China’s New Role in Africa and the South A search for a new perspective Fahamu Books Dorothy-Grace Guerrero and Firoze Manji (eds) (2008) China’s New Role in Africa and the South: A Search for a New Perspective. Nairobi, Oxford and Bangkok: Fahamu and Focus on the Global South. ISBN: 978-1-906387-26-6 Hakima Abbas (ed) (2007) Africa’s Long Road to Rights: Reflections on the 20th Anniversary of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights / Long trajet de l’Afrique vers les droits: réflexions lors du 20ème anniversaire de la Commission Africaine des Droits de l’Homme et des Peuples. Nairobi and Oxford: Fahamu. ISBN: 978-1-906387-25-9 Patrick Burnett and Firoze Manji (eds) (2007) From the Slave Trade to ‘Free’ Trade: How Trade Undermines Democracy and Justice in Africa. Oxford: Fahamu. ISBN: 978-0-9545637-1-4 Issa Shivji (2007) Silences in NGO Discourse: The Role and Future of NGOs in Africa. Oxford: Fahamu. ISBN: 978-0-9545637-5-2 Firoze Manji and Stephen Marks (eds) (2007) African Perspectives on China in Africa. Nairobi and Oxford: Fahamu. ISBN: 978-0-9545637-3-8 Patrick Burnett, Shereen Karmali and Firoze Manji (eds) (2007) Grace, Tenacity and Eloquence: The Struggle for Women’s Rights in Africa. Nairobi and Oxford: Fahamu and Solidarity for African Women’s Rights coalition (SOAWR). ISBN: 978-0-9545637-2-1 Roselynn Musa, Faiza Jama Mohammed and Firoze Manji (eds) (2006) Breathing Life into the African Union Protocol on Women’s Rights in Africa. Oxford, Nairobi and Addis Ababa: Fahamu, SOAWR and the African Union Commission Directorate of Women, Gender and Development. ISBN: 978-1-9-4855-66-8 Roselynn Musa, Faiza Jama Mohammed and Firoze Manji (eds) (2006) Vulgarisation du proto- cole de l’union africaine sur les droits des femmes en Afrique. Oxford, Nairobi and Addis Ababa: Fahamu, SOAWR and the African Union Commission Directorate of Women, Gender and Development. ISBN: 978-1-904855-68-2 Firoze Manji and Patrick Burnett (eds) (2005) African Voices on Development and Social Justice: Editorials from Pambazuka News 2004. Dar es Salaam: Mkuki na Nyota Publishers. ISBN: 978-9- 987417-35-3 China’s New Role in Africa and the South A search for a new perspective EDITED BY DOROTHY-GRACE GUERRERO AND FIROZE MANJI PAMBAZUKA Published 2008 by Fahamu – Networks for Social Justice Cape Town, Nairobi and Oxford www.fahamu.org www.pambazuka.org and Focus on the Global South Bangkok www.focusweb.org Fahamu, 2nd floor, 51 Cornmarket Street, Oxford OX1 3HA, UK Fahamu Kenya, PO Box 47158, 00100 GPO, Nairobi, Kenya Focus on the Global South, Wisit Prachuabmoh Building, Social Research Institute, Chulalongkorn University, Phyathai Road, 10330 Bangkok, Thailand Copyright © 2008 Fahamu and Focus on the Global South All rights reserved. Redistribution of the material presented in this work is encouraged by the publisher, provided that the original text is not altered, that the original source is properly and fully acknowledged and that the objective of the redistribution is not commercial gain. Please contact the publisher if you wish to reproduce, redistribute or transmit, in any form or by any means, this work or any portion thereof. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN: 978-1-906387-26-6 Cover illustration and design: Judith Charlton, Fahamu Project manager: Shereen Karmali Manufactured on demand by Lightning Source CONTENTS Acknowledgements vi About the contributors vii Introduction: China’s new role in Africa and the South 1 Dorothy-Grace Guerrero and Firoze Manji Chain-gang economics: China, the US, and the global economy 7 Walden Bello Regulating China? Regulating globalisation? 13 Luk Tak Chuen Client and competitor: China and international financial institutions 17 Shalmali Guttal The Equator Principles and the environmental responsibilities of the financial industry in China 37 Yu Xiaogang and Ding Pin Sino-African relations: new transformations and challenges 67 Xu Weizhong The role and impact of Chinese economic operations in Africa 78 Dot Keet Friends and interests: China’s distinctive links with Africa 87 Barry Sautman and Yan Hairong China’s strategic infrastructural investments in Africa 134 Lucy Corkin Civil society initiative in Africa 151 Ali Askouri China’s interest in Angola’s construction and infrastructure sectors 157 Lucy Corkin China’s rise and increasing role in Asia 191 Dorothy-Grace Guerrero Expediency and interests in contemporary China–Myanmar relations 199 Yuza Maw Htoon and Khin Zaw Win China and Latin America: strategic partnering or latter-day imperialism? 