Africans in China: A Sociocultural Study and Its Implications on ...

Africa-China relationship was dramatically illustrated at a Forum for Africa-China Cooperation (FOCAC) in Beijing in 2006, where there was a massive presence of almost 40 African heads of government. Far more African leaders attended the forum than any other gathering apart from those at the United Nations headquarters.

There are several levels at which international relations may be conceptualized, including government-to-government and people-to-people relations. Traditional, mainstream international relations studies emphasize government-to-government relations, as is the case for many current conceptualizations of Africa-China interactions. However, the intermingling of Africans and Chinese on both the African continent and in China calls for a people-to-people approach to studying these arrangements—an approach that I have adopted in this study.

In the short time that 21st-century Africa-China relations have existed, there has been intensive research on the subject from many perspectives, including the sociopolitical, the socioeconomic, and the sociocultural. This multidisciplinary research has produced a substantial number of publications, including Brautigam (2003, 2011); Brautigam and Tang (2011); He Wenping (2009, 2010); Holslag (2011); Li Anshan (2005); Li Pengtao (2010); Li Weijian, Zhang Zhongxiang, Zhang Chun, and Zhu Ming (2010); Liu Hongwu (2008); Meng Deli and Nie Dianzhong (2011); Michel and Beuret (2009); Mitton (2002); Park (2009); Rotberg (2008); Sautman and Yan (2007); Song (2011); Strauss and Saavedra (2010); I. Taylor (2006, 2008); M. Taylor (2011); Zhang Zhongxiang (2011); and Zhao Minghao (2010). Much of this research has focused on economic and political issues, but there has also been a growing number of sociological, anthropological, cultural, and linguistic studies. Here, I demonstrate that people-to-people relations are important aspects of the relationship between Africa and China and argue that both the Chinese government and African governments ought to encourage and facilitate the peaceful intermingling of Africans and Chinese because Africans in China and Chinese in Africa can serve as cultural and economic bridges to the further development of Africa-China relations (Bodomo, 2010a).