in service of political, economic, military, and other decision‐making. Arquilla and Ronfeldt (1993) for example, argue, “information is becoming a strategic resource that may prove as valuable and influential in the post‐industrial era as capital and labor have been in the industrial age” (25). Second, information may also serve as a device or mechanism used for a particular function. In this sense, the information itself is a tool for achieving specific aims and objectives. Government actors may try to disseminate favorable information, correct misinformation, or filter undesirable information in service of a particular goal. USAID produces information campaigns to promote awareness about HIV/AIDS prevention. The Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) has funded radio programs that seek to correct ideas in the Middle East on American attitudes toward Islam. Information may serve as a tool and so may its absence (Lukes 1974). This is why states, particularly closed regimes, may block certain information channels, as was the case when China blocked all major social media platforms during the 2008 Olympics. Third, state actors, particularly those concerned with trade, are also interested in information as a commodity; in other words, services that can be 32 bought or sold. In this interpretation, the entire information production chain has economic value (Braman 2006). States commonly maintain an interest in how information is created, stored, transported, distributed, and consumed and how their national economies benefit in each stage of this production process. This is not surprising given the overall value of the information industry. In the US alone the IT industry generates $175 billion in annual revenue. Globally, the computer and electronics industries grosses over $841 billion (Data Monitor 2009a, 7); and telecommunications services providers account for $1,219.7 billion (DataMonitor 2009b, 3). Fourth, information strategies that treat information as infrastructure for broader changes are closely related. Information industries not only represent a critical economic sector, but also are considered crucial for increasing productivity, profitability, and international trade. For example, aid organizations commonly present Internet and mobile connectivity as needed infrastructure for economic and social development. In USAID, ICT4D programs are often framed as providing necessary infrastructure for increased economic development and therefore new opportunities for US businesses and the related global multinationals. It is telling that the USAID homepage provides links to a report that estimates that the “bottom of the pyramid” market for ICT technologies and the services they provide to be in the tens of billions (USAID.gov 2009; Hammond et al. 2007). The information infrastructure approach is closely related to the information as a commodity 33 approach, because the growth of information as infrastructure leads to greater value of informational commodities and vice versa. Fifth, while states have long been interested in such abstract arenas as “the media” and “public opinion,” the exponential multiplication of information sources wrought by digital technologies and technological convergence has more than ever given “information” a life of its own. Officials are not only concerned with influencing individual journalists and opinion‐makers responsible for circulating information, but the obtuse construct of the global communication sphere itself. In this sense, communication networks take on a life of their own and are treated not just as conduits for information, but also as actors in themselves. Government officials commonly reference needs to combat “misinformation” or influence the global communication sphere, with little specificity. Since the first Gulf War, political communication theorists have hotly debated the CNN Effect, or the influence of the rise of a 24‐hour global communication sphere on political decision‐ making and vice versa (Gilboa 2005a, 2005b; Bennett 1990; Hallin 1986; Robinson 2002; Seib 2008). While the precise mechanisms through which media and new media content influence political decision‐making remains a subject of debate, the fact remains that officials at times treat information as an abstract opponent or as a collaborator depending on the issue or time frame. Will the media support the coalition in Iraq? Will public opinion oppose the latest round of WTO talks? 34 TABLE 1.1: DEFINITIONS OF INFORMATION Type Description Potential Uses Academic Inquiries Data Facts, knowledge, statistics Collection and selective dissemination and/or filtering of data that benefits the state Cyberwar, Netwars, information wars Tool An instrument to achieve strategic objectives Information campaigns to promote foreign policy objectives Public diplomacy, soft power, complex interdependence Commodity A thing with economic value that can be bought or sold Monetary gain for domestic constituents and increasing cross‐ border trade Information policy, ICT4D, Media & telecommunication economics Infrastructure Necessary preconditions for changes in other sectors Promote economic development in order to increase trade and investment opportunities Information policy, ICT4D, Media & telecommunication economics Actor Information as an agent Influence other states by encouraging certain forms of media and/or ICT that can lobby for state changes Media for development, journalism training, CNN effect, Indexing Defining information as an actor in society also brings up another important consideration—the respective position of the media. In recent decades, the interconnection of mobile, Internet, and satellite networks means that information, as a preoccupation of the state is much wider than the “media.” The governors and 35 the governed and competing political agencies increasingly communicate with one another through the Internet. Almost all states now place a heavy emphasis on developing their web presence and utilizing web and mobile technologies to communicate with domestic and international constituencies. Therefore, “old media,” while a component of a national information strategy is a piece of, but is decreasingly the center of state information strategies. Literature that reflects on the role of communications and state power remains largely segregated according to these differing approaches to information. Table 1.1 provides an overview of the differing approaches to information and their academic corollaries. There are numerous studies of how states have utilized information as a tool for nation building (e.g. Anderson 1983; Billig 1995; Innis 1950) and/or as a tool to promote interests abroad (e.g. Melissen 2005; Nisbet et al. 2004; Nye 2004; Tuch 1990). There are also studies of how states amass data in service of specific strategic objectives (e.g. Arquilla & Ronenfeldt 2001; Deibert 2002). While others have focused on information as infrastructure and/or as a commodity, such as those scholars who examine the influence of state policy on information infrastructure and trade (e.g. Cohen & Gilwald 2009; Cowhey & Aronson 2009; Drake 1995; Singh 2002). In a separate academic debate, but reflecting a similar approach to information, media and communications historians have also explored the state’s role in shaping the formulation of the global communications economy and 36 infrastructure in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century (e.g. Pike and Winseck 2004; Winseck & Pike 2008; and Rantanen 2005). The number of studies that examine the media as an actor influencing state behaviors has grown exponentially since the rise of global satellite television channels and new media such as blogs and social networks. Studies of iterations of the CNN effect and the Al Jazeera effect are all efforts to examine how the media as an actor in society has influenced state decision‐making (Gilboa 2005; Seib 2008). Given these approaches to information, how then is informational power placed within traditional power dynamics of international relations? Traditional Measures of State Power in International Relations In the field of international relations state power is generally divided according to major, middle, and minor powers and the United States, the only remaining superpower. As commonly defined, major powers have the economic, political, and military clout to act unilaterally, particularly in the area of security, while small and middle powers must negotiate and/or collaborate amongst themselves in opposition to major powers. South Africa is typically depicted as an “emerging middle power,” usually in concert with the BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India, and China) (Gilboa 2009; Schoeman 2003; Alden & Soko 2005). Most recently, the US Department of State has dropped the “middle” and begun to refer to South Africa as an “emerging global power” (Clinton 2009). 37 Admittedly, these designations of power status are vague. Small and middle powers are designated as such because of their relative position vis‐à‐vis major powers. In many ways the middle power label is a way of sidestepping a precise definition and accounting for the fact that in the international arena, as in all facets of life, power is relative and often changing. Actors may judge their own power and that of other states only as it is juxtaposed against other states (Gilboa 2009, 22). According to the most accepted standards, to be considered a middle power, a state must exhibit certain fundamental characteristics. First, middle powers in international relations are often major powers at the regional level. States that operate as a minor or middle power in one arena (e.g. the International Telecommunications Union [ITU]) may operate as a major power in another (e.g. the Telecommunications Regulators Association of Southern Africa [TRASA].) South Africa holds a unique position when compared to other African states. While it provides an economic and geographic anchor to the continent, it has experienced a distinctly different evolution due to its large white population and long history of apartheid rule. While South Africa’s middle power status is typically assumed in the context of international political interactions, within the continent the debate remains: Is South Africa, the dominant economic force on the African continent, a benevolent hegemon providing public goods to a region bereft of economic prosperity, or is it an exploitative power actively undermining the economies of its neighbours in the service of national and international capital? (Alden & Soko 2005, 368). 38 Second, power relationships between the same set of actors may also change over time according to the political climate or the issue at hand. Middle power definitions and behaviors changed sharply at the close of the Cold War, as regional politics superseded the global US‐Soviet chess game as the locus of power (Gilboa 2009). South Africa emerged into independence during the waning days of the Cold War, a concurrence that amplified its importance as a regional power player and as a subject of interest to the United States (Schoeman 2003). South Africa’s regional power status gives it greater ability to resist pressure from America and Britain regarding its perceived soft stance towards Robert Mugabe and his rule of Zimbabwe. However, it is unlikely to challenge the United States on issues of international trade in telecommunications. In fact, it has been a driving force behind neoliberal economic reform on the continent, a process heavily promoted by the United States (Alden & Soko 2005). This also begs the question: To what extent is a regional power like South Africa able to exert power over its regional domain when the respective activities are not sanctioned by major power allies? As Chapter 6 will argue, economic interests have been one of the principal drivers behind American information strategies towards South Africa. Third, middle powers like South Africa “are understood to be committed multilateralists as a means of overcoming their material deficiencies in terms of structural power” (Alden & Veira 2005, 1078). They commonly take leadership roles on specific issues that are generally outside the security arena (i.e. “first order” 39 issues) such as foreign aid, development, and human rights and other “second order” issues (Gilboa 2009). For example, South Africa, often with US consultation, has acted as a key force in driving regional collaboration on information policy issues through the creation of multilateral institutions like TRASA. Fourth, middle powers commonly rely on soft rather than hard power tactics, particularly when compared to major powers (Batora 2006; Potter 2002; Vickers 2004). Since independence, South Africa has placed a high priority on public diplomacy and national branding. In 2003, the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), which coordinates all the country’s marketing and tourism campaigns and oversees South African imaging and branding, listed public diplomacy as priority six in its strategic plan (Department of Foreign Affairs 2005). 11 Under Thabo Mbeki’s leadership, cultural diplomacy, exercised through a regional campaign for an African Renaissance, was also a fundamental component of the country’s regional strategy. Through the African Renaissance Campaign, South Africa has used branding strategies and political language to recast socio‐economic and political reform as cultural endeavors and/or imperatives (Kagwanga 2006; Landsberg & Hlophe 1999; Landsberg 2005). One of the main questions this dissertation explores is how these gradations of power (small, middle, and major) translate into informational power. The case 11 Following President Jacob Zuma’s election, the DFA was renamed the Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRC). As part of this reorganization, public diplomacy became one of the 11 department branches. 40 under study examines the informational strategies of a major power over a middle power. US information strategies in South Africa are equally context‐dependent and prone to fluctuations in the mechanisms of power articulation. As will be furthered elaborated upon in Chapter 3, in the South African context, major powers first became preoccupied with providing information infrastructure as a tool for furthering political power either to combat incursion by other states, or as a means of control over the indigenous population. Information as infrastructure for mercantilist extractive industries and to build new markets emerged around the same time. It has only been in recent decades that information as a commodity has emerged as an important project of state power articulation. While these general trends were established prior to this study, the question remained whether US information strategies under closer observation operate according to the same logic of power articulation predicted by existing the literature. Perspectives on Information and State Power While there have been very few empirical examinations of how states in sum total attempt to influence the information spheres of others, there are a number of existing bodies of theory that suggest how a major power like the United States would behave towards a middle power like South Africa. The bodies of theory determined to be the most relevant to this project include: complex interdependence, cultural imperialism, and world polity theory. Each of these 41 bodies of theory agree that new technologies coupled with the rise of citizen journalism, networked journalism, a 24‐hour global information sphere, and the explosion of social networking applications (e.g. Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, etc.) have prompted a corresponding preoccupation by state actors with the power of information (Morris & Waisboard 2001, Price 2002). However, these theories present differing visions of the mechanisms and the ability of state actors to harness information power. This section outlines these differing interpretations. Information as Interdependence Keohane and Nye (1977) argue that increasing global interdependence wrought by the rise of multilateral institutions and the multiplication of international financial transactions have rendered traditional realist theories of state power obsolete and decreased the utility of military actions. The ability of the state to negotiate in one area of interest is constrained by relationships of complex interdependence in other areas. Attraction (soft power) thus displaces coercion (hard power) as the most valuable currency of state power. In a revision of their early work, Keohane and Nye (1998) outlined how the global information revolution had elevated the importance of information flows in shaping international relations. 12 They identify three types of information through which 12 They later expanded these arguments in the third edition of Power and Interdependence published in 2001. 42 states assert soft power: (1) free information, (2) commercial information, and (3) strategic information (Keohane & Nye 1998, 84‐85). Rogerson (2000) built on Keohane and Nye’s (1998) work, presenting a more nuanced picture of how different flows of information shape relationships of “complex interdependence” between states. He argues that not only do states assert soft power in order to maximize their position within interdependent relationships, but that flows of information are themselves governed by “information interdependence,” the same relationships of complex interdependence that bind trade, military, and other arrangements. For example, America’s ability to dominate film production internationally is conditioned by its dependence on favorable import regulations in target societies. Within each of these types of “information flows,” he proposes analyzing the role of both the physical capabilities (i.e. hardware) and the content (i.e. software). He also differentiated five different issue areas within which most forms of international interaction fall: (1) information for security, (2) information as a commodity, (3) information for the spread of ideology (e.g. information for the establishment and the spread of democracy), (4) information for the spread of culture, and (5) information surrounding multilateral issues such as the environment or human rights (429). According to Keohane (2002), complex interdependence is an ideal framework with which to analyze situations conditioned by multiple transnational issues and contacts in which “force is not a useful instrument of policy” (2). While 43 Keohane and Nye (2001) and Rogerson (2000) present theoretical frameworks, there have been no empirical tests of this approach as it relates to the information environment. However, while Singh (2008) does not reference “complex interdependence” per se, his study of the role of international negotiation in the global information economy adopts a complementary if not commensurate approach. He posits that the ability of major powers to achieve desired outcomes in information policy is diffused in negotiations involving a wide range of actors. On the other hand, major powers are much more likely to achieve their goals in bilateral negotiations involving lesser powers, following traditional realist predictions of international relations. He identifies a number of cases to support this hypothesis. For example, in intellectual property negotiations during the Uruguay Round of World Trade Organization (WTO) agreements, power was concentrated according to North and South coalitions, leading to outcomes that favored developed countries. In contrast, in the Uruguay Round talks on telecommunications the EU‐led coalition stymied the US ability to gain favorable terms until their interests were aligned. In Singh’s (2008) estimation, the outcomes of interdependence are thus shaped by the diffusion or concentration of state power in any negotiation. Complex interdependence does not predict equality of power—rather that states can manipulate patterns of interdependence to amplify their influence. Major powers are therefore in privileged positions to dictate information flows in relation 44 to lesser powers. Accordingly, this body of theories would predict that the US ability to influence the South African information environment is predicated on attempts to maximize US influence. Its dominance across multiple issue areas will allow it maximum latitude to behave independently within relationships of interdependence. It also suggests that different issue areas relating to information are interdependent. For example, the US’s ability to impact telecommunications policy will be impacted by its ability to control strategic communication (e.g. public diplomacy) and vice versa. Information as Domination There is a body of theory about international communication that evolved out of dependency theory studies of political economy and development, arguments that helped to drive the NWICO movement of the late 1970s and early 1980s. There are several iterations of this argument, including: “cultural imperialism” (Schiller 1976), "media imperialism" (Boyd‐Barrett 1977; Lee 1979), "structural imperialism" (Galtung 1971), "cultural dependency and domination" (Mohammadi 1995), "cultural synchronization" (Hamelink 1983), "electronic colonialism" (McPhail 1987), "communication imperialism" (Lee 1979), "ideological imperialism," and "economic imperialism"(Mattelart 1979, 1994). Each of these scholars is in some way concerned with the geopolitical power of information and 45 examines international communication from the perspective of North/South disparities and/or of asymmetrical center‐periphery relationships. They posit that states must accept the values and structures of the dominant center (i.e. the West) in order to participate in the modern world system. Center nations and institutions act in such a way to attract, pressure, force, or bribe peripheral nations and cultures into shaping their social institutions to correspond to, or even promote, the values and structures of the center (Schiller 1976; Smith 1980; Said 1978). According to this estimation, the US government has propagated market liberalism and liberal democratic ideals of information and communication systems in order to optimize its control over information flows. Attempts to control the hardware and software of information systems outside US borders have served both as a supporting mechanism for and as a direct instrument of US foreign policy. Moreover, this body of theory privileges structure over individual agency. Accordingly, “actors do not necessarily know, or they are unable to express what their interest is” (Galtung 1971, 82). Dominant actors such as the United States through their unequal ability to construct structures of interaction, cause actors in the periphery to disregard their true interests in favor of ‘false consciousness’ that furthers the power of the Center (Ibid.). Critics denounce the dependency approach because it ignores the concept of an “active audience” and the increasing presence of “contra flows” of communication and information technologies emanating from so‐called periphery 46 states (Thussu 2006). However, particularly in examinations of the United States, the imperialism thesis still holds much traction. In 2000, Schiller (2000) reflected on his earlier work arguing for an even bleaker outlook on the role of American dominance. Other academics also continue to present a view of communication as a commodity used to dominate the developing world (e.g. Boyd Barrett 2006; Bagdikian 2004; Brown 2003; Ya’u 2004, 2005). Oliver Boyd Barrett (2006), for example, argues that, “the framework of media imperialism is appropriate for the study of US dominance of information and communication technology” (21). Ya’u (2005) claims that the African continent now “faces the challenges of imperialism anew, this time represented by knowledge dependence”—a process that he refers to as “cyber imperialism” (100). Cultural imperialism would predict that US government ability to shape the South African communications environment would be robust, systemic, direct, and in service of an neo‐colonial agenda. Information as World Culture Globalization is a loose term that lumps a number of disparate ideas about the implications of increasing global interconnections. Some scholars like McChesney and Schiller (2003) and Chomsky (2003) present globalization as synonymous with cultural imperialism and US domination. Here I am concerned with those scholars that set forth a strong view of globalization—that it now shapes and constrains all state actions regardless of their respective position in the 47 hierarchy of international relations (Hirst & Thompson 2002; Held 1996; Meyer et al. 1997). In this institutionalist approach, global interconnections control state behaviors, whether those states are major, minor, or middle powers. World polity proponents argue that multilateral regimes socialize states to adapt acceptable behaviors and practices that allow them to function within the world system: many features of the contemporary nation‐state derive from worldwide models constructed and propagated through global cultural and associational processes. . . [with the] result of diminishing the causal importance of the organized hierarchies of power and interests celebrated in most “realist” social scientific theories (Meyer et al. 1997, 144‐145). States reassert their relevance by attempting to shape the processes of globalization deemed beneficial to its constituents. According to this depiction, state‐to‐state influence is generally limited to efforts to support beneficial international regimes and/or to its contributions to world culture. This school argues that no state is truly viable without working through the global; information spaces are now shaped at the global and local level not the national. Because governance has moved beyond the state level, states such as the United States maximize their influence by working through multilateral institutions and by exerting pressure to make sure that other states conform to beneficial international regimes. This body of theory would predict that direct US government efforts to shape the South African information environment would work principally through multilateral initiatives, and successful strategies would be limited to those that are considered beneficial by South Africans. Any considered reforms made by the South African government and 48 encouraged by the US, would likely occur, not as a result of America’s instrumental power, but because in the globalized world culture states tend towards “structural isomorphism,” adopting similar protocols, systems, and structures. A Statement of the Problem Although each theory offers compelling explanations for the role of information in contemporary international relations, upon beginning this study it was my contention that none of the bodies of theory outlined in the preceding section alone appropriately captures the dynamics of how states attempt to intervene in the information environments of other states. Studying one type of information strategy as a function of state power is like focusing on the leaves without studying the branches, trunk, or roots. One state’s attempt to influence the information environment of another state is comprised of a complex web of information strategies. The “ecosystem of communications” between two is conditioned as much by conditions on the ground in both countries as it is by these strategies. In order to understand the connections between the United States and South Africa, I posited that we must understand the communication‐related institutional and political contexts out of which these connections emerge. I therefore developed a unique theoretical model and method of testing these connections, outlined in Chapter 2. In conducting research, I set out to explore whether the observed behaviors of US state agencies and actors towards the South 49 African information environment supported or undermined existing theories of state power articulation and my theoretical model. Moreover, because a diachronic case study allows for the comparison of trends over time, I also wanted to examine how programs and policies developed during the Clinton administration compared with the George W. Bush administration. Would these changes correspond to broader changes in the technological, regulatory, and legal configuration of the global communications environment? Do these changes correspond to broader changes in US strategic economic, geopolitical, and cultural/ideological objectives? The following chapter outlines the theoretical model and methods that I used to explore these issues. 50 CHAPTER 2: AN ECOSYSTEM OF COMMUNICATIONS The digitization of communications, coupled with the devolution of control over communications structures, has prompted an unparalleled heterogeneity in communication platforms and in information flows and counter‐flows. While states, particularly a major power like the US, were once in a privileged position to shape both domestic and transnational information flows, this is no longer the case. As pointed out in Chapter 1, private sector multimedia organizations like Time Warner, NewsCorp, Televisa, and Al Jazeera are the most visible actors in the trans‐border flow of communications content. Internet giants like Google, Yahoo, Cisco, Tyco, AT&T, and Microsoft provide the software and hardware that form the backbone of international communications networks. Billions of individuals participate in the production and distribution of content through cellular and Internet networks. In the wake of this multitude of private sector flows, states are expanding not contracting their attempts to shape the legal, structural, ideological, and economic mechanisms through which information flows. The majority of existing literature outlined in Chapter 1 focuses on individual strands of state attempts to shape international communication vis‐à‐vis other states: public diplomacy, telecommunications policy, and media and ICT for development. However, upon beginning this dissertation research, I posited that none of the works surveyed adequately described the contemporary role of information in international 51 relations. In order to identify how and why states use informational strategies as a tool of international relations, the full range of activities should be examined. In this chapter, I first outline my reasons for choosing the United States and South Africa as my case study with which to examine the role of information and power. I then describe how and why I constructed my initial theoretical model and detail the methods employed to test whether US informational activities in South Africa supported this model and existing theories of information and state power. The Case Study Approach This dissertation project involved an in‐depth diachronic case study of US information strategies towards South Africa between 1992 and 2008. It examined the strategies utilized by two successive administrations, that of William Jefferson Clinton (1993‐2000) and George W. Bush (2001‐2009). It traced the sequence and structure of the information strategies and identified the relevant political, economic, and social motivations behind them in order to help refine the proposed theoretical model (discussed below). The case study approach has been criticized because: it is prone to selection bias; it is difficult to control for intervening variables; it is hard to estimate the size of causal effects; and results are tough to generalize because the antecedent conditions of the specific case under evaluation play a central role in theory construction and/or analysis. 52 However, particularly in the past two decades, the case study methodology has gained ground in political science and related disciplines. George and Bennett (2005) identify four major strengths to the case study method. First, it allows the researcher to achieve high conceptual validity through the comparison of analytically equivalent phenomenon even if they are expressed in substantively different terms. Second, the flexibility of the case study approach allows the researcher to identify antecedent conditions and explore independent and intervening variables that were not apparent during the hypothesis stage. This flexibility allows room to foster new hypotheses rather than simply confirm or disconfirm existing ones. There have been a number of seminal case studies that help to illustrate the utility of the case study approach for generating new theory and for testing existing ones. Albert Einstein constructed his theory of relativity from a case study of the 1919 solar eclipse. Graham Allison (1971), in another example, tested whether three theoretical frameworks relating to foreign policy behavior—the “rational actor” model, the “organizational process” model, and the “governmental politics” model applied to the Cuban Missile Crisis, finding instead that a bureaucratic model of politics proved to be more appropriate. Some of the most influential theories in the field of communication have also emerged out of case studies. Liebes and Katz (1986), for example, brought the concept of an active audience to the fore with their study of the television show Dallas. Hallin (1986), through his study media coverage on the Vietnam War, underscored the importance 53 of the political agency in guiding media coverage. Third, detailed analysis of multiple dimensions of a problem allows the researcher to identify complex causal relationships. And forth, it allows the researcher to test the validity of multiple existing theoretical approaches on an individual case (George & Bennett 2005, 19‐ 22). A case study of US information strategies in South Africa thus provides an opportunity to test how existing bodies of theories explain the complex set of processes that shape information strategies between the two countries and to test an alternate model. Galtung’s (1971) structural theory of imperialism, for example, is often cited in discussions about the role of information in North/South relations. He argues that, “imperialism is a more general structural relationship between two collectivities, and has to be understood at the general level in order to be understood and counteracted in its more specific manifestations” (81). The converse is also true. In order to test the explanatory power of general systems level theories about the nature of dominance (e.g. Galtung’s structural theory of imperialism) we must examine the extent to which these approaches fit or do not fit in specific cases. I selected an examination of the United States and South Africa because I felt that it is particularly important to understand how these interrelationships operate between both major and middle powers and more importantly between North and South. The role of information in the “African Renaissance” has been stressed again 54 and again by actors on the continent and by development agencies, donors, and politicians. At the same time, neo‐imperialism and the legacies of colonialism pervade conversations about indigenous information environments. The OAU Cultural Charter for Africa reflects most clearly the legacies of decades of unequal access to culture and information platforms wield over contemporary African political life. According to the Charter, Cultural domination led to the depersonalization of part of the African peoples, falsified their history, systematically disparaged and combated African values, and tried to replace progressively and officially, their languages by that of the colonizer. [Moreover] that colonization has encouraged the formation of an elite which is too often alienated from its culture and susceptible to assimilation and that a serious gap has been opened between the said elite and the African popular masses. Given the long history of colonialism and racial injustices on the continent, coupled with related inequitable distribution of ownership, access, and content, a more thorough‐going and updated understanding of the processes through which external powers can and do engage in the contemporary African information sphere is needed. I decided that a study of United States strategies on the continent would be particularly instructive for several reasons. First, particularly following World War I, the US has played the leading role in propelling the global transformation of the communication sphere. In 1918, the first of President Woodrow Wilson’s historic Fourteen Points, which helped lead to the creation of the League of Nations, called 55 for the free flow of information. 13 Braman (2006) calls this a “pragmatic move, for acceptance of this principle made it harder for individual countries to barricade flows of political communication… and easier for U.S.‐based corporations in the information and communication industries to operate internationally” (54‐55). 14 While the United States ultimately chose isolationism over the League of Nations, it continued to promote open information flows at the multilateral level. In the late 1970s and 1980s, members of the Non‐Aligned Movement (NAM) pushed for a NWICO governed by UNESCO, which would establish rules governing the flow of media content and new communications technology and promote the decolonization of information. The United States, considered the primary perpetrator of information colonization, vociferously opposed the NWICO on the grounds that it would give UNESCO undue control over defining what constituted a free flow of information. The NWICO debates brought to the fore fundamental disagreements over the role of the state in regulating information flows and the role of the private communication industries in amplifying North/South inequities. While the NWICO failed, calls for information sovereignty and claims of cultural 13 An interesting side note: In November of that same year South African President Jans Smuts produced the treatise The League of Nations: A Practical Suggestion, “giving form and substance to [Wilson’s] nebulous idea” for a League of Nations based on these 14 points (quoted in Curry 1961, 971). Wilson was similarly inspired by Smuts’ work, and used it as the basis for the American draft of the Covenant of the League of Nations produced in 1919. 14 In an effort to break down national press monopolies and broaden its competitive advantage in the international news arena, the AP lobbied unsuccessfully to install clear language that supported unfettered access for all journalists, whether foreign or domestic, in the Treaty of Versailles (LeMay 2007, 77). 56 imperialism are alive and well. 15 Multimedia and telecommunications companies headquartered in the United States lay claim to a significant percentage of the information and communications industry. Today, the Americas region (principally the US and Canada) generates 49.5 percent of the global media industry revenue; and the American companies control over 25 percent of movie production and distribution globally (IBIS 2007, 22). Not surprisingly, during the process of negotiations leading to the 2003 World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), developing countries presented an almost identical set of concerns to those voiced during the NWICO process (Padovani & Nordenstreng 2005). As Cowhey and Aronson (2009) put it, despite challenges from China and India, the United States remains “the world market’s political, economic, and technological pivot [and] … is likely to be the single largest influence on the global [information] policy agenda” (14, 95). America’s central role in the information sector underscores the need for a case study of the ways in which it articulates information power over other lesser powers. Second, numerous scholars have criticized what they see as the undue influence of United States over international regimes governing communication (e.g. Goldsmith & Wu 2006; Hills 2007; Singh 2008). Under US pressure, the OECD launched an initiative in the 1960s to identify appropriate communication reforms 15 The NWICO debate resulted in very few programmatic changes outside of the establishment of the UNESCO International Programme for the Development of Communication (IPDC), which is deference to Western funders who adopted a practical rather than a political mission of developing communication systems (Miller 2009, 12). 57 in member states. In the years that followed, the now defunct IBI (Intergovernmental Bureau of Informatics), the ITU and others launched similar programs. In their analysis of South Africa’s attempts to participate in these regimes, Cohen and Gillwald (2009) found that “with strong allegiance to the United States Department of Commerce the governance arrangements for the Internet have been plagued by … problems of lack of participation, representation, and influence by developing countries” (1). While these regimes are increasingly negotiated at the supranational level, American power is built upon its ability to influence specific countries to follow information protocols at the national level that facilitate their adoption at the supranational level and vice versa (see also Singh 2008). In other words, there is a domino effect. For example, in the post‐Uruguay Round of the WTO negotiations (1994‐97), the United States used its considerable influence to pressure Asian and African nations into ratifying the GATS (General Agreement on Trade in Services) annex on telecommunications. The more countries that adopt US‐friendly policies, the more inclined other countries are to adopt similar principals and to commit to treaties and agreements. Third, in discussions about information sovereignty and cultural imperialism, American influence is both generalized and hyperbolized. Particularly in the information sector, the US is home to numerous civil society, corporate, and government actors involved in information policy, technology, production, or distribution. However, the tendency to subsume this diverse group of actors under 58 the convenient umbrella of Pax Americana undermines a real consideration of how power in the information society operates. In other words, it is necessary to demystify the complex set of processes commonly shorthanded as neo‐imperialism. An analysis of the role of US government strategies will allow a better window into the relative influence and interdependence of the private versus the public sector on information environments beyond US borders. Looking at how US government actors have facilitated these strategies in a specific country over time will also allow a more nuanced understanding of how interconnections depend on broader political, economic, and cultural trends and vice versa. But why a case study of US strategy toward South Africa? An evaluation of the United States government’s information strategies in South Africa provides a fertile case study for several reasons. First, instability in the Middle East, even before September 11 and the Iraq War began, prompted a concerted effort in the US government to decrease dependence on Middle Eastern oil and other natural resources. 16 This facilitated a turn in strategic attention by the US and other actors toward Africa and Africa’s material wealth. For example, the National Energy Policy Development (NEPD) Group (2001), led by Vice President Dick Cheney, recommended that, 16 China already imports more than a quarter of its oil from Africa and the National Intelligence Council projects that American African oil imports will reach the same level by 2015 (Watts 2006, 100). A number of scholars have documented the “new scramble for Africa” by the United States, the European Union, China, and other major powers seeking oil and other natural resources. See, for example, Frynas and Paulo (2006), Watts (2006), Habib (2008), and Ndumbe (2004). The first “scramble for Africa” took place during the 1960s decolonization period. 59 The President direct the Secretaries of State, Energy and Commerce reinvigorate the U.S. African Trade and Economic Cooperation Forum and the U.S. African Energy Ministerial process; deepen bilateral and multilateral engagements to promote a more receptive environment for U.S. oil and gas trade, investment and operations; and promote geographic diversification of its energy supplies, addressing such issues as transparency, sanctity of contracts and security. As a sign of the reality behind this rhetoric, in 2004, the year after the second Iraq War started, US direct investment to sub‐Saharan Africa in 2004 rose by 23.4 percent (to $13.5 billion) and trade rose by 37 percent over 2003 levels and has been rising ever since (Frynas & Paulo 2006, 231). In addition to oil, Africa also produces to 46 percent of the world’s chromium, 48 percent of its diamonds, 29 percent of its gold, and 48 percent of its platinum (Mannion 2006). While South Africa is not an oil‐producing nation, it is a leading producer of all of these minerals; and has been identified repeatedly as a “pivotal African state” for US strategy in the region (Chase, Hill & Kennedy 1994, Executive Office of the President 1991, 2002, 2006). It is the only African state listed by the US Commerce Department as one of the 10 emerging markets; and it represents approximately 88 percent of all market capitalization in sub‐Saharan Africa (Africa Advisory Panel 2004, 46). The Africa Advisory Panel Report commissioned by Colin Powell in 2004 cautions, “it is likely that South Africa will be a necessary partner in any operation in Southern Africa” (2004, 144). And the 2002 National Security Strategy for the United States, in the first of its “three interlocking strategies for the region,” stresses that “countries with major impact on their neighborhood such as South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya, and 60 Ethiopia are anchors for regional engagement and require focused attention” (Executive Office of the President 2002). Identifying how this “focused attention” is expressed and aided by informational strategy will prove instructive. Second, while South Africa has always been the subject of American strategic interest, its history of apartheid meant that the US government refrained from implementing many of the information strategies commonly practiced elsewhere until the early 1990s. Therefore, this study is limited to an analysis of US information strategies over the last 15‐year period, a relatively manageable period of time, from which the vast majority of the key players are still living and remain in positions of influence. Third, because of the South Africa’s late entry into normalized international relations, it provides an opportunity to examine how information strategies developed elsewhere succeed or fail in an alternate environment. US government media assistance strategies developed largely in response to Eastern European independence movements in East Asia. Similarly, contemporary pubic diplomacy and strategic information programs evolved in response to increased tensions between the US and Middle Eastern nations. Investigating the successes and failures with which these strategies have been practiced in South Africa can prove useful because it allows insight into all asymmetrical relationships in the area of communication. 