Jodie Yuzhou Sun
Description: Jodie Sun is a Senior Lecturer in Modern African and Global History at Fudan University and Visiting Scholar at Stanford University’s Center for African Studies. Her research focuses on international relations history between Africa and China, particularly Kenya and Zambia during the Cold-War era. In this episode we discuss the origin of China’s relationship with Africa and how that dynamic has evolved over the decades. We also compare the United States’ approach to foreign aid in Africa and examine the “new scramble” for political influence and resource access in Africa.
Website:
Publications:
Book: Kenya's and Zambia's Relations with China 1949-2019
Resources:
Background on China’s Belt & Road Initiative
Background on China’s Digital Silk Road Initiative
China-Africa Writing Competition
Chinese in Africa, Africans in China Research Network
China-Africa Shanghai International Network (CASIN) WeChat Blog
Show Notes:
[0:04] Introduction to Professor Jody Sun
[2:16] Journey into African Studies
[8:40] Insights from Field Research
[10:38] Understanding Chinese Political Concepts
[17:01] Exploring China-Africa Historical Relations
[23:18] China's Role in Decolonization
[29:15] The Impact of Chinese Aid
[34:34] The Significance of Tazara Railway
[42:50] Comparing Aid Models: China vs. USSR
[50:17] Shifts in Chinese Diaspora
[53:39] The Rise of China in Africa
[1:04:17] The Belt and Road Initiative Explained
[1:10:22] Evaluating the Success of BRI
[1:17:43] The Importance of Alumni Networks
[1:21:40] Final Thoughts on Global Experiences
Unedited AI Generated Transcript:
Brent:
[0:00] Welcome, Professor Jody Sun. Thank you for coming on today.
Jodie:
[0:05] Hi, good to see you.
Keller:
[0:07] We'd love to start off by hearing a little bit more about your story. What got you interested in Chinese-African history and how you ended up at Stanford?
Jodie:
[0:13] Right. Thank you for the invitation. So I'm originally from China in a province called Hebei. I don't know if you know about Qin Shi Huang, the first emperor of China, but my city's name after him. So I've always been fascinated about the outside world as a small kid. I read a lot of sci-fi work and travel logs and so on. So I think that curiosity about world geography, history, culture has existed since I was a kid. But in terms of really my pursuit in history and Africa, I started with my bachelor degree at Nottingham Ningbo University. So it is a Sino-British collaborative university located in Zhejiang province.
Jodie:
[0:57] When I first got there, I just thought I wanted to do something broadly about IR, international relations. And at the time, I came across a lot of subjects, talking about development, political economy.
Jodie:
[1:13] And also, there was a FOLCAC meeting, it was a forum on China-Africa cooperation. So I followed the news updates and thought, okay, there are a lot of things going on for China's investment and activities and migration in Africa, and I want to delve into that subject further. So I decided to choose to do my first bunchless thesis on the topic about cultural diplomacy of China to Africa. And then I got into archives and then read a lot of historical episodes and anecdotes. And then I thought it was cool to do my master's degree in African studies. So I applied for the program in Oxford. And I was admitted at the time, became a huge news in town because nobody heard about what African studies mean back in 2013. So remember, after I graduated, I think within a month, there came the concept of Belt and Road Initiative. But, you know, that was a lot of people joked about me like, oh, you chose a golden subject, something cool. But I didn't know that it's going to be cool later on. But I just thought,
Jodie:
[2:14] like, I just want to learn something brand new. And it's quite an interesting journey to start with that degree in Oxford. And then the first time, in order to complete the degree, I went to Zambia for my fieldwork research. So I've spent a month in the country, two weeks in the capital city called Osaka, and then two weeks in the Coppervale region, particularly in Kittwe.
Jodie:
[2:37] And then dola briefly so i think that kind of opened the door for me and and i had other opportunities to work but then i thought i need to really like you know delve much much deeper into this subject and uh to be a kind of a phd researcher in the future so i kind of decided to apply then for phd uh with the same supervisor miles lama at university of oxford and then started the chapter about being academic.
Keller:
[3:03] Yeah did that first trip to zambia change your perspective because you had been studying at that point for probably, what, six years on African culture in relation with China. Did going there in person lead to any big changes?
Jodie:
[3:15] I think before I went to Zambia for the first time in 2013, all my knowledge about Africa came from texts.
Jodie:
[3:24] You know, this is a learning process. I need to process a lot of information, but a lot of things were abstract. I remember this is an interdisciplinary training process. So we did courses that like for example like anthropology i had no idea about what it means until i studied things on like you know masquerade witchcraft and there was also a very influential book about expectation of modernity by james ferguson who's a stanford-based anthropologist writing about copper belt and so on so i had no idea what does that mean on a personal level so until i i traveled to zambia i stayed with a bunch of um uh young priests who were training uh in the same gas house i stayed so i had conversation with them and i even like wrote some chinese pieces block pieces talking about the coexistence of traditional belief systems and christianity in zambia how people just operate without any problem on on two levels of spiritualities and how that means like on a daily kind of occasions that people process that kind of information and knowledge. I think that really shaped me also in terms of how I see development. It's not like an up-down, top-down process, but rather how people live through a lot of daily challenges, but also opportunities, informal economy.
Jodie:
[4:50] People just sell stuff when I took the buses to a city center and just pop up and then, you know, to buy some water, fruits and so on. So a lot of things also, you can see resemblances of that.
Jodie:
[5:02] When i was a kid growing up in my hometown that you know i witnessed urbanization so i think there are to some level similarities about my childhood experience about this uh changing of urban lifestyle you know and also the kind of a very young and vibrant population uh is very much also the kind of environment i grew up with so i had i instantly connected with the people and the social conditions that he experienced. So I think to that point, it really changed my take of the discipline in general.
Brent:
[5:32] Yeah. And you said you lived in a gas house?
Jodie:
[5:34] Yes.
Brent:
[5:35] What is that?
Jodie:
[5:36] So he's actually, because that was my first visit to Zambia, and I contacted one of my senior students supervised by the same professor, and she said, I've been to Zambia and stayed with this gas house and it's relatively safe and provided also food as well so you can just use that place as a safe place to for you to do your field work and before that i know not a single zambian so that was the only one is i got his email and he promised to pick me up at airport so i hoped fingers crossed that this guy will show up on time otherwise i will be left in the airport without knowing anyone in the country and my parents were like so i was crazy yeah they were so worried they even called me i think a few days before i left saying that jody can you cancel the trip we were so worried and at that time remember the smartphone was not very popular in zambia and i remembered i used chinese wechat for contact and i can't sometimes receive any signal and there was sometimes electricity card and so on so it was very different you know back then but i think on another note uh it was a a life-changing moment where you really got to a place with a lot of um expectations but then that kind of expectations really lived to the ground in terms of what it means generally on on your daily life yeah.
Keller:
[6:59] When we went to china we were trying to learn a little more about chinese history and we're listening to like audiobooks on the origins of chinese political theory and part of that was the idea of like zhongo and middle kingdom and how that influenced the earlier ideas of how china perceived the world.
Jodie:
[7:16] Could.
Keller:
[7:16] You explain a little bit about that kind of idea and.
Jodie:
[7:18] Maybe how.
Keller:
[7:19] That's translated to today.
Jodie:
[7:20] That's a very conceptual question i think to me the kind of closest um relation to to to what i did is i came across a literary work by a Malian poet, politician, Mamado Gologo. And he once traveled to China in 1962 or 1963 and published his travelogue. And there was one point he made, is that China is not a country, China is a continent.
