Paper short abstract:

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.]