In this interview, Max Ajl discusses his research on the influence of China’s agrarian reform on Arab countries, particularly Tunisia, highlighting how China’s experience with an alternative development path resonated with local conditions and inspired Tunisian intellectuals and planners.

Can you discuss at the broadest level how your research intersects with China?

My work treats four areas of study in the Arab region: the history of decolonization, the history of planning, the intellectual history of heterodox planning alternatives, or “paths not taken” in the post-colonial world, and broader Arab agrarian questions. Within the first, China registers most lightly, although China sent arms to Algeria and even Tunisia, as my colleague Rebecca Gruskin uncovered in the archives. Furthermore, China was central to the world-wide mass mobilizing peasant wars of the mid-to-late 20^th century, more commonly called the national liberation struggles.

In relation to the second and third themes, China becomes much more salient. By the time planners were thinking about how to move from under-development to development in the Arab region, and particularly Tunisia, as I discussed in my article, “Planning in the Shadow of China,” they were looking for models. Some, of course, drew on the mainstream and lightly heterodox development discourses, from Ragnar Nurkse to Albert Hirschmann. But for nearly all of them there was knowledge of, if not enchantment with what they understood,  the Chinese Communist development model, by the late 1950s. Through party-overseen study tours, delegations, and research trips and the resultant books by the most prominent French left-leaning or Marxist development writers, people like Charles Bettelheim, Rene Dumont, and others, China was on everyone’s mind as a possible option or model for what countries like Tunisia could do to extirpate the poverty blighting their bidonvilles and their countrysides.

Furthermore, the young cadres studying abroad were generally studying in Paris or elsewhere in France. Communism was magnetic and China was on everyone’s minds. One finds more and more mention of China – or oblique references to the country’s policies rather than as a proper noun – in documents from UGET, the UGTT, and even nationalist bourgeois writers. Later, China was an inspiration for the explicitly Maoist segments of the Perspectives student movement as well. Concerning China’s impact on the Arab nationalists, we frankly know less, but their painting of the Fellaga and Youssefite armed struggles (1952-1954 and 1955-1956 as the conventional dating for each, although armed flash-fires of Youssefism ignited in the Tunisian Southwest until the late 1950s) as a “people’s war” is very suggestive of the way China may have begun to inflect the thinking of the Arab nationalist wing of the Tunisian national movement, including in exile.

What themes did they explore?

China in the 1950s seemed to be developing in a way that resonated incredibly powerfully with the conditions and sufferings cutting across the Tunisian countryside. Like China in the 1940s and early 1950s, Tunisia was poor if not starving, with massive rural under- and unemployment, an unequal agrarian structure, and stunted and sectoral industrialization. The Chinese Communist Party addressed these issues in the countryside through collectivizing and thereby helping  make more rational rural production patterns and the allocation of labor. Yields increased generally through labor-intensive and capital-light mechanisms, although with a modulated appropriate-scale industrialization of tasks. Labor flows to the cities to fill the circulatory needs of a national industrialization effort took place but at a controlled pace, far from the rural flight convulsing the Third World. And rural industrialization was coupled with these efforts, allowing for a broad-based scienticization, or understanding of the principles of scientific investigation and the mechanisms of industry, of the people living in the countryside. News of these achievements began to trickle then gush from China to other countries, and their people learned about it and were impressed with what they understood of China’s achievements.

In that sense, with varying degrees of specificity, or explicitness, you begin to find China all over Tunisian heterodox thought. The example of an agrarian reform and the ability of a sharply  hierarchical Third World society to shatter the spine of rural feudalism meant everything to planners who wanted to go beyond the mechanical equations of how much you could extract via saving towards investment, and instead asked a different question: could you increase incomes by changing the factor endowments in the countryside, or in less jargony terms, by taking from the rich to give to the poor, and thereby increase the magnitude of internal markets, increase rural incomes, and do so even while making it easier to reserve a surplus for infrastructural and industrial investment?

Indirectly, radical Tunisian planners seemed clearly inspired by the deployment of so-called “traditional” agricultural technologies as part of the productivity-enhancing suite within the Chinese countryside, as well as the allure of a decentralized industrial fabric which worked within rather than over and above the existing artisanal manufacturing sectors. These were often state technical attachés or employees in state institutions where China was reviled – Destourian socialism, the policy adopted officially by the Neo-Destour party in 1964 as part of its commitment to an increased state role in the economy, was avowedly anti-Marxist and anti-China – and therefore one must read those documents between their black-lettered lines to discern China’s impact.

What about the third arena of study?

My third area of study is where I go beyond the relatively siloed approach to Tunisian intellectual history – although that is a pillar – to also look at Egyptian and to a lesser extent Moroccan intellectual history. Algerian, and for that matter Mashreqi and overall Third World thinking about development that burgeoned in the 1970s and 1980s. Here, through a series of declarations and meetings, from the Arusha Declaration, which prominently featured self-reliance and  helped inform the Tanzanian economic policy and was contoured by the impact of the Chinese-influenced brilliant young economist Justinian Rweyemamu, self-reliance became a Third World policy pillar (if also sometimes buzz-word). Samir Amin was furthermore a – probably the – major disseminator of the idea of self-reliance based on the Chinese model, beginning to disseminate this very widely in French by the early 1970s. Others in Amin’s direct circles like Mohamed Dowidar and Ismail-Sabri Abdalla were enchanted with the Chinese experience and began to write systematically on self-reliance, taking their understanding of the Chinese model of modulated engagement with world trade, a cautious diversion of surplus from countryside to industrialization, and the need to fulfil basic needs as the model to follow for the Third World.

This debate was grounded in the Third World Forum, the International Foundation for Development Alternatives, the Center for Arab Unity Studies, and other Third World-centered institutions, meeting, and fora. By the late 1970s ideas of self-reliance were dominant (or even hegemonic?) within Third World heterodox development spaces, with the Chinese horizon dominating its socialist inflections and a certain vagueness concerning models, commitments, and class animating the less-socialist notions of collective self-reliance. By then Chinese achievements such as breaking through the food grain constraint and achieving a comparatively significant level of industrial capacity at a comparatively low social cost, especially as compared to the “achievements” of export-oriented industrialization in general and its paragons, the “Brazilian model” or the “Mexican model” in particular, were well-known. They were, in turn, increasingly beguiling in terms of the prospects China offered for actually breaking the vicious circles of colonial and neo-colonial underdevelopment.

My work on Tunisia in the 1970s and 1980s returns to some of these themes through the muted impact of China on the work of the most heterodox Tunisian development planners, agronomists chiefly but also economists. I have focused on the work of Slaheddine el-Amami, who was in fact a member of Perspectives, somehow escaping the state drag-net which caught so many of its young members, and a close colleague of the better-known Gilbert Naccache at the Ministry of Agriculture. Already then, in the early 1960s, I believe he had developed an interest in so-called “traditional” technologies, which were being studied or examined or integrated into development proposals by figures like J.P.-Chabert, Monique Laks, Yves Younes, Naccache, Habib Attia, and others. By the late 1970s he was a forerunner in the broader Arab debate about alternative technologies, in his own committed and idiosyncratic way taking the lessons of the Chinese experience concerning traditional approaches to terracing, water harvesting, natural fertilizer and bio-gas production and partially closing nutrient loops, as well as the need for a decentralized development matrix as the necessary framework for a Third World development which would stem rural out-migration and ensure a decent life in the countryside.

Amongst these alternative technologies influenced by the Chinese agrarian model, his great romance was with traditional irrigation, a central vector and mechanism for neo-colonial underdevelopment and misuse and marring of the ecology and agriculture of Tunisia on the one hand through the bloated budgets for big dams which filled to bursting the state agricultural research budgets. And on the other hand his deep economic-technical anthropological approach to traditional irrigation systems on the other – e.g. the rainwater harvesting or conservation systems which studded the Tunisian south like gems, allowing for run-off water to gather from mountain slopes or even milder grades and concentrate in the necessary quantities to allow fruit tree cultivation in arid areas, isohyets, where this would not be possible for most plants simply through allowing precipitation to take its normal course. These extremely labor- intensive  models were more efficient, cheaper by orders of magnitude, mobilized labor, and allowed for the use of labor furthermore for farming temperate or semi-arid crops in arid zones, fertilizing a rural civilization in lieu of the dominant patterns of poverty pocking rural Tunisia.

In this Amami was joined at the economic-modeling and theoretical level by the extremely Chinese-influenced Azzam Mahjoub, for example, who put forward proposals for rethinking extant models of development. Mahjoub  attempted  to formalize notions of “another development” that ruptured with prevailing stageism or technological neutrality that marked dominant and even Marxist models. In this Mahjoub and Amami were part of a generation marked deeply by China and put forward ideas that are not just of interest as curios but as methods for rethinking not yesterday’s development but today’s, where amidst the dead-end of export-oriented industrialization, many are re-considering the agrarian question as again central to achieving well-being and development for the nation, its poor, and its ecology.

Max Ajl is a fellow at MECAM/Universite of Tunisia and the University of Ghent, an editor at Agrarian South and Journal of Labor and Society, and the author of A People’s Green New Deal.

Featured Photograph: China town in Johannesburg, South Africa (12 May 2011).

This article by Navid Farnia delves into the ongoing struggle for national liberation on the African continent in the context of deepening relations with China and the challenges posed to the western-dominated world order by multipolarity.

By Navid Farnia

On December 29, 2023, South Africa filed a lawsuit against Israel in the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in which it alleged the Zionist regime was committing genocide against the Palestinian people in Gaza. South Africa asserted that Israel’s acts are genocidal in nature because they constitute a systematic effort to annihilate a “substantial part of the Palestinian national, racial and ethnical group.” The lawsuit also accused the Zionists of intentionally targeting civilian infrastructure, including hospitals, schools, universities, places of worship, museums, historic monuments, and places where “the sick and wounded are collected.” It highlighted the “close connection” between the genocide and the leveling of civilian infrastructure.

The United States, in response to South Africa’s historic legal initiative, firmly backed the Zionist regime. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken derided South Africa’s genocide charge as “meritless.” In February 2024, moreover, U.S. Congressmembers introduced a bill calling on President Joseph Biden to initiate a comprehensive review of U.S.-South African relations. South Africa, the proposed U.S.-South Africa Bilateral Relations Review Act (H.R. 7256) states, has a history of cooperating with what the U.S. has deemed “malign actors,” including Hamas and Iran. H.R. 7256 adds that South Africa’s deepening ties with the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and the Russian Federation also warrant further scrutiny. According to the bill, the foreign policy actions of South Africa’s ruling party, the African National Congress (ANC), have “long ceased to reflect its stated stance of nonalignment, and now directly favor the PRC, the Russian Federation, and Hamas, a known proxy of Iran, and thereby undermine United States national security and foreign policy interests.”

