This year’s G20 summit had no shortage of tense and exciting moments. Discussions pertaining to the global climate crisis, the US-China trade war, and Putin’s fatalistic remarks on the modern liberal project dominated headlines globally. Amidst this diplomatic flurry, one leader’s voice went relatively unnoticed. Bearing the heat of Osaka’s summer sun, surrounded by a respectable entourage of around 100 followers, stood the 72-year-old Rebiya Kadeer – head of the World Uyghur Congress. Her message for those inside the summit was clear: more must be done to hold China accountable for the illegal detainment of over one-million Muslim Uyghurs within its Xinjiang region, in what international rights groups have described as “concentration camps”.[1] Though China insists that these are in fact voluntary educational centres, Kadeer’s protest is a reminder of the deep resentment that persists between the CCP and China’s largest minority groups.
Such divides are symptomatic of a resurgent Han-Chauvinism that has become increasingly intertwined with the Chinese Nationalist project in the last 20 years, and that has seen renewed importance under Xi Jinping. It is becoming increasingly evident, from the actions it is taking in dealing with China’s native minorities, that the CCP’s vision of a modern China is one that favours unity over diversity, and it has become increasingly aggressive in pursuing this end.
In stark contrast to this undeniably xenophobic domestic policy, the image of China that Xi is presenting to potential allies and trade partners around the world is one that is both accepting and embracing of other cultures. In his opening speech to the 2018 Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, Xi repeatedly tackled the issue of Chinese-African cultural exchange, framing their wider relationship in the familial terms of brotherhood.[2] Perhaps the most striking parts of the speech however were not Xi’s recognitions of the need for exchange, but the solutions he offers (at two distinct points) in overcoming this hurdle: “more people-to-people exchanges in culture and art, education, sports, and between our think tanks, the media, and women and young people” are all ideas entertained, as are “fifty joint cultural, sports and tourism events”.
These programmes are not, of course, simple gestures of goodwill. They represent the tip of China’s hulking ‘Silk Roads’ project, Xi’s grand plan to connect the economies of Africa, Asia and Europe (in conjunction with the ‘Belt-and-Road). Yet through his words, Xi is building a narrative of a China that is welcoming, accepting, and keen to engage culturally, socially and intellectually with their international counterparts.
The exchanges of which Xi spoke are already underway. Between 2003 and 2016, the number of African students studying in China has risen from 2000 to over 60,000, with Chinese universities offering relatively affordable education, especially when compared to the USA, and CCP scholarships frequently awarded. Amongst many Anglophone African nations, China has become the foremost destination for students studying abroad.
The CCP has already shown that its ability to tolerate cultural deviation within its borders as lukewarm at best. Guangzhou, home to the once thriving ‘Chocolate City’, serves as a salient example. Since 2011, authorities in Guangzhou have steadily dismantled China’s largest African diaspora. Whilst clear figures are near impossible to obtain, harsh visa clampdowns have resulted in an outward surge of African traders from the city. The reasons driving local authority action on the issue are equally as murky, though the city’s governors have done little to hide their concern at the size of the diaspora, which at its peak still amounted to less than 2% of the city’s population.
Delving into the mind of Xi Jinping is a taxing task, often with little conclusive yield. One thing that is clear however is the value that Xi places on Chinese unity, culturally as well as geographically. This is evident even to the casual observer. It is visible in the satellite images of education camps in Xinjian, the rows of tanks now stationed in Shenzhen’s sports grounds, and the now hollow streets of the once vibrant ‘Chocolate City’.
China’s relationship with Africa, particularly its Anglophone nations, will no doubt continue to develop in coming years. The opportunities that China is offering to young African students are valuable and deserve praise even from the most cynical of Sinophobe’s. We must be careful, however, not to overestimate the scope of the ‘Chinese Dream’. There exist in China currently two competing and contradictory discourses being articulated by the CCP – an external rhetoric of openness and a tendency towards multiculturalism, and an internal one of Chinese unity and the centrality of Han culture. Only one of these discourses can prevail to define what a modern China will ultimately look like. Eventually the CCP will have to decide when enough culture has been exchanged, and recent history suggests it will sooner rather than later.
[1] https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/asia/uighur-leader-urges-g20-pressure-to-end-china–genocide–11671372
[2] http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2018-09/03/c_129946189.htm All speech citations from Xinhua.
[3] https://www.asiabyafrica.com/point-a-to-a/little-africa-guangzhou-china