https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1731-9547
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ABSTRACT
There are few questions of greater significance in African international relations than China's actions in and engagement with other states. Chinese infrastructure, businesses, and people have blanketed the continent and revolutionized lifestyles, transportation, and political economies. The advantages and detractions of such developments, in turn, have shaped local attitudes. African attitudes towards China, nevertheless, remain largely the subject of conjecture. This article explores the contemporary attitudes of Kenyan university students to China through surveys and contributes empirical data to the literature. Combined with a comparative textual analysis of the main Kenyan newspaper, the article sheds light on largely unknown—but generally assumed—attitudes of Kenyans towards China. The findings question a stereotype of China in Kenya and, by extension, the actions and reactions of other Africans and African states towards it. They also uncover nuanced attitudes that confound the mostly negative Western narrative about China in Africa. Accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as debt, perceived racism and unfair labour practices, Kenyan university students' attitudes and discourse in the elite media have become less positive. There is, in addition, the broad perception that it is Kenya's leadership that benefits from the relationship and not so much its ordinary citizens.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 Layne, “The US-Chinese power shift;” Chin and Thakur, “Will China change?”
2 Hakata and Cannon, “The Indo-Pacific”
3 Syroezhkin, “Social Perceptions of China”; Fitriani, “Indonesian perceptions” O'Trakoun, “China's belt and road.”
4 Manji and Marks, African perspectives; Wang and Elliott, “China in Africa”; Nassanga and Makara, “Perceptions of Chinese.” While not measuring attitudes per se, interesting insights into the views held by Kenya's jua kali casual labourers vis-à-vis China and Chinese businesses by Gadzala, "Survival of the fittest?.”
5 Taylor, China's New Role”; Brautigam, “The Dragon's Gift”; Mohan and Power, “New African choices”; Obi, “Enter the dragon?”; Dobler, “China and Namibia”; Parker and Fourie, “Sino-Angolan agricultural cooperation.”
6 For more on the growing politicization of China's actions in Africa, particularly by the US, Japan and other states associated with the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, or “Quad”, see Slayton, “Africa: The First U.S. Casualty”; and Cannon, “Influence and Power.”
7 Cai, “Understanding China's Belt.”
8 Signé, The potential of manufacturing; LaGarde, “Kenya at the Economic Frontier”; Akamanzi et al. “Silicon Savannah.”
9 Barton, Political trust; Liu and Tang, "US and China aid”; Cannon, “Grand Strategies.”
10 Cannon, “Influence and Power.”
11 Onjala, “China's development loans”; Alden & Jiang, "Brave new world.”
12 Sautman and Hairong, "African perspectives on China-Africa,” 730
13 Bailard, "China in Africa: An analysis.”
14 Sautman and Hairong "African perspectives on China-Africa.”
15 Mlambo, Kushamba, and Simawu, "China-Africa relations: What lies.”
16 Brown and Raddatz, “Dire consequences.”
17 Eisenman, “China-Africa trade”
18 Ibid., 272.
19 Gadzala, “Survival of the fittest”; Mosley and Watson, “Frontier transformations.”
20 Dollar, China's Engagement with Africa.
21 IPSOS, “SPEC Barometer”
22 Pew Research Center, Global Attitudes Survey, Spring 2015; Pew Research Center, Global Attitudes Survey, Spring 2018; Pew Research Center, Global Attitudes Survey, Spring 2019.
23 Kamoche and Siebers, "Chinese management practices.”
24 Rounds and Huang, "We are not so different.”
25 Řehák, “China-Kenya Relations,” 85.
26 Sanghi and Johnson, Deal or No Deal.
27 Siringi, “Kenya-China Trade Relations.”
28 Wanjiku, “Effect of Kenya's Bilateral.”
29 Farooq et al., “Kenya and the 21st Century.”
30 Omolo, Jairo, and Wanja. Comparative Study of Kenya, 30
31 Mahima Duggal, “China's shifting global strategy on foreign aid,” 9Dashline, 28 January 2021. https://www.9dashline.com/article/chinas-shifting-global-strategy-on-foreign-aid.
32 The print edition of the newspaper continues to go by the name, The Daily Nation. The website, however, is simply Nation. https://nation.africa/kenya/.
33 Free media content along with a robust Twitter feed, among other social media sites, mean Kenyan university students may be more prone to access its contents than those of its competitors.