While it remains to be seen whether Congress will pass H.R. 7256, the bill’s content is nonetheless revealing for its commitment to maintaining the white world order. As a sovereign nation, South Africa theoretically has the right to choose with whom it cultivates relations and supports on the international level. U.S. officials however made it a point to excoriate South Africa for confronting colonial domination in Palestine and engaging in a foreign policy that they deem to oppose United States interests. By including China, Russia, and Iran in a document inspired by South Africa’s solidarity with Palestine, U.S. officials registered their hostility to and fear of multipolarity. The bill laments the potential loss of South Africa from the U.S. imperial orbit and implies the need to exact a preemptive punishment against a country that successfully toppled a white minority-ruled apartheid regime three decades ago.^[1]

U.S. officials seek to penalize South Africa for exercising autonomy in such a way that challenges the colonial and neocolonial practices of the West. Yet, the congressional bill is historically significant for this very reason. H.R. 7256 explicitly links the active anti-colonial struggle in Palestine with attempts by South Africa to break from neocolonialism in order to practice true self-determination. From the U.S.’s perspective, both forms of anti-imperialist resistance are illegal and sanctionable.

Despite the bill’s racially loaded nature, however, its conclusions are not unfounded. Multipolarity presents a significant challenge to U.S. imperialism in two interrelated ways. First, it effectively means that the United States now has formidable global rivals, particularly China. Second, U.S. officials recognize that Third World states have greater leverage and maneuverability in a multipolar world. China’s blossoming relationship with Africa, a decades-long process, epitomizes how multipolarity empowers both the U.S.’s global rivals and the subjugated states of the Third World. Together, these developments pose an existential crisis for the states that police and benefit from the white world order.

China’s emergence has irrevocably disrupted the colonial and neocolonial models established by Europe and the United States. Having experienced imperialist exploitation itself, China has pursued an “equal partnership based on mutual benefit” with Africa and has supported Africa’s agenda in international forums, explains Siphamandla Zondi.^[2] But China’s history alone is not enough to create a different dynamic on the world market. The country’s economic growth in recent decades, coupled with the United States’ stagnation, gave rise to a multipolar order in which Third World countries no longer feel compelled to abide by Western diktats. China’s emergence, Zondi adds, “threatens the very structure of global power as we have known it since the fifteenth century.”^[3]

Given their shared histories as victims of imperialist extraction and exploitation, African countries and China have likewise developed a shared history of anti-imperialist struggle and thus, of material interests. China’s relations with African countries continue to exemplify a model committed to mutual development and fair exchange. The mutual prosperity cultivated by projects like the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI)—a global infrastructure development project launched by the Chinese government that now includes more than 150 countries and encompasses over 60 percent of the world’s population—highlight how South-South relations aim to overturn centuries of European and U.S. imperialist domination. In a section of the bill devoted specifically to China, H.R. 7256 conspicuously bemoans South Africa’s participation in the BRI, which has been called “the largest infrastructure and development project in human history.” The Belt and Road Initiative and the development of BRICS, an organization involving several of the most prosperous Third World countries, are among the new multilateral mechanisms that are upending the white world order. BRICS, like the BRI, fosters South-South economic and geopolitical coordination. Washington accordingly deems the BRI and BRICS as threats to U.S. interests, and by extension, to U.S. national security.

The alarm at South Africa’s actions thus embodies a greater fear around the U.S.’s declining influence in the world system. Since the Soviet Union’s collapse, the countries of the Third World had little choice than to engage with the United States, the world’s lone remaining superpower. Those relations reflected a perpetual and growing inequality that brought the countries of Africa, Asia, and Latin America into increasing debt and dependency. Accelerated economic growth in the United States depended upon crippling underdevelopment and even de-development in the Third World. Yet, China’s rapid economic ascension and increasing global assertiveness has ushered in the demise of unipolarity and as such, presents a major challenge to U.S. imperialism.

Imperialism indeed contains the very contradictions leading to its demise. Imperial domination may have empowered the West at the expense of Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Pacific, but it also historically led to the convergence of interests in the Third World. Europe and the United States actively facilitated China’s underdevelopment just as they did across the African continent. While European powers met at the Berlin Conference in 1884-1885 to partition Africa, they established “spheres of influence” in China during the early twentieth century. The United States advocated for an “open door policy” in China that was akin to the Congo Free State, a European colonial imposition in Africa. In both the Congo and China, Western powers developed free trade zones to subordinate markets, undermine nascent indigenous industries, and maximize the extraction and export of natural resources through coerced labor.

This model endured even after Europe’s colonial empires collapsed. Africa’s economic subjugation to the West has continued since independence. Many African countries, cash-strapped and unable to engage in substantive nation-building at independence, resorted to procuring conditioned loans from international financial institutions controlled by the West. African countries, as with other countries across the Third World, were forced to implement Structural Adjustment Programs (SAPs) in exchange for receiving loans from institutions like the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. The economic reforms stipulated by SAPs aimed to cultivate measures that would attract foreign investment, including devaluation of national currency, public spending cuts on such sectors as education and health care, privatization of previously nationalized industries, economic deregulation, and slashing state subsidies like food and fuel, among other conditions. SAPs entrenched a neocolonial relationship between Africa and the West and have thereby facilitated Africa’s continued underdevelopment. Colonialism, structural adjustment, and the resistance against these processes historically drove Africa and China toward a convergence of interests.^[4]

China’s role in Africa departs from the imperialist model set and practiced by the West for centuries. While Western development is rooted in the underdevelopment of Africa and the rest of the world, China has demonstrated a mutually developmentalist relationship with Africa. The Africa-China partnership manifests in multiple economic and sociopolitical collaborations. In a 2000 conference involving African and Chinese delegates, the convening parties established the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC). FOCAC calls for mutual nonaggression, noninterference in countries’ internal affairs, and respect for national sovereignty. It also paved the way for the formation of the Belt and Road Initiative. As a global infrastructure development project, the BRI congeals well with African interests. Beyond infrastructure, the BRI can also serve the interests of African countries through industrialization, growth of the energy sector, enhancement of the ocean economy, finance, and in the building of special economic zones. The gains from the BRI in turn compliment Africa’s Agenda 2063, which endeavors to reindustrialize the continental economy, diversify national economies, improve infrastructure and connectivity, and transfer technology and skills development.^[5] The mutual development aspirations also filter into broader international arrangements, such as BRICS, which as of 2024, includes the African nations of South Africa, Ethiopia, and Egypt, along with China, Russia, Brazil, India, Iran, and the United Arab Emirates. Other African countries, including Algeria and Senegal, have also applied to join BRICS.

China has contributed to socioeconomic development in Africa, which has likewise wrought significant returns for China. Between 2000 and 2020, the Chinese helped build over 100,000 kilometers in roads and railways, 130 medical facilities, over 170 schools, around a thousand bridges, almost a hundred ports, over eight power facilities, and forty-five sports venues. Since 2017, China has imported services from Africa at rate that grows by 20 percent annually, thereby creating almost 400,000 jobs on the continent per year. The Mombasa-Nairobi railway project in Kenya also created almost 50,000 jobs for local communities. As of 2022, China had been Africa’s largest trade partner for fourteen consecutive years, a relationship which benefits both regions.

By contrast, the United States and its European allies continue to exploit Africa in neocolonial relationships defined by one-sidedness, underdevelopment, and militarism. The United States enjoys close relations with Rwanda, which routinely foments instability on the continent, including in Mozambique and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Rwanda’s destabilizing actions help the West to more cheaply access DRC’s massive mineral reserves.

The Biden government also recently designated Kenya as a “major non-NATO ally” given the latter’s willingness to lead a U.S.-backed military occupation force into Haiti. In effect, the budding U.S.-Kenya relationship directly reflects the latter’s willingness to take on an unpopular invasion of another Third World country. Kenya’s courtship with the United States may however, cause tensions with China over Taiwan since the latter is another “major non-NATO ally” of the United States. Kenyan President William Ruto could adopt the U.S.’s position on Taiwan at the expense of his country’s materially constructive partnership with China. The warming of U.S.-Kenyan relations likewise coincides with President Ruto’s efforts to impose deeply unpopular IMF-directed austerity measures in Kenya. The resulting nationwide protests against the Ruto government signify yet another crack in the neocolonial order. Rwanda and Kenya exemplify how neocolonial stooges in the Third World play a primary role in preserving U.S. and European imperial domination.

For these reasons, the United States and its allies continue in their attempts to disrupt China-Africa relations, which are based on mutual respect for sovereignty and on national, continental, and global development. In late 2023, the governments of Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger announced the formation of a new alliance to counteract foreign influence in their territories. This came at the same time that the Nigerien government ousted French troops from the country. Niger has since held talks with China, Russia, and Iran. After catching wind of these talks, the United States sent a delegation to Niger, which houses the largest U.S. drone base in the world. Soon after the visit, Niger announced it would cease all military cooperation with the United States and called on U.S. troops to leave the country. “Niger regrets the intention of the American delegation to deny the sovereign Nigerien people the right to choose their partners and types of partnerships capable of truly helping them fight against terrorism,” said Nigerien government spokesperson Amadou Abdramane. U.S. Representative Mike Rogers later captured the alarm felt by Washington given the changing dynamics in Africa. “At the end of the day, it is critical for the U.S. to have a [military] footprint on the continent,” he said. “Africa is of vital strategic importance to the United States. We can’t let China or Russia become the preferred security or business partner.”

African countries that cultivate stronger ties with China risk upsetting and facing penalties from Western countries. Yet, multipolarity has neutralized the United States and its allies’ ability to coerce Third World countries into compliance. H.R. 7256 demonstrates the panic emanating from Washington, particularly since the bill lumps together South Africa’s relations with an array of the U.S.’s major adversaries, ranging from China and Russia to Iran and Palestine.

U.S. officials understand that the liberation of Palestine is a major marker for the direction of the world order and Africa’s place in it. South Africa’s ICJ case both represents a major stand in the push of the world’s progressive forces and illustrates that the U.S.’s ability to pressure Third World countries into supporting imperialist wars is waning. Kenya’s move in the opposite direction indicates that U.S. imperialism nevertheless persists as a major regressive force that cannot be underestimated. Indeed, both South Africa and Kenya remain contested grounds. South Africa’s recent elections and the decision of the ANC to form a coalition government with the white settler-ruled Democratic Alliance (DA) party signals political and economic regression. The DA has held political power in South Africa’s Western Cape province since 2009. Many party members and leaders have supported increasing the Cape’s autonomy and even pushed for “independence” from South Africa, rather than living under Black majority rule. The ANC’s declining domestic support, rooted in the country’s struggling economy, favors those in Washington who lambasted the ANC for its pro-Palestine position. Conversely, the protests in Kenya signal that the people are fed up with President Ruto and his western-backed neoliberal policies.

The electoral processes in Kenya and South Africa should serve as cautionary tales that show how accommodation to reactionary forces is often self-defeating. Only resistance can inextricably break a country’s shackles from imperialism in all its forms. Kenya, Niger, and Palestine highlight how popular and armed struggles are uncompromising in their efforts to wash away the old structures of power. This reality, along with the emergence of countries like China, have accelerated imperialism’s preexisting crises in dealing with resistance into a multivalent and irreconcilable contradiction. Thus, the global forces of reaction and counterrevolution can try to preserve the white world order, but they are daily demonstrating new failures at the hands of anti-imperialist resistance.

