Western imperialism has fundamentally shaped the developing world. In particular, Great Britain and the United States ‚Äď the dominant capitalist powers of the 19th and 20th centuries, respectively, have played a major role in this historical process. But why did they¬†pursue imperialism? And what effects did such¬†imperial practices have on the developing world? These are the key questions that Atul Kohli examines in his brilliant new¬†book,¬†Imperialism and the Developing World: How Britain and the U.S. Shaped the Global Periphery¬†(Oxford University Press, 2020). Kohli meticulously examines¬†both¬†the causes and consequences of modern imperialism. He finds that the impact of imperialism on the developing world has been primarily negative. Indeed, the key argument in the book is that there is an inverse relationship between imperialism and development, i.e., the less control a state has over its own affairs, the less likely it is that the people of the state will experience steady and inclusive economic progress.

Atul Kohli is the David K.E. Bruce Professor of International Affairs at Princeton University and one of the world’s leading experts in comparative political economy with a focus on developing countries.

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Several countries are vying for the African continent’s attention. While there has been considerable attention on China’s and India’s motives and interests, Russia, Germany, France, the UK, Turkey, Japan, South Korea and Middle Eastern countries are all trying to increase their footprint on the continent. 

An important first step for many of these countries is to organize a summit ‚Äď a major gathering of leaders and other high-level officials to discuss how African countries can further strengthen trade and diplomatic relations with this one country hosting the summit. The goal of these events is basically to promote the idea of achieving win-win outcomes for all involved parties.¬†

This growth in so-called Africa plus 1 summit diplomacy has generated renewed interest in better understanding the growing competition among major world powers on the continent. But in trying to explain this growing interest in strengthening relations with African countries, there is often a tendency to downplay the role and influence of African countries in setting the agenda of these high-profile events, and how African leaders articulate their needs and interests. 

My guest this week argues that we really need to better understand¬†the motives behind¬†the increased engagement in ‚ÄėAfrica¬†+¬†1‚Äô summitry by African politicians and bureaucrats.Indeed, rather than viewing these individuals as passive participants, we must recognize the numerous ways in which such summits and other high-level platforms that involve the continent, offer opportunities for African leaders to express and exert agency in both symbolic and substantial ways.

Dr Folashadé Soulé is a Senior Research Associate at the Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford. She studies agency in Africa’s international relations and the politics of South-South cooperation. She is also the initiator of the Africa-China negotiation workshop series, which brings together African negotiators and senior policymakers to exchange and build better negotiation practices when dealing with China. 

• '"Africa+1" summit diplomacy and the ‚Äėnew scramble‚Äô narrative: Recentering African agency', African Affairs, volume 119, Issue 477, October 2020, pp. 633‚Äď646
• 'How popular is China in Africa? New survey sheds light on what ordinary people think', The Conversation, November 2020
• 'Tips for African Negotiators Doing Deals with China: Rebalancing Asymmetries', Natural Resource Governance Initiative (NRGI) blog post, February 2020
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While a considerable amount of world attention is focused on China’s commanding presence on the African continent and the impact of Beijing’s ambitious Belt and Road Initiative, India’s activities in Africa have received limited attention. This is indeed surprising because India has an over 2000-year presence on the continent and India-Africa relations have witnessed a major upsurge in recent years.

In its relations with African countries, India frequently highlights the economic and philanthropic contributions of the Indian diaspora, Indo-African partnership in the post-colonial period, and solidarity with and support for the Non-Aligned Movement and the fight against racism. It also often highlights Mahatma Gandhi’s role in fighting oppression in South Africa and Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru’s active international lobbying efforts for African independence.

Following Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit in 2018, New Delhi signed numerous bilateral agreements and outlined ten guiding principles for a renewed engagement with African countries. New Delhi has also, in recent years, stepped up its diplomatic presence and outreach in Africa by announcing new missions and is prioritizing the training of its foreign services personnel in French and Portuguese. 

India’s diverse and deep historical footprint in Africa has been somewhat different to that of other powers and only in recent decades has the country moved from idealism to pragmatism and the explicit pursuit of commercial interests.

Renu Modi is a Professor at the University of Mumbai and Director of the University’s Centre for African Studies. 

• Research project: India's Footprint in Africa: South-South Cooperation and the Politics of Gifts and Reciprocity (INDAF)
• COVID-19 Crisis in Africa: Impacts and Responses¬†
• Interview: Professor Renu Modi on India-Africa partnerships | India UK Development Partnership Forum¬†
• India-Africa: Mapping Trade and Bilateral Partnerships¬†
• India-Senegal: People to People Connections through the Ages
• A look at how India's Africa strategy is working
• South-South Cooperation between India and Africa: Advancing the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development
• Pan African e-network: A Model of South-South Cooperation
• Time to Overhaul African Healthcare
• Accessing Healthcare Beyond State Borders

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One of the dominant explanations for elusive development in many parts of the world is the negative role played by corruption in the development process. And many national and local governments as well as international aid agencies have spent considerable time and resources trying to come up with plans to combat the corruption menace. But anti-corruption policy has often been difficult to implement and many well-intentioned efforts have had limited impact. 

