Why do we need ‘myth-busting’ in the study of Sino–African relations?

The literature on Sino–African relations has debated whether or not China's growing presence is a threat to Western or African interests, and has come to the conclusion that China's behavior is not uniquely immoral. Many countries, including Western liberal democracies, similarly give aid...

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Main Authors: Hirono, Miwa, Suzuki, Shogo
Format: Article
Published: Taylor & Francis (Routledge) 2014
Online Access:https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/2582/
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author Hirono, Miwa
Suzuki, Shogo
author_facet Hirono, Miwa
Suzuki, Shogo
author_sort Hirono, Miwa
building Nottingham Research Data Repository
collection Online Access
description The literature on Sino–African relations has debated whether or not China's growing presence is a threat to Western or African interests, and has come to the conclusion that China's behavior is not uniquely immoral. Many countries, including Western liberal democracies, similarly give aid to local autocrats to secure natural resources. Why, then, has so much effort been made to come to this perhaps unsurprising conclusion? We argue that the literature on Chinese foreign policy remains heavily influenced by Western states' policy interests, resulting in an impoverished debate that is primarily concerned with the idea of a China threat. In order to recover the diversity in our research on Chinese foreign policy, we argue for the need to go beyond the confines of Western strategic interests.
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spelling nottingham-25822020-05-04T16:42:28Z https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/2582/ Why do we need ‘myth-busting’ in the study of Sino–African relations? Hirono, Miwa Suzuki, Shogo The literature on Sino–African relations has debated whether or not China's growing presence is a threat to Western or African interests, and has come to the conclusion that China's behavior is not uniquely immoral. Many countries, including Western liberal democracies, similarly give aid to local autocrats to secure natural resources. Why, then, has so much effort been made to come to this perhaps unsurprising conclusion? We argue that the literature on Chinese foreign policy remains heavily influenced by Western states' policy interests, resulting in an impoverished debate that is primarily concerned with the idea of a China threat. In order to recover the diversity in our research on Chinese foreign policy, we argue for the need to go beyond the confines of Western strategic interests. Taylor & Francis (Routledge) 2014-03-01 Article PeerReviewed Hirono, Miwa and Suzuki, Shogo (2014) Why do we need ‘myth-busting’ in the study of Sino–African relations? Journal of Contemporary China, 23 (87). pp. 443-461. ISSN 1067-0564 http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10670564.2013.843889#.Uy3HIKh_s9Y doi:10.1080/10670564.2013.843889 doi:10.1080/10670564.2013.843889
spellingShingle Hirono, Miwa
Suzuki, Shogo
Why do we need ‘myth-busting’ in the study of Sino–African relations?
title Why do we need ‘myth-busting’ in the study of Sino–African relations?
title_full Why do we need ‘myth-busting’ in the study of Sino–African relations?
title_fullStr Why do we need ‘myth-busting’ in the study of Sino–African relations?
title_full_unstemmed Why do we need ‘myth-busting’ in the study of Sino–African relations?
title_short Why do we need ‘myth-busting’ in the study of Sino–African relations?
title_sort why do we need ‘myth-busting’ in the study of sino–african relations?
url https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/2582/
https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/2582/
https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/2582/