Deon Geldenhuys’s research while affiliated with University of Johannesburg and other places

Having arranged our selection of contested states in order of seniority, beginning with the most ‘junior’ pretender, we have to end with the Republic of China (ROC or Taiwan). With its contested statehood dating back to the late 1940s, the ROC was the doyen of this corps. But longevity was not the main reason why the ROC deserved special attention in this inquiry. Taiwan provided a rich illustration of the diversity among contested states and served as an outstanding example of how such an entity can skillfully exploit its limited international space. Unlike many contested states, the ROC was not a secessionist entity that proclaimed unilateral independence. Instead it owed its contested statehood to revolutionary regime change in mainland China, which reduced the ROC to the last outpost of the ancien regime. Even so Taiwan has managed to retain a measure of international recognition, with the result that its diplomatic isolation has not been as severe as that of most other contested states. Not content to be boxed in, the ROC has become a pioneer in the development of semiofficial foreign representation as a substitute for normal diplomatic ties. One of the reasons for its success in this endeavour was Taiwan’s economic muscle — a feature that has also helped the ROC develop its empirical statehood to a level far superior to that of any other contested state. Its extensive socio-economic ties with its veto state, China, added to Taiwan’s uniqueness.

The excursion into international law in the first chapter may tempt one to proffer a straightforward explanation for contested statehood: the entities were conceived and born in sin. As the products of illegal actions under international law — aggression, occupation and racial discrimination — the putative states may not join the community of confirmed states. This certainly applies to several contested states, but by no means all. In fact unilateral secession, which can be driven by factors wholly unrelated to the above offences, is the single most common origin among our selection of contested states. Given its prevalence, secession justifies considerable attention in this chapter. Thereafter other origins of contested statehood are identified. Our starting point, however, is the notion of self-determination — the holy grail of all contested states, regardless of origin. They all justify their claims to statehood in the name of this principle of international law and canon of world politics. What is meant by self-determination and what is its relationship with the controversial notion of secession?

This book investigates a phenomenon in world politics that is largely overlooked by scholars, namely entities lacking international recognition of their status as independent states. It includes case studies on the Eurasian Quartet, Kosovo, Somaliland, Palestine, Northern Cyprus, Western Sahara and Taiwan.

The Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) offers something of a model case study of contested statehood. And it is not primarily because the TRNC is a veteran contested state of 25 years’ standing. As mentioned in Chapter 1, the TRNC owed its existence to an act of secession on the part of Turkish-dominated Northern Cyprus and occupation perpetrated by Turkey. Conceived and born in political sin if not outside international law too, the self-proclaimed state was doomed to a life in international limbo. Despite having a powerful patron state in Turkey, the TRNC has been unable to graduate to confirmed statehood. Its original and veto state, the Republic of Cyprus (under Greek Cypriot rule), together with its patron state Greece, have been highly effective in keeping Northern Cyprus at the edge of mainstream international existence. By supporting opposing sides — their respective ethnic kin — Greece and Turkey turned Cyprus into a boxing ring in which they pursued their rivalry through their local proxies. Cyprus has also experienced another more beneficial form of internationalization in the shape of diplomatic settlement initiatives spearheaded by the UN and EU. These efforts together with the recent changes of government in both the TRNC and the Republic of Cyprus have improved the prospects for resolving the conflict on the island. In short, key variables in the actual making and prospective unmaking of a contemporary contested state were at work in Cyprus.

Kosovo has experienced several rounds of contested statehood. The first began in 1991 when the territory seceded from Yugoslavia (effectively Serbia) and declared unilateral independence. Not a single state recognized its purported statehood. In 1999, after NATO’s war against Yugoslavia, Kosovo became a ward of the international community. This heralded a new period of international contestation over Kosovo’s political fate as its final status was being negotiated by interested parties. Then came Kosovo’s second unilateral declaration of independence in February 2008. Although over 40 states including major Western powers had formally recognized its statehood within three months, Kosovo’s right of independence has remained contentious — albeit far less so than in the 1990s. Its current spell of self-proclaimed independence admittedly fails to meet our requirement of at least three years’ duration, but when Kosovo’s earlier experience of life in international limbo is added its inclusion in this inquiry seems justified.

The defining feature of contested states is the internationally disputed nature of their purported statehood, manifested in their lack of de jure recognition. Although serious, the deficit in recognition is not the same for all contested states. In most cases their very right of statehood is challenged by the international community, resulting in no formal recognition at all or recognition by only a small number of established states. In a few instances contested states’ right of statehood finds wide acceptance and may even be endorsed by the UN, but the realization of the right is internationally contested. But whatever differences among them, all contested states are denied conventional international recognition; this means they do not have collective recognition (typically through the UN) of both their right to exist as sovereign states and their actual existence as such. Conversely, they all experience collective non-recognition in the sense of being deliberately excluded from UN membership. This leaves contested states in a rather abnormal situation because the vast majority of contemporary states were accorded de jure recognition on gaining independence and accepted into the ranks of confirmed states without difficulty. The small group of aspirant states that has been turned away by those on the inside find themselves condemned to a twilight existence at the margins of the international community.

The previous chapter provided a theoretical introduction to contested states’ origins, the first phase of their life cycle. We now proceed with a theoretical outline of the other two stages. In dealing here with the second phase, the focus will be on how the international community responds to the existence of contested states. It is after all these reactions that create the unfavourable external environment in which contested states find themselves. In trying to survive such adversity, contested states place heavy emphasis on state- and nation-building — the twin endeavours common among new states, especially those emerging from violent conflict. But however successful such projects, very few contested states will be allowed to advance to confirmed statehood for reasons mentioned in Chapter 1. Over the long run the status quo satisfies neither contested states nor the community of confirmed states. For one thing, the deprivations of isolation will prevent most contested states from achieving sustainable economic growth. The world community is in turn concerned about the combustible potential of the unresolved conflicts between contested states and their countries of origin. So although all of today’s contested states have been in existence for well over ten years and many could survive several more years, they are all ultimately transient phenomena expected to disappear.1 This leads us to the third and final phase of the life cycle: where might contested states ‘disappear’ to?

Unlike most contested states, Palestine has not been suffering from a lack of collective recognition. The right of the Palestinian people to an own state, located in the so-called Palestinian territories and co-existing with the state of Israel, enjoyed universal recognition. The UN similarly recognized the Palestine Liberation Organization as the representative of the Palestinian people. This titular recognition has, however, not been translated into UN membership — the final baptism into the international community — for the self-proclaimed independent state of Palestine. The nature of a future confirmed state of Palestine remains a contentious international issue, especially its status vis-à-vis Israel. International controversy has also dogged the first two phases of the life cycle of the purported Palestinian state, namely its origins and the way in which the Palestinian territories have been governed. There is consequently ample reason to treat Palestine as a contested state, albeit a rather exceptional one.