How States Punch above Their Weight: Introducing Hybrid Actorness as Expanded Foreign Policy

Abstract

The interplay of states and transnational actors has found its way into Foreign Policy Analysis. At the same time, the call for new typologies of foreign policy actors has increased. We therefore develop a typological theory of expanded foreign policy and introduce a model of hybrid actorness that alludes to foreign policy actors with both state and transnational dimensions in their polity, politics, and policy. We assume that the transnational element is constitutive of such foreign policy actors. To theorize on such an expansion of foreign policy, we employ an abductive approach and revisit the polity, politics, and policy dimensions of foreign policy. We establish how these are expanded in five transnational sectors, namely state-religion, state-ideology, state-media, state-business, and state-diaspora. We then devise a typology of hybrid actorness by identifying different subtypes that range from latent to fully manifested hybrids. We argue that this model will help better grasp the evolving foreign policy phenomenon of the transnational in an increasingly globalized world.

L'analyse de politique étrangère intègre désormais l'enchevêtrement des États et des acteurs transnationaux. En parallèle, les demandes de nouvelles typologies d'acteurs en politique étrangère vont croissant. Par conséquent, nous développons une théorie typologique de politique étrangère étendue et exposons un modèle de rôle d'acteur hybride pour faire référence aux acteurs de politique étrangère qui présentent des dimensions étatiques et transnationales dans leur régime politique, la politique qu'ils suivent et les politiques qu'ils appliquent. Nous supposons que l’élément transnational fasse partie intégrante desdits acteurs de politique étrangère. Afin de théoriser une telle expansion de la politique étrangère, nous avons recours à une approche d'abduction et revisitons les dimensions du régime politique, de la politique suivie et des politiques appliquées en affaires étrangères. Nous déterminons comment l'expansion intervient dans cinq secteurs transnationaux: les relations entre État et religion, idéologie, médias, affaires et enfin, diaspora. Ensuite, nous concevons une typologie du rôle d'acteur hybride en identifiant différents sous-types, des hybrides latents aux hybrides complètement manifestes. Nous affirmons que ce modèle permettra de mieux comprendre l’évolution du phénomène du transnational en politique étrangère dans un monde où la mondialisation se renforce.

La interacción entre los Estados y los actores transnacionales ha encontrado su camino en el Análisis de la Política Exterior. Al mismo tiempo, ha aumentado la demanda de nuevas tipologías de actores en el marco de la política exterior. Por lo tanto, desarrollamos una teoría tipológica de la política exterior ampliada e introducimos un modelo de actor híbrido que alude a los actores de la política exterior que tienen dimensiones, tanto estatales como transnacionales, en su sistema político, de gobierno y de actuación. Suponemos que el elemento transnacional es constitutivo de estos actores de la política exterior. Con el fin de teorizar sobre esta expansión de la política exterior, empleamos un enfoque abductivo y revisamos las dimensiones de la política exterior en el marco de su sistema político, de gobierno y de actuación. Establecemos cómo estas dimensiones se expanden en cinco sectores transnacionales, es decir: la religión del Estado, la ideología del Estado, los medios de comunicación del Estado, las empresas del Estado y la diáspora del Estado. A continuación, ideamos una tipología de la actuación híbrida por parte de los actores mediante la identificación de diferentes subtipos que van desde los híbridos latentes hasta los híbridos plenamente manifestados. Argumentamos que este modelo ayudará a comprender mejor la evolución del fenómeno de la política exterior transnacional en un mundo cada vez más globalizado.

1 Introduction

Without the Russian Orthodox Church, Russia Today, or Gazprom, Russia would be hard to tell apart from North Korea. Without Saudi Aramco, Al-Arabiya, and Wahhabism, Saudi Arabia would be little more than a sparsely populated desert state. These examples of states that are punching above their weight in foreign policy terms are more than mere idiosyncrasies. They are cases of states employing transnational sectors and thereby expanding their foreign policy possibilities. North Korea, which has no transnational actors (TNAs) it can control, is therefore a pure state actor in foreign policy terms, as is Switzerland. The Holy See, by contrast, is both a state as well as a TNA and therefore what we would term a fully manifested hybrid actor. In between these two extremes, we identify latent hybrid actors such as Norway, partially manifested hybrid actors such as Germany and the United Kingdom, as well as strongly manifested hybrid actors such as Serbia, Russia, or Saudi Arabia. What we observe is a pattern of TNAs who are intertwined with state actors, thus constituting an own type of foreign policy actorness—what we introduce as hybrid actorness.¹ They are cases of an augmented polity of foreign policy, or, in other words, what we term an expanded foreign policy. In this article, we strive to synthesize these idiosyncrasies from the traditional field of descriptive-analytical foreign policy studies (FPS) and to integrate them into theory-led Foreign Policy Analysis (FPA). FPS—understood as non-FPA studies here—continue to dominate the empirical literature on foreign policy (e.g., Lanteigne 2010; De Haas 2010; Cox, Lynch, and Bouchet 2013; Bozo 2016; Khanna and Kumar 2018). They usually pursue a history-led approach emphasizing national idiosyncrasies, which can only be understood when considering historical contingencies. Traditional FPS with its reference to contemporary history and national institutions still leads the academic debate on foreign policy in many countries. FPS and FPA share common features, such as the “Westphalian core,” with the state as a central actor of foreign policy. Moreover, one might point to Waltz’ three images, which play an important role in FPS (often implicitly) as well as in FPA (analytically). In the 1960s, FPA set out with the marked ambition to overcome such idiosyncrasies by discerning contingent generalizations of foreign policies. In addition, FPA seeks causal pathways to produce knowledge beyond historical plausibility.

In an abductive approach, we develop a model of expanded foreign policy and introduce a typology of hybrid actorness. This is in response to Morin and Paquin’s demand that FPA should be “extending research to new categories of actors” (2018, 342). Our research objective is three-fold: First and foremost, by developing a model and defining, classifying, and clustering hybrid actorness analytically, we hope to contribute to a better understanding of foreign policy actor categories, possibilities, and instruments, and how they are expanded. Second, we seek to make FPA meet FPS: By integrating supposedly country-specific empirical phenomena of FPS into theory-driven FPA, we hope to enrich the latter with new perspectives. Third, we also hope that the model and the new analytical terms will pave the way for further theory-building as well as more specific empirical research.

