Since the opening up of China in 1979, the country had experienced phenomenal economic growth over the decades and overtook Japan as the second-largest economy in 2010. With the establishment of a conservative administration led by Shinzo Abe in December 2012 and Xi Jinping's ascendance to power as the General Secretary of China's ruling party a month earlier, the two countries intensified their commitments in aid to Sub-Saharan Africa. Surveying the Japanese and Chinese aid in Sub-Saharan Africa, this book examines the two Asian giants' policies and achievements in past decades and discusses future directions of their aid initiatives. Japan and China: A Contest in Aid to Sub-Saharan Africa is recommended for those interested in understanding East Asian international relations and contemporary aid trends and issues in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Once the world's largest ODA provider, contemporary Japan seems much less visible in international development. However, this book demonstrates that Japan, with its own aid philosophy, experiences, and models of aid, has ample lessons to offer to the international community as the latter seeks new paradigms of development cooperation.

A close look at the evolution of American political alliances in Asia and their future While the American alliance system in Asia has been fundamental to the region's security and prosperity for seven decades, today it encounters challenges from the growth of China-based regional organizations. How was the American alliance system originally established in Asia, and is it currently under threat? How are competing security designs being influenced by the United States and China? In Powerplay, Victor Cha draws from theories about alliances, unipolarity, and regime complexity to examine the evolution of the U.S. alliance system and the reasons for its continued importance in Asia and the world. Cha delves into the fears, motivations, and aspirations of the Truman and Eisenhower presidencies as they contemplated alliances with the Republic of China, Republic of Korea, and Japan at the outset of the Cold War. Their choice of a bilateral "hub and spokes" security design for Asia was entirely different from the system created in Europe, but it was essential for its time. Cha argues that the alliance system’s innovations in the twenty-first century contribute to its resiliency in the face of China’s increasing prominence, and that the task for the world is not to choose between American and Chinese institutions, but to maximize stability and economic progress amid Asia’s increasingly complex political landscape. Exploring U.S. bilateral relations in Asia after World War II, Powerplay takes an original look at how global alliances are achieved and maintained.

As China and the U.S. increasingly compete for power in key areas of U.S. influence, great power conflict looms. Yet few studies have looked to the Middle East and Africa, regions of major political, economic, and military importance for both China and the U.S., to theorize how China competes in a changing world system. China's Rise in the Global South examines China's behavior as a rising power in two key Global South regions, the Middle East and sub-Saharan Africa. Dawn C. Murphy, drawing on extensive fieldwork and hundreds of interviews, compares and analyzes thirty years of China's interactions with these regions across a range of functional areas: political, economic, foreign aid, and military. From the Belt and Road initiative to the founding of new cooperation forums and special envoys, China's Rise in the Global South offers an in-depth look at China's foreign policy approach to the countries it considers its partners in South-South cooperation. Intervening in the emerging debate between liberals and realists about China's future as a great power, Murphy contends that China is constructing an alternate international order to interact with these regions, and this book provides policymakers and scholars of international relations with the tools to analyze it.

Developing countries have for decades been trying to catch up with the industrialized high-income countries, but only a few have succeeded. Historically, structural transformation has been a powerful engine of growth and job creation. Traditional development aid is inadequate to address the bottlenecks for structural transformation, and is hence ineffective. In this book, Justin Yifu Lin and Yan Wang use the theoretical foundations of New Structural Economics to examine South-South development aid and cooperation from the angle of structural transformation. By studying the successful economic transformation of countries such as China and South Korea through 'multiple win' solutions based on comparative advantages and economy of scale, and by presenting new ideas and different perspectives from emerging market economies such as Brazil, India and other BRICS countries, they bring a new narrative to broaden the ongoing discussions of post-2015 development aid and cooperation as well as the definitions of aid and cooperation.

A journey through Johannesburg via three art projects raises intriguing notions about the constitutive relationship between the city, imagination and the public sphere- through walking, gaming and performance art. Amid prevailing economic validations, the trilogy posits art within an urban commons in which imagination is all-important.

Since the early 1990s, Japan has played an increasingly important and influential role in Africa. A primary mechanism that has furthered its influence has been through its foreign aid policies. Japan’s primacy, however, has been challenged by changing global conditions related to aid to Africa, including the consolidation of the poverty reduction agenda and China’s growing presence in Africa. This book analyzes contemporary political and economic relations in foreign aid policy between Japan and Africa. Primary questions focus on Japan’s influence in the African continent, reasons for spending its limited resources to further African development, and the way Japan’s foreign aid is invested in Africa. The context of examining Japan’s foreign aid policies highlights the fluctuation between its commitments in contributing to international development and its more narrow-minded pursuit of its national interests. The contributors examine Japan’s foreign aid policy within the theme of a globalized economy in which Japan and Africa are inextricably connected. Japan and many African countries have come to realize that both sides can obtain benefits through closely coordinated aid policies. Moreover, Japan sees itself to represent a distinct voice in the international donor community while Africa needs foreign aid from all sources.