The relationship between Chinese development projects and human rights in Sub-Saharan Africa

China is granting billion-dollar loans to African countries to build large development projects, mainly for extracting natural resources and building infrastructure. These loans are different from the loans from the Global North, in a sense that they are unconditional and do not require certain democratic or human rights standards. However, the implications of this unconditionality remain largely unexplored. In this paper, the relationship between human rights scores and the number of projects an African country receives from China is investigated for the period 2001-2007. Furthermore, the effect of voting alignment with China on this association is examined. So far, most research on China-Africa relations, and more specifically, research relating to how China impacts human rights situations in Africa, is done in a qualitative manner. However, this research borrows from several other related works and merges them into one theory that is tested in a quantitative manner. Linear,...Show moreChina is granting billion-dollar loans to African countries to build large development projects, mainly for extracting natural resources and building infrastructure. These loans are different from the loans from the Global North, in a sense that they are unconditional and do not require certain democratic or human rights standards. However, the implications of this unconditionality remain largely unexplored. In this paper, the relationship between human rights scores and the number of projects an African country receives from China is investigated for the period 2001-2007. Furthermore, the effect of voting alignment with China on this association is examined. So far, most research on China-Africa relations, and more specifically, research relating to how China impacts human rights situations in Africa, is done in a qualitative manner. However, this research borrows from several other related works and merges them into one theory that is tested in a quantitative manner. Linear, logistic, and negative binomial regressions are used to test the hypotheses. Furthermore, a mediation analysis is conducted to estimate the impact of voting alignment on the aforementioned association. The results show a negative and significant relationship between human rights score and the number of projects a country receives from China. Thus, it is important for African people and the international community to be aware of the potential risks of these Chinese-funded projects. Furthermore, the functioning of the conditional loans of the Global North might be undermined by the unconditional loans from China. Therefore, a careful re-examination of these loans is necessary to prevent any counterproductive effects.Show less

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The relationship between Chinese development projects and human rights in Sub-Saharan Africa