http://triplecrisis.com/china-and-africa-a-new-approach-to-development/ Global Perspectives on Finance, Development, and Environment Thu, 09 Feb 2012 15:49:02 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.1 http://triplecrisis.com/china-and-africa-a-new-approach-to-development/comment-page-1/#comment-4061 jd Mon, 09 Aug 2010 16:30:40 +0000 http://triplecrisis.com/?p=1021#comment-4061 This is all well and good - China as "new colonialist" is not a very illuminating term. But the more nuanced question that skeptics ask is whether Chinese investment is enabling unaccountable or incompetent leaders to maintain or tighten their hold on power, and if so, whether the malign effects of this power concentration will outweigh or cancel out some or all of the positive effects of investment and the "opportunity" provided by infrastructural gains and commercial activity. It's fine to see some knocking down of the simplistic "new colonialist" notion, but it would be nice to see some discussion of the more complicated issues as well. This is all well and good – China as “new colonialist” is not a very illuminating term. But the more nuanced question that skeptics ask is whether Chinese investment is enabling unaccountable or incompetent leaders to maintain or tighten their hold on power, and if so, whether the malign effects of this power concentration will outweigh or cancel out some or all of the positive effects of investment and the “opportunity” provided by infrastructural gains and commercial activity. It’s fine to see some knocking down of the simplistic “new colonialist” notion, but it would be nice to see some discussion of the more complicated issues as well.

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