Punching above Weight: How the African Union Commission Exercises Agency in Politics

Abstract

Conventional narratives suggest that the African Union Commission (AUC), like most international public administrations and international organisations (IOs) housed in the less materially endowed regions of the world, exercises no meaningful agency on international issues. This article however seeks to show that the AUC is neither a glorified messenger and docile follower of orders of governments nor is it an empty vessel that timidly goes where the wind of governments blows. Rather, the AUC exercises significant agency on issues that affect not just the African continent but also the broader international system. The AUC is often at the heart of international agenda-setting, norm development, decision-making, rule creation, policy development, and it sometimes offer strategic leadership. The article demonstrates six pathways through which the AUC acts like a tail wagging a dog.

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Punching above
Weight: How the
African Union
Commission Exercises
Agency in Politics
Thomas Kwasi Tieku
Abstract
Conventional narratives suggest that the African Union Commission (AUC), like most
international public administrations and international organisations (IOs) housed in the less
materially endowed regions of the world, exercises no meaningful agency on international
issues. This article however seeks to show that the AUC is neither a glorified messenger
and docile follower of orders of governments nor is it an empty vessel that timidly goes
where the wind of governments blows. Rather, the AUC exercises significant agency on
issues that affect not just the African continent but also the broader international system.
The AUC is often at the heart of international agenda- setting, norm development, decision-
making, rule creation, policy development, and it sometimes offer strategic leadership. The
article demonstrates six pathways through which the AUC acts like a tail wagging a dog.
Manuscript received 17 June 2020; accepted 1 December 2020
Keywords
Africa, African Union, African agency, international organisation, international
bureaucracy, IR theory, African Union Commission
Africa Spectrum
00(0) 1–20
© The Author(s) 2021
Article reuse guidelines:
sagepub. com/ journals- permissions
DOI: 10. 1177/ 0002 0397 21990394
journals. sagepub. com/ home/ afr
Special Issue Article
Department of Political Science, King’s University College at Western University, Ontario, Canada
Corresponding Author:
Thomas Kwasi Tieku, Department of Political Science, King’s University College at Western University, 266
Epworth Avenue, ON N6A 2M3, Canada.
Email: ttieku@ uwo. ca

Africa Spectrum 00(0)2
Introduction
Conventional international relations (IR) accounts of actors that exercise agency in global
aairs typically exclude international organisations (IOs) housed in and/or composed exclu-
sively of states in the Global South. The assumption is that the bureaucracies of these IOs
lack meaningful agency (for discussions of Global South actors as lacking meaningful
agency in international politics and neglect of African agency in IR scholarship, see Brown
and Harman, 2013; Fisher, 2018; Tieku, 2013). This assumption seems to have inuenced
the burgeoning scholarship on the African Union (AU). The prevailing view is that the pan-
African organisation is primarily an intergovernmental body (for claims that the AU is
mainly an intergovernmental body, see Forbacha, 2020; Touray, 2017; Welz, 2020). It is
widely seen by the public, discussed in popular media, and conceptualised by many experts
as an intergovernmental body (Muchie et al., 2013; Olivier, 2015; Welz, 2020). As Olivier
(2015: 214) put it, “the AU and its predecessor, the Organization of African Unity (OAU),
have been classied as interstate as opposed to supranational by commentators.” Welz
(2020: 161) takes this realist- inspired approach to the AU further by conceptualising African
governments “as principals and the AU bureaucracy – the AU Commission in particular – as
the agent.”
This widespread view that the AU and its bureaucracy are gloried servants of African
governments is perhaps unsurprising given that the AU was negotiated, signed, and ratied
by African governments. Its founding treaty called the Constitutive Act of the African Union
(Constitutive Act) would not have come into existence if at least two- thirds of the fty- four
African governments and Western Sahara had not ratied and deposited it. Moreover, there
are legal clauses in the Constitutive Act that appear to give AU member governments abso-
lute powers in the management of the aairs of the union. For instance, the Constitutive Act
empowers the Assembly of the AU, which is composed of African leaders, to make nal
decisions on all matters of the union, to hire, re and supervise AU employees, and to estab-
lish new AU institutions (African Union, 2001).
This article, however, shows that the African Union Commission (AUC) often acts
like a tail wagging a dog. Drawing insights from the literature on international public
administration (IPA), IO studies, archival materials, quantitative survey of AUC sta,
face- to- face interviews of African diplomats in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, in 2019, virtual
interviews of senior sta of AUC in 2020 and observation of the actual day- to- day activ-
ities of the AUC since its creation in 2001, the article demonstrates that the AUC exer-
cises considerable agency, dened as the capacity to shape agendas and decisions in
Africa and international aairs. Although the AUC has its own challenges,1 it is often at
the heart of agenda- setting, norm development, decision- making, rule creation, policy
development, and it sometimes provides strategic leadership. It is therefore oversimpli-
cation of the complex relationship between the AUC and African governments, a distor-
tion of social reality, and a projection of other’s experiences on the AU to assume the
pan- African bureaucracy is, or treat the pan- African bureaucracy as, a mere servant of
African governments. The AU and its bureaucracy are neither gloried messengers and
docile followers of orders of African governments nor are they empty vessels that timidly
go where the wind of governments blows. This article shows six pathways that the AUC

