For South Africa, the success of its relationship with the EU has shown the value of a pragmatic, interest-based foreign policy, particularly in the context of some government officials and pundits advocating an ideologically driven Western or eurosceptic stance. Having said that, the overarching importance of South Africa’s African agenda, its membership of the Brics group alongside Brazil, Russia, India and China, its alliance with emerging nations and its close relations with the global south should not be underestimated.

Equally true, however, is that a selective, zero-sum foreign-policy approach, feeding on Western scepticism, will not serve the broad national interest, particularly as it would obstruct South Africa’s all-important economic diplomacy. The country’s rewarding relations with Europe, and with its partners in Asia and the global south, have proved the efficacy of an independent, inclusive, interest-based foreign policy. To its credit, the government seems to realise this.

The EU’s relationship with South Africa has come a long way since the former’s resistance to apartheid, its application of sanctions and its aid to victims of apartheid in the 1980s and early 1990s. After the democratic transformation, a comprehensive trade, development and co-operation agreement was concluded in 2000, followed by a strategic partnership agreement in 2007.

On the one hand, these agreements recognised the importance of the EU’s economic prowess (generating about 30% of the global gross domestic product) and its status as South Africa’s — and the Southern African Development Community’s — biggest trade, development and investment partner.

On the other hand, for the EU, South Africa is a key African country, an important voice in global multilateral diplomacy and its biggest trading partner in Africa. The strategic partnership agreement puts South Africa in the company of China, India, Canada, Japan, Russia, Mexico and the US, all countries with which the EU has a similar arrangement.

An important aspect of the strategic partnership agreement is political co-operation and dialogue. It can therefore be expected that aspects such as South Africa’s National Development Plan, unemployment, poverty and regional underdevelopment, and peacekeeping in Africa will feature prominently in this week’s discussions.

The forthcoming Zimbabwe election will, no doubt, be a priority. A credible and legitimate outcome is important to both sides, and South Africa will be urged by its EU interlocutors to do its utmost to prevent a repetition of the chaotic outcomes of past elections in Zimbabwe.

Managing the Zimbabwean conundrum will be a test of South Africa’s regional leadership. South Africa would, no doubt, like to see EU sanctions against Zimbabwe lifted, but making weakly nuanced and premature promises, as the EU’s local ambassador did earlier this week on the future of sanctions, cannot be very helpful.

The summit should also reflect on the broader African context. The EU should pay attention to its apparent failure elsewhere on the continent, which stands in sharp contrast to its South African success story. This failure is not so much the result of inaction, but rather of what seem to be the wrong — albeit well-intended — policies and strategies.

The EU-Africa Summit in Cairo, Egypt, in 2000 outlined a framework of action for the EU in support of the continent’s efforts to achieve the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). This led to the adoption in 2007 of the Joint Africa-EU Strategy (JAES) at the Lisbon EU-Africa Summit.

The objective of the JAES was to establish a transformative political agenda for the implementation of eight themes (aid, development, trade, integration, migration, infrastructure, security and peace, and the MDGs). Another undertaking was to "treat Africa as one" to overcome inconsistencies arising from the patchwork of European instruments dealing with the continent.

About six years later, the gap between aspirations and reality has become conspicuous, and the mood is far less euphoric than it was in Lisbon in 2007. Indeed, the JAES seem to be headed towards the same fate as previous "grand plans" to "save Africa" by such groups as the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the UN. It is being argued that the JAES is not moving fast enough in the right direction, and the 13th Africa-EU Ministerial Troika in October 2009 asked for a "fundamental review" and "significant changes". In response, the EU refused bluntly to move away from its original master plan.

While the EU is at a loss to account for success at the output side of the developmental equation, progress achieved is presented in terms of the number of high-level conferences, joint workshops, studies and the like. Also, EU member states and civil society have become sceptical, suggesting the reintroduction of parallel relations with states and subregions. So, while the JAES comes across as a bureaucratic masterpiece, it seems out of touch with the complex realities of African life. It confines planning and action to experts and officials, ignoring for the most part the multiple layers of stakeholders across the continent with different cultural and political perspectives.

Its South African success story should perhaps induce the EU to rethink, perhaps revise, its holistic "Africa as one" paradigm. Africa is a continent with many faces and is totally different from Europe, rendering a one-size-fits-all approach impractical.

The central idea promoted by the JAES is a top-down approach headed and conducted by the European Commission and the Africa Union Commission, respectively. Obviously, the latter lacks the power, expertise and capacity to fill this role. It stands at the head of a state-centric confederal organisation, with little or no power to impose policies on individual member states. This is why integration in Africa fails to get off the ground, why functional or technical co-operation is minimal and why trade among African countries is declining as a share of total continental trade.

Recent success stories of various African states are attributable to the sound policies they introduced rather than the intervention of outside agencies. The EU should be aware that although its role is generally regarded as enlightened, constructive and positive, its impact is limited in the overall order of things. Its success in singling out South Africa for a "special dispensation" ought to be instructive, guiding it to a more selective approach to Africa rather than pursuing its present amorphous holistic approach as suggested by the JAES. The top-down approach should be reversed, involving civil society, individual states and the continent’s regional economic communities.

The JAES makes one wonder, in the end, whether it is not primarily about pushing an EU political agenda rather than an exercise in altruism.

This article appeared on Business Day's BD Alpha on 17 July 2013