Zaynab El Bernoussi is Professor of International Relations at the School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Al Akhawayn University
PROJECT SYNDICATE - DEC. 5, 2016
IFRANE – China is quickly becoming a world power, capable of exercising considerable influence over other countries. And it is advancing to the center of the geopolitical stage just as – if not because – American and European leadership seems to be retreating into the wings. China certainly has a receptive audience. One reason is that the “darker nations,” as the international-studies scholar Vijay Prashad calls global-South countries, feel greater kinship with China than with the United States and Europe. They identify with China’s history of anti-imperialist struggle, and even with Chinese people’s physical appearance. If you are an emerging superpower, there is a distinct advantage to having the majority of the world’s population hold such sentiments. 1972 Hoover Dam Trump and the End of the West? As the US president-elect fills his administration, the direction of American policy is coming into focus. Project Syndicate contributors interpret what’s on the horizon. The way China plays its global role also differs notably from that of the West, because it emphasizes its similarities with the “rest,” to use the historian Niall Ferguson’s expression for the non-Western world. With this strategy, China has expanded its sphere of influence far beyond its immediate region.
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