Development Policy Space and Internationalization of China’s Contender State: The Case of Overseas Development Finance
Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: Constraints on policy autonomy structurally stem from uneven capitalist development and pre-date neoliberalism, but their degree of restrictiveness varies depending on the balance of power among major states and the nature of their dominant classes. The analysis of China’s overseas development finance (CODF) reveals how its contender state-society complex relaxes external constraints on industrial policy autonomy. CODF expands finance for underfunded sectors, allows performance requirements, prioritizes the public sector, relaxes macroeconomic policies, and institutes a long-term derisking approach. It creates space for Southern countries’ political agency and terrain to grow a counterhegemonic historical bloc to transcend US-led (neo)liberal order. Still, the realization of CODF’s potential is contingent on political configurations of beneficiary countries and on the emergence of popular national forces capable of addressing the legacies of neoliberalism. JEL Classification: F63, F02, F33, F54, O25, P33, P51
Author: Salam Alshareef
Institutions: Grenoble Ecole de Management, Université Grenoble Alpes
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W4415237207