Foreign Political Engagement

The 1990s have witnessed several major external initiatives to reshape the domestic political arrangements of countries. Because these have been collective foreign ventures, usually with the active collaboration of the target countries, the term intervention is ill-suited. Instead, Deon Geldenhuys introduces the notion of foreign political engagement to describe international attempts at remaking countries in the image of the West. South Africa, Kenya, Somalia, Russia, Cambodia, El Salvador and Haiti serve as case-studies to demonstrate this important theoretical rethinking of international relations today.