Change of Names in International Relations: From Appreciation and Self-Protection to Cold War Politics

Bola A. Akinterinwa

Name is an identity and a reflection of personality. It is particularly important in international relations because it serves as a potent tool in defining, asserting sovereignty, and shaping global identity. What is in a name goes beyond the name itself. The mentioning of a name can ring many bells. Every living and non-living thing has a name and the name can always be changed for various reasons. Monuments, airports, countries, etc. have been renamed. Even marriages have prompted changes of names. A name can be changed for geographical reasons. Names of seas, regions, borders, territories, landmarks, etc. can be changed. Apart from geographical renaming, official state titles do give legal status and legitimacy to new governments at the United Nations.

More important, there is no disputing the fact that a name carries values and history in terms of global image and connects people or citizens to their culture and history. Many countries have changed their names in order to defend their nation’s dignity against past colonial powers. And true, there have been name controversies in international relations. For more than a decade, Greece and Macedonia have been in disagreement over what the official country’s name should be. What is noteworthy about changes of names in international relations is that the reasons for changes of names are also changing from appreciation to cold war. It is moving away from being an act of good gesture to dangerous cold war politics.

This development is now threatening the maintenance of international peace and security. This is what U.S. foreign policy of ‘Make America Great Again’ (MAGA) under President Donald Trump is suggesting and to which global concerns are pointing. What informed the renaming of Gulf of Mexico as Gulf of America? How do we also explain the renaming of the Lake Ontario as Lake America? In which way are these changes of names different from the previous re-naming in international relations?

Some Previous Changes of Names

Changing a name is important but not important than the reasons for seeking a change. The political motivations are particularly noteworthy, especially when asserting sovereignty and making territorial claims. In traditional African settings, for example, a name defines one’s identity, links a person to his or her ancestors, and unites him or her to the community. At the level of a whole country, names are taken more seriously. Many countries have changed their names. In Africa, Rhodesia was renamed Zimbabwe in 1980, Gold Coast was renamed Ghana in 1957 to recall the medieval Ghana Empire; Swaziland became Eswatini in 2018 to restore the pre-colonial name which meant ‘the land of the Swazi. Upper Volta was changed to Burkina Faso in 1984 in order to suggest that the country is a ‘land of upright and honest people’; Belgian Congo/Congo Leopoldville was first changed to Zaire in 1971 and later to Republic of the Congo in 1997 in consonance with President Joseph Seseko Mobutu’s policy of authenticité in protest against colonial names; Cape Verde was changed to Cabo Verde in 2013 to emphasize the Portuguese-language name and to reject the translated English name.

In Europe and elsewhere, the Irish Free State became Ireland on December 29, 1937, following the approval of a new constitution of Ireland in a national plebiscite. In 2020, the Dutch government officially dropped Holland from its international branding to use only ‘The Netherlands’, the true country name. This decision is understandable from the consideration that Holland is not the whole country. It is a regional area that consists of only two of the country’s 12 provinces. Turkey changed its name to Turkiye in 2022 to discontinue the country from being referred to as a ‘bird’ or a ‘failed’ state, because the word ‘Turkey’ also means failure. In 1993, Czechoslovakia was changed to Czech Republic, to comprise Czechia and Slovakia, following what was called the Velvet Divorce, or a peaceful dissolution into two separate sovereign states. Thus, renaming in international relations is always an important instrument of protest, appreciation, self-re-projection, and domination as it is the case with the U.S. MAGA.

Grosso modo, one prominent category of renaming in international relations is in the area of geographic features that are either shared, or contested, or used by more than one country. The category includes seas, rivers, lakes, gulfs and mountains. As these features do not belong exclusively to one country, any unilateral renaming in order to acquire primacy cannot but be provocative. This is precisely what President Trump’s MAGA is all about. Change of names of geo-political locations under President Donald Trump raises many issues of international peace and security.