While the debate on who pursues foreign policy continues, with a particular emphasis placed on TNAs (Smith, Hadfield, and Dunne 2016; Alden and Aran 2017; Chryssogelos 2017; Stengel and Baumann 2017; Groen 2020), we argue that hybrid actorness combines the foreign policy resources of both state and TNAs, enjoying the legitimacy, status, and recognition of a sovereign entity while at the same time pursuing a transnational policy. States may substantially extend their foreign policy resources in different sectors by shaping, for instance, international news coverage, and thus the perception of international politics; norms and behavior regarding energy production and the environment; or by setting up an interreligious dialogue, to name just a few possibilities. We identify five such sectors without claiming that the list is exhaustive: (i) state-religion, (ii) state-ideology, (iii) state-media, (iv) state-business, and (v) state-diaspora hybrids.

The input dimension of foreign policy—in this case hybrid actorness—translates into idiosyncratic politics depending on the different channels of influence between the state and the TNA. Our hypothesis reads that hybrid actorness is sector-specific: Depending on the sector involved, the state possesses different capabilities, a different presence, and experiences different recognition. However, this hybrid actorness polity (input dimension) feeds politics, which, in turn, leads to an “expanded foreign policy” (output dimension). Hence, expanded foreign policy is defined here as

a contingent extension of foreign policy to the sector of transnational politics making use of transnational actors which leads to an increased possibility space.

An extended possibility space means that with the help of the transnational, other target groups can be reached, other audiences can be addressed, and other instruments can be employed. The power component is evident here: In Partzsch’s (2017) understanding, this is the increased power to change things in established structures, to gain more power over other actors by promoting own goals and suppressing disliked ideas, and to co-opt new societal actors abroad (“power with. . .”). All of this enables states to punch above their weight.

When working abductively, according to Reichertz, “(s)omething unintelligible is discovered in the data and, on the basis of the mental design of a new rule, the rule is discovered or invented and, simultaneously, it becomes clear what the case is” (2010, 7). The rule, we argue, is the inclusion of transnational sectors in foreign policy polity, politics, and policy, leading to a case of hybrid actorness. In other words, from among idiosyncratic data, we have identified a phenomenon, and as Haig states, “(u)nlike phenomena, data are idiosyncratic to particular investigative contexts” (2005, 374). Our investigative context is constituted of three formerly distinct areas of research, which we seek to integrate: the one on actorness and the state in foreign policy, the one on transnationalism, and the one on traditional foreign policy.

In the following, we approach the phenomenon of hybrid actorness in an abductive three-step. In a first step, we revisit FPA approaches to systematically examine two dimensions of foreign policy: actorness and the polity of foreign policy as well as transnationalism and the politics of foreign policy. This includes actorness criteria established to analyze EU foreign policy (i.e., presence, capabilities, and recognition) in order to detect and denote the augmented actorness of state actors. We claim that the constitution of the polity of foreign policy, in other words, its (qualitative) actorness, impacts the politics of foreign policy. Screening the literature on transnationalism and transnational governance provides us with insights regarding the nature of “hybrid foreign policymaking.” We take the essence from the field that transnationalism—and also hybrid actorness—takes different shapes depending on the transnational sector in question.

In a second step, we then present a selection of heuristic case studies (Eckstein 1991, 144; George and Bennett 2005, 75), which are clustered according to the five sectors listed above. Each sector builds upon the actorness criteria and transnational elements identified previously. These empirical observations lead to the third step—the model generation. Here, the two theoretical strands, FPA and transnationalism, deductively feed the model, meeting the inductively gained empirical insights. This model is translated into a typology of hybrid actorness, which ranges from pure state actor to complete hybrid actor, with variations in latency and manifestation.

To conclude, we synthesize our findings by providing an overview of the usefulness of the criteria in light of the cases. This final aspect allows us to name further avenues of research and how to build upon this initial model of expanded foreign policy and typology of hybrid actorness.

2 Revisiting FPA Approaches

2.1 Actorness and the Polity of Foreign Policy

How can the idea of hybrid actorness and thus an expanded foreign policy find its way into FPA? First, domestic politics may provide an inroad. Rosenau (1967) or Stavridis and Hill (1996) have already looked specifically at domestic sources of foreign policy, while Hudson (2005) and Hudson and Day (2019) place an emphasis on actors, all of which have become recurring themes in FPA. According to Alden and Aran (2017), there continue to be diverging FPA approaches as to the role and significance of the domestic in shaping foreign policy, inadvertently leading to theoretical explanations. When looking at hybrid actorness, however, the link between the domestic and the intertransnational/transnational becomes easier to grasp, as they are understood as being constitutive of the actor’s foreign policy.

Second, when analyzing the decision-making environment in FPA, oftentimes only “constraints” and “caveats” are taken into consideration (e.g., Mintz and DeRouen 2010, 25–31). Yet, the presence of hybrid actorness not only changes the polity of foreign policy but also gives rise to the question of politics; in other words, how do governments try to influence the sectors of the transnational? Our assumption is that there are three ways for states to influence TNAs, namely through state funding, by providing personnel, and by defining shared goals. In this regard, hybrid actorness constitutes the polity of foreign policy, “the terrain on which foreign policy decisions are made and actions are taken” (Webber and Smith 2002, 29). Our approach here—alluding to the tension between FPA and traditional idiosyncratic foreign policy studies mentioned above—is to take the ideal-type “minimal” set of foreign policy instruments all countries share (FPA relevant) as a point of departure while adding such foreign policy forms that are country-specific and may include hybrid actorness (traditional FPS relevant).