Tieku 3
uses to exercise agency and demonstrates how the pan- African bureaucracy expresses its
international actorness.
The rest of the article is organised into four sections. The section following this introduc-
tion provides a succinct overview of the AUC. The next section then situates the argument
within the broader IR scholarship by outlining six pathways that IR scholars have identied
as avenues that actors use to exercise agency in global aairs. The third section then uses the
six pathways to show how AUC’s functions and its day- to- day activities enable the pan-
African bureaucracy to exercise agency in Africa and international aairs. The concluding
section reiterates the central argument and outlines implications of the argument.
Nature of the AUC
The AUC was established in 2001, and it became operational in 2002. The composition and
competencies of the AUC are spelled out in the Statutes of the Commission of the African
Union (henceforth Statutes).2 It is composed of the Chairperson of the Commission of the
African Union (COC) , deputy chairperson (DCP), and eight commissioners (African
Union, 2001: Article 2).3 The AUC is supported by approximately 1720 (May 2020 gure)
international civil servants at the headquarters in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, and at the repre-
sentative missions around the world (African Union, 2019). The COC is elected by the
Assembly together with the DCP, while commissioners are elected by the Executive Council
and appointed by the Assembly.
The management set- up of the AUC has been described in the literature as a co-
management IPA (Tieku, 2018). This is because unlike a single corporate IPA model such as
the secretariat of the United Nations (UN) where most of the powers including the authority
to direct, hire, re, and discipline sta are invested in the Secretary General, the key AUC
powers are spread around the AUC system. The COC acts as the AU’s chief executive o-
cer (CEO) and its accounting ocer. The DCP, who cannot be red by the COC, is respon-
sible for the administration and nance of the AUC. This means in practice that the DCP
controls both the purse of the AUC and the international civil servants who work in various
units of the AUC. Commissioners, like the DCP, are accountable to but cannot be red by
the COC. Commissioners are responsible “for the implementation of all decisions, policies,
and programmes in respect of the portfolio for which he/she has been elected” (African
Union, 2002). In practice, each commissioner has a kingdom. In the past, commissioners
who have strong personalities and capacities have often operated as if their departments are
not under the oces of the COC and the DCP. Shrewd COCs and DCPs often learn quickly
that they have little choice but to co- manage the AUC with commissioners.
Pathways Used by International Public Administrations to
Exercise Agency in Global Affairs
This section outlines the pathways that IPAs such as the AUC use to exercise agency in
the international system. These include but are not limited to the role of international
bureaucracies in drafting IO treaties, developing strategic visions and plans for IOs,

Africa Spectrum 00(0)4
developing IO regulations, implementing and monitoring IO regulations, helping IOs to
make decisions, evaluating IO programmes, agenda- setting for IOs, and other functional
activities that show international bureaucrats perform roles that go beyond functions of
servants of intergovernmental bodies. First, most international bureaucracies get the
opportunity to shape the drafting of international treaties that IOs create (Johnstone,
2012). The processes of making treaties signicantly dilute the supervisory responsibil-
ity that intergovernmental bodies are supposed to exercise over international bureaucrats
(Armstrong and Bulmer, 1998; Sandholtz and Sweet, 1998). Secretariat ocials usually
take advantage of the powers given to them to assist governments in negotiating agree-
ments to oer zero draft or background studies that form the basis of intergovernmental
negotiations. In many cases, they embed their own ideas in new agreements, and also
draft and revise at least some aspects of new agreements. The degree of involvement and
inuence in negotiation processes depends on several factors, including the availability
of technical capacity at IO secretariats, member states, issues involved, and the nature of
the negotiations. While intergovernmental bodies retain the right to sign and ratify these
agreements, some international bureaucrats adopt, make, and amend agreements without
explicit approval and ratication by every member state of the organisation. The
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the International Monetary Fund
(IMF) require a certain percentage of members to ratify new agreements before they take
eect. The IAEA requires two- thirds of members’ approval and/or ratication, meaning
a third of members may not get the chance to exercise their supervisory responsibility.
Second, many international bureaucrats have powers to enforce regulations, prom-
ises, and treaties that intergovernmental bodies make. These enforcement powers usu-
ally include the right of IO secretariats to review the actions of intergovernmental
agencies and public ocials. The role given to international bureaucrats to ensure com-
pliance with regulations, promises, and treaties is particularly powerful in IOs that have
courts attached to them. Karen Alter (2012) estimated that no less than twenty IOs have
formal courts that ensure that intergovernmental agencies comply with international
rules, regulations, and promises. Many international bureaucrats use this power to drive
states to implement changes (sometimes very costly ones) that they would not have
made without pressure from IO secretariats.
Third, several international bureaucracies have the mandate to make recommenda-
tions to intergovernmental bodies (Hurd, 2011). Some IR scholars have a dismissive
attitude towards recommendations, but that ignores the fact that many recommendations
can have consequential political eects. The reputational cost to governments for ignor-
ing recommendations made by senior international bureaucrats is often enormous. The
reputational impact of the recommendations by the General Assembly on Apartheid
played a central role in the eventual collapse of the racialised political system.
Recommendations by international bureaucrats of major IOs are often used as tools by
other actors such as non- governmental organisations (NGOs) in their campaigns. The
campaign materials of many NGOs on the Israeli–Palestinian crisis are drawn from rec-
ommendations made by international bureaucrats. Often, recommendations by interna-
tional bureaucrats serve as part of packaged information that NGOs use to pressure states

