Commonwealth of Nations: Art of Survival

The Commonwealth of Nations has been in a constant process of change since its establishment. Facing numerous internal crises and challenges, it has been reshaping its structure, goals and purposes. Today the Commonwealth is looking at yet another crisis: having assumed the role of the defender of democratic principles and human rights it seems unable to cope with its current objectives. The reasons for the Commonwealth’s recent failures are down to its unique nature, which has taken decades to emerge.

The Commonwealth of Nations has been in a constant process of change since its establishment. Facing numerous internal crises and challenges, it has been reshaping its structure, goals and purposes. Today the Commonwealth is looking at yet another crisis: having assumed the role of the defender of democratic principles and human rights it seems unable to cope with its current objectives. The reasons for the Commonwealth’s recent failures are down to its unique nature, which has taken decades to emerge.

The Commonwealth of Nations (pre-1947 known as the British Commonwealth of Nations) is a voluntary intergovernmental association that today comprises 53 nations with a total population of about 2 billion.

The Commonwealth’s Changing Nature

Throughout its history the Commonwealth has been developing its structure, goals and purposes as it adapts to the changing international environment. Initially it was a closed club of countries strongly influenced by British culture: the so-called “old” Commonwealth that was legally established in 1931 with the Statute of Westminster approved by the British Parliament. The metropolis and its dominions – Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the Union of South Africa – gained obvious economic and political benefits from their membership of the British Commonwealth, and took advantage of a range of imperial preferences and the British pound.

However, with the overall weakening of Great Britain in the wake of WWII and a powerful uptick in national liberation movements in its Asian colonies, the British Commonwealth of Nations underwent major changes. In 1947, it evolved into a multinational association comprising India, Pakistan, Ceylon and, later, other countries across Asia, Africa and the Caribbean. New countries joined the Commonwealth for practical reasons: the still fragile nations were in need of diplomatic, military, economic and political assistance from more developed countries.

However, this expanding membership undermined its continuity: a clear divide emerged between the “old” and “new” Commonwealths, resulting in its transformation into a two-tier system with developed and developing member countries occupying differing positions and, in many ways, with mismatched interests.

The obvious hierarchy in the Commonwealth and the insulated position of the ‘old British club’, emphasized in particular by the close military and technical cooperation between Great Britain, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the US [1] , sparked resentment among Asian and African member countries. Protecting their interests, young nations urged the Commonwealth to focus on overcoming religious, racial or economic boundaries, and insisted on its shift from Anglo-centrism to multilaterism.

Photo: AP Photo/Jerome Delay
Kenyan security forces line up behind Interior
Minister Joseph Lenku, September 25, 2013

At a certain point in time, this shift happened, in part due to countries such as Ghana, Uganda, Trinidad and Tobago and others [2] that in 1965 insisted on establishing the Commonwealth Secretariat as an independent administrative body responsible for holding meetings of member countries, mediating debates, and helping promote cooperation. However, it was London itself that effectively helped reduce Anglo-centrism in the association. In the 1960s and 1970s, as a result of its weakening economic and financial position, Great Britain started to curtail its military presence east of the Suez; it also reviewed its priorities in favor of Europe and the Common Market, making its policies more regionalized. With all these foreign policy transformations, London forfeited its former influence and ceased playing the leading role in the Commonwealth: it cut the cords (such as imperial preference, the GBP, military links) that once tied it to the other members. Over time, the Commonwealth gradually evolved into a multipolar entity that gave greater prominence to Asian or African states at summits on key issues such as racial discrimination in Southern Rhodesia or apartheid in South Africa. Booming economic growth in India, Malaysia and Singapore also contributed to the realignment of forces in the Commonwealth.

However, the Commonwealth still retains its binary nature, with the majority of small and less developed countries in Africa, Asia and the Caribbean heavily dependent on key donor countries such as the UK, Canada and Australia. Besides, although the degree of Anglo-centrism in the association has diminished, the Commonwealth of Nations has failed to rid itself completely of its ‘British accent.’ Great Britain contributes more to the Commonwealth than any other member, as it is responsible for up to one third of the budget, according to official data, while including indirect funding this amounts to more than half [3].

Secondly, the British monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, is the head and the symbol of the Commonwealth. Thirdly, London remains the Commonwealth’s communications center, with the Commonwealth Secretariat headquartered in London’s Marlborough House. Every year, each second Monday in March, the British capital city commemorates Commonwealth Day, with a famous multi-faith ceremony in Westminster Abbey.

