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Do the Chinese Bring Chitukuko? Rural Malawian Understandings of Chinese Development
Author(s) -
McNamara Thomas
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
journal of international development
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.533
H-Index - 66
eISSN - 1099-1328
pISSN - 0954-1748
DOI - 10.1002/jid.3313
Subject(s) - westernization , underdevelopment , china , government (linguistics) , economic growth , political science , development economics , sociology , economics , law , linguistics , philosophy , modernization theory
The Government of China assists Malawi with infrastructure, grants and loans, and Chinese businesses provide cheap commodities to Malawians. Despite this, Tumbuka northern Malawians do not conceptualise the Chinese as doing development. Rather, they perceive the Government of China as exploiting their government and conceptualise Chinese goods as signifiers of Malawi's underdevelopment. This article argues that Tumbuka apprehensions about China reflect a prominent Malawian discourse, where ‘development’ is associated with westernisation and is gifted into a nation and community by wealthy outsiders. This finding goes someway to explaining Malawians' reactions to Chinese ‘developers’ and presents a challenge to western development norms. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.