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The paper argues that South Africa's foreign policy is often over-extended and lacks focus, attempting to balance competing agendas across the AU, Brics, and the UN Security Council. It highlights a tension between the government's 'Afrocentric' approach and the domestic imperatives of poverty reduction and economic growth outlined by the National Planning Commission. The author suggests that a 'diplomacy of Ubuntu'—emphasizing common humanity and interdependence—could potentially bridge the gap between international ambitions and national interests, provided that the state increases domestic participation in foreign policy formulation through mechanisms like the South African Council on International Relations (Sacoir).