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Framing and Claiming: Contemporary Globalization and “Going Out” in China's Rhetoric towards Latin America

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 March 2012

Julia C. Strauss
Julia C. Strauss
Affiliation:
School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London. Email: js11@soas.ac.uk
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Abstract

China's increasing, and increasingly visible, engagement in Latin America has led to a variety of analyses, many based on either international relations notions of realism or international political economy precepts of trade. Rather than seeing China's rhetoric on its relations with Latin America as fluff that conceals a harder reality, this article takes rhetoric seriously as a device of “framing and claiming”: a way in which political elites in China interpret the fast-changing developing world and China's place in it. The article explores how political elites have understood the sources of China's own domestic development and then projected those notions on to other parts of the developing world, through earlier “fractal” logics of development whereby each state repeats one model of development in its own way and a currently dominant “division of labour” logic that posits one integrated model of development whereby complementarity and comparative advantage hold sway. The article concludes with a comparison of China's relations with Peru and Brazil, suggesting that China's bilateral relations with Brazil indicate a newer, emerging rhetoric of global partnership based on equality.

Keywords

China and Latin Americarhetoricdevelopmentfractaldivision of labourBrazilPeru
Type
Articles
Information
The China Quarterly , Volume 209 , March 2012 , pp. 134 - 156
Copyright
Copyright © The China Quarterly 2012

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References

1 For an explicit statement of this fear, see Pomfret, John, “China invests heavily in Brazil, elsewhere in pursuit of political heft,” The Washington Post, 26 July 2010Google Scholar, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/25/AR2010072502979_pf.html, accessed 26 June 2011.

2 Mawdsley, Emma, “Fu Manchu vs Doctor Livingstone in the Dark Continent? Representing China, Africa, and the West in British broadsheet newspapers,” Human Geography, Vol. 27, No. 5 (2008), pp. 509–29Google Scholar.

3 These figures on China–Africa trade are drawn from Hayley Hermann, “South-south relations: Sino-African engagement and cooperation,” 21 July 2010, www.focac.org/eng/zfgx/dfzc/t718472.htl, accessed 7 April 2011.

4 Dumbaugh, Kerry and Sullivan, Mark, “China's growing interest in Latin America,” CRS Report for Congress, 20 April 2005Google Scholar, http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RS22119.pdf, accessed 8 April 2011; Gonzalo Paz, “China–Latin America and Caribbean relations: a preliminary balance of the first years of the century,” unpublished paper, pp. 8–10 of draft.

5 See Strauss, Julia C. and Saavedra, Martha, “Introduction,” in China Quarterly Special Series, China and Africa: Emerging Patterns of Globalization and Development (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009), pp. 1–11.Google Scholar

6 Shen, Simon, “Exploring the neglected constraints on Chindia: analysing the online Chinese perception of India and its integration with Chinese policy,” The China Quarterly, forthcomingGoogle Scholar.

7 The original articulation of the “Eight Principles” can be found in Enlai, Zhou, “Premier Chou En-lai: revolutionary prospects in Africa are excellent!” reproduced in Beijing Review, Vol. 7, No. 14 (1964)Google Scholar, http://www.chinasecurity.us/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=409&Itemid=8, accessed 10 April 2011.

8 Enlai, Chou, Peking Review, No. 26 (20 August 1958), p. 21Google Scholar.

9 Ratliffe, William, “Communist China and Latin America, 1949–1972,” Asian Survey, Vol. 12, No. 10 (1972)Google Scholar.

10 “The China policy paper,” released on 5 November 2008, which states that “During the 20 years or so after the founding of New China in 1949, China and Latin America and the Caribbean mainly conducted people-to-people exchanges,” http://www.fmprc.gov.cn/eng/zxxx/t521025.htm, accessed 1 October 2010.

11 Zhu Rongji, “Strengthen solidarity, enhance co-operation and pursue common development,” speech given at the closing ceremony of FOCAC, Beijing, 12 October 2002. http://www.focac.org/eng/wjjh/t404118.htm, accessed 18 June 2008.

12 Ibid.

13 See Yu Zhongwen, “China's developing-country identity remains unchanged,” www.xinhuanet.com/english2010/indepth/2010-08/13/c_13443881.htm), accessed 10 October 2010.

14 http://ilas.cass.cn/cn/xwzx/content.asp?infoid=17092, accessed 11 July 2011.