Navid Farnia is an Assistant Professor in the Department of African American Studies at Wayne State University. His research broadly explores the relationship between racial oppression in the United States and U.S. imperialism. He is currently working on a book manuscript, National Liberation in an Imperialist World: Race, Counterrevolution, and the United States, which examines how the United States responded to national liberation movements both within and beyond its borders during the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s.

Featured Photograph: A map of the provinces of South Africa, in Chinese (20 June 2007).

Notes

[1] Notably, the United States and Israel were the last two countries in the world to maintain support for South Africa’s apartheid regime before it collapsed in 1994.

[2] Siphamandla Zondi, “The Rise of China, the Rise of Africa: A Convergence of Emergence and Implications for Africa’s International Diplomacy,” in Africa-China Partnerships and Relations, ed. Kwesi Prah and Vusi Gumede (Trenton: Africa World Press, 2018), 19.

[3] Ibid., 22.

[4] Kwesi Prah and Vusi Gumede, “Introduction,” in Africa-China Partnerships and Relations, ed. Kwesi Prah and Vusi Gumede (Trenton: Africa World Press, 2018), 2.

[5] Anil Sooklal, Thokozani Simelane, and Jaimal Anand, “Introduction,” in Belt and Road Initiative: Alternative Development Path for Africa, ed. Thokozani Simelane and Lavhelesani Managa (Pretoria: Africa Institute of South Africa, 2018), 3-4.

This article by Farwa Sial examines the West’s new development strategy towards Africa, which mirrors the “white elephants” of the 1970s with its focus on expensive and unproductive infrastructure projects, as an effort to counter the Belt and Road Initiative and the continent’s growing ties with China.

By Farwa Sial

‘Europe’s new external investment strategy needs to reconnect with historical business models we are going back to white elephants of 1970s – because that’s what partners want’

G7 official in a speech on Trade and Finance.

‘The era of Western dominance has indeed definitely ended’

Josep Borrell (2024), High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy / Vice-President of the European Commission. ^[1]

On 28 January 2024, three members of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso, announced their withdrawal from ECOWAS.  Created in 1974, ECOWAS is a regional economic community serving as a large trading bloc, to enhance the regional integration and economic cooperation of its 15 member countries.  The three countries’ decision to leave the trade-bloc so forthrightly, was related to a series of ECOWAS-imposed sanctions on their military governments and the countries’ objection to French influence in the bloc.^[2] Long-standing dissatisfaction with the ECOWAS was also an overarching factor; member countries include some of the most resource-rich nations, but on the whole members barely made any progress on socio-economic indicators linked to the ECOWAS promise of prosperity through regional integration.

Political uncertainty in the trade-bloc further deteriorated in mid-February 2024, when the Senegalese President Macky Sall, unilaterally postponed the country’s presidential elections and was later ousted. Faced with such existential challenges, ECOWAS lifted sanctions on Niger and other countries within a month of their imposition. While the potential breakdown of ECOWAS and the general trajectory of some African countries into authoritarianism, may not seem like a radical shift in the continent’s history, the incendiary global context, which compelled ECOWAS to lift sanctions is unprecedented. The neo-colonial drivers of the current crumbling political order in Sudan and the Congo as well as the ongoing genocide in Palestine, indelibly expose the reality that we are entering into an era of naked colonial violence. Backlash to US-centred imperialism is growing. In March 2024, Niger suspended all military relations with the US, citing issues related to US encroachment upon its sovereignty.^[3] Embedded in this evolving situation, the episodic and ad-hoc de-linking of Global South countries from Global North countries and their dominance in blocs such as the ECOWAS is representative of a broader shift in Africa’s resistance against political and economic subordination to G7 countries.

Against this background, the Western powers’ new and evolving development strategy in Africa offers important insights into how the G7 countries are failing to register the transformative changes in Africa. ^[4] In a closed-door speech on investment, trade and finance forum, a G7 official described Europe’s new external investment strategy as one that harkens back to the White elephants of the 1970s. While the speaker was using the term ‘White Elephant’ to signify the EU’s interest in funding hard infrastructure, imbued with a promise of investment and growth for recipient countries, he clearly failed to grasp its meaning. A ‘white elephant’ is an overly expensive infrastructure asset, which fails to generate value for the economy.

Considered in light of the correct definition of the term, the West’s new development strategy does seem to be going towards expensive infrastructure projects, spurred by a reactionary, performative but ultimately imagined competition with China. I make this point through a comparative analysis between the G7s contemporary development strategy vis-à-vis the Chinese development model as it unfolds within the broader demise of US-led imperialism.

Delineating Origins: Historical Imperialism vs. Bipolar World Order

Most comparative literature on Western and Chinese development strategies in Africa, fails to ground the colonial and neo-colonial reality of African development. This central omission engenders a hollow comparison, which ultimately forgoes the question of temporality and the historical nature of a unipolar imperial world order. Centring the agency of African countries entails a historical mapping, which not only connects the past to the present but is also cognizant of when and how path dependencies are ruptured. Three facts are key to any comparative analysis of Western-Chinese competition in Africa.

Firstly, China’s current global developmental model, which can be continuously traced to the early 2000s cannot compare to the 100-year history of European imperialism in Africa.  This temporality is central to the analyses, not a mere addendum. This is because Europe never left Africa. Chinese engagement with African countries took place in conjunction with European and Western economic and political interference in the region. China’s rich history of supporting anti-imperialist struggles in Africa as well as leading South-South cooperation initiatives under Mao Zedong have been extensively documented and present a very different vision of development rooted in third world solidarity. ^[5] However, this historical analysis is completely ignored in most mainstream analysis and China’s engagement with Africa and the Global South since the 2000s is placed on par with the Western imperialist model.

As others have argued more concretely, the notion of imperialism is embedded in a historical structure of global capitalism, which cannot be abstracted and selectively applied to the new bi-polar world (Capasso & Kadri, 2023;^[6] Ajl 2024, Yeros 2024). While Chinese investment projects must be subject to scrutiny and critique, the notion, context and nature of imperialism, old and new, must be based on the systemisation of global capitalist extraction. A starting point here is to note that China’s ‘going out’ or external investment strategy emerged in the aftermath of its remarkable achievement of alleviating domestic poverty. The Chinese development experience was thus not predicated on a model of imperial extraction, which has been the modus-operandi of most Western developed nations.

Secondly and aligned with the first point, the nature and scale of Chinese investments in Africa within this short period has been transformational in its focus on infrastructure and emphasis on the systemisation of productive capacities in African countries. The Chinese state-led ‘going out’ strategy, approached development from a holistic perspective, centring productive investment and infrastructure as the key to enabling inter-sectoral and cross-sectoral linkages. This was possible owing to China’s capacity to maintain control over the entire value chain of development: from providing financing through its state banks to the mapping, completion and execution of projects.

This model of development-investment has not been the nature of Western investments, which have largely focused on “soft development” since the late 1990s (explained below). Most importantly, countries categorised as low-income and least developed were considered extremely risky for Western capital and therefore not a desirable investment destination. The huge influx of Chinese investment into these countries in fact addressed this obstacle for Western capital. China’s risk-taking capacity engendered and facilitated other investment strategies. Therefore, the rise of Western infrastructure connectivity projects- such as roads, bridges  must be located as derivative of China’s ‘going out’ strategy.

Thirdly and building upon the two points above, while the very purpose of a comparative analysis is to juxtapose differences and similarities between approaches, mainstream analysis a priori assumes an overlap between Chinese and Western development strategies based on a superficial semblance. This assumption can be observed in the equivocation of two very different financing models in journalistic reporting as well as mainstream academic literature. A forced similitude between a neoliberal financing model (US/EU) and a state-led financing model (China) thus reverberates endless confusion as opposed to producing any real analysis. As Samir Amin (2018) reminds us

Deng Xiaoping said that you should start from looking at actual facts. It is exactly what the conventional professional “economists” – all of them, including the Chinese “experts” trained in the USA and brainwashed – do not do. ^[7]

To overcome this limitation, the analysis must start from comparing the nature of Chinese and Western development strategies.

Calibrating Development and Conditions

A basic definition of ‘international development’ is the financial and technical transfer of resources from some countries to others, to the ends of empowering the latter. While the 1948 Marshall Plan for Europe was premised on the reconstruction and the reorientation of European markets to be better aligned with the hegemony of US capital, the evolution of Western development strategies in the Global South took on a markedly different form.  The 1980s was the beginning of this transformative period, whereby Western development strategies and aid models laid an exclusive emphasis on targeting social indicators in Global South countries. Public goods such as health and education were major recipients of soft grants, however, these grants were often conditioned on the implementation of a privatisation roadmap as well as harmonising tools of liberal democracy such as ‘Good Governance’, exclusive funding for initiatives such as transparency, as well as monitoring and reform of electoral processes.

In addition, this financing model remained unaccompanied by investment in public spending, fiscal consolidation to promote developmental policy making, industrialisation in productive sectors and the reform and deepening of the financial sector to achieve financial autonomy. This created an artificial wedge in the very meaning of development: aid-led dependency was designed to separate and prioritise ‘soft infrastructure’ at the expense of ‘hard infrastructure.’ Donor dependency based on the soft development agenda accompanied by a marketization of public goods therefore accelerated the hollowing out of many Global South countries.  Privatisation successfully transformed the political model of governance in these countries: converting citizens into consumers.

In contrast, from the very beginning, China’s ‘going out’ strategy in the 2000s was premised on the strengthening and expansion of productive investments and public services, making no artificial distinction between ‘hard’ infrastructure and ‘soft’ infrastructure. The primary focus was on the construction of infrastructure project tools including bridges, hospitals and roads albeit complemented by transfer and sharing of knowledge such as in medical training, civil service training for public bureaucrats and strengthening of public institutions. China’s emphasis on skill development, technology transfer and knowledge sharing is often ignored by most accounts comparing Chinese and Western development strategies. The fact that such knowledge sharing comes outside of the framework of Intellectual Property governance became much more visible after China’s distribution of Covid-19 vaccines to Global South countries during the Covid-19 pandemic. The distribution of vaccines as a public good was also accompanied by humanitarian assistance to some countries, highlighting the necessity of an alternative approach to development especially as western pharmaceutical companies enjoyed quadrupling profits through the sale of their vaccines.

An important and often repeated point of comparison between the Western and Chinese model is the specific nature and role of conditionalities. While the construct of ‘conditionality’ as a necessary requisite for development assistance including grants, concessional flows and technical assistance is explicitly associated with Bretton Woods Institutions and Western bilateral development strategies emerging in the late 1990s, it has deeper roots in colonialism.

Western development strategy has been conditioned towards ensuring that the West remains distant from its historical past: in Africa’s case this essentially means the evasion of the Western countries’ reparative responsibility to African countries. Germany’s agreement to pay reparations to Namibia in 2021 was a historic shift but the modality and actual implementation of these reparations remains contested as some consider it ‘tokenistic’ in nature. Beyond this case, Western development policies, exemplified by the EU have been explicitly conditioned upon Africa’s compliance in enabling the free trade of resources, goods and commodities to the EU whilst simultaneously curbing African migration through the externalisation of European border militarization.