In deductive, theory-led FPA, certain empirical observations run the risk of being neglected if they are not deducible from foreign policy (or even International Relations [IR]) theories. For instance, if a functioning state is simply taken as given for pursuing a coherent foreign policy, state defects tend to be excluded from the theoretical research. Such defects are extensively treated in the literature on fragile and weak states (Rotberg 2004; Newman 2009). Doyle and Dunning speak of “hybrid actors that possess legitimacy or exercise authority derived from multiple state and non-state sources, including institutional, tribal, ethnic and religious” (2018, 549). Cambanis et al. (2019) employ the term “hybrid actors” when examining armed groups who are neither state nor non-state actors in a similar context. What is more, phenomena such as “Private Military Companies” (PMCs) could also qualify. Yet, they are primarily discussed under a state-private nexus, and as the term PMC reveals, their role as a contractors makes them “nonstate” in the first place (Kruck and Schneiker 2017). However, when the boundaries between the state and the private get increasingly blurred in the form of networks (Avant 2016) and informal and “murky” shadow organizations such as Wagner (Marten 2019), the military sector can also become the subject of hybrid actorness.

However, it is rare for the role of defect, incomplete, and dysfunctional stateness or statehood to be addressed by IR and FPA scholars. If so, the studies target specific areas (e.g., Jackson 1990; Risse 2013), providing an ideal type with regard to modernity (e.g., Soerensen 2001) and multilateralism (e.g., “cluster state,” Alden and Aran 2012, 70ff.), or making an argument for evolving and contested states (e.g., Kursani 2021). As another consequence, FPA has concentrated on governmental actors in order to shed more light on decision-making. In extremis, the state is “reduced to nothing more than the various actors responsible for foreign policy making” (Alden and Aran 2012, 9). Analytical studies might have a role to play here by inductively grouping empirical phenomena, which serve the double purpose of reconsidering empirical observations on the one hand and allowing for fresh theoretical thinking on the other.²

Hybrid actorness foremost enjoys the usual privileges of stateness, since states are present in all major international institutions; they have clear representatives; they can sign treaties; it is unlikely that they will dissipate in the near future; etc. Features of state-like actorness add on to these functions. The literature on EU actorness, which is meant to conceive of EU foreign policy as a sui generis foreign policy, provides a useful starting point for our endeavor to approach foreign policy actorness (Kratochvíl 2013). We start with the observation that “(t)rue actorness requires not only a clear identity and a self-contained decision-making system, but also the practical capabilities to effect policy” (Hill and Wallace 1996, 13). This can only be achieved if the actors in question are recognized as such. Bretherton and Vogler point out that “(o)nly states could make treaties, join international organizations and be held to account by other states. Legal actorness confers a right to participate, but also to be held responsible by other actors, and to incur obligations” (2006, 14). Albert and Stetter go a step further, on the one hand identifying the significance of being recognized as an actor by others, while at the same time raising the question as to “how the globalized world polity generates its own structures, which in turn facilitate the emergence of new entities in world politics by constructing new forms of actorhood beyond the nation-state” (2015, 91). When actorhood/actorness is meant to be treated separately from the state, it is no wonder that EU studies have advanced this issue. Similar to Greiçevci (2011), we propose to apply three criteria that have been developed by the EU foreign policy literature. Jupille and Caporaso’s (1998) component of actorness in international politics, namely recognition (1), serves as a starting point.³ Recognition refers to the degree to which external actors recognize an actor de jure or de facto as a legitimate “other” for interaction (Jupille and Caporaso 1998, 214–5). In the case of hybrid actorness, the adjunct TNAs have borrowed credibility from the state and may be recognized as a substitute or even proxy actor. As a consequence for the state, new channels of information, of negotiation, and of influence open up. Moreover, Bretherton and Vogler (2006, 24) add elements of presence (2) and capability (3) to better qualify actorness. “Actor capability” (Sjöstedt 1977, 16) refers to the availability of resources and policy instruments. This enables the “capacity to respond” (Bretherton and Vogler 2006, 5) to external threats and challenges. Finally,

(…) “presence” is a feature or a quality of arenas, of issue-areas or of networks of activity, and it operates to influence the actions and expectations of participants. It can be associated with tangible institutions or groupings, but it can also be expressed in essentially intangible ways which are none the less powerful. A particular presence, then, is defined by a combination of factors: credentials and legitimacy, the capacity to act and mobilize resources, the place it occupies in the perceptions and expectations of policy makers (Allen and Smith 1990, 21).

While this complementary set of criteria is used to analyze EU actorness, we believe it is equally useful to grasp any type of actorness that goes beyond the ideal-type understanding of the state in FPA. We will later enhance our illustrative cases by applying the three indicated criteria of recognition, presence, and capability to demonstrate how hybrid actorness leads to expanded foreign policy in practice.

2.2 Transnationalism and the Politics of Foreign Policy

Transnationalism is an emergent and growing field in social sciences spanning various disciplines (Portes, Guarnizo, and Landolt 1999; Risse 2007; Erman and Uhlin 2010; Tallberg 2010). TNAs are “political, social, cultural and economic agents or groups which have trans-societal relations across borders in pursuit of their goals, to a certain degree independently from domestic governmental considerations” (Thiel and Maslanik 2017, 1 referring to Risse 1995). Hill defines them as “those private groups or even individuals who, while they require physical facilities inside states, do not need governments in order to conduct international relations” (Hill 2003, 189). Oftentimes, scholars outside the transnational research field lament the limited influence and impact of TNAs, pointing, for instance, to INGOs’ financial dependency on states (Thiel and Maslanik 2017, 260). What is more, their agendas might be counterproductive when producing additional nationalist resentment (Orenstein, Bloom, and Lindstrom, 2008). In sum, the argument that state actors make use of TNAs, which leads to increased actorness, seems convincing. Hence, transnational actorness remains adjunct to state actors.⁴