15 These documents are available in English, Chinese and Spanish on the PRC's Ministry of Foreign Affairs website. In order (Li Zhaoxing, Vice-Minister Zhou Wenzhong, and the “Policy paper on Latin America and the Caribbean”), the versions I consulted are to be found at: http://www.fmprc.gov.cn/eng/zxxx/t172349, accessed 10 October 2010, http://www.fmprc.gov.cn/eng/zxxx/t183695.htm, accessed 1 October 2010, and http://www.fmprc.gov.cn/eng/zxxx/t521025.htm, accessed 1 October 2010.

16 “Vice-Foreign Minister Zhou Wenzhong talks about Vice-President Zeng Qinghong's visit to the Five Latin American and Caribbean countries.”

17 The China policy paper on Latin America and the Caribbean was released simultaneously in English, Chinese and Spanish versions on 5 November 2008, immediately after the US presidential election. I have worked with the English version available on the Ministry of Foreign Affairs website, www.fmprc.gov.cn/eng/zxxx/t521-25.htm. The Chinese version is “Zhongguo dui Lading Meizhou he Jiajinbi zhengce wenjian,” released by Xinhua on 5 November 2008, at http://news.xinhuanet.com/newscenter/2008-11/05/content_10308177.htm.

18 Ibid. section III, point 3.

19 The literature on the “resource curse” is vast, but some of the more useful pieces that lay out the importance of (political) institutions and ethnicity, and, by implication, some of the differences between Chile and Peru are: Ross, Michael, “The political economy of the resource curse,” World Politics, Vol. 51, No. 2 (1999)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Mehlum, Halvor, Moene, Karl and Torvik, Ragnar, “Institutions and the resource curse,” The Economic Journal, No.116 (2006)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Furm, Ruikang Marcus and Hodler, Roland, “Natural resources and income inequality: the role of ethnic divisions,” Economic Letters, Vol. 107, No. 3 (2010)Google Scholar.

20 “Zeng Qinghong yu Milü zongtong Weisiman jüxing huitan” (“Zeng Qinghong and Peruvian Vice-President Weisman hold a discussion meeting”), 27 January 2005, http://www.fmprc.gov.cn/chn/pds/wjb/zzjg/ldmzs/wxwlb/t181453.htm, accessed 11 July 2011.

21 Ibid.

22 Ibid.

23 “Peru–China trade diversifies, but investment struggles,” cable from Embassy Lima (Peru), 5 February 2007, cable reference ID #07LIMA330, http://wikileaks.org/cable/2007/02/07LIMA330.html, first published on 17 June 2011, http://www.cablegatesearch.net/cable.php?id=07LIMA330, accessed 15 July 2011.

24 “Wu Bangguo, Li Changchun fenbie huijian Milü zongtong Jiaxiya” (“Wu Bangguo and Li Changchun divide meetings with Peruvian President García”), 20 March 2008, http://www.fmprc.gov.cn/chn/pds/wjb/zzjh/ldmzs/xwlb/t416702.htm, accessed 11 July 2011.

25 Ministry of Foreign Trade and Tourism of Peru and Ministry of Commerce of the People's Republic of China, “China free trade feasibility study,” www.mincetur.gob.pr/newweb/portals/0/Peru-China per cent20jfs per cent20Final.pdf, accessed 13 July 2011. This report is not dated but was clearly written in 2007, as the last data from a large range of sectors cited in support of its positive conclusions are from 2006.

26 Ibid. p. 160.

27 Ibid. p. 160.

28 “Minister: Peru–China FTA to boost Peru's exports,” report from Xinhua, 1 March 2010, in The China Daily, http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2010-03/01/content_9518779.htm, accessed 15 July 2011.

29 “China, Brazil strengthen relations,” Xinhua, 29 August 2006. http://www.gov.cn/misc/2006-08/content_372510.htm, accessed 16 July 2010.

30 Julie McCarthy, “Growing trade ties China to Latin America,” 1 April 2008, http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89275971, accessed 8 April 2011.

31 Beijing, 19 May 2009, http://www.fmprc.gov.cn/eng/wjb/zzjg/ldmzs/gjlb/3473/3474/t566945.htm, accessed 28 March 2011.

32 Ibid. points XIV–XVIII.

33 “Minister Chen addressed the closing ceremony of China–Brazil Trade and Economic Co-operation Seminar,” 18 May 2011, http://english.mofcom.gov.cn/column/print.shtml?/newsrelease/significantnews/201105/20110507569587.html, accessed 22 June 2011.

34 “ZhongBa lianshou jianshe ‘huoche tou’,” 14 April 2011, http://theory.people.com.cn/GB/14384895.html, accessed 5 July 2011.

35 Ibid.

36 Yu Zhongwen, “China's developing-country identity remains unchanged.”