In comparison, albeit without colonial baggage, China’s contemporary development model is also concerned with access to commodities, raw materials and market creation for the absorption of Chinese surplus. However, unlike Western development strategies, this model is not linked to demands for better governance, interest in regime change for better compliance with Chinese investments, the implementation of sanctions and the imposition of penalties when conditions are not met. While select conditions are attached to China’s project procurement and contracts for goods and services as well as in cases of debt restructuring, the pattern which emerges in the impact of these conditions is markedly different from conditions embedded in the West dominated global financial architecture. China’s approach to conditions is largely concerned with ensuring the longevity and guarantee of economic investments and has produced both positive as well as adverse results for Global South countries.

However, these conditions are not egregious enough to immobilise countries, such as those observed in the historical and on-going impact of IMF and World Bank conditionalities.  The incompatibility of conditionalities in both Western and Chinese development strategies does not absolve a criticism of China, however it is equally important to ascertain the nature and context of Chinese conditions in Global South countries. The global impact of Western sanctions, rise of Western protectionism and competition between the West and China, in every possible realm has certain repercussions for China including in the realm of multilateralism and debt reform.  These need to be carefully researched.

In summary, a comparative analysis between  western development strategies and the Chinese development model necessitates rigour in differentiating between the historical and structural origins of their approaches. Western conditionalities have ultimately resulted in the gradual erosion of  sovereignty in Global South countries, repressing any avenues of third world solidarity and South-South cooperation.  China’s development strategies do not replicate this model.

The new Scramble for Africa: By Whom and How?

The comparative grounds for Western and Chinese development in Africa have gradually taken a new turn through a competing series of infrastructure connectivity models.  These models have some variation in their discrete proposals however the aim is to mobilise private finance and invest replacing traditional aid and concessional finance. More importantly, the strategies are traditional alliances between ‘like-minded partners’, including the US, South Korea and Japan. US commercial investors and multilateral development institutions under the auspices of the US-led Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment (PGII) ensure the continuation of the failing US-led neoliberal order.

While different models now focus on enhanced coordination between Export Credit Agencies (ECAs) to effectively create an environment for domestic  investments to be subsidised through export credits and development financing it is important to note that China’s development model has always combined financing and trade with China’s Eximbank being at the centre of its global investments. The Western turn towards hard ‘infrastructure’, use of export credits for development suggests a superficial emulation of characteristics which mark the Chinese development. This is because beyond cosmetic shapeshifting, the Western corporate sector remains the determinant factor shaping the new development strategies, while the Chinese development model remains state-led under the direction of the Chinese communist party. While China continues to face a combination of different internal and international pressures, the Chinese State supersedes China’s domestic iteration of the private sector. In contrast, vessels like the EU are not simply promoting the interests of the EU private sector but strengthening the private sector of G7 countries to the ends of ensuring the continuation of the US-led neoliberal order.

This is most starkly visible in the EU’s recent attempt to balance its multiple goals of controlling migration through claims to “securing” its borders, supporting the genocide in Gaza and broader colonization of Palestine and partnering with US-aligned Gulf capital to extend neoliberal policies throughout the region. In March 2024, the EU provided a €7.4 billion ($8.06 billion) funding package to Egypt for the period 2024-2027. The EU support complemented the IMF’s expanded $8 billion loan deal with Egypt in the same month and was also complemented by a $35bn investment deal between Egypt and the UAE for developing the Ras al-Hekma peninsula.^[8] Egypt is therefore a site for the West’s new unfolding development agenda, which seeks to securitise EU borders against African and Palestinian migrants as the EU and the West continue to support Israel militarily.

As the Western order declines, the EU and developed countries are under pressure to invest and deliver on greater distributional gains, especially when it comes to serving Global South elite interests. From this perspective, China’s developmental model is also not entirely immune to the contradictions of capitalist development. These contradictions must be analysed from the duality of China’s national or domestic experience as well as its external development model. China continues to experiment with select liberalisation and privatisation with an overarching retention of state ownership.

China’s experimentation with Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) on a domestic level^[9] and the initiation of PPPs in recipient countries is one such example.^[10] Other examples include the nature of Asian Investment and Infrastructure Bank (AIIB) investments in Global South countries, China’s adoption of private finance instruments created by Bretton Woods Institutions and China’s role in reforming the sovereign debt architecture. The pressures of operating in a neo-liberal world order, playing on the ‘openness’ of countries, which have free trade agreements with Western markets and integration into the development finance architecture creates a host of issues for China and recipient countries. These issues require scrutiny, critique and reform especially concerning their impact on Global South countries.

A critical approach to Chinese investment also means a concrete understanding of China’s global rise, which initiated as an interplay with the existing hegemonic order but has been subject to China’s vigilance in disciplining its companies and curbing rentierism, both at the national level as well as in its international projects.  In 2021, China launched the Global Development Initiative (GDI), which is designed to complement the BRI but embeds a vision of development based on China’s own development experience with an enhanced focus on knowledge sharing, technology transfer and South-South development.^[11] The initiative is free of patents and dominance of intellectual property rights and rent seeking. Although it is too early to predict the developmental impact of the GDI, China’s focus on a more communal approach to development, such as in the case of Covid-19 vaccine distribution needs to be contextualised and reflected in the GDI model. China continues to adapt, evolve and regulate its economic rise. Nonetheless, it is ideologically, structurally and materially a different development model, which necessitates engagement on its own terms, even when these terms appear superficially comparable to the development models of traditional imperial powers like the US and the EU.

Conclusion

As Western blocs such as the EU transform into a full-fledged war economy strengthening NATO,^[12] proposing the use of its public banks like the European Investment Bank (EIB) to lend to the defence industry^[13] as well as exploring the option of a new EU army,^[14] it is becoming increasingly clear that the Western constructs of ‘development’, ‘investment’ and ‘security’ can no longer remain in their siloed guises.

This is not merely a turn towards Keynesian warfare – it is a continuation of Western history and a symbol of the West’s political woes, as its countries succumb to domestic fascism. Meanwhile China continues its strategy of deepening the Belt Road Initiative (BRI) at a pace of its own, subject to the contradictions of capitalist development including dealing with issues of problematic projects in recipient countries. The paradigm of development as a comparative ground for Western and Chinese is not external to these formations but embedded within these changes. As detailed above, the grounds for a comparative analysis between the West and China must extend from their historical engagement with Africa to the current situation of escalating violence and the decline of US-led Western order.

African agency between such powers lies in securing the interests of its people through a combination of strategies including stronger criteria for partnerships, de-linking with US-led imperial conduits and an enhanced focus on perpetually increasing its bargaining power through strengthening its domestic productive capacities.

Farwa Sial is a Research Associate at the Department of Economics, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS).

Featured Photograph: China mall on the spintex Road, Accra, Ghana (30 April 2023).

Notes

[1] Borrell Josep (2024) Munich Security Conference: the four tasks on the EU’s geopolitical agenda https://www.eeas.europa.eu/eeas/munich-security-conference-four-tasks-eu%E2%80%99s-geopolitical-agenda_en. Josep Borrell, High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy / Vice-President of the European Commission.

[2] The sanctions first implemented on Niger and then applied selectively to Mali and Burkina Faso included trade bans, freezing of financial transactions, closure of borders between the ECOWAS and the three countries as well as travel bans on select individuals.

[3]Al Jazeera (2024) Niger suspends military cooperation with US: Spokesman. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/3/17/niger-suspends-military-cooperation-with-us

[4] The Group of Seven (G7) is an informal forum that brings together the advanced industrialised economies of Italy, Canada, France, Germany, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States of America. The European Union also participates in the group. The G7 is home to 776 million people and the aggregate domestic product (GDP) of G7 member states represents about 30 percent of the global economy.

[5] Yu, G. T. (1977). China and the Third World. Asian Survey, 17(11), 1036–1048. https://doi.org/10.2307/2643352;  Mao Zedong (1959) Africa’s task is to struggle against imperialism. Available at the Wilson Centre Archive https://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/mao-zedong-africas-task-struggle-against-imperialism#_ftn0; Taylor, I. (2018) ‘Mao Zedong’s China and Africa’, Twentieth Century Communism, 15, 47+, available: https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A626124559/AONE?u=anon~54c4395&sid=googleScholar&xid=3300da19

[6] Capasso, M., & Kadri, A. (2023). The imperialist question: A sociological approach. Middle East Critique, 32(2), 149–166 ; Ajl, M. (2024). Palestine’s Great Flood: Part I. Agrarian South: Journal of Political Economy, 13(1), 62-88. https://doi.org/10.1177/22779760241228157; Yeros, P. (2024). A World Will Only Be Possible by the Intervention of the “Sixth Great Power”. Agrarian South: Journal of Political Economy, 13(1), 14-40. https://doi.org/10.1177/22779760241230679

[7] Samir Amin (May 2018) – Financial Globalization: Should China move in? Defend Democracy press. https://www.defenddemocracy.press/22137-2/

[8] New Arab News (2024) Egypt economic crisis: What is Ras al-Hekma and why is Cairo ‘selling it’ to UAE? https://www.newarab.com/news/egypt-economy-what-ras-al-hekma-cairo-selling-uae

[9] Lydia Jones & Michael J. Bloomfield (2020) PPPs in China: Does the Growth in Chinese PPPs Signal a Liberalising Economy? New Political Economy, 25:5, 829-847, DOI:10.1080/13563467.2020.1721451

[10] China South Global Project (2024) China Could Fund Kenyan Rail Through Public-Private Partnership: Kenyan President  https://chinaglobalsouth.com/2023/12/19/china-could-fund-kenyan-rail-through-public-private-partnership-kenyan-president/

[11] Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of China (2022) Jointly Advancing the Global Development Initiative and Writing a New Chapter for Common Development.  https://www.fmprc.gov.cn/eng/zxxx_662805/202209/t20220922_10769721.html

[12] Somdeep Sen, NATO and the global colour line, International Affairs, Volume 100, Issue 2, March 2024, Pages 491–507, https://doi.org/10.1093/ia/iiae012

[13] Euractiv (2024) EIB ready to ‘stretch’ lending criteria as it prepares for EU Council’s call to arms https://www.euractiv.com/section/economy-jobs/news/eib-ready-to-stretch-lending-criteria-as-it-prepares-for-eu-councils-call-to-arms/

[14] Defensenews (2024) EU member countries push back on Italy’s call for European army https://www.defensenews.com/global/europe/2024/02/05/eu-member-countries-push-back-on-italys-call-for-european-army/

This article by Carlos Oya explores the implications of Global China’s overseas emergence in the last two decades for Africa’s industrialization journey and aspirations, noting the significant impact of Chinese engagement on infrastructure and manufacturing, while emphasizing the crucial role of African policy agency in overcoming structural challenges for sustainable development.