Tieku 5
to adopt international instruments of great political consequence (Hurd, 2011: 120).
Recommendations also have a powerful name and shame eect on intergovernmental
actors. Many of these recommendations are based on commissioned studies in areas that
intergovernmental bodies may have limited knowledge and expertise. Decisions of the
UN Security Council are usually based on recommendations contained in reports sub-
mitted by the Secretary General (Butler, 2012). Most of these reports are written by
leading experts in the eld. As such, recommendations carry tremendous weight in the
decision- making processes of actors in the international system. In other words, there is
power embedded in recommendations that international bureaucrats can and do exploit
to exercise agency in global aairs.
Fourth, many IO secretariats have powers to represent the collective will of the inter-
national community or their member states. These representational powers enable inter-
national bureaucrats to exercise tremendous inuence way beyond those associated with
obedient servants of governments (Karbo and Murithi, 2017). The representational
activities have allowed international bureaucrats to sometimes recontract interests of
states, manage, and even reconstruct state institutions. Zanotti (2011), for example,
showed that the powers that UN bodies have to represent the international community in
places such as East Timor allowed UN sta to inuence the direction of the people of
East Timor in ways that no single government, however powerful, can or will be able to
do. Similarly, similar delegated powers enable UN sta to write constitutions of coun-
tries emerging from conict in ways that fundamentally reconstruct and shape the poli-
tics, society, identity, and culture of these fragile states. Curtis’s (2012) insightful
collections demonstrated how the UN’s work enabled international bureaucrats such as
UN ocials to reconstruct identities of people in countries that have gone through civil
war. The deployment of the UN in countries such as Liberia and Sierra Leone gave UN
ocials and agencies the opportunity not only to shape the nature of governments and
the public institutions that emerged, but also the very nature of the society that came out
of the process. It is not a sheer coincidence that most postwar societies are liberal,
market- oriented, and have similar public institutions. Finally, the presence of World
Bank Group and the IMF in the Global South allow sta of these organisations to dictate
economic policies of many countries (Easterly, 2013).
Fifth, many IR works have identied agenda- setting as an important instrument that
international bureaucrats use to direct, inuence, and shape thinking at the global level
(Puchala, 1999; Sandholtz and Sweet, 1998). International bureaucrats increasingly set
the agendas for other actors in the international system. The leadership of international
bureaucrats has formal responsibilities to draw attention to matters of interest to global
actors. Article 99 of the UN Charter gives the Secretary General the power to “bring to
the attention of the Security Council any matter which may threaten the maintenance of
international peace and security” (Luck, 2006). This broader agenda- setting mandate
allows a creative Secretary General to take advantage of and to direct the Security
Council. Some Secretary Generals have used these powers to commission studies that
have looked at issues that even powerful states are unwilling or uncomfortable to dis-
cuss. Others have used this power to introduce a reform agenda into the UN system. The

Africa Spectrum 00(0)6
former Secretary General Boutros Boutros- Ghali took advantage of these powers to put
peacebuilding on the agenda of the Security Council. The agenda- setting powers make
international bureaucrats gatekeepers on many issues.
Sixth, international bureaucrats have many strategic powers. These include the power
to provide strategic leadership and acting as advisors to governments and intergovern-
mental agencies. Many international bureaucrats are often informal advisers to govern-
ments and intergovernmental bodies. Some of them even tell governments what they
should or should not do. It is widely documented that IMF and World Bank sta often
dictate microeconomic policies of a number of developing countries that have borrowed
money from these two banks (Dreher, 2009; Dreher et al., 2015; Moore and Scaritt,
1990). Even those that were not given intrusive powers use savvy ways to inuence
governments to take a direction that they would not have done otherwise. For example,
a number of UN sta working in various UN departments or agencies, including the UN
Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) and the United Nations Development
Programme (UNDP) have used their advising capacity to sometimes shape economic
thinking and policies of many African countries. Policies pursued by African countries
are often dictated, encouraged, or supported by these international bureaucrats. Other
international bureaucrats provide unsolicited but consequential information and advice
to intergovernmental bodies.
How the AUC Exercises Agency in Africa and Beyond
Although the subtext of the introduction is that it is controversial, at least in realist dom-
inated IR scholarship, to suggest that the AU is an independent actor that exercises enor-
mous agency in international aairs, the section below applies the six theoretical insights
of how international bureaucrats exercise agency to the AUC. The analysis shows that
the AUC exercises agency on several issues that shape the African continent and beyond.
Before delving into the empirical discussions, it is important to indicate the foundation
of AUC’s international actorness. The source of AUC agency comes from the relative
independence that it enjoys, and the functional roles and activities that AUC sta and
supporting casts such as consultants perform on a day- to- day basis. As international civil
servants, AUC sta are not supposed to “seek or receive instructions from any govern-
ment or from any other authority external to the Union” (African Union, 2002). In addi-
tion, AU bureaucrats are required to be responsible only to the commission, and AU
members are mandated “to respect the exclusive character of the responsibilities of the
Members of the Commission and the other sta and shall not inuence or seek to inu-
ence them in the discharge of their responsibilities” (African Union, 2002).
While the above articles have not guaranteed a 100 per cent autonomy to the AUC,
they have given AU sta the platform to do their work without major interferences from
African public ocials. Data from the rst- ever survey of AUC sta demonstrate that
there is little interference of the work of the AUC sta by African embassy ocials
(Tieku et al., forthcoming). Even though there are theoretical speculations and assump-
tions based on experiences of IOs in the Global North and anecdotal suggestions of the

