Min Ye
Xiaoyang Tang
Jennifer Bouey
Courtney Fung
Ammar Malik
Mustafa Sayed
Yan WANG
Wendy Leutert 
Austin Strange
Oscar Otele
Andrea Pollio
Isaac Kardon

India China Institute at The New School

China’s global engagement with countries in the developing world is rapidly evolving in an era where traditional aid discourses and the practices of emerging powers in international development are undergoing significant changes. As the largest South-South cooperation provider and the world’s second-largest economy, China’s development activities overseas have sparked debates regarding its role as a rising power in international development and its implications for the post-liberal global order. Over the past few decades, China has substantially diversified its instruments and infrastructure in development practices. While some view China as a catalyst for new models of development and growth, others accuse China of being responsible for the debt crises faced by many recipient economies. China’s involvement in international development has led to wide-ranging impacts.

This seminar series invites experts from five continents to engage in a three-part discussion on the instruments, finance, and infrastructures of China’s international development. In the first part, we explore the evolution and diversification of instruments in China’s international development practices, including its deployment of foreign aid and development finance, as well as its evolving role in international security arrangements and global economic governance institutions. In part two, we delve into the composition of Chinese development finance, comparing it to the World Bank, and examine how the Global South perceives its local impact. In part three, we take China’s global infrastructure engagement as an example to illustrate the different actors and approaches involved in China’s international development practices, as well as the role of state-led development. Using the three panel discussions, we illustrate the wide-ranging impacts of Chinese international development engagement at the local, national, and global levels.