First, Donald Trump wants to present himself to the whole world as an agent of a new America, as a protector of a strong and not a weak America under President Joe Biden and as a maker of renewed great America. In the eyes of Donald Trump, Joe Biden, his immediate predecessor, was unnecessarily too weak which should not have been so. Donald Trump therefore wants to show America’s strength and send indirect messages to China, the quietly rising challenger and aspiring new leader of the world. America wants to tell China and other competitors that it is not yet ready to relinquish its leadership of the world.

In showing American strength, Donald Trump has deliberately been threatening the national interests of other sovereign states. The renaming of Gulf of Mexico and Denali is a good illustration of this point. On the very first day in office in January 2025, President Trump signed Executive Order No. 14172, entitled ‘Restoring Names That Honor American Greatness.’ The Order directed the Secretary of Interior to rename the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America for use by the Federal Government and the U.S. Board on Geographic Names. Besides, the same Order also restored the name Mount Mckinley to Alaska’s tallest peak. The renaming as Mount Mckinley was a reversal of the 2015 decision taken under President Barack Obama who returned the mountain to its traditional Alaska Native name, Denali.

Renaming Denali as Mount Mckinley did not generate controversy because the Mount Mckinley is located within the United States. The exercise of renaming falls squarely within the purview of domestic competence of the U.S, Government. However, the renaming of Gulf of Mexico as Gulf of America generated much animosity simply because the waters of the Gulf are adjacent not only to the United States but also to Mexico and Cuba. President Trump unilaterally decided to appropriate the commonly accepted name, Gulf of Mexico. The major considerations of President Trump were the economic importance of the Gulf to the United States, and the infuriating facts of trade imbalances, unauthorized migration, and drug trafficking across the U.S.-Mexico border.

The immediate implication of the U.S. unilateral decision is that the renaming does not go beyond the 12 nautical miles from the coastline recognized by international law as limit of exercise of national sovereignty. While the renaming of the Gulf was considered ‘appropriate’ in the eyes of Donald Trump, President Claudia Sheinbaum of Mexico noted that Mexico and the rest of the world would continue to call the body of water the Gulf of Mexico, adding that in the same logic, North America itself could be renamed ‘Mexican America’ since Mexico’s 1814 constitution used that phrase before the United States’ own founding documents were signed. As noted by Agata Weremczuk, ‘the President of Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum, has unequivocally stressed that the country will continue to use the existing term ‘Gulf of Mexico’ (vide “The Significance of Geographical Names and Trump’s Strategic Intentions – Gulf of Mexico or Gulf of America?” (February 19, 2025 Titan, News, Experts).

The problematic raised in international relations is about how to refer to the Gulf. For the United States of America, Google calls it Gulf of America while Mexico retains the old name. This is how the United States is promoting disorderliness and making the maintenance of international peace and security more difficult. The mere fact that the Gulf, regardless of whatever name it answers, is accessible to Mexico and Cuba, requires a tripartite consultation in the spirit of international law. Donald Trump is vehemently opposed to consultation in the wrong belief that America can be great again by manu militari. More disturbingly in international relations, the renaming does not have any legal weight beyond the United States. This is in spite of the fact that the U.S. House of Representatives passed a legislation seeking to codify the Gulf of America.

As if the renaming of Gulf of Mexico were not enough, Donald Trump again extended the trade war or his struggle to Make America Great Again to Canada last week by renaming Lake Ontario. What greatness is there in the act of renaming? What international respect is there for Americans if the renaming is only meaningful to Americans? Unlike the Gulf of Mexico to which three different sovereign states have access, Lake Ontario is one of the Great Lakes straddling the border between New York State and the Canadian province of Ontario. This means that the renaming is a bilateral issue to be addressed by both the United States and Canada. The likelihood of Canada taking the renaming of the Lake as friendly is remote, bearing in mind that President Donald Trump had once proposed to Canadians to accept to be the 51st constituent part of the United States. The Canadians have politely rejected the insult.