61 Fourth, South African independence coincided with a broader global recognition of the importance of communication structures and policies. While all nation‐states remain deeply invested in controlling their information spaces, particularly those in Africa, in most other countries in the region colonial information systems were transferred to newly‐independent governments with relatively little structural reconfiguration. It was only in the 1990s that other countries in the region made moves to reconfigure their information and communication policies. South Africa’s late independence coincided with this reform movement; and thus since its inception, it has been characterized by a highly mobilized set of stakeholders interested in communication and information policy. There are numerous civil society groups (e.g. Institute for a Democratic South Africa [IDASA]), citizen journalism movements (e.g. Women’sNet, MobileActive.org, Reporter.co.za, the Association for Progressive Communication [APC], and Highway Africa) and media and ICT activists (e.g. Save Our SABC, Freedom of Expression Institute, and SangoNet 17 ) concerned with the both content and policy. Some of these stakeholders have worked in service with US interests and others have mobilized against them. Fifth, in reality, South Africa, while commonly defined as a middle power in the international scene, often functions as a hegemon at the regional level. This is particularly true in the realm of communication. South Africa maintains a virtual 17 SangoNet runs CitizenJournalismAfrica.org with funding from HIVOS and the European Union. 62 monopoly over satellite broadcasting in Anglophone Africa, plays an influential advisory role to information ministries in the region, and currently hosts the only underwater broadband Internet cable link to Africa. The prevalence of US programming on South African satellite broadcasts and its close relationship with US corporate and government telecommunications actors have prompted claims that South Africa at times operates as a sub‐agent of US cultural imperialism on the continent (Nyamnjoh 2004). A study of South Africa can thus provide insight into broader US informational strategies toward the African continent. Sixth, in October 2007, the DOD launched AFRICOM, a new central command to address US strategic interests in Africa. This is a landmark organization because it also plans to coordinate with both USAID and State Department initiatives on the continent. Its launch initiated a wave of concern, particularly within powerful states such as South Africa and Nigeria, over encroaching US power, prompting a series of discussions in the media and in government circles about the best US communication practices towards the African continent. Finally, I chose South Africa because I had a personal connection with southern Africa. I believed that my experiences as an American living in the region and working within the communications industries would provide me with a more subtle insight that would enrich the case study. In the following sections I outline the model and methods I developed to examine this case study. 63 Constructing a Processual Model of Information Flows This dissertation’s main subject of analysis is the strategies used by different actors within the United States’ political agency to influence the South African information environment. By political agency, I mean the set of political actors concerned with a particular political project (Arsenault & Castells 2006). In this case, the project refers to US information policy towards South Africa. I define information strategies as the calculated attempt by a government actor(s) to use instruments of information and communication to influence the content, form, or structure of the South African information environment. In the following section, I outline these strategies in greater detail, provide a working definition of what constitutes a “national information environment,” and present my initial theoretical model depicting the processes through which I posited that a major power like the United States would attempt to influence the information environment of a lesser power like South Africa. I started from the premise that this process of influence is multi‐faceted and at times contradictory. While realist, rational actor, and balance of power theories of interstate relationships typically treat the “state” as an irreducible unit in international relations, there are a number of theoretical approaches (e.g. Allison’s [1971] Bureaucratic politics model, Constructivism, and the political processes model) that propose a more complicated interpretation of how states interact. Particularly when it comes to information policy, states are not unitary actors. 64 Public diplomacy, regulatory policies, media and ICT development, and propaganda are all efforts to shape the information environment in line with sometimes differing strategic interests of the United States and/or specific individuals or groups within the US political agency. Even the most recent Government Accounting Office (GAO) survey of national information policy stresses that the “The United States’ current national communication strategy lacks a number of desirable characteristics . . . such as a clear definition of the problem, desired results, and a delineation of agency roles and responsibilities” (2009, 1). The American system of governance reinforces this lack of cohesion. The division between the executive and legislative branches and the presence of several quasi‐independent agencies such as USAID, the FCC, USTDA, and the USIA until 1999 means that US information policy has never really been that coordinated (Cowhey & Aronson 2009; McKnight & Neumann 1995). However, in order to examine whether this estimation of US informational strategy proved to be true vis‐à‐vis South Africa, it was necessary to formulate a theoretical model that accurately described the processes of interaction. Upon beginning this study, I theorized that different strands of informational interaction between nations 18 combine to form what I conceptualize as an 18 I intentionally use nation rather than state to stress that this ecosystem of communications subsumes much more than state information efforts. 65 ecosystem of communications. 19 In science, an ecosystem refers to a group of interdependent organisms that share the same habitat. There may be little or no day‐to‐day interaction between individual organisms, but each influences the conditions under which the other exists. Similarly, as information content and systems have become increasingly central to all facets of life including international relations, a system of communications‐related connections has emerged that links specific countries and provides the building blocks for the global ecosystem of communications. An ecosystem of communications refers to the total architecture of communications linking two countries, including the physical infrastructure of communications and the content that flows through that infrastructure. This ecosystem of communications between two countries is constituted by the flow of different forms of information as outlined in Chapter 1: (1) as data, (2) as a tool, (3) as a commodity, (4) as infrastructure, and (5) as an actor in society. These different types of information fall within seven broad channels of international interaction: military, diplomatic, economics and trade, aid and facilitation, intelligence connections, Non‐State Transnational Relations, and multilateral. But before discussing the constituent elements of the ecosystem that connects two countries and outlining a model that predicted how a state such as the United States would seek to influence this ecosystem of communications, it was important to identify the 19 This term was coined after consultation with Ernest Wilson and owes a debt to the work of Lee et al. (2000) who examined how the Silicon Valley ecosystem facilitated the growth of technological and corporate innovation. 66 primary building blocks. In particular, it is necessary to identify what constitutes a national information environment. This dissertation is concerned with how US government actors attempt to influence the ecosystem of communications between the US and South Africa in service of various goals. Therefore, it is necessary to provide a working definition what constitutes the South African information, which is the primary dependent variable in this study. Conceptualizing the South African Information Environment As Monroe Price (2002) notes, “the tentacles of influence by one state over the media of another are hardly new, but the process of interaction, through treaty or agreement on the flow of ideas, information, and sheer data, is every day, intensifying” (3). One of the fundamental challenges to a study of these “tentacles of influence” is defining the dependent variable. A number of politicians and academics have put forth related definitions. However, again, a particular conception of information, as outlined in the preceding chapter, undergirds each of these definitions. There are those who approach information as a commodity and/or as infrastructure that define national information environments according to economic zones. Drake (1995), for example, defined the national information infrastructure (NII) as “the computerized telecommunications networks, customer interfaces, services, and applications . . . [that are] at the heart of an increasingly integrated communications and information businesses” (1). His definition thus 67 includes the basic hardware (infrastructure), not the software (content) of national information environment. Braman (2006) similarly defines national information spaces according to zones of economic and legal policy. However, she asserts that national information spaces are not the product of geographic spaces, but vice versa. National borders evolved in large part out of international trade laws, laws that were formed in order to establish more favorable conditions for the trade of information, communication and cultural goods (227). Volkmer (2003) and others take a different approach, looking at national information environments as “a national public sphere.” In this sense, the implication is that information is a tool for building or inhibiting discourse and citizenship. Other authors reference “national media systems,” “national media environments,” etc. However, nuanced definitions of how a national information environment as a dependent variable should be defined and studied are lacking. These differing theoretical approaches to an information environment lead to a series of questions. First, is any information environment truly national? No, not in the strictest sense. Local systems are part of the global infrastructure and vice versa. Moreover, nations and states are not synonyms, although they are interrelated. The nation—while generally anchored to some geographically located state—is not necessarily congruent with that physical space. The national information environment is similarly unbounded and amorphous, though still tethered to the state and to the nation. 68 Second, national information environments are constituted across multiple levels of analysis. Often, state information strategies produced within a particular country target national, regional, and global information systems. As will be discussed in more detail in chapters 3 and 6, South Africa was central to negotiations surrounding the strategic deployment of Internet cable systems around the African continent due to its regional economic power, its large networked population, and because of its leverage over regional multilateral institutions concerned with information policy such as South African Development Community (SADC), TRASA, the New Economic Plan for African Development (NEPAD), and the African Union (AU). US efforts to lobby South Africa to adopt infrastructure cable projects impacts the ability to influence the information environment of an entire continent, potentially altering the flows of information between the global North and South. Third, national information environments are part of the project of the respective political agency as well as the cultural, economic, and social actors within that country both past and present. Particularly in the global South, the domestic strategies of former colonial powers heavily influenced the development of post‐ independence national information environments, as will be discussed further in Chapter 3. Francophone African colonies inherited relatively diverse decentralized communication systems while Anglophone African countries inherited tightly 69 controlled and centralized systems. Given these complexities, how does one conceptualize a national information environment? Figure 2.1 provides an overview of my initial model of the South African information environment. FIGURE 2.1: INITIAL MODEL OF THE SOUTH AFRICAN INFORMATION ENVIRONMENT 70 Figure 2.1 suggests that the South African information environment is made up of four broad areas: rules and laws (e.g. media laws, privacy regulations, free speech laws, telecommunications policy), content (e.g. media programs, inter‐ personal communications, news coverage), public opinion, and the physical communications infrastructure (e.g. Internet connections, satellites, airwaves). Their counterparts in other nations and at the global level influence each of these four parts. The South African information environment is thus part of the global information environment, and vice versa. In addition, each of these four broad macro‐level constructions are shaped by the characteristics of the individuals (micro‐level) and the bureaucracies that shape them (meso/organizational level). While many of the details surrounding the South African communications sphere will be explained further Chapter 3, it is important to stress the demographic factors that condition this environment. South Africa is a land of stark racial, economic, and social divisions. These divisions shape individual participation in the South African environment and help to constitute whose interests are represented in terms of content, rules, and structures. Today, South Africa has approximately 49 million inhabitants, nearly one‐third of which are under the age of 15. Almost 80 percent of the population is black, 9.1 percent is white, 2.6 percent are Indian, and the remaining 9 percent are coloured (the southern African term for people of mixed race). Language also bounds the flow of information. There are 11 official languages spoken in the country. However, most of the media and ICT content are 71 in English, the first language of the smallest percentage of the population (only 8.2 percent). Thus, while we may approximate something called a national information environment, particularly in South Africa, we cannot assume that at the individual level there is any uniform participation or access to that environment. Previous scholars have touched upon the subject of American influence over one, or two, or several dimensions of this environment. Robert Horowitz (2006), for example, points toward “the powerful backroom pressures wielded by US government agencies and US corporations during the debates surrounding the South African Ministry of Posts, Telecommunications and Broadcasting Green Paper and White Paper process” (232‐37). Princeton Lyman (2002), Ambassador to South Africa from 1992 to 1995, attributes a great deal of influence to the United States in South Africa’s overall transformation. While their research and my own uncovers a pattern of influence, my intention is not to overstress, but to uncover how American government programs and policies in the region have evolved towards the region. The South African communication environments have evolved out of a complex set of negotiations and economic exigencies, of which US strategies are but a dimension. Chapter 3 will examine the intricacies of the South African communications environment in greater detail; and Chapter 7 will present a revised final model of the South African environment. 72 Defining an Ecosystem of Communications After conceptualizing what constitutes the South African information environment, I then turned to a consideration of the different channels through which it was connected with that of the United States. In other words, I sought to identify the constituent elements of the ecosystem of communications between the two countries. A review of existing literature uncovered relatively few typologies with which to divide my analysis. Majid Tehranian (1997) outlined the different arenas of international relations impacted by the global communications revolution: (1) the military arena; (2) the diplomatic arena, which he divides into public diplomacy, people (e.g. citizen) diplomacy, and virtual diplomacy; (3) the economic arena; (4) the science and educational arenas; and (5) the cultural arena. He also presented three components of national communication policies: (1) cultural policy, which includes laws and norms related to heritage, identity, speech, and schooling; (2) information policies include the production and dissemination of public information; and (3) media policies which dictate the mediated modes of communication (Tehranian 1997). However, Tehranian’s model placed little or no influence on Internet, telecommunications, and media infrastructure. Rapid advances in ICTs during the past decades means that the nature of information flows between two countries is increasingly dictated by their respective levels of communications infrastructure development. The structural conditions of any information environment—whether it be local, national, or global—plays a major 73 role in determining the form and content of that environment, and vice‐versa. State and non‐state actors attempt to influence and control this infrastructure in service of various agendas. Moreover, the presence or absence of infrastructure has critical implications for who produces, consumes, and distributes information flows. High or low levels of Internet and mobile penetration dictate the range of actors producing and receiving domestic and cross‐boarder information flows. Therefore, a typology of an information environment is needed that takes into account communications infrastructure as well as content. Rogerson (2000), although he did not present a formal typology, differentiates five different issue areas within which most forms of international interaction fall: (1) information for security; (2) information as a commodity; (3) information for the spread of ideology (e.g. information for the establishment and the spread of democracy); (4) information for the spread of culture; and (5) information surrounding multilateral issues such as the environment or human rights (429). This interaction, according to Rogerson includes both physical capabilities for information and content. While I found Rogerson’s (2000) work compelling, applying these five different types of international informational interaction in practice proved difficult. I hypothesized that the national information environments are linked by hardware (i.e. infrastructure) and software (i.e. content) across seven broad channels of international interaction: military, diplomatic, economics and trade, aid 74 and facilitation, intelligence connections, Non‐State Transnational Relations, 20 and indirectly through interactions at the multilateral level. These channels of informational interaction coincide with and support general (non‐informational) international interactions. For example, the United States may provide military hardware to South Africa—a form of military interaction that is not necessarily relevant to the ecosystem of communications between the two countries. However, this exchange of military goods becomes relevant to the ecosystem when it in some way influences information flows between two countries. For example, military arrangements become relevant to the information sphere when and if the DOD holds a press conference promoting the exchange of military goods as evidence of America’s commitment to South Africa. I will turn to describe these channels in more detail shortly, but here it is important to stress that these channels are conditional. Different channels are more influential between certain countries and under certain conditions. For instance, in times of war, military interactions may supersede other channels in importance. During foreign policy disputes, diplomatic interactions many be more influential. I hypothesized that each of these channels represents a potential means by which one state may try to influence the information environment of another state. I therefore looked at all the different agencies, departments, and bureaus through 20 Defined as, “regular interactions across national boundaries when at least one actor is a non-state agent or does not operate on behalf of a national government or an intergovernmental organization” (Risse-Kappen 1995, 3). 75 which the United States had produced programs and otherwise influenced the South African information environment. I then identified the relevant US government entities concerned with each of these channels that were also involved in programs and initiatives seeking to influence the information environment of a middle power state like South Africa. Table 2.1 provides an overview of the typology and the respective US government actors who seek to utilize that channel. TABLE 2.1: CHANNELS OF INTERACTION BETWEEN NATIONAL INFORMATION ENVIRONMENTS AND GOVERNMENT INFORMATIONAL STRATEGY Channel Dept/Agency Type of Information Strategy Target Military DOD, Army, etc. Strategic Comm, media Assistance Public opinion, media content Diplomacy (public & state‐to‐state) State Dept Public diplomacy, journalism training, broadcasting, advocacy, & cultural exchange Public opinion, media content Economics & Trade Commerce Dept. USTDA Comm Service USTR Lobbying for legislation, regulatory training, lobbying for business Regulatory structure, communication infrastructure ownership Aid & Facilitation USAID Sub‐contractor Public diplomacy, media assistance ICT assistance, regulatory Training Media content, political ethos, ICT structure Multilateral Diplomacy & International Relations State Department Representatives ITU, WTO, ICANN All 76 TABLE 2.1 CONTINUED Intelligence Connections DOD CIA NSC Psyops Propaganda Content, structure, public & elite opinion NonState Transnational Relations Non‐State Actors e.g. Corporations, NGOs, trade associations Corp contracts/partner. media assistance, journalism training, person‐to‐person, diaspora Contracts for infrastructure and content provision, regulator structure, political ethos Military The most obvious and direct way a nation‐state may influence the information environment of another nation‐state is through military intervention. For example, one of the first acts of aggression by the American armed forces during the Gulf War was to disable Saddam Hussein’s communications structures. In the face of revolutionary movements in Latvia and Lithuania, one of the Kremlin’s first actions was to attempt to regain control over the TV transmission towers. However, military influence over the communications environment is not limited to hard power intervention. Cyberwar, psychological operations, 21 etc. all rely on collecting and receiving data as tools in the military arsenal (Arquilla & Rodenfeldt 1993, 2001). For example, during the 1999 Kosovo War, the Yugoslav government sought 21 As defined by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, “psychological operations (PSYOP) is to induce or reinforce foreign attitudes and behavior favorable to planned operations to convey selected information and indicators to foreign audiences to influence the emotions, motives, objective reasoning, and ultimately the behavior of foreign governments, organizations, groups, and individuals” (2003, ix). 77 to destabilize NATO’s computer operations by sending over two million emails (Dutton 2009). During the second Gulf War, the American Department of Defense (DOD) also attempted to leverage the Iraqi media environment in multiple ways, paying journalists for favorable stories, launching “private” online magazines about Middle Eastern politics with editorial slants favorable to the United States, and distributing press releases and holding news conferences. US military ties with South Africa have increased steadily since Nelson Mandela’s election in 1994. The 1997 Binational Commission led by Vice President Gore and South African Deputy President Thabo Mbeki established a defense committee. In 1999 alone, more than 1000 American military officers visited South Africa as a part of military exchange programs (Kozaryn 1999). However, in terms of South Africa, United States military engagement has been relatively restricted to collaboration on hard power issues and military exchange programs. The most concentrated military effort to influence the information environment surrounded a failed public relations initiative in support of the establishment of AFRICOM, a separate US military command located on the African continent. South Africans remain among AFRICOM’s most vocal opponents. However, in the wake of fervent opposition, direct attempts at lobbying in South Africa were relatively short. Because there have been a lack of information‐related military initiatives targeting South Africa and because military protocols complicate the process of interviews, my consideration of this channel is relatively minor in this particular study. 78 Diplomacy Diplomacy, as it is usually defined, refers to the formal negotiations conducted between representatives of nation‐states across a broad range of economic, social, and political issues. This arena of interaction can at times be a decisive component of the overall ecosystem of communications between two countries. For example, acrimonious confrontations between political leaders can dominate media content, alter or halt communications related development programs, stall corporate contracts, and influence public opinion about the other country. States have long sought to leverage foreign domestic public opinion in service of formal diplomatic negotiations. Cull (2008) points to a series of historical examples of states courting foreign public opinion, beginning in 480 BC with the Persian invasion of Greece, when envoys from Xerxes appealed directly to the people of Argos to remain neutral. As communication platforms have expanded, diplomatic practices progressively moved out of the shadows and into the mediated spotlight. Negotiations that used to take place in smoky rooms between ambassadors and secretaries of state now are largely performed either in front of or through conversations in the media (Gilboa 2002). As a result, public opinion now holds greater power over diplomatic outcomes than at any point in history. Efforts to effect positive diplomatic outcomes are critically intertwined with efforts to shape the information environment of the respective partner in negotiations. In 79 order to move public opinion in their favor, states first have to bring a favorable case before the domestic public through efforts generally labeled as “public diplomacy.” Public diplomacy refers to attempts by states to bypass formal government channels and directly reach out to foreign publics. There has been a tendency on the part of academics to broaden the definition and the study of public diplomacy to include private citizen diplomacy and cultural flows (e.g. Melissen 2005). Edmund Guillion, a career foreign service diplomat and dean of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, is commonly credited with popularizing the term by using it at the establishment of the Edward R. Murrow Center for Public Diplomacy. According to the Center’s first brochure, Public diplomacy . . . deals with the influence of public attitudes on the formation and execution of foreign policies. It encompasses dimensions of international relations beyond traditional diplomacy . . . [including] the cultivation by governments of public opinion in other countries; the interaction of private groups and interests in one country with those of another . . . (and) the transnational flow of information and ideas (quoted in Wolf & Rosen 2004, 3). Interactions between “private groups and interests” are critical intervening variables for public diplomacy. However, in order to maintain the utility of the term, I limit consideration of public diplomacy as a channel to formal government attempts to influence the information environment in order to promote favorable foreign domestic public and elite opinion about either immediate strategic priorities 80 and/or US culture and ideology in general. 22 This promotion may take place through presidential addresses, press releases, press conferences, international broadcasting, speeches, and/or meetings with non‐government stakeholders. In the United States, the USIA (until 1999), the State Department, and various international broadcasting agencies have been the primary public diplomacy practitioners. The Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs manages the majority of US public diplomacy programs through his/her oversight over the Bureaus of Educational and Cultural Affairs (ECA), International Information Programs (IIP), and Public Affairs; and his/her position on the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) (which manages US international broadcasting efforts). Under the Bush administration, the DOD, experiencing mission creep born out of far superior funding, began public diplomacy operations. However, in terms of South Africa, DOD activities in this area have been relatively minor. The main public diplomacy practitioners have been the State Department, US Embassy in Pretoria, successive occupants of the White House, and the Voice of America (VOA), which has maintained a bureau in Johannesburg since the 1950s. Economics and Trade Economics and trade provide a critical, and, in the African context, sometimes the most critical channel of interconnection. This influence takes place 22 The latter is often referred to as “cultural diplomacy.” 81 through bilateral trade agreements, tariffs, economic treaties, and flow of goods and capital. Global spending on information and communication technology exceeded $3.7 trillion 2008 and is estimated to reach $4 trillion by 2011 (WITSA 2008). American actors such as the USTDA, the US Commercial Service, and the International Communication and Information Policy (CIP) group in the State Department 23 have all adopted programs to pressure other states towards adopting rules and regulations governing information platforms that favor US economic strategies. These include: promoting policy reform issues like privatization, liberalization, and an independent regulator; lobbying the South African communications regulator (ICASA) and the Department of Communications (DOC) to enact favorable policies; encouraging South Africa to join multilateral regimes that adhered to US policy priorities; and championing US and global multimedia businesses. As the second‐largest source of foreign direct investment (FDI) in South Africa, the US is in a particular position to push for communications reform. An estimated 600 American companies (including subsidiaries, joint ventures, local partners, agents, franchises, and representative offices) do business in South Africa. In 2008, the US exported $6.5 billion worth of goods to South Africa, up 199 percent since 1994 (USTR 2009). It has thus been in a privileged position to negotiate 23 One of seven issue-oriented organizations within the Bureau of Economic, Energy, and Business Affairs. 82 bilateral agreements that favor American communications companies in South Africa and push for market liberalization reforms in the telecommunications sector. When looking at influence channels between the North and South, divisions between economic and aid channels are often hard to distinguish. Trade and investment relate closely to grants, loans, and other financial flows tied to development initiatives. At the end of the Cold War, aid programs previously justified as countering Soviet influence were increasingly framed according to economic strategy. In response, the Clinton administration zeroed in on “trade not aid” as a tagline to describe its development agenda. Under this framework, government actors responsible for dispensing aid have often framed their efforts as attempts to increase trade; and organs of the Commerce Department have provided aid to certain domestic actors in order to increase trade. While, particularly in the area of information policy, there have been frequent cases of overlap between these channels, for the purposes of this dissertation, aid channels are divided from economic channels accordingly. Aid channels refer to the direct provision of funds, training, and/or development assistance related to the communications environment. Economic channels refer to bilateral trade agreements, increasing access for business, and/or lobbying on behalf of constituent companies operating within the other country. 83 Aid While aid programs are commonly framed as humanitarian gestures, a necessary redistribution of wealth from North to South, and/or redress for legacies of colonialism and mercantilism, they also represent an important channel of broader state interest and influence. As USAID’s own published literature recognizes: “U.S. foreign assistance has always had the twofold purpose of furthering America's foreign policy interests in expanding democracy and free markets while improving the lives of the citizens of the developing world” (USAID.gov 2009). There are a number of private foundations involved in aid programs such as the George Soros Foundation, the Ford Foundation, and the Rockefeller Foundation. However, the majority of aid that flows between the United States and South Africa vis‐à‐vis the communications sphere involves state‐to‐state interaction. Information strategies produced through aid channels commonly coincide with these two foreign policy interests. Programs targeting the ICT sector are commonly framed according to economic goals (i.e. a developed communications sector is a prerequisite for broader economic development) while media programs are commonly subsumed under broader democracy promotion efforts. International aid programs targeting the ICT sector mushroomed during the Clinton administration, and were particularly encouraged by Al Gore’s Global Information Infrastructure (GII) initiative (which will be discussed further in Chapter 6). 84 Examples of aid‐related ICT sector programs include: providing expertise on information policy issues, funding telecommunications and Internet connectivity programs, and providing training for ICT and professionals and end users. In addition to USAID, other organizations such as the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and the National Telecommunications Training Institute (NTTI) have also provided training and development assistance in the area of information policy to countries around the world, including South Africa. Aid channels have also provided the main conduits for influencing the form and practice of foreign media systems. Programmatically, these media assistance programs are largely divorced from those programs described above which target the ICT sector and evolved out of different trajectory. Media development programs emerged against the backdrop of the Cold War out of the belief that a developed media and information sector was critical to developing Western‐style democratic capitalism and a corresponding rejection of state socialism. Two American academics, Daniel Lerner (1958) and Wilbur Schramm (1964), helped to instill the sentiment among the aid community that communications systems played a role as an independent rather than a dependent variable in national development in emerging nations. Lerner’s (1958) book, The Passing of Traditional Society, provided a theoretical rationale for focusing on the media sector. In his study of Balgat, Turkey, he argued that the media were key socializing institutions that encouraged indigenous populations to embrace modernity. Following the book’s 85 publication, the United Nations General Assembly called for a program to help developing countries expand their mass media systems and announced an initiative to encourage its member states to include media development as a fundamental component of their economic development (Hyden & Leslie 2002, 3). UNESCO then commissioned communications scholar Wilbur Schramm to determine the precise role that the mass media played in development. 24 The resulting book, Mass media and national development: The role of information in the developing countries (1964), provided a sort of bible for media development, the subtext of which still lingers in contemporary governmental approaches. Schramm’s overarching message was that the media provided a singularly powerful conduit through which broader national economic and political development could be achieved. If communications systems were adequately developed, then human resources could be trained and mobilized, political tensions dispelled, and “counterproductive attitudes and social patterns” discouraged (Schramm 1964, 32). In the late 1970s, the NWICO movement and the rise of Dependency Theory quieted public discussions about the role of media as an agent of modernization. But, among Western aid organizations the idea that freedom of expression, freedom of press, and freedom to organize are fundamental prerequisites for political 24 Schramm founded the Institute of Communications Research at the University of Illinois, Urbana Champaign and had co-authored the influential book Four Theories of the Press The Authoritarian, Libertarian, Social Responsibility, and Soviet Communist Concepts of What the Press Should Be and Do. He also investigated the role of communications systems in the communist occupation of Seoul (Peterson, Seibert & Schramm 1956; Riley & Schramm 1951). 86 organization, remained a base line for even the most minimalist definitions of democracy. In order to combat the calls for greater information sovereignty raised by the NWICO movement, the United States, other Western powers, and multilateral institutions actually expanded the scope of communications development programs. Aid actors were now equally concerned with initiatives that used media systems as a conduit to promote a broader respect for a Western style press and the open flow of information, in addition to funding programs that actually developed the media system. In the wake of the revolutions in Eastern Europe in the late 1980s and early 1990s, allocations for media assistance programs expanded ten‐fold, as the role of underground media organizations in spreading revolutionary messages lent support for arguments about the political and economic utility of media assistance and free press promotion (Kumar 2006). 25 Media assistance advocates also pointed to the role of increased media freedoms introduced under perestroika and glasnost as the final demise of the Soviet Union. In response to the Soviet collapse, Western aid organizations flooded into the former Soviet Union to provide journalistic, technical, and media management training (Kumar 2006). In the ensuing decades, media and ICT assistance programs have flourished and expanded. South Africa’s transition to democracy coincided with this exponential increase in media assistance and ICT programs. During the period under study, 25 In the run up to Polish independence, Radio Solidarity and hundreds of underground revolutionary magazines played a critical role in mobilizing resistance. 87 multiple US aid organizations have either funded or operated numerous programs that train journalists, bloggers, ICT and media industry professionals, or funded or trained private and public sector South African organizations in how to better utilize these communication platforms in service of promoting their agendas. These organizations have included: USAID and several publically‐funded but semi‐ autonomous organizations, including the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), the National Democratic Institute (NDI), and the International Republican Institute (IRI). In addition, particularly immediately before and after South Africa’s democratic transition, US actors also funded and trained an array of press freedom and democracy promotion advocacy organizations. These actors have also worked through intermediary organizations such as Internews and local South African NGOs, advocacy organizations, and universities out of recognition that direct bilateral funding has often been greeted with skepticism. Multilateral Multilateral organizations are key intermediaries through which national information environments are connected and through which state actors, particularly the United States, seek to exert influence over other states. However, the dual role of communication platforms complicates dissecting multilateral regimes as channels for state influence in the information realm. On the one hand, the proliferation of communication technologies and global information flows has 88 helped to facilitate the rise of multilateral regimes. On the other hand, multilateral regimes have emerged as arenas in which a host of actors—coalitions of countries from the global South (e.g. the NWICO), private media and communications companies, civil society and social movements (e.g. WSIS), and major powers like the United States—negotiate norms on information flows, technical standards, freedom of expression, etc. This duality also pervades the American use of multilateral channels to produce information strategies. The US has encouraged states to adopt multilateral agreements it deems particularly desirable (e.g. GATS) and reject those it finds undesirable (e.g. the NWICO). It has also encouraged domestic reforms designed to develop and expand national information environments so that those states might better participate in a host of multilateral and bilateral economic agreements thereby increasing economic and trade opportunities. The clearest example of the utility of the multilateral trade channels to influence foreign domestic information environments surrounds the second round of WTO negotiations. In 1997, the United States fought hard for adoption of the Basic Telecommunications Agreement (BAT) under the fourth protocol of the WTO General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), which ultimately shifted the locus of power over telecommunications policy from the ITU to the WTO. Articles XVI and XVII of the second round of GATS required signatories to open up their telecommunications sector to competition, issue additional licenses to private 89 communications operators, and expand opportunities for foreign investment. Article XVIII of the same agreement also included a commitment to “The Reference Paper” on basic telecommunications. The Reference Paper basically encapsulated the elements of privatization and competition lauded by the United States (Cowhey & Aronson 2009). Countries were asked to sign the agreement and to “schedule” the Reference Paper as an additional WTO commitment on market access for basic telecommunications services. US government actors have also encouraged the development of information policies and strategies that allow other states to more readily participate in multilateral governance arrangements both at the regional and international level that are relevant to information policy. For example, USAID encouraged and funded the launch of the Telecommunications Regulators Association of Southern Africa (TRASA), an organization that facilitated better regional adherence to the agreements on telecommunications made at the WTO. In addition to the more direct uses of multilateral channels to influence information policy at the international and national level, there have also been indirect impacts. 26 Following the publication of the Reference Paper, even non‐ signatories began to use it as a reference point for telecommunications reform. Policy produced at the multilateral level under pressure from the US then became a standard by which even non‐participating nations were judged. GATS and the BTA also had another secondary impact. While many countries, including South Africa, 26 See also Drake & Wilson (2008). 90 sought to hold on to government monopolistic control, there was extreme pressure to at least appear to embrace competition policy. They realized that adherence, or the appearance of adherence, to WTO guidelines was a prerequisite for attracting much desired communications investments. Thus, the WTO agreement “altered the composition of expert community influencing global governance. . . How to rationalize and administer a natural monopoly was no longer the central goal. Instead, demonstrated expertise in managing competition policy and trade rules became critically important” (Cowhey & Aronson 2009, 149). At least in the South African case, the FCC and other US competition specialists became a critical source of expertise globally on competition matters. The US was the first major power to enforce competition policy; this fact, coupled with American economic power, brought US experts into heavy demand. Covert Operations During my investigation, I focused on the first five channels. I left out covert operations because their very nature makes them difficult to study empirically. It is highly unlikely that any bureaucrat or agent would be willing to either commit to an interview or share the logistics of their operations. There have been numerous uncorroborated allegations about CIA influence in the country: that South Africa has collaborated with the CIA in the extraordinary rendition of terrorist operatives in Africa; that the Scorpions crime fighting unit is under the direction of the CIA; and 91 that the CIA invented the AIDS virus (Stolley 2008). Rumors of CIA involvement in South Africa and in African in general continue to surface. Given the CIA’s long history of involvement on the continent (e.g. funding rebel groups in Angola, orchestrating the assassination of Lumumba in Zaire), these suspicions are understandable. Schraeder (1994) and others have documented the CIA’s historical involvement in South Africa (Lemarchand 1976). The CIA established and maintained close contacts with the South African intelligence agencies, particularly the Bureau of State Security (BOSS) in support of its efforts to prevent the victory of the pro‐Soviet MPLA in the oil‐rich country of Angola. It also provided the intelligence to the apartheid government that led to Nelson Mandela’s arrest in 1962. However, despite this history, determining current covert operations by US actors, and more specifically covert efforts to influence the information environment, are beyond the ability of this researcher to establish. NonState Transnational Relations Transnational relationships provide a pivotal channel through which the US national information environment connects to that of other states. It subsumes the bulk of private flows that concern information‐related private interactions between non‐state actors. This includes the linkages wrought across boarders via transnational communications‐related corporations, social networks like Facebook or MySpace, inter‐personal networks, NGOs, and private media organizations. An 92 American‐based transnational ICT corporation like AT&T, for example, might establish a subsidiary or sell telecommunications equipment in another country, thereby altering the information infrastructure. Influencing the content that flows across boarders, an NGO or social movement in one country might initiate a campaign designed to influence greener business practices in another. At the individual level, members of the diaspora might transmit information back to their home country. Multimedia corporations headquartered in one country might either directly broadcast or syndicate content in another. In the South African case, US‐based and multinational multimedia conglomerations (e.g. Time Warner, NewsCorp, Disney), ICT companies (e.g. Cisco, Google, IBM, and AT&T), development finance institutions, trade associations (e.g. the American Chamber of Commerce in South Africa, the South African Chamber of Commerce in America, the APC, and the Global Information Infrastructure Commission (GIIC), private lobbying groups (e.g. the TransAfrica Forum), citizen‐to‐ citizen contacts, as well as the African diaspora in the United States, and the American diaspora in South Africa have been pivotal participants in the ecosystem of communications. However, because this dissertation focuses on state informational strategies, I only focus on the transnational channel of interaction when there has been direct state involvement, such as USTDA attempts to broker favorable deals for US companies. 