However, the literature on the influence of TNAs demonstrates a more nuanced picture. It departs from the assumption that transnational actorness should be defined and conceptualized vis-à-vis or even against the state (e.g., Babic, Fichtner, and Heemskerk 2017; Breslin and Nesadurai 2018). For instance, “transgovernmental” activities denote border-crossing regulatory networks (Thiel and Maslanik 2017). In a similar vein, Della Porta and Tarrow (2005) stress effective TNA strategies with regard to other international actors, primarily states. Going a step further, Baumann and Stengel (2014, 490) concede that “non-state actors have a significant impact on states’ foreign policymaking” and call this “hybrid foreign policymaking” (Baumann and Stengel 2014). This means “a process by which decision makers (..) formulate policy goals and translate them into outcomes and that involves state actors as well as non-state actors” (Baumann and Stengel 2014, 495).⁵ When moving from the politics to the polity level, the literature on environmental issues also employs hybridity, for instance, when analyzing “transnational climate change governance networks”. In their network typology, hybrid ones fill the space between purely private or public ones. In hybrid governance networks, public and private actors work together for the purpose of dealing effectively with climate change. Here, similar to the field of economic cooperation, “public–private partnerships,” which cooperate beyond the state for governance purposes, attract attention (Börzel and Risse 2005, 198). Arguably, states are resorting to the possibilities public–private partnerships (PPP) or quasi-autonomous nongovernmental organizations (Quangos) offer. In these cases, however, they are implemented or even instrumentalized by the state. What is more, they are usually situational, while the transnational main entity remains untouched, and they usually focus on one issue area and are thus limited in scope or time.

TNAs pursue policy in transnational spaces defined by religion, ideology, language, ethnicity, or business. For instance, diaspora phenomena have emerged as an important field of transnational activism (Kinnvall and Petersson 2010). While some, such as TNCs, cling to instrumental goals, others strive for common goods (Risse 2007, 252). The booming field of transnational actorness increasingly conceives of the space between the public and the private domain as a blurred one, allowing for different kinds of institutional settings depending on issue area and region. Yet common taxonomies tend to maintain the public–private border as well as the national and international one (Baumann and Stengel 2014, 492). Overall, we tend to share this assumption while adding an actorness element to it. We not only see “hybrid foreign policymaking” (politics) but also “hybrid actorness” (polity). While the former is concerned with the increasing power of TNAs, the latter stresses the states’ resources to make use of TNAs. The literature on TNAs reveals the multifacetedness of actor-related channels in different sectors of the international. As a consequence, hybrid actorness may take very different shapes in different sectors. Our argument therefore reads that the concrete relationship between state and transnational realm and thus the nature of the hybrid actorness under question remains sector-specific.

Admittedly, turning the power relations around, TNAs can capture the state, which is the case in rent-seeking societies. This can, for example, occur in so-called quasi-states, or what Risse (2013) classifies as states with areas of limited statehood. Regarding the foreign policy of such states with forms of “hybrid governance,” Alden and Aran (2017, 94) observe that they either have less or no access to conventional foreign policy instruments such as those mentioned above. At the same time, they are much more closely linked or even dependent upon the international system than fully functioning states are. Yet, as Risse (2013, 9) points out, “(l)imited statehood does not equal the absence of governance, one political, social, or economic order.” This process can involve various constellations of actors—be it state or non-state—who co-govern in these areas of limited statehood (Risse 2013, 11). The actors involved can include public–private partnerships, International or Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), and multinational firms (Risse 2013). What is significant here regarding foreign policy is the link between state and society and what impact this has for the foreign policy in question. Yet the focus of this article lies in demonstrating the extended possibilities of the state—not its limitation due to state capture.

3 Foreign Policy Studies: Empirical Observations from Five Sectors

In the following, we show how hybrid actors have extended foreign policy options based on the transnational elements of religion, ideology, media, business, and diaspora. The actors presented here are known to foreign policy scholars, yet the foreign political instruments and possibilities employed have so far not been included in conventional understandings of FPA. These foreign policy actors, so our argument goes, are particularly well-equipped to act in a globalized world or a “transnational environment” (Hill 2003, 193). As mentioned above, a hybrid actor can draw its hybridity from more than one transnational sector, and we argue that there is a spectrum of how autonomous the state and transnational elements are. By applying the three criteria of stateness introduced above, we will be able to approach the angles of this spectrum while at the same time proposing subtypes of hybridity.

3.1 State and Religion

There are numerous examples of past and present forms where state and religion are interwoven (the United Kingdom and the Church of England; the Russian Federation and the Russian Orthodox Church; Japan and Shintoism; Israel and Judaism; Saudi Arabia and Wahhabism, etc.). In many cases, though, the transnational feature of religion is weak. In the case of Japan, for example, Shintoism is not a religion that would significantly transcend borders, which makes the transnational realm limited. In the case of Saudi Arabia, though, the massive investment in external cultural policy after 1979 has substantially extended the ruler family’s capabilities due to Wahhabism’s increased importance in the Islamic world. The two “textbook” examples we look at more closely here are Iran and the Holy See.⁶ Iran and the Holy See are both recognized states,⁷ while at the same time the respective religions of Shiism and Roman Catholicism constitute their transnational actorness. In both cases, we have heads of state who are religious leaders, each elected by a body of religious representatives. What is more, the religious realm of its actorness, in this case Iran’s Shia authority, allows for Iran to pursue transnational relations. Be it the Shia population in Iraq, the Alawites in Syria, Hezbollah in Lebanon, or the Zaydis Houthi rebels in Yemen, the religious authorities in Teheran are recognized as a patron and protector of faith, which allows for significant power over the different groups. Further examples of how this expands foreign policy space are meetings focused on interreligious dialogue that bring together mainly religious representatives, but also state representatives to tackle issues that are not usually of a religious nature: Iran and Japan held such an interreligious meeting to discuss the environment (Tehran Times 2022); similarly, a series of conferences were held in cooperation with South Korea and which included Buddhist and Christian representatives, the most recent held in December 2018 (International Quran News Agency 2018). From the Iranian side, these meetings are usually organized by the Islamic Culture and Relations Organization (ICRO), linked to the Iranian Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance (ICRO n.d.).

