The papers in this panel explore a wide range of contemporary issues around work and industrial development between Africa and China.
Long Abstract:
This hybrid panel considers a number of related contemporary issues around work and industrial strategies between China and Africa. Rapid economic and social transformations in Asia and in Africa present several important lessons linked to industrial growth, employment and knowledge spillovers in African contexts.
In the panel, we consider issues of agency, legitimacy and learning by actors at a range of levels. The panel explores how states, institutions and individual workers are influencing, or are influenced by, policies and practices related to work, industrial strategies and development in several African countries. The relevance of local African contexts, and the exercise of power in terms of setting and responding to competing agendas are important considerations that have implications for sustainable development.
Methodology
Panelists will upload pre-recorded presentations. Convenors will ask panelists to watch other people's presentation in advance of the synchronous sessions. The convenors will also share in advance what they think are the key questions emerging from the recorded presentations which will be prompts for the synchronous discussion. The convenors will also start the synchronous session outlining these questions. Then, each presenter will give a 2min pitch summarising their key argument and another 2min in which they address one of the key questions form the convenors. After this, the discussion will be open to the audience with convenors' moderation.
This research uses a learning lens to explore the dynamics of policy translation of Chinese SEZ experiences in Ethiopia. The roles of Chinese actors as policy entrepreneurs and epistemic communities are highlighted, who have interacted with local political institutions to shape the policy process.
Paper long abstract:
Among other African countries, Ethiopia is widely considered as a notable case in the continent to draw lessons and learn from major East Asian economies for latecomer industrialization. From institutionalization of the Japanese Kaizen approach to the establishment of sectoral institutes in line with the South Korean model, learning from China's industrialization especially taking the "Special Economic Zones(SEZs)" approach become increasingly evident in recent years. With the ambition of transferring Ethiopia into Africa's light manufacturing hub by 2025, more than 10 specialized industrial parks (a type of SEZs) have been established in different urban centres since 2012 mainly led by the Federal Government of Ethiopia.
As one of the most successful countries to achieve far-reaching economic transformations by leveraging SEZs, China has been active in this process. The earliest industrial Park in Ethiopia was developed by a Chinese investor as a part of MOFCOM initiatives. Beyond the park developers, Chinese actors have also been intensively engaging as investors, infrastructure contactors and knowledge partners. Through tracing the policy learning process of the Ethiopian state over the evolution of industrial park programme— more specifically the interaction between different types of ideas, institutions and actors, my research aims to contribute a better understanding of the agency from both Ethiopian and Chinese sides that have shaped the policy and politics in the context of Ethiopian late industrialization and urbanization.
We report on African workers and the exigencies shaping precarity and managerial control. Embedded in exhausting, exploitative conditions, they deal with tensions through compliance alongside overt and subtle resistance.Results expose interplays between workers' identities and negotiating wellbeing.
Paper long abstract:
Who builds African cities? In search of security and well-being in African workplaces.
This study explores the agency of workers labouring in African cities and their responses to economic and social precarity. We report on insights from fieldwork conducted in four African cities (Abuja, Jos, Nairobi, Mavoko). The rapid infrastructural and industrial growth underway in these African sites is supported by workers (male and female, migrant and locals) engaged in constructing and transforming African urban geographies. Their experiences and responses to rapid change and insecure livelihoods remain a very understudied area.
Through fieldwork at multiple sites, we report on the exigencies that shape African workers' livelihoods and responses to precarity and managerial control. The results highlight long hours, exhausting work tasks, low pay and insecure work conditions, alongside challenges in balancing their roles as parents and caregivers. Embedded in exhausting and exploitative conditions, the workers contend with these tensions through a range of compliant and resistant responses. The study presents insights into the interplay between workers' identities as family providers and as employees negotiating with workplace managers.
Drawing on literature on autocratic sources of legitimacy and global panel country-year data on Chinese workers overseas, this paper empirically demonstrates that autocratic regimes are more likely to allow Chinese infrastructure companies to bring workers from home to complete projects abroad.
Paper long abstract:
Over the past two decades, the number of Chinese workers sent overseas to complete engineering and construction projects has increased significantly along with the expanding role of Chinese companies in foreign countries, including developing economies with large populations. Yet, there has been little systematic analysis of this phenomenon. This article builds on selectorate theory and literature on autocratic legitimacy to hypothesize that differences in the sources of legitimacy of governments in democratic and autocratic regimes make the latter more willing to allow Chinese companies to bring Chinese workers to complete infrastructure projects. Our statistical analysis of a global country-year panel dataset of Chinese contract workers overseas from 2004 and 2019 supports this hypothesis. Moreover, these dynamics are brought to light in a case study on Algeria. This article prompts important considerations regarding both the role of state institutions in host countries in shaping China's human and economic presence overseas, and the impact of Chinese economic activities on the economic and political landscape of foreign countries.
[Note: the order of authors is alphabetical, i.e. "Andrea Ghiselli & Pippa Morgan". However, as submitting/presenting author, the system lists me (Pippa Morgan) first and does not allow this to be changed. If our paper is accepted, grateful if the correct order could be reflected in the conference program. Many thanks.]
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Short Abstract:
The papers in this panel explore a wide range of contemporary issues around work and industrial development between Africa and China.
Long Abstract:
This hybrid panel considers a number of related contemporary issues around work and industrial strategies between China and Africa. Rapid economic and social transformations in Asia and in Africa present several important lessons linked to industrial growth, employment and knowledge spillovers in African contexts.
In the panel, we consider issues of agency, legitimacy and learning by actors at a range of levels. The panel explores how states, institutions and individual workers are influencing, or are influenced by, policies and practices related to work, industrial strategies and development in several African countries. The relevance of local African contexts, and the exercise of power in terms of setting and responding to competing agendas are important considerations that have implications for sustainable development.
Methodology
Panelists will upload pre-recorded presentations. Convenors will ask panelists to watch other people's presentation in advance of the synchronous sessions. The convenors will also share in advance what they think are the key questions emerging from the recorded presentations which will be prompts for the synchronous discussion. The convenors will also start the synchronous session outlining these questions. Then, each presenter will give a 2min pitch summarising their key argument and another 2min in which they address one of the key questions form the convenors. After this, the discussion will be open to the audience with convenors' moderation.
Accepted papers:
Session 1 Friday 8 July, 2022, -