Appreciation, Self-Protection, and Cold War

As shown above, renaming is a good instrument of power. It is an exercise of power. It is a manifestation of politics per excellence. It can have a multipurpose function. For our purpose in this column, it should be recalled that during the colonial days, rivers, mountains, cities, and an entire territories were renamed after colonial monarchs, explorers, and national heroes. By so doing, indigenous names were consciously obliterated. However, with decolonization, African leaders began to reverse the colonial acts of renaming in favour of local names, indigenous languages, etc.

As of today, and in this Vie Internationale, we distinguish between and among three broad types of renaming. First is appreciation and identity renaming in which people are honoured for their services to the community, or to show historical memory or restore dignity to a place or people. Second is self-protection renaming, which is done to assert sovereignty, or protect economic or territorial interests, as well as projecting strength, drawing a symbolic boundary when there are situations of contested resources or assets. The third category is the cold war style or the tit-for-tat renaming. Greater emphasis is placed on this third category in order to underscore the implications for the maintenance of bilateral and international peace and security.

Without jot of doubt, the most common category of renaming in international relations is the change of the name of a country, examples of which we have mentioned above. It is the third category of renaming, that is, the diplomatic tit-for-tat type that we want to explicate in order to draw lessons for global peace and security and particularly for Africa’s development and strategic autonomy in global affairs.

At the level of Nigeria’s bilateral relationship with the United States, there have been both appreciation and cold war types of naming and renaming. It was in appreciation of U.S.-Nigeria good understanding under Nigeria’s Chief Olusegun Obasanjo and United States under President Bill Clinton that the access road to the international airport in Abuja, Nigeria, was not only renamed Bill Clinton but also that he was given a Nigerian name, OMOWALE, a Yoruba name meaning a ‘Child Returns.’ The name suggests the returning home of a son, the returning of a friend of Nigeria and Nigerians. This is expression of gratitude. Appreciation naming is also an invitation or request for a better entente in the relationship. Consequently, it does not involve political qualms.

At the level of cold war renaming, there were two cases of note: the Kudirat Abiola Corner Affair and the Walter Carrington affair. As regards the Kudirat Abiola Corner Affair, the Nigerian pro-democracy activists in the United States proposed that the New York City honour Kudirat Abiola, the wife of Chief M.K.O. Abiola whose electoral victory was annulled by military President Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida in June 1993. The activists suggested that the street corner outside Nigeria’s United Nations Permanent Mission and Consulate at the intersection of East 44th Street and Second Avenue in Manhattan be named ‘Kudirat Abiola Corner.’ The strategic calculation of the pro-democracy activists was to compel Nigerian diplomats to see her name whenever they enter and also go out of the building.

The proposal unsettled the mind of the government of General Sani Abacha who was compelled to lobby the U.S. State Department and fund opposition to the proposal, as well as go to courts to challenge the renaming. The argument of Nigeria was that the act of renaming was an improper interference with the diplomatic standing of Nigeria’s Permanent Mission. The City Council held hearings and eventually upheld its authority to rename. General Abacha was not happy with the decision and would retaliate immediately.

The Nigerian government renamed the street on which the U.S. Embassy was located on Victoria Island after Louis Farrakhan, the controversial leader of the Nation of Islam. The name of Louis Farrakhan was among other names like Muammar Gaddafi, Saddam Hussein, and Timothy McVeigh that were considered just to provoke the U.S. Government. The political lull created did not last long as the Louis Farrakhan Street was again renamed in honour of Walter Carrington, a former U.S. ambassador to Nigeria, a major critic of General Sani Abacha, after Nigeria’s return to civilian rule. Thus, the Kudirat Abiola Corner affair is an expression of the use of naming of streets as a proxy battlefield for a much larger political confrontation over the issues of democracy, human rights, and legitimacy. It was an expression of a cold war.

At the international level, the cases of the renaming of the Gulf of Mexico and the Lake of Ontario are good expressions of cold war and self-protection. Trade relationship between Canada and the United States has been collapsing and not at all in good shape. In fact, Washington has placed tariffs on Canadian goods against which Canada has also retaliated. President Trump has explained that the deepest parts of the lake lie within U.S. waters and that the United States could be said to hold most of the lake’s volume.

