With some reservations, I agree with Barry Sautman and Yan Hairong on this:
The Chinese, it is said, are in Africa only for natural resources, to feed China’s industry and huge population. To exploit the continent, they provide loans and aid to rogue regimes. They worsen the plight of Africans by dumping cheap, shoddy products in their markets and ruin local industry. Chinese investors pay Africans a pittance, in contrast to more ethical Western firms. Given all that, China can only be an obstacle to Africa’s development.
It’s an exciting tale but, alas, the media have gotten it all wrong. It’s not mainly China that impairs Africa’s development, but a world system of neo-liberal capitalism, based on privatization, trade liberalization, and reduced social spending, into which China is now partly integrated. As part of the same world system, China and the West have many activities in common in Africa, but there are also some distinctly Chinese trade and investment practices and these are often more appealing to Africans.
"Africa" has a lot to gain by the involvement of China and that it is too easy and too sensationalistic to keep seeing Africa and Africans as objects of exploitations. It is never go when Africa is the place where hegemons, particularly formal colonial powers, are able to come and to serve their national interests without giving much in return and diversity and multiplicity are essential, That said, the focus as always ought to be elsewhere since development remains the central question and that we knows that it cannot be accomplished by trading partners or even solely international trade.
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