Tracking Underreported Financial Flows

China’s Development Finance and the Aid–Conflict Nexus Revisited

Bibliographic Data

ID6284589
AuthorsAustin Strange (0000-0003-0878-7920, Harvard University), Austin M Strange (Harvard University), Axel Dreher (0000-0002-4017-8570, Alfred-Weber-Institute for Economics, Heidelberg University, Heidelberg, Germany, corresponding author), Andreas Fuchs (0000-0002-6309-5954, Alfred-Weber-Institute for Economics, Heidelberg University, Heidelberg, Germany), Bradley C Parks (William & Mary), Bradley Parks (Institute for the Theory and Practice of International Relations, College of William and Mary, Williamsburg, VA, USA), Michael J Tierney (0000-0002-1864-5072, Institute for the Theory and Practice of International Relations, College of William and Mary, Williamsburg, VA, USA)
Year2017
Volume61
Issue5
Pages935-963
Publication date2017-05-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Conflict Resolution (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0022-0027 • E-ISSN: 1552-8766
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/0022002715604363
OpenAlexW3121611104
LanguageEN
Citations received79
References cited42

China’s provision of development finance to other countries is sizable but reliable information is scarce. We introduce a new open-source methodology for collecting project-level development finance information and create a database of Chinese official finance (OF) to Africa from 2000 to 2011. We find that China’s commitments amounted to approximately US$73 billion, of which US$15 billion are comparable to Official Development Assistance following Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development definitions. We provide details on 1,511 projects to fifty African countries. We use this database to extend previous research on aid and conflict, which suffers from omitted-variable bias due to the exclusion of Chinese development finance. Our results show that sudden withdrawals of “traditional” aid no longer induce conflict in the presence of sufficient alternative funding from China. Our findings highlight the importance of gathering more complete data on the development activities of “nontraditional donors” to better understand the link between aid and conflict

Aid effectiveness · Business · China · Developing country · Development aid · Economic growth · Economics · Nexus (standard · Political science · Sociology · Tracking (education · Computer Science · Finance · International Development and Aid · Poverty, Education, and Child Welfare · Religion, Society, and Development

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