209 Alexandre de Freitas Barbosa The position of civil society organisations in China today 238 Fu Tao No harmonious global society without civil society 246 Peter Bosshard Index 253 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The publishers are grateful for the support provided by China Development Brief, Christian Aid, Euro Burma, Misereor, Oxfam Hong Kong’s China Unit, OxfamNovib, Open Society Initiative and the Transnational Institute, both for the conference at which these papers were first presented and for the publication of this book. The articles by Yu Xiaogang and Ding Pin, Xu Weizhong and Fu Tao were translated from Chinese by Lewis Husain. vi ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTORS Ali Askouri is the director of the London-based Piankhi Research Group working in the field of development and human rights. Alexandre de Freitas Barbosa is a consultant at Instituto Observatório Social. He holds a PhD in applied economics from Universidade de Campinas (UNICAMP) and a masters in economic history from Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Walden Bello is executive director of Focus on the Global South. Peter Bosshard is the policy director of International Rivers, an environmental and human rights organisation based in Berkeley, USA. He coordinates a programme to monitor China’s role in global dam building and to strengthen the environmental policies of Chinese financiers. Lucy Corkin is projects director at the Centre for Chinese Studies (CCS) at Stellenbosch University and lectures on China’s political economy. Lucy coordinated and formed part of the CCS research team that investigated China’s investment in the infrastructure and construction sectors in Africa, a research undertaking completed in November 2006 for DFID-China as well as a Rockefeller Foundation-sponsored scoping study of China–Africa relations. Ding Pin is a journalist with China Environment News. Fu Tao is the editor and researcher of China Development Brief (Chinese version). Dorothy-Grace Guerrero is a senior research associate with Focus on the Global South and heads its China programme. Shalmali Guttal is a senior research associate with Focus on the Global vii CHINA’S NEW ROLE IN AFRICA AND THE SOUTH South. Over the past 15 years, she has worked in India, the United States, the Lao PDR, Thailand, Cambodia and other countries in Southeast Asia. At Focus, she does research, advocacy and campaign work on globalisation, privatisation, trade, natural resources, and alternatives. She is the coordinator of the Reclaiming and Defending the Commons programme at Focus. Dot Keet is originally from Zimbabwe and has worked as a researcher and lecturer in African political economy. She is currently a research associate of the Alternative Information and Development Centre (AIDC) in Cape Town, South Africa and is also a Transnational Institute fellow on the Africa and Alternative Regionalisms programme. Khin Zaw Win has been a human rights activist and development practitioner. He is now advocating for much-needed economic reform in Myanmar as part of the larger effort of facilitating the country’s multiple and difficult transitions. Luk Tak Chuen is currently head of the Research and Development Centre of the China Unit, Oxfam Hong Kong. Firoze Manji is founder and executive director of Fahamu and co-editor of Pambazuka News. Barry Sautman is a political scientist and lawyer in the Division of Social Science, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology whose research concerns nationalism and ethnic politics in China, as well as China–Africa relations. His most recent monograph, co-authored with Yan Hairong, is East Mountain Tiger, West Mountain Tiger: China, the West, and ‘Colonialism’ in Africa (Baltimore: University of Maryland Series on Contemporary Asian Studies, 2007). Xu Weizhong has worked in African studies for more than 20 years and is currently director of the Department of African Studies in the Institute of Asian and African Studies, China Institute of Contemporary International Relations. His major publications include Developing World: Active Response to Economic Globalization and African Ethnic Problems, Research on National Problems in the World. viii CONTRIBUTORS Yan Hairong teaches in the Department of Applied Social Sciences, Hong Kong Polytechnic University. Her research interests include rural-to-urban labour migration in China, domestic service, gender, and development, as well as China–Africa links. Her book, Belaboring Development: Migration, Subjectivity and Domestic Service in Post-Mao China, will be published by Duke University Press. Yu Xiaogang is founding director of the Greenwatershed Project in Yunnan Province. He is also the winner of the 2006 Goldman Environmental Prize for Asia, which honours grassroots environmental heroes. Yuza Maw Htoon did a masters in international public policy at the School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, and is now an executive of the Mingalar Foundation