93 The presence of US‐based multinational corporations has been particularly important throughout the history of US‐South Africa relations. For example, a 1980 report by the US Senate Committee on Foreign Relations concluded that “although the scope of US ties with South Africa is extensive, our economic relationship constitutes the strongest and most controversial aspect of our association with South Africa” (5). The controversy outlined in the report referred to the continued presence of US multinationals in the face of apartheid restrictions. Until 1994, when Nelson Mandela formally took the reigns of power as the country’s first elected black president, debate raged among stakeholders whether the continuing presence of American businesses ameliorated or intensified the apartheid system. Corporate actors argued that American corporations benefited South Africans by encouraging development and promoted comparatively progressive labor practices that served as an example for South African corporations. Anti‐apartheid activists argued just the opposite: the infusion of US capital only fueled the economy upon which the apartheid system rested. While the days of codified racial and human rights violations are over, US‐based communications and non‐communications related corporations wield a powerful influence over the country. This is particularly true in terms of the information environment. American brands populate billboards and television commercials. US television shows, movies, and music dominate South African public and private broadcasting. US corporations also encouraged a host of practices such as commercial advertising, public relations, mall culture, and fashion 94 trends (Campbell 2007). Chapter 3 provides more details on private non‐state flows in order to provide context. However, in my primary research and analysis I focus on these flows only as they condition and are conditioned by US government activities. As subsequent chapters will illustrate, private communication flows, American‐based MNCs, and private associations have both supported and undermined US government informational strategies in South Africa. Interactions Across Channels While this typology divides channels of interaction between countries according to different channels, these divisions are largely presented for analytical and explanatory convenience. Information flows within one channel may depend on flows in other channels. It is because of these processes of inter‐channel interaction that informational flows are best depicted as an ecosystem of communications. Actors that operate in one channel may never come into contact with those who operate in another, just as in a natural ecosystem different species of plants and animals never interact directly; but if a certain animal population becomes overpopulated then the entire ecosystem may be threatened. Similarly, one channel conditions another. For example, diplomatic communication is necessarily influenced by the presence of a Cyberwar or military campaign. Entrenched bureaucratic protocols mean that there is, more often than not, little day‐to‐day overlap between government departments that work through 95 different channels. However, one of the central arguments of my dissertation is that while there may be little formal integration of information policies in the international arena, in practice there is interplay between these different channels based upon geopolitical, cultural/ideological, and economic strategies. For example, public diplomacy campaigns practiced by State Department officials that advocate market liberalization complement attempts by USAID and the USTDA to encourage adoption of liberalized communication policies. Media assistance programs that fund domestic organizations that lobby for democratization and Fourth Estate press models go hand in hand with public diplomacy campaigns that advocate the same. An ecosystem of communication between two countries is conditioned by both the form (i.e. available platforms, ICT policy, media policy, penetration, etc.) and content (i.e. media products, autonomous mass‐self communication, etc.) of their national information environment. Form dictates content and vice versa. Thus, a complete exploration of state information strategies vis‐à‐vis another state should not be limited to policies designed to impact either content or form. They are mutually constitutive. For example, efforts to lobby for US corporate contracts can undermine campaigns that promote the US’s espoused goals of media as a Fourth Estate and vice versa. 96 My Initial Theoretical Model With this ecosystem perspective in mind, I constructed a theoretical model predicting the processes through which a major power like the United States attempts to intervene in the national information environment of a middle power like South Africa. FIGURE 2.2: INITIAL THEORETICAL MODEL 97 This admittedly rough model depicted in Figure 2.2 attempted to illustrate several simultaneous, often contravening, processes. First, within both countries there is a process of negotiation between the formal political agency and non‐state actors (e.g. corporations, NGOs, citizens, trade associations, and private media.) This brokering is not limited to information policies per se, but has a profound influence. Second, there are also processes of negotiation between and within the respective governments and non‐state actors (Singh 2008). This negotiation takes place at the macro, meso, and micro levels (as will be detailed further below). Third, these processes of interaction take place through multiple channels including: military, diplomatic, economic, aid, intelligence connections, transnational relations, and through proxy organizations such as the World Bank, the UN, and other multilateral organizations interested in information policy. Fourth, all of these processes are almost always influenced by similar interactions between other states attempting to influence and protect their own information environments. China’s charm offensive in Africa, for example, has played a role in escalating US activities in the African region. Fifth, the ill‐defined and porous lines surrounding each country represent that country’s national information environment (elaborated in Figure 2.1). These information environments help to constitute and are constituted by the global information environment. Finally, “other nation states” appears at the bottom of the figure to imply that similar processes of interaction take place between other states and at the same time might influence the information strategies of other states 98 including the United States. On completing this study, I revised and refined this model, as presented in Chapter 7. It is included here as a point of comparison between my initial perceptions of the processes under examination and my final conclusions after conducting primary research. Measuring Information and Power as Endgame The majority of the literature reviewed in Chapter 1 is concerned with how state and non‐state actors leverage power relationships and to what effect. This dissertation is primarily interested in dissecting how government actors conceive of and operationalize informational power across state borders. Informational power can be measured in two general ways. First, how much does one state influence the information environment of another? In other words, to what extent does the form, content, ideology, etc. of the target state change over time to reflect the aims and objectives of the sending state? How many US television programs are on TV? How many newspapers in South African newspapers advocate US positions? How many US companies won contracts to provide the South African telecommunications infrastructure, etc? Second, and alternately, we may also examine the aims and objectives themselves. In that case, we are less concerned with examining information for information’s sake but rather the broader role that information strategies play in facilitating a nation’s aims and objectives. States rarely if ever produce information strategies in order to produce results in the information 99 sphere alone. For example, the US government instituted several exemptions that allowed American companies to continue to provide South Africa with information technology equipment in the face of large boycotts during the apartheid era. Informational networks play a dual role; they are both the subject of and the tools for the articulation of power relationships (Castells 2009). In other words, actors struggle to control the form and content of communication networks and at the same time utilize those networks as a platform through which to seek other primary goals such as access to natural resources or a yes vote in WTO talks. Of course, precise measurements for either measures of power would be difficult if not impossible to obtain. It would be an insurmountable task to account for all the intervening variables that might dictate the slant of the domestic press for or against US policy, the popularity of American programs, and/or the success of US businesses in South Africa. While evidence will be presented, where possible, to illustrate the success or failure of particular US strategies in South Africa, this dissertation is principally concerned with identifying the processes rather than the results. In order to adequately address the issue of power, in the following chapters my analysis is divided according to three broad spheres: how the United States attempts to influence the nature of the South African information environment in service of its political, social, and economic objectives. 100 First, perhaps the oldest form of state informational power arises from information strategies to achieve specific foreign policy political objectives such as support for a war, occupation, treaty, or agreement. Political strategies that target the content of the domestic information environment are typically achieved via public diplomacy 27 and strategic communications initiatives. Second, while states have long been concerned with “winning the war of ideas,” the wide dissemination of new media and communication technologies means that states must increasingly compete with a host of state and non‐state actors with opposing cultural and ideological worldviews. States thus seek to influence the information environment of others to promote broader public appreciation of their culture and ideology by encouraging complimentary attitudes towards and content in media and communication platforms. In this arena, the form and content of the domestic information environment are equally important. In the United States case, American government actors have targeted the form of the domestic South African communications sphere through media assistance and development programs that promote a liberal democratic ideal of the press as the Fourth Estate through media assistance and development programs. Other 27 Mark Leonard (2003) provided a typology for public diplomacy as it is practiced by states that provided a useful launch pad for my own investigation. He divides public diplomacy into three broad types: (1) reactive or day-to-day communications; (2) proactive, strategic communication; and (3) long term relationship building activities. Each of these types comes into play in the major spheres of interaction: economic, social/cultural, and political. 101 programs seek to influence the content, promoting activities that produce an environment that is more receptive to US cultural products and programs. Third, states may promote their economic interests in the information sphere through two mechanisms. They lobby for regulations and agreements that maximize the ability of their constituent media and communications businesses to establish and expand their presence abroad. They may also promote informational policies and provisions that maximize economic opportunities overall. Here we see again the dual role that the communication sector plays both as an economic sector and a tool for building broader economic opportunities and growth across sectors. Strategies that operate according to economic aims and objectives may include: lobbying for changes in regulation, trade policies, and infrastructure development and ICT4D programs. These divisions are made largely for the sake of organizational and analytical convenience. In practice, politics, economics, culture, and ideology are tightly interwoven. This approach to conceptualizing how power strategies are achieved may be represented according to a grid, with the three spheres of power articulation on one axis and the seven channels of influence on the other. 102 TABLE 2.2: DIMENSIONS OF INFORMATIONAL POWER Channels Political Societal/Cultural Economic Military Diplomacy Economics & Trade Aid & Facilitation Multilateral Intelligence Connections Non‐State As illustrated by Table 2.2, different actors may attempt to achieve aims and objectives through one or many of the seven channels identified above (i.e. military, diplomatic, aid and facilitation, multilateral, economic, private, and intelligence connections) and may also seek economic, political, and social goals simultaneously. For example, USAID (America’s main development arm overseas) may collaborate with the USTDA to promote changes in the South African communications regulator in order to promote economic growth in the communications sector. Journalism training programs, which are typically framed according to societal/cultural goals, are also commonly linked to political goals. For example, David Hoffman, president of Internews (a non profit organization majority‐funded by USAID), argues that, As the United States adds weapons of mass communication to weapons of war, therefore, it must also take on the more important job of supporting indigenous open media, democracy, and civil society in the Muslim world. Even though many Muslims disagree with U.S. foreign policy, particularly toward the Middle East, they yearn for freedom of speech and access to information. U.S. national security is enhanced to the degree that other nations share these freedoms. And 103 it is endangered by nations that practice propaganda, encourage their media to spew hatred, and deny freedom of expression (84). Conversely, different strategic interests are evoked according to their political utility. US policymakers commonly frame issues pertaining to the international flow of information in terms of trade and economic rights. Braman (1989) argued that this “trade perspective [on information policy] . . . provides a way of distinguishing social from economic issues, permitting policymakers to exclude social, political, or cultural concerns when dealing with what they prefer to see as purely economic matters” (234). For example, according to Ambassador Diana Lady Dougan, former head of the State Department's Bureau of International Communication and Information Policy: We cannot accept such broad generalizations as the 'protection of cultural integrity' to be a sufficient justification for information control, particularly as these are too often only a guise for economic protectionism or censorship of the press (quoted in Braman 1989, 234). Thus, different sets of aims and objectives may drive different programs at different times according to broader political conditions. Data Sources and Levels of Analysis Implicit in my theoretical model is the premise that informational power articulation across state borders takes place at multiple levels of interaction. In order to clearly define these levels, I utilized Pan and McLeod’s (1991) suggested approach to multi‐level analysis in mass‐communications. At the micro level, 104 individual‐to‐individual interactions provide the basic units of analysis. At the macro level, the basic units of analysis include variables at the societal level such as public opinion and the levels of pluralism, inequality, and autonomy in communication systems (Pan & McLeod 1991). Included in this multi‐level perspective are horizontal relationships of production and consumption and vertical and diagonal linkages through social and organizational mechanisms. For example, at the micro level the behavior of South African media and communications organization professionals may impact the macro–level influence of the information environment on social changes and political stability. Journalism training programs produced by the American government and other actors may have influenced these professionals’ behavior. Conversely, public opinion at the macro level may influence the individual choices and behaviors of politicians and regulators. These cross‐level linkages often work through a meso level (e.g. organizational level) comprised of groups, agencies, and organizations whose collective behaviors ultimately may impact macro and micro level variables. Figure 2.3 provides a visual depiction of these levels as they pertain to this study. 105 FIGURE 2.3: DISSERTATION LEVELS OF ANALYSIS As Figure 2.3 attempts to illustrate, a study of how US information strategies are produced requires multiple levels of analysis, at the individual level, the systems level (e.g. capitalist international relations), and the organizational level (Pan & McLeod 1991). At the macro (systems) level, this includes: • How US government policy influences the South African communication environment. 106 • How changes in the South African information environment influence US government policy. • How capitalist international relations influence communication policies and products. At the micro (individual) level, this includes: • How US government officials target South African government officials and vice versa. • How US government officials target South African journalists, ICT infrastructure workers, and policy elite and vice versa. At the meso (organizational) level, this includes: • How South African government organizations influence the South African communication environment. • How US government organizations influence US government policy • How US government organizations influence South African government organizations. In order to adequately document and analyze US information strategies towards South Africa across these multiple levels, this dissertation utilized analysis of primary documents, an examination of financial spending, and interviews. Data for the study include: verbatim submissions to the South African telecommunications and broadcasting restructuring processes, personal interviews, conferences on communications issues in South Africa, American and South African 107 government documents, statistical databases, published literature, and unpublished papers. First, I conducted an analysis of American and South African government press releases, public reports, private documents, and speeches to identify how information strategies were both reported and framed. This analysis was used to create a narrative of US information strategies as they were officially presented. I also drew upon this research to create an initial organizational mapping of the key departments, individuals, and bureaus responsible for implementing information strategies. Second, using data obtained from the GAO, Office of Management and Budget (OMB), the Federal Assistance Award Database, and other offices I attempted to ascertain the actual level of financial and regulatory support behind those programs. I also collected available data documenting the presence of US corporations in the South African information sector. Third, I consulted available statistics and analysis on the overall form and structure of the South African information environment in order to ascertain its structure and make‐up (see Chapter 3). These steps allowed me to ascertain an initial depiction of the macro‐level structures of US information strategies and the South African information environment as well as establish a list of potential interview subjects reflecting the micro‐level processes. 108 The majority of the remaining data presented in the following chapters was gathered at the micro level in order to determine the meso‐level processes and was gathered through semi‐structured interviews. When beginning this study, I posited that the organizational repertoires, bureaucratic purposes, and systems of power articulation were critical. Graham T. Allison (1971) underlined the importance of organizational actions within government in his study of the processes that led up to the Cuban Missile Crisis. In his book, United States Foreign Policy Towards Africa, Schraeder (1994) illustrated how the entrenched practices of the “policy‐making establishment” typically played a greater role in the execution of US‐Africa initiatives than any overarching US agenda. Therefore, when identifying the necessary sources of data, I began with Allison’s Bureaucratic Politics approach, which Sees no unitary actor but rather many actors as players—players who focus not on a single strategic issue but on many diverse intra‐ national problems as well. Players choose in terms of no consistent set of strategic objectives, but rather according to various conceptions of national security, organizational, domestic, and personal interests (Allison & Halperin 1972). Interviewing individual actors involved with producing US information strategies provided a means with which to both explore whether the processes of informational power articulation across state boundaries conformed to the theoretical model depicted in figures 2.1 and 2.2. I also included a number of their South African counterparts in order to examine the relative differences between how strategies were conceived by the United States and received in South Africa. 109 As Mason (2002) points out, qualitative semi‐structured interviewing is a valuable methodological tool because it: (1) minimizes bias, (2) allows the researcher to explore unexpected themes, and (3) takes account of the fact that the subject’s knowledge, views, and interpretations are meaningful dimensions of the institution for which they work (63). Interview subjects were identified using the Delphi method. They were selected because of their involvement in South African information and communication policy. Interview subjects fell mainly into three categories. 1. Current and former government employees working for the Department of Defense, the Department of State, the USTR, the Commercial Service, and USAID (previously an independent agency that now reports to the Department of State) headquartered in Washington, DC, and at select offices on location in southern Africa. 2. Their current and former South African counterparts. 3. Key stakeholders, who while officially outside either government, have played a key role in the negotiation process and/or can provide useful context. Appendix A provides an overview of the interview subjects selected, organized by channel and subject category. The interviews were coded in order to identify indications of which programs conformed to which spheres of informational power (political, societal/cultural, and economic). After finishing the interview process, I 110 then evaluated how the data collected conformed to existing models of state influence and to my proposed theoretical model. The major results of these findings are presented in chapters 4, 5, and 6. Limitations of the Study Several limitations to this study should be noted. First, because a case study of US information policy towards South Africa involves an analysis of a unique set of historical conditional variables, the ability to generalize its findings is limited. As the following chapter will illustrate, there are a set of unique antecedent conditions that have played a central role in shaping the ecosystem of communications between South Africa and the United States. Moreover, this is a case study that looks at the actions of a major power, a capitalist liberal democracy, on that of a middle power, a country transitioning to a liberal democracy. The applications to states with different socio‐political structures may be limited. However, the model developed is one that may be tested in alternate cases. Second, questions of causality are difficult if not impossible to determine. There are no hard and fast measurements whereby we can identify the precise level of US influence over time. Moreover, studying information policy is challenging because this policy can be viewed as both an independent and a dependent variable in that it both shapes and responds to developments in the South African information environment. 111 Third, studying issues of communication and power is complicated by the fact that communications platforms play a dual role. They are both the subject of power struggles and the platform upon which broader social, political, and economic tensions are negotiated. It is precisely this duality that intrigues me, even as it provides explanatory challenges when trying to establish clear models that demonstrate the processes of information and state power. Last but not least, given that racial inequality has been a fundamental feature of South Africa’s information environment, it is unfortunate, but not surprising, that my South African interview subjects were heavily skewed towards Caucasian. Only four of the individuals interviewed out of approximately 25 were black. I tried to rectify this problem, with little success. White South Africans have been disproportionally represented in the communications sector both before and after independence. The available pool of black South Africans was much smaller and I was unable to obtain interviews with some of the more critical black actors. Race plays a critical role in shaping individual experiences and perspectives across a variety of subject matters. Particularly given South Africa’s history of apartheid, I believe that interviewing a broader range of black stakeholders would have provided me with a more nuanced perspective. I predict that race and socio‐ economic status of the US and South African actors involved in communications issues would have played a more pronounced role in their account of events. 112 Moving Forward The results of my investigation are presented in the succeeding chapters. Chapter 3 provides a contextual overview of the South African information environment. An analysis of US information strategies during the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations would be incomplete without a more complete picture of how South Africa’s complicated history of racism, colonialism, and social inequality coupled with the United States’ long history of involvement in the country has shaped the information environment. Chapter 4 examines the evolution of US political strategies in South Africa. Chapter 5 explores US attempts to influence the cultural and ideological bent of the South African information environment. Chapter 6 pinpoints the US economic incentive to influence the regulatory, legal, and organizational processes governing South African communications. Finally, Chapter 7 provides a revised theoretical model based on my research findings. 113 CHAPTER 3: INFORMATION AND POWER IN SOUTH AFRICA South Africa is a land of contrasts: of poverty and wealth, of violence and progress, of racism and reconciliation. Colonialism, apartheid, abundant mineral wealth, geopolitical importance, and economic and racial inequality have helped to constitute its information environment and the ecosystem of communications between the US and South Africa. Throughout South Africa’s history, external and internal actors have struggled to adapt and change its domestic communication structures in service of a vast array of interests, some benign, some benevolent, and some exploitative. Before moving into an examination of how the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations operationalized specific information strategies in South Africa, it is necessary to gain a better understanding of South Africa’s multifaceted information environment and America’s long history of involvement in its evolution. As Chapter 2 argued, one state’s attempt to influence the information environment of another involves an elaborate web of strategies and counter‐ strategies that fail or flourish according to an array of political, economic, and social determinants. Conditions on the ground in both countries condition the “ecosystem of communications.” Therefore, in order to understand the connections between the United States and South Africa, we must understand the communication‐related institutional and political contexts from which they emerge. 114 South Africa is a complex and multifaceted society. Attitudes towards the media, telecommunications, culture, and ideology are often contradictory. US information strategies have not simply been a process of X acting on Y. Members of the South African polity have often invited and capitalized on US information programs and policies in service of their own overarching goals. This process of collaboration and at times mutual exploitation was shaped by the structural, cultural, sociopolitical, and economic factors underlying the South African communications sphere. To explore these mechanisms, this chapter proceeds in four interrelated sections. First, it provides a brief overview of the contemporary South African communications sphere. Second, it examines the historical and contemporary socio‐political tensions that underlie this environment. Third, it addresses issues of ownership and access. And finally, it details America’s long history of involvement in the South African communications sector. The Contemporary South African Information Environment The South African media environment has always been one of the most, if not the most, developed in sub‐Saharan Africa. South Africa began using the telegraph as early as 1860 and the first telegraph company opened in Cape Town in 1962, less than 20 years after similar developments in the United States (Appendix B provides a full timeline of key events in the South African communications sphere). The first telephones appeared in 1878, and the international radiotelegraph was introduced 115 in the 1920s. While South Africa’s communications sector is no longer quite so cutting edge, it remains one of the most developed in the region. Table 3.1 compares South African to Zambia and Zimbabwe, two nearby countries. TABLE 3.1: SOUTH AFRICA’S COMMUNICATION’S ENVIRONMENT IN COMPARATIVE PERSPECTIVE South Africa Zambia Zimbabwe MSI Rating 2007 3.10 2.25 1.27 Freedom House 28 (Free) 64 (Not Free) 89 (Not Free) Television Terrestrial: SABC 1‐3, E‐TV (priv); Satellite: MNet, DSTv (60 channels) Terrestrial: ZNBC (owns 30% of DStv); TBN (US‐ based Christian station), MuVi Tv (Lusaka only); Satellite: DStv, Terrestrial: ZBH (1 channel); Satellite: DStv: includes BBC, CNN, etc. TV Audience 84% (last 7 days) Not Avail. Not Avail. Newspapers 43 weekly and bi‐ weekly (4 major owners: Naspers, Johnnic Comm, Caxton and CTP Publishers and Printers, Independent News & Media). 3 national daily and 4 national weekly newspapers (1 privately owned) State‐owned: The Herald, The Chronicle, 6 weekly newspapers (2 private) Newspaper Readers 66.2% 37.10% NA Radio SABC (5 National Stations & 13 Regional); Radio Pulpit (privately owned national); + 13 other private regional stations and 90 Com Radio ZNBC (2 national, 1 reg); Radio Phoenix (4 provinces); 7 Catholic stations, 14 Comm Stations Zimbabwe Broadcasting Holdings (4 stations) 116 TABLE 3.1 CONTINUED External Radio 16 international (e.g. BBC World, VOA, WRN, Radio Nederland) African stations (e.g. Radio Wave, Energy from Namibia), & Christian stations (TransWorld & Radio Veritas) VOA, BBC World Service Voice of the People Studio 7 (VOA), SW Radio, BBC World Service Voice of America Radio Audience 94% (last 7 days) 50% 85.3% Telecom Internet Penetration 15.0% 4.3% 11% Internet & VANs 355 ISPs (5 broadband) and 274 VANS 6 ISPs 15 ISPs Mobile Penetration 67.9% 45.5% 6.36% Mobile Vodacom (50%), MTN (35.8%), Cell C (12.3%) MTN (31%), Cell Z (21% State‐ owned), CelTel (48%) NetOne, Telecel, Econet (private) Fixed Line 18.2% HH 1% Regulators/Policy Makers ICASA, Ministry of Trade & Industry, Ministry of Comm, SATRA IBA, Ministry of Transport & Telecom, Ministry of Information & Broadcasting Ministry of Information Data Sources: ITU 2008; Gillwald & Stork 2008; SAARF 2008. In terms of the media sphere, Freedom House ranks South Africa among the top three “most free” media environments in sub‐Saharan Africa (with Mali and Mauritius). There are approximately 20 daily and 13 weekly newspapers, most of 117 which are published in English. Approximately 14.5 million South Africans regularly consume urban daily publications, 66.2 percent regularly read print media, 94 percent regularly listen to commercial and public service radio, 19 percent listen to community radio, and 66.9 percent regularly watch television (SAARF 2008). There are over 100 community radio stations and 13 private commercial radio stations. The South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) maintains three national TV stations (SABC 1,2, & 3) and one Africa‐wide station (SABC Africa). In addition to SABC television, there is one private free‐to‐air TV station, E‐TV, which was licensed in 1998. Although still low when compared with other middle powers, the South African Internet sphere has expanded rapidly in recent years. Approximately 10 percent of the population regularly accesses the Internet. 28 Social media applications like Twitter and Facebook have also proved immensely popular. The most popular website destinations in 2008 were Wikipedia, Facebook, and Google. In 2008, Facebook surpassed Google as the most visited site in South Africa (Lingham 2007). MXit, a platform that combines mobile SMS technology with social 28 This may change if the Ministry forces the Telkom telecommunications parastatal to give up control over the local loop system, which would lower the cost of broadband connectivity provided by start-up broadband providers. The potential reduction in cost is made possible by the completion and near completion of several undersea cable projects that significantly increased broadband capacity on the continent. The sea-cable projects will be discussed in greater detail later in this chapter. 118 networking, is also one of the most popular sites in the country. 29 Sixty‐one percent of urban South African youth between the ages of 16‐24 regularly use MXit technology (BMI 2008). There are also more Twitter users in South Africa than anywhere else on the continent. Unity for Africa, which uses Ushahidi 30 technology, has also become a popular site for NGOs to document reports of xenophobic violence around the country beginning with the anti‐Zimbabwean refugee riots in May 2008. However, while South Africa appears to have a relatively diverse information environment, particularly when compared to its neighbors, it is riddled by tensions over the appropriate role of government vis‐à‐vis communications and issues of access and ownership. The Sociopolitical Context The contemporary South African information environment, like all facets of South Africa, can only be understood against the country’s unique history of racial and economic oppression. Racial and economic‐based inequalities have been a constant feature of the South African information environment since the first Dutch settlers arrived at the Cape of Good Hope in 1652. Codified racial segregation began 29 MXit allows mobile users to send and receive individual messages and chat room updates via the Internet. Because messages are sent via the Internet and not via the mobile network, the cost per message is significantly reduced (typically 1c for a MXit message compared to approximately 75c per SMS). This has made MXit an extremely popular communication platform in South Africa. 30 Developed by Kenyan blogger and activist Ory Okolloh, Ushahidi—which means “testimony” or “witness”—is a crisis reporting social tool first developed during the Kenyan election violence of 2007. See http://www.ushahidi.com/ for more information. 119 in the nineteenth century when the British instituted a system of Pass Laws that prohibited the movement of black South Africans into areas primarily occupied by whites. In 1913 with the passage of the Immigrant Regulation Act and the Scheduled Areas of the Native Lands Act subjugation of the non‐white population intensified. These regulations prompted an era of racial segregation and oppression largely commensurate with that of other colonies. However, in 1948 when the National Party took power it instituted a totalizing system of control that dwarfed anything seen before. New legislation designated inhabitants into racial groups ("black," "white", "coloured," and "Indian"). These groups were then forcibly segregated through brutal forced removals. Beginning in 1958, the NP formally revoked the citizenship of black South Africans and designated them as citizens of one of 10 Bantustans 31 (divided along ethnic lines), again forcibly removing approximately 3.5 million people residing in the wrong area. Beginning in the early 1960s, in response to successive waves of protest, the South African government enacted increasingly draconian laws, which, among other things, permitted lengthy and secretive detentions of anti‐apartheid activists. In every country, political players broker for access to and control over communication channels. However, as the rest of this section will demonstrate, colonialism, apartheid, and the process of racial reconciliation have complicated and 31 The 10 Bantustans and corresponding ethnic group divisions were Transkei (Xhosa), Bophuthatswana (Tswana), Venda (Venda), Ciskei (Xhosa), Gazankulu (Tsonga), Kangwane (Swazi), KwaNdebele (Ndebele), KwaZulu (Zulu), Lebowa (Northern Sotho), QwaQwa (Southern Sotho). 120 intensified the importance of communications content and control in South Africa. At independence, the ANC inherited one of the most tightly managed communications environments on Earth. Colonial communications systems (e.g. the national broadcasting and “indigenous population” surveillance systems) established by the British were refined and expanded under apartheid rule (Ndlela 2007). All media outlets were threatened with censorship or banishment if they were found printing quotes from ANC leaders or including photos of revolutionary leaders like Nelson Mandela. Thus, the evolution of the post‐independence South African communications environment has in large part been shaped by the history of white dominance over communications systems, racial and socio‐economic inequalities in access and ownership, and competing beliefs about the appropriate relationship of the state to the media and communications infrastructure. The long history of white uses of the information system to manipulate and control the non‐ white populations has often provided both a considered justification and a convenient rationalization for government control over the form and content of the communications sphere. Colonized by the Dutch in the 1650s, followed by the British in 1806, South Africa became an independent republic in 1910. After decades of battling over mineral and natural resources, British and Afrikaans settler communities reached an uneasy détente based on their shared need to exploit black labor. When the NP came to power in 1948, it formalized the apartheid system, one of the most brutal 121 systems of racial segregation in history. During this period, USIA (similar to the Soviet, British, and other European countries) funded education and/or exchange programs. Numerous ANC leaders and white South Africans toured the United States and/or attended US universities on the government dollar, including Frederik de Klerk, who later noted that his first‐hand experience with a desegregated America contributed to his decision to enact apartheid reforms (Dizard 2004, 207). Many key leaders in the communications sector also participated in these programs including: Nape Maepa, former chairman of the South African Telecommunications Regulatory Agency (SATRA); Ivy Matsepe‐Cassaburi, Minister of Communications from 1999 to 2009; and Ihron Rensburg, former head of the SABC. After decades of protracted struggle by often disparate and uncoordinated revolutionary groups against this brutal oppression, the apartheid system began to visibly crack in 1990 when President F.W. de Klerk made a historic speech announcing the legalization of organizations such as the ANC and the release of Nelson Mandela. The first free elections took place in 1994, in which the ANC swept into power. Although the ANC took the helm of a country with one of, if not the most, progressive constitutions in the world, there is a large disconnect between the theoretical rights enshrined in the constitution and the day‐to‐day practice of governance. Constitutional checks and balances do not work properly in what functionally operates as a one‐party state. The Democratic Alliance (DA) and, since 2008, COPE (Congress of the People) are represented in parliament. However, since 122 independence, the ANC has controlled more than 60 percent of the parliamentary seats (62.65 percent in 1994, 66.35 percent in 1999, 69.69 percent in 2004, and 65.9 percent in 2009), the presidency, and the organs of governance. While the ANC and “the government” are typically used interchangeably, the ANC is itself a multi‐ faceted organization with a Gordian internal political dynamic. The post‐ independence incarnation of the ANC subsumed a number of other factions— including the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) and the South African Communist Party (SACP)—in a government of national unity. ANC rule has thus always had to reconcile the demands of communist, unionist, populist, and capitalist sensibilities (Tomaselli & Teer‐Tomaselli 2008). While capital has typically won out against workers issues and social reforms, this factionalism has helped to shape both the form and content of the South African information sphere. This ideological schizophrenia permeates governance in general and attitudes towards the media and information policy in particular. Some within the ANC saw national broadcasting system and telecommunications as valuable state resources and distrusted privatization. Others more readily embraced the “Washington Consensus” that media and communications systems benefited society and the overall economic wellbeing of the country if they were liberalized and privatized. Some attribute this division to the fact that, under apartheid, some members of the ANC leadership found refuge and support in the Soviet Union, and were thus more likely to embrace a Soviet model of information systems, while 123 others were influenced by their time in Europe and the United States. However, in practice, there is no such pattern. Mbeki, who displayed clearly ambivalent attitudes towards media independence throughout his presidency, studied in the United Kingdom. And Ivy Matsepe‐Cassaburi, who has been roundly criticized for her recalcitrance on liberalizing the telecommunications sector and supporting SABC’s editorial independence earned her PhD in sociology from Rutgers University in New Jersey. In fact, as will be discussed in subsequent paragraphs, support for privatization and liberalization have often gone hand in hand with support for increased government control (Cohen & Gillwald 2008; Horwitz 2006). And, as will be illustrated further in Chapter 6, this political mind‐field has also colored US information strategies in the country. Ambivalent attitudes among the South African political elite about the ability of both old and new media to mobilize the South African Renaissance and/or be used as tools of imperial domination or subversion by domestic and international actors are understandable given South Africa’s long history of communications warfare. As early as the 1830s, the print press served as a political weapon for opposing English and Afrikaans white elites. English newspapers evolved out of the mining industry, as mining tycoons established or acquired newspapers through Johannesburg Consolidated Investments, a subsidiary of mining giant Anglo American. South Africa's largest contemporary newspaper group, Independent Newspapers, dates back to 1889 when Francis Dormer established the Argus 124 Printing Company, a company closely linked with diamond magnate Cecil Rhodes. The Afrikaans press emerged largely in reaction to the English press. Conservative Afrikaans missionaries launched their own publications in order to combat the more liberal slant of some of the English papers on issues such as slavery, interracial tensions, and religious missionary work. The Afrikaans press mushroomed in size after Afrikaans became an official language in 1925 because, as DeBeer & Tomaselli (2000) document, print media provided a means of promoting Afrikaans culture and political identity. In the 1830s, missionaries also started newspapers aimed at black audiences. In the 1890s, black‐owned publications emerged under the auspices of black and coloured political movements. These publications suffered from lack of capital and were eventually purchased by better‐financed white‐owned publishing houses. When the NP took power in 1948 and began the institutionalization of apartheid, the print media almost uniformly championed the changes. Both in the pre‐ and post‐independence era, print media have largely remained the realm of the black and white urban elite. Broadcast media, (i.e. radio and television) are the only media that reach a national audience and have thus been considered fundamental to victory in any political contest. Radio has long been a critical source of persuasion on the African continent. South Africa was and is no exception. In 1933, the Nazis launched Radio Zeesen, an Afrikaans language station targeting sympathetic audiences in Namibia and South Africa. The BBC followed with a counter station three years later in 1937. Between 125 1958 and 1960, Radio Moscow, Radio Peking, Radio Prague, the VOA joined the fray. German, Polish, Romanian, and Bulgarian broadcasters quickly followed. Egypt and Ethiopia, the first post‐colonial states, also launched their own international broadcasting services. Beginning in 1963, ANC’s Radio Freedom carried regular broadcasts from its secret headquarters in Johannesburg. Writing in 1964 on the state of the media in Africa, Rosalynde Ainslie referred to the ‘the propaganda war of the air,' in which external services of the leading African states compete with those of white South Africa on the one hand and of foreign countries on the other, to influence the thinking of the continent (quoted in Mosia et al. 1994, 6). This was also true on the domestic front. Founded in 1936 and based on the BBC public service model, the SABC quickly abandoned its public service mission and evolved into an organ of state propaganda, nicknamed “his master’s voice” by the opposition (Tomaselli & Teer‐Tomaselli 2008, 175; Ndlela 2007, 68). When indigenous language stations were introduced, they were considered instruments of propaganda to keep the “natives” happy. Indeed, when Zulu broadcasts were first introduced, white South Africans were encouraged to present listening to radio as a privilege and not a right (Wasserman 2005). Not surprisingly, during the transition period negotiations, broadcasting and media policy was one of the ANC’s first priorities. In 1992 and 1993, there was a dramatic push to free the national broadcasting system from NP control ahead of the 1994 election. In retrospect, given the massive black population, an ANC victory appeared inevitable, but at the time there were no such guarantees. Thus, the 1993 126 Broadcasting Act, which evolved out of part of the pre‐election multi‐party negotiation process, represented a compromise for both parties. As SABC Board member Alison Gillwald (2009) explains it, both parties agreed to an autonomous broadcasting structure, because neither could be guaranteed victory, and so were willing to commit to a system that they would be happy with if they were on the losing side. Following the Broadcasting Act, many SABC‐owned regional stations were sold to black‐controlled investors and more than 100 community radio licenses were granted to various diverse sociopolitical groups such as rural women's cooperatives, Afrikaans communities, and various religious bodies. In an example of the counter‐influence of South Africa on the American communications environment, Former FCC Chairman, William Kennard, on a tour of South Africa in 1996 to promote US communications interests, was so inspired by the role of community radio there, after his return he initiated the Low Power FM (LPFM) initiative, granting 100 watt radio licenses to community radio stations across the United States. However, these community radio stations in South Africa reach less than 20 percent of the population and play little if any role in the national political arena (SAARF 2008). During the post‐independence period, the independence of the national broadcasting system has been at the heart of the debate about the relationship between media and government. The long history of white uses of the information system to manipulate and control the non‐white populations has often provided 127 both a considered justification and a convenient rationalization for government control over the form and content of the communications sphere. In South Africa, the print media remains a battleground for the elites and plays a limited role in swaying votes on the ground. Although over 60 percent of the population regularly consumes newspapers, the majority of these publications are tabloids with little political content. The real locus of power for politicians is the editorial slant of SABC’s radio and television stations, which have a nationwide audience (Tomaselli & Teer‐Tomaselli 2008, 179). As Ndlela (2007) points out, The public broadcasting model in Southern Africa, though modeled on public service principles, was never intended to serve the general public interest. Indeed much of the weakness of the system stems from its structure and role in society. Partisanship was built into the structures of public broadcasters since their inception in the region (69). Given the historical uses of broadcasting as a propaganda tool by both domestic and foreign actors, it is not surprising that members inside the ANC saw the SABC as a critical resource for nation building. The debate began almost immediately. Media watchdog groups such as the Freedom of Expression Institute (FXI) and the Media Monitoring Project (MMP) objected to that fact that Independent Broadcasting Authority’s 1995 Triple Inquiry Report recommended granting only one commercial television license (to MNet) and contained no mention of protecting the editorial independence of the SABC from the Ministry (FXI 1995). The first real rumblings of pronounced government interference involved moves to corporatize SABC. In 1998, Minister Jay Naidoo 128 began to corporatize elements of SABC, namely Channel Africa (the country’s continent‐wide international broadcaster) and SABC Africa, while at the same time removed constitutional guarantees that protected the independence of what was then the broadcasting regulator, the Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA). Here we see the first of many examples in which moves toward privatization were paired with increased, not decreased, government interference. Naidoo’s staff explained that the moves towards corporatization were a response to recommendations made by the McKinsey group 1997, which conducted an audit at the suggestion of John Birt, Director General of the BBC. Objections centered mainly on the fact that the principal stakeholder in the new corporation would be the Minister of Communications who would also have to approve the SABC board review policy on program and editorial content. These criticisms increased when Eddie Funde, Mbeki’s close friend and an ANC stalwart, was appointed Chairman of the Board. The Broadcasting Amendment Act, which finally passed in 2002, fulfilled Naidoo’s intent to corporatize SABC by turning it into a hybridized broadcast service with a semi‐public service mandate and compelled to produce advertising revenue. This move was described by the Media Monitoring Project (1998), a group funded by USAID, as more evidence of the government’s preoccupation with broadcasting as a cash cow for government and an instrument for nation building. Although Thabo Mbeki took the presidential reigns from Nelson Mandela in 1999, it was only in 2000 that the print media began to openly attack him 129 (Wasserman 2005). His popularity began to decline in the face of soaring crime rates, his public skepticism of the link between HIV and AIDS, and a series of high‐ profile media scandals charging the ANC with arms trading, vote rigging, and other shenanigans. Press scrutiny heightened after Mbeki called upon the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHC) to investigate racism in the media. In response to hostile media coverage, government intervention in SABC radio and broadcast editorial content only increased. Several high‐profile staff members resigned in protest; and party loyalists quickly filled the vacant positions. In 2006 the Mail and Guardian published a story implicating SABC CEO of News, Snuki Zikalala, for creating a “blacklist” of commentators not favorable to the government. Former SABC head and son of liberation hero Walter Sisulu, Zwelakhe Sisulu, chaired an inquiry into the allegations, which resulted in the 2006 Sisulu Commission Report, which the SABC tried to suppress. In 2007, Mbeki summarily dismissed the SABC board members, who were considered to be loyal to his political rival Deputy President Jacob Zuma, 32 and appointed an entirely new board whose loyalties were in line with the Mbeki‐favorable SABC bureaucrats. The SABC board soon became the subject of national debate, and activist networks joined forces to form the “Save our SABC” campaign. In 2007, when Mbeki loyalists unilaterally appointed a new SABC board, the confirmation was delayed by four months amidst popular 32 Zuma won the presidential election in April 2009. 