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Contemporary conflicts no longer unfold as isolated crises. They evolve within an increasingly interconnected international system where geopolitical rivalry, economic interdependence, technological change, and institutional fragility reinforce one another. The result is a spectrum of insecurity in which local confrontations generate regional realignments and global repercussions, challenging long-held assumptions about security, resilience, and international order.

 

The recent escalation involving the United States and Iran illustrates this transformation. While the immediate focus has been military confrontation and regional stability, the disruption surrounding the Strait of Hormuz has demonstrated that strategic chokepoints are not simply geographic bottlenecks; they are critical nodes through which global vulnerabilities become visible. Energy markets, maritime trade, financial systems, food security, and development trajectories remain deeply conditioned by events unfolding in the Gulf. Rather than constituting an exceptional episode, the Hormuz crisis exposes structural dependencies that have accumulated over decades of globalization.

 

This issue examines these dynamics from multiple perspectives. The contributions on the Gulf explore the economic consequences of disrupted maritime trade, the strategic dilemma confronting Gulf monarchies as confidence in traditional security guarantees erodes, and the implications of renewed energy instability for an international order already under considerable strain. Together, they invite a broader reflection on how regional conflicts increasingly function as stress tests for global governance and economic resilience.

 

The reconstruction of Gaza demonstrates that post-conflict recovery is fundamentally a political and institutional challenge as much as a financial one. Also, the latest developments about Beaufort Castle in Lebanon reminds us that technological innovation has not diminished the enduring strategic significance of geography. Rather, it has transformed the ways in which terrain, mobility, and control interact in contemporary warfare.

 

The African continent provides a complementary perspective on these evolving dynamics. A decade of changing conflict patterns reveals the adaptation of armed groups, the growing complexity of peace operations, contested political transitions, and the rapid diffusion of affordable technologies that are reshaping the conduct of violence. These developments point less to a succession of discrete crises than to a profound reconfiguration of authority, security governance, and state resilience across diverse regional contexts.

 

Today conflict must be understood as a multidimensional phenomenon operating across scales and the boundaries separating domestic and international security, regional instability and global risk, are becoming progressively less meaningful.

 

At a time when the international system is marked by strategic competition, fragmented governance, and accelerating uncertainty, understanding the spectrum of conflict requires moving beyond conventional geopolitical narratives. It demands attention to the structural forces that connect seemingly distant crises and to the emerging patterns that will shape the security landscape in the years ahead.

THE US-IRAN CONFLICT AND THE MIDDLE EAST

Hormuz and the Invisible Fractures: The Price of a Distant War - Views from the New South

 

This volume examines the Strait of Hormuz as a strategic chokepoint and a revealing fault line in today’s international order, showing how a regional crisis can expose deeper geopolitical, economic, energy, trade, and security vulnerabilities, with consequences that reverberate across global markets, supply chains, financial stability, and the New South... Read more

 

 

The Global Costs of Disruption in the Strait of Hormuz

 

Mehran Haghirian

 

The war on Iran and in the Gulf has made it impossible to treat the Strait of Hormuz as a regional issue. The disruption around the Strait has moved through the world economy in concrete ways, from higher fuel bills and pressure on food and fertilizer supply chains to rising costs for households and companies far from the conflict. This policy brief examines how Hormuz became one of the main channels through which the costs of the war spread beyond the Gulf. It argues that the crisis exposed the extent to which global markets, food systems, industrial production, mobility, and development finance are tied to the Gulf’s stability. The real issue now is how the Gulf states and their partners can build greater resilience once the war fully ends... Read more

 

The Gulf’s Strategic Paradox: Lost Confidence in the US Security Umbrella

 

Ferid Belhaj

 

The Gulf monarchies: Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain, and Oman increasingly exist in a world where the United States no longer looks like the unquestioned guarantor of regional stability. Repeated tensions with Iran, the vulnerability of the Strait of Hormuz, attacks on Gulf infrastructure, and Washington’s cautious and calculated responses have all raised serious doubts about how far the United States would actually go to protect its Gulf partners. And yet, despite these growing doubts, the Gulf states continue to anchor their currencies overwhelmingly to the US dollar and keep the vast majority of their sovereign wealth inside American-centered financial markets... Read more

 

 

Stress Test: The Hormuz Crisis and the Fracturing of the Global Energy Order

 

Rim Berahab, Sabrine Emran

 

The global energy system has entered a period of acute structural stress following the strikes by the United States and Israel on Iran in late February 2026, and the subsequent disruption of flows through the Strait of Hormuz. According to the International Energy Agency, the resulting shock marks the most severe disruption to global energy markets since the 1970s oil crises, with systemic characteristics comparable to the combined effects of those crises and the 2022 Russia-Ukraine energy shock... Read more