Jodie:
[7:49] So that's why sometimes when people say, why do you put China-Africa together? It's not on the same level. Africa is not a country, we have to say a lot of times. On the other hand, I think what China represents is not only a nation state. It's something bigger than a nation state. It's because the whole idea about Westphalian sovereignty, right? This nation state as the key units of international relations was a modern creation and very European one as well. A lot of Chinese history in terms of political organization and societal organization originated with its own history of involvement, like the kingdom's idea about ancient unparenting tribute system in terms of how China framed its relations with other neighboring countries and so on. So I think that kind of concept has a lot of resonances in the sense that how
Jodie:
[8:36] you see yourself being connected with a wider world.
Jodie:
[8:40] And from that point of view, it is Sinocentric because China considered as to be the center of the universe for a long time. That was the emperor believed for a long time. But on the other hand, I think I also see that related to the idea of harmony. So you can understand these relations not only like disjunctures, particularly in comparison with some of the European powers. It's more like based on a growth of industrialization. Capitalism is very much based on expansion. And that expansion was not territorial, but mainly through economic transactions and colonization follow up with that. But I think to China, that concept is about trade facilitation of information and goods. Of course, there is...
Jodie:
[9:29] An unbalanced power of relations in that concept of Middle Kingdom, because China has to be in the center of the universe. On the other hand, a lot of their relations were not really formalized. It was more based on common perceptions about civilization and particular type of culture, and Confucianism was one of it, and there are other types of influences of Buddhism and other philosophies as well. So it's based on a more kind of harmonious way of seeing society. I think that plays a huge part. Today, when we talk about collectivism of Chinese culture or East Asian culture in general, there's something different from what we see the kind of forces that make, for example, United States quite unique is its history of expansion in the West and also independent movement and so on. I think definitely there is a civilizational feature to that argument. And to what extent this really helps understand today's international relations is another question, I guess.
Brent:
[10:33] Yeah. And then just for context for the listener, China in Chinese is Zhongguo, correct?
Jodie:
[10:39] Yeah.
Brent:
[10:39] Yeah. Now kind of moving into your work specifically, could you give us a broad overview, and we can dive deeper into this too, about China's relationship with Africa?
Jodie:
[10:52] I think the reason why I was fascinated by the history of China-Africa was exactly the point that when I saw a lot of investments, and particularly the flow of people to the African continent, there was little being said about what was the presence, China's presence, before this whole flow of money and people. So there was assumption that this was something new. This was refreshing, not only to Africans, but mainly that point of view came from the West. It seems that European powers have been there, but like China, you know, only emerged as a big economic power. This was a recent thing after 2000. But after you dig really closely into that history, you will realize that even before the foundation of PRC, for example, the reason why I talk about my hometown.
Jodie:
[11:44] Qin Huangdao, is where exactly the point where a lot of indentured labor of northern China were recruited during the late Qing dynasty and then exported to a wits, South Africa, to work on the mining site. So there was a history in terms of earlier Chinese, as in Dutch labor, across the globe including, I know, United States is part of the destination, but South Africa was a big history.
Jodie:
[12:11] And those people left South Africa after they finished the work. But then at the turn of the 20th century, there were also income of some of the Chinese migrants. That was during even the Republican era. And in South Africa, for example, you see different generation of Chinese there as well. So I think that makes it a little different in terms of when you say China or Chineseness, what do you mean? It's not always associated with PRC or even CCP. It was a kind of cultural term, for example, in South Africa, where you see different generations of Chinese, but they originally, from different parts of the country, they experienced very different types of the history, and the Chinese-ness, they can mean quite differently as well. So I think that was the kind of point where I entered the field to bring a question mark about what do we mean here in China. And also for Africa is the same question. African countries, most of them got independence after the end of the Second World War. And because of the kind of whole idea about restructural power.
Jodie:
[13:12] Decolonization came as a kind of natural process that British, particularly British and French, had to allow these countries to independent. In some cases, Portuguese ones were more violent. So we know about that history. But to what extent China played a role into it, a few scholars really discuss about this in detail. It seemed that you just mentioned that, oh, there was some sort of engagement, and we don't know what exactly it is. So I want to just go over the kind of simplistic term that China-Africa has a history, but what is that history? So that's, I think, my job, to do this work.
Keller:
[13:50] In that initial movement after the decolonization, what were a few of the big drivers for that change? Was it industrialization? Was it... Chinese families seeking different cultures? What were a few of the things you found?
Jodie:
[14:06] I think the decolonization era, when we talk about it, is mainly the 50s and 60s, where these, again, there is an anglophone-francophone bias in here. We're not talking about lusophones, which came a bit later. But most of the kind of impasse for China to get involved in there. That was after the PRC was established. And if you know about the context of China's foreign policy, you would know that was a few years later, after the PRC was established, there was a Korean War. China got involved into an indirect conflict with the United States and the allied power in a way. And that kind of.
Jodie:
[14:50] Hostile diplomatic relations also means that China, the PRC was banned from entering the UN. So it was the ROC who was taking the seat of the UN for a long time until 1971. But China need allies. So there's a practical question again is when the existing powers, the European ones and also the United States, I mean, they had their own visions of ideology, which was not something China identified with. So I think, ideologically speaking, there was a pursuit for a kind of other way of organizing the world, not the capitalist way. So that's what Soviet Union believed in and CCP believed in. On the other hand, I think, practically speaking, China needed more allies. So a lot of independent countries, African countries, they were admitted to the UN. And it was a huge push, I think, China to engage more broadly with newly independent countries and to have more different types of collaborations and partnerships and friends. Basically, anyone needs friends. So was China at the time.
Keller:
[15:55] Could you describe a little bit about the characterization of the UN from China? Because when we grew up, we learned about the UN and they kind of, they pitch it very much as this holier than thou, organization and it was a very solely good force. But obviously, in the context of China and other nations, the UN was probably perceived as maybe an aggressor, especially in diplomatic relations. Could you speak a little bit to that?
Jodie:
[16:19] That was a really good question, actually. Because I think as a historian, I have different wills, particularly African historian. There was one particular historic episode that we studied a lot. I even published a paper about it, is the Congo crisis.
Jodie:
[16:35] Where there was the 1960, the Secretary General Hammersholt led a peace mission to get entangled in Congo and to help stabilize the situation there. But from the local point of view, UN did very little things to really help pacify
Jodie:
[16:56] the violence, particularly that stemming from the Katanga region in the south. And that was the point where Prime Minister Petrus Lumumba was frustrating because UN, he felt, was powerless in dealing with some of the successionist movements in Katanga. So he basically called for help first to the United States, got rejected, and then to Soviet Union. And it was the unilateral agreement where it really worked. And it was the Soviet Union who committed and sent promised troops and, you know, military supplies.
Jodie:
[17:33] On the other hand, it annoyed U.S. and Belgian forces quite a lot. And eventually CIA was involved in finally assassinating Patris Lumumba at the time. So I think from Africans' perspective, if you ask different people, they'll have different opinions on this. And definitely in the Congo crisis, the UN was a relatively weak player. And Hamoshaw himself tried very hard to make it work by making a lot of efforts to negotiate with regional powers and so on. But his flight...