By Carlos Oya

Different perspectives provide different narratives of Africa’s industrialization trajectory in the postcolonial period. The conventional wisdom shaped by dominant narratives is that there has been no or very limited industrial development in African countries with the exception of South Africa. There are different interpretations of this sluggish path of structural transformation. Some consider that most African countries do not yet meet the basic structural conditions conducive to sustained industrialization, i.e. a sufficiently educated workforce, low fertility rates (hence higher domestic savings), access to cheaper electricity (Robertson 2022). In Robertson’s view, earlier experiences of industrialization in Africa were therefore ‘premature’. Other interpretations point to ‘premature deindustrialization’, as a post 1980s phenomenon after some promising efforts in the 1960s-70s, driven by premature exposure to global markets, and especially Chinese goods imports, through liberalisation and unmanaged globalization, courtesy of economic policy reforms linked to the Washington and post-Washington consensus, leading to ‘reverse structural change’, i.e. primary or informal service sectors growing their shares in the economy (Rodrik 2016). Finally, some see African experiences of industrialization as ‘thin’ in the sense of some success achieved in some countries but primarily at lower-end manufacturing and specific tasks within global production networks for those exporting, and in domestically-oriented subsectors subject to less competition and constrained by small domestic markets (Page 2012). Arguably, the realities of industrialization in African countries are characterised by a bit more variation that these general characterizations suggest (Cramer et al 2020). This variation across countries and over time, suggests some ‘bias for hope’ a la Hirschman (1971) is warranted, and a need for greater emphasis on the power of policy agency to overcome the classic obstacles to industrialization that most African economies have historically faced (Cramer et al 2020).

Using the term ‘contingent industrialization’ I refer to the industrialization efforts of African states in the 1960s-70s, characterized by the imperative of reducing external dependence through Import Substitution Industrialization  (Lawrence 2020), as well as of the past 30-40 years, when some countries found windows of opportunity  to integrate into global production networks (e.g Mauritius, Kenya, Madagascar, Ethiopia) contingent on specific national and global dynamics. This happened at a time when hegemonic neoliberal discourses and practices by powerful Western aid institutions typically reduced the policy space of most African governments, in a way that was especially detrimental to industrial policy. These contingencies, combined with some limited policy agency, would partly explain the significant variation across countries as well as the lack of sustained industrial transformations across  the continent.

More recently, from the late 1990s onwards, the narrative of industrialization has vacillated between  the opposing lenses of the glass half-full vs. glass half-empty.  The chart below illustrates this apparent contradiction. For example, for Sub-Saharan African economies as a whole, from  the early 2000s there was stagnation in the manufacturing share of GDP (glass half-empty). Yet, during the same period, there was a clear recovery and growth in manufacturing value added in real terms (Figure 1). This aggregate picture masks significant variation across countries. The following chart (Figure 2) illustrates the importance of this variation, with Ethiopia standing out compared to other African countries.

Figure 1. Industrialization trends in Sub-Saharan Africa 1981-2019

Source: Own elaboration from World Development Indicators (World Bank)

Figure 2. Variation in manufacturing growth performance across countries

Source: Own elaboration from UNIDO statistics

Global China’s contributions to Africa’s industrialization

Given the coincidence between this revival of industrialization and industrial policy and the rapid expansion of China’s engagement in African countries, it is worth asking whether the two may be somehow related. In other words, has China’s engagement contributed to these renewed while limited industrialization efforts across SSA since 2000? To answer this question, we must take into account the significant variation noted above, and the potential vectors of Africa-China relations that may have contributed to these new trends, particularly visible in some countries. The diagram below summarises these channels.

Figure 3 Key channels of Global China’s contributions to Africa’s industrialization

Source: Own elaboration

Let’s focus here on two of these, namely (a) contributions to infrastructure development, which include the role of new development finance and the rise of Chinese contractors; (b) new FDI to manufacturing sector and related business services, such as logistics, which also come with access to suitable and affordable technology and job and skills creation. It is also important to note these vectors interact with and reinforce one another.

Infrastructure building and development finance

It is hard not to emphasise the centrality of basic economic infrastructure in any industrialization effort, but particularly three aspects. First, any industrialization process is electricity-hungry. From the first industrial revolution to the last, the availability and use of cheap energy has been a foundational factor. Investments in power generation that result in both lower electricity costs and secure reliable supply to factories are necessary conditions for well-run factories at competitive costs, especially when competing in global markets. Second, lower transport and logistics costs are especially important for exports, given their impact on competitiveness, but also necessary for the development of more integrated supply chains within a country. Investments in expanding the road network, railway, ports, and logistics operations are central to the building of industrial eco-systems, in the past and now. Third, the experience of industrialization in East Asia has reminded us of the importance of industrial hubs. In particular, dedicated industrial hubs/parks to ensure agglomeration economies, intra- and inter-sector linkages and reduce the cost of accessing basic infrastructure also contribute to sustained industrialization efforts. Industrial hubs may also contribute to a more effective management of migrant workforces in a context of rapid social and labour market changes.

Chinese engagement in this area has been undeniable, whether in the form of patient finance dedicated to the development of basic economic infrastructure or as direct contribution to the building and development of strategic infrastructure projects. Chinese contractors’ revenues rose from less than US$2bn before 2003 to over US$50bn in the period 2015-2020 before a decline in 2021-22 (https://www.sais-cari.org/data-chinese-contracts-in-africa ). This mirrored trends in Chinese official finance, although Chinese contractors also obtained a rising proportion of their projects from non-Chinese finance institutions (Zhang 2021). The proportion of loans going to power and transport/logistics was close to 65% for the accumulated period 2000-22 https://www.bu.edu/gdp/2023/09/18/a-new-state-of-lending-chinese-loans-to-africa/) . Chinese contractors accounted for over 60% of Africa’s construction and infrastructure market by 2019, up from only 10% in 2003, reflecting a dominance that emerged in record time (Zhang 2021).

Access to finance is a basic condition for the development of basic infrastructure needed for industrial revival. In this regard, the first order priority is access to long-term credit lines at favourable terms. This has broadly been the case for much of Chinese finance, coming from institutions like EximBank or CDB. Although not strictly speaking always concessional,  there has consistently been significant debt relief, debt management flexibility and adjustment in loan conditions (Acker et al 2020). However, the decline in the volume of funding since 2018 is noteworthy. Maintaining sustained levels of “patient finance” remains critical for Africa’s industrialization prospects, because the development of industrial capabilities in contexts of multiple constraints requires decades not years. In this sense, the recent decline in Chinese loans is concerning, even after accounting for debt stress situations. However, even with declining access to Chinese loans, the rapid growth in infrastructure finance and Chinese infrastructure contractors may have laid some foundations for further structural transformation, and indeed contributed to create conditions for local construction material manufacturing to arise as well as to induce further investments in these sectors. The linkages between basic economic infrastructure and industrial development are strong.

Manufacturing FDI

Chinese FDI (flow) in Sub-Saharan Africa has shown robust growth in the past two decades, increasing from only US$75 million in 2003 to over US$5 billion in 2021 (Data: Chinese Investment in Africa — China Africa Research Initiative (sais-cari.org)). In value terms, although construction and mining attracted the bulk of Chinese FDI to Africa, manufacturing accounted for a stable and respectable 14% between 2013 and 2021. This is remarkable given that extractive and financial sectors typically account for more than 80% of total FDI in most African countries (Calabrese and Tang 2023). In terms of numbers of investment projects, different studies have suggested the proportion into the manufacturing sector is higher, around 30-40% depending on the country (Calabrese and Tang 2023; Sun 2017; Shen 2015). In Ethiopia, if we consider Chinese firms investing from tax havens (and thus not officially “Chinese”) or Hong Kong (sometimes reported separately) the share of manufacturing may go up to 80%. In terms of the type of investors, most studies suggest a majority of Chinese investors target the domestic market rather than relocating to export to global markets (Calabrese and Tang 2023). This is despite expectations that the saturation of China’s low-technology labour intensive manufacturing could result in 85 million labour-intensive manufacturing jobs relocating to other LMICs, with the African region as a potential host (Lin and Xu 2019). The ’flying geese hypothesis’ (Akamatsu 1962), i.e. when countries are leaders (lead goose) or followers in particular segments of global value chains according to their competitive advantages, is however yet to materialise in African countries, with the exception of cases like Ethiopia, Mauritius or Madagascar, due to relatively low productivity (and higher unit labour costs), high inputs and logistics costs, and variable wages across countries (Jenkins 2019; Brautigam et al., 2018; Altenburg et al 2020). There is clearer positive link between the infrastructure construction boom, partly driven by Chinese finance and contractors, and the growth in local building material industries, including many Chinese manufacturers who saw opportunities and moved from import business into direct manufacturing production (Wolf 2023). This kind of spillover effect is important insofar as the building materials industry can generate positive linkages with other economic activities and further contribute to economic transformation.

Therefore, the dynamic of Chinese FDI has been a second key vector contributing to some development of industrial capabilities and manufacturing growth in the continent. Both FDI into manufacturing and construction, which account for a large share of Chinese FDI, potentially contribute to industrial development, directly or indirectly. Flows have been uneven and not always sustained, given the difficult economic and political environment found in a number of African countries, but a very significant and growing number of countries have received such flows in different measure. When FDI flows into barely developed manufacturing sectors, much depends on the type of activity and company. Key expected contributions include spillover effects, development of manufacturing export capacity, development of local supply chains, creation of industrial jobs, skill development in manufacturing work, and incorporation of new technology and organizational capabilities to the host countries. The strength of each of these vectors hinges on whether firms invest to produce for the domestic market or global markets, whether the activity is labour or capital intensive, whether it requires locally sourced inputs, and if there is enough manufacturing experience and emerging industrial eco-systems in the host country or not. There is a significant variety of Chinese investors across sectors and within manufacturing, and different ‘varieties of capital’ in this process eventually affect the resilience or not of ongoing industrialization efforts and their associated productive and employment dynamics (Calabrese and Balchin 2022, Lee 2017, Chen 2021). The evidence so far suggests that some of these contributing vectors are either weak or in their very early stages and that a sustained growth in manufacturing investments over a longer period, supported by coherent and forward-looking industrial policies are needed (Calabrese and Tang 2023; Oya and Schaefer 2019; Jenkins 2019). In some countries, unsurprisingly, Chinese (and other foreign) manufacturers have struggled to expand their local supply chains and have remained somewhat dependent on Asia’s production networks, especially when exporting for global markets (Whitfield and Zalk 2020). In the building materials industry, the lack of a strong enough industrial base has also meant that imports have often fiercely competed with local production, as in Angola in the early postwar period (Wanda et al 2023). However, there are signs that new eco-systems have begun to emerge, and supportive policies and market dynamics are forcing new investors to make efforts to strengthen linkages, spillover effects and skill development of African workers (Oya and Schaefer 2019; Xia 2021). The arrival of Chinese industrial machinery may also gradually contribute to industrialization efforts through more affordable and suitable technology and capital equipment for emerging small and medium-scale manufacturers in labour-intensive sectors (Chen et al. 2016; Jenkins 2019).