The same regarding the religious transnational realm applies to the increased presence of the Holy See and its extended foreign policy space. A 2010 Christian–Islamic meeting is indicative of this cooperation at different levels, when the president of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue delivered a message from Pope Benedict XVI in reply to a previous letter from President Ahmadinejad (Pope Benedict XVI 2010). The Iranian ambassador to the Holy See listed the areas in which these two “Abrahamic religions” seek to work together in order to achieve more peace and justice in the world, namely culture, science, and religion (Naseri as quoted by La Stampa 2011). Leading up to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), the Holy See continuously supported these negotiations; Pope Francis repeatedly encouraged a positive outcome (cf. Pope Francis 2015). On the same day that the Iran nuclear deal was signed, Bishop Cantú, chairman of the International Justice and Peace Committee of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, drafted a letter addressing all members of Congress in which he pleaded for support of the agreement, referring to Pope Francis and the common goal of a more secure and fraternal world (Bishop 2015).

In sum, the recognition of both actors can be found in structures beyond the international system, namely in the religious structures. The presence of Iran and the Holy See in international institutions is uncontested, and their capabilities are hardly limited to diplomatic or military means (albeit not in the case of the Holy See). They include the direct (material) support of societal groups beyond the state’s territory (such as the Hezbollah, but also “bonyads,” charitable trusts in and outside of Iran); the ability to reach, mobilize, but also increase the number of followers or believers; or nonconventional forms of peace negotiations.

3.2 State and Ideology

A classic example of a state-ideology hybrid actor can be found in the early days of the Soviet Union and Comintern, which actively sought to extend the class struggle to other parties and rebel groups around the world. In democratic countries, strong parties have sometimes developed some form of foreign policy. For instance, domestic ideological cleavages triggered a kind of secondary foreign policy in the Italian First Republic when the Partito Comunista Italiano (PCI), opposition party between 1945 and 1991, attempted to establish special links to the Soviet Union and other communist parties while actively taking an independent stance vis-à-vis NATO and détente (Schoch 1988, 103; 340–9). The communist party in Italy—for a long time Italy’s strongest party—was excluded from government for decades, which made its foreign policy ambitions resemble compensation. Admittedly, this secondary foreign policy did not dance to the tune of the government. Yet the government could rely on the “special relationship” to the Soviet Union, and without doubt it meets the requirements of the expanded foreign policy since it contributed to an extension of Italy’s foreign policy possibility space.

Another example of state-ideology hybrid actorness are the political foundations in Germany with long-term, global goals sharing the core of the state’s foreign policy. The Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES), closely linked to the Social Democratic Party (SPD), the Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung (KAS), closely linked to the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), the Friedrich-Naumann Stiftung, closely linked to the Liberals (FDP), the Heinrich-Böll Stiftung (the Greens), and the Rosa-Luxemburg Stiftung, closely linked to the Linke, are cases in point in Germany. The foundations receive their funding directly from the state (from various ministries, including the Ministry of Interior as well as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs), i.e., not via the political parties they are ideologically connected to, and this funding has significantly increased within the past 10 years, reaching a total of over half a billion Euros (Tagesschau 2018; BMI 2023; KAS n.d.). Their activities are viewed as complementing and promoting rather than running counter to state interests. Apart from their domestic responsibility of contributing to and promoting political awareness and democracy education, these foundations have historically also played an important role internationally, mainly in the area of democracy promotion. Legally autonomous but ideologically bound to the respective parties, these political foundations allow the German state to indirectly fund and support societal actors abroad whom they would not be able to overtly support politically vis-à-vis their international/bilateral partners (increased presence in other countries’ civil societies). A past example is the support of various civil society groups and projects by the KAS during Pinochet’s rule in Chile in the 1980s (cf. Pinto-Duschinsky 1991). More recently, Tunis became one of, if not the only, city in the world in which all six foundations are represented. Following the Arab Spring, the process of fostering democratization was “supported by special funds from the Foreign Ministry” (Ratka and Stahl 2018, 135). Areas of cooperation included supporting trade unions, universities, or women’s rights. In the context of the Arabellion and the subsequent counterrevolution, however, offices also had to be closed—the head of the KAS office in Cairo, for example, was sentenced in absentia to 5 years in prison (Rosbach 2017). Other authoritarian regimes followed the example: China expelled the liberal Friedrich Naumann Foundation and demanded from the remaining foundations to cooperate with particular “Amity-Societies,” aiming to control the foundations’ agenda (Sueddeutsche Zeitung 2018). The Chinese pressure seems to have worked: None of the foundations’ China offices still talks about human rights on their websites.

Due to the activities of these political foundations, however, Germany is recognized by civil society actors around the world as supportive of their (democratic) endeavors. Germany thus becomes present at a societal level and, at the same time, expands its capabilities. Tellingly, Russia has not only labeled the political foundations themselves as “foreign agents,” but also any Russian NGO that accepts funding from them (Rosbach 2017). As mentioned above, each political foundation pursues its own ideologies, and this determines with whom they work together; however, the uniting ideology is that of promoting democracy, working together at a transnational level, and thereby expanding Germany’s foreign policy space.

3.3 State and Media

A further transnational sector that is institutionalized in foreign policy terms is media (Gershon 2009). Two prime examples of transnational media are Qatar and the United Kingdom (UK). While Qatar has a population of less than three million inhabitants, its news channel Al Jazeera reaches more than 430 million households worldwide (Al Jazeera 2023). A subsidiary of the Qatar Media Corporation (Bloomberg 2018), Al Jazeera is state-owned and broadcasts not only in Arabic but also in English. Throughout the Arab Spring it openly supported the Muslim Brotherhood, arguably a transnational/societal network, and has thus been repeatedly accused of promoting terrorism by the authoritarian regimes in the region (Miles 2017). Apart from Al Jazeera Arabic and Al Jazeera English, the network started broadcasting Al Jazeera Balkans in 2011, claiming the position of “first regional news channel” (Al Jazeera Balkans n.d.) and the stated goal of “we’re bringing together a region” (Al Jazeera Balkans n.d.). Al Jazeera is closely linked to the state of Qatar and its ruling family, and the hybrid character of this foreign policy actor, in terms of recognition, presence, and capability, becomes particularly apparent when considering that requiring Qatar to close down Al Jazeera was one of the thirteen demands issued by Saudi Arabia during the Gulf crisis in 2017 (Wintour 2017).