130 outcries. 33 The struggle to control SABC only intensified when then Deputy President Zuma, who represented the populist wing of the party, and then‐President Thabo Mbeki began to war within the party and within media. In early 2008, Zuma swept to a landslide victory as president of the party and the assumed next president. Party loyalties split down the middle between Mbeki who was then assumed to be president until 2009 and the ANC party president and heir apparent Jacob Zuma (Tomaselli & Teer‐Tomaselli 2008). As will be discussed in greater detail in Chapter 5, many of these activists represented organizations, which the US government had a hand in funding, principally through USAID. During this period, the ANC also increasingly relied on apartheid‐era media legislation, and in some cases suggested amendments for even more stringent press controls than were present at independence. In 2007, Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Home Affairs proposed an amendment to the 1961 Film and Publications Act repealing the exemption of the news media from government oversight under the guise of combating child pornography. Many pundits pointed out that even under the tight control of the NP, the print presses were exempted from government review. 34 After Zuma’s ascension to the presidency in April 2009, it remained uncertain whether the contentious relationship between the media and the political establishment would change. While freedom of the press is enshrined in the 33 See Tomaselli & Teer-Tomaselli (2008) for a more detailed account. 34 This independence was formalized in the 1961 Films and Publication Act. 131 constitution, in practice tensions remain between whether the main role of the press should be that of a watchdog or as a development tool of government. Because of these socio‐political factors, the South African information environment has been characterized by the simultaneous presence of heated debate among elites, generally via the print presses, and a more banal national media system subject to the guidance of the reigning political agency. Mobile and Internet connectivity offer the potential to collapse these two spheres. However, South Africa has a plurality of media outlets controlled by a privileged few. In South Africa, as in countries around the world, politics and economics go hand in hand. Economics and Ownership The South African information environment has been both a factor in and a product of the country’s broader socio‐economic equalities. South Africa is Africa’s regional economic hegemon. It boasts an annual GDP of US$255.16 billion and a GDP per capita of US$5384 (World Bank, BMI‐T 2007). According to the 2007 Index of Economic Freedom, South Africa has the third freest economy in sub‐Saharan Africa and ranks fifty‐second among the world’s most‐free economies. Technically South Africa is ranked as a Middle Income country. However, it is more appropriately described as a country in which Third and First World economies co‐ exist. At independence, the RDP provided an economic policy framework to address inequality, but was discarded in favor of the neo‐liberal Growth, Employment, and 132 Redistribution Program (GEAR), which prioritized market growth over redistribution and social safety nets. Official estimates rank unemployment in South Africa at around 25 percent (Statistics South Africa 2009), but non‐government sources maintain that it is closer to 42 percent. The average life expectancy is only 50.2 years old, HIV infection rates are estimated to be 17 percent, and more than half the black population lives in poverty (Ibid.). In 2008, the United Nations Human Development Report rated South Africa’s Gini coefficient at .65, identifying more pronounced economic inequality than was present at independence (it was .57 in 1994) (UNHDR 2008). It now ranks one hundred and twenty‐first in the world in terms of inequality, well below Brazil (a comparable middle power). South Africa may boast a highly developed technical and industrial sector, but it is also a country where the majority of the population still lacks adequate food, shelter, and sanitation. As this section will illustrate, this co‐existence of economic progress and social inequality has provided both a rationale and an impetus for changes in the media and communications sector, with mixed results. The need to redress economic inequalities prompted regulation and redistribution of valuable communications properties from white to black owners in order to support black economic empowerment. Championing the power of a liberalized communications sector to promote broader economic progress, the state made moves to privatize telecommunications properties even as it retained majority ownership and control 133 over the more lucrative properties. This quasi‐privatization and liberalization resulted in a communications sector controlled by a band of usual suspects. Broadcasting and telecommunications have been an important source of capital for both business and government. Telecommunications has represented one of the highest growth sectors accounting for 6 percent of total GDP, the largest of any single sector in the South African economy (Gillwald 2006, 2). According to the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB), gross broadcast industry advertising revenue has increased in value from just over R2 billion in 1994 to close to R8.5 billion (NAB 2009). In the early 1990s, communication structures, media organizations, etc., were, not surprisingly, white owned and urban based. 35 Because ICTs represented both a key component of state control and a lucrative sector, which blacks were almost completely excluded from, the ANC considered ICT policy to be critical to South Africa’s economic success. The ANC’s election manifesto (which became its first economic policy framework, the Reconstruction and Development Programme [RDP]) listed access to communications as a basic right and stressed that “information is today considered a commodity of great significance, and South Africa must now catch‐up in order to take advantage of the changing technological and economic roles that telecommunications can play” (ANC 1994, Section 4.6.6). It 35 At independence, blacks made up 75.6 percent of the population, Asians (primarily of Indian descent) 2.6 percent, mixed-race (what South Africans refer to as coloureds) 8.6 percent, and whites 8.6 percent. Only 50 percent of back South Africans lived in urban areas compared to 89 percent of other races (Horwitz 2006, 1). 134 pointed out that, “for black people it is estimated that less than 1 line per 100 persons is in place compared with about 60 lines per 100 white persons” (ANC, 1994, Section 2.8.1). It also noted the importance of communications infrastructure in rolling out other basic services to the poor and underserved populations: The development of an advanced information network should play a crucial role in facilitating the provision of high‐quality services to all the people of South Africa. It must provide a significant advantage to the business sector as it reduces costs and increases productivity, and serves as an integral part of financial services, the commodities market, trade and manufacturing (ANC 1994, Section 4.6.7). Since 1994, stakeholders across the political spectrum have stressed the importance of developing the South African “information society.” The information society is a term that has surfaced and resurfaced throughout the post‐independence period. Issues of ICT ownership, ICT for development, and ICT expansion in service of broader economic development have been hotly debated (Braman 1998). South Africa’s telecommunications reform process coincided with similar processes in countries around the developed world. However, it was complicated by the fraught political process surrounding independence and by the pressures of external actors like the United States, as will be discussed further in Chapter 6. In the waning days of apartheid, the NP made moves to privatize the South African telecommunications infrastructure. In 1991, the government registered the state telecommunications parastatal as Telkom SA, with the state as the one and only shareholder. Telkom’s incorporation instigated what remains an ongoing national discussion about the role of the private sector and the public sector in providing 135 communications. In the transition period, debate raged about whether commercialization or privatization was a better scenario for redistributing ownership to black South Africans. Telecommunications was singled out as item of importance at the 1992 Convention for a Democratic South Africa (CODESA). After these discussions, Vodacom SA garnered a contract as the first mobile network provider, followed by MTN in 1994, and Cell C in 1998. Following independence, dozens of stakeholders met in a series of consultative processes, commonly known as the 1995 Green Paper Process and the 1996 White Paper processes, which ended with the 1996 Telecommunications Act. However, as the realities of economic liberalization made clear that an equitable information society for all South Africans was not so easily achieved, this process largely deflated (Gillwald 2009; Cohen 2009, interviews). While paying lip‐service to ICT for development, the MOC also began to put into motion all the key elements of the “Washington Consensus” approach to telecommunications: privatization, liberalization, and an independent regulator (Gillwald 2006, 5). However, it ended up failing to fully implement redistributive policies or the Washington model. The Electronic Communications Act No. 36 of 2005 represented attempts to expand competition and the independence of the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA), which had become the regulatory authority for both broadcast and telecommunications in 2000. However, the 2006 ICASA Amendment Act undermined any substantive changes to regulatory independence. The Amendment 136 mandated that the MOC approve ICASA’s hiring of any and all foreign experts and supervise the creation of a performance management system and that Parliament appoint the ICASA councilors who were then subjected to final approval by the MOC (BMI 2008). As previously mentioned, privatization has often served as a mechanism for increasing government influence in the communications sector. Privatization has also provided a critical source of money for the government and a public means of answering calls to redistribute financial control over valuable media and communications companies to black investors. In 1994, white‐owned presses sold several of their publications to black‐owned business groups as part of the reconciliation process. For example, Johannesburg Consolidated Investments sold the Sowetan (one of the most important apartheid‐era newspapers for the black community) and Times Media Ltd, to black business groups. In 1996, the SABC sold off six government owned radio stations 36 to black‐controlled groups for an estimated 500 million rand (approximately US$111 million). In early 1997, the MOC sold eight new commercial radio licenses for broadcast frequencies in South Africa's three biggest cities (Johannesburg, Cape Town, and Durban). However, when the MOC auctioned off stake in Telkom, the state’s most valuable information technology asset, the race and nationality of the purchaser were not an issue. In 1997, Thinatra (a joint venture of the American company SBC Global and Malaysian 36 Gauteng's Highveld Stereo and Radio Jacaranda, KwaZulu-Natal's East Coast Radio, the Western Cape's KFM, the Eastern Cape's Radio Algoa, and the Free State's OFM. 137 Telecom) purchased a 30 percent stake in Telkom for $1.2 billion, what is estimated to be the largest single influx of foreign capital in the South African economy during the 1990s (Horwitz & Currie 2007). They won the contract largely because all other potential investors withdrew their bids out of exasperation with government bureaucracy. Almost 10 years after independence, calls for redistribution of resources from white to black hands had not been satisfied. In response to these criticisms, the government introduced Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) in 2003 as a compromise measure to ensure that black South Africans benefited from the adoption of neoliberal capitalist policies. In the media and communications sector, BEE further complicated communications development as numerous ICT infrastructure programs had to be negotiated in line with the new restrictions. The BEE program is largely considered to be a failure, having benefited a few black millionaires with heavy political connections, rather than enfranchising disempowered groups. For the most part, BEE restrictions led to more entrenched cronyism and the awarding of lucrative contracts to ANC insiders who had long benefited from the largess of the government under the auspices of racial redistribution of telecommunications. 37 BEE’s failure marked a much longer pattern of what Horowitz and Currie (2007) characterize as “enrichment rather than empowerment” (457); and what Nyamnjoh (2004) refers to as the “practice of 37 See Horwitz and Currie (2007) for a more detailed account. 138 exclusion while preaching inclusion.” Members of the public and private sector frequently utilize the language of diversity of ownership and a diversity of voices; but 15 years into independence, communications platforms remain controlled by a small cadre of business interests and government actors, following a similar pattern of concentration and corporatization seen around the world (Bagdikian 2004; Teer‐ Tomaselli, et al. 2006). Today, South Africa’s information environment is more appropriately characterized by a plurality of outlets rather than a diversity of voices. Zane Ibrahim, of Cape Town’s Bush Radio—a community broadcaster nicknamed the “mother of community radio” because it began as a pirate radio station during the late 1980s—credits the increase in community radio outlets not to grassroots involvement but to “the ‘consultants’ and the many new broadcast equipment supply companies...[who] are laughing all the way to the bank” (Ibrahim 1999, 15; also quoted in Nyamnjoh 2002, 128). Much of South Africa’s news media environment reflects the same processes of commercialization, convergence, and concentration seen in Western markets (Arsenault & Castells 2008; Tomaselli & Teer Tomaselli 2008). MultiChoice, which operates the digital satellite TV service, DSTv, maintains a monopoly on satellite provision. Four companies currently dominate the newspaper industry: Independent Newspapers, Johnnic Communications, Naspers, and CTP/Caxton. Naspers is the largest multimedia conglomerate in the country, has controlling interest in numerous print publications 139 (including The Sun, the largest national daily newspaper read by 16.5 percent of the population), News24 (South Africa’s largest digital news source), MxIt (South Africa’s most popular mobile and Internet social network), and MultiChoice (SAARF 2008). Most experts attribute South Africa’s lagging Internet penetration on the de facto monopoly held by Telkom SA, a monopoly which, as Chapter 6 will illustrate, US government consultants unwittingly helped to solidify in the 1990s. In 2005, the Ministry of Communications (MOC) licensed Neotel as a second network operator, but the company has been slow to roll out consumer services because Telkom still controls the majority of the copper wire infrastructure through which dial‐up and broadband services are delivered. South Africa’s Internet growth has plateaued, and little progress has been made during the past five years. In 2009, South Africa international Internet bandwidth was only 852 bits/second/user (which is similar to Ethiopia) compared to, for example, Tunisia who now has 1800 bits/sec/user (ITU 2009, 33). The ITU (2009) ranked South Africa eighty‐seventh on its ICT Development Index in 2009 (IDI) down 10 places from seventy‐seventh in 2002. Because of Telkom’s monopoly, Internet costs are highly restrictive and those who can afford access via personal computers suffer from extremely restrictive caps on bandwidth usage and regular outages. The long‐term ramifications of Telkom’s monopoly are particularly clear against the backdrop of the long and Gordian attempts to expand the number of 140 undersea cables connecting the east coast of Africa to the international Internet backbone. In 1994, AT&T launched AfricaOne, what was to be a 2.5‐ gigabyte/second underwater cable around the continent. The project failed largely due to the intractability of Telkom, because without South Africa, the largest potential market for Internet connectivity, profit margins would not be reached (Rush 2008). Multiple other corporations and multilateral organizations initiated similar projects, each of which failed or were perpetually delayed. However, in 2004 South Africa won the bid to host the 2010 World Cup, the second largest international sporting event in the world. In the following months, a wide array of actors announced undersea cable initiatives that would be ready before June 2010. 38 Over the last five years, the South African Ministry of Communications has stood out as the principle roadblock for many if not all of these projects. Multiple multinational agreements involving African nations along the east coast of Africa were delayed or canceled over South African demands that BEE restrictions be met. On July 23, 2009, SEACOM, an undersea cable with 1.28 Terabyte per second capacity was the first of these projects to go live. SEACOM’s launch was accompanied by much fanfare in South Africa, with predictions of exploding connectivity rates and plummeting costs. However, to date, SEACOM’s launch has 38 The names and the investors in these projects have changed multiple times. At the time of writing, the cable projects either completed or expected to be completed included: SEACOM, EASSy, TEAMS, WACS, MainOne, GLO1, and ACE. However, as of October 2009 only the SEACOM project had reached completion. Many of the other cable projects have been riddled by construction delays and contractual conflicts with the regulatory bodies of the participant countries. 141 only highlighted the ramifications of Telkom’s monopoly over wireline services and the cartel‐like behavior of the private service providers. SEACOM has activated another 35 gigabytes per second (GB/s) of capacity in the East Africa region. In comparison, South African companies have procured an additional 20 GB/s of capacity. While 20 GB/s is still a large increase, a number of factors have prohibited this jump from fulfilling expectations of an immediate Internet revolution. The major hurdle to Internet proliferation in South Africa has always been cost. ADSL broadband costs between 50 and 70 rand per GB. 39 Rather than reduce costs, South African broadband companies have increased the number of gigabytes for their basic packages, while holding price levels constant. As of October 2009, the cheapest broadband subscription remained around $28 per month (approximately 200 rand) well out of the range of most South Africans whose average annual income is $10,000. Furthermore, regardless of what broadband provider one chooses, in South Africa you must also be connected to the local loop (the copper wire phone infrastructure), which is entirely controlled by Telkom. Therefore, in addition to the $28 per month broadband fee, an ADSL subscription requires that the user pay Telkom approximately $32 per month (approximately 250 rand). Depending on the package, the local loop portion of the cost of connecting to the Internet can be as high as 80 percent. Therefore, regardless of increased capacity offered by the cable projects, broadband costs are not expected 39 Unlike in the United States, no providers offer unlimited access. Instead, customers choose from a range of packages; the more expensive the package, the greater the number of gigabytes. 142 to decrease significantly unless Telkom relinquishes its monopoly of local loop access (Gedye 2009). Former MoC Matsepe‐Cassaburi set 2011 as a deadline for local loop unbundling. However, there have been no moves to programmatically enforce this unbundling and most pundits are skeptical about whether it will happen (Song 2009; Thornton 2009). Therefore, the cable projects have significantly increased download capacity for existing subscribers who can afford the high connection fees; but overall South African Internet penetration remains stagnant, particularly compared to East African countries where the number of subscribers immediately skyrocketed with SEACOM’s launch. Because of these prohibitive costs of Internet connectivity, the majority of South Africans access the Internet over their cellphones rather than their computers. There are four mobile providers, Vodacom (ownership split between Vodafone UK and Telkom SA), MTN, Cell C, and Virgin Mobile, which account for 51.0 percent, 35.8 percent 12.3 percent, and .03 percent of the total subscribers respectively. MTN and Vodacom dominate the mobile market and have been rightfully accused of collusion in artificial price inflations. Telkom SA also holds considerable sway over the mobile market through its status as a 50 percent shareholder in Vodacom SA, the country’s largest mobile provider. These companies maintain close relationships with and influence over the principal governing institutions over the communications market: the Independent 143 Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA, 40 a quasi‐independent regulator based on the FCC), the Department of Communications, the Competition Commission (since 2001), and the Parliamentary Portfolio Select Committee on Communications. Chapter 6 will discuss the evolution of the telecommunications structures and the US role in those developments in much greater detail. Despite these shortcomings, South Africa remains a communications force on the continent. If the United States is the world’s information “pivot” as described by Cowhey & Aronson (2009, 14), then South Africa plays a similar role for the African continent. The South African mobile company, MTN is twenty‐sixth among the largest ICT companies in the world and is active in over 21 countries with over 48 million subscribers. The World Bank estimates that the South African cellular companies MTN and Vodacom, together with the Kuwaiti company Celtel, account for 50 percent of all FDI in telecommunications in Africa (World Bank 2006, 28). DataTec, an ICT networking company also ranks fifteenth among the largest global ICT firms and has offices around the continent (World Bank 2006, 38). In their analysis of the South African position in the African media market, Teer‐Tomaselli, Wasserman & DeBeer (2007) argue that while the South African media occupy a marginal position in the global media arena, as a market for media products owned and produced outside its borders, they extend their influence (albeit on a much smaller scale) as a powerful role‐player into the region and further on the continent (154). 40 ICASA was created in 2000 through the merger of the South African Telecommunications Authority (SATRA) and the Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA). 144 SABC Africa currently broadcasts in almost every African country and produces shows that are rebroadcast in Europe and the Americas on channels such as the Africa Channel. DSTv dominates the satellite television service in Anglophone Africa, providing a standardized programming slate heavily laden with Western content, prompting criticisms that South Africans are sub‐agents of Western cultural imperialism in Africa (Nyamnjoh 2004, 127; Teer‐Tomaselli, Wasserman & DeBeer 2007). While cultural imperialism may be the wrong term, there is truth to these claims. American programming is heavily represented in South African television and radio, broadcast both domestically and regionally. This is nothing new. The American Connection As outlined in Chapter 2, South Africa has been identified again and again as a “pivotal African state” for US interests in the region (Chase, Hill, & Kennedy 1996, Executive Office of the President 1991, 2002, 2006). The United States has played an equally important strategic role for South Africa. Commercial trade between the two countries began in the eighteenth century. By the nineteenth century, these trade connections were firmly established. Americans wore South African leather on their feet, dressed in South African wool products, and adorned themselves with South African diamonds. American entrepreneurs flocked across the ocean, drawn by South Africa’s gold and diamond fields and other mining opportunities. In 1917, J.P. Morgan and future‐president Herbert Hoover helped to secure the start‐up 145 capital for the Anglo‐American corporation, which became one of South Africa’s largest mining companies. Conversely, South Africans drove American plows nicknamed the Yankee and the Eagle; lived in towns called Florida, Denver, and Cleveland; rode in American stagecoaches; and eventually watched American movies and television, listened to American music, and used American typewriters and computers (Campbell 2007). During the Cold War, these relationships intensified. The United States needed access to sea routes around the Cape and depended on South African uranium and other minerals considered essential for the its military arsenal. South Africa leveraged these strategic assets in return for US technology, military hardware, and corporate investments, which were much needed in the face of global boycotts and condemnation. As this section will illustrate, the United States has played a significant role in the evolution of the South African information sphere, providing both media content and material infrastructure for the communications sector. While this study is principally concerned with the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations, America’s long history of involvement in the South African information environment provides a critical context. The history provided here is limited to key events that shaped US information policy prior to the period of study. However, a detailed historical timeline is provided in Appendix B. In terms of private sector flows, American cultural products have dominated the South African market for over a century. Even under British colonial rule, 146 American movies, radio programs, etc., filled the theatres and the airwaves. Some of the most popular forms of entertainment for nineteenth century white South Africans were American‐style minstrel shows and ragtime music. In the 1890s, Orpheus McAdoo's Virginia Jubilee Singers, a group of African American performers, made waves among the South African black population when they toured the country (Campbell 2007). In the 1920s, Vaudeville troupes routinely made the trip down South. Columbia Music established a South African subsidiary in the 1920s. In 1913, an American immigrant named Isadore W. Schlesinger opened the African Film Trust in Johannesburg, a company that would maintain a virtual monopoly over South African film production and distribution through the Second World War (Walsh 1998). MGM also established a subsidiary in 1933 (ibid). In 1925, Schlesinger also launched the African Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), South Africa’s first radio station (Campbell 2007, 140). 41 After the NP legalized television in 1976, the vast majority of its programming was American commercial programming. By the early 1990s, seven out of 10 of the most popular programs on South African television were American (Keller 1993, 5), and, ironically, the Cosby Show, a program about a black upper‐middle class African American family living in Brooklyn, was the top‐rated show on television (Campbell 2007, 131). African Americans provided a continuing cultural influence in South Africa since the 1790s when a small band of tradesman arrived in search of work in the diamond minds 41 SABC took over ABC in 1936. 147 and in the British South Africa Company’s military operations. 42 Hubert "Yankee" Wood founded the Kokstad Advertiser in the Eastern Cape in 1881, a newspaper and printing service still in operation today. The African American presence expanded in the late 1890s when the Methodist Episcopal Church (AME) and the National Baptist Convention (NBC) both established a missionary presence there. The presence of African Americans also initiated an ongoing diplomatic debate between the United States and South Africa about whether South African racial laws should extend to black Americans. The American diplomatic mission required all African Americans to register and receive a passport (if they did not already have one) in order to receive honorary white status (Vinson 2004). American entertainers like Bill Cosby, Stevie Wonder, Quincy Jones, and Harry Belafonte were also vocal proponents of the cultural boycott against South Africa in the 1980s at the same time that they were becoming the leading icons among the South African black community (Campbell 2007). High profile black intellectuals such as historian John Hope Franklin also maintained close relationships with revolutionary groups and members of the black South African clergy. African Americans who had participated in the anti‐apartheid movement were also some of the first Americans to establish 42 The question of whether African Americans were subject to the same racial laws as indigenous black South Africans was a critical source of contention between South African and US officials. In 1893, a white policeman in the Transvaal publicly whipped John Ross, a black American, for supposed "impudence." The United States Department of State supported Ross in a claim against the Transvaal government for damages totaling $10,000. William Van Ness, the American consul at Johannesburg, demanded the Transvaal government give the matter their "immediate attention." Following this incident, African Americans were granted “honorary white” status while in the country, although it was later revoked with little diplomatic protest after the establishment of Jim Crow laws in the United States (Vinson 2004). 148 American business activities in South Africa following the release of Nelson Mandela. While paling in size and scope to the flow of American private media content, the US government‐also made intermittent efforts to add their voice to the fray. The VOA broadcast Afrikaans content during World War II in order to combat Nazi influence and later developed a special two‐hour jazz special VOA program specifically targeting South Africa. In 1947, while de facto and de jure segregation still dominated American race relations, the USIS opened the first integrated library in South Africa in Johannesburg, followed by branch offices in Durban and Cape Town. During the 1960s, the USIA also invited controversy when it opened another branch in an Anglican Church in Soweto, which was first disguised as a “music appreciation club” run by a USIS officer. Later, it expanded the program to include a separate building with a satellite dish where WorldNet Television programs were available for viewing (Dizard 2004, 205‐7). In the late 1980s, increased pressure for a complete boycott largely ended cultural diplomacy programs. These programs were re‐introduced and expanded shortly before independence, as will be discussed further in Chapter 5. This presence of American cultural products followed deeper cultural connections, based upon both the production and consumption of material goods. In addition to the close trading relationships, American practices also provided a 149 model for an array of industries, from beauty pageants 43 to the now pervasive presence of a shopping mall industry to advertising. James Campbell (2007), in his study of the influence of American culture on South Africa, argued that the American experience was [also] invoked in the elaboration of segregation, in the establishment of the first suburbs, in changing fashions in music, dress, and interior decoration, in conservation policy, in the creation of Bantustans, in political struggles against apartheid, and in innumerable ongoing debates about apartheid’s legacy… with profound significance for South Africa’s past, present, and future (131). Not surprisingly, fears of “Americanization” have surfaced frequently, and there have been many instances of push back. The NP censored numerous American films and programs depicting inappropriate or incendiary relationships between races. Successive governments provided subsidies for local South African films made in Afrikaans in hopes of promoting more local content. “Americanization” has also been as much about the South Africanization of American products. As soon as American cultural products entered the South African environment they were re‐ appropriated and reinterpreted, following similar patterns of glocalization and localization identified by theorists in countries around the world (e.g. Robertson 1995). For instance, in the 1930s and 1940s one of the most popular forms of music was Mbaqanga, a musical genre that blended traditional music with American jazz and swing musical styles. 43 Schlesinger also established the Miss South Africa Pageant. 150 The United States has also been intimately involved in providing the material infrastructure for the South African information sphere. South Africa was historically dependent on foreign communications technology. As early as the nineteenth century, the United States provided all of South Africa’s cameras and typewriters. As economic sanctions intensified, the South African defense industry, in recognition of South Africa’s World War II era dependence on foreign products, became increasingly interested in developing local communications equipment. In 1950, the Defense Industries Board created the Electronics Communications Committee to address the issue. By the mid‐1990s, the manufacture of telecommunications equipment constituted the largest part of the South African electronics sector (Horwitz 2006, 3). However, South Africa remained dependent on foreign production and investments in the communications sector. The apartheid system of registration and surveillance rested upon communications technology provided by British and American technology firms that competed heavily for contracts. For example, IBM, among the most active US technology companies in South Africa, provided the technological system for the “Book of Life” identity system (Cogburn 1997, 258). While all American administrations during the Cold War era voiced public opposition to apartheid, almost all maintained a quiet policy of engagement with the white‐led government in order to maintain US military operations outside of Cape Town and to ensure continuing lucrative investment opportunities for US 151 businesses. Throughout the Cold War, the United States, through both corporate and government contracts, played a crucial role in buttressing the development of the South African communications infrastructure at the direct invitation of the NP. In an effort to reduce dependence on Britain, the NP actively courted American investments with lowered tariffs and taxes. IBM and other US companies set up South African operations in large numbers. During the NP’s first decade in power, American investment in South Africa increased five fold (Campbell 2007, 144). As American technology companies expanded their presence, the key South African industries of mining, banking, and oil refining depended increasingly on US computers and telecommunications equipment. The NP’s demand for cutting‐edge technology provided a crucial bargaining chip as the Soviet and American scramble for Africa intensified. In 1952, the US agreed to sell over $112 million in arms to the South African military and to veto a UN arms embargo. As part of this deal, in return for US scientific and technical collaboration as well as guarantees of any capital required to develop and expand production, the South African government agreed to provide the US with its entire output of uranium oxide (Schraeder 1994, 196). In the late 1970s, in response to an increasingly vocal anti‐apartheid lobby within the United States, US companies adopted the Sullivan Principles, 44 seven 44 Rev. Leon Sullivan, an African-American preacher, and a General Motors board member created the Principles in 1977. General Motors also happened to be the largest employer of blacks in South Africa. 152 rules for companies conducting business in South Africa. 45 Under these guidelines, first proposed in 1977, participating companies pledged equal pay, integrated facilities, special housing, education, and training for their South African employees. While these principles helped to decrease US corporate activities in South Africa, they never completely stopped. American businesses (particularly technology companies) continued to play a critical role in providing the material infrastructure for the apartheid government. Throughout the 1980s, US banks provided billions of dollars in loans. The military and police drove GM and Ford automobiles fueled by CalTex and Mobile; and nearly every government department used IBM and Hewlett Packard computers. When Reagan came into office he signed a series of boycott exemptions, including one for computer equipment. In the early 1980s, Apple accounted for 85 percent of the personal computer market in South Africa (although it ceased operations in 1985); and IBM cornered the majority of the mainframe sales (Knight 1986). In 1985 alone, IBM and Hewlett Packard sold $180 million and $44 million worth of computer equipment, respectively, mainly to the government (Knight 1986). The 1985 Export Administration Act (ECA), which banned the sale 45 “(1) Non-segregation of the races in all eating, comfort, and work facilities; (2) Equal and fair employment practices for all employees. (3) Equal pay for all employees doing equal or comparable work for the same period of time; (4) Initiation of and development of training programs that will prepare, in substantial numbers, blacks and other nonwhites for supervisory, administrative, clerical, and technical jobs; (5) Increasing the number of blacks and other nonwhites in management and supervisory positions; (6.) Improving the quality of life for blacks and other nonwhites outside the work environment in such areas as housing, transportation, school, recreation, and health facilities.” A seventh Sullivan Principle was added in 1984: “working to eliminate laws and customs that impede social, economic, and political justice.” 153 of computers to the South African government, contained an exemption for private companies. Because ARMSCOR 46 contracted out over 60 percent of its security operations to private companies, the restrictions on computer sales to the government had little impact (Knight 1986). The ban on computer sales to government was further undermined by the fact that many US technology companies sold their products through licensing and distribution deals with local companies, which were not subject to US regulations (Ibid). In 2002, Khulumani Support Group, representing 32,000 South African clients, filed a lawsuit in the Eastern District of New York, citing 21 foreign banks and corporations as defendants for personal injuries suffered as a direct result of the complicity these banks and corporations had with the apartheid regime. IBM as well as several American energy companies and banks were among the defendants. As subsequent chapters will explore further, this long and complicated relationship between Cold War strategies, US corporate interests, and the apartheid government’s dependence on technological imports, created a launch pad from which the US constructed a post‐apartheid information strategies; the bureaucratic functioning of South African government had long depended on US expertise, equipment, and funding in the communications sector. 46 Founded in 1968, ARMSCOR is the South African government-supported weapon-producing conglomerate. It was established after the UN international sanctions on arms trade with South Africa were formalized in 1967. It remains the officially appointed arms buyer for the Department of Defense. 154 Conclusion As this chapter has sought to establish, the form, content, and economics behind the South African information environment are the product of numerous factors and numerous competing interest groups. The US has certainly not been the determining force in its evolution, but it has played a consistent and varied role. Information strategies produced by the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations, which will be discussed more thoroughly in the following chapters, represented a continuation and an adaptation of, not a radical change, from previous ones. Cold War exigencies (justified or not), US corporate interests, and South Africa’s historic dependence on outside media content and information technology paved the way for US involvement in the country. As the following three chapters will demonstrate, America’s influence in the country varied and often resulted in effects that were the opposite of what was intended. In the years leading up to and after the transition period, South Africa remained a strategic country for American interests. Because of the worldwide outcries over the injustices of apartheid, during the pre‐independence era US government information strategies were typically more straightforward, practiced via quid pro quo economic and arms deals, international broadcasting, and cultural and public diplomacy efforts. In the overarching framework of the Cold War, involvement in South Africa was rationalized according to national security concerns but also limited by domestic objections to its system of governance. The white apartheid government invited 155 and depended on US involvement, creating a mutually beneficial relationship (for the white population, that is). The ANC’s transition to power coincided with the collapse of the Cold War rubric. South Africa remained of strategic importance, but the rules of engagement changed. US influence over the communication environment continued unabated, but was evidenced through more strategic deployments of political aid and skills transfer. These strategies had to balance the US government’s geopolitical, economic, and ideological goals, with increasing domestic and international interest in South Africa’s rebirth as a “Rainbow Nation,” its emergence as a Middle Power with full diplomatic status, and a simultaneous decline in support for international aid programs. 