Dawn C. Murphy, China’s Rise in the Global South: The Middle East, Africa and Beijing’s Alternative World Order

Excerpt

Dawn C. Murphy’s China’s Rise in the Global South: The Middle East, Africa and Beijing’s Alternative World Order joins a growing scholarship on China’s relations with Africa and the Middle East since the end of the Cold War. However, as she repeats throughout the book, Murphy’s ultimate goal goes beyond simply providing an assessment of the relations between China and those two regions. Rather, taking Africa and the Middle East as representative of the broader Global South, Murphy wants to address a series of questions related to China’s relationship with the existing liberal order and the United States. As such, after a review of China’s goals in Africa and the Middle East, every chapter of the book examines a different aspect of China’s engagement with those regions, from diplomatic forums and government special envoys to trade and security cooperation. At the end of each chapter, Murphy provides an assessment of whether Chinese actions diverge or converge with the values of the liberal international order, and whether they reflect a competitive or cooperative attitude toward the United States. …