China’s Transformative Approach To Africa

The main purpose of this thesis is to analyse these recent historical,and transformative,relations between Angola and China as a useful case study that can synthesize and be used as a standard case to explain the development of this transformative and close commercial and trade relations between China and Africa in the 21st century.The dependent variable for the research will be the diplomatic missions,events and deals between China and Angola during the time frame that I established for the study;while the independent variable will be the domestic events and domestic political concerns of the respective countries,combined with the geopolitical transformations that occurred throughout the years that determined the course of the relations between China and Angola,and how that translates to a larger geopolitical conjuncture.The real aspect of this dissertation begins with a brief historical contextualization towards Angola-Chinese relations after both countries officially established diplomatic relations in 12 January 1983,until the 2002,when the civil war in Angola had officially ended.With the strengthen of economic cooperation between the two countries,we will investigate on the reasons,the dynamics,and factors that contributed to the creation of a channel of Chinese financial assistance to Angola through the offering of credit lines in the form of infrastructure projects,and how those funds were used by Angola for its post-war reconstruction.Consequently,this dissertation also focuses on how China,through its policy of investments and financial assistance,exchange it for Angola’s oil and other natural resources in the form of a cooperative exchange that serves both interests equally.This author chose the specific chronological arc(1983-2019),to make a synthesis of what was the Sino-Angolan bilateral relations during those early years until today.This period provides the opportunity to analyse and understand of how the People’s Republic of China after the rise of power of Deng Xiaoping and its economic reforms adopted an entire new approach in its foreign policy,specifically its diplomatic relations and how it includes in the boarder "South-South cooperation".The methods used in this dissertation were mostly through the correspondence of Angolan academics and students that did most of the research dealing with China-Africa diplomatic relations,as well as the author’s own research on both Angolan,Portuguese,Chinese,and international media,that reported the most pivotal events of this close cooperation between the two countries.The study builds upon the theory of Realism,especially the natural-resource management and development dependency.Other theories,related to structuralism such as postcolonial studies and the "South-South cooperation",and how those theoretical themes can fit in the transformative Sino-Angolan relations.A series of conclusions can be mentioned:this transformative relationship did bring many implications to Angola,and in a lesser extent,to China as well.Angola witnessed a period of economic re-growth and a period of de-coupling from its traditional partners and former colonial empire,while China consolidated its access to Angola’s oil.China was able to successfully convince Angola and the rest of Africa that it would be a better investment alternative than the West and its international financial organizations.Despite that a few problems persist:cultural misunderstanding between the two nations;the US response;the possibility of Angola being over-reliant on China’s aid and economic assistance;and Angola’s economy necessity for more restructuring and diversification.