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UK Reshapes Foreign Aid Strategy to Confront China 

by Cobus van Staden
File image of British Secretary for Foreign Affairs Liz Truss at a meeting of NATO Ministers of Foreign Affair on Ukraine in Berlin on May 15, 2022. Bernd von Jutrczenka / POOL / AFP

The United Kingdom has announced major shifts in its foreign aid strategy. These changes put the UK in closer alignment with the United States, and redirect aid spending toward geopolitical goals, particularly containing China’s rise. UK foreign aid has been cut by $4 billion since 2020.

UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss made this focus on China clear: “In an increasingly geopolitical world, we must use development as a key part of our foreign policy. Malign actors treat economics and development as a means of control, using patronage, investment and debt as a form of economic coercion and political power. We won’t mirror their malign tactics, but we will match them in our resolve to provide an alternative.”

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