Fragmented soft power in the myth of global China : changing dynamics of China's education aid to Africa

Abstract

With its increasing economic presence, China as an emerging donor and its soft power in Africa catch wide attention. China’s education aid to Africa, in comparison with traditional donors, has been examined by existing studies. The comparative lens reveals the distinctiveness of China’s education aid. Yet, with a state-centric approach, it can hardly explain two paradoxical questions: (1) despite China’s increasing government scholarships, training, and Confucius Institutes in Africa, why does its soft power in Africa remain insufficient? (2) although Africa is not prioritized in China’s government scholarships and the establishment of Confucius Institutes, why is China’s cultural presence in Africa faced with neo-colonialism critics?

This doctoral study answers these questions from an endogenous perspective with China as the agent. Employing critical realism as its analytic framework, it constructs a transformational model of international development cooperation, which entails dual agent-structure relations. Internally, China’s ministerial actors and the state transform each other. Externally, China and the current international development cooperation architecture reproduce each other. The research is completed through a qualitative design of two phases lasting from 2018 to 2020. Phase I investigates bureaucratic politics in the policymaking of China’s education aid to Africa through analyzing statistics, policy content, archives, in-depth interviews, and participant observations. Phase II conducts a case study on Ethiopia to explore the manifestation of bureaucratic politics at the implantation level. Ethiopia is selected as a typical case for its typicality of bureaucratic structure in the Chinese embassy and maximum variation of education aid activities.

This thesis first reveals that China’s education aid to Africa results from the interaction between ministerial agendas and Chinese foreign policy. The ministerial divide between China’s Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) and the Ministry of Education (MOE) hinders China’s soft power projection. Secondly, it suggests that the education-for-economic growth paradigm, soft power for external recognition, and insufficient knowledge production jointly entail China’s incapability in the neo-colonialism debate. Yet, these should be understood from an endogenous perspective. China’s divergent attitudes toward education for economic growth and education for all project its domestic development experience rather than rejecting social justice. Its soft power approach originated as policy toward developed countries while is inappropriate for China-Africa relations. Such endogenous dynamics consist of China’s input in South-South Cooperation and its reproduction of the international development cooperation architecture. However, this reproduction is veiled owing to the insufficient knowledge production of China and in South-South Cooperation.

The contribution is threefold. (1) It addresses the “epistemic fallacy” that neglects social realities beyond one’s perception. This fallacy is usually reinforced by the uneven international power structure. Bridging this gap implies a way out of the uneven structure to produce knowledge of and from the South. (2) It bridges disciplinary knowledge on education aid in international relations, development studies, and comparative education. (3) It fills the gap beyond the domestic and the international perceptions on China’s education aid to Africa.