Jodie:
[18:06] Mysteriously crashed down in Andola, Copper Belt, Zambia. I visited even his site where the plane crashed. And there were lots of theories, some of those conspiracy ones, talking about his death and so on. And there was still a puzzle unresolved until today. So I think really have to see in terms of different periods of time, UN had played very different roles. And another point to this is actually why a lot of African country leaders voted for the PRC to be re-admitted to the UN. Not because ideologically they were friendly to China. On the contrary, their reason was very simple. PRC was bigger. It has bigger size of population. And to them, it's simple that number speaks. They want a realistic representation of a country that matches up that size. So if you read actually the speeches and the papers for these diplomats who negotiated for that voting, the argument is like that. It's nothing about ideology. So even those who were traditionally considered as hostile countries to China, voting in favor for the PRC, like Kenya, the countries I studied in the 70s, was not so friendly. But it voted even for China's re-admission.
Brent:
[19:32] And then can you break down that a bit more in context of current-day China? So the PRC is now mainland China, and was Taiwan in the UN at that point? And then when African countries voted to admit mainland China now, that's what switched it to mainland having more control?
Jodie:
[19:52] I think that kind of result of the vote came only in 1971, but the efforts have already been there. As early as the Bandung Conference, the first Afro-Asian conference in 1955, because China wanted to be represented at the conference. It's important because it was organized by a non-aligned state. A lot of newly independent countries were involved. At that time, many African countries were not independent yet, but a lot of Middle Eastern countries and Southeast Asians, even including the host country, Indonesia, they were very keen to have that kind of... You know, a multilateral framework that is different from, you know, the imperial ones or the European or U.S.-led ones. So I think it's at that point that China really pushed very hard for its own foreign policy principles. For example, five principles of coexistence, you know, was also quite very heavily installed here. And I think that struggle continued all the way in the 60s to the 71 and even afterwards because we know although china was re-admitted to u.n 71 many other african countries still recognize roc for a long time until currently only swatini right one of the only countries that recognize roc so it took a while for the efforts to come out but i think the struggle was already what was already underwater for quite some time.
Brent:
[21:16] And could you define roc.
Jodie:
[21:17] Republic of china yeah yeah what.
Brent:
[21:20] Is that for like people who might not know because i feel like what's like the difference between that and the prc.
Jodie:
[21:25] All right um that that would be a very interesting question because the one thing i don't use taiwan is because taiwan is a geographical concept until the recent party who fundamentally claimed for some sort of unique identity as as taiwan is that was very different from the nationalist chinese nationalist party Chinese International Party still believed in one China principle. The only difference is it should be Nationalist Party, not CCP, who was in control. So there was definitely still some common ground for that conversation. There is recognition of only one China, one government, but who should be the legitimate government is the fundamental question. But the identity about Taiwan as a country was a very recent thing. It was kind of materialized in the last two elections, in my opinion.
Keller:
[22:26] You mentioned Eastbody being the only country that recognized the ROC back in the 70s. Is that something that still continues today, or have they changed the recognition to the PRC?
Jodie:
[22:35] So some countries that did not recognize PRC in the 70s switched to PRC after 2000s. So a lot of countries did that. I think, practically speaking, China economically had a lot of investments and doing very well. To me, it's nothing ideological. It's pragmatic diplomacy. You just basically want to deal with a more powerful and influential player. That benefits It's for your economic growth, for your political image, and for all sorts of different things.
Brent:
[23:19] And then kind of take a step back into more historical context. What were some of the major ways China got involved in Africa during the 50s and 60s?
Jodie:
[23:29] I think there are several levels in engagement. The first one, of course, is political. And that political means China was very active in promoting a different type of world order. So see a lot of that diplomatic common ground is the idea that we try to establish an anti-colonial and anti-imperialist social and political order so that was a kind of a common ground where china got involved in a lot of these afro-atian solidarity non-aligned movements and various other platforms and based on the political recognition of that common interest and you that kind of recognition, there's also a lot of economic aid. At that time, there was some trade in different countries, but that trade was relatively small compared to African countries' relations with European nations mainly, for example.
Jodie:
[24:27] Particularly with former colonial masters like France or Britain.
Jodie:
[24:33] Um but china's socialist aid has its unique feature because it has a lot of turn, turn over projects it means that they're going to help construct a project and transfer the project immediately to the local authorities and most of the projects that china sponsored are related to either infrastructure we're talking about railway roads textile mill hydropower stations Or there are some sort of agricultural teams that we call a technical agreement that China sends a lot of experts to help cultivate a type of talents in doing, you know, agricultural growth or wood calving. And I think there are also things that are talking about different kinds of, I think, what was the name of it? I couldn't recall. But anyway, so there were lots of technical aid, including even doctors, medical doctors, Chinese medical doctors. So economically, that was a huge thing. And then culturally, a lot, right? So I think what interestingly is about this production about African literature and a lot of those things were translated into Chinese and published in the 60s that nowadays the Chinese young people don't even know they exist. So, until I started doing this research, I realized a bunch of interesting African literature got translated to Chinese at the time in the 60s.
Jodie:
[25:59] And that kind of pushed also, I think, for the cultural phenomenon of Africa being not only about Africa, but it is about the oppressed people's experience. And we have to do something about it. And we kind of have that kind of... I think, very much necessary relations with Chairman Mao's idea is mass mobilization. They want people to get involved into revolution and continued revolution as well.
Keller:
[26:27] I definitely want to ask more about the literature piece, but back to the infrastructure quickly. What was China's stake in those early infrastructure programs? Were they getting some kind of economic benefit directly, or was it more of a soft power tool of just having political goodwill?
Jodie:
[26:42] Yeah, that's a very good question. I think most of these socialist aid were signed based on the idea that this is supposed to be mutually beneficial. But in reality, that kind of mutually beneficial, most of the time, do not translate into material gains. So these projects, as I said, although local governments were supposed to pay back China, this was most of the time zero rate for their payment, or it's like China just forgave a lot of these sort of repayment schedules and so on. So materially, even for a project like Tazara Railway, the Tanzania-Zambian cross-nation railway, it did not really make economic benefits at all to China. It cost you a lot of money, but it really was not for economic reasons it built in the first place. So I think I would rather say that most of the impacts of these aid programs are towards the political significance to establish kind of trust and collaboration in the long run.
Keller:
[27:52] And with the African literature piece, how was that distributed in China? Once they did the translations and built up this piece of cultural significance, what did that look like? Was it going to libraries? Was it something that was embedded in younger children education?
Jodie:
[28:08] Yeah. Particularly, if we talk about the translated African literature into Chinese, these were not produced for any commercial purposes. They are not supposed to make any money because that was a socialist era. And most people read books in public libraries and schools. So the idea is really educational. The idea is really to broaden up the existing curriculum. And I think a follow-up reason to that is really to show that China was actively supporting a lot of liberation struggles, you know, and a lot of these anti-imperialist struggles abroad. And that gives a lot of faith and belief, I mean, in the local populations, and that helps for the solidarity in general, and also helps and then lead to naturally, I think, to the Cultural Revolution in 1966, is to get people, everyone involved in the revolution. It's not only about those people in power, but it's about everyone. It's down to the countryside. It's everyone has to participate in the revolution.
Jodie:
[29:10] So the circulation was very much limited to public libraries and schools.
Brent:
[29:15] But public libraries and schools in China?
Jodie:
[29:18] Yes, in China.
Brent:
[29:19] As well as Africa or not really?
Jodie:
[29:21] This was another thing. So they translated the African literature into Chinese language, but the Chinese also published some of the literatures written by African scholars. So including Mao Zedong Logo, the person I just mentioned from Mali, he published his travelogue in China with a Chinese press in both French and English. And that target market is, of course, towards the globe, not to Chinese. So at the same time, China also participated actively in the Afro-Asian Writers Bureau. So they had its own official publication out of it called Sokol. And China also contributed to that kind of global literary scene by contributing to that kind of so-called third world literature, we call it today.