Tieku 7
occasional personal and backroom interventions by embassy ocials, overall there is
little concrete evidence to show that AU bureaucrats take instructions from the African
missions or even donors who provide most of the programme budget. The discussions
below, which provide empirical support for the six theoretical insights of how interna-
tional bureaucrats exercise agency, demonstrate the international actorness of the AUC.
Rule-Drafting Powers
The AUC plays a central role in the drafting of AU treaties, declarations, decisions, and
resolutions that aect both Africa and the broader international system. The rst draft or
zero draft of most AU legal instruments are usually crafted by the AUC legal team or
consultants hired by the AUC. As Mando (2018) showed, the AUC and the Pan African
Lawyers Union (PALU) wrote the rst draft of the amendments that state representatives
negotiated and adopted as the Protocol on the Statute of the African Court of Justice and
Human Rights. The opportunity to provide zero draft or background study to new legal
instruments gives AUC ocials enormous gatekeeping powers. They can and often do
use the opportunity to develop documents in ways that reect their perspective, what
they perceive as the views of key member states, and to delimit the kinds of issues and
ideas that are put on the table for negotiation by state parties. In theory, member states
are supposed to give the AUC comments on these drafts, but African governments have
the habit of not sending comments or supervising the drafting of these documents in any
meaningful manner (Interview with a member of the oce of the AU legal counsel on
21 February 2018). For instance, only two African governments formally sent comments
on the zero draft instrument, which eventually became the Protocol Relating to the
Establishment of the Peace and Security Council of the AU (the PSC Protocol).4 The
PSC Protocol created the AU Peace and Security Council, which has been very inuen-
tial in the international peace and security landscape (Williams, 2009).
The dearth of technical capacity in the bureaucracies of African states is a major rea-
son why African governments do not often provide substantive comments on draft doc-
uments. With the exception of a few states, African civil services do not attract the
strongest human capacity within various African states (Mkandawire, 2017; Olowu,
1999; Schwarz and Abels, 2016). The pay system of the AUC, however, allows the AUC
to attract considerably stronger candidates than most civil service in Africa.5 As Tieku
et al.’s (forthcoming) data showed, the average AUC sta is middle- aged and holds at
least a postgraduate degree. The survey data indicated that almost all the 1,720 AUC
professional sta have at least a master’s degree; many of them hold PhDs in their elds.
And the majority of them have worked for many years, including holding senior public
service positions, before joining the AUC. For instance, the current commissioners of
the Department of Peace and Security (DPS) as well as the Department of Trade and
Industry (DTI) were the Algerian and Zambian Ambassadors, respectively, to the AU
prior to joining the AUC.
In contrast, the majority of sta at African missions in Addis Ababa are generalist,
and most of the African embassies are too small to handle all the AU issues competently.
As the High- Level Panel of the Audit of the AU noted, “the relatively small size of most

Africa Spectrum 00(0)8
missions and their limited expertise to handle the broad range of technical issues
addressed by the AU” meant that the Permanent Representative Council (PRC: that is,
government representatives to the AU) “largely focused on Organisational oversight
matters, as opposed to the substance of the agenda of the Union”(African Union, 2007:
37). It is not uncommon to nd rst degree holders in charge of senior portfolios, includ-
ing ambassadorial positions in African embassies in Addis Ababa. Senior sta of the
AUC often complain that the lack of experts and interlocutors at African missions makes
their work “doubly” dicult as they often “spend too much time brieng and explaining
things to PRC members” (Interview with a member of senior management of the AUC,
18 October 2020). The low level of technical skills at the PRC level is often told in terms
of the famous professor–students approach that the rst chairperson of the AUC Alpha
Oumar Konaré took in his interactions with PRC members. Konaré is widely known to
have treated PRC members like rst- degree students and would often go to PRC meet-
ings to lecture rather than brief them (Interview with a member of AU sta association,
18 June 2019). Even though African politics sometimes dees logic and basic principles
of political life, experiences show that people nd it dicult to give orders to those who
are technically superior to them.
Besides the institutional weaknesses of African missions in Addis Ababa and public
services at home, draft legal texts sent by the AUC do not often receive enough attention
in part because senior ocials at the ministries often think their experts will get the
chance to look at them carefully during intergovernmental expert meetings, which the
AUC often convenes over many of these documents. But these experts’ meetings are too
large, driven by bureaucratic imperatives, and too complex for any meaningful redraft-
ing of these instruments (Interview with an African Ambassador, 20 June 2019). There
is also the issue of per diem and travel allowance, which are paid in the sought- after US
dollars, that the cash- strapped government experts have become very dependent upon.6
For fear of being dropped from the invitation list, many of these experts “behave prop-
erly” (Interview with AU protocol ocer, 18 June 2019).7 In any case, AUC ocials
provide secretarial duties at these meetings and often have the power to interpret and
summarise discussions at these meetings in ways that reect their cognitive orientations
more than anything else.
Though some AU bureaucrats engage in self- censorship, there is ample evidence to
show that AUC ocials have used these powers to put progressive ideas on Africa’s
agenda (Matlosa, 2008). A classic example is the African Charter on Democracy,
Elections, and Governance (African Governance Charter). Many of the AU policy and
legal instruments, including the post- conict reconstruction policy, read like literature
reviews of best practices in part because they were written by AUC bureaucrats usually
in collaboration with consultants (Tieku, 2018; Touray, 2017). Government ocials
often provide little substantive input in the development of these instruments (Tieku,
2019b).8 For instance, the creation of the AU transitional justice instrument was driven
largely by the AUC with consultancy services provided by think tanks such as the
Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation (CSVR) (CSVR, 2013; Murithi,
2018).