Despite the challenges associated with researching the phenomenon, corruption has attracted considerable academic interest over the years. And one of the leading thinkers on anti-corruption, governance and economic development is my guest this week. Mushtaq Khan is a professor of economics at SOAS, University of London where he directs the Anti-Corruption Research Consortium (ACE).

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Since its inception in the international development discourse in the late 1980s, sustainable development has often been celebrated for its rhetorical appeal to political correctness. But is it a useful tool for global development?

The idea of ‚Äúsustainable development‚ÄĚ has¬†not only acquired new layers of meaning¬†over the years but has in many ways¬†witnessed a¬†rejuvenation since 2015 following the adoption¬†by world leaders¬†of the¬†2030 Agenda¬†and its accompanying 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

The SDGs ‚Äď grouped under overarching themes of people, planet, dignity, prosperity, justice and partnership ‚Äď have been widely praised for a strong articulation of an environmental dimension, in addition to breaking new ground with global goals on inequality, economic growth, energy, and peace.¬†

Despite being imperfect and highly ambitious, the SDGs are the result of a comprehensive participatory process, unparalleled in the history of global development. Indeed, while its predecessor ‚Äď the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) ‚Äď focused exclusively on low-income countries, the SDGs encompass a much broader agenda that applies to all countries.¬†

By closely linking ‚Äúsustainability‚ÄĚ with ‚Äúdevelopment‚ÄĚ through the principles of ‚Äúuniversality‚ÄĚ, ‚Äúintegration‚ÄĚ and ‚Äúleave no one behind‚ÄĚ, the 2030 Agenda has been much celebrated in activist, business and policy circles as a means to stimulate a radical shift in world affairs. But the SDGs have also been criticized for their unrealistic ambitions and lack of focus.¬†

The world was already off-track in achieving many of the SDGs before Covid struck. And now there are major concerns over the extent to which these ambitious global goals can be achieved in the next 9 years. 

Frank Biermann is a professor¬†of Global Sustainability Governance at¬†Utrecht University‚Äôs Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development. Frank is a¬†leading scholar of global institutions and organizations in the sustainability domain.¬†In addition to being a prolific writer, he¬†pioneered the ‚Äėearth system‚Äô governance paradigm in 2005 and was the founder and first chair (2008-2018) of the¬†Earth System Governance Project, a leading global transdisciplinary research network of sustainability scholars.

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International public finance, that is required to address global challenges in the decades to come, is woefully inadequate. And rather than aid, which offers an obsolete approach, we should be talking about joint investments ‚Äď or as my guest this week puts it, Global Public Investment (GPI).

In his recent book, The Future of Aid: Global Public Investment, Jonathan Glennie urges us to move away from the patronizing and outdated aid narrative. 

For starters, he points to the ambitious SDGs and the need for more money to achieve these goals in the years ahead. Domestic resources, he argues, is insufficient to address the challenges the world currently faces and will face in the years ahead. What we must do, he argues, is to turn around the donor-recipient relationship and encourage even the poorest countries to contribute 0.7 % of their GNI to international development. This would in turn require a transformational governance structure where everyone sits around the table ‚Äď a structure that mitigates the fact that some countries have more money and contribute more than others.

Jonathan Glennie is a writer and campaigner on human rights, international cooperation, sustainable development and poverty. 

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I was recently made aware of the fact that 10 wealthy countries have monopolized 75% of all vaccinations delivered worldwide. This has led the United Nations to sharply criticize the world’s wealthy countries for hogging Covid vaccines. In light of growing vaccine nationalism, many voices have for long been calling for global sharing of vaccines. But it turns out 130 countries have not received a single dose of a Covid vaccine. Thus, we are at a critical moment when vaccine equity appears to be the biggest moral test before the global community.

Indeed, numerous recent opinion pieces in the media have highlighted how vaccine nationalism ‚Äď driven by power and competition between states aimed at protecting the national interest ‚Äď has several negative consequences for low-income countries. A few days ago,¬†Kenya petitioned the UN Security Council to urge wealthy countries not to hoard surplus Covid-19 vaccine supplies, adding its voice to calls for global production to be shared more equally.

Without equal access to vaccines, public-health experts have warned that the pandemic could continue to live on residually for years on end, resulting in more deaths and further economic collapse. When the virus remains endemic somewhere, it will continue to pose a threat everywhere.

But there are also some promising initiatives currently underway. One of these is the COVAX Initiative ‚Äď the drive to ensure that vaccines reach low-income countries ‚Ästwhich the World Health Organization and countries like Norway have been promoting as the fastest way to end the pandemic. But how effective has it been thus far? And are countries being generous in allocating resources to this Initiative?