 

The Strategic Permanence of Terrain, from Sun Tzu to the Satellite Era: The Case of Beaufort Castle in Lebanon

 

Abdelhak Bassou

 

This paper examines why Beaufort Castle in Lebanon retains military significance in an age of satellites, drones, and cruise missiles. It argues that the site’s value is primarily geographic: overlooking the Litani Valley from more than 700 meters, it offers enduring advantages in observation, control of routes, and force protection. Drawing on Sun Tzu, Clausewitz, and Jomini, the paper shows that technology may transform warfare, but it does not eliminate the strategic functions of terrain: seeing, blocking, holding, and controlling space... Read more

 

 

Financing Sustainable Reconstruction of Gaza

 

Hafez Ghanem, Liel Maghen

 

The reconstruction of Gaza will depend not only on the amount of funding mobilized, but on how financing is structured, governed, and anchored within a broader political context. In a setting shaped by movement restrictions and weak institutions, financial design is not neutral but shapes priorities, distributes power, and determines what can be implemented on the ground. The paper examines the key challenges that have limited the translation of financial commitments into actual projects, alongside emerging approaches that seek to address these barriers... Read more

 

AFRICAS’ EVOLVING SECURITY LANDSCAPE : A DECADE IN REVIEW

Session1: Ten Years On: Patterns, Shifts and Continuities in Africa’s Peace & Security Landscape

 

This panel offers a retrospective reflection on how Africa's peace and security landscape has evolved over the past decade. The aim is to identify the major shifts that have reshaped the continent's security environments, while also highlighting the structural continuities that persist. Discussions will focus on conflict dynamics, institutional and regional responses, the reconfiguration of political and security authority, and the key strategic lessons that can be drawn from this period... Watch

 

 

Session 2: Stability at Stake: Lessons from a Decade of Peacekeeping

 

This panel offers a reflection on the lessons that can be drawn from the past decade of peacekeeping in Africa. It examines how mandates have evolved, how intervention environments have changed, and the tensions between efforts at political stabilization, institutional legitimation, and regional ownership... Watch

 

 

 

Session 3: A Decade of Terrorism: Containment and Adaptation amid Strategic Fatigue

 

This panel offers a reflection on how terrorism in Africa has transformed over the past decade. It examines armed groups' capacity to adapt their tactics, consolidate their territorial presence, and pursue their expansion strategies... Watch

 

 

Session 4: Evolving Governance Models and Political Transitions in Africa

 

This panel explores the contemporary transformations of governance models and political transition dynamics across Africa. It seeks to examine how political transitions reveal deeper reconfigurations of authority, legitimacy, and political order, particularly in contexts characterized by institutional fragility... Watch

 

 

 

Session 5: Low-Cost Technologies and the Transformation of Conflict Dynamics

 

This panel examines the spread of low-cost technologies and their impact on conflict dynamics across Africa. It explores how these tools are reshaping the use of violence, enhancing the adaptive capacities of armed actors, and influencing both the vulnerabilities and responses of states operating in highly diverse security environments... Watch

 

 

Session 6: Africa’s Security Future: Prospective to 2036

 

This panel offers a forward-looking reflection on the major trends that could reshape Africa’s security environment by 2036. It aims to explore possible trajectories emerging from transformations affecting regional balances, forms of political authority, security architectures, environmental pressures, demographic dynamics, and the evolving nature of external engagement on the continent... Watch

 

 

 

PRESENTATION OF THE ANNUAL REPORT ON AFRICA'S GEOPOLITICS

The 2026 Annual Report on Africa's Geopolitics (RAGA) by the Policy Center for the New South examines an African continent shaped by a dual transformation: that of an international system that has become increasingly fragmented, conflict-prone, and transactional; and that of Africa's own strategic environment, where the relationships between security, sovereignty, connectivity, and influence are being redefined. Africa emerges neither as a peripheral actor nor as a mere arena for competition among external powers, but as a space where broader political, strategic, and geoeconomic balances are being reshaped under growing constraints.

The Report explores these reconfigurations through their concrete manifestations: the transformation of conflict dynamics, the growing importance of technological competition, mounting pressures on strategic corridors, maritime spaces, and critical resources, the evolution of security partnerships, and the shifting global narratives surrounding the continent. Through this perspective, the Report presents an Africa that is both exposed to increasingly complex power dynamics and actively engaged in shaping its own strategic choices. More than a snapshot of current developments, it offers a structured analysis of how the continent is positioning itself at the heart of today's evolving global power landscape.... Watch

 

 

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