Analysis
Diverse voices, unique insights on key issues shaping China’s engagement throughout the Global South.
analysis
Transsion’s Transgressions in Africa
Transsion has long been the pride of China's private sector engagement in Africa. It's conquered the African mobile phone market by providing affordable devices that include a number of fantastic features customized specifically for local consumers. Its suite of brands including Tecno, ...
Development and the Complications of Tech
Today's news presents a vivid, if sobering, glimpse into the complications of Chinese tech in Africa. The same company - Transsion - is both boosting African startups and allegedly allowing African consumers to be scammed. The discussion about the spread ...
It’s Been Nearly 6 Months Since Guangzhou, What Have We Learned?
It's been six months since Guangzhou became synonymous with anti-black and anti-African discrimination. In the wake of numerous videos, photos, and accounts of the maltreatment of African residents in the southern Chinese megacity, feelings on all sides have hardened. It's true ...
Malawi Farmers To Chinese Agricultural Advisors: “Yes We Need the Expertise, but Not All of It”
At one technical cooperation farm in Malawi the usual donor-recipient relationship was turned on its head when Chinese agricultural experts found something to learn from the farm’s management. A blank slate approach towards the project site can undervalue the efficiency of the project, as has been shown ...
Somaliland Should Brace Itself For What Comes Next
All week I've been wondering why China's response to the opening of the new Taiwan representative office in the capital of Somaliland had been so subdued. Normally, whenever Taipei ventures out into the world to expand its diplomatic presence, Beijing responds almost instantly with ...
It’s Been a Violent Year for Chinese Workers in Africa
Aside from everything else going on, 2020 is proving to be a rather violent year for Chinese workers in Africa, particularly in Nigeria. Today's news that yet another Chinese national was taken hostage by kidnappers who raided a construction site in Niger state follows a ...
The China-Mediterranean Observer: Chinese and Iranian Analysts Are Not Aligned on Proposed Pact
We found a number of very interesting articles published by the media of the wider Mediterranean region that provide important insights into some of the most interesting aspects of China’s relations with the countries there. Though we selected articles published by the media of a number of ...
Taiwan’s Flag Now Flying Again in Africa
Taiwan opened its newest mission in Africa today at a ceremony in Hargeisa, capital of the self-declared state of Somaliland. Although the new representative office is not quite the same as formal diplomatic recognition, it's certainly close and marks the rare win for President Tsai ...
COVID, International Cooperation, and China-Africa: What Next?
Compared to global COVID-19 hotspots such as Latin America, the United States, and India, African countries have – on average – fared relatively well thus far in the pandemic. However, cases are on the rise, with states such as South Africa and Egypt particularly badly hit, ...
A Totally Different China-Africa Conversation
China is such a polarizing issue in the U.S. and Europe at present that almost any discussion on the topic is bound to become political. That's certainly the case in the China-Africa space, where webinars hosted by U.S./European think tanks, universities, and companies often devote the bulk ...
The Chinese “Western Media Conspiracy”
When the news broke on Sunday that Kenyan Health Cabinet Secretary Mutahi Kagwe announced that he had decided to ban the import of Chinese-made PPE due to quality concerns, the reaction on Chinese social media was entirely predictable. Right off the bat ...
You Can Actually See Chinese Soft Power Draining Away in Nigeria
China's apparent unwillingness to engage Nigerian civil society in a discussion over the ongoing loan controversy is eroding what's left of Beijing's credibility in the media, politics and among the country's enormous young, online population that gets most of its news from social media. ...