China’s New World Order Model of Engagement: A Critical Comparison with the Old European Colonial Powers’ involvement in Africa

Abstract

China’s engagement model with Africa has received little scholarly attention from international relations scholars and practitioners in the past. Scholars who have written more about China’s engagement with Africa have far more focused on other significant aspects emanating from alternative sister disciplines of econometrics, economics, political science, and so forth. While this is the case, this paper sought to extensively delve into the subject of China’s Africa engagement model and compare and contrast China’s Africa engagement model with that of the British and French colonial models of the earlier imperial period. This paper argues fundamentally that China’s Africa engagement model—although not far different from that of the European colonial powers—advances pillars that champion a soft foreign policy stance while it hides its extensive disregard for African countries and their economies. Methodologically, this paper relied on complete interdisciplinary discourse analysis and prevailing continental relevant literature on the subject of China-Africa relations, British-Africa relations, and French-Africa relations.