China’s Belt and Road Initiative and South-South Cooperation

ABSTRACT

China often emphasizes the imperialist nature of the North-South development cooperation model and considers it a threat to the Global South. The Chinese administration has officially declared that its development aid falls into the South-South cooperation (SSC) category and is essentially different from North-South cooperation. As an international cooperation initiative proposed by China, The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is the most concrete example of China’s understanding and practice of SSC. This article critically examines whether and to what extent China’s South-South cooperation offers an alternative to North-South cooperation. Benefiting from examples of China’s aid practices in Egypt within the scope of the BRI, this study argues that China’s aid practices replicate the pattern of the North-South aid relations and the Western imperial practices.

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Notes

1. The State Council of the PRC, ‘China’s International Development Cooperation in the New Era’, Information Office of the State Council of the People’s Republic of China, January 2021, http://english.www.gov.cn/archive/whitepaper/202101/10/content_WS5ffa6bbbc6d0f72576943972.html (accessed 27 May 2021). The origins of South-South Cooperation go back to the Bandung Conference where newly independent Asian and African nations came together in 1955 to discuss the potential for cooperation among developing countries. The objective of improving cooperation among developing countries resulted in the establishment of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) in 1964. At the first UNCTAD conference, Latin American, African and Asian countries created the Group of 77. In 1978 a conference of the Global South was held in Argentina, to adopt the Buenos Aires Plan of Action for Promoting and Implementing Technical Cooperation among Developing Countries (BAPA). In December 1980, the United Nations General Assembly established a High-level Committee on the Review of Technical Cooperation among Developing Countries (TCDC), which meets every two years and was renamed the High-level Committee on South-South Cooperation in 2004. For details, see the United Nations Office for South-South Cooperation (UNOSSC), About UNOSSC, https://www.unsouthsouth.org/about/about-unossc/ (accessed 15 December 2021).

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12. The origins of South-South Cooperation go back to the Bandung Conference where newly independent Asian and African nations came together in 1955 to discuss the potential for cooperation among developing countries. The objective of improving cooperation among developing countries resulted in the establishment of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) in 1964. At the first UNCTAD conference, Latin American, African and Asian countries created the Group of 77. In 1978 a conference of the Global South was held in Argentina, to adopt the Buenos Aires Plan of Action for Promoting and Implementing Technical Cooperation among Developing Countries (BAPA). In December 1980, the United Nations General Assembly established a High-level Committee on the Review of Technical Cooperation among Developing Countries (TCDC), which meets every two years and was renamed the High-level Committee on South-South Cooperation in 2004. For details, see the United Nations Office for South-South Cooperation (UNOSSC), About UNOSSC, https://www.unsouthsouth.org/about/about-unossc/ (accessed 15 December 2021).

13. The Action Plan adopted at the latest FOCAC Summit, which was held in Beijing in September 2018, holds a commitment by China to increase its aid to African countries to ‘deepen South-South Cooperation and promote common development’. See The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of People’s Republic of China, Forum on China-Africa Cooperation Beijing Action Plan (2019–2021), https://www.fmprc.gov.cn/mfa_eng/wjdt_665385/2649_665393/201809/t20180910_679538.html (accessed 4 September 2021).

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17. Ibid.

18. Ibid.

19. Ibid.

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21. D. Williams, International Development and Global Politics: History, Theory and Practice, Routledge, Abingdon, 2012, p. 171.

22. M. Esteban and A. Pérez, op. cit., pp. 191–92.

23. M. Naim, op. cit.

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25. S. Parker and G. Chefitz, op. cit.

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30. Ibid., p. 150.

31. European Commission, op. cit.

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37. Ibid., pp. 27–28.

38. S. Kennedy, ’The Myth of the Beijing Consensus’, Journal of Contemporary China, 19(65), 2010, p. 461.

39. Ibid., p. 469.

40. See Linda Jakobson (ed.), Innovation with Chinese Characteristics: High-tech Research in China, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke, 2007.

41. A. Kroeber, ‘China’s Push to Innovate in Information Technology’, in L. Jakobson (ed), Innovation with Chinese Characteristics: High-tech Research in China, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke, 2007, pp. 37–38.

42. A. Y. So and Y. Chu, ’Interrogating the China Model of Development’, in H. Veltmeyer and P. Bowles (eds), The Essential Guide to Critical Development Studies, Routledge, Abingdon, 2018, pp. 406–407.

43. A. Bieler and A. D. Morton, Global Capitalism, Global War, Global Crisis, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2018, p. 185.

44. J. Hardy, ‘China’s Place in the Global Divisions of Labour: An Uneven and Combined Development Perspective’, Globalizations, 14(2), 2016, p. 195.

45. G. W. Cusson and L. A. Culpi, ‘The BRICS’ New Development Bank: A China-led Challenge to Western Hegemony?’, in E. Woertz (ed), Reconfiguration of the Global South: Africa, Latin America and the Asian Century, Routledge, Abingdon, 2017, p. 122.

46. K. Stacey, ‘China signs 99-year lease on Sri Lanka’s Hambantota port’, Financial Times, 11 December 2017, https://www.ft.com/content/e150ef0c-de37-11e7-a8a4-0a1e63a52f9c (accessed 16 October 2021).

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49. M. Hart-Landsberg and P. Burkett, ’China and the Dynamics of Transnational Accumulation: Causes and Consequences of Global Restructuring’, Historical Materialism, 14(39), 2006, pp. 22–28.