156 CHAPTER 4: PROMOTING US FOREIGN POLICY Communications systems are neutral. They have neither conscience nor morality, only a history. They will broadcast truth or falsehood with equal facility. Man communicating with man poses not the problem of how to say it, but more fundamentally, what is he to say? Edward R. Murrow 47 Africanists have continually debated the mechanisms and the determinants of US foreign policy toward Africa. Typically, they conclude that it has been marked by what African Studies Association President Crawford Young characterizes as “essential continuity,” occasionally broken by flurries of interest surrounding crises or monumental events (see Alden 2000; Copson 2007; Schraeder 1994; Young 1984). In other words, Africa remains the backwater of US foreign policy. Once programs and policies are initiated, they continue out of bureaucratic inertia until extreme circumstances call for their re‐evaluation. Existing studies of US policy towards Africa are normally restricted to a consideration of formal American foreign policy structures. They typically mark the beginning of US‐Africa foreign‐ policy relations (separate from relations with colonial powers) as 1958 when the State Department launched the Bureau of African Affairs after Ghana became the first sub‐Saharan African state to achieve independence (Schraeder 1994, 6‐8). 47 Henry Loomis, a former USIA employee, read this Murrow quotation from his notes while presenting the Edward R. Murrow Award on March 2, 1978 (Sperber 1998, 687). 157 However, as established in chapters 2 and 3, US strategic interests in South Africa date back to the 1700s and are considerable and intricate when compared to those in most other African states. 48 Moreover, foreign policy as expressed through informational strategy does not necessarily adhere to the same patterns as foreign policy‐making. Following World War I and the ensuing commitment to open communication enshrined in the Treaty of Versailles, diplomacy moved out of private meetings and communiqués and into the public eye. In the intervening years, state actors have increasingly relied on informational strategies that ultimately target foreign decision‐makers, but utilize the media and domestic and foreign public opinion as an intermediary. 49 Although the tools of international relations have changed, the goals have remained the same. Today, politicians, officials, bureaucrats, and 48 The Middle East, the War on Terror, and China’s rising global influence typically supersede South Africa and Africa in general as a strategic priority. However, as outlined in Chapter 2, South Africa has been identified again as again as a “pivotal African state” for US interests in the region (Chase, Hill & Kennedy 1996, Executive Office of the President 1991, 2002, 2006). The 2002 National Security Strategy for the United States lists the first of its “three interlocking strategies for the region” as: “countries with major impact on their neighborhood such as South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya, and Ethiopia are anchors for regional engagement and require focused attention (Office of the President 2002). Moreover, South Africa is the only African state listed by the US Commerce Department as one of the 10 emerging markets; and it represents approximately 88 percent of all market capitalization in sub-Saharan Africa (Africa Advisory Panel 2004, 46). 49 Jan Melissen (2005a) considers the communication’s revolution and the subsequent dispersal of media platforms as the primary reason that “public opinion [is] an increasingly important component of international relations” (3). And Eytan Gilboa (2000) argues, “interrelated revolutionary changes in politics, international relations, and mass communication have greatly expanded the media’s role in diplomacy” (276). The centrality of media strategies to contemporary international relations has been illustrated through studies of: international broadcasting efforts (e.g. Price 2002), the media texts and programs that public diplomacy policies produce (e.g. Zollner 2006; Wang & Chang 2004), their implications for foreign policy (Entman 2003; Gilboa 2002; Tumber & Webster 2006), and audience reception (Nisbet et al. 2004). 158 invested members of the private sector utilize a variety of communication channels and middlemen to ultimately clarify, gain support for, and/or enforce their foreign policy agenda in other states and at home (Cook 1989; Entman 2000; Gilboa 2002, 83). The GAO (2009) estimated that in the eight years following September 11, the US government spent over $10 billion on communications programs in service of furthering US strategic interests (1). In this hyper‐mediated environment, ambassadors and State Department officials are no longer the principal or even the main producers of public outreach. Over the last century, rapid changes in the available communications technologies have altered the relationship between territory and national power. With the widespread adoption of these technologies, physical presence, either through military occupation or colonization, gradually declined in importance as a precondition of state power. The collapse of the Soviet Union further decoupled geopolitical strategy from territoriality, as traditional Cold War spheres of influence faded away (see Entman 2000). As Agnew and Corbridge (1995) argue, in this environment the geopolitics of international relations is conceived of and produced by constituent players according to socially constructed spheres of influence and sovereignty rather than physically bounded spaces. As a result, international relations depends more on what Nye (1990) defined as co‐optive or “soft power” rather than hard power intervention or threat. While military and economic power are still central to a state’s standing vis‐à‐vis others, informational strategies 159 designed to target elite and mass public opinion are often the currency through which states seek and obtain their political goals. In the South African case, particularly in the immediate post‐apartheid era, a wide range of bureaucratic actors from the Department of Commerce, to the State Department, to USAID played a role in pursuing America’s political goals via informational strategies. The media and/or public opinion (as it is constructed and expressed in the media) is an important conduit through which US actors have sought to pursue political goals in South Africa. 50 Although media development, infrastructure, cultural diplomacy, and capacity building (which will be discussed further in chapters 5 and 6) are linked to America’s political interests, this chapter is principally concerned with those informational strategies that most clearly reflect the American government’s short and long‐term foreign policy agenda in South Africa. The terminology used to describe this genus of informational strategies varies according to the department. Employees in the State Department label them as public diplomacy, 51 while the Voice of America refers to them as relationship building, USAID and the Commerce Department as in‐country public relations, and the DOD as strategic communications. Academics, on the other hand, often refer to 50 By public opinion as expressed in the media, I mean the aggregation of individual opinions and attitudes as measured by opinion polls, surveys, and focus groups as it is reported in the media and perceived by society. See also Arsenault & Castells (2006) and Castells (2007). 51 Public diplomacy as generally defined within the State Department includes a range of media-centered and person-to-person initiatives designed to influence, inform, and engage foreign domestic publics about US foreign policy including exchange programs, cultural diplomacy, and training (See, for example, Djerjian 2003; GAO 2003, 2004, 2007, 2009). 160 this specific type of outreach as media diplomacy, a subset of the practice of public diplomacy, which also includes other subsets such as interpersonal activities including exchanges, cultural diplomacy, and citizen‐to‐citizen diplomacy (Cohen 1986; Gilboa 2000; Katz & Liebes 2007; and O’Heffernan 1991). The most commonly accepted definition of media diplomacy is the one set forth by Gilboa (2000), and refers to: uses of the mass media to communicate with state and non‐state actors, to build confidence and advance negotiations, as well as to mobilize public support for agreements. [and] is pursued through various routine and special media activities, including press conferences, interviews, and leaks, as well as visits of heads of state and mediators in rival countries and spectacular media events organized to usher in a new era (Gilboa 2000, 294‐95). While Gilboa accurately describes these activities, I argue that with the introduction of new technology communication platforms, this form of outreach is pursued through a variety of avenues (e.g. internet networks, SMS campaigns, etc.) and is not necessarily limited to the mass media. Whatever the chosen moniker, these strategies focus on influencing the content of the South African information environment rather than the structure, approaching information as a tool with which to promote foreign policy objectives and/or treat the South African information sphere as an actor in society that may serve as either an obstacle or an aid to those objectives. Actors within the US government have attempted to influence the South African information environment through three primary axes of 161 intervention: (1) targeted media diplomacy 52 campaigns tied to changes (or lack thereof) in the US foreign policy agenda in South Africa; (2) international broadcasting efforts; and (3) influence campaigns designed to leverage South African support for US interests in countries in the SADC region. Table 4.1 provides an overview of the methods, trends, and targets. TABLE 4.1: TYPOLOGY OF US POLITICAL INFORMATION STRATEGIES TARGETING THE SOUTH AFRICAN INFORMATION ENVIRONMENT Methods Approaches to Information Channels/Actors Targets of Influence International Broadcasting As an actor in society Voice of America, IBB South African Public & Elite Opinion Regional and Global Public and Elite Opinion Public Relations As a tool USAID, USTDA, US Embassy, Department of Commerce Opinion Leaders, Members of the media (domestic, regional and international) Media Events / MetaNarratives As a tool and as an actor in society Department of State, US Embassy, Department of Commerce Opinion Leaders, Members of the media (domestic, regional and international) As this chapter will demonstrate, the strategies summarized in Table 4.1 are both concentrated (i.e. tied to specific foreign policy goals and directed at specific 52 Including new media. 162 subsets of actors) and diffuse (i.e. informational campaigns that cast a wide net in order to reach public opinion), and have achieved various levels of success. Some attempt to influence opinion leaders and makers at the micro‐level and/or relevant South African agencies and institutions at the meso‐level. Others, such as international broadcasting, bypass domestic structures entirely, projecting the Voice of America directly into the South African information environment. Under closer observation, some US geopolitical information strategies in South Africa during the Clinton and Bush administrations have provided “essential continuity,” while others are linked to broader changes in foreign policy (Young 1984). However, patterns identified in informational strategies are not necessarily coterminous with general trends in foreign policy. First, the US government has engaged in media diplomacy strategies designed to build support for and understanding about specific programs or policies adopted by respective administrations and at times through more general strategies designed to support the meta‐narrative of the day whether it be “trade not aid” under the Clinton administration or the Bush administration’s humanitarian HIV/AIDS agenda. These strategies are typically guided by the White House foreign policy priorities and tend to leverage information as a tool (see Chapter 1) and/or as an actor in society in order to achieve elite and broader public acceptance for or to distract from the respective administration’s policy agenda(s), with varying levels of success. Second, there is also a group of informational strategies with a political agenda that 163 are more routinized, propelled by bureaucracy rather than interest at the higher levels of government. VOA broadcasts and day‐to‐day outreach programs, with few exceptions, similarly approach information as a tool for building general US credibility and awareness about its policies. 53 Finally, there are those information strategies not specifically aimed at South Africa, but that leverage the South African national information environment as a conduit to reach one or many other primary targets. These strategies may not then necessarily cohere to general US foreign policy goals within South Africa, but evolve out of the belief that informational activities conducted within South Africa may service foreign policy goals in other African countries and/or at the multilateral level. What follows is a closer analysis of each of these types of strategies. It is not an exhaustive description of every US government sponsored political information program, but rather provides exemplars in order to illustrate the breadth and depth of the ways in which US government actors articulate and seek to achieve foreign policy goals by acting upon the South African information environment. 53 VOA employees and executives stress the importance of journalistic integrity and objectivity in reporting. While VOA broadcasts do not directly advocate for US political interests, part three of its mission is to “present the policies of the United States clearly and effectively, and will also present responsible discussions and opinion on these policies” (VOA Charter 1976). In this sense, the VOA serves US political objectives by providing a reliable platform through which information about its policies can be conveyed to South Africans. 164 Changing Rhetoric and Changing Realities South Africa rose from the ashes of apartheid against the backdrop of four interrelated processes which have shaped US political information strategies: (1) the end of the Cold War; (2) a widespread embrace of neoliberal economic reform among major powers and in multilateral institutions; (3) increasing concerns about combating terrorism in Africa; and (4) a mobilized domestic constituency invested in South Africa’s rebirth. First, the demise of the Soviet Union and the subsequent collapse of the bi‐ polar Cold War upended the framework of US public diplomacy strategies. During the Cold War, concerns about countering Soviet influence in South Africa were paramount, ameliorated by largely symbolic anti‐apartheid rhetoric (see Chapter 3; Edwards 2001; Habib 2008; Kraxberger 2005; and Schraeder 1994). While all administrations during the Cold War era voiced public opposition to apartheid, almost all maintained a quiet policy of engagement with the oppressive white government in order to combat Soviet influence, secure US military operations outside of Cape Town, and to ensure South African support in the Soviet/US proxy war in the nearby oil‐rich country of Angola. As Benjamin Gilman, Chair of the House Committee on International relations from 1995 to 2001, framed it: “during the Cold War, America saw Africa through the prism of our ideological, political, and economic struggle with the Soviet Union” (Gilman 1997). Peter Schraeder (1994) neatly summarizes the essential polarity of US foreign policy towards South Africa, 165 According to the CIA, the greatest asset of US‐SA ties was the Afrikaner government’s fervent anti‐communism and strong support for the US in its ideological competition with the Soviet Union. However, an equally important drawback of these ties was the ‘propaganda’ liability of Washington’s association with apartheid (194). Ronald Reagan echoed these sentiments in an interview with Walter Cronkite, on March 3, 1981: “Can we abandon a country that has stood by us in every war we’ve ever fought, a country that strategically is essential to the free world in its production of minerals we all must have and so forth?” (220). The end of the Cold War invited a fundamental re‐evaluation of this position, first under the George H. W. Bush administration and more clearly under the Clinton administration. Second, a concentrated push towards market liberalization in the developing world by the United States and other national and multilateral actors altered the scope and the framework through which America engaged with Africa in general and South Africa in particular (Bond 2006). While promotion of democratic capitalism has long been a pillar of the US foreign policy strategy against the Soviets, as the Cold War thawed, capitalism, not democratization, took first priority (Entman 2000). In this environment, domestic support for aid to African countries in the form of grants and infrastructure projects declined. However, opinion polls found that Americans were more likely (61 percent) to support US international assistance if they believed that the United States would benefit economically (Adamson et al. 2000). By 1996, Congress had reduced direct development assistance to the region by as much as 25 percent (Cason 1997, 147). And a rising percentage (up to 35 166 percent from 10 percent) of remaining funds were distributed via private NGOs and through public/corporate partnerships (Martin 1998). Third, the 1998 bombings of the Kenyan and Tanzanian embassies by the Egyptian Islamist Jihad turned American domestic attention toward the security situation on the continent. While often overlooked by pundits, these security concerns have helped to shape outreach towards South Africa. Against the backdrop of the terrorist bombings of the American embassy in Kenya and Tanzania, a small radical Islamic vigilante group, the People Against Gangsterism and Drugs (PAGAD), emerged on the scene in the 1990s. Openly critical of US policies in the Middle East and of Israel, it staged several demonstrations against the embassies. While never confirmed, many pundits inside the US government suspected that the group was Saudi‐backed and responsible for a series of bombings in “Western type” establishments in the Eastern Cape. It also mounted an unsuccessful attack against the US consul general in Cape Town. In response to American pressure, South African authorities convicted and jailed several of its leaders, and the group largely disbanded (Africa Advisory Panel 2004, 114). However, particularly following September 11, the nearly one million Muslims living in the Cape Town area remain a subject of concern and a rationalization for more direct democratization promotion campaigns. For example, the Africa Advisory Panel (2004) cautioned that The threat of terror to U.S interests in Africa is concrete, rising, and discernible. The probability of another attack on Americans on African 167 soil is high. South Africa saw the rise of violent, radical Muslim cells in the late 1990s, with ties to South Asia. They have been eradicated, but the motive, opportunity, and means to revitalize attacks on U.S. interests persist. As pressures upon Al Qaeda and other radical Islamic movements intensify in Kenya, North Africa, and elsewhere, many experts assert they will migrate to more accessible venues in West and southern Africa (106‐07). Finally, throughout the 1980s, the anti‐apartheid movement within the United States and around the world grew in size and scope, mobilized by images of the brutal repression of the black population, such as the massacre of 19 mourners at a funeral in the Langa Township in 1986 (Edwards 2001, 258). Groups like DATA (Debt, AIDS, Trade, and Africa), ADNA (the Advocacy Network for Africa), Africare, APIC (the Africa Policy and Information Center); religious organizations like Africa Faith and Justice Network, Catholic Relief Services, Church World Service, the American Friends Service Committee, and the Episcopal Public Policy Network; and organizations with no clear Africa mandate like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch all took up the cause to free Nelson Mandela (Copson 2007, 12). Together with the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC), these groups lobbied heavily for a harsher US stance on apartheid and delivered a steady stream of testimony before the Congressional Human Rights Caucus. South African liberation became both a global political movement and a pop‐ culture phenomenon. In 1984, the song “Free Nelson Mandela” by Special AKA moved up the charts raising broader awareness about Mandela’s long imprisonment and serving as an anthem for activists around the world. In 1988, even as Mandela 168 sat in prison, over 750 million people in 60 countries watched the Nelson Mandela 70th Birthday Tribute (aka Freedom Fest) hosted by Artists Against Apartheid at a packed Wembley Stadium in London (Jet 1988). Performers and special guests were the who’s who of Hollywood, including: Harry Bellefonte, Chubby Checker, Joe Cocker, Roberta Flack, Richard Gere, Whoopi Goldberg, Whitney Houston, and Sting. In 1990, when President de Klerk released Nelson Mandela after 27 years in prison, excitement and expectations mounted not only at the prospect of a free South Africa, but of the role that Americans and the US government might play in aiding that transition. Of course, there were numerous other factors that contributed to US foreign policy concerns within South Africa. However, these four have been identified as key determinants of change in US foreign policy towards South Africa, which in turn invited new programs, and as a result changes in information strategies. Table 4.2 provides an overview of the evolution of US geopolitical strategies in South Africa from the Cold War to the present as well as the key programs and competitors against which these policies were shaped, the specifics of which will be addressed in the context of the ensuing analysis of the evolution of the corresponding informational strategies. 169 TABLE 4.2: TRENDS IN AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY TOWARD SOUTH AFRICA Cold War Era Clinton Era Post 911 Key Themes Containment “Selective Engagement” National Security “Trade not Aid” Neoliberal economic reform HIV/AIDS Prevention Terrorism Failed States Ideology of Freedom Marquis Programs Missile Range Tracking Station at Grootfontein Sullivan Principles 54 AGOA Binational Commission US‐SADC Bi‐ National Forum AGOA Extension PEPFAR Key Competitors Soviet Union Unilateral Moment China India The European Union As Table 4.2 outlines, different themes, programs, and strategic competitors have moved to the forefront during different periods of US‐South Africa relations. These themes describe actual foreign policy shifts, but in retrospect they appear as themes precisely because they were constructed as such through the use of informational strategies. Both the Clinton and the Bush administrations relied heavily on what has variously been labeled “media diplomacy” (Gilboa 2000) and/or staging “media events” (Dayan & Katz 1992), at times to distract from at other times to promote their respective foreign policy agendas in South Africa. This section pays particular attention to “media events”—defined by Dayan and Katz (1992) as non‐routine 54 The Sullivan Principles were guidelines for US corporations drawn up by Reverend Leon Sullivan, member of GM board. Senior policy makers favored these in lieu of formal sanctions. 170 events designed to capture media attention and reach the public imagination. State‐ initiated media events refer to the conduct of international relations in the public eye with the express intention of attracting publicity (Ibid.). For example, President Clinton could have delivered details about the US aid package to South Africa directly to Mandela or worked through ambassadors or trade representatives. Instead, he chose to announce the program at a special ceremony on the White House lawn. This form of informational strategy has multiple targets. US government officials may target certain South African opinion leaders in the hopes that they echo their support in the media or they may also target the media directly in order to build positive public opinion and thus foreign policy acceptance among decision‐makers. Dollar Diplomacy South African independence coincided with a looming foreign policy vacuum. For the preceding 40 years, America’s messaging strategies towards South Africa had hinged on opposition to communism, to apartheid, and to colonialism. By the early 1990s, all three of these familiar frameworks were on the wane, necessitating a complete re‐evaluation of America’s foreign policy toward South Africa. America had several key interests: (1) to maximize trading opportunities with South Africa; (2) to ensure that the many high‐ranking members of the ANC and COSATU who were also members of the South African Communist Party (SACP), would not move 171 the country towards socialism (See also Gumede 2007; Lodge 2003); (3) to fulfill domestic expectations that the special relationship between Americans and South Africans forged through the active engagement of Americans, particularly African Americans, in the apartheid struggle would be carried through in the post‐ independence era; and (4) to minimize discontent with the overall decline in aid. Under the Clinton administration, this cocktail combined to encourage the adoption of the meta‐narrative of the US fulfilling its commitment to South Africa through trade not aid, what has sometimes been called “Dollar Diplomacy,” bolstered by rhetoric and media events. Undersecretary of State for African Affairs Susan Rice perhaps best captured the spirit of this Dollar Diplomacy in her 1997 induction ceremony speech: We must realize that the end of the Cold War calls for a new paradigm for U.S. policy‐makers. . . Integrating Africa into the global economy entails simultaneous pursuit of several core activities: promoting economic reform, trade, and investment; sustaining democracy; promoting respect for human rights; and continuing our attempts to resolve remaining conflicts (Rice 1997). The order of her statements is telling. Bringing South Africa into the global economy came first. All other programs were subsumed by a philosophy of “trade not aid,” which became an oft‐quoted catchphrase in Washington during this period. As previously noted, in the wake of the Cold War, domestic support for direct development aid declined as support for programs that supported market expansion increased. Clinton entered office in January 1993, at the height of CODESA negotiations, “stressing that the twin themes of democratization and 172 market economies" for Africa (Willan 1992). Even before taking office, Clinton had expressed his commitment to the ANC, releasing a message through the current ambassador, Princeton Lyman, which was picked up by numerous news agencies including the South African Press Agency (SAPA) 55 : President‐elect Clinton has made clear his support for the negotiation of a transition to non‐racial democracy, and has pledged his strong support to a new South Africa, once the transition is irreversible (Lewis 1992). Immediately after entering office, the Clinton administration expanded already high levels of US financial support to the ANC and to civil society groups and actors. The overarching message emanating from DC and from US representatives in South Africa was for full US support for South African independence. In November 1993, Clinton signed the Transition to Democracy Act, which lifted all remaining US economic sanctions and included a substantial aid package. Almost immediately afterwards, US Commerce Secretary Ronald Brown led the first business delegation to South Africa on a five‐day whirlwind trip. The delegation met with both black and white businessman and with political leaders across the spectrum. During this trip, Brown announced the launch of the US‐SA Business Development Committee and designated South Africa as one of the top 10 emerging markets worldwide. In the wake of the TDA and Brown’s trip to South Africa, South African media coverage 55 SAPA is a non-governmental news agency founded in 1938. 173 was overwhelmingly positive with such headlines as “Billions for South Africa” and “Huge US Support” (Lyman 2002). On May 4, 1994, five days before Mandela’s official inauguration, Clinton unveiled the US aid package at a special ceremony on the South Lawn of the White House to a throng of journalists and stakeholders. It was a $600 million package over three years, consisting of $136 million from USAID and $30 million in housing loan guarantees. The balance would come from OPIC, the USIA, and the UTDA in the form of technical assistance and training. As Princeton Lyman (2009), US Ambassador to South Africa from 1992 to 1995, recalls, Nelson Mandela and members of the ANC expected US assistance with infrastructure in the form of grants and material assistance and were “furious” at the size of the American aid package. Figure 4.1 provides a visual depiction of the drop. 174 FIGURE 4.1: US GOVERNMENT GRANTS TO SOUTH AFRICA (1986 – 2008) Data Source: US Department of Commerce Bureau of Economic Analysis (2009). As Figure 4.1 demonstrates, US government grants rose steadily during the transition period, peaking in 1995 at $124 million, then gradually, contrary to the ANC’s expectations, trended downwards throughout the rest of the Clinton presidency. Grant levels rebounded and surpassed transition levels during the Bush administration mainly due to a major increase in funding allocations for the PEPFAR HIV/AIDS program, a program of which the Mbeki administration was particularly skeptical. Given the rhetoric of US‐South Africa partnership espoused during the transition period, the ANC leadership expected a settlement close to if not commensurate with the Camp David Accord Settlement, which distributed $3 billion to Israel and the Palestinian territories. Instead, the US put together an aid package, which Mandela referred to at a 1994 press conference as “peanuts.” Not only was it considerably smaller than expected, but the bulk of the money was not in grants and 175 infrastructure development but in technical assistance and private loan guarantees, what Lyman (2002) called “smoke and mirrors” to mask the small sum (227). The Embassy, the Office of the Vice President, USAID’s regional office, and Clinton himself each struggled to figure out how to increase at least the perception of America’s commitment to South Africa (Lyman 2009, interview). Throughout the apartheid era, US public diplomacy towards South Africa reflected the Janus‐faced nature of American interests. Moral denunciations of apartheid accompanied movements to protect America’s military and economic interests in South Africa (Martin 1998, Schraeder 1996; Lyman 2002). In the post‐apartheid era, the opposite trend occurred. Public diplomacy campaigns elevated US appreciation for and involvement in the birth of the Rainbow Nation, even as governmental support in programmatic and economic terms declined. Dollar Diplomacy, or what Alden (2000) labels “virtual engagement,” emerged as a useful tool with which to stress the US’s continuing support for South Africa, fulfill the demands of the domestic US South Africa lobby, and press for a South African embrace of market liberalization. While Alden (2000) calls US policy towards South Africa during the 1990s “virtual engagement,” Dollar Diplomacy was undergirded by a broadening physical presence of the US government in South Africa, as more and more departments opened up offices in South Africa in order to provide technical assistance and training. In 1993, only USAID, the State Department (in the form of the US Embassy), and the VOA had physical headquarters in South Africa. By 1996, the DOD, the Department of 176 Agriculture, OPIC, the USTDA, and the Department of Commerce had all opened offices in and around Pretoria. Promoting trade was not simply a disingenuous exercise in public relations management, but was underscored by a very real interest both within and outside the halls of government in the economic opportunities offered by South Africa and a belief that greater economic ties would benefit the birth of the “Rainbow Nation.” 56 Many believed that strengthening African economies would foster South African and regional political and social stability as well as create more export opportunities for American businesses. Belying predictive models about the importance of bureaucratic practice over individual initiative, Commerce Secretary Brown’s passionate commitment to South Africa and Africa in general has also commonly been described as a decisive factor in shaping this Dollar Diplomacy. In what appears to be a unique circumstance, from 1993 until his death in a plane crash in April 1996, Brown, as the US Secretary of Commerce, not the Secretary of State, was perhaps the most visible face of the US towards South Africa. Warren Christopher, Secretary of State from 1992 to 1997, did not visit the country until October of 1996 during which he met with Mandela and delivered a lecture at the University of the 56 In the first four years of ANC rule, the “Rainbow Nation” was the main theme of domestic public affairs and South African public diplomacy. However, it quickly became clear that Desmond Tutu’s vision of a South African rebirth into a “rainbow nation” finding “unity in cultural diversity” was all but impossible in the face of economic disparity, the recalcitrance of the white population, and the growing calls for retribution rather than reconciliation. While the West continued to be enamored with the “Rainbow Nation” ideal, domestically the campaign was an abject failure. See also Maloka (2001). 177 Witwatersrand (Wits). 57 Under Brown’s leadership, the Department of Commerce played a high profile role in the US outreach towards South Africa. He led the first business delegation to South Africa just days after Clinton lifted all sanctions. The Secretary of Commerce is allowed to appoint one ambassadorial‐level representative worldwide. In 1994, Brown tapped Millard Arnold to that position as Minister Counselor for Commercial Affairs for South Africa just a week after Mandela’s election. It is also commonly believed that Clinton moved forward with AGOA in part out of a desire to fulfill Brown’s economic and trade plan for Africa (Keller 2009). Brown’s interest in South Africa was matched and aided by a group of American businesses with clear interests in promoting trade with South Africa. Founded in 1993, today the Corporate Council on Africa (CCA) represents over 200 US companies and stakeholders interested in Africa‐US business linkages across the continent and claims to represent over 85 percent of all American private sector investment in Africa. Many of its founding members were former government employees. It officially launched in 1993, at a Gala event hosted at the State Department in which Secretary Ron Brown delivered the keynote address. Shortly after the gala, Brown led the CCA members on the well‐publicized trip to South Africa. It is no coincidence that its launch coincided with South African 57 Madeline Albright visited South Africa twice, once in December of 1997 and once in December of 2000 for the expressed purpose of talking about HIV with Mbeki. 178 independence. While the CCA has continent‐wide business interests, the bulk of its activities take place within South Africa. The CCA visited South Africa just weeks after its formation, and launched the US‐South Africa Business Council in 1993. While technically a non‐state actor, the CCA has close linkages with multiple offices of the US government and has been a frequent partner of the USTDA, the CIP, and the Department of Commerce in producing events and programs related to US trade in South Africa. 58 Their activities complemented other private‐public efforts to promote US‐South Africa trade, efforts which Millard Arnold’s office and the US Embassy heavily promoted. In 1995, the Clinton administration established the American‐South African Binational Commission co‐chaired by Vice President Al Gore and Thabo Mbeki, one of the first such bodies of US foreign policy. The Commission, the brainchild of Ron Brown, met twice a year, alternating between US and South African venues and had six working committees: Agriculture, Conservation, Environment and Water, Human Resource Development and Education, Science and Technology, Sustainable Energy, and Trade and Investment. 59 According to former (then current) US Ambassador to South Africa James A. Joseph (1997), 58 The CCA hosts regular US-Africa Business Summits as well as industry specific trade shows and corporate diplomacy programs. Most recently, in 2008, the CCA joined with USAID to launch the South African International Business Linkages-II (SAIBL), a program publicized both by USAID and the DOS. 59 As subsequent chapters will demonstrate, the Science and Technology and the Trade and Investment working committees played a significant role in framing the development of South African ICT and media infrastructure and policy. 179 No US vice president in history and no domestic cabinet secretaries ha[d] ever devoted as much time to the well‐being of another country as these officials have committed to South Africa. . . Identify a problem or a major issue in South Africa and you are likely to find some agency of the US Government working with a South African counterpart to find a solution. State Department officials and embassy staff largely condemned Commission activities, labeling them as a “political stunt” more than “real foreign policy work.” However, the well‐publicized Commission meetings continued unabated through the end of the Clinton presidency. The number of media events peaked in 1996 and 1997. In recognition of faltering South African support for the United States “trade not aid” initiatives, the administration put its full support behind a series of media events designed to emphasize America’s commitment to South Africa’s political and economic rebirth. From March 13‐16, 1997, 69 politicians, government actors, businessman, academics, corporate representatives, and journalists gathered at Arden House, Harriman, New York, for the Ninetieth American Assembly on "Africa and U.S. National Interests." For three days the participants examined issues arising out of the African continent, how they affect US national interests in the present and future, and what policy the United States should follow. The Assembly was designed as a prelude to the National Summit on Africa (the precursor to the Africa Society), a multimedia event that was to include leading African American celebrities, corporate actors, philanthropists, and African lobbyists. Although all the major Clintonistas (including Clinton, Gore, and Albright) committed to attend, interest 180 both within the United States and in Africa fell short of expectations. As a result, it was downsized from 10 conferences to five, the film series reduced, and the Summit itself delayed until February 2000 (Alden 2000, 365). More successful, though equally fleeting, was the US‐SADC Forum, what was to be a series of bi‐annual meetings of the US government actors, SADC actors, and business people concentrating on “promoting SADC's regional economic integration, strengthening the region's ability to address security challenges, tackling the scourge of HIV/AIDS, and building the capacity to prepare for and manage disasters” (SADC Forum Communiqué 2000). In 1997, Clinton proposed the Partnership for Economic Growth and Opportunity in Africa, which offered different levels of economic benefits to countries in sub‐Saharan Africa (SSA), depending on their economic reform measures. The partnership led to the 2000 African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), which included a Southern African Enterprise development fund. Half of its $100 million budget went to South Africa. Alden (2000) characterized these efforts as attempts “to both ‘privilege’ the new government in Pretoria and, concurrently, exercise influence over Africa’s potential hegemon” (Alden 2000, 259). During the AGOA development process, South African resistance to Clinton’s “trade not aid” tactics escalated. Many questioned whether it was simply a public relations campaign designed to ameliorate concerns voiced by both South Africans and members of the US domestic African lobby about the very real reductions in overall 181 development funds allocated for the region (see Figure 4.1). At the same time, although the Binational Commission continued to meet, it began to lose steam for a number of reasons, one of which was the untimely death of Ron Brown in 1996 (Lyman 2002). While the United States remained a visible presence in South Africa throughout the Clinton administration, the reality never matched the rhetoric. These events and the publicity surrounding them were designed to promote appreciation for American involvement and continue US influence over the transition process and largely to promote acceptance for trade not aid. PEPFAR to the Rescue? The Bush administration gradually phased out, canceled, or shelved many of the flashier Clinton trade initiatives, including the Binational Commission, but ultimately decided to retain and extend AGOA. 60 However, on the ground, representatives of the Embassy and the State Department in DC retained a rhetorical focus on the importance of trade and continued to push for market advantages. Condoleezza Rice perhaps best typified the Bush administration message on this issue: International economic policies that leverage the advantages of the American economy and expand free trade are the decisive tools in shaping international politics. They permit us to reach out to states as varied as South Africa and India and to engage our neighbors in the 60 In 2001, Bush ended the US-South Africa Binational Commission. Collin Powell explained that such a set up did not "fit the leadership model" of President Bush. 182 western hemisphere in a shared interest in economic prosperity (Rice 2000, 50). However, at the diplomatic missions in Pretoria, Johannesburg, and Cape Town the focus shifted towards promotion of the Bush “humanitarian agenda” (Deane‐ Connors 2008, 2009, interview). Particularly in the waning days of the Bush administration, the government advertised its Africa policy as Bush’s greatest success. 61 Part domestic resurrection of his legacy, part public diplomacy strategy, Bush’s Africa policy did reflect several fundamental changes. First and foremost, outreach to South Africa shifted largely from Dollar Diplomacy to HIV/AIDS Diplomacy. From January 20, 2001, Bush began to scale‐down many of the high‐profile economic campaigns indicating that similar, but different, programs would replace them. In the immediate wake of September 11, 2001, all eyes turned to the Middle East, and Africa initiatives temporarily moved to the backburner. It was not until the months preceding the Iraq War in 2003, that the administration’s approach to Africa began to take full form. Coinciding with almost global opposition to the impending Iraq War, the administration surprised many by unveiling the Presidents Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), one of the most ambitious programs for Africa in US history. 61 It is beyond the scope of this dissertation to dispute the validity of the administration’s claims. Time and again the administration has stressed how it tripled the budget for Africa to $6.6 billion. However, this number is disputed because it represents budget requests not actual money spent. 183 Launched in 2003, PEPFAR pledged $15 billion over five years towards combating HIV/AIDS, and provided one of the most high profile and most publicized Bush administration initiatives in Africa. Jendayi Frazer, who was special assistant to the president and senior director of African Affairs at the National Security Council form 2001 to 2004, Ambassador to South Africa from 2004 to 2005, and Under Secretary of State for African Affairs from 2005 to 2009, stresses that PEPFAR was not an exercise in “AIDS diplomacy.” Rather, the administration’s interest in the AIDS crisis in Africa surfaced well before September 11 and evolved out of Bush’s particular interest in the crisis and Kofi Anan’s push for greater investment by the developing world to solve the crisis (Frazer 2009, interview). Frazer reports that the first cabinet level meeting of the new administration focused on the AIDS issue. However, while a humanitarian project, it appears that PEPFAR was, and remains, a critical component of Bush’s attempt to rehabilitate his image. Domestically, it helped to address the demands of his Christian Conservative base for expanded humanitarian outreach in Africa during a critical pre‐election period. Internationally and in the African region, it offered an example of American largesse in the wake of overwhelming objections to the Iraq War. PEPFAR even commissioned a Director of Public Affairs and Public Diplomacy (Kristin Pugh) responsible for raising the profile of the initiative at home and abroad. She billed it as “the largest international public health initiative aimed at a single disease that any nation has ever undertaken.” The $15 billion commitment included $5 billion 184 for existing bilateral programs, $1 billion for the UN Global Fund to Fight AIDS, and $9 billion for new programs in select target countries in Southeast Asia, Africa, and the Caribbean. As one of the 15 target countries for PEPFAR, the project funneled upwards of $1 billion into South Africa between 2003 and 2005, 62 making South Africa the single greatest recipient of any of the 15 PEPFAR‐eligible countries. Since 2003, PEPFAR has been one of the central pillars of American public diplomacy in the southern African region. According to Mary Deane Connors (2008), Minister Counselor for Public Affairs, since arriving at the US Embassy in South Africa, her job as head of public diplomacy for the Embassy has been “all PEPFAR all the time.” The lobby of the American Embassy in Pretoria is awash with PEPFAR promotional materials, and Connors regularly hosts videoconferences and other profile‐raising events and places editorials in local newspapers. The Embassy has also participated in several high profile public diplomacy events managed out of the PEPFAR office in DC. In July 2005, First Lady Laura Bush, accompanied by Ambassador Randall L. Tobias, the US Global AIDS Coordinator, visited South Africa, Rwanda, and Tanzania, and toured several Emergency Plan projects. In Swaziland, Tobias and the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Health both submitted to AIDS tests in an event carried live on Swazi TV and SABC. In 2005, as Bush’s popularity ratings bottomed out both at home and abroad, he celebrated World 62 South Africa received nearly $89.3 million in 2004, nearly $148.2 million in 2005, $221.5 million in 2006, $397.8 million in 2007, and $590.9 million in 2008 to support HIV/AIDS prevention, treatment, and care programs. 