Industrial policy framework

Overall, the combination of infrastructure financing and provision, and Chinese FDI has likely contributed to better conditions for Africa’s manufacturing revival, but the long-term impact of these engagements is largely mediated by African agency (Mohan and Lampert 2013), or, more specifically, the existence of a coherent and ambitious industrial policy framework (Whitfield and Zalk 2020). How and what does this mean? The contrast between Angola and Ethiopia is illustrative in this regard. Ethiopia experienced a ‘golden’ period of industrial policy development and experimentation between the mid-2000s and 2020, which consisted of a number of policy ingredients (Oqubay 2019): (a) a conducive political settlement, with a strong central leadership intent on trying to solve common coordination failures; (b) capacity to discipline sources of finance and steer funding towards priorities set out in various operational plans, e.g. channelling domestic and external development finance towards industrial hubs and infrastructure for industrial development; (c) focusing on ambitious employment and forex targets while avoiding a ‘race to the bottom’ (like new “sweatshops”); (e) the latter relied on the capacity to target and discipline investors  through reciprocal control mechanisms, and to ‘build verticality’ by luring large global production network anchor firms (large retail brands in garment, for example) to persuade their top suppliers to invest in Ethiopia; finally, (d) dynamics of policy learning and experimentation before and during the process of policy design, formulation and implementation. Angola, in contrast, did not meet most of these requirements for industrial policy success (Lippolis 2022). In fact, very few countries have managed to even get close to delivering on one or two of these conditions. The history of industrial policy in SSA is one marked by half-hearted attempts, lack of continuity, coordination failures, political obstacles, external hindrance, and weak capacities (Chitonge and Lawrence 2020). While colonial legacies played a role in terms of discouraging manufacturing development, the two decades of neoliberal structural adjustment reforms in the 1980s and 1990s were particularly damaging, halting and reversing incipient efforts to industrialize in several African countries. Even in contemporary Ethiopia, the fragile political settlement since 2020 has put in doubt the viability of the current industrialization model, with or without China’s engagement (Lavers 2023).

Furthermore, the process of building an industrial workforce in countries lacking industrialization experience faces multiple obstacles and contradictions, and is likely to be more uneven and slower than expected, despite industrialization’s promise to generate large numbers of decent jobs (Oya 2019). Employment dynamics and outcomes depend largely on the particular nature of industrial sectors and their linkages with global production networks. Therefore, the kind of investment and employment dynamics and outcomes associated with Chinese-driven FDI and infrastructure development are very different in Angola and Ethiopia, two countries where China’s engagement has been particularly intense since the early 2000s (Oya and Schaefer 2019).

Conclusion

Efforts to industrialize or to achieve any form of sustainable structural transformation in Africa have met countless obstacles since through the colonial and postcolonial eras. Variation in outcomes, performance, and trajectories, has also been substantial. There is not one single trajectory. This variation also characterizes the relative contributions of Chinese engagements in SSA to industrialization prospects since the early 2000s. It is undeniable that the rapid development of basic infrastructure in power and transport/logistics, and the relatively large share of manufacturing in Chinese FDI have generated positive effects and contributed to creating some basic conditions for initial and further industrial growth. However, available evidence suggests these are still early days, and the process is highly contingent on African policy agency, and on the different economic and political obstacles that continue to hinder further economic transformation.

Carlos Oya is a development economist by training, working on labour relations and employment, economic transformation, development policy, poverty, and research methodology. Carlos recently led a project on structural transformations and employment outcomes in infrastructure construction and manufacturing sectors in Ethiopia and Angola, with a special focus on Chinese firms (www.idcea.org).

Notes

Acker, K., Brautigam, D., & Huang, Y. (2020). Debt relief with Chinese characteristics. Working Paper No. 2020/39. China Africa Research Initiative, School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, Washington, DC. Retrieved from http://www.sais-cari.org/publications.

Akamatsu, K. (1962) A Historical Pattern of Economic Growth in Developing Countries’, Developing Economies, Tokyo, Preliminary Issue No. 1, pp. 3–25.

Altenburg, T., Chen, X., Lütkenhorst, W., Staritz, C., & Whitfield, L. (2020) Exporting out of China or out of Africa? Automation versus relocation in the global clothing industry. Deutsches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik. Deutsches Institut fuer Entwicklungspolitik. Discussion Paper https://doi.org/0.23661/dp1.2020

Brautigam D., Tang, X, & Ying, X. (2018) What Kinds of Chinese ‘Geese’ Are Flying to Africa? Evidence from Chinese Manufacturing Firms. Journal of African Economies, 27, DOI: 10.1093/jae/ejy013

Calabrese, L., & Balchin, N. (2022) Foreign Investment and Upgrading in the Garment Sector in Africa and Asia. Global Policy, 13, 34-44.

Calabrese, L., & Tang, X. (2023) Economic transformation in Africa: What is the role of Chinese firms?. Journal of International Development DOI: 10.1002/jid.3664

Chen, Y., Sun, I. Y., Ukaejiofo, R. U., Xiaoyang, T., & Bräutigam, D. (2016). Learning from China?: Manufacturing, investment, and technology transfer in Nigeria. IFPRI Discussion Paper n. 01565. Intl Food Policy Res Inst.: Washington DC.

Chen, W. (2021) The dynamics of state–business relations between the Ethiopian state and Chinese private firms: A case study of the Eastern Industrial Park. WIDER Working Paper 2021/122.

Chitonge, H., & Lawrence, P. (2020). The political economy of industrialization and industrial policy in Africa, 1960‒2018. In

Cramer, C., Sender, J., & Oqubay, A. (2020) African economic development: Evidence, theory, policy. Oxford University Press.

Hirschman, A. O. (1971) A Bias for Hope: Essays on Development and Latin America. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

Jenkins, R. (2019). How China is Reshaping the Global Economy. Oxford University Press.

Lavers, T. (2023). Ethiopia’s ‘Developmental State’: Political Order and Distributive Crisis. Cambridge University Press.

Lee, C. K. (2017). The specter of global China: Politics, labour, and foreign investment in Africa. University of Chicago Press.

Lin, J. Y., & Xu, J. (2019) China’s light manufacturing and Africa’s industrialisation. In A. Oqubay & J. Y. Lin (Eds.), China–Africa and an economic transformation (pp. 265–281). Oxford University Press.

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Oqubay, A. (2019). ‘Ethiopia: Lessons from an Experiment’, in Célestin Monga and Justin Yifu Lin (eds) The Oxford Handbook of Structural Transformation. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 591–618.

Oya, C. (2019). Building an industrial workforce in Ethiopia, in F. Cheru, C. Cramer & A. Oqubay (eds) The Oxford Handbook of the Ethiopian Economy. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 669–686.

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In their piece, Barry Sautman and Yan Hairong discuss Ethiopia as a model for China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), contrasting positive Chinese engagement and infrastructure investment on the African continent with the West’s negative media depictions and limited support, while highlighting Ethiopia’s significant economic growth and industrialization.

By Barry Sautman and Yan Hairong

In the late 20^th Century, there was a “tendency of [Anglosphere] media to focus almost exclusively on the negative side of the African experience,” with Africa “seen as the one part of the world for which the future was likely to be far worse than the past.”^[1] A UK business journal famously labelled Africa “The Hopeless Continent.”^[2] A quarter century later Western media still frame Africa negatively.^[3] Dominant depictions are built on a patronizing racism that has its roots in the colonial and neo-colonial relationship between the West and Africa. Chinese activities on the continent are similarly judged by Western entities to be uniquely negative,^[4] influencing some African media to do the same.^[5] The consistent Western deprecation of the Chinese presence in the continent reflects both Yellow Peril and Red Menace ideologies mobilized to confront what the US government regards as its “only peer competitor.”

Western media promote, for example, a “Chinese debt trap” claim; yet, studies have shown that China holds only an 18% share of Africa’s external debt^[6] and that among 19 African countries in debt distress in 2017,  the share of these countries’ external debt to China averaged just 15%.^[7]  Moreover, after the G-20 created the Debt Service Standstill Initiative in 2020 to supposedly relieve heavily indebted states, China

became the most significant debt relief country in this initiative. It suspended $5.7 billion in debt payments, contributing to more than half of the total global debt moratorium. Through this action, 45% of debts owed by the poorest countries to China was suspended. In contrast, the UK had no suspension of payments on its commercial loans and still recovered $3.2b in debt from countries that applied for the debt standstill initiative.^[8]

China renegotiated or wrote off more than $78b in loans for foreign infrastructure projects between 2020 and early 2023.^[9] After obtaining China’s debt relief in 2023, Ethiopia requested other G-20 countries to also suspend the country’s debt payments.^[10]

Compared to Western media coverage, “Chinese reporting on the continent is more abundant, positive and diverse.”^[11] Western media focus mainly on corruption and ineffectiveness of African leaders, civil wars and terrorism. Chinese media report on a wide range of socio-economic topics and are positive about Africa’s development potential and its wider global and regional connections beyond the West.  Chinese officials and scholars affirm that “China needs Africa as much as Africa needs China”^[12] or even that “China needs Africa more than Africa needs China.’”^[13] China calls Africa “a continent of opportunities and a promising land for investors.”^[14] China and its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) benefit from solid African diplomatic support, but China also reciprocates; thus, in 2022 it launched an “Initiative for Peaceful Development in the Horn of Africa” and in 2023 upgraded its relationship with Ethiopia from a “strategic partnership” to the rare level of “all-weather development cooperation.”^[15]

No Chinese leader has pronounced, as did French President Nicolas Sarkozy in Senegal in 2007, that Africans have “not entered history” and are not oriented toward the future or progress.^[16] Even as Trump in 2018 termed African states “shithole countries,”^[17] Xi Jinping framed African states and peoples as equals, distinct from the hegemonic dehumanization in western media.”^[18] From 2014-2020, he made ten trips to Africa, while in 2017-2022, there was only a single, brief stopover in Africa by a US president, in Egypt.^[19] Although one can find examples of internalization of western stereotyping, in large part Chinese merchants who live on the African continent are  equally positive in their perceptions of African development and potentials for economic partnership.  Chinese who work closely with Africans^[20] and Chinese managers at industrial enterprises in Ethiopia we interviewed, regard local workers as reliable, adaptable, quick-learners.^[21]

Ethiopia as a BRI Model: Industrialization through infrastructure building

Among Africa’s 54 states, 52 are part of the BRI, but there is no African country that Chinese officials have been more positive about than Ethiopia; they regard it, as an idiom puts it, “the only one and no number two” (独一无二).   Ethiopia is Africa’s second most populous country.  It has a Japan-level population, but is growing at 2.5% per annum and with an average age of 18.8, while Japan’s population is shrinking at -0.5% per year and has an average age of 49.^[22] Despite an ongoing civil war in 2022, Ethiopia’s GDP grew by 5.3%, versus 3.6% for all of Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA).^[23] Though GDP growth does not capture the entirety of human development and wellbeing, at the junction of world and especially developing country economic stagnation, this level of GDP growth is welcomed. Addis Ababa is the “capital of Africa,” hosting the African Union, UN Economic Commission on Africa, and African Center for Disease Control, plus Africa offices of many international organizations, such as the United Nation Development Program.

