China's Expanding Role in Africa

[Bill Moore]

David,

Sometimes I think these studies miss the real essence of the threat. Normally we should encourage the development of economic infrastructure in Africa regardless of what country provides that assistance. Africa’s rise economic rise is long overdue, and failure to support the African nations and regional organizations develop in a way that can provide jobs to rapidly expanding youth bulge will lead to instability far beyond Africa. We have already seen the beginning of this instability with the mass migration into Europe, and it will only get worse if current trends continue.

Is China part of the solution, or part of the problem? To see the threat clearly, first you have to disregard the communist party narrative, it sounds great, but it is a lie. Like a block of ice, this lie rapidly evaporates when exposed to the sunlight. China’s ports benefit China and corrupt African officials in most cases, as in any situation we shouldn’t paint with too wide sh, because there may be situations that deviate from the norm. To sustain China’s miraculous economic growth (much like Japan’s phenomenal growth previously), China understandably needs access to resources. These resources include oil, minerals, fish, and food (agriculture), and let us not forget access to endangered species. China also wants to expand its market for Chinese goods, to include the deadly counterfeit drugs they frequently sale to various African nations. Most of the above equates to the reinforcing the 'resource trap' that much of Africa has been trapped in for decades. An economy that is dependent upon a particular resource, and often one primary market to sell it to, for various reasons tends to breed corrupt politicians that control the trade and see no incentive to diversify their economy. Rich in oil or another resource, yet suffers from massive poverty.

To add to this burden, China is pushing its ideology, which is socialism with Chinese characteristics. In reality, it is authoritarian capitalism. China is now exporting its tools and methods to enable dictators to enforce control over its population (smart city technologies, facial recognition, internet monitoring and control, social credit system, etc.). Authoritarian governance simply locks bad into place, further limited the ability of the nation to evolve economically and politically, which serves China’s purposes perfectly.

I can only speak for myself, but I wouldn’t mind China displacing the U.S.A. as the world’s superpower if they embraced the liberal, rules, and norms based international order. When the USA replaced the UK as the world power, there were no significant disruptions, since we generally had the same values (minus the UK’s colonies). However, a China-led world order would be very, very different. Human rights progress would be reversed, all religions would be under threat, democracy would be at risk, and instead of a win-win approach to economic development, China would seek to generate a global economic order that solely benefited China. This world will become increasingly destabilized, and the risk of major wars will increase.

China “could” do much good in Africa and the world writ large if it wasn’t led by a racist, Han, communist party that embraces an agenda that threatens what most people hold dear.