185 AIDS Day with a lavish affair featuring the Darbys, a South African family receiving retroviral treatment with the support of PEPFAR funding. Coinciding with the launch of the almost universally unpopular Iraq War, many, including those in South Africa, greeted the program with skepticism. Pundits ruminated on whether the program would come to fruition, labeling it a PR stunt designed to placate George Bush’s Christian Conservative base as an election year loomed. Of particular concern was that the administration gave responsibility for PEPFAR to the State Department, an agency whose mandate is diplomacy, with only supporting roles for USAID and the Department of Health and Human Services (Atwood et al. 2008). PEPFAR, while a humanitarian public health program, was underpinned by both strategic and ideological conditions. Originally, the newly funded programs were to be based on Uganda’s successful ABC program: Abstinence, Be faithful to your partner, use a Condom. However, during House of Representatives appropriations negotiations an amendment passed, supported by considerable administration lobbying, that required that at least one‐third of the prevention funds be spent to promote sexual abstinence; and a second amendment allowed faith‐based groups to reject “objectionable strategies” such as condom distribution. PEPFAR also requires that recipient organizations only spend dispersed funds on name‐brand drugs, ostensibly to protect patent rights and 186 assure quality. 63 Further raising eyebrows, Bush appointed former chairman of Eli Lilly and Company (the world’s tenth largest pharmaceutical conglomerate), Randall Tobias, a man with no prior experience with AIDS or African politics, as US Global AIDS Coordinator (Dietrich 2007). A third policy that triggered debate is a legislative requirement prohibiting funding of any group that does not have an explicit written policy opposing prostitution and sex trafficking, a caveat that proved particularly problematic for organizations on the ground working with HIV‐ positive prostitutes (Alexander 2008). PEPFAR, with its money and its controversies, dominated the US public diplomacy agenda until the end of the Bush administration in January 2009. In many ways, the focus on Bush’s humanitarian agenda helped to eclipse the increasingly acrimonious relationship between South Africa and the United States on a number of issues including: Zimbabwe (discussed below), the War on Terror, South African recalcitrance to tow the US line at the Doha Round of WTO trade talks, AFRICOM, and general South African distaste for the George W. Bush administration. However, as the Obama administration moved into office, although the Africa Bureau remained unstaffed until June of 2009, at the behest of career State Department officials PEPFAR as the face of US public diplomacy moved to the back burner. As several current embassy officials noted in 2009, Obama’s election ignited 63 Two lobby groups, the Corporate Council on Africa's Task Force on AIDS and the Coalition for AIDS Relief in Africa, funded by major pharmaceutical companies, such as Bristol-Myers Squibb, Abbott Laboratories, Pfizer, and others, formed to lobby Congress in support of PEPFAR funding. 187 an almost total sea change in the way that American outreach took place in South Africa (Hudson‐Deane 2009; Zurba 2009). Rather than calling reporters and pushing the US agenda into the news, the information officers were amazed by the onslaught of media professionals reaching out to the Embassy on a broad range of subject matter. Whether this honeymoon period will last remains to be seen. Continuity As previously mentioned, US political informational strategies have been marked by changes depending on the mix of domestic and international priorities. Under the Clinton administration they were conditioned by larger changes in the international environment after the Cold War, and under the Bush administration by strategic security concerns propagated by September 11 and the ensuing War on Terror. However, while these two historical shifts were important drivers of messaging strategies emanating from high‐level actors, at the same time many programs and policies such as VOA Africa Service, while passionately championed by their employees, have continued in the face of a largely disinterested Congress and Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG). Although these rather routine strategies may have emerged out of a period of change, or have been used to support the foreign policy goal of the day, international broadcasting in the country and routine embassy media outreach have continued uninterrupted and largely unaffected in terms of funding and support by changes in US Africa policy. These 188 informational strategies are maintained to ensure that there is a conduit through which the government can channel information about American policy into South Africa, regardless of the political climate. First, the US Embassy in Pretoria, the USIA (until 1999), consulates in Johannesburg and Cape Town, and USAID each employ press officers responsible for liaising with the local media. Embassy and USIA press officers have worked routinely to publicize various embassy events within the South African media before, during, and after the apartheid era and worked as on‐site support for any and all visits by US government delegations. USAID, on the other hand, employs one woman, Reverie Zurba, to conduct press relations. She was hired in 1994 on contract to help combat hostility within the South African NGO community about declining US funding (which will be discussed in greater detail in Chapter 5), and has remained in the job ever since. With very few resources, using a color laser printer and a fax machine, Zurba provides the main USAID contact to the media in Johannesburg. Second, international broadcasting activities in principle seek to alter or expand the range of voices in a domestic information environment. While these broadcasters may serve multiple ends such as building credibility, adding plurality, or fostering awareness, their clearest purpose is to serve as a reliable channel through which states may transfer information to other states (VOA Charter 1976; Zollner 2006). This information may take the form of propaganda, as it did during 189 the Second World War, or it may be largely factual. The United States first began broadcasting into South Africa in 1942 with dedicated Afrikaans broadcasts designed to combat Nazi influence in the country. The service was pulled in 1949 as part of a post‐World War II reconfiguring. America’s voice remained silent in the region for the next decade, largely in deference to the British who, due to their colonial experiences in southern Africa, deemed the country their sphere of influence. The continent‐wide VOA Africa service formally launched in 1959 joining a cacophony of other foreign governments and nationalist movements who launched broadcasting agencies during the 1950s. The VOA has remained a constant presence in the country since 1959 and has maintained a news bureau (one of four in Africa) in Johannesburg. Currently, the VOA is available through multiple frequencies in South Africa including: Bush Radio in Cape Town, Kaya FM in Johannesburg, 1485 medium wave, and through Multichoice/DSTV audio channels. In March 1991, the short‐lived US television broadcaster WorldNet launched Africa Journal, an hour‐long program linking experts in the United States with viewers in sub‐Saharan Africa to discuss a variety of topics, including current events, politics, economics, media, the environment, human rights, and women. VOA TV took over the program, which maintains a small but loyal audience on its South African syndicates. In addition, the VOA produces Straight Talk Africa, a weekly program broadcast on radio, TV, and the Internet, that remains one of the 190 most popular programs in the Africa service, covering such topics as politics, health, social issues, and conflict resolution. Africa, particularly southern Africa, is the VOA’s greatest success story. Almost 45 percent of VOA listeners (approximately 45 million) reside on the continent (House Subcommittee on Appropriations 2006). However, belying the small bureaucratic capital of both the VOA and more specifically the Africa Division, budgetary allocations for Africa broadcasts remain relatively stagnant, around $12 million per year compared to the approximately $180 million allocated annually since September 11 for the Middle East Networks. And, the majority of employees interviewed argue that “the powers that be” do not consider Africa to be “strategically important.” Johannesburg Bureau Director Scott Bobb (2008) attributed budgetary constraints to Democratic influence over Congress, arguing that: “Democrats leave VOA alone, but they don’t give it much money. But Republicans give it a lot of money but want it to speak for them.” Despite Bobb’s perceptions, funding has remained low but relatively constant in spite of the partisan balance in Congress. Although VOA Africa remains the most successful service, its budget has hovered between 5 and 6 percent of the total VOA budget throughout the period of study (Budget of the United States Government 1992‐ 2009). VOA actors working in the Africa Bureau largely avoid the term “public diplomacy” and even disavow any connection between their efforts and the US 191 political agency (Dillard 2008; Bobb 2008, interviews). Africa Division Chief for VOA Gwen Dillard (2008, interview) points to the VOA Charter: VOA reporters and broadcasters must strive for accuracy and objectivity in all their work. They do not speak for the U.S. government. They accept no treatment or assistance from U.S. government officials or agencies that are more favorable or less favorable than that granted to staff of private‐sector news agencies. Furthermore, VOA professionals, careful to preserve the integrity of their organization, strive for excellence and avoid imbalance or bias in their broadcasts. 64 She argues that public diplomacy is about strategic influence and driven by politics of the day. The VOA is about “opening up a dialogue that is sustained in good times and in bad.” She pointed out that VOA editorials, which take up a minute percentage of overall broadcasts, are the only point of “public diplomacy.” However, VOA as a funded arm of the US government sets a news agenda, which is in itself a political act. Its particular mission is to provide an information conduit linking the US to South Africa, as well as a host of other countries, that provides background about specific issues related to US foreign policy. Thus, VOA is, for the purposes of this study, defined as an informational strategy tied to promoting the US foreign policy agenda. 64 Full text of the Charter is available from http://www.voanews.com/english/About/JournalisticCode.cfm. 192 A Conduit for the Continent A number of scholars have documented the reliance by middle power states on conduct of public diplomacy (Alden & Vieira 2005; Batora 2006; Gilboa 2009; Potter 2002‐2005). Analysis of US public diplomacy strategies towards South Africa suggests that the reverse trend is perhaps more critical; middle powers are a pivotal target for public diplomacy because they may serve as conduits and/or obstacles for messaging strategies. US officials target South Africa in service of country‐specific agendas, but more often than not they realize that (1) they need to permeate the South African media sphere in order to carry their messages to the broadest possible audience, and (2) they need South African support to achieve broader objectives in sub‐ Saharan Africa. Beyond Borders Two buildings in Johannesburg, 1 Park Road (home to the VOA) and the Richmond Building located just a few miles from each other, house almost all the major media organizations represented in Africa, including: the AP, The Los Angeles Times, Reuters, CNN, the VOA, CBS, Deutsche Welle, and The Economist. And countless other stringers and freelancers sit in coffee shops and/or live in houses in nearby Melville. As Hannerz (2004) also points out, a significant percentage of all the news that flows in and out of and around the African region emanate from those 193 two buildings (61). All the major African media outlets are similarly headquartered in the northern suburbs of Johannesburg, including Interpress Service Africa, Nigeria News Service, Globecast, and others. Because South Africa is the home to numerous regional and global media actors, it provides a conduit for public diplomacy regionally and acts as a boomerang for informing US media outlets about US government activities in South Africa. In other words, if you can get the right message into the South African media, it may reverberate across the continent, and vice versa. In recognition of that fact, in 2009, under the initiative of Mary Deane Connors, former Minister Counselor for Public Affairs, 65 the US Embassy in Pretoria opened a regional media hub, 66 the goal of which was to: Increase official US voices and faces on African television, radio and other media, so that the US government message is visible, active and effective in advocating US policies, priorities, and actions with African audiences (http://southafrica.usembassy.gov/mediahub.html 2009). Paula Caffey, the International Broadcasting Bureau’s Regional Marketing Director, is also based in Johannesburg, although she operates independently from the embassy and the regional media hub. Her territory extends from the Horn of Africa, to the Congo, to the Great Lakes, to Madagascar. While South Africa is important as a regional media center, it appears that the IBB focus is shifting towards syndicating 65 I interviewed Ms. Connors twice, once in August 2008 and once in March 2009 during which she served as Charge d’Affairs until the new South African ambassador was appointed. 66 The State Department also operates other regional media hubs in: London, Dubai, Brussels, Miami (for Latin America), and Tokyo. 194 VOA content in countries like Kenya. Because Johannesburg is home to the most diverse and developed media environment, it is an important launch pad for the region. However, as the number of commercial news providers has expanded, the demand for syndicated VOA content has declined. For example, from 1996 onwards, the VOA provided content for SABC Africa, the SABC’s regional satellite television channel, until SABC news director canceled the contract in 2006 out of disinterest (Rensberg 2008). 67 Leveraging the Regional Hegemon The prevailing wisdom within the State Department, the DOD, and USAID is that if South Africa opposes an initiative, it is likely to fail. As the Africa Advisory Panel summarizes: South Africa’s uniquely important role in Africa does pose challenges, especially when it effectively blocks or deflects international action on an important crisis, as it has done in Zimbabwe. Public and private pressure must be exerted on the South African government to become more proactive on Zimbabwe, to avoid at all costs even appearing to be an apologist for the regime, and to deliver on their repeated promises of an imminent agreement (2004, 132). Thus, the United States Embassy, particularly under the leadership of Ambassador Eric M. Bost, routinely lobbied the South African elite and public to take a stronger position against Robert Mugabe’s brutal repression in Zimbabwe and the establishment of AFRICOM, the first US military operation dedicated solely to US 67 SABC Africa ceased all operations in August 2008 due to poor ratings performance. 195 interests in Africa. 68 One interviewee, who declined to be identified, noted that Bost was so aggressive on the Zimbabwe question, that the Bureau of African Affairs had to intercede and his speaking schedule was changed to focus on the US humanitarian agenda rather than political issues. Some of the most targeted US strategic information campaigns in favor of a more aggressive Zimbabwe policy have largely been practiced outside the boundaries of both official State Department spokesmen and the Embassy. Instead, these campaigns have been produced via semi‐autonomous funded organizations such as Studio 7 and the National Democratic Institute (NDI). While general interest in VOA Africa has been relatively static, Studio 7, a pirate radio station broadcast into Zimbabwe, has had no trouble finding funding. Studio 7 is maintained by journalists working out of South Africa, broadcast on VOA frequency, and funded by a $1 million annual grant from USAID. Johannesburg correspondents complain that while Studio 7 broadcasts over VOA frequency, its separate funding and failure to follow VOA professional guidelines degrades the overall reputation of the station as a fair and balanced news source. 68 The Africa Advisory Panel Report (2004), Rising US Stakes in Africa, produced by the Center for Strategic and International Studies and commissioned by then US Secretary of State Collin Powell, identified seven key areas of particular concern for the US including: crafting a US energy policy in Africa, developing capital markets, developing peace in oil-rich Sudan, promoting resource conservation, countering terrorist threats, promoting peace operations, and combating AIDS transmission. South Africa was identified as a key bilateral partner in each of these endeavors except for Sudan, where its influence is limited. In subsequent years, several key themes emerged: (1) engaging Africa in the War on Terror, (2) elevating US influence in the region in order to secure access to natural resources ahead of competitors like China and the European Union, and (3) the desire to promote Bush’s successes in Africa as his major successful “foreign policy” endeavor. While the intricacies of shifting geo-political exigencies could be examined in much further detail, this chapter is primarily concerned with the ways in which the US articulated the agendas via information strategies. 196 As will be discussed further in Chapter 5, the NDI has also provided funding for high level Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) leaders (formerly the opposition party in Zimbabwe) to visit Johannesburg and undergo media training so that they better engage with the South African and international media headquartered there (Cormier 2008, interview). South Africa’s importance as a conduit for regional public diplomacy strategies is also evidenced through the AFRICOM campaign. In October 2007, the DOD launched AFRICOM, a new central command headquartered in Stuttgart, Germany, to address US strategic interests in Africa. Its mission is to work in concert with other US government agencies (i.e. the State Department and USAID) to conduct military‐to‐military programs that promote a stable and secure African environment in support of US foreign policy. However, from the start there was a large disconnect between the Africa Bureau in the Department of State and AFRICOM, which was supposed to be a synergy between the DOD, the DOS, and USAID. AFRICOM’s launch was a key event for several reasons. First, AFRICOM pushed for greater integration between military, State Department, and USAID programs on the continent. Second, it also marked one of the first times when the US military became interested in public diplomacy campaigns in relationship to Africa. Its launch initiated a wave of attention both within the continent and within government circles about the best practices towards the African continent. The AFRICOM debate has also sparked 197 renewed attention towards the role of information strategies in facilitating US objectives in Africa. South Africa emerged as a key target for officials seeking to allay concerns that the command represented US neo‐imperial objectives. However, in practice, according to Embassy officials, they try to avoid any mention of AFRICOM when conducting outreach campaigns because resistance was so widespread. Informational strategies pursued within South Africa are also at times closely interwoven with larger US foreign policy strategies concerning perceived rivals in the country and on the continent. As previously noted, the Soviet Union’s demise invited a full‐scale about face in US‐South Africa relations. Today, China’s moves into the region have instigated similar concerns. In 1999, the annual volume of trade between China and Africa was $5.6 billion. After the establishment of the China Africa Cooperation Forum, Sino–African trade more than quintupled to $29.5 billion in 2004. US‐Africa trade also increased dramatically during the same period from $26.9 billion in 1999 to $58.9 billion in 2004. However, Sino‐African trade continues to expand at a much more dramatic rate calling into question the future of US dominance in the region (Brookes & Shin 2006). Not surprisingly, interviewees also cited China’s growing socio‐political influence as a subject of concern. Recent studies by the Pew Research Center were particularly worrisome. The Pew Global Attitudes Survey (2008) found a growing symmetry in perceptions about the influence of China and the United States in nations around the world. Sixty‐three 198 percent of respondents consider China and 64 percent consider the United States as having a great deal or fair amount of influence on their country (6). Coinciding with the Chinese charm offensive, language emanating from the US Embassy and from USAID has more than ever linked US political goals to ideological concerns. For example, in a 2007 editorial in Insight Africa, Ambassador Eric M. Bost reminded readers that: Although much has been made of China's growing presence in Africa, spurred by its intense interest in oil and other natural resources, it is really the United States ‐ with its history of democracy, respect for human rights and open markets ‐ that is best positioned to be a reliable partner in supporting the African Renaissance. And the United States fully understands that South Africa, as the regional economic and political power, is best positioned to take the lead in that Renaissance. Truly, there is no better hope for a brighter future for Africa than a stable, prosperous South Africa. Harkening back to Soviet‐era language, Bost stresses the importance of US values to its utility as an African partner. This connection between policy and ideology will be discussed further in the following chapter. But, first we must examine the total processes through which US political informational strategies are produced. Mapping Political Information Strategies While the original theoretical model depicted in Chapter 2 provided a launch pad for analysis, during the course of research and interviews it became apparent that the model did not reflect the sum total of the processes taking place. Figure 4.2 199 provides an overview of the mechanisms through which the US has utilized informational strategies in service of geopolitical goals in South Africa. FIGURE 4.2: PROCESSUAL MODEL OF US POLITICAL INFORMATION STRATEGIES At the micro level, individual representatives from US government bureaucratic organizations within the US political agency, such as the White House, the DOS, DOC, and the VOA, utilize media diplomacy to reach out to South African public opinion leaders and media actors in order to ultimately influence the content 200 of the South African information environment at the macro level. Some of these strategies target the content of the South African information environment, while others target the regional, global, and ultimately the US domestic information environment. These micro‐level processes are constituted by the broader needs of their respective organizations and of the American political agency at the macro level. For example, because the Secretary of Commerce took a particular interest in South Africa, informational strategies emerging out of the DOC were more pronounced. And, as the VOA’s overall budget is drained to fund broadcasting (i.e. Radio Sawa and AlHurra) in the more strategically important Middle Eastern region, it is ultimately limited in its ability to expand programming. In many ways, it is difficult if not impossible to separate informational strategy from the exigencies of foreign policy. The individuals who ultimately produce these strategies are bound by funding restrictions dictated by the interests and needs of the top levels of government, including Congress and the White House. They are also bound by the realities of policy. If Congress fails to ratify a large aid package or if the US president makes the unpopular decision to enter Iraq, then informational strategies no matter how well crafted ultimately fail to resonate and therefore are difficult to measure or identify. This presents a twist on Luke’s (1974) third dimension of power. Power may be articulated through absence. The reverse is also true. The failure to articulate power is also expressed through absence. While the series of media events 201 surrounding the “trade not aid” and PEPFAR initiatives are relatively easy to identify, they may or may not be joined by a host of failed efforts (e.g. press releases sent and speeches made, but never reported), which remain forgotten within Washington, DC, and in South Africa. This leads to perhaps one of the most important points about US political information strategies targeting the content of the South African information environment. US attempts to influence the South African information environment in service of political goals are not simply a matter of X acting upon Y. These strategies are heavily contingent upon conditions within South Africa. The presence or absence of demand by South African institutions and individuals about US activities and foreign policy goals shape how US informational campaigns are distributed and consumed within the South African information environment. Media events only become media events because someone outside the organizing body cares. Under apartheid the lack of plurality of media sources meant that the VOA was more in demand. When the ANC was pleased with American aid packages, it reiterated American messaging strategies and did the opposite when it was displeased. Beginning in January 2009, rather than working to push the American agenda forward, the services of foreign press officers were very much in demand due to widespread excitement within South Africa about the election of the first African American president (Hudson‐Deane 2009, interview). Domestic South African actors are thus critical to the production of any informational strategy. 202 There is also a problem in differentiating between what constitutes an informational “strategy” and what is simply a description of events. While the focus on trade was a key public diplomacy message, overall trade between South Africa and the United States did increase dramatically. Foreign Direct Investment and overall trade between the two countries did increase substantially during the period under study. Figure 4.3 provides an overview of US foreign direct investment in South Africa and South Africa’s investment in the United States in constant dollars. FIGURE 4.3: AMERICAN AND SOUTH AFRICAN FOREIGN DIRECT INVESTMENT Data Source: US Department of Commerce, Bureau of Economic Analysis (2009). 203 The United States provides the second largest source of foreign investment in South Africa, behind only Britain, South Africa’s former colonial power. Moreover, as depicted by Figure 4.4, while the balance of trade shifted in favor of the United States during the Clinton administration, during the Bush administration it moved the opposite direction, to a trade deficit of almost $3 billion, favoring South Africa. FIGURE 4.4: BALANCE OF TRADE IN GOODS AND SERVICES BETWEEN THE US AND SOUTH AFRICA (1992 – 2007). Data Source: US Department of Commerce, Bureau of Economic Analysis (2009). Finally, documenting US information strategies in service of US political interests necessarily invites questions of cause and effect. Measuring outcomes is a particular conundrum for a study of informational strategies and state power. Nye 204 (2008) points to the gap between co‐optive power resources as expressed through public diplomacy and measured outcomes: Public diplomacy tries to attract by drawing attention to potential [power] resources . . . But if the content of a country’s culture, values, and policies are not attractive, public diplomacy that “broadcasts” them cannot produce soft power. It may produce just the opposite (95). Public diplomacy campaigns (or media diplomacy, or public relations, etc.) are not the only determinants of foreign policy successes and failures, nor are they the only determinants of changes in public opinion for better or for worse. While we can point to broad trends in public opinion as evidence of successes or failures, measuring causality is difficult if not impossible. Opinion polling in South Africa, particularly during the Clinton administration, has been sporadic at best and largely limited to urban centers. We know that in 2002, despite the emphasis on partnership and expanding investment opportunities in Africa, only 29 percent of South Africans believed that American policies lessened the gap between rich and poor countries and only 23 percent believed that the US took South African interests into account when formulating international policy (Pew 2002). Of course, as with all diplomatic outreach strategies, measuring the relative influence of information policies and programs is problematic, if not impossible. Despite the US charm offensive, the vast disconnect between American rhetoric and the reality of on–the‐ ground programs breeds disparate responses, which are hard to gauge via opinion polls or even interviews. Moreover, as the next chapter will argue, 205 cultural/ideological goals are sometimes achieved even as immediate foreign policy goals result in failure. 206 CHAPTER 5: CONDITIONING MINDS: PROMOTING US CULTURE AND IDEOLOGY Why are we Americanising ourselves, why? – Jacob Zuma, Launch of the Creative Workers Union of South Africa (September 9, 2007) The media in South Africa are moving to smash the golden calves of dictators and overturn the tablets of law. Louise Bourgault (1995) In tandem with the strategies promoting American political foreign‐policy agendas and platforms described in Chapter 4, actors within the US government have also participated in a range of informational activities designed to foster a more general appreciation for the United States’ cultural and ideological worldview within South Africa. They promote the ideal of democracy and free markets through direct advocacy (e.g. speeches, media campaigns, and press releases) as well as by encouraging a subset of practices and ideals considered to be fundamental pre‐ requisites for their practical implementation, including a free and independent press; a domestic civil society that actively promotes democracy, human rights, free‐ press ideals, and economic development; and a media and ICT‐literate society. Informational strategies designed to promote US culture are related, yet slightly different. These strategies promote American customs, values, and ideas as well as their material manifestations (e.g. movies, cinema, TV, etc.) within South Africa. 207 These cultural products and programs may be imbued with “American” ideology, and/or designed to promote relationship building and/or cross‐cultural collaboration. Taken together, these strategies (those promoting ideology and those promoting culture) have sought an isomorphism of content and structure of the South African information environment towards the US model. They seek to create a more hospitable climate for state and non‐state American actors and interests: for business, for development, and for foreign policy agendas. State actors promote American culture and ideology through four primary axes of intervention in the South African information environment: (1) directly advocating democratic capitalism within South Africa through media diplomacy; (2) funding civil society groups who advocate the same; (3) media assistance programs designed to foster a flourishing Fourth Estate press; and (4) cultural diplomacy. Table 5.1 provides a typology of US government ideological and cultural strategies and the related governmental organizations responsible for their production. 208 TABLE 5.1: TYPOLOGY OF US CULTURAL/IDEOLOGICAL INFORMATION STRATEGIES TARGETING THE SOUTH AFRICAN INFORMATION ENVIRONMENT Methods Approach to Information Channels/Actors Goals Direct Advocacy As a tool to promote ideals and values DOS, USAID, White House Public & Elite Opinion Supporting & Fostering Sympathetic Domestic Groups: Funding, Market analysis, End‐user training, Information diffusion As a tool to promote ideals and values USAID, IRI, NED, NDI, Freedom House, USAID, USIA (until 1999) Creating the necessary meso‐ level civil society groups (Community Organizations, Social Movements, Health Service Providers, NGOS) necessary to enact macro‐level democratization Media Assistance: Independent Media Networks, Media Literacy, Journalism Training, Media Policy, Trade Association Development As infrastructure for democratic capitalism USAID Office of Democracy and Governance, State Department Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, Freedom House, NDI Creating the necessary meso‐ level institutions and agencies necessary for a Fourth Estate Press Cultural Diplomacy: Screenings, Shows, Cultural Exchanges, etc. As a tool to promote US culture and values and as infrastructure for democratic capitalism USIA (until 1999), US Embassy Public opinion & elite opinion As noted in Table 5.1, these methods of intervention are each undergirded by a specific approach to information. Public diplomacy and subsets of cultural 209 diplomacy campaigns utilize information as a tool with which to encourage appreciation for US ideals, values, and practices. Media assistance actors consider a free press a necessary prerequisite for broader transformations such as the flourishing of democracy and free markets. In this sense, the media as a Fourth Estate provide infrastructure for democracy and capitalism to flourish. Corresponding to these different approaches to information, these strategies target different facets of the information environment. Media assistance programs are concerned with shaping the practices and protocols of individual journalists at the micro level and of their respective organizations at the meso level. Cultural diplomacy programs on the other hand work across several levels. Some strategies, such as those produced by USIA and later the US Embassy, seek to insert American content into media networks, while others directly target individuals by inviting them to participate in US cultural content and appreciation programs. Of course, as this chapter will argue, these attempts are neither cohesive nor necessarily articulated according to this framework. But they are drawn together in this chapter because they share an overarching strategy: creating a South African environment that encourages a worldview that is compatible with American values and interests. This chapter examines how US actors have sought to promote American ideology and culture within the South African information environment in four sections. First, it explores the definitional issues surrounding the study of information strategies in service of ideology and culture. Second, it examines how 210 the US government efforts to promote the ideal of democracy, either through direct advocacy or by funding sympathetic domestic groups. Third, it outlines media training and development programs. Last, it looks at cultural diplomacy activities. Anatomy of Informational Strategies for Ideology and Culture A consideration of how the US utilizes informational strategies to foster appreciation for US culture and ideology necessitates closer attention to two questions: (1) What exactly is an American ideology? and (2) Once defined, how does this complicated entity conceive of and produce an ideological and cultural worldview? First, when we refer to an American ideology, what precisely do we mean? The information strategies promoting American foreign policy as described in the preceding chapter were undergirded by a particular ideology. Ideology, both as a rationalization and a motivation, is central to the policy‐making process and to the advocacy of those policies through informational strategy. 69 US government officials rarely announce a new foreign policy agenda without linking it in some way to the grander scheme of promoting democracy, freedom, and economic prosperity. However, foreign policy is generally issue‐specific and/or linked (genuinely or not) to the implementation of the methods with which a particular societal ideal might 69 Michael Hunt (2009) makes a compelling case for the centrality of ideology in foreign policy in his book Ideology and Foreign Policy. 211 be achieved. While there are varying conceptions and interpretations of what constitutes ideology, 70 in this chapter I define political ideology as the collection of ideals, principals, and myths that upholds a particular vision of the way in which society and or a substratum of society should operate. In South Africa as elsewhere, the US has used informational strategies to promote democracy, free‐markets, and (more so during the Bush administration) “freedom” as guiding ideals. These informational strategies take two principal forms: strategies designed to promote an abstract appreciation for a particular model of society, and the establishment of communication structures and practices believed to be necessary pre‐requisites for the fulfillment of that ideal. Information strategies designed to promote American ideological and cultural perspectives in South Africa then necessarily target multiple‐levels: public opinion, the domestic organizations and institutions that produce content, and the individuals that constitute both. Political ideology as expressed by state actors is constructed according to two parts: the ideal itself, and the mechanisms and methods through which that ideal might be achieved. Democracy as an ideal promises equality, participation, open society, human rights, individual rights, etc. The methods and mechanisms through which the ideal of democracy is achieved may include such things as the conduct of free and fair elections, the establishment of a free and independent media, the protection of human rights, among others. In another example, market 70 See for example Althusser (2008), Knight (2006), and Thompson (1990). 212 capitalism as an ideology promises to achieve prosperity and opportunity through open markets, liberalized trade rules, and consumption. There are informational strategies designed to promote the ideal itself and those designed to ensure that the necessary mechanisms and methods to achieve that ideal are in place. However, no two government employees and/or no two Americans in general would describe the goals and methods of democracy and/or the free market in precisely the same way. Baker (2005), Jost (2006), and perhaps most famously Converse (1964) have demonstrated that there is no one set of “traditional” and/or “American” values. However, while there are definitive disagreements about the methods by which to achieve democracy, government actors almost uniformly embrace democracy as an overarching goal for society both within the US and abroad. No one speaking in an official government capacity insinuates that democracy as an ideal is bad. Across US government departments, promoting democracy as a goal is almost universal, although different bureaus, individuals, and departments might differ on how best to define that ideal and the best methods of reaching said goal. Particularly since September 11, government actors have noted the importance of long‐term relationship‐building public diplomacy activities and related programs that develop and promote an American ethos of freedom and 213 democracy. 71 For example, when asked about public diplomacy in an interview with Foreign Policy, Colin Powell (2001) answered: What are we doing? We’re selling a product. The product we are selling is democracy. It’s the free enterprise system, the American value system. It’s a product very much in demand. It’s a product that is very much needed. While government actors “sell” the “American value system” through a number of activities (i.e. election monitoring, skills training, etc.), this chapter is principally concerned with state attempts to diffuse the “American” ideological and cultural worldview within South Africa by actively seeking to influence the information environment in order to foster and/or amplify trends within the domestic information sphere that are conducive to US interests and values and to its constituent actors. For example, belief in free market ideals may lead to more opportunities for US MNCs. The closer the South African press system mirrors the functions of the US press, the more likely that the political values and practices in South Africa will complement American ones. Typically, examinations of the spread of ideology and the spread of culture have been conducted through the lens of cultural imperialism and/or according to an examination of North/South/Center/Periphery relationships. Herbert Schiller presented an encompassing definition of the processes through which culture and ideology are used to further the goals of the “center”: 71 In another example, the Djerjian Report (2003) on US public diplomacy cites the need to stress America’s role as a liberator and a builder of democracy, not as conqueror and occupier (68). See also GAO (2004, 2005, and 2009); and USAID (2008). 214 The sum of the processes by which a society is brought into the modern world system and how its dominating stratum is attracted, pressured, forces and sometimes even bribed into shaping social institutions to correspond to, or even promote, the value sand structures of the dominating center of the system (1976, 9, also quoted in Sreberny‐Mohammadi 2006, 49). However, the imperialism school typically focuses on the total system. What Hamelink calls “cultural synchronization” between the center (e.g. the United States) and the periphery (in this case South Africa) occurs as a by‐product of the capitalist flow of media and other cultural goods. An examination of micro and meso‐level activities in both the core and the periphery that constitute that system is largely absent. As Annabelle Sreberny‐Mohammadi (1997) argues, “Schiller’s interest lay in documenting the rise of American corporate power and its ideological expansion worldwide via the media” (49). While the capitalist flow of American cultural products clearly plays a role in promoting American culture and ideology around the globe, and vice‐versa, the role of the state in this process is largely assumed rather than explicated. In reality, the observed behaviors of US promotion of culture and ideology in South Africa are more nuanced. These strategies represent attempts to foster an appreciation for “American” values of democracy and a flourishing and deregulated Fourth Estate press, values that the producers of these strategies genuinely consider to be universal human rights. This process involves much more than targeting public opinion on specific issues, such as PEPFAR or AGOA. It involves attempts to influence both producers and consumers of mediated communications at the cultural and ideological level. These strategies take many 215 forms: media training and assistance, democracy promotion and education, and the use of cultural diplomacy programs. These are strategies with long‐term (or what Leonard (2003) and others refer to as “relationship building”) components. It should be stressed that the individual producers of these programs almost to a fault report a genuine belief in the benefits they may offer South Africa and US‐South Africa relations, and do not consider themselves as participating in a premeditated attempt to promote US grand strategy. 72 Selling Democracy In the early 1990s, despite Nelson Mandela’s heroic status and general outpourings of international goodwill, speculation remained about whether the new government would adequately manage the still robust South African economy and draw the disparate revolutionary and political factions into a cohesive political project for rebuilding the nation and the African continent. In contrast to other African nations, at independence South Africa benefited from robust civil society, aided by both domestic and international forces (including the US) during apartheid and a widespread support for democratic principals. Yet, tensions remained. Many within the ANC still professed (and continue to express) an interest an allegiance to 72 Although, cultural imperialists would argue that is because these actors are agents of power so embedded in the systems level, that they are unaware of its existence. 216 socialism and/or communist ideologies. 73 The United States and other Western powers wanted to ensure that a full South African democratic transition took hold and that democracy evolved in the “right way” (Hearn 2000). Of particular concern was the belief that leaders of the liberation struggle had transferred to their supporters an appreciation of an “economic, as opposed to a procedural view of democracy” (Mattes & Thiel 1998). USAID officials in particular watched worriedly as South African public approval of national and local governments dropped by about 10 percent in the three years following the 1994 election (Hearn 2000, 825). During the 1990s, the United States government was far and away the largest funder of South African civil society groups (Joseph 1997). The bulk of this funding went towards democracy organizations concerned with the overall relationship between politicians and society (Hearn 2000, 826). Moreover, it had already established connections to some of the most high profile indigenous NGOs such as the Institute for a Democracy in South Africa (IDASA), which the US had been funding since the 1980s. 74 The majority of these grants, particularly during the 1990s went towards institutions and structures concerned with democracy promotion. For example, in 1993, Congress allocated a grant of $1,907,000 to a consortium of NDI, NRI, and the Joint Center for Economic and Political Studies to 73 Longtime Minister of Finance, Trevor Manuel famously said of Mbeki, that in the past “you couldn't be a social democrat and think like [Ronald) Reagan, now things are turned on their head” (quoted in Gumede 2006, 2007). 74 See Figure 4.1 for an overview of the trends in US grant making to South African institutions between 1986 and 2008. 