Evolution of the Commonwealth’s Goals and Purposes

Given the bipolar world system, the association concentrated mostly on issues such as decolonization, the North-South dialogue, racial discrimination and apartheid in Southern Rhodesia and South Africa. However, after the Cold War, assistance from international financial institutions and industrially developed lending countries (in conjunction with their economic and political conditionalities) the Commonwealth adopted a broader spectrum of goals and objectives. The association started to focus more on promoting liberal and democratic values and human rights across the less developed countries. Its agenda also incorporated issues such as environmental protection, gender equality, fighting drug trafficking and other key challenges.

Between 1991 and 2009 Commonwealth countries developed quite a few programs promoting and facilitating democracy in developing member countries. They included election observation missions, technical assistance for elections, promoting the parliamentary system, and the establishment in 1995 of the Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group to safeguard democratic principles and ensure early detection of abuse.

Photo: wikipedia.org
Women's wing of Liberation Tigers of
Tamil Eelam marching in a parade

However, the Commonwealth failed to chart any significant progress in promoting and safeguarding its key values. For instance, Fiji has been under a military dictatorship since 2006 (Fiji’s membership of the Commonwealth was suspended in 2009); Nigeria and Kenya have suffered from ethnic and sectarian clashes; Swaziland continues to have, de facto, an absolute monarchy and political parties are banned; Sri Lanka, which hosted a Commonwealth summit in November 2013, is guilty of blatant violations of human rights, including sexual violence against those suspected of having links with the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. And this is far from being an exhaustive list of offences and abuses that have taken place in the Commonwealth.

The Commonwealth cannot conduct any peacekeeping or peace enforcement operations or impose economic or other sanctions. The only leverage it has over the country responsible for this kind of rights violation is threatening it with the suspension or annulment of its membership. Therefore, the Commonwealth’s objective – to rely of soft power to help promote and facilitate democracy in less developed member countries – has proved too complicated and difficult to attain [4].

Over the past three years, “old” Commonwealth members, and in particular Great Britain, have fought hard to restore the undermined prestige of their association’s soft power, once so successful in addressing decolonization and racial equality issues, but failed to achieve very much in terms of promoting democratic values. Since 2010, the UK coalition government led by David Cameron has been actively supporting the need to restructure Commonwealth institutions in order to boost efficiency, in particular through a broader mandate for the Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group, establishing the office of Commonwealth Commissioner [5], reforming the Secretariat, etc. But as the 2011 Commonwealth Summit, held in Perth, Australia, demonstrated, most member countries were not prepared to embrace radical change: the bulk of the proposed reforms was either rejected or put on the back burner. The only success that the summit had was to endorse the text of a Commonwealth Charter, which was officially adopted on March 11, 2013. The Charter, which brings together the organization’s key values, is expected to make it easier for members to focus their efforts on those areas that are of overarching importance for the Commonwealth (human rights, gender equality, tolerance, world peace and security, etc.).

In 2012, the Parliamentary Foreign Affairs Committee issued an illuminating paper, ‘The role and future of the commonwealth,’ which points openly to the lack of tangible progress in making the organization stronger. It notes, in particular, that the Commonwealth has been less active and less visible of late, and there is alarming evidence that it may no longer have the ability to influence developments. The 2013 Commonwealth member countries’ heads of government summit in Colombo merely proved that the British were right to be concerned over the lack of progress in making the organization more effective. Given the grave human rights violations in Sri Lanka, the key players boycotted the summit, including Canada’s Prime Minister Stephen Harper and the Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, while the prime minister of Mauritius, Navinchandra Ramgoolam, not only followed their example, but actually withdrew the offer to host the 2015 summit. Out of 53 member countries, only 27 heads of government attended the summit that was supposed to discuss global issues and the Commonwealth cooperation with the United Nations and the G20, suggesting the organization was in the grips of apathy.

Overall, looking at the desperate attempts, by the British in particular, to achieve any tangible progress in reforming and strengthening the Commonwealth, the results are largely negative: waning interest in the Commonwealth among most of its members and, moreover, the loss of one of them. In 2013, the Republic of the Gambia, in West Africa, dropped out of the Commonwealth, accusing Great Britain of neo-colonialism and alleging that the latter, according to the current Gambian President, Yahya Jammeh, was funding the opposition in the country.