Brent:
[30:13] Yeah. And then just for like a broad contextualization... How many Chinese went to Africa during the 50s and 60s?
Jodie:
[30:23] I mean, Chinese people in the socialist, you know, the Mao Zedong particularly, don't have private passports. So they do not travel for individual purposes. Most of the time they travel is because they have diplomat reasons or business reasons. And at that time, there was no private capital in China anyway. So it had to come from either the state governments or from a kind of what we call the SOE today. But it's actually most of these are still state-owned enterprises. Very few people. So most of the time they carried on certain missions, political, cultural, economic missions to Africa. And then after they finished their work, they immediately came back to China. So they were not allowed to travel freely. So I think based on that, we don't have a concise figure how many of them, but I would say very limited. I mean, at the time when the Tazara Railway was built, there are lots of engineers and workers and even doctors travel to Tanzania. A lot of them stationed in Tanzania. That number could be quite high. But except for that project, most of the time, you know, there will be just a dozen of people who stay there for like two years or three years. After completing the mission, they will come back home, I guess.
Keller:
[31:46] Could you give a little context to the Tanzania-Zambia railway? What was the reasoning, I guess, behind building it? What was the significance?
Jodie:
[31:53] Yeah. I mean, Tazara Railway is probably one of the only things, if you ask anything, that what China-Africa historical relations could possibly look like. A lot of people's first reaction would be the railway because it's a visible project and people still use it today. Although I will say it was not very good and pleasant. It took a long, long, long time, sometimes even broke down in the middle. And the service was not up to the level like what we took, like high speed train in China. So the expectation should not be too high, I will take it. On the other hand, it was a meaningful project because that was a time where Zambia was struggling economically to export its mineral wealth abroad.
Jodie:
[32:39] Usually, historically, Zambia was part of Rhodesia, right? The whole idea about Central African Republic was after where Rhodesia collapsed, right? There was a short period of time. And most of the time using the southern route to today's Zimbabwe, historically southern Rhodesia, and then to South Africa and got export there. But because of Rhodesia declared independent unilaterally in 1965.
Jodie:
[33:07] And Britain did nothing to it, whereas it got suddenly very hostile and it was a white minority government, very racist, had apartheid system, so the same as South Africa at the time. So Zambia said we couldn't deal with these two hostile powers, so we need to redirect all mineral wells to another port. And Zambia is landlocked. The other option is to the east, because the west option was connected with Angola. Angola was also under Portuguese colonization. So from Zambia's perspective, it was very much surrounded by hostile neighbors. Tanzania was the only one that they considered as friendly. So it was... President Kaounda, who reached out to President Nirey, talking about, you know, can we have a joint project that helped transfer our wealth abroad that could go through Dalai Salaam, today's, you know, the kind of main part of Eastern Africa. And they agreed. And Julius Nirey was very close with Chairman Mao and Premier Zhou Enlai at the time and visited China several times and then prompted the conversations and then followed up with a whole kind of tri-party, negotiations between China, Tanzania, and Zambia and say, we're going to have a real way that connects copper belt to dala salam through these new railway line and then that railway line got discussed in the late
Jodie:
[34:29] 1960s and was only constructed then in the 1970s.
Brent:
[34:34] And is that a commercial line only or now is it also for like passengers as well.
Jodie:
[34:40] Yeah that it's mainly i will it's a combination of passenger and cargo travel originally it's more towards cargo because the need is really for the mineral export but after the, railway got privatized if you know about the history of Tazar it was owned by, tripartite authorities so it was run by three parties at first but then both countries experienced privatization at the turn of the cold wall, end of the cold wall, kind of happened the same time, early 1990s. So there was private companies who were operating the railway. So now they are discussing about how to make money. Then they came to question because you don't no longer, you have this state investments anymore and you have to make money. And it's difficult to make money because obviously, as I said, the railway was quite slow and it broke down at times. So people just turned to other routes. And then South Africa, Zimbabwe got, you know, independent in a way, and then Zambia had other alternatives now. So you don't have to rely on their railway again. So that was another kind of challenge.
Keller:
[35:51] And then in terms of aid involvement, we talked a lot about China. How would you talk about the Western involvement at that same time and compare how the U.S. or other Western powers were involved?
Jodie:
[36:03] I think at the time, the WB, what we call it like World Bank, has been doing a lot actually in Africa and different countries. So was United States. They had aid program, but also peace corps and so on. So there are definitely a lot of other alternatives available.
Jodie:
[36:22] But in terms of the approach they're doing aid a very a very a very different as i say china's aid was not about money it was really basically about project based so they do not give you money to buy things but we help you build a dam a road a railway and so on so in that sense it was mainly project driven type of aid and also is based on political trust and so on meanwhile for World Bank investments, particularly these multilateral loans, they have to do a lot of evaluation reports. They have to show that this is an economically meaningful project, that it is sustainable after its completion, and it can sustain and make the investments back. So the logic, I think, is very different. And I think at the time where Tazaro was being built, there was also a team of U.S. Workers trying to build a road connecting the same cities across Tanzania and Zambia. So there were some documents, historical documents, saying that when the two teams encountered each other, the Americans and the Chinese, they kind of say, you know, they had some exchanges of words, they were competing for influence and competing for, infrastructure at the same time in the 70s.
Keller:
[37:43] Yeah, that's super interesting because I know like when I've looked into the World Bank and like that approach of finance first, it always like kind of baffles me because there's a lot of like lack of transparency. They'll just give a ton of money. And I have had a hard time finding many points of that return of investment being logical. And so, yeah, it's something I've always been curious about of like why we chose the particular structure we did. and a lot of it seems to kind of stem back to like domestic fiscal policy in a lot.
Jodie:
[38:13] Yeah yeah i think again the logic is very different because don't don't forget that in the 80s there's lots of push for imf and world bank to have structural uh adjustment programs so a lot of these people firmly believe obviously i think they were trained in the chicago school and they had a firm belief that you have to really privatize everything to make it work and african governments were also You know, you have to really democratization happen the same time hand in hand with liberalization and states should have less and less control over economy, which was quite the opposite for many African countries who are struggling to develop their industry. So what they need is actually a fundamental change from focusing on the kind of what we call the kind of export-driven economy to more industrialized investments in light industry or heavy industry. And that could prosper national development of particularly the rural areas. And so I think for that sake, China did provide some sort of alternatives and necessary projects that African countries needed the most.
Brent:
[39:30] And then is there any information showing that African countries were maybe more receptive to Chinese help than the Western help? Is there any evidence to show that maybe the africans were more willing to accept help from china versus the americans whether or not they associated americans with like the western white powers that were just colonizing them or like if the tzara railway and the americans coming and try to build a roadway was there one like clear like we want to go with china or we want with the U.S.
Jodie:
[40:09] I think what is more important about this is really to understand Africans' perspective. So in my opinion, China presents an alternative and that alternative means that Africa has a choice to choose from different models and different plans. Some countries did relatively well where you have more consolidated players to make economic decisions. Some players, I mean, some countries were relatively weak in the negotiation table. So it really depends on the kind of exact situation that we're talking about. But I think what makes sense is really to emphasize the question not from the kind of aid giver perspective, but rather from the host country perspective. We should shift the conversation to what African countries need the most. And they have to make important and responsible decisions for themselves. And this is, I think, the critical question that we have to engage with.
