Neocolonialism Or Community Of Interest?

Africa is China's long-standing political and economic partner.The friendship between China and Africa has a long history and continues to advance.Sino-African trade is also an important part of Sino-Africa relations.Today,with the rise of trade protectionism,strengthening trade cooperation between China and Africa is of even greater practical significance.In 2018,China has become Africa's largest trading partner for nine consecutive years.China actively seeks a win-win relationship and mutual benefits with Africa in the framework of South-South cooperation.Under the "One Belt,One Road" initiative and the "going-out" strategy,the world witnessed remarkable achievements in China-Africa trade.Besides,China is actively trying to establish a China-Africa Interest Community.At the same time,the increasingly tightened trade between China and Africa has also aroused "China negativism".Western media defines Sino-African relations as neocolonialism.This distorted image of China also negatively influenced people's perception of China-Africa trade.In order to understand how African media view Sino-African trade,this paper selects four representative African countries that have a close economic relationship with China—South Africa,Nigeria,Kenya and Algeria.This paper focused on reports about Sino-African trade published by the four main media of the four African countries during a period between the sixth and the Seventh China-Africa Cooperation Forum.By combining the framework and agenda setting presented by the reports,through content analysis and text analysis,it is concluded that the image of Sino-African trade under the perspective of African media is not neo-colonialism.However,the reports reflected the characteristics of community of interest and represented a possibility of establishing one between China and Africa.This paper also explores the overall attitude of African media to Sino-African trade through five perspectives: overall China-Africa economic and trade exchanges,China-Africa bilateral trade,China's aid to Africa,China's FDI and contracting projects in Africa,and at last,the different attitude towards traditional African trading partners,such as the U.S.and Europe.Finally,this paper also proposes from two aspects advices for shaping a win-win Sino-African trade image,so as to promote the establishment of a community of interest and a more sustainable China-Africa relations.