Education for the international: the tutelage of African diplomats during decolonisation

Keywords: Diplomats, Decolonisation, Education, Africa, International
Session Type: Virtual Paper Abstract
Day: Sunday
Session Start / End Time: 2/27/2022 03:40 PM (Eastern Time (US & Canada)) - 2/27/2022 05:00 PM (Eastern Time (US & Canada))
Room: Virtual 77

Abstract

Through the second half of the twentieth century, African countries emerged from the so-called ‘tutelage’ of European imperial powers, to represent themselves internationally as sovereign states. One consequence of this change was an expansion in diplomatic training, as hundreds of Black African diplomats-in-training travelled to Europe and the US to attend bespoke programmes. This paper makes use of the double meaning of tutelage, which refers to both the pedagogical and (geo)political processes where guardianship and instruction are held in tension with increasing independence, to explore the context of diplomatic training for African foreign servicemen and women in the years before and after independence. As the archival record shows, relationships were racialised, both between students and trainers present in the classrooms and training institutes, and at a broader scale operating through enduring international dependencies proceeding from the former European empires and the new superpowers of the Cold War.

The African diplomats in training actively resisted and overcame constraints placed upon them by the institutions and societies in which they lived and worked, and brought with them knowledge of alternative pre- and anti-colonial histories of African diplomatic practice. Trainers needed to adapt their methods and course content, problematizing the generalizability of their pedagogy, knowledge and practice. Drawing on early findings of ongoing archival research, this paper argues that pedagogy played a disruptive role in negotiating the politics of postcolonial diplomacy, and highlights how racist/colonial values and structures in international relations were challenged and maintained in the spaces of diplomatic training.