By comparison, the BBC reaches an audience of approximately 370 million worldwide. As a public service organization, one of the BBC’s main purposes determined in the Royal Charter and Agreement is “(t)o reflect the United Kingdom, its culture and values to the world” (BBC 2018). The speech given by then Foreign Secretary William Hague on the occasion of the 80th anniversary of the BBC World Service in 2012 reflects its global presence and the societal/transnational role the BBC assumes in the UK’s foreign policy. Underlining its role as “a source of reliable and impartial information that transcends borders, regions and cultures” (Hague 2012), he also points to how the BBC has been perceived externally, namely as “perhaps Britain’s greatest gift to the World in the 20th Century” (Annan 1999 quoted by The Economist 2014). Not only does the stated purpose reveal the aspired recognition and presence, the World Service was directly funded by the Foreign Office up until 2014, proving the capability aspect (The Economist 2014).

In both cases, Qatar and the United Kingdom, we have hybrid actorness based, inter alia, on their transnational realm of media, extending foreign policy capabilities. Whether by design or by evolution, these actors are constituted in a way that they are capable of distributing information not just beyond their respective territories, but around the globe. This is not to say, of course, that the BBC and Al Jazeera are similar regarding content and autonomy. Regime type, self-understanding, and the history of the BBC qualify it as a rather autonomous actor vis-à-vis the government subscribing to critical and pluralist reporting, whereas Al Jazeera’s structures are less transparent. For sure, the BBC cannot simply be instrumentalized by the government. But it cultivates and extends the transnational sphere of the English language, providing information and raising awareness for British topics. Both media actors’ audiences are not limited to those of the same faith, ideology, or nationality, thus expanding their recognition, capability, and presence. This category could alternatively be labeled state and knowledge or information, and media could equally be subsumed under state and business. Hence, state-media hybrids represent an own classification of hybrid actorness, as media has assumed a role in (state) foreign policy at least since the United States Office of War Information (OWI) was established in 1942. Further examples of hybrid actorness in this category are Russia and Russia Today (RT) or China and CGTN.

3.4 State and Business

While the transnational sectors of religion and ideology are based on a common belief or set of values and thus pose a strong transnational link in terms of identity, hybrid actorness based on business draws on other forms of a transnational realm, arguably driven more by profit than salvation. State-business hybrids are not short-term or even ad hoc enterprises, but they pursue long-term global goals, thus excluding PPPs. Past and present examples of state-business hybrids include the United Kingdom and the East India Company in the early nineteenth century; France and Elf Aquitaine and the latter’s role in Africa; or Italy and ENI before the companies were privatized. Further cases to be discussed might be Norway and Equinor, Turkey and Turkish Airlines, Saudi Arabia and Saudi Aramco, and Microsoft, Apple, and Google cooperating with US security agencies. Such state-business hybrids become far more versatile and can engage with a greater number of partners in different fields (increased presence). For instance, Russia’s oil company Rosneft and its gas company Gazprom expand Russia’s recognition, presence, and capabilities: Before the Ukraine war, 40 percent of Gazprom’s total gas exports flowed through Ukraine and on to Western Europe (Steiner 2018). Russia and Ukraine have repeatedly clashed regarding purported outstanding debts in the past years—be it for the gas supplied or for the transit thereof. Tensions peaked during the Ukraine crisis in 2014, when Russia first raised the gas price by 80 percent in April 2014 (Kirby 2014) shortly after the Maidan Revolution and then cut the gas supply to Ukraine more than once in the ensuing months and years. More recently, a dispute was settled by a tribunal in Stockholm, though this has not been implemented to date (Buckley 2018). Both companies were targeted by US sanctions even before the Ukraine war, but have continued to pursue business with European countries, among others, most prominently with Germany, whose former chancellor Gerhard Schröder had been chairman of the board of directors of Rosneft (until 2022), together with Igor Sechin, former deputy prime minister of the Russian Federation (Rosneft 2019). This transnational business realm has strengthened Russia’s state and more specifically its foreign policy capabilities compared to other nonhybrid actors. Yet after 2022, Gazprom has been increasingly perceived as a beadle of the Russian government, has been targeted by sanctions, and suffered stark decreases in turnover and profits.

3.5 State and Diaspora

The diaspora literature examines very different cases around the globe reaching from specific politics of identity to possible effects of diasporas on the kin-states themselves (cf. Koinova 2013, 2014). The fact that a kin-state instrumentalizes an ethnic diaspora⁸ beyond the borders of the homeland looks like a typical case for hybrid actorness at first glance (e.g., Nijkang 2020). Yet admittedly, relations in the triangle between kin-state/homeland, diaspora, and host country can be diverse and nuanced. For instance, the diaspora might lobby for its cause in the kin-state (Shain and Barth 2003; Aydogan 2018), or the endeavors of the kin-state to influence the diaspora run empty (Haroon 2018). In any case, the literature broadly accepts the notion that diasporas can have influence on the bilateral relations between home- and host-country and even on the foreign policy of host countries (Koinova 2014). The research on diasporas indeed shares the claim made in this article that hybrid actorness starts with a foreign policy polity attributing additional capabilities to a state’s foreign policy. Yet whether these additional capabilities materialize depends on the spectrum of possibilities covering the relationship between state and TNA. It is evident that Hungarian, Israeli, Russian, and Indian foreign policies vis-à-vis their diasporas differ fundamentally in this regard.

Serbia and the Serb minority in Kosovo and in Bosnia are prominent examples. Due to historical contingencies such as Serbia’s move to the North, the results of the Congress of Berlin (1878), and the outcome of the Yugoslav wars, a sizeable number of Serbs live outside Serbia. A first case touches upon Kosovo, whose independence (2008) remains contested in Belgrade until today. As a consequence, the Serb-populated North of Kosovo has become a constant trouble spot characterized by street blockades, gunfire, and even attacks on border guards and UN soldiers. Whether the Serb minority merely obeys the Serb government’s orders or follows a distinct agenda remains doubtful. It is common academic wisdom, though, that the government in Belgrade seeks to instrumentalize the Kosovo minority in order to impede further recognition and press the international community for benefits (Stahl 2011).