Brent:
[41:13] That was what I was trying to ask. From the African perspective, was there a tendency to want to go towards Chinese help or World Bank Western help?
Jodie:
[41:23] As I said, it depends on different situations. So China was relatively good in certain things like railway projects, infrastructure. That's what they historically just, the projects were cheap for China construction companies. The human cost is cheap as well in terms of China has own industrial supplies and a relatively established supply chain. So meaning that the cost to maintain certain projects where they use Chinese spare parts for Santa Gabriel and so on was also cheaper than the other options. So I think that makes sense economically, but not for everything, because you obviously see a lot of benefits, for example, a lot of some of the smaller scale projects they do in the rural areas. There are also players from Singapore, from Japan, from Korea, all these other emerging economies, and India as well. They do some of the rural projects for irrigation projects, anti-alleviation, kind of poverty alleviation projects, and so on. They have their own methods of doing it. They start with a relatively small village and then try to implement on a larger scale, whereas China likes to do more kind of bigger scale infrastructure. So I think the logic is very different there.
Keller:
[42:40] And at this time, how did the USSR fit into these different aid projects?
Keller:
[42:45] And what was their dynamic with how they gave aid compared to China?
Jodie:
[42:51] Yeah, of course. I mean, in the socialist era, USSR is a bigger brother. So in terms of the monetary engagement, Soviet Union gave, I would say, a lot of aid projects as well. Not only the infrastructure aid, but also military aid was huge in terms of its commitment, particularly during the Khrushchev era in the 60s. And some of that relations continued until today, particularly talking about the military engagement, level engagement.
Jodie:
[43:19] But in terms of the way they do socialist aid compared to China is slightly different, I will say. In the case I studied about Kenya, where this minister traveled both to Soviet Union and China, coming back with quite similar agreements, they had an inter-ministral discussion about which offer is better. So one limitation of the Soviet aid program is they force African countries to buy Soviet-made products. And most of them have industrial goods that not a single African country need at that time.
Jodie:
[43:52] But they do not do monetary exchanges. In a way, they don't exchange in dollars because that's why Soviet Union did not join the whole Britain World Institution in the first place. They don't want to use dollars to do that kind of trade. So the mode is really on a barter trade type of mode that they want African countries to buy their goods. And they don't find this sum of goods appealing. So on that particular situation, these Kenyan ministers, regardless of the political, in the ideological differences, they favor the Chinese agreement because China, as I say, what they ask is just turnkey projects and then very much the trade relations between kenya and china was already before was there before independence and they had a lot of things that they want to import from china like bicycles a lot of these kind of things that kenyans that they really like they really want and kenya can still export their for example agricultural goods uh to china at this time so.
Jodie:
[44:55] That kind of reciprocateness i think is very important uh to understand that level of engagement i guess yeah.
Brent:
[45:02] Yeah and then kind of transitioning a bit how did these efforts in the 50s through the 70s really start to lay the foundations for today's involvement between china and africa and also like what countries are maybe like the most connected i.
Jodie:
[45:19] Think the reason why i started my PhD project, and then which turned into a book I published last year, is I want to build up this myth that there is a mouse China, the so-called socialist China, and then there's after opening up, there's a post-socialist China. I argue that a lot of continuities, particularly when you talk about leadership, many of these African countries, Southern Africa in particular, they came to power in the 70s and 80s and even early 1990s, they receive a lot of help from socialist East, including Soviet Union, Eastern Europe and China. And their relationships were close politically, like Angola, Mozambique, Zimbabwe. They represent that kind of continuities of relations from the upper level. And some of the leaders even received military training in Nanking Military School back in the 70s, right? So that kind of political trust...
Jodie:
[46:17] Based both, I think, on a personal and party level, continued until today. And that's really some sort of continuities you'll see. On the other hand, on the social lived experience, you also see that continuity in countries like Tanzania and Zambia. For example, from that medical sector, you know China sent a lot of medical aid doctors to these countries in the 60s, 70s, and some of them finished their mission and they decided to stay in Tanzania and Zambia and opening up their clinics. And they became private entrepreneurs, whereas they used to be dispatched as socialist aid doctors, they now are businessmen. They're operating their own clinics, but they utilize the existing networks they build up during the kind of earlier missions. And they operate their clinics in different cities where Chinese communities live, but also where there are lots of other Chinese activities used to have, for example, in the sites where they used to build Tazara and so on. So that kind of relations continued. And it was the same people who transited from the socialist era to a kind of capitalist now person, investments and being a boss and so on. So that was really fascinating. And people's mindset don't just change overnight. It takes a while for people to understand that kind of changes. But I think certainly in terms of China's earlier footprints in some of the countries were stronger.
Jodie:
[47:45] For example, the countries I talk about in Eastern Africa and Southern Africa were relatively stronger, but not to some countries where, for example, they did not recognize PRC for a long time during 60 and 70, and they restarted engaging with it only later on. So that could be a very different type of... You know, historical legacy that we are talking about.
Keller:
[48:06] And when was that shift where Chinese citizens could start to run their own private practices in Africa? Was that in the 90s?
Jodie:
[48:13] I think that would start from 2000, really, because these people were still dispatched, continue. The aid doctor program continued until today.
Brent:
[48:21] Oh, okay.
Jodie:
[48:21] So it is something, it was like a socialist aid program, but it was practiced until today. The difference is now is more towards the mode that they were not stationed in some of the rural villages that they used to go. We call barefoot doctors where they did not have clinics. They just carry some toolkits, boxes, and travel to the countryside. This is very different now. Now they have big hospitals, receive money in Zambia, the Muanamasa teaching hospital. I mean, they got funding from China to build that Ministry of Health. And then also a lot of these doctors collaborated with Zambian doctors in hospitals. And then when they came out of that system and they had their own business, often is in big cities, in Lusaka, in Andola. So they were transformed into a modern medical practitioner that is similar to any Western practitioners.
Brent:
[49:23] Do you have a general idea of the Chinese diaspora in Africa?
Jodie:
[49:29] Well general idea in terms of numbers yeah size i don't trust size numbers because there were lots of under a lot of misunderstandings about how big the size was there were some books talking about like early 2000 about chinese community angola uh you know there was like a million or something i wish this was not true at all there was only because that was when there were some big projects and China sent some of the construction workers to work on certain projects. There can be tens of thousands of people at a certain time, but the majority of them just left and came back to China when the project finished. So when we talk about diaspora, we have to make clear, who are the people who
Jodie:
[50:13] just worked as foreign aspects and then they will go back to China? Or the rest of them stayed and make families and bring their families and then have their family business, that's a different matter. I think for that, it varies from one country to another and varies from one year to another as well.
Keller:
[50:33] When China started to really grow and industrialize in the early 2000s, could you describe any sentiments that you felt when you were in China when that shift happened? Was it something people talked about? Could it be felt in a way?
Jodie:
[50:50] You mean early 2000s in terms of how this migration?
Keller:
[50:54] Within China when it really started to boom economically. Did that change the dynamic and the conversations people were having around business? And was that something you were involved in?
Jodie:
[51:05] Yeah, I think that's a huge, huge transformation because I was born in 1990. So I witnessed basically some of the early benefits of the open up policy when I grew up. I see how we get access to the first McDonald's when I was six in my city and people were queuing outside.
Brent:
[51:26] Did you like it?
