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| 1 |
ID:
132308
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2014.
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| Summary/Abstract |
This article investigates how perceptions of China in Mozambican civil society are affected by entrepreneurial activity and bilateral cooperation between China and Mozambique - real, imagined, visible and legal as well as clandestine and illegal in the agricultural and forestry sectors. The research problem concerns how discourse on Chinese investors is formed in Mozambique. Two questions are posed. How does Mozambican civil society perceive their room to maneuver at a time of Chinese growing economic interest and 'return' to Africa? What views exist on the policy space for the national government? Using qualitative ethnographic interviews to answer these overarching questions about expanding/contracting maneuvering space, this article explains how Mozambique's largest social group - peasants - the National Association of Small Farmers (UNAC) and other societal actors perceive Chinese investors. Informed by theoretical debates on civil society, the article argues that coinciding with China's large-scale return to Africa, an already tense dynamic between civil society and the state is picking up speed. It is argued that this phenomenon is likely to have more to do with African governments accruing more power and policy space than through direct impact of Chinese economic activity on African social life. However, to avoid negative discourse formation, China and host governments need to become more open on and transparent about bilateral agreements.
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| 2 |
ID:
161259
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| Summary/Abstract |
China has been much more involved in Africa's economy and trade than in its security. However, over the past decade or so, China has increased its participation in the United Nation's Peacekeeping Operations (UN PKOs), particularly in Africa. It has also taken steps to better protect its overseas nationals and, in 2017, established a naval base in Djibouti. This article focuses on the participation of China's People's Liberation Army in the United Nation's Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) since 2013. It aims to unpack the diplomatic process that led China to take part in this mission and to analyse the form of this participation. Mali was the second time (the first being in South Sudan in 2012) that China opted to deploy combat troops under the UN banner, underscoring a deepening involvement in PKOs and an increasing readiness to face risks. Finally, this article explores the implications of China's participation in the MINUSMA for its foreign and security posture as a whole. Often perceived as a realist rising power, by more actively participating in UN PKOs China is trying to demonstrate that it is a responsible and “integrationist” great power, ready to play the game according to the commonly approved international norms. Is this really the case?
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| 3 |
ID:
153717
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This paper conceptualises the geosocial by examining the transnational connections of African student migrants and their educational experiences in Chinese cities. While there is now an established scholarship on Chinese migration to Africa, new research on the concurrent flow of African migration to China is emerging. Recent publications on African migrants in China tend to focus on the experiences of African traders, drawing out issues of illegality, ‘low-end’ globalisation and their impacts on Chinese trading cities. In comparison, this paper shifts the analytical lens to African educational migration in Chinese cities, foregrounding how global householding patterns reflect and leverage on the geopolitical and geo-economic dimensions of China-Africa relations. The paper shows that individual and family goals are negotiated through educational migration that, on the one hand, is concerned with accumulating human and cultural capital through a learning stint in Chinese cities, and on the other hand, is framed by perceptions of China-Africa relations. The paper argues that through educational migration, transnational social reproduction links Africa with China, but the social differentiation and everyday sociality that the African students experience in Chinese cities reinforce racial coding and development asymmetries. In so doing, the paper draws out how the geosocial reflects and constitutes the geopolitical and geo-economic dimensions of transnationalism.
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| 4 |
ID:
186851
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| Summary/Abstract |
The question of who represents Africa and how Africa is represented to global audiences continues to be hotly debated in academic publications and in the media. The majority of these discussions critique Western representations of Africa, or set up the West as the implied Other in debates over Africa’s right to self-representation. In recent years, however, Africa has found itself increasingly represented by the People’s Republic of China. This article examines the visual representations of ‘Africa’ that are used in promotional material produced by China in connection with official China–Africa cooperation. The article finds that one of the dominant stereotypes used by China is that of natural, ‘primitive’ Africa, a stereotype that has historically been strongly associated with the imperial gaze of the West. This is seen as potentially undermining key elements of China–Africa discourse, notably China’s emphasis on respect for its African partners. At the same time, the article highlights similarities between the imperial gaze and the tourist gaze, and considers the possibility that China’s representations of Africa might be compatible with a tourist gaze on Africa.
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| 5 |
ID:
133160
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| Publication |
2014.
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| Summary/Abstract |
The rapid intensification of ties between the People's Republic of China (PRC) and Africa's 54 countries is of considerable geopolitical significance. It is impossible to understand how the PRC has sustained year-on-year breathtaking growth without factoring in the contribution of African commodity exports and the profits reaped by Chinese enterprises through African demand for consumer goods, construction projects, and information and communication technology services. An extensive literature analyses the China-Africa story: an initial shouting match pitted those who cast Beijing as leading the re-colonization of the continent1 against authors praising China as Africa's savior at a time when the West would only engage through the lens of the Global War on Terror and rock star-driven charity.2 In recent years, a more nuanced conversation has underscored historical dimensions to the China-Africa relationship, exploring change and continuity in Africa's place in the global political economy, and deconstructing the myth that all Chinese actors-such as PRC embassies, state-owned enterprises, private firms, and migrating individuals-share a unity of purpose, guided by a grand plan hatched by the Chinese Communist Party.3
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| 6 |
ID:
118965
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2013.
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| Summary/Abstract |
Most analyses of China's renewed engagement with Africa treat China as the driving force, and little recognition is given to the role of African agency, especially beyond the level of state elites. This article investigates the extent of African agency in engagements with China and argues that at various levels African actors have negotiated, shaped, and even driven Chinese engagements in important ways. Suggesting a theoretical framework that captures agency both within and beyond the state, the article provides an empirical analysis of African agency first by showing how elements of the Angolan state created a hybrid set of institutions to broker Chinese investment projects, and second by discussing how African social actors have influenced and derived benefits from the activities of Chinese migrants in Ghana and Nigeria. While both cases demonstrate African agency, the ability of African actors to exercise such agency is highly uneven, placing African politics at the heart of any understanding of China-Africa relations.
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| 7 |
ID:
117794
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