The reason for this negativity may also lie in the Commonwealth’s binary structure and, as a consequence, the lack of unanimity of opinions on the organization’s overarching aims and purposes. Most “new” Commonwealth members have no need for a strong organization that, through institutions such as the Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group or the Commonwealth Commissioner on democracy, rule of law and human rights, would be in a position to interfere in developing countries’ internal affairs. They are wary of any change originating from the “old British club” members, regarding it as a manifestation of neo-imperialist ambitions. As a result, all attempts by the UK and its old allies to turn the Commonwealth in a robust structure fail, quite predictably, since throughout its history this organization has always had a decentralized system.

Photo: AP
Gambian President Yahya Jammeh during
a military parade in Brazil in 2005

Nevertheless, even without ambitious projects to make the Commonwealth more effective at promoting democratic principles, the association does retain some importance for its members. What value do member countries see in it? First, it is an opportunity to benefit from mutually advantageous cooperation with developed member countries in economic, technological, cultural and other areas; this cooperation is based on an extensive network of Commonwealth governmental and non-governmental institutions [6]. The organization was instrumental in helping members develop by contributing to reducing the debt burden in the least developed countries and safeguarding maritime borders. The UK, as the Commonwealth’s biggest donor, has been expanding its bilateral aid programs with the most vulnerable of the countries. The Commonwealth Grants Commission offers talented individuals in member countries an opportunity to get an education and find work [7]; ministerial meetings promote important contacts at government level, and so on.

Does the Commonwealth Have a Future?

Not all observers are optimistic about the Commonwealth’s prospects. Given recent Commonwealth summits’ negative record, quite a few observers predict that the organization will never become a genuinely important actor on the world stage or, in the future, may even forfeit any support on the part or either “old” or “new” Commonwealth members. Professor Philip Murphy, Director of the Institute of Commonwealth Studies, University of London, argues that member countries’ interest is only sustained by Queen Elizabeth II, while Prince Charles, who will eventually become Head of the Commonwealth, is not blessed with similar charisma.

Despite these negative predictions, it is unlikely that the Commonwealth will lose all support and cease to exist. It has survived in the past thanks to its flexibility and adaptability to global changes. The difficulties it currently faces in promoting democratic principles will hardly have fatal consequences. Besides, the Commonwealth is not just an international forum that meets once or twice a year to discuss global issues, individual member countries’ problems or the association’s prospects. It is also an extensive network of a huge number of non-governmental organizations supporting interaction between journalists, business people, and academics. In a globalized world, the Commonwealth, with its multi-tiered network of links between governments, civil society and business is increasingly relevant. The Commonwealth of Nations will be able to preserve its importance and continue to play a significant role in international affairs.

1. Military and technical collaboration programs include cooperation between armies aimed at harmonizing equipment and personnel training (ABCA); cooperation among air and space forces (ASIC); cooperation on radio and electronic intelligence (UK-US SIGINT); technical cooperation program on defense science and technology matters (TTCP), and technical cooperation (AUSCANNZUKUS). All these entities are still functioning.

2. Smith A. Stitches in the Time. The Commonwealth in World Politics. Ontario, 1981. P. 4 – 5.

3. Based on an interview with Prof. Philip Murphy, May 15, 2013, London.

4. Tolstukhina A.Yu. The Commonwealth of Nations: Re-assessing opportunities // Asia and Africa Today. 2012. No 7. P. 65.

5. Irrespective of the Secretary General or the Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group, the Commonwealth Commissioner is to monitor crises in members and respond whenever they have to do with human rights violations or abuses of the principles of democracy and the rule of law. EPG Report. http://thecommonwealth.org/sites/default/files/news-items/documents/EminentPersonsGroupReport.pdf

6. There are about 100 accredited governmental and non-governmental organizations within the framework of the Commonwealth: Commonwealth Fund for Technical Cooperation; Commonwealth Parliamentary Association; Commonwealth Association; Association of Commonwealth Universities; Commonwealth Games Federation; Commonwealth Arts; Royal Commonwealth Society; Commonwealth Youth Programme; Climate Change Fund to assist developing countries, etc.

6. Murphy P. Britain and the Commonwealth: Confronting the Past - Imagining the Future // Round Table: the Commonwealth Journal of Commonwealth International Affairs, 100 (414). 2011. P. 267 – 283.