Jodie:
[51:27] Everyone was excited. As a kid, hamburger, that was like the most favorite thing you can imagine as a kid uh and starbucks i think only came to my city in 20 maybe 2010 or even yeah or even later because as i said i did not come from beijing or shanghai or these big cities my city represents most of the it's a coastal town but still the kind of second t-shirt tier type of city that only witnessed that urbanization change of economy in the last few decades or so. So I think people were excited about these business opportunities and people were excited about studying abroad, for example. This was only after 2000, there was a thing that people really talk about, studying abroad and, you know, English was not a compulsory subject during my parents' generation.
Jodie:
[52:20] Most of them even studied Russia as their first foreign language, right, for that generation. And my parents went to college i think uh in 79 that was just one year after the open up they benefited from that kind of education opportunity and then came me we i started english as a kid in my primary school it became you know primary type of as it's important as important as chinese and mathematics uh so you weigh very heavily so that's why we invest a lot of resources into English study and doing business. And that's why we have a lot of people quitting their job in the government and public sector and then went to Shenzhen and the other Cantonese areas and to make business and make money. And that was a huge, huge, huge transformation. I think 1990 and 2000, that was really, I think the millennium was the changing transformative era for us.
Keller:
[53:16] And then kind of building off of that back to Africa, how did that boom in China kind of translate to the relations in Africa? And were there other players that were now interested in this, you know, the new scramble we talked about within Africa?
Jodie:
[53:32] I think what is very important about this is where you see the socialist eras engagement. Most of these engagements were initiated by state. It's very centralized. You don't see any of the minor players, even we're talking about like provincial governments, like going out, seeking for investments and so on. But after opening up, a lot of these provincial governments, now they have KPI. They have to develop their economy. What they do is they want to develop the SOE and they try to find external markets for these state-owned enterprises. So they encourage different SOEs to invest and attract foreign investment. So it was at that time where these small, relatively, players came actively outside to search for funding. They also borrowed a lot from banks because they need initial investments and so on. And then they went to Africa and they tried to negotiate on their behalf for certain deals and economic trades and so on. And then also came this relatively small, private entrepreneurs.
Jodie:
[54:36] Remember that Chinese were only allowed to have passport really, really later on. So most of the Chinese people don't know this idea about tourism, foreign tourism. They have no idea. This was only happening after the opening up that China has passport. They can travel. And they started to look out for opportunities. First of all, they mainly look at Southeast Asia because that was the closest. They also have sizable Chinese overseas community and so on. And then opening up their vision because they see tourism.
Jodie:
[55:08] Most of the European and US market, very difficult and competitive for them to make money. So they are in the developing countries and African markets, they think is big. Huge population is relatively not as developed at some parts of the world. So they can just do some simple trade, just bring stuff from A to B and then sell. There is no added value to that you know model but you just need to just like transport and get access to goods and then there are lots of also uh minor place like particularly nigerians were were very key in this bringing a lot of the goods from china to african markets to nigeria so they carry on suitcases and then cargo and then make money like even slippers we're talking about plastic toys and then cell phones like clothes and then you know other digital stuff came afterwards.
Keller:
[56:07] Sorry i'm just gonna blank in within that new scramble like were there other players now that it's in the 2000s that were a part of these emerging markets that made it a little bit more competitive for trying to enter like you mentioned that simple a to b trade were there you mentioned India earlier, were there other players that were trying to get involved in these markets in a different way that posed difficulties or was it kind of just an open land field for countries to come in and just explore a new market?
Jodie:
[56:38] Yeah, I think it would be an open land field because you don't forget that China's rise to power was a relatively recent thing compared to what we called the, four asian uh dragons you heard of that so there are other can.
Brent:
[56:56] You explain that.
Jodie:
[56:56] Yeah so there there are other in the 80s mainly the most kind of the industrialized players in east asia were considered as hong kong taiwan south korea and malaysia i think if i got it right if not singapore i think it's malaysia or.
Keller:
[57:12] To think not japan.
Jodie:
[57:13] Uh no japan was way industrialized at that point already so japan was way way way before that.
Brent:
[57:20] Okay so these were like the ones.
Jodie:
[57:21] Coming yes there was like what we call like the also the asian miracle stuff yeah the things about it was before the uh we call the financial crisis before the financial crisis so these four players industrialized mainly in the 80s so they have already started to invest overseas and then japan was in africa quite active before their economic disaster in the 1990s. So it was quite visible in 70s, 80s. But I would say they do not see Africa as the most desirable place for investment. The Japanese were more interested in investing real estate in New York, like United States. So they're eyeing for more mature markets. But they're a relatively small player who try to enter the market. Another thing i think more visible and competitive one to china on the same level china is is india you have to talk about india because india is a huge player uh in africa not only because of history of migrants uh the asian communities that lived in eastern africa and also so long as south africa for a long time but also india emerged as a huge player to invest in mineral uh industry For example, in Zambia, copper mining, they bought one of the biggest mines there and a lot of technological stuff as well. So India was definitely the other player who was active. In the region.
Keller:
[58:47] That's interesting. When we came back from China, we actually went to a talk with Sequoia, the big VC firm. They were talking about how they just recently split into having their Sequoia India, Sequoia China, and their U.S. base.
Jodie:
[59:00] Right, right, right, right, right.
Keller:
[59:02] Interesting. And then how would you characterize that relationship in the early 2000s and continuing on today of these new countries coming into Africa? Because I would say, probably it's fair to say moving away from colonialism, But there is still an aspect of maybe not transparent ideas of who the beneficiaries are. Could you give a little context on that?
Jodie:
[59:26] Again, as I said, the end of Cold War led to a lot of political economic changes to African countries. Whereas during the Cold War, most of the time, the governments were considered as a kind of strong one-party rule type. So you have a lot of leading parties that, you know, they have some sort of election. It is still considered as a democracy, but weak democracy in the Western standard. But by the time of the end of the Cold War.
Jodie:
[59:57] IMF and the World Bank, there are lots of pressure, Western countries as well, for these governments to democratize. So this is called the second wave of democratization in Huntington's term. And that came also privatization, which means that used to be the state-owned companies now become privatized. So they need investors to buy their company. For example, mining industry was a huge thing in a lot of these countries' privatization process. In Zambia, it was a case where they basically have open bid for every other country to invest. So countries that used to be powerful in this industry, like the Anglo-American was the biggest player in Zambian mining. There were also some sort of Switzerland-based mining companies. They came, of course, and then came the Indian one. And China was only a minor player. So even though we talk about China's presence and everything and so on, to what extent China is really different from the other player was the question. I think it was mainly about these African countries, I think, trying to get access to as many players as possible and to make these commercial investments and projects profitable and to really contribute to economic growth.
Keller:
[1:01:11] Yeah and then how would you say the fate of africa and the new country's involvement like how does that play in to you know in the few next five ten years it seems very much like the u.s and the idea of the u.s is like a hegemonic hegemonic power is starting to shift, and it seems like especially from this conversation how other countries get involved in africa is going to play a really big role in how they develop as future powers in the next 50 years how important would you say the fate of africa is to that development into a multipolar world i.
Jodie:
[1:01:46] Think this is a hugely debated uh topic i was just reading the paper about this topic whether china was going to make a big difference i'm not sure actually uh about this because you have to also witness how this belt road initiative and the so-called major power of diplomacy It's sustainable. Now there were lots of uncertainties about China's economic performances because there are lots of concerns in terms of whether this model of investing in infrastructure overseas could really help China's economic development.