Ethiopia is however seen as the BRI model country in Africa for reasons more directly related to key aspects of the Initiative – infrastructure building and industrializing investment. As a Kenyan analyst has put it, “China is the only major country that has proven quite interested in going into fragile situations to do some infrastructure projects in Africa,”^[24] while Western states have scaled back such activities.^[25] By 2017, Chinese firms had 50% of Africa’s internationally-contracted construction market.^[26] China also provides financial wherewithal for infrastructure-building, with more than one-fifth the value of external loans to sub-Saharan Africa coming from Beijing.^[27] In 2006-2018, China lent Ethiopia US$14.83 billion, 82.2% of it for 70 mega-projects (22 in transport and communications, 35 in power, 13 for sugar factories and urban water supply).^[28]

An Ethiopian business journal stated in 2020 that “Ethiopia is the leading country in sub-Saharan Africa with the highest number of Chinese contracted projects.” It averred that “Almost all big buildings, roads and dam projects throughout the country are being handled by Chinese contractors.” Local firms are not thought to be equipped to complete mega-projects, but Ethiopians do participate.  A China Communications Construction Company manager in Addis has noted:

We have 800 local engineers and thousands of local workers. We have created over 5,000 job opportunities. We have close to six subcontractors, particularly in road, building and finishing works. We usually work hand-in-hand with local grade-one contractors. If we win bids, we subcontract part of the project to them. If they win, they subcontract it to us because they need knowledge and technological capacity. ^[29]

In fact, contrary to Western media portrayals, not many Chinese work at projects in Ethiopia. There were fewer than 6,000 in 2021, among the 15,000 Chinese then-reported as living in a country of 127 million people.^[30]

Ethiopia as a BRI Model: Industrialization through manufacturing

China is important to Africa’s trade pattern. Using the problematic category of “Sub-Saharan Africa” (SSA), one-fifth of its total goods exports go to China, with metals, minerals, and fuel some three-fifths of that, although Ethiopia exports none of these. China is also the largest source of imports in Africa, mainly manufactures and machinery.^[31] Many imports are used in Chinese infrastructure and industrial projects, especially in Ethiopia.

China’s proportion of the stock of SSA’s FDI is still small, at 4.4%. ^[32] Its share however is growing, while the UK and US shares have diminished: they had 17% and 15% of FDI stock in Africa in 2004–08, but only 6% percent each in 2014–18.  From 2016 to 2020, China also contributed 20% of the value of greenfield (entirely new) FDI in Africa, more than three and four times the US and UK shares.^[33] Moreover, little of the US’s aid to Africa promotes industrialization.^[34]

Despite scholars contending that “Several features of Ethiopia make it a ‘perfect storm’ for Chinese investment,”^[35] the country has been central to China’s industrializing investment in Africa.  African leaders emphasized at the 2022 AU meeting that industrialization is key to mitigating poverty and must be sped up.^[36] When the BRICS countries met in 2023, Ethiopia was asked to join and Xi Jinping said China would “support Africa in growing its manufacturing sector and realizing industrialization and economic diversification.”^[37] Already by 2017, China was said to be involved in 12% of Africa’s industrial production.^[38] Some 13.4% of its stock of investment in Africa in 2021 was in manufacturing – with 37% in construction and 10% in mining^[39]-but manufacturing’s importance is increasing, especially in Ethiopia.  In 18 key African states in 2000-2010 and 2010-2018, manufacturing’s average annual value-added growth was 5% and 4.3%; while in Ethiopia it was 7.8% and 16.8%.  Average annual growth in manufacturing jobs in the 18 states was 4.8% and 4.9%; in Ethiopia it was 11.2% and 6.9%.^[40]

Some 3,000 Chinese firms operate in Africa; 70% of them private.^[41] The proportion is similar in Ethiopia^[42].  While state-owned enterprises (SOEs) dominate in construction, Chinese firms in manufacturing are mainly private. SOEs are large and experienced, but private firms vary in size, background and focus: many are small-to-medium and family-owned and thus more vulnerable to such destabilizing factors as epidemics, civil wars, and sanctions.^[43]

Ethiopia is Africa’s second largest FDI recipient and China plays a key role in its industrialization.^[44] As of late 2023, China’s 1,844 investment projects in Ethiopia were 4-5 times the number of US and Indian projects.^[45] Its stock of investment in 2023, at $4.8b, was one-tenth the stock of all Chinese FDI in Africa and one-sixth the stock of all FDI in Ethiopia. It is said to have created 560,000 Ethiopian “job opportunities,” mainly in clothing and textiles, building materials, plastics and metals, and engineering.  In 2021, Chinese firms accounted for 60% of Ethiopia’s approved new FDFI projects, almost all in manufacturing and services.^[46]

Ethiopia’s manufactured exports in 2023 were a fifth of all its exports. Chinese manufacturing exporters are based in Ethiopia’s 13 public and 5 private industrial parks (IPs), eleven of them Chinese-built and mostly housing Chinese firms.  IPs have attracted FDI of US$740m since 2013 and IP occupancy rates have been as high as 80%.  They have created 150,000 jobs, almost all for locals and mainly for women.  The oldest IP, the Chinese-managed Eastern Industrial Park near Addis, had 26,000 workers in 2023, 5% of them Chinese and 70-80% women.^[47] Hawassa IP, 275 km south of Addis was even larger and 97% of its 35,000 workers in 2021 were locals.^[48] Ethiopia plans to transform all IPs into special economic zones. The first will be the Chinese-built Dire Dawa IP being completed in late 2023, 450 km from the capital, along with the Chinese-built railway from Addis to the port at Djibouti that handles Ethiopia’s external trade.^[49]

Ethiopia as a BRI Model: non-economic aspects 

The Ethiopia/China BRI relationship is not wholly economic; for example, educational ties are well-developed.  In 2018, China had recruited 81,500 African university students and offered more scholarships to its African students than all the leading Western governments combined.^[50] Already by 2017, when China had 74,011 African students, 4,883 were Ethiopians, up from 844 in 2011 and more than twice the number of Ethiopians studying in the US.^[51] In 2023, Ethiopians were said to “account for the largest Chinese scholarship recipients.”^[52] China was also supporting 117 Ethiopians studying at Addis Ababa University.^[53]

The Luban Workshop, a vocational training program China developed as part of the BRI, is worth noting as well.  It has operated since 2016 in 25 developing countries, including Ethiopia.  Workshops are partly tailored to graduates getting jobs in local Chinese firms and one at Ethiopian Technical University since 2021 is paired with China’s Tianjin University of Technology.  Many of its instructors are Ethiopians who studied in China.  The curriculum centers on robotics and AI-using manufacturing, as well as including  learning specific to IT giant Huawei’s technology. This is perhaps one reason why an Ethiopian team finished 3^rd among 146 teams from 36 countries in Huawei’s 2023 ICT competition.^[54]

In the BRI era, there were also intermarriages between working class Chinese male migrants and rural-to-urban Ethiopian women workers. Many couples have met in factories.^[55]

Ethiopia as a BRI Model, But Not a Model for Transformation

Although Ethiopia is a model BRI country in Africa, the relationship is not unproblematic.  On the Chinese side, in mid-2023, infrastructure-builders faced severe problems from the Ethiopian government’s shortage of foreign exchange and from increasing materials costs.^[56] The situation for IPs since early 2022 has also been precarious, due to US sanctions imposed during the civil war with Tigrayan rebels.^[57] Ethiopia’s eligibility for duty-free entry of its goods into the US under the politically-conditioned African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) was suspended which, the Ethiopian government said, resulted in “millions” of workers being laid off.^[58] The US move caused Ethiopia to further strengthen its ties with China and though the war ended in November 2022, the US renewed its sanctions against Ethiopian officials in fall 2023.  Ethiopia remains outside AGOA, which itself may expire for all of Africa in 2025.^[59] China, in contrast, now grants zero tariff treatment to 98% of products from Ethiopia.^[60]

On the Ethiopian side, Chinese and other foreign-invested firms continue to pay IP workers very low wages, averaging with benefits only about US$100 a month.  That is less pay than for comparable work in Bangladesh, albeit slightly higher than what workers earn at surrounding Ethiopian-owned firms.  Wages of the few Chinese IP employees, mainly managers, supervisors, and trainers, are much higher, up to 20 times the local wage.^[61] Unsurprisingly then, there have been strikes, such as one at the Hawassa IP in 2019.^[62] These actions had achieved some positive outcomes, such as higher wages and recognition of unions – until many thousands of workers at Hawassa and other IPs were laid off in 2022 due to sanctions.

Presumably, the US will soon lift sanctions, as for the past 120 years it has generally had with Ethiopia “a long-standing and important partnership,” in which US “security assistance” has supported successive Ethiopian regimes’ internal and external violence.^[63] When sanctions end, it is unlikely that the close connection with China will be severed.      It is equally unlikely however that being a model BRI country will, in itself, lead to Ethiopia transforming from a peripheral to semi-peripheral economy, as perhaps an important lesson of China’s experience is that it takes much more than foreign investment to transform an economy, let alone a society.

Barry Sautman is a Professor Emeritus of Political Science at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. He is a political scientist (PhD Columbia University) and lawyer (JD UCLA, LLM NYU) who primarily teaches international law, China/US relations, contemporary China, ethnicity and nationalism. One of his areas of research has been ethnic politics in China and comparative perspective, including ethnic policies, the political-economic and legal aspects of the Tibet and Xinjiang issues.

Hairong Yan is a Professor of Anthropology, Tsinghua Institute for Advanced Study in Humanities and Social Sciences and Department of Sociology. She researches on agrarian change and food sovereignty in China and China-Africa links. She is interested in studying labor, gender, rural-urban relations, socialism, post-socialist transformations, neoliberal capitalism. Before joining Tsinghua, she taught in Hong Kong Polytechnic University.

Featured Photograph: Leader of Namibia and Lesotho stayed at Kerry Hotel Beijing during 2018 Beijing Summit of Forum on China–Africa Cooperation.

Notes

[1] David F. Gordon and Howard Wolpe, “The Other Africa: An End to Afro-Pessimism,” World Policy Journal (WPJ). 15:1 (1998): 49-59; David Rieff, “In Defense of Afro-Pessimism,” WPJ 15:2 (1998) https://ciaotest.cc.columbia.edu/olj/wpj/wp_99red01.html

[2] www.economist.com/weeklyedition/2000-05-13.

[3] Javier Blas, “What Has Happened to Africa Rising? It’s Been Another Lost Decade,” Bloomberg, Sept. 12, 2023; Ruchir Sharma, “The World Economy’s Biggest Problem is Africa,” Financial Times, Dec. 15, 2023.

[4] Chibuike Obuh, “The Representation of Africa in Western Media: Still a 21st Century Problem,” MA thesis, Edinburgh Napier University, 2015, DOI:10.13140/RG.2.1.3984.2326; Raphael Mweninguwe, “African Media’s Portrayal of Its Continent Raises Questions,” Media Diversity Institute, June 7, 2023, www.media-diversity.org/african-medias-portrayal-of-its-continent-raises-questions/ .

[5] Frankline Matanji, China in Africa: Representation of Chinese Investments in Africa by Western, Chinese, and African Media,” International Journal of Communications 16 (2022): 1713-1736.

[6] Gu Xuewu, et al, “China’s Engagement in Africa: Activities Effects and Trends,” Universitat Bonn, June, 2022,: 2, www.cassis.uni-bonn.de/en/publications/chinas-engagement-in-africa.

[7] Deborah Brautigam et al, “Trump Team Bashes China but Offers No Alternative in African Nations,” The Hill, Mar.15, 2018,  https://thehill.com/opinion/international/378583-trump-team-bashes-china-but-offers-no-alternative-in-africa

[8] Gu Xuewu, et al, “China’s Engagement in Africa: Activities, Effects, and Trends,” Center for Global Studies, Universitet Bonn, 2022, www.cgs-bonn.de/cms/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/CGS-China_Africa_Study-2022.pdf.