Tieku 9
Rule-Enforcement Powers
The AUC has at least three enforcement powers, namely the power to “implement deci-
sions taken by other organs of the AU,” the mandate to “coordinate and monitor the
implementation of the decisions of other organs of the AU,” and the power to “assist
member states in implementing AU programmes and policies” (African Union, 2002).
Attached to these powers is a mandate to review and report regularly and publicly about
the behaviour of African governments. Some AUC ocials have taken advantage of this
power to name and shame governments that have not implemented policies and deci-
sions of the AU. For instance, as part of its mandate to “ensure the mainstreaming of
gender in all programmes and activities of the Union,” the COC often uses its annual
reports to highlight publicly the regulatory and institutional mechanisms developed by
AU member states to promote gender equity (African Union, 2003). These annual
reports carry signicant naming and shaming impacts. Though correlation is not
causation, it is not just a sheer coincidence that there has been progressive development
of institutional mechanisms in African governmental machinery, including the presi-
dency, to promote gender issues since the AU emerged on the political scene in 2001.9
Some AUC sta used these enforcement powers to impose AU’s code of conduct and
rules of engagement on African security personnel on AU peace support operations
(African Union, 2015). For instance, the AUC pushed troop- contributing countries
(TCCs) to its peace missions to enforce the AU’s zero- tolerance on sexual abuse. Unlike
in the past where IOs basically ignored accusations of sexual assaults by their peace-
keepers, the AU appointed an independent team of investigators to examine Human
Rights Watch’s allegations of twenty- one cases of sexual exploitation and abuse by the
Ugandan and Burundian Contingents as well as some civilian personnel to the AU
Mission to Somalia (AMISOM) (Human Rights Watch, 2014). Though the report was
inconclusive in large part because the leadership of the military in the aected countries
did not fully co- operate, it was interesting that those who were accused of sexual mis-
conduct were quietly withdrawn from the mission and/or banned from participating in
future missions, and in at least one case the accused person is generally considered to
have been jailed (African Union, 2015). The allegations would have been an additional
footnote to the massive literature that exists on the culture of impunity that peacekeep-
ers, especially those on UN missions, accused of sexual exploitation have enjoyed over
the years had it not been the AUC’s power to enforce rules on peace support missions.
That said, the AUC should and could do more to ght the culture of sexual exploitation
in peace missions in Africa.
Recommendation Powers
The AUC has powers to make recommendations to African governments. The AUC has
used this power quite eectively to the extent that many governments and agencies in
Africa nd it dicult to ignore AU’s recommendations. The AUC cleverly brings
together not only leading experts in the eld it intends to make recommendations but
also the politically connected people in the area to put together most of its reports and

Africa Spectrum 00(0)10
recommendations.10 In many instances, the AUC cedes the presentation and entrepre-
neurial work of the recommendations to the chair of the committee or commission, who
is often politically connected. As a result, AUC recommendations have become heavy-
weights in the decision- making of the African political class. Because many govern-
ments and intergovernmental bodies in Africa are clearly aware of the impact of AUC
recommendations, the African political class sometimes expends considerable energy
discouraging AUC from setting up commissions and committees about their countries or
tries to quash the publication of reports that contain costly recommendations. For
instance, the government of South Sudan and the Sudan Liberation Movement in oppo-
sition spent considerable political and diplomatic capital in 2015 to quash the release of
the nal report of the AUC of Inquiry on South Sudan (AUCISS) (African Union,
2015).11 They moved to delay the release of the report in large part because of its recom-
mendations (Deng, 2015; Tribune, 2015). The leaders would not have worked that hard
to kill the report if they had thought that its recommendations were mere cheap talk. The
AUC bureaucrats have, at times, used recommendations of this nature to advance their
interests, shape the direction of African politics, and to exercise subtle power over the
African political class.
Representational Duties
The AUC exercises several representational powers. It plays an ad hoc representational
role in the form of speaking and attending public gatherings on behalf of AU member
states. In this role, the AUC is required to articulate views and to behave in ways that
reect the collective preferences of African states. Demands for AUC’s representations
are so high that the leadership of the AUC spends most of their time travelling and
attending meetings. The high rate of travelling, in particular, has generated enormous
debate within the Commission, as it impacts negatively on the productivity of the AUC.
The other representational function the AUC exercises include the creation of permanent
missions in important capitals around the world. These missions are tasked with the
responsibility to promote the interests and values of the African continent, articulate
collective views of African states, and act as a delegate of the African society of states
outside of the African continent. As of October 2020, the AU had established permanent
representational oces to the UN in New York, IOs in Brussels, the League of Arab
States in Cairo, and the UN in Washington, DC. There is evidence that some of them
actually help African states construct their interests in international negotiations. For
instance, the intellectual and political leadership for the Common African Position on
the 2020 Review of the UN Peacebuilding Architecture was provided by the AU oce
in New York (African Union, 2020; Interview with peacebuilding expert on 17 October
2020). On trade negotiations, the AUC oce in Geneva brings together African embassy
ocials in Geneva to construct their interests, agree on common positions, and share
negotiation tactics on major global trade issues (Ostry and Tieku, 2007).
In addition, the representational oces provide a exible institutional forum for
African states to develop strategies for the implementation of international rules and

