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The United States could better advance its agenda for American-Chinese relations by deferring to “middle power leadership” on such issues as reforming the international financial system, according to Bruce Gilley, an associate professor of political science at Portland State University, and the author of “The Right to Rule: How States Win and Lose Legitimacy.”
Washington could also engage South Africa “in dampening China’s support for Robert G. Mugabe’s regime in Zimbabwe,” he recently wrote.
Good idea, although a little complicated by the fact that South Africa’s president, Jacob Zuma, and the ruling African National Congress have shown a disturbing degree of enthusiasm for the “China model” of developmental authoritarianism as an alternative to what the ANC calls the market fundamentalism of Western democracies.
Even though the China model has begun to creak a little, the South African Institute of International Affairs (SAIIA) has “taken on an exceedingly important task,” writes Sina Odugbemi:
Its ‘China in Africa’ research project ‘seeks to develop an understanding of the motives, rationale and institutional structures guiding China’s Africa policy, and to study China’s growing power and influence so that they will help rather than hinder development in Africa’. (p.2). An important research paper – ‘The Rise of China’s State-Led Media Dynasty in Africa’ – was published in June this year by SAIIA as part of its ‘China in Africa’ research project. The author, YuShan Wu, is a researcher on the team. The report shows that China is moving into the African media landscape with a striking comprehensiveness and intensity.