Jodie:
[1:02:26] Structural change because china suffered from now quite very much the high you know cost of labor nowadays is you know a lot of these factories move their investment to vietnam and other countries on the other hand there were lots of uncertainties about china u.s you know geopolitical tension and whereas there is a trade war and you know technological competition it's a there's a lot of certainties how you know this model gonna be sustainable so definitely i would say there are attempts to be as multi-polar as possible by the end of the day it's i also kind of believe in the realist game that you know in the arena of security and military engagements it's very much a zero-sum game and that you have only have like one winner so it's very difficult actually how to diversify um that sort of mindset also like we don't want to use a term like second cold war because it's not helpful when you say that too many times people believe in that people believe that china becomes a second soviet union that is.
Jodie:
[1:03:33] Ideological in competition with united states but on the other hand as i said china economically is very much integrated to the world it has a lot of u.s bones and investments and if u.s dollar dollar crack collapse china is the number one to suffer because it has the largest u.s uh dollar reserves anyway so i think it's a much more integrated world compared to the cold war era where soviet union basically had its own way of doing economic trades and everything so i would say there are lots of uncertainties on the other the hand, everyone has to believe in something that we are not in this subsidized dilemma
Jodie:
[1:04:15] that finally there's only one winner of the game. But as academic, what we can do is just to foster the conversation to be more considerate of the other alternatives to allow more conversation, particularly in the United States, and to diversify that conversation, to talk about, things and not only in a kind of bipolar sense i think that's at least things that we can do yeah yeah.
Brent:
[1:04:39] So you definitely think that the multipolar outcome will be the best for the entire.
Jodie:
[1:04:45] World i definitely think that's the best because you don't want one power to replace the other and some people say that bipolar particular ir theories will say bipolar system is stable But the things they couldn't explain is that the benefits and welfare of, you know, that type of prosperity is not only about stability. It's also about how much you have a kind of... Prosperous and open environment where you can have different sorts of movements of ideas and people and things. And I don't think bipolar system is considered as successful if the only standard to that successfulness is that we don't have a nuclear war so far. I was quite very much taken back by the argument of really theory. So I think we have to at least believe in the benefits of a multipolar state in order to make that happen otherwise we're just running away from one you know a trap to to to another yeah yeah i.
Brent:
[1:05:52] Know nothing about ir and a bipolar state does just sounds counterintuitive to like human like culture and just the way we interact.
Jodie:
[1:06:01] If there's if there's two.
Brent:
[1:06:02] People competing someone wants to win.
Jodie:
[1:06:04] So but.
Brent:
[1:06:05] Like a multipolar state where like it could benefit everyone in some way or another.
Jodie:
[1:06:09] Yeah makes.
Brent:
[1:06:10] Just logical sense.
Jodie:
[1:06:12] Yeah yeah yeah and.
Keller:
[1:06:14] Then you mentioned the belt and road initiative and kind of how that's playing into the current relations could you give a little bit of background into that initiative and kind of tying back into the multi-polar world aspect kind of how that's a really interesting seed to china.
Jodie:
[1:06:27] Getting involved in the world that's a big question but i think to answer that simply is to go back to the term that it has historical meaning, the Silk Road. We're talking about Han Dynasty trade. The Chinese, you know, try to deal with Central Asia through these kind of goods carried by camels throughout the desert from Xinjiang and then all the way to, you know, today's Pasha and then even Europe. So the one of the benefits of this sort of idea is be a little bit imaginable in terms of a connected, you know, Europe, I would say Eurasia, but that Eurasia is different from a certain definition, but a connected Europe-Asia, how it could possibly look like. And the concept was raised during President Xi's visit to Kazakhstan as well, 2013. And this was a time that China was economically doing very well. On the other hand, it had a lot of uncertainty in terms of energy security things. You have to develop a kind of continuous sustainable industrial.
Jodie:
[1:07:35] Situation but then you need energy and so on so this is also we think about central asia eastern europe these kind of chines traditionally and persian state as a security provider on the other hand it also benefits in the sense to think about, that china tries to transform itself from a minor player of international order to a major power so china needs again a new type of language to speak with your other partners so what is the available choice at that time china need to come up with a framework so for a long time china had this idea about tau guang yang hui in particularly in hu and jiang spirit where china was barely economic doing very well but diplomatically played relatively.
Jodie:
[1:08:20] Absent role, a minor role. But China now had a lot of overseas investments. At that time, 2013, as I said, China had already investments in Africa, in places like Angola, Sudan, and DRC. But increasingly, the states and security were put in question if you can't protect these overseas assets, it also can be a problem. So why not we take advantage of this new language to protect overseas investment, but also to build up new type of partnerships with other countries, particularly the developing countries. They also want to have development plans and.
Jodie:
[1:08:54] Infrastructure because infrastructure brings in supply chain brings in a lot of other employment and you know welfare and so on so this is i think mutually beneficial to different partners so this is how idea where you know the bell row initiative was initiated and it was supposed to uh have that kind of influence you know across different parts where you have infrastructure you bring connectivity and then possibly industrialization and other things. Although we now witness in Africa, some people will say de-industrialization. Industrialization did not happen naturally after certain investments. So it's a question. Now we even enter the era of a digital era. We didn't even want to have more factory because we're concerned about environment. We're concerned about pollution and all these things. So how are we going to transform that into a digital belt role? Now the fascination is towards AI and digital initiative, and that investment was not hardware, but software.
Jodie:
[1:09:59] And that was, again, came to the question about this US-China technological attention and lots of uncertainties.
Brent:
[1:10:07] And then maybe less so your director of research, but since you're pretty involved in Africa, how would you characterize Africa's reception now that we're over 10 years past
Brent:
[1:10:21] the Belt and Road Initiative? Has it been successful for them? Do they enjoy what that initiative has brought?
Jodie:
[1:10:28] I think I would say if I evaluate Beltran Initiative to what extent it was successful, from the African's perspective, it brought opportunities, as I said, even though the standard gauge rail in Kenya had a lot of problems in terms of economically, it did not... It was not as profitable as some people expected when they first built it. At least the phase two of that railway started end of last year. So we can still have some time to see what kind of economic benefits could bring.
Jodie:
[1:11:06] I think i think in a way it did actually open up possibilities for trade and then commodities movements and employment and even training for skilled labor and so on but my question is again the sustainability of these projects if we could make i mean i talked about this before with my students two days ago in my class the only reason they had the gauge railway is because they want to connect with uganda and if they connect with uganda they will bring up regional integrity and also economic prosperity but in order to be beneficial and economic viable they have to finish all three phases but when they first completed phase one there came the covid and then the whole problems uncertainties and so on and kenya was struggling to pay back the loan for phase one If they don't pay back for phase one, China will not risk investing in phase two. And then if you don't have phase two, phase one will not make money.
Jodie:
[1:12:09] That's the contradiction, right? So what are you going to do? This is a dilemma. You're caught in. And that's a problem faced by a lot of less developed countries. Because you don't have the advantages like many early industrialized European nations, who's, I would say, in a very sarcastic way, wealth was build-out slave trade in the first place and then colonization but african countries don't have that opportunities what are they going to do so this is all the serious problems uh you want to have project you want to have infrastructure regional integration but you don't have you know that power that that capacity to make it happen and and that's a real problem now i will say.
Brent:
[1:12:52] And then another part of the Belt and Road Initiative was connecting African students coming to China, correct?
Jodie:
[1:13:01] Mm-hmm.
Brent:
[1:13:01] So how would you kind of describe the relationships between these students from Africa in China with the Chinese population?