Tieku 11
decisions. The AU representation oces in New York and Geneva removed many chal-
lenges as well as shortened the process for African candidates vying for positions in IOs.
As the Ugandan ambassador to the UN pointed out, due in part to the work of the AUC,
the African continent usually presents a single candidate for elected position in IOs
(Ayebare, 2018). This has been instrumental in the relative successes of African candi-
dates contesting IO elections. It played a key role in the elections of Ethiopia’s Tedros
Adhanom Ghebreyesus as the director general of the World Health Organisation on 23
May 2017, and of Rwanda’s Louise Mushikiwabo as the secretary general of the
International Organisation of the Francophonie (OIF) on 12 October 2018.
Agenda-Setting and Proposal Initiation
The AUC has the power to “initiate” proposals for consideration by other organs of the
AU. This power eectively grants the AUC the opportunity to set the agenda, to propose
new ideas, and to provide direction for the union. The AUC took advantage of this power
to invent the “sectoral expert meetings,” where most of the agenda items for AU sum-
mits are generated (Interview with a member of senior management of the AUC, 18
October 2020).12 Many of the agenda items for summits are developed at sectoral meet-
ings even though the AU rules provided that agenda items for summit must be provided
by the Assembly of the Union, the Executive Council, the PRC, the AU Commission,
any other organs of the Union, and any other item formally proposed by member states
and regional economic communities. The agenda- setting powers of the AUC together
with the power to do research have placed the AUC in a position to shape the pace and
direction of continental African politics.
The agenda- setting and the convening powers have placed the AU in a position where
it arranges and manages many of the meetings of the AU. The AUC uses these two pow-
ers to bring together some of the experts on an issue- area to think about and develop
solutions for, and policies on, the issue. If exercised to their fullest, the agenda- setting
and the convening powers hold enormous supranational promise, especially given that
the AUC is dealing with countries that have limited institutional, technical, and bureau-
cratic capabilities.
Some of the departments of AUC have taken advantage of this power to develop
several policy instruments, norms, and binding rules. The DPS took the lead in helping
the AU develop extensive regulations on unconstitutional changes of government in
Africa (Souaré, 2014). The regulations adopted rst as Declarations in Harare in 1998
have been used to suspend from the AU states such as Guinea- Bissau and Sao Tome and
Principe in 2003, Togo in 2005, Mauritania in 2005 and 2007, and Guinea in 2008 after
military takeovers (Legler and Tieku, 2010). The success of the anti- coup regulation
encouraged AUC sta in the DPS to hire a consultant to draft a broader governance
charter for the African continent. The African Governance Charter, among other things,
made elections the only legitimate means of acquiring state power in Africa.13 Keen
observers of African politics credit these regulations for the reduction of the number of
military coups in Africa since the AU emerged on the scene (Souaré, 2014; Makinda
et al., 2015).

Africa Spectrum 00(0)12
Strategic Powers
The AUC has the power to provide strategic leadership to both the AU and African govern-
ments. This strategic leadership mandate is reected in the Statutes of the AU in multiple
ways. Some of the strategic powers are explicit in nature, while others are implied in the
AUC Statutes. Article 2(m) of the Statutes empowers the AUC to prepare strategic plans
and studies for the consideration of the Council. The AUC has used these powers over the
last decade to develop three strategic plans. The rst was put in place by the Konare regime
from 2004 to 2008. The major thrust of this strategic plan was to shift the AU from a general-
purpose organisation to focus more directly on political integration. The second strategic
plan was introduced by Jean Ping from 2009 to 2011. The broader goal of the plan was to
develop a common value system for the African continent. The nal plan was introduced by
the Zuma administration for the period of 2012 to 2016. The Zuma plan aimed at position-
ing the AUC in a way that it would be able to drive the Agenda 2063, which is an ambitious
long- term plan designed to create conict- free and prosperous Africa by 2063. The Agenda
2063 is now the main strategic document guiding the work of the AU. It is the reference
document for even the Assembly of the AU.
The other delegated function that enhances AUC’s strategic powers is the mandate to
“build capacity for scientic research and development” of member states (African Union,
2002: 4: Article 2). This power has put the AUC in a position to commission studies that
socialise states and other actors in the international system to pursue goals that they would
not otherwise pursue. For instance, in July 2019, the AUC and the Small Arms Survey
released the rst- ever continental- wide study mapping illicit arms ows in Africa (The
African Union Commission and the Small Arms Survey, 2019). Among other things, the
report is meant to put pressure on AU members and other actors in the international system
to tackle the small arms problem on the African continent. The research powers also put the
AUC in a position to build strong relationships with research institutions and knowledge
centres around the world that have enhanced the agency of the AUC. Although the AUC
leadership has yet to take full advantage of the delegated intellectual power, especially given
the dearth of intellectual capacity within governments and bureaucracies in Africa, there is
enough evidence to show that the AUC is using it to shape long- term strategic thinking on
the continent. For instance, the AUC provided the intellectual support and co- ordination for
the AU, African Development Bank (ADB), and the UNECA to shape economic thinking
on the African continent. Their collaborative research and reports have largely driven the
discourse and the socialisation of African leaders on the continental African free trade area
(Amila, 2019; Luke and MacLeod, 2019).
An equally important mandate that has enhanced the intellectual capacity of the AUC is
the mandate given to the AUC to collect and disseminate information and maintain a reli-
able database on the AU and regional integration in general (African Union, 2002). This
mandate has been used by some of the shrewd AUC sta to not only create a knowledge
production unit in the AUC, but it can also be used to position the AUC as a strategic think-
ing institution for the African continent. Some departments have taken advantage of this by
building partnerships with carefully selected individuals and think tanks in ways that enable
them to exercise intellectual power over the African political class and other actors around

