Chinese and Western Development Approaches in Africa: Implications for the SDGs

ThisDevelopment chapter discusses the entry of ChinaChina into the game of foreign finance in AfricaAfrica in an international comparative perspective. We present an analysis of long-run changes in the allocation of Western aidAid both globally and in AfricaAfrica, along with estimates of the global sectoral allocation of Chinese aidAid. A similar analysis is also applied to ChinaChina’s foreign direct investment and international tradeTrade. While previous literature has predominantly attributed ChinaChina’s economic embrace of AfricaAfrica to domestic factors, we argue that the sectoral distribution of Beijing’s foreign aidAid—and partly foreign direct investment—is also affected by changes in the patterns of Western aidAid and investment flowing to the African continent. We provide quantitative evidence for long-run trends, switches and breaks in Western developmentDevelopment assistance. ChinaChina’s foreign aidAid typically flows into AfricaAfrica’s physical infrastructure and productive sectors of agricultureAgriculture and manufacturing, filling the vacuum which emerged when Western financial flows shifted to other activities, most notably capacity building and good governanceGovernance reforms. While the increasing tradeTrade relationships between ChinaChina and AfricaAfrica are often described as South–South tradeTrade, the pattern highly resembles the typical North–South tradeTrade patterns. Overall, this chapter shows that financial resources from both the traditional Western donors and emerging donors from the Global SouthGlobal South such as ChinaChina can help African recipient countries to achieve the Sustainable DevelopmentDevelopment Goals. ChinaChina’s developmentDevelopment assistance in AfricaAfrica may serve as a complement to the kinds of foreign aidAid provided by the traditional donor countries.