A second case of a powerful Serb diaspora is the Republika Srpska (RS) in Bosnia, which makes up about half of the country. Following the ceasefire of the Dayton Accord, the RS possesses significant autonomy and uses it until today to block important reforms demanded by the European Union as well as Bosnia’s constitutional court. In fact, all Serbian governments have defined themselves as protectors of the Bosnian Serbs’ interests (Keil 2017, 55). Yet the price to pay for Serbia’s influence in Bosnia is the possible feedback of RS policies on Serbian politics. For instance, the current leader of the Bosnian Serbs, Milorad Dodik, has become more powerful over time and pursues his own game with the neighboring states as well as Russia (Huskic 2022, 379f.).

In line with the general argument of diaspora studies, the two examples demonstrate that diaspora politics is politics in its own right, and their impact on the host countries depends on many factors. Yet analytically speaking, the examples show that Serbia’s hybrid actorness in form of a kin-state allows for an expanded foreign policy on Serbia’s behalf. This increased recognition as a key state of the Balkans means an enhanced presence in the international scene—Serbian president Vučić being a frequent dialogue partner of the German or French government and for Brussels. Again, by no means this argument presupposes that state influence on diasporas is always deliberate or even effective. Yet beyond doubt, the Serb diasporas give Serbia increased leverage on political outcomes in the region.

4 Model Generation: Hybrid Actorness and Expanded Foreign Policy

When analyzing the state’s capabilities in foreign policy with regard to autonomy, we identify a spectrum with the “pure,” minimal state and—completely separated—an entirely autonomous TNA at one end of the spectrum (see figure 1). At the other end, there is an entirely fused “hybrid actor,” i.e., an actor who is a state and a TNA alike.

As we have learned from the illustrative cases, such hybrid actors are rare but could be found in the religious sector. Iran and the Holy See qualify as hybrid actors, and their hybrid actorness provides them with enormous power in the transnational realm of religion beyond their state borders. Between the two ends of the spectrum lies the gray-zone of hybrid actorness, where states have some but very different influence on the transnational. Our argument reads that the actorness in question is hybrid in the sense that both elements are constitutive of its foreign policy, and—so our counterfactual argument goes—without either of these (state or transnational), the actorness would change significantly. To put it differently, Russia’s foreign policy would look different without Gazprom, as would the UK’s without the BBC, but also the Catholic Church would be a different actor without the Holy See’s credentials of being a state.

The standard state toolkit of foreign policy instruments to choose from includes military means, positive or negative material incentives such as economic sanctions, various forms of self-commitment, symbolic acts, or even nonaction (Kinsella, Bruce, and Harvey 2012, 20ff.). In addition to these, hybrid actorness may be inclined to an ideology or identity and share goals and values that transcend state boundaries, thus allowing them to (deliberately or inadvertently) widen their scope of foreign policy activity.

We propose the following definition of hybrid actorness:

Hybrid actorness denotes the particular constitution of a foreign policy polity of both state and transnational elements resulting in an expanded foreign policy increasing recognition, presence, and capabilities in the international sphere.

While hybrid actorness starts with the state bureaucracy of foreign policy, this polity is complemented by the transnational component. The outcome, in all cases, is expanded foreign policy, an extended foreign policy space that has been demonstrated with the help of established actorness criteria (from the EU foreign policy literature), i.e., presence, recognition, and capability. Our illustrative case studies have revealed that in most cases the criteria overlap. The following (table 1) presents a tentative qualitative assessment of actorness criteria.

We have offered some power-related dimensions to shed light upon the politics between the state and the TNAs. In such terms, the capability criterion looks as the most straightforward but falls short when it comes to large communities that are hard to control (diaspora, religion). These latter hybrids, by contrast, enjoy greater recognition. Media hybrids exhibit specific features since they indicate high presence and capability but are usually not perceived as a substitute for the state. Media hybrids such as the BBC and Al Jazeera address global audiences by raising awareness for their home countries foreign policy agendas (“power over”). The diaspora case, for instance, provides another example for “power over” effects meeting Holzscheiter’s (2005) argument of increased discursive capabilities leading to additional intersubjective power. Serbian and Hungarian governments may address their diasporas, thereby owing leverage in neighbor relations and regional security. Another example for the co-opting of further actors beyond borders provides the religious sector, which reveals types of intercultural/interreligious dialogue defining common goals and preparing for conflict resolution (“power with”). Iran, the Holy See, Saudi Arabia, Israel, and Russia—all of them increase their political weight by making use of their religious transnational communities. Admittedly though, the country cases are very different, and we need more comparative studies to shed light on the latency and manifestation of their hybrid actorness.

Personnel and financing help to understand the increased capability of business hybrids, which safeguard state goals in energy policy. Evidently, the “power to” make use of new structures and new channels of influence. Religions have different organizations and networks that bring information and guidance to people (high presence), which cannot be affected by traditional foreign policy. By making use of party affiliations, the German government has been implementing a second-track diplomacy that may hold communication open if formal diplomacy breaks down (high capability of the state-ideology hybrid). Yet, as the increasing pressure of autocratic states (China, Russia, and Egypt) against German party foundations reveals hybrid actorness might become a liability. The pressure feeds back on the parties and even on the government to soothe its policy and relinquish human rights claims: Instead of altering the foreign policy of the autocratic regime, the attacks on the hybrid actorness may change the overall foreign policy—hybrid actorness reverse. The liability argument can also be attributed to the sanctions against Gazprom and to the Serb diaspora case if diasporas play games at the expense of the kin-state. The analogy to a superpower with a global reach applies: The enormous foreign policy space may also invite other actors to attack somewhere on the globe. This is why we state that hybrid actorness not only benefits from the transnational but can also be targeted by this.