Tieku 13
the globe. For instance, the AU Leadership Academy (AULA) has developed strategic part-
nership and joint studies with research organisations and universities across the globe. In
2018, the AULA, in partnership with Western University in Canada, the University of Agder
in Norway, and the University of Oslo/ARENA in Norway, conducted a large- N study
aimed at soliciting the views of international bureaucrats on pertinent global issues. Other
AUC sta have used the knowledge management and dissemination powers to develop
institutional mechanisms that has put the AUC at the forefront of thinking on African issues.
For instance, the AUC created the Pan African University with ve campuses spread across
the continent in 2011. The focus of the University on graduate programming and research
has enhanced the AUC’s knowledge- building capacity. The AU also established the African
Centre for the Study and Research on Terrorism (ACSRT) in Algeria in 2004 to do research
and produce fresh ideas on ways to deal with terrorism issues.
In addition, the AUC has powers to provide intellectual leadership when it comes to the
development of common African positions on major global issues (Zondi, 2013). This is a
major strategic mandate as it puts the AUC in a position to basically dictate Africa’s position
on international subjects (Ayebare, 2018). The AUC has used this power to develop a com-
mon African position on subjects ranging from UN reforms, African representation in IOs,
and international trade. In some instances, the relevant AUC unit basically wrote the com-
mon African position and presented it to the relevant AU organ for adoption. For instance,
the most recent Common African Position on UN Review of Peace Operations (the Peace
Operation Policy), which was submitted to the UN in April 2015, was written almost exclu-
sively by a handful of technically gifted individuals in the DPS (Interview with senior AUC
sta, 18 June 2019). Many members of AU did not actually read it, and those who did read
it were able to do so during the 25th AU summit held in June 2015 when the Assembly
adopted document (Interview with senior sta, 17 October 2020). In other words, they read
it at least two months after it was sent to the UN.
The nal strategic power the AUC has is a mandate to “mobilise resources and devise
appropriate strategies for self- nancing income- generating activities and investment for the
union” (African Union, 2002). The AUC used this power to nudge African governments to
adopt a series of self- nancing measures, including the imposition of a levy of 0.2 per cent
on eligible imports on AU members (Sungu, 2015). It is projected that the levy will generate
approximately US$1.2 billion annually (Mugabe, 2019). This will enable the AU to fund
100 per cent of its operational budget, 75 per cent of the programme budget, and 25 per cent
of the peacekeeping budget. As of the time of writing, over 22 African countries were esti-
mated to be implementing the levy (Dogbevi, 2017; Yankey, 2018).14
Conclusion
The article drew insights from IR scholarship to show that the AUC exercises consider-
able agency in African and international aairs. The AUC sta working in tandem with
non- state actors (consultants) shape AU actions, African politics, and international aairs
in many ways. The AUC relationship with African governments is complex. It is far from
a classic agent–principal relationship. Yet, the AUC is treated in some quarters as a mere

Africa Spectrum 00(0)14
secretariat of African governments. Several factors account for the misperception and
misrepresentation of the AUC. Among them is the simple fact that some people approach
the AUC with templates from elsewhere in the world. In the name of theoretical rigour,
they often impose these templates on the African reality thereby minimising or ignoring
experiences that do not cohere with these preconceived ideas. Many of these templates
are either borrowed from American politics and/or European Union (EU) studies. Indeed,
the EU seems to have set the imaginative ceiling for the study of international
bureaucracy.
Moreover, because the AUC does not have EU structures or competencies, it is tempting
to use the EU template to dismiss AUC as a mere paper pusher. Such an argument is how-
ever not only grounded on awed assumptions; it presupposes that international actorness
should be or is the same everywhere and/or that international actors play a monolithic role
in the international system and/or that supranationalism can be legitimately exercised only
with European ascent. It should, however, not be forgotten that the EU and its institutions
are products of a particular historical development, and the AUC is an artefact of another
social processes. It is a stretch to expect dierent historical processes to produce the same
outcomes.
The AUC exercises enormous agency but the channels it uses to exert inuence are
slightly dierent from that of the EU and American politics. The AUC channels should
be explored and theorised in their own right and not through the lenses of American and/
or European politics. The excessive projection on the AUC and African politics has also
led to exaggeration and romanisation of the capacity of governments and their public
services. This article indicated that the weak capacity of African governments and their
public services compared to the relatively better expertise at the disposal of the AUC
enabled the pan- African bureaucracy to inuence the African political class and to exer-
cise agency through six pathways.
Besides showing that the AUC exercises enormous agency and should be added to the
study of key international actors, the article encourages researchers to rethink the way they
approach African politics. It will certainly be helpful not to project experiences elsewhere in
the world on African politics and to go beyond African political leaders and governments in
an attempt to uncover drivers of African politics. The article implies that the role of political
leaders and African states is overstated while that of transnational actors such as Africa’s
international bureaucrats are understated, understudied, and poorly understood. A little bal-
ance in our approach to the study of African international life and indeed, people in the
Global South will enhance the quest for accurate knowledge.
Acknowledgements
The Informal IR Lab at King’s University College. Thomas Kwasi Tieku is Associate Professor
of Political Science in King’s University College at The University of Western Ontario, Canada.
Email: ttieku@ uwo. ca. I am grateful to the 2020 members of Informal IR Lab namely Jessica
Afara, David Carson, Victoria Hinkson, Elizabeth Kozak, Nordiah Newell, Megan Payler, Eunice
Oladejo, Renae Pennington and Ben Drummond for research and editorial assistance. The views
expressed here and any error in the article are solely mine.

