A brief history of China-Africa relations
Africa has been crucial to China’s foreign policy since the end of the Chinese civil war in 1947. China supported several African liberation movements during the Cold War, and for every year since 1950 bar one, the foreign minister of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has first visited an African country.
China’s new foreign minister Qin Gang visited five African countries and the African Union in January 2023. Wang Yi, the former foreign minister, visited 48 African countries and premier Xi Jinping undertook 10 visits to Africa between 2014 and 2020.
In 1971, the votes of African countries were instrumental in winning the PRC control of China’s seat in the UN General Assembly and Security Council – displacing representatives from Chinese nationalist forces, who had been defeated in the civil war and now governed Taiwan.
In the following decades, China’s focus in Africa switched to eliminating all remaining recognition for Taiwan’s government. Burkina Faso, Malawi, Liberia, Senegal and others all switched their recognition from Taiwan to the PRC. Eswatini is the only African nation still to recognize Taiwan’s government in 2023.
In 1999 China created its ‘Going Out’ strategy, which encouraged Chinese companies to invest beyond China.
The strategy was a statement of China’s growing economic might and created a new wave of Chinese engagement in Africa. It was also an important source of employment for Chinese citizens working on new infrastructure projects.
In November 2003 the first tri-annual Forum for China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) summit was held in Beijing. FOCAC was created to improve cooperation between China and African states and signalled China’s growing strategic initiative in Africa.
Chinese president Xi Jinping delivers his speech during the November 2021 China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) meeting in Dakar, Senegal, pledging to offer one billion COVID-19 vaccine doses to Africa. Photo by SEYLLOU/AFP via Getty Images.
In 2013, China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) was launched by Xi Jinping, featuring an ambition to reinvigorate the old silk trading route along the East African coast. This should theoretically have seen Chinese investment concentrated in East Africa, but many other African states also sought opportunities through the BRI, making the initiative quickly expand in scope and ambition.
The BRI saw a huge number of signature infrastructure projects built across Asia and Africa, funded by Chinese loans whose size, nature and origin were often opaque. Some African countries became badly exposed to Chinese lending during this period.
Chinese investment peaked around 2016. Since then, Chinese loans to African governments declined significantly, falling from $28.4 billion in 2016 to $1.9 billion in 2020 – partly due to changing priorities in domestic Chinese politics, and partly due to the apparent difficulty African countries had repaying loans.
China’s investment in Africa
China has taken a position contrary to Western governments in its African investment. It characterizes its loans as mutually beneficial cooperation between developing countries, promising not to interfere in the internal politics of those it loans to.
In this respect it presents itself in contrast to Western countries, who are accused by China and some African governments of arrogant, democratic posturing – often by former colonial powers that looted African resources during the 18th and 19th centuries.
China has learned by doing, and the reality of large-scale investments taught Chinese investors the limits of their approach. For instance, during the South Sudanese civil war, China had to deal with representatives of various forces opposed to the government to maintain the Greater Nile Oil Pipeline, operated by the China National Petroleum Corporation.
China has not made significant efforts to export communist ideology in Africa since the Cold War ended, claiming that Chinese communism could not be replicated outside of China.
However, ideological links exist between the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the rulers of a state like Ethiopia, whose Prosperity Party has origins in ‘revolutionary democracy’ and Marxist-Leninism.
China’s National People’s Congress has formal relations with 35 African parliaments and the CCP International Liaison Department (ILD) has relations with 110 political parties in 51 African countries.
Western politicians have increasingly voiced fears that China’s intentions in Africa are predatory, intended to create a network of African states that are obliged to service their debts by offering China access to resources, trade opportunities and locations for military bases.
Debt trap diplomacy
US commentators often describe Chinese policy in Africa as a ‘debt trap’, part of a deliberate strategy to loan unmanageable sums to African countries, draw them into China’s sphere of influence, and force unfair commitments upon them.
Some African nations do have extensive Chinese loans and are suffering from out-of-control debt, exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, the invasion of Ukraine, and high interest rates. But their situations cannot be entirely blamed on Chinese loans. States including Kenya and Zambia have poorly managed their debt to all creditors, not only China.
Meanwhile, other African countries have created realistic, manageable debt arrangements with China without the tremendous risk and uncertainties that characterized some major BRI projects.
China also faces significant problems due to its extensive loans made during the BRI boom period, as it will struggle to force repayment while maintaining its image as a friend of developing nations.
BRI projects were largely uncoordinated and unplanned, with credit offered by competing Chinese lenders. This contradicts the idea of a coherent ‘debt trap’ policy by China.
However, the idea that China may use debt strategically, to expand its influence in the African content and secure access to resources, cannot be completely dismissed. China is an emerging superpower in strategic competition with the US. Building stronger economic relationships in Africa would be a logical step in its aspirations to be a global power.