In reaction to the thinking, the Canadian Prime Minister, Mike Carney, said the name Ontario was derived from a ‘centuries-old indigenous (Wendat) word which means ‘the lake is beautiful, the lake is big.’ More importantly, Prime Minister Caney made it clear that the name Ontario predates the founding of Canada and the founding of United States, and therefore, Canada’s identity and its names would not change to suit Washington’s political messaging. This is again a situation of order and counter-order amounting to disorder. It is a pointer that U.S. renaming cannot have much effect outside of the United States.

The same reasons of politico-economic interests largely informed the renaming of the Gulf of Mexico. In this regard, to what extent can it be rightly argued that U.S. acts of renaming have succeeded? Have the acts been able to bring the Chinese to their knees or to accept the sovereign superiority of the United States by Mexico and Canada? There is nothing to suggest that. Canada is coping with the U.S. tariff in a defiant manner. The mere fact that Canada has arrogantly rejected U.S. request to have Canada become the 51st State of the United States ought to have taught Donald Trump some lessons about the principle of sovereign equality. Since Donald Trump has made himself the lord of lords and another omnipotent power in international politics, of what benefit to the people of America has the policy of Make America Great Again been? Has the policy brought more friends or enemies in international relations?

Even within the context of Nigerian politics, renaming as retaliation has not helped nation-building. Nigeria’s original National Anthem was “Nigeria, We Hail Thee.” It was adopted on October 1, 1960. It was generally accepted even though it was written and composed by British citizens. However, in 1978, the military Government of General Olusegun Obasanjo replaced it with “Arise, O Compatriots” but President Bola Ahmed Tinubu also rejected “Arise O Compatriots.” He restored “Nigeria, We Hail Thee” as National Anthem in May 2024. Many observers considered the renaming as a diversionary tactic to make people see less of the economic and security problems with which the country was faced.

Whatever was the case, there is no disputing the fact of serious misunderstanding between Chief Olusegun Obasanjo as President and Alhaji Bola Ahmed Tinubu as Governor of Lagos State. President Obasanjo reportedly undermined Governor Tinubu, especially in matters pertaining to creation of new Local Government Areas. Now that Governor Tinubu is Nigeria’s President, he availed himself of the opportunity as president to retaliate using the context of national anthem to engage in a cold war. The misunderstanding between both of them is deep-seated. In this regard, why has renaming been used as an instrument of retaliation and not stricto sensu for nation building? What prevents another incoming President in the future from changing or re-writing a new National Anthem?

Without jot of doubt, every act of renaming is not simply an administrative exercise. Be it at the level of geographic feature, a state, or a piece of urban infrastructure, renaming is a communication between and among political actors to either show admiration, assert sovereignty, correct a colonial wrong, protect a domestic interest, or deliver a well-calculated insult in diplomacy. Renaming as a tool of ‘Making America Great Again’ (MAGA) under President Donald Trump is not about admiration for anyone or appreciation. It is more about unilateralism and insulting of other sovereign states, intimidating them to accept U.S. claims of sovereignty. The renaming of the Gulf of Mexico and Lake Ontario are clear manifestations of U.S. policy aggressiveness. Most unfortunately, the strategy of MAGA has not succeeded in intimidating China, the perceived arch rival, if not enemy, of the United States. And true enough, China has attained the same level of technological and industrial greatness as the United States, if not more, particularly in many areas: military equipment (the Fujian aircraft carriers), genetically modified seeds, the increasing use of the RMB (cross-border payment system by 180 countries) which necessarily makes the dollar less of a priority. Besides, China does not use Western medical equipment as Shanghai United Imaging’s CT scanners are now entering the U.S. and Europe according to Professor Yang Fan of the University of Political Science and Law. Consequently, if President Trump wants to promote an imperialism-driven new world order while the world wants the maintenance of international peace and security, Africa should not accept. Reaction can begin with the renaming of all inherited colonial names in Africa.