The Sound Of Economics

Since the end of the Chinese civil war in 1947, Africa has been crucial to China’s foreign policy. First, China supported several African liberation movements during the Cold War. Second, in November 2003, the Forum for China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) was created to improve cooperation between China and African states and third, Xi Jinping announced China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) in 2013, which aimed to reinvigorate the old silk trading route along the East African coast. Furthermore, a relatively unknown fact is that China has made significant investments in Africa's digital space. In this episode of The Sound of Economics, Giuseppe Porcaro is joined by Alicia García-Herrero and Iginio Gagliardone to talk about China’s image and digital influence in Africa. They discuss specific examples of successful and unsuccessful media narratives built by China and assess the role that Europe plays in relation to China and Africa's digital influence. Relevant publication: The Belt and Road Initiative tran