Malawi’s Post-Independence Foreign Policy and Its Influence on Development Options


This paper analyses the causes, processes and systemic factors that have been central to Malawi’s post-independence foreign policy and its implications for national development policy options between 1964 and 1993. The paper argues that Malawi’s post-independence foreign policy and development direction were mainly adopted in reaction to the failure of Kamuzu Banda (the first president of Malawi) to win international support (at an Organisation of African Unity summit) for his quest to interact economically with more countries. From a historical institutionalist perspective, it can be argued that this rejection “carved out” a future foreign policy direction that was deliberately meant to “rebel” against the Organisation of African Unity’s prescriptions. Subsequent development policies (for instance, maintaining ties with Israel and the apartheid South African regime) were actually more of an aftermath of this “carved-out” foreign policy direction. In other words, foreign policy dictated the development policy options. The findings are drawn from available documentary sources (new and old) and a review of existing literature. Through a re-examination of the existing evidence in the context of historical institutionalism, it provokes and recasts a new and fascinating debate on Malawi’s post-independence foreign policy architecture.