Return to isolationism? China and the decoupling of people-to-people relations in China’s relations with Africa
Start Date
13-4-2023 3:45 PM
End Date
13-4-2023 4:45 PM
Description
In its history, China has used self-isolation as a strategy to deal with perceived internal and foreign ‘existential threats.’ This strategy frames the non-Chinese and outside world as the ‘dangerous other’, thus justifying self-isolationism as a survival and preservation strategy. This paper, explores how China has employed this strategy to deal with the COVID pandemic. The COVID pandemic triggered this survival instinct in China and resulted in its self-isolation. The paper examines how Beijing’s zero COVID rate strategy, ostracization of foreigners, particularly Africans, and their framing as the other has resulted in the decoupling of people-to-people engagement from Beijing’s foreign policy. It further explores how the self-imposed Isolation of China and framing of Africans as the dangerous other challenged China's self-portrayal as the continent’s all-weather friend, and how that has exposed the schism between the responses of African elites and ordinary citizens to the othering of Africans in China.
Document Type
Presentation
Recommended Citation
Hodzi, O. (2023, April). Return to isolationism? China and the decoupling of people-to-people relations in China’s relations with Africa. Presented at the International Symposium on Africa-China Relations in an Era of Uncertain Future. Lingnan University, Hong Kong.
Return to isolationism? China and the decoupling of people-to-people relations in China’s relations with Africa
In its history, China has used self-isolation as a strategy to deal with perceived internal and foreign ‘existential threats.’ This strategy frames the non-Chinese and outside world as the ‘dangerous other’, thus justifying self-isolationism as a survival and preservation strategy. This paper, explores how China has employed this strategy to deal with the COVID pandemic. The COVID pandemic triggered this survival instinct in China and resulted in its self-isolation. The paper examines how Beijing’s zero COVID rate strategy, ostracization of foreigners, particularly Africans, and their framing as the other has resulted in the decoupling of people-to-people engagement from Beijing’s foreign policy. It further explores how the self-imposed Isolation of China and framing of Africans as the dangerous other challenged China's self-portrayal as the continent’s all-weather friend, and how that has exposed the schism between the responses of African elites and ordinary citizens to the othering of Africans in China.