Jodie:
[1:13:12] Yeah. I think education is very important, particularly the young people, because the continent is very young. for different reasons. If you think about the nowadays young people in China don't want to give birth to children anymore. So we see a lot of problems with that. But Africa is a very young and dynamic continent. So you invest in talents, particularly young talents, then you will see a lot of good benefits of that. So education is something that really we should talk about. So China put a lot of money to give scholarships to African students to China, their first priority is for these African students still to United States and UK if they have scholarships for a lot of African students because I think the education level, the quality and also the kind of prosperity for them to get a job is there. But they're expensive if they don't have the scholarship. But China has everything for free. So this comes the alternative again, a substitution, a very good alternative for many African students who cannot afford going abroad. So they will take up the opportunities. Most of them study in China in the kind of what's called engineering or STEM field, in science and things.
Jodie:
[1:14:28] Not really in humanity and social sciences. There are lots of reasons of that, but also Chinese is difficult to study is one of the main reasons. So students in my university, in Fudan, they have to take, both chinese and english classes and some of their doing medical degrees they have to learn everything like in chinese so it's really difficult for them for the first few years to other programs.
Brent:
[1:14:55] Set up for like when they're in africa they're learning chinese so then they're allowed.
Jodie:
[1:14:58] Yes a lot of those students some of them uh participated in the confucius institute language training for like one year or two before they got admitted to to china so they had some language training but it's still very hard if you do a medical degree in chinese but i see some of them really good i know one of them was from yui chui who has been in china i think for six or even eight years like he recently completed an internship in a local hospital in shanghai he can speak like fluent mandarin chinese and then have conversations with these patients and basically everyone loves here so you don't see like a uretrain in a chinese uh local hospital and it was great because even i mean these are the kind of things that we really have to focus on and also that's why i organized for this uh local network chapters called uh china africa shanghai international uh network the idea is really to organize some public engagement events and to invite all these African students and some of them, after their degree finished, they started their own business or they had their own jobs and so on, and then to connect with the professionals, with researchers. And there are lots of other Chinese who have worked in African countries on different capacities. So we can foster the conversation because it's very difficult for African students to get jobs in China after they finish their degree.
Jodie:
[1:16:25] The principle, I think, for Chinese government, they want them to go home and, you know, try to cultivate the economic growth and so on. But some of them have families, some of them just want the life. They think the life in Chinese cities better. They want to bring the family over and so on. But they struggle to find a job in China. And there are lots of problems in terms of how we really take advantage of these talents into a real, we would say, ambassadors of China-Africa relations. And one advice I really gave to my government is that they really have to build up at first a database of alumnus, particularly those African students who used to study in China. And after their graduation, we have to track where they were and to take advantage of the anonymous network because these people could really be the useful kind of, you know, they're people who know the language, know the culture, and build up the connections. Otherwise, what are you going to do after the few years of education and they came back home and they forgot everything? So I think this is something I really have to work harder on it.
Brent:
[1:17:29] Is the government listening to you?
Jodie:
[1:17:31] Hopefully. I try to put yeah I really this is my kind of number one advice is we need just like a database the universities also have to work very hard uh
Jodie:
[1:17:41] to build up that network for them.
Brent:
[1:17:44] Do like the universities in China like do a good job with Chinese national Chinese.
Jodie:
[1:17:49] National alumni networks uh not necessarily alumni but on different universities I think they have quite uh strong I mean depends on again different universe they have different roles but, but i think the mainly targeted chinese ones not the foreign ones which i think is quite unfortunate we should have yeah because i studied overseas so i took advantage a lot from my you know oxford lamina system yeah and also my nottingham uh lamina system it was really good so i think yeah this is my like this is something for the government and also for universities you can do quite easily yeah just track them and keep conversation and make them feel belonged, right i i know a friend who said like she bumped into a canyon in mombasa where she was doing some urban reservation work and they they graduated from the same university where she was teaching but he did not really introduce where he did his study until she said she was from that university it seemed that they don't really feel belonged that they graduated from from that that uni that That's what the thing, why you don't feel proud about a Chinese university that graduated. I guess if they're from Stanford, they would rather put it on the first line of their CV.
Brent:
[1:19:06] That's super interesting just because alumni culture is so huge in the US.
Keller:
[1:19:13] And as part of the bottleneck for getting jobs after graduation, is it just a competitive job market in China? Or is there a cultural aspect of employers are more keen to hire Chinese students Chinese graduates than they are African First.
Jodie:
[1:19:29] Of all there are not many companies that you know recruit foreigners there are lots of, complications about immigration policy in china this is our first thing it's very difficult to become a chinese citizen if you're a biological not chinese we only see rare cases in certain aspects even including a stanford students if you know about about about her guayling ailing gu yeah so she was one of the few like examples and also a few football players who were originally from nigeria yeah you know they got chinese citizenship talent citizenship even though they do.
Brent:
[1:20:09] You call it talent citizenship.
Jodie:
[1:20:10] Yeah something like that so it's like their talents so they can become chinese that's amazing yeah so there's something like like like this but otherwise it's very difficult so i think that this was the main reason that even if you have some jobs in chinese you know company and so on you could not become a chinese citizen and then you might just work for a few years and live you can't bring your family and it's a different thing like immigrant country like united states yeah you work for a few years wait for a green card right so this is like i think the primary reason and also the work culture in china you also went there so you know that you have to know the language very well it was not a like a very international in different parts of city shanghai is exception but not anywhere in the country so you have to know and grasp really well the language to get a job.
Brent:
[1:21:01] Yeah we were woefully.
Keller:
[1:21:03] Unprepared google translate wasn't a thing we would have yeah not made it far.
Jodie:
[1:21:08] But i appreciate your courage to it was fun yeah.
Brent:
[1:21:13] It was we traveled for six months went to 13 different countries and that was by far the best experience.
Jodie:
[1:21:19] Wow okay yeah it's.
Brent:
[1:21:20] Just the most interesting most different most welcoming yeah so welcoming.
Jodie:
[1:21:25] Yeah but.
Brent:
[1:21:28] Is there any other final notes you want to leave the listener maybe about, getting out there in the world and experiencing firsthand traveling and that type of like.
Jodie:
[1:21:39] What you've.
Brent:
[1:21:39] Experienced with that.
Jodie:
[1:21:40] Yeah i i think again uh i i learned that this uh project is mainly targeting the young people who want to explore the world and subject want to do so i think area studies or you know it's about really knowing something outside of your comfort zone so i learned quite a lot from my study of foreign culture and country in different ways and shape who I am in terms of talking to different types of people who have different life trajectories. And on a certain point, life paths cross and you have a lot of conversations and engagements. And then you kind of challenge a lot of concepts that you used to take for granted about what is good what is bad what a world should like a lot of pre-assumptions and you know all these kind of cultural stereotypes and so on and generally i think i really encourage people to open up their eyes and american audience i joke about this as chinese who was able to speak english and you know travel overseas at least i compare news both in chinese and english and every other sources.
Jodie:
[1:22:50] But a lot of Americans, they probably don't even have a capacity to, you know, read the other side of the story. So I really encourage you, if you don't read the language, at least you can travel and you can experience a different country in different ways. And you will see a different type of world. And particularly for young people, have a lot of opportunities. And don't be too pessimistic about the world because you can really do something to make this happen. And by having that experience and building up on it to make a small change, you can really empower a lot of people living surrounding by you.
Keller:
[1:23:24] It's a beautiful message. Thank you for your time.
Jodie:
[1:23:26] Yeah. Thank you. Thank you for the invitation.
Brent:
[1:23:28] Thank you.