event

Will Africa Shape U.S.-China Strategic Competition?

Tue. March 28th, 2023
Washington, D.C.

The African continent is increasingly the nexus of great power competition between the U.S. and China. While the U.S. provides the most official development assistance to Africa, China is the continent’s leading bilateral trade partner, with both nations competing for ever-deeper ties across the continent. As U.S.-China competition intensifies, how will African countries balance their relationships with these two global powers, and even shape the trajectory of this competition?

Join the Carnegie Endowment for a special conversation with leading experts on the changing relationship between African nations and the U.S. and China and whether Africa’s development priorities around industrialization, job creation, and universal electrification can remain salient in this rapidly changing geopolitical theatre.

Tea, coffee, and pastries will be served.

EconomyForeign PolicyNorth AfricaSouthern, Eastern, and Western AfricaEast AsiaChina
Carnegie does not take institutional positions on public policy issues; the views represented herein are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of Carnegie, its staff, or its trustees.
event speakers

Zainab Usman

Senior Fellow and Director, Africa Program

Zainab Usman is a senior fellow and inaugural director of the Africa Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, D.C. Her fields of expertise include institutions, economic policy, energy policy, and emerging economies in Africa.

Evan A. Feigenbaum

Vice President for Studies, Acting Director, Carnegie China

Evan A. Feigenbaum is vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, where he oversees its work in Washington, Beijing, New Delhi, and Singapore on a dynamic region encompassing both East Asia and South Asia. He served twice as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State and advised two Secretaries of State and a former Treasury Secretary on Asia.

Mzukisi Qobo

Mzukisi Qobo is head of the Wits School of Governance at the University of Witwatersrand. He has been serving on President Cyril Ramaphosa’s Economic Advisory Council since 2019. His book The Political Economy of US-China Relations and Implications for Africa was published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2022.

Michael J. Tierney

Michael J. Tierney is a professor of international relations and director of the Global Research Institute at William & Mary. He is a co-founder of AidData and co-authored Banking on Beijing: The Aims and Impacts of China's Overseas Development Program (Cambridge University Press 2022).

Tang Xiaoyang

Chair and Professor, Department of International Relations, Tsinghua University

Tang Xiaoyang is the chair and a professor in the Department of International Relations at Tsinghua University. He was a resident scholar and the deputy director at the Carnegie-Tsinghua Center until June 2020.