50. Ibid., p. 22.

51. D. Harvey, A Brief History of Neoliberalism, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2007, p. 144.

52. A. Bieler and C. Lee, ’Chinese Labour in the Global Economy: An Introduction’, Globalizations, 14(2), 2016, p. 181.

53. A. Y. So and Y. Chu, ‘Interrogating the China Model of Development’, in H. Veltmeyer and P. Bowles (eds), The Essential Guide to Critical Development Studies, Routledge, Abingdon, 2018, pp. 411–412.

54. Xinhua News Agency, ’China, Egypt Eye Belt, and Road Cooperation’, 25 April 2017, http://www.xinhuanet.com//english/2017-04/25/c_136232916.htm (accessed 2 October 2021).

55. Egyptian General Authority for Investment and Free Zones (GAFI), ’A Strong Economy and an Environment Suitable for Investment’, https://www.investinegypt.gov.eg/english/pages/whyegypt.aspx (accessed 20 December 2021).

56. OECD, OECD Investment Policy Reviews: Egypt 2020, OECD Publishing, Paris, 2020, p.21.

57. Xinhua News Agency, ’China Now Biggest Investor in Suez’, 23 March 2017, http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/business/2017-03/23/content_28648386.htm (accessed 2 October 2021).

58. Xinhua News Agency, ’China Harbour builds new terminal south of Egypt’s Suez Canal’, 30 August 2018, http://www.china.org.cn/business/2018-08/30/content_61026547.htm (accessed 4 October 2021).

59. Xinhua News Agency, ’China key to modernizing Egypt’s railway infrastructure’, 14 August 2017, http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/business/2017-08/14/content_30575962.htm (accessed 5 November 2021).

60. Global Construction Review, ’Chinese contractor to revolutionize Egypt’s rail system’, 4 September 2014, https://www.globalconstructionreview.com/chinese-contractor-revolutionise-9ts9-rail-syste6/(accessed 4 November 2021).

61. M. S. Diab, ’Belt and Road Puts Egypt at Forefront of China’s New Renewable Energy Projects’, Ahram Online, 23 March 2019, http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/1/64/328705/Egypt/Politics-/Belt-and-Road-puts-Egypt-at-forefront-of-Chinas-ne.aspx (accessed 10 November 2021).

62. World Nuclear News, ’China, Egypt agree to nuclear cooperation’, 28 May 2015, https://www.world-nuclear-news.org/NP-China-Egypt-agree-to-nuclear-cooperation-2805154.html (accessed 6 November 2021).

63. Energy Egypt, ’Chinese Consortium Wins Contract for Hamrawein Coal-Fired Plant’, 26 June 2018, https://energyegypt.net/chinese-consortium-wins-contractfor-egypts-hamrawein-coal-fired-power-plant/ (accessed 5 November 2021).

64. UNCTAD, World Investment Report 2021, United Nations Publications, New York, 202, p. 6.

65. OECD, OECD Investment Policy Reviews: Egypt 2020, OECD Publishing, Paris, 2020, p. 37.

66. OECD, OECD Review of Foreign Direct Investment Statistics: Egypt, OECD Publishing, Paris, 2020, p. 9.

67. Historical bloc, which is linked to the Gramscian concept of hegemony, is key for both constructing and contesting hegemony. It refers to a form of unity in aims and beliefs among various social-class forces with competing and heterogeneous interests.64 During the 1970s, the postwar historical bloc that had organized the US-led hegemonic order was crumbling due to a combined political and economic crisis. The fracturing of the economic arrangements that had led to the postwar economic growth and thus social stability not only damaged the anticommunist compromise between capital and labour, but also threatened the whole capitalist system. Therefore, the entire system had to be reconstructed around new institutional and regulatory arrangements to create the conditions for renewed accumulation and expansion of capital. It was not until the 1980s that that a ‘solution’ to these challenges was found with the emergence of a new historical bloc built around neoliberalism across the advanced capitalist countries. This new neoliberal historical bloc was primarily concerned with overcoming the crisis of falling rate of profit that had emerged over the 1970s and early 1980s. By attacking working-class organizations, by increasing the rate of exploitation, by spatially reorganizing manufacturing industries and generating massive new reserves of global labour, the rate of profit was significantly restored from its lows of the early 1980s. China has been a key supporter and component of this neoliberal historical bloc.

68. K. Hassan, ‘US warns Egypt to avoid Chinese companies on 5 G connections’, Al-Monitor, 3 November 2020, https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2020/11/egypt-china-us-war-5g-networks-boycott.html (accessed 4 November 2021).

69. Ursula von der Leyen, op. cit.

70. Egypt Independent, ‘Egypt, China sign economic deal to enhance joint cooperation’, 9 November 2021, https://egyptindependent.com/egypt-china-sign-economic-deal-to-enhance-joint-cooperation/ (accessed 12 November 2021).

71. Xinhua News Agency, ‘Chinese vocational workshop in Egypt prepares graduates for labour market’, 02 September 2021, http://www.news.cn/english/2021-09/02/c_1310164523.htm (accessed 15 November 2021).

Additional information

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Yahya Gülseven

Yahya Gülseven works as an expert for the Turkish International Cooperation and Coordination Agency. He has 16 years of experience in the design and implementation of development cooperation projects in various countries. He also works as a part-time instructor in the Department of Political Science and International Relations, Başkent University, Ankara. His research interests are international aid architecture, emerging donors, and the South-South Cooperation.