34 While President Uhuru Kenyatta had dissembled on the topic, more recent reporting indicates that a Chinese takeover of port operations is highly unlikely. See N. Musungu, “Forget it: State House makes U-turn on releasing SGR contract,” Nairobi News, 29 April 2019. https://nairobinews.nation.co.ke/forget-it-state-house-makes-u-turn-on-releasing-sgr-contract/. See also N. Muchira, “Kenya: China Cannot Seize Port of Mombasa if Debt Default Occurs,” The Maritime Executive, 16 March 2021. https://www.maritime-executive.com/article/kenya-china-cannot-seize-port-of-mombasa-if-debt-default-occurs.
35 Niwattanakul et al., "Using of Jaccard coefficient.”
36 Alschner, Seiermann, and Skougarevskiy, The impact of the TPP.
37 Sanger and Warin, "Dataset of Jaccard similarity.”
38 Rich, "Like father like son?;” For more examples see Bursztyn, Nunes and Figueiredo, “How congressmen connect.;” Garcia et al., “Ideological and temporal components.”
39 Higuchi, “A Two-Step Approach (Part 1)”; Higuchi, “A Two-Step Approach (Part II).”
40 Pang and Lee, “Opinion mining and sentiment.”
41 Farhadloo and Rolland, "Fundamentals of sentiment analysis.”
42 Kaya, Fidan and Toroslu, "Sentiment analysis of Turkish.”
43 Mihelcea and Strapparava, “Semeval-2007 task 14.”
44 Huang and Wang, “The New ‘Cat.’”
45 Agarwal, Singh and Toshniwal, “Geospatial sentiment analysis.”
46 Halperin and Heath, Political research, 263.
47 Johnston, “Is Chinese Nationalism Rising?.”.
48 A soon-to-be-published study, which was made available to the authors, on the COVID-19 pandemic found that the pandemic accelerated feelings of anger or ill-will, even hatred against Chinese nationals who have been present in Kenya for years. Institute for Strategic Dialogue. COVID-19 Hate and Extremism Content Action Research: Kenya, forthcoming.
49 Rinker, Package “sentiment.”
50 Paul Wafula, “Exclusive: Behind the SGR walls,” The Standard, 8 July 2018. https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/article/2001287119/exclusive-behind-the-sgr-walls; Ibrahim Oruko, “Senators now probe SGR racism claims,” The Daily Nation, 10 August 2018. https://www.nation.co.ke/news/Senators-now-probe-SGR-racism-claims/1056-4706062-f9vl3n/index.html.
51 Allan Olingo, “Kenya fails to secure $3.6b from China for third phase of SGR line to Kisumu,” The East African, 27 April 2019. https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/business/kenya-fails-to-secure-3-6b-from-china-for-third-phase-of-sgr-line-to-kisumu-1416820
52 Muhkwana, “Attitudes towards China;” BBC, “Letter from Africa: Kenya's love-hate relationship with Chinese traders,” 24 June 2019. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-48743876
53 Adult single tickets cost Ksh3000 (1st Class) and Ksh1000 (2nd Class) as of late 2020. The travel time between Mombasa-Nairobi and vice-versa takes four and a half hours. Prior to the opening of the SGR, the trip took over eight hours and could be much longer depending on traffic and road conditions.
54 Jevans Nyabiage and Keegan Elmer, “African railways feel pinch of China's belt and road funding squeeze,” South China Morning Post, 19 December 2020. https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3114551/african-railways-feel-pinch-chinas-belt-and-road-funding
55 Njoki Chege, “Only ‘loyal’ African patrons are allowed in Chinese restaurant after sunset,” Nation, 23 March 2015. https://nation.africa/kenya/counties/nairobi/only-loyal-african-patrons-are-allowed-in-chinese-restaurant-after-sunset-1078450
56 Conteh-Morgan and Weeks, “Is China playing?,” 88-91.
57 George Tubei, “30 Chinese-made armoured vehicles Kenya bought are useless against rocket-propelled grenade attacks as US swoops to the rescue,” Pulse Live Kenya, 18 September 2019. https://www.pulselive.co.ke/bi/politics/a-look-at-chinese-made-armoured-carriers-kenya-bought-which-are-useless-against-rpgs/ehyyfr1
58 Kagwanja, Kenya's 2017 Elections. See also Nyadera, Agwanda, and Maulani, “Evolution of Kenya's Political System.” See also Cannon and Ali, “Devolution in Kenya.”
59 Julius Otieno, “Ruto now turns against Uhuru, criticises ballooning public debt.” The Star, 23 February 2021. https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/2021-02-23-ruto-now-turns-against-uhuru-criticises-ballooning-public-debt/.
60 Eric Matara, “Kenya Should Renegotiate Its Foreign Debts, Says Mudavadi,” Daily Nation, 18 May 2020. https://allafrica.com/stories/202005190150.html