217 provide training for politicians on how to compete in multi‐party elections. This section is principally concerned with the role of the US in supporting programs, organizations, and the creation of institutions designed to promote a broader public appreciation for democracy, market liberalization, and the Fourth Estate. Former State Department advisor Howard Wiarda presents a concise argument for the benefits of democracy promotion: A US stance in favor of democracy helps get the Congress, the bureaucracy, the media, the public, and elite opinion to back US policy. It helps ameliorate the domestic debate, disarms critics (who could be against democracy?) ... The democracy agenda enables us, additionally, to merge and fudge over some issues that would otherwise be troublesome. It helps bridge the gap between our fundamental geopolitical and strategic interests ... and our need to clothe those security concerns in moralistic language ... The democracy agenda, in short, is a kind of legitimacy cover for our more basic strategic objectives (Wiarda 1990, 270, also quoted in Robinson 1996, 73). Democracy promotion is in itself the cornerstone of American foreign policy. LeMay (2007), in his analysis of media assistance strategies, concludes that this promotion, although inspired by the work of academics like Lerner (1958) and Schramm (1964), has been largely a‐theoretical, based on the premise that democracy (and capitalism) are better than the alternatives and that a flourishing Fourth Estate is the critical to this process (36). This is evidenced through a variety of strategies. First, USAID and the State Department have produced and funded a number of activities designed to increase conversations and actions surrounding democracy promotion in South Africa. For example, USAID gave DATEX, Inc., $11.5 million to 218 establish regional linkages and promote a broader appreciation of democracy. They also gave the National Institute for Public Interest Law and Research (NIPILR) $3.5 million to establish 18 democracy centers around the country. Second, government funding has been funneled through several quasi‐governmental democracy promotion organizations. In 1982, President Ronald Reagan addressed the British parliament: Let us now begin a major effort to secure the best—a crusade for freedom that will engage the faith and fortitude of the next generation. For the sake of peace and justice, let us move toward a world in which all people are at last free to determine their own destiny. Following this speech, Congress allocated $31.3 million to establish the non‐profit grant‐making foundation, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), which was tasked with launching four non‐profit organizations that would be the foot soldiers of democracy promotion around the world. These organizations included the NDI, the IRI, the American Center for International Labor Organizations (ACILO), the NED, and the Center for International Private Enterprise (CIPE). For the last 25 years these organizations have operated as 501(c) non‐profit organizations, principally funded through grants from USAID, the State Department, and the NED. In terms of democracy promotion, the IRI, the NED, and the NDI have been the most active in South Africa. NED involvement in the country began shortly after its endowment. It quietly funneled money and vehicles to both the ANC and the Zulu Inkatha movement (Dizard 2004, 207). Both the NDI and the IRI established 219 offices in South Africa in the early 1990s and began to spread training and financial backing to US‐friendly civil society organizations. In 1994, the IRI launched the Free Society Project in partnership with the South African Institute of Race Relations (SAIRR), a civil society organization dedicated to implementing democracy‐ strengthening initiatives. Still operating, the Free Society Project “aims to increase the influence of the Free Society Project’s views on individual liberty and economic freedom, informing the national debate of a vision of a free South African society within a free, prosperous, and economically integrated sub‐continent.” The NDI has also been active, producing voter education manuals and sponsoring the visits of delegations from other African countries such as Cote D’Ivoire to learn about democracy in South Africa, and vice versa. More recently, the NDI in South Africa has turned its attention towards providing support to the Zimbabwe opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), and elevating the MDC’s profile in South Africa in hopes of pressuring more stringent action against the Mugabe regime. The majority of these programs remain unadvertised (Cormier 2008). The NDI in South Africa has been involved in providing members of the MDC assistance in media relations, marketing, and in refining their public policy statements. It also helps to arrange visits to South Africa so that MDC members may conduct press conferences and other meetings with members of the international and South African press. However, the NDI keeps these activities low profile in order not to 220 diminish the MDC reputation (Cormier 2008). As such, documenting the full extent of these programs is difficult. In addition, there are strategies that are not necessarily targeted toward South Africa, but that have implications for US government activities there. The US government has funded organizations such as Freedom House and IREX, which provide influential rankings of the quality of democracy in individual countries and the quality of press freedom. Freedom House, a US‐based INGO that produces research, reports, and rankings on the performance of democracy and the press in countries around the world, receives over $20 million in federal funding per year, by far the bulk of its budget. Freedom House in turn also lobbies the US government to expand activities for democracy promotion worldwide. Freedom House was one of the most vocal opponents of apartheid and proponents of the divestiture of US companies from South Africa, and has maintained operations in the country since 1994. Other American foundations have also played a critical role in promoting democracy in South Africa. As early as the 1920s, the Phelps Stokes Fund of New York made grants for black education (although this program was discontinued during WWII) (Berman 1983). During apartheid, the Center for Applied Legal Studies at the University of Witwatersrand, funded by the Carnegie Foundation, sought legal recourses to the reform of apartheid. While formally a non‐state actor, reference should be made to the importance of the Ford Foundation and other US 221 NGOs in fulfilling democracy promotion efforts in South Africa and in the southern African region. The Ford Foundation established its office in Johannesburg (one of 12 regional offices worldwide) in 1993, before the official end of apartheid, and provides upwards of $16 million in grants to southern African organizations each year. US government strategies that attempted to open up the South African communications environment in service of US business interests will be discussed in greater detail in the following chapter. However, something should be said here about efforts to promote neoliberal economic reforms as an ideology in tandem with the broader campaigns describe in Chapter 4. As previously mentioned, particularly in the early 1990s, many within the US administration feared that South Africa could move towards socialism or communism. US agencies have sponsored a number of training programs designed to link economic reform and market liberalism to democracy building and good governance, such as the Free Society Project. In other examples, the IRI has conducted financial training workshops for government actors. USAID has also provided entrepreneurship training with organizations like EDSA. And, in 2000, it provided the Media Institute of South Africa (MISA) with $875,000 in order to conduct an open airwaves campaign lobbying the public in favor of the economic deregulation of the media environment. The State Department and USAID also funded trade workshops and training for journalists in economic principals (see Appendix D for more details of these programs). 222 Promoting Media as an Actor in Society Speaking before a USAID‐sponsored 75 investigative journalism class at the University of Rhodes in 2006, Dr. Carleene Dei, USAID Director, told the class, “Now that this country is proudly democratic and peaceful, it is important to entrench the hallmarks of a free society, such as journalists who know how to probe and report news accurately.” Efforts at media and information technology development go hand in hand with US ideological strategies. While related, these attempts at media training are programmatically separate from lobbying efforts on behalf of American media companies and from ICT training programs, which are funded by economic development offices rather than those involved in democracy promotion (as described in chapters 2 and 6). Media development experts within USAID and other offices, while often asked to promote a deregulated media system, more typically present their goals in terms of development language and consider media programs to be largely a‐political in motivation, although they assert that they have domestic political ramifications. While the State Department highlights the need to win foreign public opinion in order to further democracy promotion or other stated diplomatic goals, those concerned with media development like USAID, the NED, and the semi‐autonomous non‐profits IREX and Intermedia focus more narrowly on developing an 75 This class received $300,000 in USAID funding. 223 independent media as a pathway to other development goals (whether they be political, economic, or both). Krishna Kumar (2006), Senior Policy Analyst, Bureau for Policy and Program Coordination, Center for Development Information and Evaluation at USAID, cautions against an expanded conception of media assistance, warning that “blurring the distinction between the … endeavors creates false expectations in donor countries and genuine apprehensions in recipient nations. US policy‐makers, for example, would expect and demand that media projects promote a better understanding of our policies abroad, and evaluate the success and failure of such projects accordingly” (3). Despite the reservations voiced by media development practitioners about integrating media assistance and public diplomacy activities, US government literature and public communication strategies invariably promote free and open media system as the cornerstone of democracy. For example, “since the 1980s, USAID has supported the growth of independent media as part of its strategy for promoting democracy and open societies” (USAID 2004, ix). Of course, the inadequacies of the US media system are largely downplayed and the nuances of the media as a Fourth Estate are generally unexplored. In terms of Congressional budget justifications and similar public documents, the importance of media development is typically presented according to two rationales. First, media actors are the conduits through which cultural and ideological ideas are transmitted. Second, the structure, policy, and mores of the media both emanate from and can 224 influence broader ideological trends of a society. An open media system is presented as a necessity, although the specifics of the ideal system are rarely addressed. For example, the NED’s guiding documents stress the importance of an open communications system: Democracy involves the right of the people freely to determine their own destiny. The exercise of this right requires a system that guarantees freedom of expression, belief and association, free and competitive elections, respect for the inalienable rights of individuals and minorities, free communications media, and the rule of law. As described in Chapter 3, by African standards, the South African media environment has, since independence, been marked by relative diversity. It is among the most developed and highly saturated in sub‐Saharan Africa. Freedom House ranks South Africa in the top three “most free” media environments in sub‐ Saharan Africa (along with Mali and Mauritius). There are approximately 20 daily and 13 weekly newspapers, most of which are published in English. Approximately 14.5 million South Africans regularly consume urban daily publications, and community newspapers have a circulation of upwards of 5.5 million. Approximately 66.2 percent of South Africans regularly consume print media, 97.2 percent regularly listen to radio, 66.9 percent regularly consume television, and 22.8 percent access the Internet on a weekly basis (SAARF 2006). South African satellite television operators such as MNET and DSTV, who are also content providers, are expanding rapidly within South Africa and are the dominant providers across the continent. However, stations operated by the SABC (now a hybrid 225 public/commercial broadcaster) remain dominant among both satellite and terrestrial viewers. Despite its relative strength, the evolution of the South African media environment has been marked by controversy. Indeed, ambivalent attitudes about “the media”—their ability to both mobilize the South African Renaissance and/or be used as tools of ruling party imperial domination or subversion—have been a constant feature of the post‐apartheid media environment. As Chapter 6 will illustrate in more detail, in South Africa there has always been a tension between those who support media deregulation and those who believe the state should maintain control, and between those who support full press independence and those take a more developmental approach to journalism (i.e. the media should support the state in a project of nation building). The United States government has played a critical, if intermittent, role in funding and supporting organizations, institutions, and training that promote a watchdog press. Broadly defined, media assistance refers to the attempt of foreign actors to “assist” in the production, distribution, and regulatory practices of domestic media and new media. Assistance ranges from grants, journalist training, equipment provision, the training of regulators, to the funding and development of media 226 schools and professional organizations (Price 2002b). 76 Multiple surveys of media assistance programs have identified a link between broader foreign policy goals and media assistance programs. For example, an internal survey of USAID media assistance programs by the Bureau for Policy and Program Coordination found that Media assistance has contributed to the achievement of many foreign policy goals. It often, though not always, produced the same results that public diplomacy sought to achieve. In many countries, support to independent media created political space that enabled the United States to pursue specific foreign policy goals, such as holding of elections, promotion of human rights, or political reconciliation. (Kumar 2006, xiii). Similarly, in a 2002 Foreign Relations Committee Hearing on America’s Global Dialogue: Sharing American Values And The Way Ahead For Public Diplomacy, Chair Joseph Biden opened the conference with the statement: As we have learned, for better or worse, people tend to trust local sources of news and information more than they do foreign sources. Without a free, fair, and open flow of information in these societies, propaganda and misinformation are able to flourish. It is in our interests to have professional journalism abroad promoting the internal dialog that serves their interests as well. Public diplomacy is not just about what we say. It is about promoting an environment in which multiple voices, including our own, can be heard (Senate Foreign Relations Committee 2002, 2). “Media assistance” emerged as a significant component of international development aid in the late 1980s with the formal end of the Cold War. Civil society 76 For the purposes of the proposed study, media assistance includes programs designed to intervene directly in the creation and construction of domestic media producers and outlets. It does not include external transmissions into target societies such as AlHurra, VOA, and Radio Sawa. It also precludes the broadcasting of US government‐produced products on domestic platforms. 227 and development workers attributed the Soviet Union’s collapse in part to the presence of fledgling elements of a free press. Countless agencies and actors poured into Eastern Europe, contributing significant amounts of money to help nurture independent media and encourage full democratic transitions. Since 1989, the United States alone has contributed an estimated $1 billion for media development in closed and/or transition democracies around the world (Kumar 2006, 2). This figure represents only an estimate and does not take into account a number of related activities currently administered by the Defense Department, the CIA, and the National Security Association. 77 Nor does it take into account a wealth of “experts,” private contractors, and in‐kind contributors participating in the development of foreign national media spaces. Today, US government actors spend approximately $148 million per year on media assistance programs around the world (Olson 2008). Traditionally, these programs have focused on building commercial media, theorizing that professionalism will attract audiences, and have largely left civic education to nonprofit organizations (Ibid.). South African independence precipitated a flurry of media diversification and movements toward breaking white dominance over the media sector. Black journalist training emerged as critical “corrective measure” for greater black empowerment (Berger 1999). However, US media assistance programs during the 77 Sections 1206 and 1207 of the 2006 National Defense Authorization Act allow the Department of Defense to transfer limited funds and training to foreign countries to build partner capacity for the global War on Terrorism. Portions of these funds have been allocated towards media assistance training. 228 Clinton administration focused largely on training politicians in the appropriate methods of media outreach and the funding of government watchdogs who supported free press ideals through public lobbying. USAID, for example, provided grants to IDASA and IMSSA (Independent Mediation Service of Southern Africa) to conduct workshops with local and national government actors. At the same time, they provided grants to democratic watchdog groups to create and circulate newsletters documenting the democratic transition and the processes of reconciliation. The Media Monitoring Project (MMP), MISA, the South Africa Freedom of Expression Institute (FXI), the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC), and the Independent Media Diversity Trust (IMDT), as well as the state‐ sponsored Media Development and Diversity Agency (MDDA) are just a few organizations dedicated to the study and promotion of media freedom to which USAID has provided either advisory or financial support. These watchdogs are principally concerned with the quality of reporting, equality of access, the racial breakdown of media ownership, and evidence of state censorship. It was not until the waning days of the Clinton administration that the actual training of journalists became a more significant component of US programs in South Africa, when USAID provided $875,000 to MISA in 2000. These training programs increased under the Bush administration, peaking in 2004 with the 229 funding of two journalism schools at Wits and the University of Rhodes. 78 Perhaps coincidentally, although my interview subjects have not verified this, this rise in media training coincided with a more vocal offensive towards the press by Mbeki and the ANC in the wake of the further expansion of the arms scandal. Mbeki’s rise to the ANC presidency in 1997 facilitated a preoccupation with the role of the media in democracy in South Africa. As outlined in Chapter 3, Mbeki’s relationship with the South African press can only be described as acrimonious. For example, in his “Letter from the President” in ANC Today, Thabo Mbeki chastised reporters who focused on the ANC arms scandal as “fishers of corrupt men” and promised that the ANC: …will not abandon the offensive to defeat the insulting campaigns further to entrench a stereotype that has, for centuries, sought to portray Africans as a people that is corrupt, given to telling lies, prone to theft and self‐enrichment by immoral means, a people that is otherwise contemptible in the eyes of the ‘civilized’ (Mbeki 2003). This is but one instance in which Mbeki called for the need for positive reporting. He frequently equated negative reporting about the ANC or allies of the ANC with support of the “media apartheid” and an undermining of the African Renaissance. 78 Formal journalism training surfaced in South Africa in the late 1950s, when the Afrikaans-language Potchefstroom University (PU) launched a journalism department. A decade later, the second department opened at Rhodes University, with funding from the Education Ministry, which was anticipating a demand for media specialists following the launch of the first national television station. During the 1970s, journalism departments proliferated (among white universities) and in the 1980s the majority of existing journalism programs introduced a media studies component. Three historically black universities (Fort Hare, Zululand, and Bophuthatswana) opened journalism departments in the 1980s, but these programs focused on teaching rather than research. The majority of the research produced during this time period was (1) published in Afrikaans, (2) utilized white subjects, and/or (3) contained questionable research methods predicated on racist ideologies. 230 Other South African politicians commonly share Mbeki’s attitude towards media power in South Africa. An ANC report released in August 2002, titled “Media in a Democratic South Africa,” notes: Our profound interest in understanding mass communication in general and mass media in particular arise from our acceptance of our role as the leader of the national democratic forces for transformation. It is therefore expected that, we should be the main communicators of the South African vision, which in turn will influence attitudes and values of the broader society. Mbeki’s election also coincided with a growing realization both domestically in South Africa and in Washington that storm clouds were on the horizon for the Rainbow Nation, including the highest levels of income inequality in the world, stark racial divides, and skyrocketing crime rates. His contentious position towards the SABC and the press in general raised warning bells in Washington, DC. Concern reached a crescendo in 1998 when Minister Jay Naidoo began moves to corporatize elements of SABC while at the same time removed constitutional guarantees that protected the independence of the IBA. This move prompted five years of heated debate on the role of national broadcasting and raised criticisms of the ANC’s attempts to bend both platforms to the needs of the party at the cost of the principals of Forth Estate journalism. Objections centered mainly on the fact that the MOC would be the principal stakeholder in the new corporate SABC and would need to approve all board policies on programming and editorial content. These criticisms became louder with the appointment as Chair of Eddie Funde, Mbeki’s 231 close friend and an ANC stalwart. 79 Not surprisingly, US support for institutions concerned with media diversity and freedom also increased during this period. In 2000, USAID gave MISA $400,000, its then largest donation to media law reform in Africa, to set up a legal defense fund for media organizations. It also provided funds to the Southern African Regional Democracy Fund (SARDF) to conduct advocacy campaigns on behalf of a free and independent media. Peter Golding (1977, 292) has argued that professionalism is “an ideology that has been transferred in parallel to the transfer of technology as part of the general stream of cultural dependence” (cited in Sreberny‐Mohammadi 1997, 60). A Kenyan media scholar Uche (1986) also argues, “by his training and exposure, the Third World journalist has been acculturated to Western media culture.” (12). While not conceived of as a process of indoctrination per se, media assistance programs are a critical means through which US government actors have sought to shape the behaviors of the individuals and organizations responsible for circulating content within the South African information sphere. These programs are underpinned by a particular conception of the role of the press and the ideal vision of society. However, as outlined in Chapter 3 and elsewhere, the South African media represents a plurality rather than a diversity of voices. While the print media maintain a healthy rivalry with the ANC, the information channels that reach the largest percentage of the population (e.g. SABC radio and television) remain under 79 The Broadcasting Act finally passed in 2003, turning SABC into a public service company, which was largely considered to be an ANC victory over press freedom. 232 the control of a government weary of fully independent press. However, as the next section will demonstrate, US government actors have influenced the content of SABC and other media outlets in other ways, through partnerships, cultural promotions, and other exercises. Cultural Diplomacy Operating independently from these above efforts have been a host of cultural diplomacy programs that promote US culture and US‐South African cultural exchanges in service of improved public diplomatic relations in the country. Today, South Africa is the only country in sub‐Saharan Africa to play a prominent role in the trade of core cultural goods (UNESCO 2005). As previously mentioned, it has a diversified media environment, as well as active theater, music, and traditional arts industries. However, it is also generally considered to be the most “Americanized” country on the continent. Between 1994 and 1999, outside investors poured money into South Africa’s cultural industries. It was during this period that South Africa began to fully integrate into the global media network (Arsenault & Castells 2008; Berger 1999, 97). Time Warner, for example, purchased a 20 percent stake in the Midi consortium, which owned E‐TV and won a hotly contested television broadcast license in 1998. At the same time, utilizing these increased connections, external cultural products poured into South Africa. 233 South Africans frequently complain about the Americanization of their country. As of 2003, 21.3 percent of South African cultural imports came from the United States (UNESCO 2005, 32). US television programs dominate both the state and non‐state broadcast channels. Multichoice, the main satellite television provider, carries a majority of American stations. And even politicians have adopted American‐style campaigning tactics. 80 Sreberny‐Mohammadi (1997) argues that Tomlinson (1991) “situates the general problematic of cultural domination within a global process of ‘the imposition of social institutions of modernity … capitalism, bureaucracy, urban‐industrialism … a Western praxis’ yet is not particularly concerned to explore precisely how those broad institutional forces operate” (50). This section is an attempt to explore how US government institutions further American culture and related American products within South Africa. It examines cultural diplomacy, as it is traditionally defined in US government circles, as the promotion of US cultural activities such as film, music, theater, art, etc. Of course, culture and ideology are intertwined. This inter‐relationship is stressed again and again by government actors rationalizing cultural diplomacy budgets who argue that “the values embedded in our artistic and intellectual traditions form a bulwark against the forces of darkness” (US Advisory Commission 80 Fifty-eight percent of the South African party managers and campaign experts have utilized US consultants (Plasser 2000, 53). The ANC also frequently hires Applied Marketing and Communications (AM&C), one of South Africa’s most successful agencies that advertizes its ability provide US-style campaign tactics. Moreover, in the first open election in 1994, the ANC hired Bill Clinton’s media advisors Stanley Greenberg and Frank Geer, and the National Party used Saatchi & Saatchi (Plasser 2000, 47). 234 on Cultural Diplomacy 2005, 1). Cultural promotion is considered an ideal method of reaching out to “non‐elites,” youth, and those with poor English skills (Ibid, 5); it is a method of reaching foreign “minds” through their “hearts,” rather than more ideological strategies which take the opposite approach. It should also be said that private flows of cultural goods are perhaps the most important component of US cultural influence in South Africa. This section is concerned with ways in which US government actors seek to augment and/or capitalize on those flows. Cultural diplomacy is commonly considered a core component of US public diplomacy. Long before Time Warner, Disney, or NewsCorp consolidated their global empires (Arsenault & Castells 2008), the USIA distributed US cultural products on a global and a multimedia scale. Created in 1953 during a period when most of the world still struggled to build and/or rebuild its communications industries after two destructive world wars, the USIA found local populations hungry for any American cultural products that they could deliver. The USIA not only distributed, but also produced hundreds of newsreels, films, and documentaries designed for foreign audiences. Some of the most enduring images of the USIA from this period are of appreciative audiences greeting USIA‐owned Jeeps and riverboats outfitted as mobile projection units (Dizard 2004, 162‐73). In the late 1980s, increased pressure for a complete South African boycott ended cultural diplomacy programs, if only briefly. In response to calls within the global academic community for a policy of constructive engagement with leftist 235 members of the South African intelligentsia, the USIA—principally due to the efforts of cultural attaché Brooks Spector—was one of the first governmental organizations, American or otherwise, to re‐open cultural programs. Fulbright professors returned to the more progressive South African universities (with the permission of the National Education Crisis Committee (NECC) 81 ) in 1990. In 1992, Spector‐led negotiations between the USIA, the NECC, and others to authorize the renewal of American cultural exchanges and the Embassy began the first officially authorized US‐South African exchanges in a decade. These first programs stressed America’s commitment to a multi‐racial society and included a two‐week tour of a play by the African American playwright August Wilson and a tour by the Dance Theatre of Harlem. Both productions performed in front of de‐segregated audiences; and the Dance Theatre also selected several South Africans—black, white, and colored—to return to Harlem to participate in another performance (Spector 2009, interview). During the majority of the Clinton administration, cultural and public diplomacy were considered the USIA’s domain. In 1999, after the Foreign Affairs and Restructuring Act collapsed the USIA into the State department, cultural diplomacy programs were taken over by US Embassy cultural affairs and public affairs officers (who were/are likely former USIS employees). Some of these cultural diplomacy programs are routine and largely perfunctory. For example, 81 A parent-student-teacher alliance, founded in 1985 to build educational structures for Black South Africans. 236 each February, the US Embassy sponsors events around South Africa that celebrate African American History Month. These activities include things like print exhibits of African American art, sponsored screenings of the film epic Ray about the life of Ray Charles. USAID has also funded a series of media development programs, programs that aim not to improve the media itself but to use the media as a conduit for development. For example, beginning in the 1990s, USAID gave funding to the Sesame Street Workshop to create a multi‐racial South African version of the show. In 2002, it provided further funding so that Kami, an HIV‐positive Muppet could move onto Sesame Street and teach South African children about AIDS prevention. In 2004, USAID also provided funding to SABC to produce Tsha Tsha, a program about young people living with HIV. These programs, while health related, are also an exercise in cultural diplomacy—using culture to improve awareness about AIDS, a subject of great debate between the Mbeki government and the Clinton administration followed by the Bush administration. These activities are also carefully promoted as humanitarian gestures. In a strange use of language, USAID (2003) circulated a press release, after Takalani Sesame won an award at the World Media Festival: The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) quietly stands behind the scenes celebrating the awards won by South Africa’s Takalani Sesame World AIDS Day episode at the recent World Media Festival. 237 Takalani Sesame has been lauded for its cultural sensitivity; however each iteration of Sesame Street promotes a set of values culturally linked to the United States. The Children’s Television Workshop (CTW) was roundly criticized for indoctrinating children in the US ethos. Their move towards co‐productions, evolved in part out of those criticism, as CTW employees explained: “exporting television around the world to countries requesting them may seem to produce an inevitable uniformity of television content around the world. Our effort [i.e. co‐productions] is to produce the opposite effect “(quoted in Selznick 2008, 133). However, while American children may watch Burt and Ernie and South African children may watch Kami, these characters still live on the same street, just different ends of the block. Underlying the culturally‐specific characters is a set of values linked to the United States and to the American worldview. In the last few years, as concern about America’s overall reputation has increased inside government, there has been a renewed focus on providing American reading and reference material as an “a‐political” form of outreach. While most USIA libraries closed after 1999, the Rosa Parks Library remains open, due in part to the fact that many of the ANC leaders frequented the Soweto location during apartheid and because of interest and support from the Congressional Black Caucus. While still popular among the local community, it also doubles as a historical marker of America’s long‐term commitment to an independent South Africa (Dobson 2009). In March 2009, Consul General Andrew Passen unveiled a new section of the library, 238 the Small Business Corner, which provides entrepreneurial guides and computers for aspiring business leaders in the area, a complement to the broader push for an appreciation of free markets referenced in previous sections of this chapter. Over the last five years, the Embassy and the Consulate in Cape Town have also moved to expand existing resource centers and libraries and open new ones in more “accessible locations.” While the Embassy and the Consulate both maintain resource centers, security measures implemented after September 11 have discouraged visitors who would rather not go through three security gates to check out a book. In recognition of that fact, the Embassy has increasingly worked through local partners to provide American content in existing libraries and schools. For example, in October 2004, the US Embassy in South Africa established an “American Corner,” housed in the Verwoerd High School in Pretoria and open to the public. The corner contains books, periodicals, and computers with Internet access in order to provide “comprehensive and accurate information about American society, culture, values, and education” (US Diplomatic Mission to South Africa 2004). 82 To date, the majority of traffic to the corner has been driven by high school students in search of research materials (Deane‐Connors 2008). In 2008, under the direction of Deane‐ Connors, the Embassy, in partnership with the University of Pretoria, launched the 82 There are currently over 175 “American Corners” around the world. An American Corner, is based on a formal partnership between an American embassy and a host country institution, and is an information outpost with multimedia collections of publicly accessible books, periodicals, CD-ROMs, and videos on American history, politics, literature, society, and culture. 239 Mae Jemison Science Centre at a semi‐rural satellite campus. The Centre targets lower‐income middle and high school students, most of whom have no money for expensive science textbooks. It features a complete library of science and literature as well as a screening room, televisions, computers, and a media library of American movies about science. The Centre’s popularity far exceeded Embassy‐staffer expectations, though broadband Internet and air‐conditioning probably may have something to do with student enthusiasm. 83 However, according to staff members and under my observation, the students make full use of the library and particularly the Internet to conduct research and watch science‐related documentaries and feature films. The Mae Jemison Centre is a valuable resource for the local community, and its staff conveys a genuine belief in the value of its educational mission. However, while cultural diplomacy programs like the Centre promote “cross‐ cultural understanding” and often originate from the best of motives, there is still a side effect. These cultural diplomacy programs also promote and/or familiarize local populations with American books, movies, television programs, music, and more. Consumption of US cultural goods is also tightly interwoven with larger ideological strategies. The promotion of a free press, the ideological acceptance of the practices of democracy as promoted by the United States, and the promotion of 83 I visited the center and interacted with the students in February 2009. I arrived well before the Centre opened, but students were already lining up. In casual conversation, the students expressed their appreciation for the Center resources, although it appeared that few if any were aware of that this was an Embassy project, particularly because local Embassy employees are its primary staffers. 240 market liberalism may also result in an increased appetite for US cultural products that reflect this ethos. Influencing the Public Mind The efforts by US government actors to make the South African information environment more hospitable for US culture and values, as described above, are concurrent, but not hierarchical or coordinated. In programmatic terms, cultural diplomacy, media assistance, and international broadcasting interact seldom if ever and are responsible to different departments and actors in Washington. The VOA reports to the BBG. The Public Affairs Officer at the US Embassy in Pretoria reports to the Bureau of Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs at the DOS. Media assistance program directors report to USAID or to IREX or Intermedia (who ultimately justify their budgets to USAID). Figure 5.1 provides an overview of the processes of US cultural and ideological strategies toward South Africa as analyzed in this chapter. 241 FIGURE 5.1: PROCESSUAL MODEL OF US GOVERNMENT CULTURAL AND IDEOLOGICAL INFORMATION STRATEGIES First, there is a process of brokering between different branches of US government that determine the US cultural and ideological agenda in South Africa. Second, this brokering dictates the funding levels provided to the organizations working within South Africa. The State Department and USAID provide budget justifications based on their opinion of conditions on the ground. Congress determines funding levels based on their own agenda, pressure from the Oval Office, and pressure from USAID and the State Department. USAID and the State Department then use these funds for ideological and cultural strategies in multiple ways. They directly produce programs that promote US culture and/or ideology. They fund domestic South African organizations that facilitate these goals and/or 242 they provide funding to quasi‐governmental organizations like the NDI and the IRI to engage in similar strategies. Third, these strategies target non‐governmental organizations like IDASA, MISA, citizen groups, journalists, and members of government. Some strategies directly influence those individuals responsible for producing media content in order to facilitate a democratic environment and others target media content, seeking to create a news agenda that favors US influence. Fourth, and perhaps most importantly, the majority of the arrows in Figure 5.1 are marked with dollar signs, reflecting the transfer of government grants and assistance to organizations and actors who favor these cultural and ideological strategies. Arguably, the most effective component of these strategies has been funding indigenous organizations that in turn promote the ideals that the US favors. IDASA, ACCORD, MISA, and others continue to maintain an active and influential presence in South African discussions about media and democracy issues, although their main goals are specific reforms not US promotion. But the question remains, to what extent have these ideological and cultural strategies influenced the public mind? As Campbell (2007) documents: While South Africa's history as a British colony is reflected in the country's parliamentary system and its renewed membership in the Commonwealth, many of the controversial political issues debated in South Africa today‐ federalism, judicial review, minority rights, affirmative action‐revolve around concepts appropriated (some might say misappropriated) from American political discourse (130). 243 The question raised by this analysis is, to what extent can these strategies be credited with agenda‐setting these issues with South Africa? The subset of informational strategies described in this chapter, ultimately target the public mind, 84 seeking to foster a macro‐level appreciation for the same ideals embraced by Americans. How then do these informational strategies organize, transform, or maintain power relationships within the South African information environment? It is necessary to point out a few critical caveats. First, the relative utility of these strategies that target the South African public mind are questionable. The number of dependent and intervening variables that shape individual attitudes and ideas are countless. Second, a case study on American government efforts in South Africa does not imply that the United States is the only potential source of foreign influence. Indeed, parallel efforts by private organizations such as the Ford Foundation or the OSI and by the EU, the British Council, and others may also compound and/or undermine US strategies. Third, informational strategies as produced by United States government actors are contingent upon the needs and demands of domestic actors. If USAID pulled all funding from IDASA, we cannot be sure whether the organization’s activities would radically change if they were pressed to identify alternate funding sources. Fourth, South Africa is a country riven by racial, economic, and social divides. These groups evince differing attitudes 84 By public mind, I refer to the societal level aggregation of values and attitudes that help to constitute the South African information environment. 244 towards a host of issues. For example, a 2009 Pew Global Attitudes survey found evidence that across 13 different countries as economically developing countries grow prosperous, their middle classes understandably become more satisfied with their lives. But many of their basic values also appear to change. Over time, the values of the middle classes in emerging countries become more like those of the publics of advanced nations (Pew 2009). Its findings were most pronounced in the countries with the highest levels of inequality: Chile, Russia, Bulgaria, and South Africa. Overall, lower income South African’s responses differed by an average of 12 percent with their higher income counterparts. This differential was particularly distinct in attitudes towards democratic practice. For example, more than two‐thirds (68 percent) of middle‐ class South Africans but only half of lower‐income South Africans believed that a fair judicial system is very important (Pew 2009). US messaging strategies targeted towards individual actors and transmitted in the media are highly unlikely to reach or to resonate equally with these different social groups. It is also difficult to establish the extent to which well off South Africans are more receptive to democratic ideals because they have greater access to the information channels (e.g. television, internet, newspapers, etc.) used to transmit those values. Finally, there is no way to assign a relative weight to what I call “America fatigue.” South African interviewees commonly exhibited an overall exhaustion with the omnipresence of American products and culture and with the bureaucratic hoops necessary to access American government funding and support when compared with other donors. 245 This sentiment is frequently repeated by politicians and elites both within elite circles and reported in the media. For example, in September 2007, the presumed next president of South Africa, Jacob Zuma, pounded his fist on the podium at the launch of the Creative Workers Union of South Africa and asked, “Why are we Americanizing ourselves, why?" However, given all these caveats, we can examine public opinion surveys to determine whether there has been a shift one way or the other that favors the United States. A series of Pew Global Attitudes Surveys (2002, 2007, 2008) found that Africans are more favorably disposed towards the United States than respondents in other regions of the world. Figure 5.2 provides a comparison of South African attitudes towards the United States juxtaposed with those in other countries. 246 FIGURE 5.2: VIEWS ON THE UNITED STATES (2007) Data Source: Pew Global Attitudes (2007). However, as Table 5.2 illustrates, South African approval of the United States extends beyond favorability for the country in general, to support for different aspects of American society and for its people. 247 TABLE 5.2: SPECIFIC SOUTH AFRICAN ATTITUDES TOWARDS THE UNITED STATES Favorable Unfavorable US influence is: 42 12 US treats its citizens 64 34 US is a partner 60 8 US War on Terror 43 36 US movies, music, and TV 70 22 US views about democracy 53 31 The spread of US ideas and customs 41 45 Data source: Pew Global Attitudes Project (2007). As Table 5.2 displays, 70 percent of South Africans report liking American cultural products such as TV, movies, and radio programs, ranking only behind the Ivory Coast (Pew 2007). These same findings are echoed by the Voice of the People Surveys conducted by Gallup International on behalf of the World Economic Forum (WEF). Support for democracy across sub‐Saharan Africa is also the strongest in the world, tied only with North America (defined as Canada and the United States) (Pew 2007). Moreover, Devra Moehler, in a statistical analysis of the Pew Global Attitudes survey data in 2002, identified several trends in Africa that were counter to trends found elsewhere. In all African audiences, including South Africa, television viewing and access to international news were associated with more favorable attitudes towards the United States. Watching international programs, personal contacts, and travel to America expanded support for the United States while domestic radio usage reduced it (Moehler 2007). Work by theorists such as Billig (1995) and Lee et al. (2000) who examine the impact of national media platforms on national identity 248 have also incorporated aspects of cultivation theory to illustrate the role of national media in fostering identity construction and identification. Thus, we may posit, but not necessarily conclude, that US efforts to promote culture and ideology may contribute in some small way to this process of creating favorable impressions of the US ideals, if not the American government in South Africa. 