To discuss vaccine nationalism, the merits of the COVAX Initiative and vaccine diplomacy being carried out by China and India, I am joined by Antoine de Bengy Puyvallée, who is working on a PhD in political science and is based at the Centre for Development and the Environment at the University of Oslo. Over the years, he has worked extensively on global health governance and global cooperation to manage dangerous disease outbreaks such as Ebola. He has been particularly active in the media of late in pointing out the dangers of vaccine nationalism.

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Within international relations theory and foreign policy circles, there is considerable interest in understanding China’s rise to power. In an exciting new book, my guest argues that China’s various types of encounters with countries in the Global South are very different from the behaviour and investment strategies of the US and European countries. 

In Shaping the future of power: Knowledge Production and network-building in China-Africa Relations, Lina Benabdallah explores the integrated roles of social relations, knowledge production and power in China’s foreign relations. 

She argues that it is simply not enough to look at the amount of loans, aid and foreign direct investments originating from China. While these material factors are important, we mustn’t ignore the investments made in people-to-people relations and human resource development in China-Africa relations. Indeed, relations and relationality are central to China’s foreign policy and diplomatic conduct. 

In the book, Lina examines how China deploys social capital and relational productive power on the African continent through knowledge production via human resource development and professionalization programs. Chinese investments in human resource development, she argues, expand Beijing’s network of connections with military officers, civil servants, journalists and regular citizens. They also act as spaces for expert knowledge production, and norm diffusion.

Lina Benabdallah is an assistant professor of politics and international affairs at Wake Forest University in the United States. We discussed how China brands its model of development in Africa, the broad categories of knowledge production and network building activities, and whether African countries have much say in how these relations are conducted.

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As Covid vaccines become available, health officials, policymakers, philanthropic organizations and people like you and me are being confronted with numerous ethical challenges and moral dilemmas. Who should get the vaccines first and how long should others wait? What about the inequality of access to vaccines between countries?

Some of us may agree that rich countries have a moral responsibility to subsidize vaccination programs around the world. But how best can this be achieved? And what types of principles such as fairness, equity, effectiveness and reciprocity should we apply?

To discuss these issues, I am joined by Aksel Braanen Sterri, a Norwegian political scientist and philosopher who has recently argued that Norway should donate all its vaccines to low-income countries, and that Norway should be at the back of the vaccine queue rather than being in front. He also claims that helping these more needy countries ought to be viewed as an investment in our common future rather than an act of charity. 

Aksel recently completed a PhD in philosophy and teaches applied ethics at the University of Oslo. In addition to being a postdoctoral fellow, he writes a column in an influential Norwegian daily and is a regular contributor to the Norwegian public debate on a wide range of social and political issues.

We discussed the role of philosophers in addressing current global challenges, the various proposals currently doing the rounds on how best the world can distribute Covid vaccines, why Norway and other rich countries ought to subsidise or donate vaccines to more needy countries and groups and what constitutes vaccine justice.

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One of the many ways in which India has expanded its influence in global affairs relates to pharmaceutical products. The Indian pharmaceutical sector has enthusiastically highlighted its ability to develop Triple A technology (affordable, available, adaptable). By encouraging research hubs and offering a steady supply of affordable drugs to many countries, including the United States,¬†India has rapidly moved from being a pharmacy for low-income countries to becoming the ‚Äúpharmacy of the world‚ÄĚ.¬†

The country’s rapidly growing economy has been a major beneficiary of the astonishing rise of the domestic pharmaceutical industry. In becoming a powerhouse on low-cost generic drugs, India contributes actively to meeting global demands for vaccines, Over the Counter (OTC) medicines and patented drugs.

An important factor that has contributed to enhancing the reputation and profitability of Indian pharmaceutical companies abroad has been the government’s tough policy on patents, which has enabled Indian firms to manufacture generic versions of drugs that are much more expensive in countries where they were originally developed. 

But Indian companies also face numerous challenges in the export market. There is a growing demand to reduce costs even further. And several countries in¬†Latin America, Sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia are trying to protect and promote their domestic industries by introducing new regulations that make Indian imports more expensive. There are also concerns that India has become increasingly dependent on imports from China for so-called ‚Äúactive pharmaceutical ingredients‚ÄĚ required for making both advanced and essential medicines.

To discuss India’s huge and thriving pharmaceutical industry and the country’s ability to supply affordable vaccines and generic drugs to low-income countries, I am joined by Rory Horner. He is a Senior Lecturer in Globalisation and Political Economy in the Global Development Institute at the University of Manchester. We began by discussing the role and impact of the pharmaceutical industry in global development. 

• Resources:
  • "The world needs pharmaceuticals from China and India to beat¬†coronavirus" (The Conversation, 2020)
  • "India is key for global access to a COVID-19 vaccine ‚Äď here‚Äôs¬†why" (The Conversation, 2020)
  • "The segmented globalisation practices within India‚Äôs pharmaceutical industry" (blog, 2017)
  • "Pharmaceuticals and the Global South: a healthy challenge for development theory?" (blog, 2016)
  • "Indian Company Offers to Supply AIDS Drugs at Low Cost in Africa" (New York Times, 2001)
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