Comparative Education Bulletin - Faculty of Education - The ...

a total of 24 students came from Africa to China. As we have seen,
Egyptian students were the first among these, followed by students
from Cameroon, Kenya, Uganda and Malawi. Starting from a modest
five countries at the end of the 1950s, China’s educational cooperation
reached 43 African countries and 2,245 students by the end of the 1980s
(He, 2006).
A second phase of educational cooperation started in the 1990s.
More specifically, this second phase of cooperation was initially linked
to the events surrounding the Tiananmen Square killings in June
1989. China’s relative isolation in the face of intense criticism from the
West – coinciding with messages of approval from various African leaders
– led to the Chinese government’s realization that Africa was a useful
and manageable source of international support (Taylor, 2006). In
particular, many African leaders were threatened by the West’s postcold
war discourse on human rights and democracy. In this, they found
a degree of common ground with Beijing.
During the 1990s, the number of African students in China and
the number of Chinese teachers in Africa doubled. This boost was not
only due to increasing assistance to Africa from China: the number
of African students studying in China on their own means increased
from two in 1989 to 1580 in 1999 (He, 2006). During this period Chinese
and African countries also increasingly developed common research
programs.
The third phase of educational cooperation was triggered by the
first Forum on China-Africa Cooperation in October 2000. Similar
forums have been conducted every third year – in Africa and China
alternatively. Accordingly, a second forum was held in Addis Ababa in
December 2003. A third forum was convened in Beijing in November
2006, receiving unprecedented media attention. This third phase of
cooperation is marked by an acceleration of the cooperation between
China and Africa. During the recent forum, according to government
sources, China’s promises included the following:
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Double its 2006 assistance to Africa by 2009.
Provide US$3 billion in preferential loans and US$2 billion in
preferential buyer’s credit over the next three years.
Human resources and technology expertise transfer in
agriculture, as well as aid for medical, health and educational
areas; Chinese government scholarships to African students
to double from 2,000 a year to 4,000 annually in 2009. (Sunday
Morning Post/South China Morning Post, 5 th November, 2006).
Whereas most international observers welcome China’s accelerated
engagement with Africa, others have pointed out that there are also
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