249 CHAPTER 6: IMPROVING INFORMATION INFRASTRUCTURE: EXPANDING ECONOMIC OPPORTUNITIES If South Africa succeeds economically, it will not only create a model for development, but it will be a beacon of hope for the whole continent. A strong South African economy could become the engine of growth, which powers other countries, especially in Southern Africa. –Al Gore, United States/South Africa Binational Commission Meeting 1997. Now that we no longer have this bipolar world but a unipolar world, the United States is really calling the shots and is a growing economy and we see the effects it has had on everybody… and therefore understanding how they think, how they work and they work everywhere, everywhere. They are like ants everywhere. They understand. They have connections. They have networks. They understand our regulatory environment, every other country’s regulatory environment. They can want to shape it to make it more… I mean if you look at the battles at the WTO around OUZO and Grappa and all that. If we think that was a big battle, that’s chicken feed compared to the battle that’s going to take place in this sector [communications]. And you can’t go into this sector not knowing... what’s the word I want? Not knowing your business, because you have to compete with minds, with experience, with networks that are much bigger than ours. – RSA Minister of Communications, Ivy MatsepeCasaburri, May 19, 2000. Communications and economic trading systems are inextricably intertwined; control of information flows offer considerable economic advantages. Indeed, dating back to the Roman Empire, the promotion of a common language and a common legal system have played a fundamental role in solidifying trade routes. (Innis 1950; Rossides 2002). Founded in 1865, the International 250 Telecommunication Union (ITU), the second‐oldest international organization still in existence, established “one of the most lucrative and technologically significant international cartels in history” (Cowhey 1990, 169). The examples go on and on. As Rossides (2002) points out, the power of communications technology lies in both its day‐to‐day utility and more importantly in its ability to “establish and maintain a created reality” that furthers the end goals of those who control its deployment (14). Africa, including South Africa, remains the least developed region in terms of communications. However, particularly over the last decade, it has experienced the greatest connectivity growth in the world. 85 In 2008, the South African IT market alone was valued at $8.5 billion, and is expected to rise to $13.5 billion by 2013 (Market Research 2009). Telecommunications now ranks among the top five most active economic sectors in sub‐Saharan Africa, accounting for 21 percent of the activity index (Africa Investor Index 2009). Over the last two decades, as developed country markets have reached saturation, Africa has emerged as the final frontier for telecommunications and information technology. A variety of domestic and international governmental, corporate, and civil society actors have made concerted (if not always successful) efforts to develop the continent’s ICT and broadcast infrastructure in order to promote greater economic ties and expand market demand in their favor. Weak barriers to entry into national markets, high start‐up 85 For example, as of March 2009 Africa’s mobile penetration is 28 percent compared to 38 percent in Asia, 72 percent in the Americas, 79 percent in Oceana, and 111 percent in Europe. However, while penetration rates have plateaued in much of the world, it is growing at 32 percent a year on the African Continent (ITU 2009). 251 costs, and lack of skills training within the continent have created a “Wild West” environment, where those with the biggest guns (i.e. the greatest political leverage, financial resources, and technical expertise) stake claims on national and local ICT and broadcast structures and development projects. Corporations like AT&T, Tyco, Lucent, and Cisco race to be the first to lay telecom cables and provide satellite services. OECD countries like the United States, China, Australia, France, and Canada compete to provide regulatory and technical expertise and garner lucrative deals for their corporate constituents; and international and regional organizations like the ITU, the ATU, and the WTO jockey to influence legal and regulatory frameworks in service of expanding market opportunities. Both in public discourse and in academic debate, the United States is commonly depicted as the fastest gun in this technological gold rush (e.g. Boyd‐Barrett 2006; Hedley 1999; Matsepe‐Casaburri 2000; Ojo 2004). A detailed examination of the South African case allows us to unpack the veracity of that perception. This chapter documents the central role of economic strategy in shaping the ecosystem of communications between South Africa and the United States. It explores US attempts to shape the ways and means in which South Africa connects in line with US economic interests. Information policies in service of economic strategies have been far and away the most dominant and the most effective of US information‐related campaigns in South Africa. These economic‐focused programs evolved out of three primary motivations. First, US government actors encouraged 252 a modernized communications structure in order to further South Africa’s economic development and its potential as a US trading partner. Second, they sought to create opportunities for US telecommunications and media companies within the country. Third, as previously mentioned, the end of the Cold War prompted a turn away from interest in international development towards expanding markets. Couching programs in the language of economic opportunity helped to sell them to Congress, which in turn was better situated to rationalize them to their domestic constituents. This was particularly true following September 11, when it became increasingly difficult to find funding for ICT‐related programs outside the Middle East. Unlike the processes documented in chapters 4 and 5, economic strategies principally target the structural (i.e. form) of the telecommunications and broadcast sector rather than their content. These strategies approach information as a commodity and/or as infrastructure through which other commodities can be bought and sold. US government actors attempted (not always successfully) to influence the South African communications environment in service of broader US economic goals through a variety of mechanisms, including: • Promoting policy reform issues like privatization, liberalization, and an independent regulator; • Shaping the structure and practices of the South African communications regulator (ICASA) and the Department of Communications (DOC); 253 • Encouraging South Africa to join multilateral regimes that adhered to US policy priorities; • Championing US and global multimedia businesses; and • Creating a constituency for a fully developed communications environment through ICT training and development. This chapter proceeds in six interrelated sections. First, it outlines the general mechanisms of interaction between the US and South Africa vis‐à‐vis economic strategies. Second, it explores the dynamics of US attempts to promote privatization and liberalization of the South African communications market. Third, it documents US attempts to influence the regulatory and legal environment. Fourth, it explores the role of regional and multilateral initiatives. Fifth, it underlines the role of US telecommunications corporations. And finally, it evaluates the economic strategies present in US ICT4D programs, which seek to establish a domestic constituency that is connected and literate in the “information society.” A Marshall Plan for ICTs 86 As in many other countries, the need for an “information society” 87 provided a framework and a synonym for a “developed” and inclusive economy that would 86 Italian Foreign Minister Amintore Fanfani suggested a Technological Marshall Plan in 1966, that the American government and corporations should provide Europe with greater technological capacity and skills. 254 lead to South African prosperity and opportunity. Civil society actors, entrepreneurs, and government officials at all levels pointed to the problems and the potential reforms needed within South Africa’s communications sphere. In 1995, in one of the most cited speeches of his political career, Thabo Mbeki reminded G7 leaders that in Durban 75 percent of white households but only 2 percent of black households had access to telephones (Mbeki 1995). He went on to say that: It is … quite clear that the building of our information and communication infrastructure offers a unique opportunity to enhance international co‐operation. As we have said, we believe that this initiative must be global in nature and involve a great variety of actors, from inventors, financiers and manufacturers to operators, educators, artists and so on, drawing into the global project both the domestic and the international, both South Africans and the peoples of the world (Mbeki, 1995). This rhetorical preoccupation with the need to build a flourishing “information society” continued throughout the period of this study. 88 At the same time, we observe a professed ambivalence towards the process of technological development, hinging mainly upon recognition that implementing the physical structures of the “information society” brings with it the potential for “info‐imperialism.” These fears were reflected both in the author’s interviews with stakeholders and in historical records. Mbeki, (1998) one of the greatest 87 A concept that evolved out of Peter Drucker’s (1969) characterization of the shift to a “knowledge society” and Fritz Machlup’s (1962) study of a “knowledge industry.” 88 See Van Audenhove (2003) for detailed documentation on the ambivalent attitudes of South African leaders towards the technological development process. 255 spokesmen for the need for ICT development, told delegates to the Ministerial Meeting of the Non‐Aligned Movement in Durban, South Africa, in 1998: Over the last few years, a number of words and phrases have entered into the vocabulary of international discourse. Among these are globalisation, liberalisation, deregulation and the information society or the information super‐highway. The fact of the matter however is that all these processes originate from the developed countries of the North, reflect the imperatives of the economies and the levels of development of these countries and therefore, naturally, serve the purposes of our rich global neighbours. Ivy Matsepe‐Casaburri, Minister of Communications (MoC) from 1999 to 2009, has made similar statements: They [Americans] are like ants everywhere. They understand, they have connections, they have networks. They understand our regulatory environment, every other country’s regulatory environment. They can want to shape it to make it more… I mean if you look at the battles at the WTO around OUZO and Grappa and all that. If we think that was a big battle, that’s chicken feed compared to the battle that’s going to take place in this sector. And you can’t go into this sector not knowing...what’s the word I want? Not knowing your business, because you have to compete with minds, with experience, with networks that are much bigger than ours (2000, 8‐9). Of course, politicians often tailor messages according to their audience. Public statements often obfuscate rather than reveal the processes of interaction between developed and developing countries. Scholars such as Patrick Bond (2006), Michael Allen (2006), and Adam Habib (2008) have stressed the tendency of South African political elites to “talk left, and walk right.” The actual pattern of interaction and influence between the United States and South Africa is much more complicated. 256 In order to establish a pattern of attempted influence, Table 6.1 provides a detailed timeline of the major communications milestones in South Africa and the parallel US initiatives. TABLE 6.1: US GOVERNMENT BROADCASTING AND TELECOMMUNICATIONS INITIATIVES Year South African Policy Milestones US Initiatives Parallel Donor Initiatives 1990 Task Group on Broadcasting in South and Southern Africa USIA plays advisory role for taskforce (1990‐1992) 1991 Jubalani! Freedom of the Airwaves Conference ANC National Media Conference Post Office Amendment Act Telkom commercialized Nov. – TICASA founded 1993 ANC Workshop: “Telecommunications in Post‐ apartheid South Africa” Independent Broadcasting Act 89 MTN & Vodacom licensed NTF established First independent SABC board elected Anti‐apartheid restrictions abolished; Commerce Secretary Ron Brown leads a business delegation to SA, which includes IT advisors to consult with the ANC IDRC sends first exploratory mission 1994 March – Independent Broadcasting Act of 1993 begins. BEE legislation passed Clinton announces $600 million aid package Al Gore calls for GII TRADENET 90 (USAID) Freedom of Expression Institute 89 The Independent Broadcasting Authority Act 153 of 1993 established an independent broadcasting regulator, the Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA), before South Africa’s first all-race elections in 1994, to ensure that the public broadcaster fulfilled its function in the public interest. 257 TABLE 6.1 CONTINUED Year South African Policy Milestones US Initiatives Parallel Donor Initiatives 1995 Feb. – Mandela & Mbeki speak at G7 March – NTTP launched Green Paper on Science & Technology Green Paper on Broadcasting Policy July – Green Paper on Telecom Policy launched Commerce Dept. Declares SA as one of top 10 emerging markets, US submits to the Green Paper process 1996 IBA Triple Inquiry Report 91 COMTASK launched Communication 2000 Report March – White Paper on Telecommunications April – ISAD Conference, Helderfontein Conference (IDRC) Nov. – 1996 Telecommunications Act Satellite Basics Training Workshop for IBA June – Leland Initiative (USAID) (1996 – 1999) ITAC launched (DOS) NTIA/Commerce leads ISAD US submits to the White Paper process 1997 Feb. – SATRA established April – TELI Strategic Plan SBC Global takes over Management of Telkom May – Universal Service Agency created April – Hearing on US Trade with sub‐ Saharan Africa US sends SATRA councilors for training IDRC Acacia Initiative (1997 – 2003) 90 TradeNet was an electronic communications network developed to enable researchers and policy makers in eastern and southern Africa interested in cross-border trade and food security issues to exchange working papers, analyses, and databases. The network incorporates both Internet and FidoNet linkages. 91 Adopted by Parliament in 1996, the Report laid a blueprint for the future development of broadcasting policy in South Africa, by providing vital information in the three areas of inquiry: (a) the viability of public service broadcasting; (b) cross-media control of broadcasting services; and (c) local content quotas on South African broadcasting. 258 TABLE 6.1 CONTINUED Year South African Policy Milestones US Initiatives Parallel Donor Initiatives 1998 Feb. – Presidential Review Commission: IT for Government May – GCIS launched South Africa approves the GATS agreement White paper on Broadcasting Policy 92 The Internet for Economic Development (IED) initiative (DOS) 93 Sep SATRA and IBA visit CRTC for two weeks 92 Established the Department of Communications. 93 Launched under the coordination of the State Department's Bureau of Economic and Business Affairs. The initiative initially involved 12 countries, which Vice President Gore announced in June 1999. These countries, which were chosen based on their commitment to developing a (1) liberalized, pro-competitive telecommunications policy and regulatory environment; (2) a physical infrastructure sufficient to exploit the power of Internet communications; (3) educated entrepreneurs, knowledge workers, and policymakers; (4) Internet applications tailored to the needs and conditions of the developing world; and (5) liberalization of related sectors. 259 TABLE 6.1 CONTINUED Year South African Policy Milestones US Initiatives Parallel Donor Initiatives 1999 Broadcasting Act of 1999 94 DPSA Initiated SAITIS launched SATRA & IBA Combine to form ICASA National ICT Forum FCC launches Africa Development Initiative and signs consultative agreement with SATRA through August 2000 95 FCC Chairman visits SATRA FCC SATRA Workshop 96 Global Technology Corps 97 IDRC Acacia Ministerial Meeting 94 The IBA was intended to provide a regulatory framework for SABC. In 1999 the South African government introduced a new piece of broadcasting legislation—the Broadcasting Act. In establishing this legislation, the Department of Communications (DOC), through the 1998 White Paper on Broadcasting Policy, reflected the government’s policy stance on a number of issues not covered within the IBA Act. 95 FCC signs partnership with South Africa (and Uganda and Ghana) to share ideas on open markets, competition, spectrum management, and licensing. These two-way partnerships allow us to demonstrate the critical links between privatization and investment, and competition and universal service. They consult with their partners on a regular basis to ensure steady progress toward their goals. 96 Over 40 South African senior regulatory officials attended the workshop, including SATRA Chairman Nape Maepa, Deputy Chairman Eddie Funde, and Councilors Gosa, Mayimele-Hatashatse, and Willie Currie. 97 Within the State Department, the Office of International Information Programs established the Global Technology Corps in mid-1999 to set up public-private partnerships committed to closing the international digital divide. The GTC works with companies, individuals, and organizations that are willing to volunteer their time, expertise, and resources to help spread the benefits of information technology worldwide. 260 TABLE 6.1 CONTINUED Year South African Policy Milestones US Initiatives Parallel Donor Initiatives 2000 June – The Independent Communications Authority of South Africa Act, 98 AT&T sues Telkom for monopolistic behavior Clinton visits South Africa Launches AGOA Oct. – Commerce Ass’t Secretary leads business delegation to SA 2001 Feb. – Telecommunications Policy Colloquium Presidential National Commission on Information Society and Development (PNC on ISAD) announced FCC signs a one year cooperative work plan with ICASA 2002 PNC on ISAD Commission formed AGOA amended NetTel @Africa (USAID, Internews) launched USTTI Training for 6 ICASA employees (USAID) CATIA 2002 – 2006 (DFID) 2003 Digital Freedom Initiative launched Proposed SACU‐US Agreement 2004 NetTel@Africa (USAID, 2004 – 2006) 98 Provided for the merger of the South African Telecommunications Regulatory Authority and the Independent Broadcasting Authority to form the independent Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA). 261 TABLE 6.1 CONTINUED Year South African Policy Milestones US Initiatives Parallel Donor Initiatives 2005 The Electronic Communication Act of 2005 99 The ICASA Amendment Act 2005 100 2006 FCC Training 2007 FCC Training 2008 Mbeki approves Broadband Infraco Act of 2007 and Electronic Communications (EC) Amendment Act of 2007 Oct. 2008 World Telecommunications Standardisation Assembly USAID funds MobileActive Current as of April 2009. This chart, while not exhaustive, documents US government actors’ long‐term efforts to influence the South African national information infrastructure in line with US approved economic policies and processes. 101 While the specifics of many of these programs will be discussed in greater detail in the later parts of this chapter, it 99 Defines “significant market power” as a factor to be considered in regulatory decisions. It further continues the pre-established controls of earlier legislation. These include: limitations on cross-media control of commercial broadcasting services; limitations on control of commercial broadcasting services; limitations on foreign control of commercial broadcasting services. The most significant aspects: Convergence of Telecommunication and Broadcasting regulation-making processes; Replacement of the existing telecommunications and broadcasting licensing frameworks with a single licensing regime; and the enhancement of the Regulator’s competition powers in terms of dispute settlement and significant market power determinations. 100 The law also increased the number of council members from seven to nine, more precisely replicating the FCC model. 101 Defined by Al Gore in 1993 as a country’s web of communications networks, computers, databases, and consumer electronics. 262 is presented here in order to stress the longevity and the scope of US activities in encouraging an open and liberalized South African communications sectors. Table 6.1 also provides an overview of the sheer number of actors involved in these initiatives, underscoring the complexity of the processes of US‐South African interaction vis‐à‐vis the communications sector. The primary US government actors involved in these initiatives in South Africa include: • The International Communication and Information Policy (CIP) group, one of seven issue‐oriented organizations within the Bureau of Economic, Energy, and Business Affairs at the US DOS; • The International Bureau of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC); • The United States Trade and Development Agency (USTDA); • The National Telecommunications Training Institute (NTTI), • The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), the US President’s principal advisor on telecommunication’s policy; • The Telecommunications and E‐Commerce section of the US Trade Representative (USTR); • And multiple offices within USAID. The FCC, the NTTI, and USAID have provided training and expertise. The USTR and the USTDA are the leading actors advocating for US companies and play a role in paving the way for US companies wishing to do business in the country and/or the region. They have also funded numerous training programs for South African 263 regulators (see Table 6.1). The CIP, on the other hand, serves a coordinating role among these actors, and serves as the primary point of contact between the US government and the Ministry of Communications. They get involved at the ministerial level, principally when there is a bottleneck at the level of the regulator or the MOC that impedes US business interests (Gibbs 2009, interview). USAID, in addition to its role in training and policy expertise, has also funded connectivity programs like the Leland Imitative, NetTel@Africa, and Edu@Tel that provide funding for on‐the‐ground infrastructure development programs for underserved populations. Their South African target organizations include: the MOC, the Ministry of Trade and Industry (MTI), the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA), and (until 2000) the two organizations out of which ICASA emerged, the South African Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (SATRA) and the Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA). In addition, numerous temporary committees and policy committees, civil society actors, local South African ICT and media organizations, as well as regional communications organizations like the CRASA (the Communication Regulators Association of Southern Africa) and the African Summit on the Information Society (ASIS) have been the target of US initiatives. At the same time, individuals working within different US government departments have established and maintained long‐term advisory and personal connections with key stakeholders in the South African communications 264 environment such as Patrick Boateng, a telecommunications specialist working with the FCC and Tom Carnegie, one of the longest‐serving employees in the CIP. US involvement in the South African telecommunications sector thus reflects a multi‐ level process. At the macro (systems) level, this includes: • US promotion of adopting a regulator based on the FCC model and of privatization of communications parastatals (e.g. Telkom and the SABC). • Changing opportunities and interests in South Africa on the part of US and global multimedia businesses. • Belief and adherence to international communication protocols and products At the micro (individual) level, this includes: • US government officials’ attempts to influence the decision‐making processes of South African government officials and South African government officials soliciting US funding and/or expertise for communications related issues. • US government officials’ person‐to‐person interactions and/or facilitating person‐to‐person interactions with South African communications officials, corporations, and civil society individuals. At the meso (bureaucratic) level, this includes: • The extent to which South African government officials influence the South African communication environment based on US government activities. 265 • How US government officials influence US government policy as a result of their interaction with South African officials. Further complicating these processes, is the fact that, aside from a brief interlude in the mid‐1990s when Al Gore’s office made a concerted effort to coordinate the promotion of a National Information Infrastructure (NII) as part of his Global Information Infrastructure Initiative (GII), there has been little commonality or control between US government actors. For example, an officer in charge of the telecom portfolio for South Africa had no idea that USAID had now or ever had major ICT programs within South Africa (Uddin 2008, interview). Moreover, Diane Steinour, the NTIA officer in charge of the Southern African portfolio since 1985, was not familiar with USTDA activities in South Africa (2009, interview). Contrary to popular wisdom, the United States has never really had a coordinated information policy. As Lee McKnight and W. Russell Neuman noted in 1995, The diffuseness and subtlety of military‐industrial linkages has made the clear articulation of technology policy more difficult. Also hindering effective government action is the fact that over twenty federal agencies claim some jurisdiction over national information and communications policy and are on occasion joined by the courts, the Congress, and state regulatory agencies in formulating policy. Each bureaucracy has its own vision of the public interest. The attempt to develop effective coordination among them is always a struggle—and at first glance impossible (1995, 146). However, McKnight and Neuman (1995) were looking specifically at the national information infrastructure. While US information policy in South Africa lacks 266 coordination, 102 the number of players involved is far fewer than at the domestic level and so it is possible to at least chart out the full range of programs as they unfolded in South Africa (see Table 6.1). The rest of this chapter is concerned with unpacking the mechanisms of these processes. Championing an Open Communications Market Although the ANC government has long professed a desire to expand South African participation in the “information society,” there has been a longstanding and unresolved debate about whether the government or the market provides the best leading mechanism. At independence, the ANC faced the same predicament as many other liberation parties, and it inherited a communications system geared towards government intervention and control. The NP apartheid government broadened and consolidated monopolies over communications infrastructure including the press, broadcasting, and telecommunications established under British colonial rule. For the fledgling ANC government, communication institutions offered both a tool for promoting national unity and an object for reform. Fully relinquishing control over these structures was considered risky, as they provided a mechanism for promoting national unity and the new government. Many of the key decision‐ makers within the ANC had benefited from the aid of and education of communist 102 Ernest Wilson, in a prepared statement before The House Subcommittee on Africa in May 2001, called for “greater inter-agency attention to African ICT.” He stated, “One should encourage the relevant USG agencies to pursue their own initiatives in ICT and Africa, and to coordinate them. The FCC has done excellent things here, as has USTR and Commerce. That must continue.” 267 countries where state control over communications systems was the standard. As Tomaselli and Teer‐Tomaselli (2008) point out, in the early 1990s the ANC vacillated between “Marxist‐inspired communal control to post‐Cold War democratic pluralism” in terms of media regulation (173). Far fewer had been schooled in the United States and the European Union where a liberalized media and communications sector were seen as critical (Bussiek 2003; Teer‐Tomaselli 1994; van Audenhove 2003). A division that continues today emerged between those who wholeheartedly embraced a more “Western” approach to communications policy and those who supported the Soviet model. In recognition of this predicament, Western aid agencies funneled large amounts of money into programs that championed a liberalized communications sector. As documented in Chapter 5, many of these programs evolved out of a desire to consolidate a flourishing Fourth Estate press in line with the Western democratic ethos. However, they were also motivated by a desire to encourage appreciation of a liberalized and competitive communications sector that would further economic development and make South Africa both a partner and a purchaser in the global market for information and communications technology. In South Africa, telecommunications and ICT, rather than broadcasting and media have been particularly relevant to US economic interests. Reforming the South African broadcasting sector was an early but temporary subject of US interest. The question of broadcasting, largely instigated by media 268 reform groups like IDASA (then principally funded by USAID), MISA (funded by the NED, SIDA, and others) and the FXI (funded by the OSI), took center stage at CODEDSA (i.e. the national constitutional political negotiations) (Horwitz 2006). 103 As early as 1991, the ANC and US actors recognized that in order to ensure an ANC victory the broadcasting sector needed to be reformed, and the SABC, which had a monopoly on broadcast communications, needed to be freed from National Party control. A year before the first elections, the Independent Broadcasting Authority Act 153 of 1993 established an independent broadcasting regulator, the Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA), to ensure that the public broadcaster fulfilled its function in the public interest. According to Chris Patterson (1994, 23), US Embassy and USIA officials bragged that through their backroom influence on the negotiations they had “broken the back of the national broadcaster” in South Africa, thus ensuring greater consumption of American programs. However, Teer‐ Tomaselli and Tomaselli (1994) call this a misrepresentation: Rather, what these commentators are saying is that the US Embassy, which impacted local debates through visits by FCC personnel and communication lawyers since 1991, have seriously undermined `state monopoly broadcasting'. Their intention was to ensure "democracy of the dial" and to open broadcasting to "multiplicities of voices" over and above PSB (18). US efforts to promote an open media environment in support of democratization were documented in Chapter 5. In terms of economic strategy, however, Teer‐ 103 Reform of the broadcasting sector took center stage because ANC feared moving into an open election while the National Party still controlled the SABC. 269 Tomaselli and Tomaselli (1994) are correct; US actors have been relatively disinterested in the broadcast sector. While difficult to prove or disprove, this may due in large part to the fact that American multimedia businesses have been less concerned with breaking into the content delivery channels because even before independence there has been a consistent demand for US programming content from the SABC (both radio and television) and from MNET and ETV (see Chapter 5 for more details). This theory is supported by the fact that, while there have been a number of scandals over the undue influence by the Ministry of Communications and the ANC over the editorial slant of SABC, and that new entrants find it difficult to break into the broadcasting sector, there have been few corresponding US initiatives. In contrast, several US agencies have taken a concerted interest in championing a liberalized telecommunications sector throughout the period under review. These interests were pursued through more specific programs as documented in the next section, but more generally through the promotion of a market‐driven communications environment. Particularly during the Clinton administration, the US saw itself as a communications architect, helping to design and implement an international communications environment dictated according to open market principles. In many ways, both in interviews and in public documents and speeches, there appears a sort of schizophrenia—a desire to create an open market for communications while preserving US sovereignty and control over the 270 global infrastructure. A fully developed communications environment around the world is seen as providing greater opportunities for US businesses, IT and otherwise (Steinour 2009; Blakeman 2008, interviews). “Telecommunications services improve the international competitiveness of US businesses,” proclaimed the influential NTIA Infrastructure Report: Telecommunications in the age of information (1991). At the same time, a developed communications environment has also been stressed as essential for the economic prosperity of South Africa. For example, in June 1999, FCC Chairman William E. Kennard launched Connecting the Globe, a multi‐stage project to build a “global information community.” This was followed by Connecting the Globe: The Africa Initiative, launched in January 2000. From the very beginning these programs linked interconnection with economic prosperity, not just for the US but also for the global citizenry. As Kennard described in his forward, In a very real sense, we...are architects—designing and building a dynamic international community. We too are fundamentally involved in bringing people together, connecting communities with one another. Together we can continue to draft the blueprint for this grand, global economy [my emphasis] where individuals, communities and nations can all participate (Kennard 1999, i). In 1995, the formal US government comments on the Green Paper on Telecommunications Policy (which laid the ground work for the 1996 South African Telecommunications Act; see Chapter 3) jointly authored by Reed Hundt, Chairman of the FCC; Larry Irving, Assistant Secretary of the NTIA; Jeffrey M. Lang, Deputy US 271 Trade Representative; and Vonya B. McCann, head of CIP, expressed to the then current South African Minister of Communications Pallo Jordan, We appreciate that you are challenged to take advantage of South Africa's competitive advantage in communications infrastructure to advance your role in regional and world commerce while promptly addressing the ethical imperative of bringing service for the first time to some 85 percent of the population. This is a staggering task. Precisely because this challenge is so great, we believe that the introduction of competition and private investment would provide the best means of attaining both these goals in the shortest period of time (Hundt et al. 1995, 2). The same document also stressed that competition promotes universal service, citing increases in telephony after the breakup of AT&T in the United States (Hundt et al. 1995). Different variations of the themes evoked in the Green Paper response, including: competition, private investment, and independent regulation, have been repeated consistently both through interpersonal communications, in policy responses, and in training literature. There is not evidence for a grand neo‐imperialist strategy, however. Across departments and levels of authority, interview subjects professed a belief that, despite its problems, the US communications model is the most successful one in the world. While the precise mechanisms must be altered according to the national conditions, minimal regulation, an independent regulator, and open competition are the best option. Of course, these conditions also benefit US economic interests, as US companies are some of the best positioned to take advantage of market conditions. Alan Gibbs (2009, interview), a specialist in international 272 telecommunications policy for the CIP, for example, emphasized his belief in the need to convince emerging countries that “command and control” methods of communications regulation is a losing battle. Indeed, he echoed a common sentiment, that when it comes to ICT provisions, the market always wins. If governments do not get out of the way of companies seeking to fill consumer demands for connectivity and access, the market will bypass them completely. South African ICT experts equally champion many of the policies advocated by the US government agencies over the years. Indeed, the majority of the South African ICT experts interviewed concurred with many of the US recommendations, namely that South Africa should have introduced a shorter and well‐defined time frame for introducing full competition and ending the Telkom monopoly (Cohen 2009; Maepa 2008; Thornton 2009, interviews; National Broadband Forum 2009). And many academic analyses find that competition in the telecoms industry has benefited connectivity (e.g. Wilson & Wong 2004). Of course, this section has documented the rhetorical championing of the adoption of policies that support economic opportunities. Rhetoric is simply rhetoric. However, it has been supported by a broad array of well‐financed programs designed to influence the form and structure of the regulator and the Ministry of Communications. 273 Structuring the Telecommunications Market At independence, South Africa, like much of the developing world, represented an almost virgin market for telecommunications and related ICTs. As previously mentioned, the regulatory and legal structures of communication favored government monopoly, not competition. The US government thus offered its expertise and training in matters related to regulatory and legal structures. These programs can be categorized according to: (1) consultation on the design of the independent regulator; (2) regulatory training and consultation programs; and (3) harder to quantify interpersonal connections. Both in policy briefs and through training programs, a number of US programs promoted the adoption of an independent regulator based on the FCC and/or the more corporately structured UK OFTEL (changed to OFCOM in 2003) model (Hundt et al. 1995). The IBA, SATRA, and ICASA are in theory independent regulators operated by a board of councillors similar to the FCC’s Board of Commissioners. In practice, much of their functioning has been undermined by the MOC and Telkom, which the Ministry controls. As Thornton (2009), Gillwald (2009) and others stress, regulatory designs, particularly in the African context, rarely translate into regulatory practice. The regulator lacks any real legal mandate and has been consistently undermined by the MOC, pressure from the ANC party machinery, and legal challenges. In the history of ICASA, it has never won a legal challenge filed by one of the big three telecommunications companies. The ICASA 274 board has also become little more than a revolving door for corporate hires. Vodafone, Mnet, Telkom, and other big ICT companies actively pursue and hire ICASA and DOC councillors, ensuring that capacity within these agencies is minimized. For example, the DOC media liaison officer Joe Makhafola left the Ministry to join AlTech. After working for three years for Telekom, Andrew Barendse signed on as an ICASA councillor, and returned to Telkom immediately after tendering his resignation. Tracy Cohen, one of the most techno‐savvy ICASA councillors and an academic who publishes frequently on regulatory issues, left to join NeoTel. Recognizing that regulatory design is only a small part of the process, US actors have worked to build “capacity” in every iteration (e.g. SATRA, IBA, and ICASA) of the South African regulator through consultancy agreements and training programs. The FCC in particular has maintained a close relationship. It signed several consultative agreements, first with SATRA (1999‐2000) then with ICASA (2000‐01) to provide expertise on agency, structuring the rulemaking process, spectrum allocation, the proper role of the regulator, staff issues relating to the processing of applications, delegation of authority issues, and conflict of interest management. It also hosted several seminars and training institutes both in Johannesburg and in Washington for regulatory staff, on rulemaking, procedural transparency and the public, and the consultation and comment process. These agreements were framed as transfer of best practices through promoting 275 “competition and choice” (Kennard 1999; FCC 2000). There have also been numerous training programs hosted by the USTTI. However, here again we see the limits of these strategies. First, there is a very real divide between those who embrace the US model and those who do not. Second, Gillwald (2008, 2009), Thornton (2009), Esselar (2009), and others question the long‐term benefits of these training programs. ICASA’s revolving door means that capacity gained is quickly lost to the private sector. Third, this process of influencing the structure of the South African legal and regulatory environment was not simply the US agencies trying to influence the South African players. At times, organizations such as SATRA actively sought US funding for training and consultants in order to negotiate greater autonomy from the Ministry of Communications, who used its control over SATRA’s budget to curtail programs it saw as undesirable. According to Nape Maepa, SATRA Chairman from 1997 to 2000, The government was being stingy about giving money for us to do what the law required us to do. So I would go to people like TDA [i.e. USTDA] and say will you fund this, and they were only to happy to, if I could prove that down the road there were opportunities that would be out for open market tendering (2008, interview). In addition to more direct US initiatives, there are a number of factors that have potentially played a role in the development of the South African national information infrastructure. First, US government agencies have published and made available to countries like South Africa untold numbers of handbooks, training materials, and manuals. During the 1990s and early 2000s, the NTIA’s (1991) 276 Telecommunications in the Age of Information and the FCC’s Connecting the Globe: A Regulator’s Guide to Building a Global Information Community provided a critical resource for SATRA and the IBA (Kennard, 1999). Second, personal relationships between members of both the South African and US policy elite have also been a factor. For example, former SATRA Chairman Nape Maepa maintained close relations with FCC Chairman William Kennard and USTTI Chairman, Ambassador Michael Gardner. And Ambassador David Gross, US Coordinator for International Communications in the CIP from 2001 through the end of the Bush administration, remains on a first‐name basis with all the current and former South African Ministers of Communications. Third, a number of key players in the South African telecommunications environment were the recipients of US government academic support during the apartheid era. Attending school at an American university is of course not necessarily commensurate with influence. However, former SATRA Chairman Nape Maepa cites his education and work experience in the United States as key to shaping his appreciation for the American communications model. On the other hand, Ivy Matsepe‐Casaburri, MoC from 1999 to 2009 was a professor at Rutgers University before returning to the United States, and throughout her tenure remained incredibly wary of US influence. 277 The Regional Strategy Over the last 20 years, regional economic communities such as the EU, ECOWAS, ASEAN, and SADC have played an increasingly important role in information policy. Van Gorp & Maitland (2009) explain this trend according to increased interregional competition: seeking to maximize gains from this interregional competition, the United States has placed an increasing focus on regional regulatory structures, particularly in ECOWAS and SADC. South Africa’s national information environment is directly impacted and impacts that of the broader regional information structure. US regional strategies thus play a fundamental role in the overall economic information strategy towards South Africa. USAID has supported regional telecommunications reform in southern Africa since 1994, helping four out of the six countries in the southern African region to “draft new policies and legislation to increase competition and efficiency in telecommunications” (USAID 2009). US government programs in South Africa provided both a launch pad for encouraging similar reforms in the rest of the region and helped South Africa to solidify its leadership role among its SADC peers. South Africa, as the largest telecommunications market in the SADC region and the largest economic trading block, played an important role in shaping regional telecoms policy, both as a model and a facilitator of creating networks between regulators. While national communications systems provide the central building blocks of the global information infrastructure, South Africa’s participation in both regional and 278 international bodies, treaties, and agreements are critical to facilitating the success or failure of these programs. Some US government programs helped to shape the regional environment within which South Africa’s national information infrastructure evolved, and others encouraged South Africa to adopt international regimes and policies that facilitated its regional and global integration. Table 6.2 provides an overview of key milestones in the regional telecommunications policy and parallel US initiatives. TABLE 6.2: REGIONAL US GOVERNMENT BROADCASTING AND TELECOMMUNICATIONS INITIATIVES Year African Policy Milestones US Initiatives Parallel Donor Initiatives 1994 World Telecommunications Development Conference (Buenos Aires) SADC Protocol on Transport, Communications & Meteorology launches Al Gore announces GII Principles 1995 First African Regional Symposium on Telematics for Development (UNECA, ITU, UNESCO, IDRC) Oct. ‐ Mandela Attends ITU Conference G7 Summit on the IS  AISI launched SADC Regional Telecommunications Restructuring Program (RTRP) funded by USAID 104 USAID funds SADC consultation process on the SADC Protocol on Transport, Communications & Meteorology 104 Provides regulatory support for SADC member countries to launch TRASA (now CRASA). Managed by PriceWaterhouseCoopers and funded by USAID. 279 TABLE 6.2 CONTINUED Year African Policy Milestones US Initiatives Parallel Donor Initiatives 1996 April ‐ ISAD Conference Aug. ‐ SADC Protocol on Transport, Communications & Meteorology Signed. March ‐ Liberalization and Regulation ‐ An Enabling Policy Environment Conference (USAID Leland Initiative) NTIA leads ISAD Africa Link (USAID, 1996–2002) African Information Society Initiative (AISI) UNECA 1997 TRASA Inaugural Meeting (emerged out of RTRP USAID program). June ‐ Global Knowledge Conference (GK1) WTO Agreement on Basic Telecommunications (ABT). FCC sends delegation to TRASA USAID funds SATCC‐TU team to create model legislation, USAID funds PricewaterhouseCoopers consultants to develop new legislation for Lesotho and Swaziland. ITU Africa Telecom 1997 1998 COMESA 3 rd Conference 105 Africa Telecom Forum, Johannesburg 106 The Internet for Economic Development (IED) initiative (DOS) ITU Africa Telecom 1998 1999 Aug. ‐ TRASA Meeting ATU formed FCC Chair Kennard attends AFCOM, FCC launches Connecting the Globe, a Regulator’s Guide to Building an Information Community 105 Ministers of Telecommuni