[9] Matthew Mingey and Logan Wright, “China’s External Debt Renegotiations After Zambia,” Rhodium Group, June 2023, https://rhg.com/research/chinas-external-debt-renegotiations-after-zambia/.

[10] “Ethiopia Seeks Debt Relief from Other Creditors After China, IMF official Says,” Reuters, Oct. 14, 2023.

[11] Dani Madrid-Morales, “Africa in the News: Is News Coverage by Chinese Media Any Different?” paper, Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication conference, Toronto, 2019, www.danimadrid.net/research/2019_africa_in_the_news_chinese_media_any_different_draft.pdf.

[12] Li Hongwei and Jacqueline Muna Musiitwa, “China in Africa’s Looking Glass: Perceptions and Realities,” RUSI, Aug. 3, 2020, https://rusi.org/explore-our-research/publications/commentary/china-africas-looking-glass-perceptions-and-realities.

[13] Adams Bodomo, “Africa-China Relations: Symmetry, Soft Power and South Africa,” China Review 9:2 (2009): 169-178.

[14] “China’s Win-Win Investment in Africa Set to Rise Despite Western Slander,” Global Times, Aug. 18, 2023.

[15] Karoline Eickhoff and Nadine Godehardt, “China’s Horn of Africa Initiative: Fostering or Fragmenting Peace,” Megatrends Afrika, Working Paper 1, Oct. 2022, www.swp-berlin.org/assets/afrika/publications/MTA_ working_paper/MTA_WP_01_Eickhoff_Godehardt_China_HoA_formatiert_12102022.pdf; “Ethiopia-China Economic Cooperation,” Ethiopia Ministry of Finance, Dec. 26 2023, www.mofed.gov.et/blog/ethiopia-china-economic-cooperation/.

[16] “Africans Still Seething Over Sarkozy Speech,” Reuters, Sept. 5, 2007.

[17] Josh Dawsey, “Trump Derides Protections for Immigrants from ‘Shithole Countries,” Washington Post, Jan. 12, 2018.

[18] “Full Text of Chinese President Xi’s Signed Article on South African Media,” Xinhua, July 23, 2018; “Full Text of Chinese President Xi’s Signed Article on Rwandan Media,” Xinhua, July 21, 2018.

[19] Paul Nantulya, China’s Deepening Ties to Africa in Xi Jinping’s Third Term,” Africa Centre for Strategic Studies, Nov. 29, 2022, https://africacenter.org/spotlight/chinas-deepening-ties-to-africa-in-xi-jinpings-third-term/; Blas, What Has Happened.

[20] Micah Petersen and Saleem Ali, “Chinese Migrant Perceptions of Africans: Understanding Confucian Reflexive Politics in Southern Africa,” Social Sciences 7: 172 (2018): 1-18.

[21] Yan Hairong and Barry Sautman, “China, Ethiopia and the Significance of the Belt and Road Initiative,” China Quarterly (2023): 1-26, doi:10.1017/S0305741023000966.

[22] “Ethiopia Demographics,” Worldometer, 2023, www.worldometers.info/demographics/ethiopia-demographics/; “Japan Population,” Worldometer, 2023, www.worldometers.info/world-population/japan-population/.

[23]  “GDP Growth (Annual %) Sub-Saharan Africa,” World Bank, 2023, https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.KD.ZG?locations=ZG

[24] Jevans Nyabiage, “As Coups Threaten African Stability, China Struggles to Make Headway with Belt and Road Interests,” South China Morning Post (SCMP), Oct. 1, 2023.

[25] Jon Lomoy, “Chinese Aid – a Blessing for Africa and a Challenge to Western Donors,” CMI Insight 2021:2, www.cmi.no/publications/7750-chinese-aid-a-blessing-for-africa-and-a-challenge-to-western-donors.

[26] Irene Yuan Sun, et al., “The Dance of the Lion and Dragon,” McKinsey, 2017: 10, www.mckinsey.com/~/media/ mckinsey/featured%20insights/middle%20east%20and%20africa/the%20closest%20look%20yet%20at%20chinese%20economic%20e.

[27] “Regional Economic Outlook: Analytical Notes: At a Crossroads: Sub-Saharan Africa’s Economic Relations with China,” International Monetary Fund, Oct. 2023: 3, www.imf.org/-/media/Files/Publications/REO/AFR/2023/ October/English/china.note1.ashx.

[28] Ethiopia-China Economic Relations.

[29] “Chinese Companies Taking over Ethiopia’s Construction Industry,” Ethiopian Business Review no. 81 (2020), https://ethiopianbusinessreview.net/chinese-companies-taking-over-ethiopias-construction-industry/.

[30] “Number of Chinese Workers in Ethiopia From 2009 to 2021,” Statista, 2024, www.statista.com/statistics/ 1321437/number-of-chinese-workers-in-ethiopia/; “Ethiopia – France begins evacuation of its citizens from Ethiopia in the face of the advance of the TPLF,” Europa Press, Nov. 28, 2021.

[31] Regional Economic Outlook: 2.

[32] Regional Economic Outlook: 3.

[33] Stephen Morgan, et al, “Foreign Direct Investment in Africa: Recent Trends Leading up to the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA),” US Department of Agriculture, Oct. 2022: 10, 14, www.ers.usda.gov/ webdocs/publications/104996/eub-242.pdf?v=3027.7.

[34] “U.S. Assistance for Sub-Saharan Africa: An Overview,” Congressional Research Service, Nov. 7, 2023, https://sgp.fas.org/crs/row/R46368.pdf.

[35] Amy Freedman and Naomi Bekele, “China’s Belt and Road Initiative in Malaysia and Ethiopia,” Indian Journal of Asian Affairs 35:1 (2022): 1-22.

[36] “African Leaders Call for Faster Industrialization During African Union Summit,” African Development Bank Group, Dec. 1, 2022, https://www.afdb.org/en/news-and-events/press-releases/african-leaders-call-faster-industrialization-during-african-union-summit-56945.

[37] “China’s Xi Pledges to Support Africa’s Industrialisation at BRICS,” Reuters, Aug. 25, 2023.

[38] Sun, The Dance: 10.

[39] “Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) Stock from China into African Countries in 2021, by Sector” Statista, 2023, www.statista.com/statistics/1222749/fdi-flow-from-china-into-africa-by-sector/.

[40] Hinh T. Dinh, “Industrialization in Africa: Issues and Policies,” Policy Center for the New South, 2023: 12,
www.policycenter.ma/sites/default/files/2023-10/RP_05-23_Hinh%20T.%20Dinh%20.pdf.

[41] Tu Lei, et al, “Africa Becomes a New Magnet for Chinese Investors Under BRI,” Global Times, Sept. 12, 2023.

[42] Yan and Sautman, China, Ethiopia.

[43] Chen Weiwei, “China and Africa: Ethiopia Case Study Debunks Investment Myths,” SOAS China Institute, Mar. 17, 2022, https://theconversation.com/china-and-africa-ethiopia-case-studydebunks-investment-myths-177098.

[44] “Investment Flows to Africa Dropped to $45 Billion in 2022,” UNCTAD, July 5, 2023, https://unctad.org/news/investment-flows-africa-dropped-45-billion-2022.

[45] Ethiopia-China Economic Cooperation; Can Ethiopia: 26.

[46] “Ethiopian Minister Commends China’s Contributions to Economic Progress,” Xinhua, July 7, 2023; “Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in Ethiopia,” Lloyds Bank, 2023, www.lloydsbanktrade.com/en/market-potential/ethiopia/investment.

[47] Can Ethiopia:25; Mukesh Shankar Bharti, “The Sustainable Development and Economic Impact of China’s Belt and Road Initiative in Ethiopia,” East Asia 40 (2023): 175-194; Tu Lei, Africa Becomes.

[48] “Ethiopia’s Hawassa Industrial Park Stares at Massive Job Losses over US Decision,” Texfash, July 23, 2022, https://texfash.com/update/ethiopias-hawassa-industrial-park-stares-at-massive-job-losses-over-us-decision; Christian Johannes Meyer, et al, “The Market-Reach of Pandemics: Evidence from Female Workers in Ethiopia’s Ready-Made Garment Industry,” Sept. 7, 2020, https://osf.io/gwy5r/download.

[49] “Chinese Contractor Says Ethiopia’s Dire Dawa Industrial Park Nearing Completion,” CGTN, June 16, 2023, https://africa.cgtn.com/chinese-contractor-says-ethiopias-dire-dawa-industrial-park-nearing-completion/; “Investors with 6B Birr Capital Sign MoU to Work in Special Economic Zone,” Ethiopian News Agency (ENA), Nov. 2, 2023.

[50] Natasha Robinson and David Mills, “Will Experiences of Doctoral Study in China Influence African Academic Practice?” International Higher Education 111 (2022): 19-21.

[51] “China Emerging as a Major Destination for African Students,” ICEF Monitor, Apr. 21, 2021, https://monitor.icef.com/2021/04/china-emerging-as-a-major-destination-for-african-students/.

[52] Chinese Scholarship Empowers Ethiopian Students Dream,” Xinhua, Aug. 27, 2023.

[53] “China Extends Grant for 117 Addis Ababa University Students,” ENA, Mar. 9, 2023.

[54] Shibani Mahtani and Joshua Irwandi, “Winning Friends by Training Workers is China’s New Gambit,” Washington Post, July 10, 2023; “Developing Nations Benefit from Chinese Expertise,” China Daily, July 5, 2023; “Ethiopia Students Finish 3rd at Global Huawei ICT Competition in China,” Further Africa, May 31, 2023, https://furtherafrica.com/2023/05/31/ethiopia-students-finish-3rd-at-global-huawei-ict-competition-in-china/.

[55] Weng Wei, “A South-South Cross-Border Marriage Between Chinese Men and Ethiopian Women,” African Human Mobility Review 9:2 (2023): 103-122.

[56] Selamawit Mengesha, “China-Ethiopia Funding Row Threatens Key Infrastructure Link,” Reporter, July 8, 2023.

[57] Ashenafe Endale, “Industrial Parks Teeter on the Edge as Export Markets Calm,” Reporter, May 13, 2023.

[58] “Job Losses Wreck Livelihoods in Ethiopia’s Garment Industry,” IndustriAll, Sept. 6, 2023, www.industriall-union.org/job-losses-wreck-livelihoods-in-ethiopias-garment-industry.

[59] “Biden Renews National Emergency Executive Order Imposing Sanctions on Certain Persons in Ethiopia,” Addis Standard, September 8, 2023; Ohio Omiunu, “US Suspends Four Countries from AGOA: Reassessing the Human Rights Trade Nexus,” Afronomics Law, Nov. 6, 2023, www.afronomicslaw.org/category/analysis/us-suspends-four-countries-agoa-reassessing-human-rights-trade-nexus.

[60] Jevans Nyabiage, “In Ethiopia, China and the US Map Rival Roads to Lasting Peace,” SCMP, Mar. 27, 2023.

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