Sino-African Economic Ties and Democracy

This study is set to provide quantitative evidence on the effect of China’s growing economic presence on democracy in Africa, with a special focus on the role of trade and FDI, because most of the literature has focused on the role of aid, even though the increase in trade and FDI has been much more prominent in the 2000s. On the basis of a quantitative cross-country analysis, the study attempts to answer the research question ​‘does the increasing economic dependence on China influence democratisation in Africa?’​. Additional subset analyses and the literature are utilized to further examine the patterns and nature of the potential relationships. The quantitative analysis is conducted by running regressions on time series data on democratization, trade, FDI stocks, and socio-economic development. The findings of the analysis suggest that the increasing economic dependence on China does not​ have an unequivocally negative influence on democracy in Africa as a whole. Instead, the results suggest a high degree of complexity​: ​the influence of the Chinese economic engagement seems to depend on, among others, the type of the commercial relationship, the initial level of democracy, the level of socio-economic development and the size of the partner country’s economy