The empirical observations suggest at first glance that hybrid actorness always means more power. This is not the case; we have to consider that hybrid actorness can be latent only. In the diaspora case, Serbia’s impact on the Serb diasporas abroad was manifest, but what about Albania?⁹ Only rarely (if at all), the kin-state Albania makes use of the Albanian majority in Kosovo or the minorities in North Macedonia, Serbia, Montenegro, and Greece. Moreover, the case of BBC reveals that domestic regulations due to checks and balances may hinder the immediate government influence on TNAs. Regime types, so one of our theses reads, might explain why some hybrid actors remain latent while others partially or even fully become manifest.

Some critical discussion is in order here. A critical point should be raised when it comes to the assumption that a change in polity automatically translates into a change in policy—in the words of our model—hybrid actorness leads to an expanded foreign policy. Admittedly, the (minimal) state can also expand its possibilities by investing in new policies (e.g., cultural policies or public diplomacy). Moreover, it can find “insular” or “embedded agencies” within the state bureaucracies in order to exert influence (Breuning 2007, 118). An interesting feature in this regard is paradiplomacy¹⁰ meaning “the conduct of external engagements (across socioeconomic, security, and energy fields, for example) by subnational/provincial governments in both federal and unitary systems” (Liu and Song 2020). While we would admit that such a polity may also lead to an expanded foreign policy—a similar argument could be made for “city diplomacy” (Chan 2016)—the transnational component is missing. In all of these cases, we would still speak of state organizations, which disqualifies them from hybrid actorness. In the case of hybrid actorness, the state employs transnational intermediaries, making use of their legitimacy in the transnational realm. It is another dimension, another channel for foreign policy. In sum, investing in normal foreign policy instruments, paradiplomacy, city diplomacy, and so forth make a complementary but analytically distinct argument. TNAs possess a certain degree of autonomy, which—in an unlikely case—might lead to policies independent from the state. These two attributes speak against a mere extension of foreign policy instruments but constitute a qualitative and substantial foreign policy complement.

Another critical point may stem from similarities to Nye’s concept of “soft power” (Nye 2004, 2008).¹¹ Is “expanded foreign policy” not exactly this, simply generalizing a trend Nye has been analyzing for the US seeking dominance by culture “after hegemony” (Nye 2004, 5)? Soft power, we would argue, is first and foremost a concept regarding perceptional outcomes, e.g., when McDonald’s business success is attributed to the US’ soft power. The concept touches upon traditional foreign policy as well as the outcomes of autonomous TNAs but neglects the realm in-between the two. Hence, input- and polity-wise, our argument raises a new point, but the increased actorness outcome, i.e., expanded foreign policy, would meet Nye’s soft power approach.

This said, we posit that a model of hybrid actorness consists of various subtypes. As mentioned in the introduction, we perceive this type of actorness as a spectrum that ranges from the pure state/TNA to the (fused) hybrid actor (see figure 2). We are interested in the types in between, namely those with different manifestations of hybridity. We distinguish between latent hybrid actors, partially manifested hybrid actors, and fully manifested hybrid actors. Latent hybrid actors, as the heuristic case studies indicate, are those (state) actors who have the potential to exert influence on TNAs. Partially manifested hybrid actors have expanded foreign policy capabilities in at least one sector; however, the state retains control and no fusion between state and TNAs takes place. Fully manifested hybrid actors have expanded foreign policy in one or more sectors, and these transnational sectors have become constitutive of the foreign policy actor.

5 Conclusion

The aim of the model generation in this article can be understood as a rejoining endeavor: making use of historical, country-specific knowledge of traditional FPS, arranging it analytically, generating a model, and, by doing so, transferring it to FPA.

Embarking from our research puzzle that some countries are systematically “punching above their weight,” we have theorized on expanded foreign policy and introduced the concept of hybrid actorness as a new typology for FPA. Phenomena that have existed in international politics for decades, and that have arguably become more en vogue as transnational issues become more prominent, now become analytically accessible. The main argument is that beyond the minimal set of a foreign policy polity such as the state bureaucracy, states can make use of the transnational realm to expand their foreign policy. This hybrid actorness allows for increased power in the international as well as transnational sphere, as can be explored by employing actorness criteria such as presence, capabilities, and recognition. Our argument suggests that expanded foreign policy contributes to achieving the state’s foreign policy goals, which could make the foreign policy more effective—in short—make the state more powerful.

Increased capabilities enable the state to gain more power to push for its agenda in IOs as well as vis-à-vis other states. Spurred presence may help to build up power with coalitions and alliances. And fostered recognition allows for gaining power over societal actors, which could not be reached by classic foreign policy. Yet the exact causal pathway regarding politics—so our thesis reads—remains sector-specific and only allows for contingent generalizations. Hybrid actorness in transnational sectors can take different shapes—be it institutional “double hats” as leaders of states and religions; ideological proximity as in the case of the political foundations; or state-owned, state-sponsored media agents. Our heuristic cases reveal several subtypes of hybrid actorness spanning the five transnational sectors of religion, ideology, media, business, and diaspora, ranging from latent to fully manifested hybrid actors. Regime types, so one of our theses paving the way for future research, might explain why some hybrid actors remain latent while others partially or even fully become manifest. Moreover, we do not link our argument to normative considerations. Whether such an expanded foreign policy makes use of transnational politics to enrich the world’s public sphere or whether it goes for hybrid warfare is beyond the scope of the argument. One of our research goals was to encourage further research. Beyond the regime-type argument above and the need for microstudies of how and by which means the TNAs are tied to the state, we touched upon the liability presumption. Hybrid actorness may trigger undesired feed-backs from and attacks on the TNAs in play. The literature on diasporas already calls for caution in this regard, considering that the diaspora may provide feedback on the kin-state, effectively limiting the government’s recognition. Under which circumstances this “wag-the-dog” phenomenon carries the day is already a topic in the transnationalism literature and deserves a closer theoretical and empirical look. What is more, studies on hybrid actorness can complement the growing literature on the transnational. In our understanding, the growth of the transnational community cannot only be grasped as pure denationalization, but we should also consider that states seek to react and counteract to their perceived loss of power by pursuing an expanded foreign policy. As already explored in the case of hybrid transnational climate change networks, these two research perspectives might merge and enhance our understanding of the complex relationship between the state and the transnational sphere.

Footnotes

References