Cultural Cohesion in Regional Organizations: Equatorial Guinea, The CPLP, and its Death Penalty Abolition

In 2014, Equatorial Guinea joined the Communidade dos Países de Língua Portuguesa (CPLP). The state’s inclusion in the organization was controversial for two reasons: first, Equatorial Guinea’s primary language is Spanish, while CPLP is a community of Portuguese-speaking countries, and second, Equatorial Guinea still allowed the death penalty, despite abolition being an expected prerequisite for membership. In 2022, however, Equatorial Guinea abolished this practice, and CPLP members praised the steps the country took during its accession. The case of Equatorial Guinea and the CPLP is one of both the power of cultural cohesion and a regional organization that prioritizes it among its members. Based on semi-structured interviews with prominent political elites conducted between 2022 and 2023, I argue that the CPLP successfully influenced an “outsider” country through the spread of the Portuguese language and the abolition of the state’s death penalty.