Small States in a Global Economy: The Role of Institutions in Managing Vulnerability and Opportunity in Small Developing Countries

Small island economies, Growth, Governance

The Dragon's Gift: The Real Story Of China In Africa

The Beijing Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, held in November of 2006 helped to focus more world attention on the state of the African economy, which has seen far too many worries and failures and far too few successes.  As the author states "It forced the West to focus on something new:  Chinese aid and other forms of economic engagement were sharply on the rise in Africa.  China was on a track to become the African continent's largest trading partner, outpacing Great Britain and the United States.  Nearly 900 Chinese companies had invested in Africa by then (2002) – in factories and farms, retail shops and oil wells.

China in Africa: Seven Myths

Sensationalism and rumours cloud our ability to understand China’s growing engagement in Africa, and to craft appropriate responses. This paper dissects seven common myths on China in Africa. Many of the fears about Chinese aid and engagement in Africa are misinformed. This paper unpacks seven myths: (1) ‘China is a newcomer to Africa’; (2) ‘China targets pariah regimes’; (3) ‘China hurts the West’s efforts to build democracy’; (4) ‘Chinese aid is huge’; (5) ‘Chinese aid is mainly used to win access to resources’; (6) ‘China is sending millions of farmers to Africa, leading the land grab’; and (7) ‘Chinese companies bring in all their own workers’. While China’s rise in Africa is cause for some concern, efforts to gain a more realistic picture should help Africans and their other development partners to craft appropriate responses

China’s Investment in African Special Economic Zones: Prospects, Challenges, and Opportunities

China’s recent moves to establish special economic zones (SEZs) in several African countries can make a significant contribution to industrialization in Africa. But the success of these projects is by no means guaranteed. Meeting the objectives of both China and African countries will require an active partnership and a framework for collaboration that includes engagement from host governments, processes for phasing-in local control, communication and enforcement of standards, and support for integration with local economies.China, investment, Africa, special economic zone, SEZ, industrialization, partnership, development, World Bank, foreign direct investment

Ecological Civilisation Discourse in Xinhua’s African Newswires: Towards a Greener Agency?

How does Chinese central media represent Africa through its environmental news? This article argues that the way in which Chinese central media organisations have reported environmental issues across the African continent has altered from a reactive “charm defensive” towards the promotion of a developmental model: “Ecological Civilisation”. Based on a critical discourse analysis of headline African news published by the Xinhua News Agency, this research illustrates the emergence of this new, unexpected turn in Chinese representations of Africa, as well as highlighting the coherencies and tensions within this discourse. Questioning why this change in the emphasis of content has occurred, it investigates explanations at the macro-, mezzo-, and micro-levels of analysis, concluding that the evidence indicates that Xinhua’s content remains closely linked to the soft power goals of the Chinese Communist Party. However, the presence of risk discourses in some reports indicates that the hegemonic discourse is altering. This could potentially be the result of Xinhua’s own commercial objectives in Africa, or of the subjectivities of individual Xinhua journalists seeping into reports. This research provides significant contributions to an understanding of Chinese soft power in Africa, the ecology of Chinese media in Africa, and the development of environmental discourses

Globalisation, adjustment and the structural transformation of African economies?: the role of international financial institutions

Under the auspices of the World Bank and IMF, for almost two decades, sub-Saharan African countries have implemented structural adjustment, an orthodox package of economic reform measures. During this period there has been an unprecedented proliferation of technology investment and trade in the world economy. However sub-Saharan Africa has performed poorly under adjustment and has been largely marginalized from the international economy. The paper investigates the problems with the theoretical model underlying structural adjustment policies to explain why the model is not conducive to either African development or Africa’s increasing participation in the global economy. An example is used to illustrate the existence of an alternative set of policies that may be better suited for Africa

The dragon’s gift: The real story of China in Africa [In Chinese]

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