Issue cover

Vol. 1 No. 1 (2026): Volume 1, Issue 1 (2026)

View Issue TOC

Sovereignty Without Territory Revisited: Recognition, Diplomatic Agency, and the Politics of Statehood in South Sudan, Somaliland, and Western Sahara

Abraham Kuol Nyuon
DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.19593461
Published: April 15, 2026

Abstract

Recognition as strategic interaction is developed as an analytical lens for understanding sovereignty without territory: contested statehood, international recognition, and diplomatic strategy in South Sudan, Somaliland, and Western Sahara. It argues that international recognition does not flow automatically from legal criteria or empirical statehood, but from interaction among patron alignments, regional norms, diplomatic entrepreneurship, and perceived governance legitimacy. Drawing on a structured, focused comparison of three cases across four variables—empirical statehood indicators, patron-state alignment, regional organisation posture, and governance legitimacy—combined with discourse analysis of UN Security Council resolutions and AU communiqués and elite interviews with foreign ministry officials, the study engages debates in post-Westphalian sovereignty, constructivism, and legal positivism while developing a typology of recognition strategies available to contested entities. Three core claims are advanced. First, South Sudan’s rapid recognition reflected convergence between self-determination claims, regional sponsorship, great-power acceptance, and negotiated secession. Second, Somaliland demonstrates that effective governance can produce de facto legitimacy without formal recognition when regional norms remain restrictive. Third, Western Sahara shows how prolonged diplomatic contestation and patron rivalry can sustain durable limbo despite international visibility. The study concludes that recognition diplomacy operates as a sequence of legitimacy-accumulation strategies rather than a single juridical event, and that clearer regional doctrines and differentiated forms of diplomatic access are necessary for entities caught between empirical governance and geo

Full Text:

PDF HTML Cover Image

Read the Full Article

The HTML galley is loaded below for inline reading and better discovery.

Open HTML Open PDF

How to Cite

Abraham Kuol Nyuon (2026). Sovereignty Without Territory Revisited: Recognition, Diplomatic Agency, and the Politics of Statehood in South Sudan, Somaliland, and Western Sahara. African International Relations, Vol. 1 No. 1 (2026): Volume 1, Issue 1 (2026). https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.19593461
EndNote (RIS) BibTeX

Keywords

Contested statehoodrecognitionsovereigntySomalilanduti possidetisself-determination

Research Snapshot

Desktop reading view
Language
EN
Formats
HTML + PDF
Publication Track
Vol. 1 No. 1 (2026): Volume 1, Issue 1 (2026)
Current Journal
African International Relations

References

  • Unknown Author (1996). State Sovereignty as Social Construct. https://doi.org/10.1017/cbo9780511598685
  • Dalei Jie (2012). Sovereignty–Security Nexus, Domestic Constraints, and the Taiwan Independence Policy (1988–2010). Asian Security, 8(2), 188-212. https://doi.org/10.1080/14799855.2012.690246
  • Marie‐Joëlle Zahar (1999). Fanatics, mercenaries, brigands ... and politicians : militia decision-making and civil conflict resolution. eScholarship@McGill (McGill). https://escholarship.mcgill.ca/concern/theses/cv43nz86k
  • Sked, Alan (2011). M. Fabry (2010).Recognizing States. International Society and the Establishment of New States since 1776. Diplomacy & Statecraft, 22(3), 540-541. https://doi.org/10.1080/09592296.2011.599671
  • Heidi Hudson (2010). Continuity and change: An evaluation of the democracy-foreign policy nexus in post-apartheid South Africa. Southern Journal for Contemporary History, 35(2), 108-130. https://doi.org/10.38140/sjch.v35i2.77
  • Catherine O. Johnson; Minh Nguyen; Gregory A. Roth; Emma Nichols; Shazia Alam; Degu Abate; Foad Abd-Allah; Ahmed Abdelalim; Haftom Niguse Abraha; Niveen ME Abu-Rmeileh; Oladimeji Adebayo; Abiodun M. Adeoye; Gina Agarwal; Sutapa Agrawal; Amani Nidhal Aichour; Ibtihel Aichour; Miloud Taki Eddine Aichour; Fares Alahdab; Raghib Ali; Nelson Alvis‐Guzmán; Nahla Anber; Mina Anjomshoa; Jalal Arabloo; Antonio Araúz; Johan Ärnlöv; Amit Arora; Ashish Awasthi; Maciej Banach; Miguel A. Barboza; Suzanne Barker‐Collo; Till Bärnighausen; Sanjay Basu; Abate Bekele Belachew; Yaschilal Muche Belayneh; Derrick Bennett; Isabela M. Benseñor; Krittika Bhattacharyya; Belete Biadgo; Ali Bijani; Boris Bikbov; Muhammad Shahdaat Bin Sayeed; Zahid A Butt; Lucero Cahuana-Hurtado; Juan Jesús Carrero; Félix Carvalho; Carlos A Castañeda-Orjuela; Franz Castro; Ferrán Catalá-López; Yazan Chaiah; Peggy Pei-Chia Chiang; Jee-Young J Choi; Hanne Christensen; Dinh‐Toi Chu; Monica Cortinovis; Albertino Damasceno; Lalit Dandona; Rakhi Dandona; Ahmad Daryani; Kairat Davletov; Barbora de Courten; Vanessa De la Cruz‐Góngora; Meaza Girma Degefa; Samath Dhamminda Dharmaratne; Daniel Díaz; Manisha Dubey; Eyasu Ejeta Duken; Dumessa Edessa; Matthias Endres; Emerito Jose A Faraon; Farshad Farzadfar; Eduarda Fernandes; Florian Fischer; Luísa Sório Flor; Morsaleh Ganji; Abadi Kahsu Gebre; Teklu Gebrehiwo Gebremichael; Birhanu Geta; Kebede Embaye Gezae; Paramjit Gill; E. V. Gnedovskaya; Hector Gómez‐Dantés; Alessandra C. Goulart; Giuseppe Grosso; Yuming Guo; Tarun Gupta; Arvin Haj‐Mirzaian; Arya Haj‐Mirzaian; Samer Hamidi; Graeme J. Hankey; Hamid Yimam Hassen; Simon I Hay; Mohamed Hegazy; Behnam Heidari; Nabeel Herial; Mohammad Ali Hosseini; Sorin Hostiuc; Seyed Sina Naghibi Irvani; Sheikh Mohammed Shariful Islam; Nader Jahanmehr; Mehdi Javanbakht (2019). Global, regional, and national burden of stroke, 1990–2016: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2016. The Lancet Neurology, 18(5), 439-458. https://doi.org/10.1016/s1474-4422(19)30034-1
  • Joan Fitzpatrick (2002). Sovereignty, Territoriality, and the Rule of Law. Hastings international and comparative law review, 25(3), 303. https://repository.uclawsf.edu/hastings_international_comparative_law_review/vol25/iss3/4/
  • Peter Hansen (2010). The ambiguity of khat in Somaliland. Journal of Ethnopharmacology, 132(3), 590-599. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jep.2010.02.028
  • Sassen, Saskia (1998). Thede factoTransnationalizing of Immigration Policy. Challenge to the Nation-State, 49-85. https://doi.org/10.1093/0198292295.003.0003
  • Jan Selby; Clemens Hoffmann (2014). Beyond scarcity: Rethinking water, climate change and conflict in the Sudans. Global Environmental Change, 29, 360-370. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2014.01.008
  • Zunes, Stephen; Mundy, Jacob (2010). Western Sahara. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctt1j2n9vz