Tieku 15
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship,
and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following nancial support for the research, authorship, and/
or publication of this article: The Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada
funded the Informal IR Lab at King’s University College where a signicant portion of this article
was produced.
Notes
1. See Tieku (2019a) for documentations of some of the challenges.
2. African Union, 2002.
3. The number of departments and commissioners will change from eight to six in 2021 when
the new AUC departmental structure comes into force. For details, see African Union (2019).
4. Only Kenya and South Africa sent comments. But as pointed out repeated during interactions
with ocials at both the AUC and African missions in Ethiopia, the comments came after
many informal promptings from AUC ocials. Ben Kioko, the former AU Legal Counsellor
and a citizen of Kenya, in his usual diplomatic way admitted that he had to force the com-
ments out of the Kenyan government.
5. The number of times African embassy ocials, including Ambassadors, try to transition into
the AUC have become legendary stories in the AU system.
6. This point came up repeatedly during interviews but a senior diplomat who has organised
many of these expert meetings put it best when he said “this per diem thing is a big problem.
It encourages too much self censorship. Many government experts who come to our meetings
worry about future invitations. They often don’t say what they are thinking. You only get
their candid views in private and after assuring them that what they say will not impact on
future invitations.” Interview with senior AUC sta, 20 June 2019. The Center for the Study
of Violence and Reconciliation (CSVR) (2013) Also, see Samb et al. (2020) for the problem
of per diem in development.
7. To behave properly in AU circles is to follow the line of the discourse at meetings. The expec-
tation is that the experts are there to bless these documents.
8. The circumscribed involvement of government experts in the drafting of AU rules partly
explains the implementation gap.
9. A number of African states including Ghana and Liberia established their ministries/depart-
ments with a focus on gender immediately following the creation of the AU.
10. For instance, when the AUC chairperson wanted to investigate the human rights violations
during the armed conict in South Sudan and make recommendations on the best way and
means to ensure accountability, she appointed the politically connected and powerful former
Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo to chair the team of independent experts. For details,
see Human Rights Watch (2015).
11. The report was eventually released a year later.

Africa Spectrum 00(0)16
12. An informal institutional mechanism with no formal basis in the AU legal framework.
13. Besides elections, the common means of acquiring power in Africa has been military coups,
armed rebellions, and popular protests.
14. Ghana, Kenya, and Rwanda took the lead in implementing the levy. For details, see Dogbevi
(2017).
15. Please add (African Union 2007).
16. (African Union 2007).
ORCID ID
Thomas Kwasi Tieku https:// orcid. org/ 0000- 0002- 8452- 2118
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Author Biography
Thomas Kwasi Tieku is an associate professor of political science at King’s University College
at The University of Western Ontario in Canada. He is the former director of African Studies at the
University of Toronto where he won the Excellence of Teaching Award. He has co- ordinated the
Social Justice and Peace Studies programme at King’s, served as the Lead Researcher at the Centre
for International Governance Innovations (CIGI) and was 2017 Carnegie Fellow at the University
of Ghana, Legon. Thomas’ current research, which is supported by Canada’s Social Sciences and
Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), focuses on informal international relations, mediation,
peacebuilding, and international organisations. He has authored, co- authored, or co- edited four
books and over thirty refereed journal articles and book chapters. He has served as a consultant to
several organisations and governments, including the World Bank Group, UN, AU, CIGI, and the
Government of Canada.
Email: ttieku@ uwo. ca
In der falschen Liga: wie die Kommission der Afrikanischen
Union in der Politik agiert
Zusammenfassung
Die gängige Meinung ist, dass die Kommission der Afrikanischen Union (AUC), wie die
meisten internationalen öffentlichen Verwaltungen und internationalen Organisationen
(IO), die in ärmeren Regionen der Welt beheimatet sind, keine bedeutende
Handlungsfähigkeit in internationalen Fragen besitzt. Dieser Artikel versucht zu zeigen,
dass die AUC weder ein Bote und fügsamer Erfüllungsgehilfe von Regierungsbefehlen
ist noch ein williges Fähnchen im Wind der Regierungen. Vielmehr übt die AUC einen
bedeutenden Einfluss auf Themen aus, die nicht nur den afrikanischen Kontinent, son-
dern auch das internationale System betreffen. Die AUC steht oft im Mittelpunkt von
internationalem Agenda- Setting, der Entwicklung von Normen, Entscheidungsfindungen,
der Schaffung von Regeln, der Politikentwicklung, und bietet ab und zu sogar strategische

Africa Spectrum 00(0)20
Führung. Dieser Artikel zeigt sechs Wege auf, wie es der AUC gelingt, als Underdog
Führung zu übernehmen.
Schlagwörter
Afrika, Afrikanische Union, afrikanische Agency, internationale Organisation, inter-
nationale Bürokratie, Theorien der Internationalen Beziehungen, Kommission der
Afrikanischen Union