EastAsia

China has been expanding its global economic presence through foreign direct investment, foreign aid, and trade. China’s growing economic influence, however, is inviting worries and suspicion in many countries, leading to the rise of anti-China protests. How and when does China’s economic expansion promote anti-China protests? We explore this question by examining the effect of Chinese FDI on the rise of anti-China protests across 127 countries.

Anti-China protests have been creating challenges to China’s global ambition to further expand its political as well as economic influence globally. How does Beijing respond to anti-China protests? How do anti-China protests affect Beijing’s use of public diplomatic resources? We address this question by examining the effect of anti-China protests on China’s public diplomatic engagement across low- and middle-income countries with different levels of democracy.